A SERMON Preached in the Parish-Church of St. Swithin London March 10th 1694 5. Upon the Much Lamented Death Of our Most Gracious Queen By THO. BOWBER M. A. Formerly of Wadham Colledge Oxon. LONDON Printed for William Rogers at the Sun over against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleetstreet 1695. To the Right Honourable Sir Iohn Summers Kt. Lord Keeper of the Great SEAL of ENGLAND and one of His Majesties most Honourable Privy Council My Lord IT needs not create Wonder in any to find your Lordships great Name in the Front of this Sermon who will but consider the Faithful Service you did and the great veneration you had for that Excellent Princess of whom in Mournful Accents it speaks The Performance how mean soever is the natural product of just Grief and Sorrow for the Common Loss of us all and therefore needs not fear a favourable acceptance from your Honour But my Lord there is another Reason that entitles this Dedication to your Lordship I must always gratefully remember a singular instance of your Favour and Kindness to me and I thought I could not better express my Gratitude than by making a publick Acknowledgment thereof The Discourse I here present your Lordship with has nothing to recommmend it but Truth and Plainness Astonishing Grief such as ours slights and disdains the mean and useless Ornaments of empty Rhetorick My chief Aim and Design in Preaching it was to make Men better to which Pious end they having so great an Example set before them for their imitation I hope it may conduce now in Submission to the importunities of several some of which for their Piety and Friendship had great influence over me it appears in publick That God Almighty may long continue your Lordship the Delight of this Kingdom for the Impartial distribution of Justice and the Reformation of the Abuses and Corruptions of the late Times is the most sincere and hearty prayer of My Lord Your Lordships most Humble Devoted and Obliged Servant THO. BOWBER 2 Chron. XXXV 24. The latter part of the Verse And all Judah and Jerusalem Mourned for Josiah MAN tho formed in respect of his Body of Corruptible Principles yet these did the Almighty so equally Poise so harmoniously Attemper that the Divine Workmanship had it not dasht itself in pieces might have been for ever free from Corruption For in so blissful a Condition God Created Man with such light of Understanding holiness of Will Affections so Regular and with such Strength and Ability to have withstood the Temptations of the Serpent that he might not only have seated himself in Immortality but have conveyed it down to his Posterity But aspiring to a more high and exalted degree of Happiness than the all-wise God had thought fit to place him in he fell from his Original Excellency and Forfeited his Incorruptibility That Decree Gen. 2. v. 17. In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely dye took then immediately Life and Vigour and an universal Mortality came into the World every one became obnoxious to Death and all past Generations are but Monuments of its Reign and Triumph The Young Dye with the Old the Rich with the Poor the Wise with the Foolish Good Josiah as well as Wicked Ahab Could Goodness or Greatness Youth or Beauty or any other Human Excellency have been any security against Death our most Incomparable Princess had still Sate upon that Throne which She sola tely Adorn'd with Her Royal Presence but to our unspeakable Grief and the Astonishment of all round about us She was quickly snatcht away by Death and no doubt in Mercy as good Josiah was that her Eyes might not see the Evil which we know not how soon may befall us without a speedy Reformation Her Prayers doubtless as well as Josiah's had a mighty Energy in them to turn away the fierce Anger of God and to encline Him to Mercy Yet whatever Benefit we we might reap from them in Her Life-time we were soon Deprived of Her and that in a time when we thought Happiness at Hand and our selves Embracing it A Lovely Scene of Affairs had but just presented itself with a very Charming Aspect a Check was given to our Enemies abroad the King to the great Rejoycing of His Royal Consort and People returned home in Safety and a Loyal Parliament Assembled ready and prepared to Execute whatever might truly tend to the Honour of the Nation and the Interest of Church and State so that the Hearts of all good Men did exceedingly Rejoyce and they already anticipated that Happiness which they expected without interruption to Enjoy This was the goodly posture of Affairs when we were all surprised by an unexpected turn of Providence And this was the State of Judah when Josiah was gathered to his Fathers the Jews then promised themselves some long Prosperity when on a sudden a fatal Arrow from the Egyptian Host cut off their King and Hopes together It was indeed said of him That he should be gathered to his Grave in peace for he had no open Enemies none that made War against him yet not harkning to the words of Pharaoh Neco who went up to War against the King of Assyria by the River Euphrates not harkning I say to his Words from the Mouth of God would needs Fight him in the Valley of Megiddo where receiving a sore Wound he was carried in a Chariot to Jerusalem where he dyed and was buried in one of the Sepulchres of his Fathers and what great Impression his Death made upon all the People is here Expressed And all Judah and Jerusalem Mourned for Josiah Which words teaching us that it hath been the Practise of the Church mournfully to Resent the Death of Religious Princes the Method I shall confine my self to in the Prosecution of them will be 1st Of all to offer some Reasons in General to show That the Death of good Princes is matter of great Mourning and Lamentation to a People or Kingdom 2dly I shall Enquire more particularly into the great Cause the Jews had to Mourn for the Death of good Josiah 3dly Upon the sad Occasion of the Death of our late most Excellent Princess I shall set before you the great reason we all have to Mourn for so Great and Irreparable a Loss 4thly and Lastly I shall apply what hath been spoken in Two or Three Natural Inferences 1st The Death of Religious Princes is matter of great Mourning and Lamentation and surely were it not so there had never been such Lamentations for their Death Recorded in the Sacred Scriptures When Moses the Servant of the Lord Dyed the Children of Israel are said to weep for him in the Plains of Moab thirty days Deut. 34. v. 8. When Samuel Dyed all the Israelites were gathered together and Lamented him 1 Sam. 25. v. 1. When Hezekiah slept with his Fathers all Judah and the Inhabitants of Jerusalem did him Honour at his Death 2 Chron. 32. v. 33. And this Mourning for
Josiah in the Text was a very great Mourning 't is said to be as the Mourning of Hadradrimmon in the Valley of Megiddon Zech. 12. v. 11. Eus Ecc. Hist de vita Constantini lib. 4. cap. 65.67 And when Constantine the Great Dyed how greatly did the Tribunes Centurions the whole Order of Judges and Magistrates Lament his Death all places were filled with doleful Shrieks and Lamentations that the common Good of them all was taken from them These Instances plainly prove That to make doleful Resentments upon occasion of the Death of good Princes was the practice of the Church of God and a Practice 't is as Old and Ancient as the Church it self for 't is founded upon the Law of Nature How pleasing and agreeable to Nature is it to Weep and Grieve for the Death of our Natural Parents especially if they be Good Much more then surely if we have any true Zeal for Religion any regard for the Publick Good ought we to express our Grief when the Fathers of our Country are by Death taken from us For 1st A Religious Prince is a great Blessing to a Nation a promised Mercy Isaiah 49. v. 23. 'T is said Kings shall be thy nursing Fathers and their Queens thy nursing Mothers A Godly Prince is an unspeakable Blessing such a ray of Divine Love and Favour to a Nation as bespeaks a very peculiar and distinguishing Providence presiding over it Because the Lord loved Israel for ever therefore made he thee King speaking to Solomon to do judgment and justice 1 King 10. v. 9. or to establish them for ever as 't is rendred 2 Chron. 9. v. 8. When Princes are endued with Wisdom Piety and the Fear of God 't is at once the greatest Lustre and Glory to themselves and the greatest Mercy and Blessing which a People can enjoy Blessed be thou O Land when thy King is the son of Nobles and thy Princes eat in due season for strength and not for drunkenness On the other hand An Irreligious Prince is a sure Token of Gods heavy Displeasure against a People and of sore Judgments and Desolations to be poured out upon them Wo unto thee O Land when thy King is a Child and thy Princes eat in the morning Eccl. 10. v. 16. when thy King is a Child that is in Understanding such was Rehoboam in the midst and strength of his Age a Child of one and forty Years old 2dly Princes have a very great Influence upon their People either to diffuse and spread the true Religion or Idolatry and Prophaneness throughout their Territories Thousands nay almost whole Nations and Kingdoms imitating and following their Examples for what Entertainment Religion meets with at Court the like for the most part it finds throughout the Kingdom A Religious King therefore is a mighty Instrument both to establish the true Religion and to engage his Subjects in the ways thereof by setting over them faithful Pastors Men of Learning Integrity and Piety such as shall feed them with the spiritual Food of sound Knowledge and win them by the Prevalency of their own good Examples Jehosophat a Religious Prince sent Princes and with them Levites and Priests to Teach in all the Cities of Judah and Asa his Father a good King commanded Judah to seek the Lord God of their Fathers and to do the Law and the Commandments and what great Influence it had on the People you may find in the 2 Chron. 15.12 13. verses Thus Josiah made all that were present in Israel to serve even to serve the Lord their God and all his days they departed not from following the Lord the God of their Fathers but in his Sons days who did Evil in the sight of the Lord they returned to Idolatry for all the chief of the Priests and the People transgressed very much after all the abomination of the Heathen and Polluted the house of the Lord which he had hallowed in Jerusalem In * Vide Euseb Zozom Theodor. Ecc. Hist et Magdeburg Ecc. Hist the Reign of Constantine the Great the first Christian Emperour what Numbers what Multitudes of Proselytes were daily added to the Church And what effectual Care was there taken to suppress Heresies and to reconcile differences in Opinion but yet in the time of the Arian Emperours the wonderful growth of Arianism gave occasion to that Complaint of St. Hierom that almost the whole World Mourned to see itself become Arian Thus in Julian the Apostates Reign they returned to Idolatry and did with the utmost Zeal espouse it Contending as eargerly for Error as Truth itself 3ly Religious Princes are the Defence of a People they are as the Walls of a Nation as the Chariots and Horse-men thereof The Psalmist Ps 47. v. 9 calls them the Shields of the Earth for by their Prayers they engage the Irresistible Strength of Heaven to be on their Side Whilst the Governours and Princes of Israel and Judah were Religious and kept close to the Service of God they were Victorious and Triumphant as in the Days of Joshua and the Elders who out-liv'd him and as in David's Asa's Jehosaphat's and Hezekiah's Reigns But when they forsook the Lord their God his Word and Ordinances they soon fell as a Prey into the greedy Jaws of the Assyrian Monarchs by whom they were carried away Captive At least good Princes stave and keep off the Execution of Judgments upon a Nation when they cannot by all their Prayers and Tears turn them away Hezekiah when such black Clouds of Wrath did hang over Judah and Jerusalem that Micah Prophesied chap. 3. v. 12. That Zion should be Plowed as a Field and Jerusalem should become heaps and the Mountain of the house as the high places of the Forest did yet so far prevail that Peace and Truth Flourished in his Days And in Josiah's Reign when that Nation was in such deep Arrears to the Almighty that the Execution of all the Threats and Judgments Denounced against them was ready to take place yet by Prayer and Humiliation did this good King so far mitigate the Divine Wrath that it did not lay hold on them during his Life When good Princes are taken away from a People 't is like the breaking down the Bounds of the Sea a passage is thereby laid open for the Divine Wrath to break in upon and overwhelm them Well therefore may the Death of good Princes be thought matter of great Mourning and Lamentation to a Kingdom or People I proceed 2dly To enquire more particularly into the great cause of the Jews Universal Mourning for the Death of Josiah to which Enquiry we shall receive abundant satisfaction if we do but Contemplate the greatness of the Loss they sustained by his Death which I shall endeavour to set forth by describing First His Great and Extraordinary Piety Secondly His Zeal against Idolatry Thirdly His Publick Spirit Fourthly The time of his Death First He was a Prince of most Illustrious Piety one of the brightest
they might be blessed and happy for ever Let the Officers of the Army mourn for she Cloathed them in Scarlet and put on Ornaments of Gold upon their Apparel Lastly Let all the Inhabitants of the Land Mourn For the Beauty of Israel the Glory of our Nation is now clad and wrapt up in Mourning And now having filled our Hearts with a deep sense of Grief for the Death of our Pious Princess what we are chiefly and more especially to Bewail is our Sins which are the true cause of all the mischief done us and will if not timely and sincerely repented of do us more Let us then lay our Hands upon our Breasts and weep bitterly that the Floods of Impiety are risen to such an height that they break through all Banks all Bounds all Laws as if they had got the Ascendency of the Word and were out of the reach and above the check of an Almighty Power Jeremiah complaining of the many and heinous Sins of Judah tells us that Prophaneness was gone forth into all the Land and that Men were grown Impudent in Sinning Were they ashamed when they had committed abominations nay they were not ashamed neither could they blush Jer. 8. v. 12. And can we when we reflect upon the common Practices of this dissolute Age and how greatly Iniquity abounds among us think our selves deserving a better Character It is manifest that there is an excess of Corruption and Degeneracy among us that neither the most endearing Mercies nor the most terrible Judgments can reclaim us that Religion notwithstanding the great helps and advantages it meets with than which perhaps no Age had ever greater is in a very low and languishing Condition hardly able to come up to the Character of the Church of Laodicea being fallen from luke-warmness to somewhat farther distant from the Temper which God requires So that without endeavouring to aggravate that which already exceeds all Number and Measure we may safely sit down with this perswasion that we as well as the Jews have done enough to make God angry with us and least we should continue to provoke his Anger against us let us not only Mourn for our own Sins and the Sins of the Land by fits and starts but let us instantly manifest the truth reality and sincerity of our Sorrow by an outward entire Reformation of Life and an inward change of Mind this will prove the most effectual Method to turn away the fierceness of God's Anger that we Perish not Thirdly and Lastly Are Religious Princes a mighty Blessing to a Nation This then should teach us to set a very great and due value upon our present Sovereign and to fix all that Love and Affection that was divided between the Royal Pair upon him alone it was for our Sins as well as the Tryal of his Christian Valour that Heaven so unexpectedly smote him in the most tender part to allay and sweeten therefore so severe an affliction Let us esteem the early acknowledgments of Duty and Loyalty among the least of those many and innumerable Services we stand indebted to him let us prize him as God's Vice-gerent as the anointed of the Lord as the Breath of our Nostrils Let us offer our most humble and devout Prayers to God for him beseeching him to Crown His Arms with success both by Sea and Land that he may be a terror to his and our Enemies to cover him with his Providence as with an impenetrable Shield to preserve his Sacred Person from all the Plots and Attempts of his Enemies both at home and abroad and after a long and happy Reign here on Earth to change a Fading into an Incorruptible Crown of Glory to be worn in the highest Heavens Now to God the Father God the Son God the Holy Ghost three Persons but one Eternal God he ascribed all Glory and Honour Dominion and Majesty both now and for ever FINIS