to serve even to serve the Lord. But alas we have cause to lament it that few other Cities do follow your Pious Example and a very small part of the Country is yet reformed Our Plantations abroad are still a Reproach to our Nation and Religion by their insolent Wickedness and uncontrouled Impieties And nothing is yet done to reclaim the Natives of this Kingdom from their Abominations and it may be that for this Sin they have been so often the Rod of God's Anger to correct us and if we still neglect their Souls they may become the Sword of his Vengeance to destroy us 2. We come as far short of their Reformation with respect to the Sins that were supprest for all the Abominations that were spied in the Land of Judah and Jerusalem and that were in all the Countries of the Children of Israel did they put away and restored their Religious Worship to its greatest Purity according to all the Law of Moses So that their Reformation seemed to be perfect in this Respect but ours is very defective for it hath not yet been extended so far And many great Sins which our Penal Laws do not reach are still committed with Impunity and those that are punishable do often escape Some Persons pretend to a Prerogative above the Laws of God and Man to prophane the Sabbath How much precious time is sinfully mispent in Ale-houses and Taverns thro' the Week and some are not ashamed to be found in them on the Lord's Day if they are not catch'd there in the short time of Divine Service Nay what Cursing and Swearing Perjury and Blasphemy Oppression and Injustice Lewdness and Prophaneness c. are still abounding among us And many are impudent to serve the Devil by such Wickedness when few are Zealous for God to give Information and put the Laws in Execution against them And if they did not escape that were so much more reformed Jer 5.29 what shall become of such a sinful Nation as this The 7th and last Cause of our Fear that I will mention is from the many other Sins which abound among us that cannot easily be restrained by Humane Laws nor fall under such a Reformation As many Back-slidings and Declensions in the Ways of God great Formality and Hypocrisie in his Worship Murmuring Complaints 1 Cer. 10.10 and Discontent at the Providence of God Divisions and Contentions among Professors The Sins of Sodom as Pride Ezek. 16.49 fulness of Bread and abundance of Idleness Love of the World and Covetousness which is Idolatry c. For these and such like Sins may the Wrath of God be poured out upon a People and so much of them is found among us that may justly increase our Fears that notwithstanding all our Reformation the Lord may not turn from the fierceness of his Wrath wherewith his Anger is kindled against us c. But some may possibly think Objection that these things are unseasonable upon this Occasion and Object that they expected only Encouragements to this Work and behold I have discouraged them altogether for to what purpose shall they be active in it if notwithstanding all they do we are still in danger and how can they be diligent that are possessed with these Fears Answer 1. Ans 1. If there be such real grounds of Fear it 's neither safe nor prudent to conceal and be iguorant of them for the Judgments we fear will neither come sooner nor be greater because they are foreseen and discerned at a distance Every wise Person will desire to know his Danger Prov. 23.3 For the Prudent Man foreseeth the Evil and hideth himself but the Simple pass on and are punished 2. Ans 2. True Zeal will not be discouraged but rather animated by apprehensions of Danger as true Valour never appears so much as in the most hazardous Attempts It 's a pusillanimous Spirit that shrinks at the appearance of Danger and sinks under its own Fears Nay such Fears will rather excite the most active Endeavours and should make the Slothful diligent and the Coward couragious Persons in a Storm need no other Motive to excite them to the use of all means for their Safety than a Sense of their Perilous Condition their Danger is sufficient to provoke their Diligence and we never labour so hard and successfully as when we work with Fear and Trembling Phillip 2.12 So that these are proper Motives to excite your Zeal and quicken your Diligence in this Work 3. Ans 3. 'T is not a Prospect of the Event but a Sense of Duty that doth chiefly determine Upright Persons in their vertuous Attempts for whatever be the Issue of them 't is their desire to be found Faithful in the way of Duty And as it hath been sufficiently proved to be your great Duty so it may be a tryal of your Sincerity if in the face and over the fears of all Dangers you are constant and vigorous in the Work of Reformation 4. Ans 4. If you are Sincere and Zealous in this Work you shall not lose your Reward which doth not depend upon your Success but your faithful Diligence in it And supposing the worst that your Fears can suggest concerning the Issue of it the Lord will accept your Labours and make you Honourable you may deliver your own Souls have great peace Isa 49.4 5. and hopes of Everlasting Glory Your Work is with your God and you shall be Glorious in his Eyes 5. Ans 5. Tho' there be such causes of Fear to make you serious yet there are also grounds of Hope to encourage and make you cheerful in this Work 'T is a very critical Season in which God keeps us upon our good Behaviour that you may be cautious and careful to approve your selves to him in what you do we have trespassed against the Lord and therefore should be afraid of his Judgments Ezra 10.2 3 4. Yet now there is hope in Israel concerning this thing Now therefore let us make a Covenant with our God and put away all our Iniquities and let it be done according to the Law Arise for this matter belongeth unto you be of good Courage and do it For Secondly 2 Applicat In the next place I will show you what are the grounds of our Hope concerning the issue of this Reformation and your generous Labours in it And 1. You may lengthen out your Tranquility procure a long Reprieve and delay the Execution of threatned Judgments for a great while You know not how far you may prevail with a patient God who hath often and long spared a sinful Nation but never poured out his Wrath upon a reforming People We may hope to escape whilst such Zealous Reformers survive 2 Chr. 34.28 and as it was promised to Josiah You may be gathered to the Grave in Peace that your Eyes may not see all the Evil that he will bring upon this Place and upon the
should behave your selves that if it be possible we may escape the Calamities that our National Sins have deserved I shall begin with the first of these by comparing our Condition with that of Judah and if we shall find upon inquiry that ours is like to theirs nay if ours appears to be much worse what reason then shall we have to fear that we are still in danger of the Miseries we deserve And 1. The chief and fundamental cause of our Fear is the great Provocations we have been guilty of which are too too like the Sins of Judah if they do not exceed and deserve severer Judgments than were inflicted upon them And tho' I might run the Parallel much farther backward yet I shall confine my self at present to that which is expresly mentioned 2 Kings 23.6 as the reason why the Lord turned not from the fierceness of his great Wrath wherewith his Anger was kindled against Judah viz. The Provocations that Manasseh had provoked him withal i. e. The gross Iniquities that were committed in his Reign countenanced and influenced by his Command and Example and continued through the much shorter but as wicked Reign of Amon his Successor And hath not the profligate Wickedness and Impiety the horrible Profaneness and Lewdness of the two late Reigns been equal to theirs I have not time to mention either of them nor to compare them both together You may do it your selves if you 'll read 2 Kings 21 ch and 2 Chron. 33 ch And consider what hath been acted of late in these Kingdoms for which God may as severely punish us as he did Judah for their Sins The 2d cause of our Fear is from the Dispensations of Gods Patience who hath long spared us and his Patience been as oft abused by us So that this may be the last Tryal he will take of us and if we still provoke him to anger he may resolve to pass by us no more For this was the case of Judah as it 's represented by the Prophesie of Am. 7.1.8 That he first threatned to send the Grass-hoppers to devour them but at the Intercession of the Prophet the Lord repented and removed them And again he called to contend by Fire but this also shall not be saith the Lord. And last of all he appears with a Plumb-Line to take a stricter Account of them and declares that he will not pass by them any more And hath not the Lord been dealing so with us when he delivered us from the Spanish Armado that appeared as Sea-monsters ready to devour us but proved like Grass-hoppers easily dispersed And from the Gun-Powder Plot that threatned to contend by Fire but this also shall not be saith the Lord. And hath not he repeated these Warnings by the Pestilence and Fire that made a very great Destruction but not a full end of us Nay hath he not trippled them by the horrid Irish Rebellion in 41 and the Civil Wars that threatned our Dissolution And also by our late Dangers that were like to have been more Fatal to us if a Patient God had not seasonably interposed to deliver and restore us to this happy State in which we have another opportunity to reform and repent that we may escape the last Effects of his Destructive Vengeance And if we don't improve it aright we have cause to fear what may be the dreadful Issue of such a Fatal Neglect A 3d Cause of our Fear is That very few are sincere and hearty in the Work of Reformation begun among us Alas this is too evident to be doubted for tho' some Zealous Inhabitants of our Jerusalem are active to promote it yet they are but a small number and how many are very backward and unwilling to be engaged in it nay what vast Multitudes do still resist and at best are only Passive and must be forced to comply with it but do still love their Sins which they are compell'd to leave and are ready to return to them again if Restraints were removed Your Experience doth sadly prove this so that I need not say any more of it to convince such as you are of this reason of our fear The 4th Cause of our Fear is The want of National Repentance and publick Acknowledgements of the great iniquities that have abounded in these Kingdoms We have had some days of Humiliation upon other Occasions but there hath not yet been so much as a general Confession of the grievous Sins of the Two last Reigns Whether we have been too tender of their Reputation or our own it 's certain we have not exposed them openly and humbled our selves for them with grief and shame before the Lord which is necessary to vindicate the Glory of God and deliver us from a National Destruction For tho' a patient God may spare the worst of particular Sinners in this Life because he will repay them fully in that to come yet Nations will not appear as such to be judged and punished in the next World and therefore cannot escape the direful Effects of Divine Vengeance in this without a publick Repentance for National Sins A 5th Cause that increases our Fear as it aggravates our Guilt and Danger is what Judah is accused for Jer. 3.6 8 10. That when She had seen all that God had done to Back-sliding Israel yet her treacherous Sister Judah feared not and turned to the Lord but feignedly and not with the whole Heart And have we not as doleful Instances of the sad Desolations of other Protestant Churches whom the Lord hath made to drink very deep of the Cup of his Indignation and may he not cause us to drink of the Dregs of it A Jealous God is on his way and begun to punish others and shall we escape What reason have we to fear the last and most terrible Effects of his Wrath if we do not fear and turn to the Lord with our whole Heart The 6th Cause of our Fear is That we come so far short of the Reformation in Josiah 's days And if he executed the fierceness of his Wrath upon them notwithstanding all their successful Attempts to reform the Nation what shall become of us who have not extended the Reformation so far as they did either as to the Places and Persons that were reformed or the Sins that were suppressed 1. As to the Places and Persons that were reformed The Reformation in Josiah's Reign was not confined to the City of Jerusalem and those of Benjamin that were present in it but extended to all the Cities of Judah and Benjamin Nay their Zeal carried it to all the Countrys that pertained to the Children of Israel to Bethel and the Cities of Samaria that were not directly subject to the Kings of Judah But it may be that after the Ten Tribes were carried Captives some of Judah Transplanted themselves and made Colonies there which gave an advantage to the Zealous King of Judah to suppress their Idolatries and cause them also
Inhabitants of it And as Hezekiah said in such a case 2 Kings 20.19 Good is the Word of the Lord and is it not good if Peace and Truth be in my days So it 's good and worth all your Labours if you prolong Peace and Truth as long as you live and they may be continued much longer And in the mean time how much good may be done how many may be converted and Eternally saved Some may be prepared for their share of those Tryals and become useful to support and comfort others and preserve a sense of Religion under them all Nay your faithful Diligence may have a further influence to abate the violence and shorten the continuance of those miseries and procure an happy Issue out of them and restore a more prosperous State after they are past Such have been the blessed Effects of the like Attempts and may be so again for the God you serve is as Patient and Long-suffering as Merciful and Gracious as ever 2. Your Zealous Endeavours may be Crowned with much greater Success and prevail so far as to remove all the Causes of our Fears and supply all the defects of this Reformation that it may become effectual at last to avert the Judgments threatned against us altogether For hath not the Work prospered in your hands hitherto beyond all Mens Expectations and who knows whereunto it may grow and who would not take Encouragement to persevere and encrease their Diligence when they find by glad Experience that their Labours are not in vain It 's very observable what fresh Encouragement and great Advantages you have obtained upon every Occasion of this nature 2 Chro. 15.2 For even since the last time you have found that the Lord is with you while you are with him For by your Zealous Diligence and the large Bounty that was liberally contributed to this Work you have been successful in prosecuting those Lottery Games that had the pretence of Authority to support them And what can stand before your vigorous Zeal How much Leudness and Prophaneness hath been supprest in this City And we are told of considerable Progress that is made in other places Our King like the great Josiah hath called the Elders together and effectually recommended it to them in Parliament and they have made good Laws to promote it Some Judges do earnestly recommend it to the Justices of Peace and Magistrates in their Circuits and greatly encourage the Execution of them Some Persons of considerable Interest both in Church and State in England begin warmly to espouse it and as we are told they express their Regret that they have so long neglected it and suffered meaner Persons to get the Honour of it You have the Almighty God on your side whose Work you do and who makes it to prosper Zech. 4.7 8 9 10. So that Mountains become Plains before you and therefore let none despise the day of small things for he that laid the Foundations of this Work may also finish it and bring forth the head Stone thereof with Shoutings crying Grace Grace unto it 3. A Spirit of serious Practical Religion is poured out upon many and that which doth very much encourage our Hopes that God hath some kind thoughts of Love and Peace for the rising Generation is that plentiful measures of it are fallen upon many young Persons who are combined together in several Societies for the Exercises of Godliness and they are all continually praying for you nay you have the Prayers of all the Godly for your Success And is it not from the same Spirit of Peace and Love that there is such a blessed Harmony and Agreement among them of different Persuasions in other matters who conspire joyntly together to carry on this Excellent Work And I hope when some unreasonable Jealousies and Prejudices are worn off that it will procure a greater Union which the envious endeavours of some spiteful Men shall not be able to prevent No small measures of a Spirit of Zeal have also been poured forth upon some Magistrates and Inhabitants of this City and the Work hath prospered in their Hands not by Might nor by Power but by the Spirit of the Lord. And how necessary and effectual such Divine Assistances are to perfect this Work hath been sufficiently proved in a former discourse of this nature Vid. Mr. Weld's Reformation Sermon and our hopes are exceedingly raised by the successful appearances of them 4. The present Revolution of Providence we are fallen under doth also encourage our Hopes for if we understand any thing of the Apocalyptick Writings the Antichristian Kingdom is begun to fall and will gradually decline to its total Dissolution and the Churches of Christ must proportionably advance to their best and most flourishing Condition And tho' the Witnesses may be slain yet its only in one Street of the great City Rev. 11.8 12. and they shall soon rise again to a better State All Affairs in the World must effectually concur to the accomplishment of these Predictions and now the Wheels of his Chariots seem to move very swiftly and make haste by the frequent great changes in the World to perform some glorious Work that he hath designed for the great Happiness of his People And being well assured that we have espoused his Cause and are a part of his true Church we may comfortably expect that he who hath done such wonders for us already to deliver us from the very brink of Ruin and restore us to all the Priviledges we enjoy will perfect his Work and bring to pass the great designs of his Providences and your Endeavours which appears to be the same 5. There is an amazing Providence of late that gives further Encouragement to our great Hopes which I will briefly mention viz. That after all the Confusions and Wars that have been in most Nations of the World we are suddenly surprized with an Universal Peace Ps 46.9 He hath made Wars to cease to the ends of the Earth And usually such a Dispensation is accompanied with some great deliverance or advancement of the Church as there have been many Instances particularly The Reign of Solomon was the time of greatest Peace and highest Advancement of the Church under the Old Testament In the Reign of Darius when the Temple was rebuilt Zech. 1.11 and the Church most reformed all the Earth was still and at rest In the days of Augustus when the Temple of Janus was shut The Temple of Janus was never to be shut but when there was an Universal Peace thro' the World and this was the third time of its shuting Our Lord Jesus Christ came into the World and laid the Foundations of the Gospel Church And Cnstantine the Great restored Peace to the Empire and great Prosperity to the Church of God And what may we now expect will be the Issue of such a sudden change of Affairs in the World How quickly is the Scene altered and