and Kingdome and all the people under their Government so amongst the Romans when any great Officer civill or military had done good service for the Commonwealth he was honoured with the title of a good Patriot or a Father of his Country and when men of the best ranke amongst them the Patricii came to be listed among the Senatours they were stiled Patres conscripti listed Fathers the Kings of the Philistines were stiled Abimelech which is as much as to say the King my Father and nothing more frequent nor familiar with Solomon throughout the whole booke of the Proverbs then speaking to his Subjects to call them his sonnes and why all this but to shew with what a Fatherly affection Princes and Rulers ought to governe their Subjects and with what filiall and sonne-like duties of honour reverence and obedience Subjects ought to carry towards them again In the first commandement of the second Table which St. Paul takes notice of to be the first Commandement with promise Ephes 6.1 the duty of Subjects to their King and Governours is call'd for under the notion of honour and the motive perswading to the duty that it may come sweetly and chearfully is the relation of a Father Honour thy Father and thy Mother thy Father the King and thy Mother the Church thy Father the Civill Magistrate thy Mother the Ecclesiasticall for that this command doth not only concerne our naturall Parents nor cheifly them but principally the Magistrate our Civill Father and the Church our Holy Mother the reason in the commandment which is the promise annex't to such obedience doth clearly evince That thy dayes may be long in the Land which the Lord thy God giveth thee which clearly declareth that this command is not principally meant of a family command but of a Nationall command nor the promise a personall promise but a more generall promise to the People nor the duty so much intended of a family duty of piety of children toward their Parents as of subjection and obedience of Subjects toward their Civill and Ecclesiasticall Parents the King and the Church the neglect of which duty toward them and their undutifull murmurings mutinings seditions conspiracies treasons and rebellions against them is the ruine of Kingdomes the destruction of Monarchies great States Cities Common-wealths and the ready way to shorten the period of them for by these they expose themselves to the Rapine of all their enemies or of any any Nation that will take the advantage of their divisions and dissentions to fall in upon them and to make a prey of them and so throw them with their Kings and Princes out of the Land which the Lord their God had given unto them as it is now with this very People to whom this command was given as you may read 2 Kings 17. and 2 Chronicles 36. The only way for a people to live long in the Land which the Lord their God giveth them to prolong their dayes in peace and happinesse is by honouring and being obedient to their father and their mother their Rulers and Governours both Civill and Ecclesiasticall yet it pleaseth the wisedome of God to commend these duties to us under this near and dear relation of Parents and children that both the termes in it may from this expression learn their duty that Princes and Rulers may govern with a gentle hand much tendernesse and affection not as Tyrants but as Fathers not as over slaves but as over sonnes and on the other hand that Subjects may know how to obey not as by compulsion but of a free willing minde not out of a slavish fear but out of a filiall affection Thus while Rulers governe their People as Fathers and the People honour and obey as sonnes it is the only way to prolong our dayes in peace plenty happinesse security and to live long in the Land which the Lord our God giveth unto us and all this is taught us under this sweet notion and relation in the Text wherein Job professeth himselfe to be unto the poor a father And this was the second Character of a worthy Magistrate we now come to the third in the next words of the Text The Cause that I knew not I searched out These words shew the pains and patience prudence diligence which Job did and all other worthy Judges and Magistrates do and ought to use in examining Causes Persons brought before them for finding out of the truth that so they may judge righteous judgement all these are comprehended in the word searched The cause c. I searched out The righteous Judge of all the world when he came down from heaven to earth as sometimes he did to execute judgement though he knew the cause before he came yet before he past sentence or executed judgment he would examine the Cause and find out the truth by diligent enquiry see this in the examination of Adam Gen 3. the arraignment of Cain Gen 4. the judgement of Sodom Gen 19. Adam where art thou to the first and hast thou eaten of the fruits of the tree of which I commanded thee thou shouldst not eat as if he knew nothing of it Cain where is thy brother Abel to the second thy father hath lost a sonne the world a saint and I a faithfull servant and martyr thou must not so carry it thou shalt not so go away with the murder ubi est Abelfrater tuus where is thy brother Abel I will go down see to the third he needed not to go down and see for his own information the cry of the City was come up to him and might save his labour for going down to them as to his own information but by this his judiciary proceedings the Judge of all the world would teach all earthly Judges to know how warily and orderly they ought to proceed in hearing determining causes that are brought before them that so they may find out the truth and give sentence without error hence it is that Judges were anciently called Cognitores and to hear a cause in the Roman Orators language was cognoscere causam to know a cause and this requires much paines and patience prudence and diligence not slightly to passe it over but to search into it It is the honour of a King to search out a matter saith Solomon Pro 25.2 a rare example whereof he was himselfe in the case between the two harlots in discovering the true mother of the child in question 1 Kings 3. and such is the command in all other cases in the case case of Idolatry Deut 17.4 and in the case of false witnesse Deut 19.17 in the former saith the Text Thou shalt make diligent enquiry in the latter Thou shalt make diligent search both made good here in my Text by this worthy King Judge and Magistrate the subject of our discourse the cause which I knew not I searched out and great reason is there for all this care paines patience
we may if we please multiply instances enough in any kind of undertaking take one in that way which is proper for our discourse at this season in carrying on of a Suit in Law An honost man hath a Cause good enough he hath eyes good enough to see it and knowes the way of the proceedings and how it should be mannaged but he wants wherewithall he wants leggs first he wants a purse that 's one legg and secondly he wants power and friends to countenance his Cause that 's another legg and that must needs go hard with him when he wants both leggs if he had but one of them yet he would make some hard shift to hop or halte along or help himselfe with a Crutch or a wooden-legge or rather then fail a silver-legge I have heard of such but when a man wants both that must needs go hard with him and such were the impotent which Job reliev'd in the Text I was limbes or leggs to the lame he speaks in the plurall number Now in such a case for a compassionate Magistrate to lend a Hand a Crutch a Legg or any thing to a helplesse lame man is certainly an act of pure mercy and charity or if he will not lend a legg to the man yet to lend a legg to his Cause and to his proceedings in it that it may goe on with expedition and be brought to some issue in some time and not hang in suspence and be delayed from time to time by new motions and orders writs of error devices to carry it out of one Court into another till they tyre out a man at a long runnning for want of leggs to maintain his course You know the story of the impotent man in the 5. of John which lay at the Banks of the Bath or Poole of Bethesda so many years at certain times there came an Angell and moved the waters of the Bath and then whosoever stept in next had certain cure of his infirmity whatsoever it was this poor man had lay'n under his infirmity 38 yeares how many of these he lay at those bankes expecting cure we cannot tell perhaps most of them and yet for want of limbes to help him into the water when it was stirred still he was carried backe as he came without cure perhaps you would be angry with me some of you if I should make an allegory of this and apply it by way of allusion to the method of your proceedings in your course for the relieving of such impotent creatures as come to you for cure in their severall necessities if I should compare that Bath to some of your Courts soeveraigne enough for their cure if they could but seasonably get into them or when they are in get out again the stirring of the waters to your active proceedings in them the impotent man lying on the bankes to the poor Clyent his long lying there toyour long detaining of him without relief without dispatch it would suit but too well in all the parts of it for there shall you have a poor Clyent attend from Term to Term from year to year and for well nigh as many years as this impotent man did and yet what for want of the Angells to stirre the waters or of limbes to help him in when they are stir'd or out again when he is in still he comes back again as he went without the cure he hoped for a great disparagement certainly though not to the Law yet to the proceedings in it and a great grievance to the subject that the Sunne shall travail twenty times between the Tropicks too and fro and he many times twenty as far as will take in many of the paralells for relief and yet can bring his matters to no issue where the tediousnesse of the journeyings adds no small aggravation to the tediousnesse of the delay and expectation Certainly this one consideration is much for the justification of those worthy Patriotts in this Kingdome that lay out themselves in their endeavours for the resurrection of that Ancient and Honourable Court of a Presidentship here once established in these Northern-parts the reasons for which are as strong and as many now as ever they were and that with some additions In the flourishing Kingdome of France there are eight such Courts they call them Parliaments thogh from any of them there may be an Appeal to the grand-Parliament at Paris yet these are eight standing Courts of great Honour and Authority erected in so many severall Provinces of the Kingdome for the ease of the Subjects that they may not be forc't all from the remoter parts of the Kingdome upon all occasions to come up to Paris and to travell so far for Justice as to make it dear of fetching for the same reason have there bin the like Courts of Justice erected here in England though not so many one of which is yet in being in the West and another was here in the North and why it should not be continued or restored I cannot imagine except it be this That as that great City of London the very belly of the Kingdome hath engros't unto it selfe all the Trading so that other her sister of Westminster would do the like by the Law and so make of them both two great Monopolies And so I passe from this sort of impotent people in the Text the lame though it be long first I had been more brief in this discourse if those whom it concern'd had been so in their dispatches The next sort of helplesse people in this Spittle in the Text and quarter'd in the next room are the poor and to them Job tells us he was a Father ver 17. Here we are to consider first the object of his charity and compassion they were the poor secondly his charity cōpassion toward them exprest under the notion and relation of a Father As to the first well did the Lord know that what through the oppression covetuousnesse and cruelty of some what through the idlenesse ill-husbandry prodigality and improvidence of others there would be allwayes some poor in the Land as our Saviour tells us Math. 26 11. The poor you shall have allways with you and therefore God hath mercifully provided for their releife In the Law there was a Tythe provided for them Deut. 14.29 that speakes home to us that receive Tythes and tells us that we are not to receive them all and altogether for our own selves we are not altogether Proprietaries but rather Usu-fructuaries of them in part though we have the best title to them and share in them yet they were not originally sett a part onely for our selves but partly in trust we receive them to have but not to hold we must distribute with one hand aswell as receive with the other by this very Law the equity whereof remaineth to this day and so far forth is Morall there is a share due out of them to the poor Secondly for the possessours of Fields and
and Authority in them that wear them and adde in the estimation of the people glory and honour to those that are clothed with them And state and magnificence to the actions that are done in them Fourthly They are documents to them that wear them and put them in mind what they are and what they have to do and admonish them to carry in them that state and gravity that becomes them and so to demeane themselves that they may be a greater honour to their Robes then their Robes are to them Upon all these accounts how unreasonable are the exceptions of vain and sordid men against them who look upon them with an envious and an evill eye and charge them with vanity and ostentation and such as might well be spared surely had these men been in Moses's time they would have control'd the wisedome of God in appointing such rich Garments to be made for Aaron with an ad quid haec perditio what needs this wast whereto is all this cost they would have told us that God is a spirit and that Aaron should have worshipped him in spirit and in truth and if he did so it were all one whether he did Minister in a pair of linnen or of letherne Breeches an Ephod or a Miller's jacket and so I leave this first part of the Character and come to the second His inclination to mercy compassion where he found fit objects for it in that he was Eyes to the blind feet to the lame and to the poor a Father Under these three sorts of people are comprehended all such poor impotent helplesse people of what sort or kind soever which stand in need of our help and relief And if I take the words litterally and so plead the cause of such I shall therein do the Text no wrong for how do the streets swarme with such how are the high-wayes and hedges lin'd with them besides how many Hospitalls and Almes-houses are there full of such founded by the piety and charity of mercifull men for their releif yet what by the cruelty and covetuousness of some what by the negligence and unfaithfulnesse of others intrusted for them what through the inabilty of those that are in them to helpe themselves shamefully wronged and defrauded and the meanes belonging to them in a second or third generation well nigh quite extinguished now in such cases for the Magistrate to looke upon them with a mercifull eye and provide for their releife by reviving wholesome Lawes made for that purpose by setting on foot the Commissions for pious and charitable uses and taking care to the due execution of them is certainly a work not only of Justice but of mercy too well worthy the care of a worthy Magistrate by which he shall become as Job in the text Eyes to the Blind feet to the lame and to the poor a father But Job had a farther meaning in this Expression then this he speakes Metaphorically by the blind doth Job understand the ignorant man by the lame the impotent man and by the poor the indigent man and they all equally stand in need of help The blind man hath leggs good enough to walk with but he wants eyes to see his way and so he must necessarily fall into one of these two mischiefs or both either to erre out of the way or to stumble and fall in it the lame man hath eyes good enough to see his way but he wants leggs to go in it and so is in as ill case as the other the poor man may have both his eyes and his limbs and yet being poor and wanting a purse to carry on his businesse he is in as ill a condition as any of the other the worthy Magistrate is a releif to them all and supplies them with those helps that are most suitable to their several necessities Ignorantem dirigendo impotentem supportando indigentem sublevando by directing the ignorant supporting the impotent and relieving the indigent and thus make good the Character here in the Text and becomes Eyes to the blind feet to the lame and to the poor a father The ignorant man hath a good Cause but wants skill to mannage it wants eyes to spy out all those niceties which in his proceedings and carrying of it on might destroy it and indeed he had need of good eyes indeed that can spy out all the windings and turnings the niceties quirks quillets quidities that a good Cause may be subiect to and yet ther 's not the least of these suppose the misdateing a Declaration mistaking a Name or mis-spelling of it vitium scriptoris or some such slight matter but it shall be pleaded to the destruction of the whole businesse and the poor Clyent shall be forc't either to loose his Cause or to put his Cap to daying as we use to say or to fetch it about again and again upon some such other light and slight Cause till he become weary of his Suite and his life too and chuse rather to sit down and to loose all then to hazard the recovery of it by a remedy worse then the disease now in such a case for a Magistrate to lend an eye to the blind is certainly on Act not only of Justice but of Mercy too and of pure charity And here by the way let me propose it to you nimble-Pleaders as a case of conscience whether in such a case when you see the Cause clearly against you truth and equity on the other party for the love of a Fee or to advantage a Clyent you may lawfully undertake in it and set your witts upon the tenters to find out some such slight errors or mistakes to overthrow it and to use your cunnings against your conscience to the perverting of judgment And so I passe from the blind to the lame another sort of impotent People here quartered in the next room of this Spittle in the Text I was eyes to the blind and limbs to the lame The former sort of impotent people we spake of wanted eyes to see these want limbes to walke and so are in as ill a case as they for though they see their way never so well yet if they want leggs and limbs to goe there may they sit still and perish and without helpe must needs do so look what the want of leggs is to an impotent man for walking such is the want of means to any man to carry on his businesse in any undertaking for instance In the military way Rabshakeh says truly 2. Kings 18.20 Wisedome and Counsell are for the warre they are the eyes but let those be never so good to contrive yet if they want men munition and moneys they are the leggs or sinewes of warre as we call them they will make but slow marches or Progresse in their undertakings even such as a man would do in a journey travelling without leggs or with leggs without sinewes Hāniball in his warr against the Romans found it so and for this