favorem and she knows not how to pacifie him And how should she when God is angry with his people that prayeth Where is the strength of this Samson What is become of that power which was wont to command heaven and earth The visible heavens have been opened by prayer n so Elias brought down raine The invisible heavens have been opened by prayer so the penitent malefactor got from the Crosse into Paradise o So stephen saw the heavens opened and the Sonne of man standing at the right hand of God Omnia vincentem vincit It was wont to be an especiall favourite of God but now alas it is cast out of favour for God is angry with prayer r Thou hast covered thy selfe with a thick cloud that our prayer should not passe thorow This is a wofull condition of our souls when the Lord is angry at our prayers when he will not hear them not answer them it is a cause of sadnesse in us but much more when he is angry with them s Therefore will I deale in fury though they cry in mine ears with a loud voice yet will I not hear them This is fury indeed Before the ancients of Israel had said The Lord seeth us not he hath forsaken the earth There they deny God eyes and here he denyes them ears A burning wrath as the Originall hath it How long wilt thou smoak against the prayer of thy people 3. And of thy people this encreaseth the wonder For God to stopp his ears against the prayers of the Heathen to reject the petitions of Idolaters to despise a devotion done before painted blocks and Images is no marvel For they dishonour him in their prayers and God will be angry with any thing that eclipseth his glory But he does not use to slight those that serve him and continue in his holy worship It is strange that hee should bee angry at the prayer of his own people Angry with them whom hee hath chosen angry with them long and angry with them at their very prayers This must bee some extraordinary wrath and so you have all the circumstances that may advance the wonder Now for the Answer that takes off this admiration and satisfies us with some reasons why God may bee angry with his people that prayeth God is never angry at his people without a cause and it must be a great cause that makes him angry with them in their devotions whereof wee have three considerations 1. There may be infirmities enough in our very Prayers to make them unacceptable As if they bee 1. Exanimes without life and soul when the heart knowes not what the tongue utters 2. Or Perfunctorie for God will none of those prayers that come out of fained lips 3. Or Tentativae for they that will petere tentando tempt God in prayer shall go without 4. Or fluctuantes of a wild and wandring discourse ranging up and down which the Apostle calls beating the aire as huntsmen beat the bushes or Saul sought his fathers asses Such prayers will not stumble upon the Kingdome of Heaven 5. Or if they bee Praeproperae run over in hast as some use to choppe up their prayers and thinke long till they have done But they that pray in such hast shall bee heard at leisure 6. Or sine fiducia the faithlesse man had as good hold his peace as pray Hee may babble but prayes not hee prayes infectually and receives not He may lift up his hands but hee does not lift up his heart Onely the prayer of the righteous availeth and onely the beleever is righteous But the formall devotion of a faithlesse man is not worth that crust of bread which hee askes 7. Or sine humilitate so the Pharisees prayer was not properly Supplicatio but superlatio A presumptuous Prayer profanes the Name of God in stead of Adoring it All or any of these defects may marre the successe of our Prayers 2. But such is the mercy of our God that he will winke at many infirmities in our devotions and does not reject the Prayer of an honest heart because of some weaknesse in the petitioner It must bee a greater cause then all this that makes God angry at our prayers In generall it is sinne t We know that God heareth not sinners but if a man doth his will him he heareth u If I regard iniquity in my heart the Lord will not hear my prayer They bee our sins that block up the passage of our prayers It is not the vast distance between Heaven and earth not the thick clouds not the threefold regions nor the seven-fold Orbes nor the firmament of starrs but only our sinnes that hinder the ascent of our prayers When you make many prayers I will not hear you Why a Because your hands are full of blood God will none of those petitions that are presented to him with bloody hands Our prayers are our bills of exchange and they are allowed in Heaven when they come from pious and humble hearts But if wee bee broken in our religion and bankrouts of grace God will protest our bills hee will not bee wonne with our prayers Thus sinn is the generall cause 3. In particular it is the hypocrisie of sinne or the sinne of hypocrisie that makes God so angry with our prayers When wee honour him with the prostration of our bodies and sollicite him with the petitions of our lips and yet stil dishonour him in our sinfull lives is not this hypocrisie When we speak before him in the Temple as suppliants and sinne against him abroad like rebells is not this hypocrisie Like the outlaw that sues to the King for a pardon and yet resolves to live in rebellion We will not part with our beloved sinnes and yet begge the removall of Judgements will not this dissimulation make God angry with our very prayers If wee shall Judas-like kisse his Throne with the Devotion of our lipps and betray his Honour with the wicked works of our hands should he not be angry at our prayers Wee make as if we did lift up our hands unto him but indeed we stretch out our hands against him if this be prayer it is such a one as deserves anger Fear can make the Divell himselfe fall to his prayers b I beseech thee torment mee not Another request he made which Christ granted but it was in wrath not in favour The pride of our hearts the covetousnesse of our hands the blasphemy of our mouthes the uncleannesse of our lusts the wickednesse of our lives these make God angry with our prayers If wee could bee throughly angry at our sinnes God would cease to be angry at our prayers But so long as wee run on in those sinful courses upon earth let us look for no favourable audience from heaven Doe good and continue it then pray for good and have it It hath been said loquere ut te videam speak that I may see thee so saith God to
GOD'S ANGER AND MAN'S COMFORT TWO SERMONS Preached and Published BY THO. ADAMS LONDON Printed by Tho Maxey for SAMUEL MAN at the signe of the SWAN in Paul's Church-yard 1652. TO The Most HONOURABLE and CHARITABLE BENEFACTORS Whom God hath honoured for his Almoners And Sanctified to be his Dispensers of the fruits of Charity and Mercy To Mee In this my necessitous and decrepit Old age I humbly PRESENT This Testimony of my Thankfulnesse WITH My incessant Apprecations to the Father of all Mercies to reward them for it in this life and to crown their Souls with everlasting Joy and Glory in the life to come Through JESUS CHRIST our Lord Amen THO. ADAMS GOD'S ANGER PSALM 80. ver. 4. O Lord God of hostes how long wilt thou be angry with thy people that prayeth IT hath been said of Warre that it is Malum an evill but it may be Necessarium a necessary evill It is good sometimes to hunt the Wolfe though it is better to fodder the Sheep They speake of a drowning man Etiam ad Novaculam that he will rather take hold of a knife then of nothing A very coward will catch the edge of a naked sword to save his life though it cut his fingers Man being cast out of Paradise and that Paradise guarded with a sword in the hand of a Cherub durst not attempt a re-entry because he was guilty But Commonwealths that have lost any part of their Territories or just Priviledges by forraign invasion and hostile violence may justly venture upon the sword and fairly hope for a recovery because they are innocent hanc picem amolire gladio Irene signifies Peace Yet the Turke could sacrifice his beuteous Irene to the God of Warr If Warr in it self were utterly unlawfull God would never have accepted this Title The Lord of hostes Yet in this stile he takes such delight that he is oftner called the God of hoasts in the former Testament then by any other Title In those two prophesies of Isaiah and Jeremiah it is given him no lesse then an hundred and thirty times All creatures are mustered and trained put into garison or brought forth into the field by his command Which way can we look besides his Armies If upward into heaven there is a band of Souldiers even a a multitude of the heavenly host praising God If to the lower heavens there are a band of Souldiers it b was universa militia coeli to which those Idolaters burnt incense On the earth not only men are martialled to his service so Israel was called the host of the living God but even the brute Creatures are ranged in arrayes So God did levy a band of flyes against the Egyptians and a band of frogs that marched into their bedchambers He c hath troops of locusts and armies of caterpillers Not only the chariots and horsemen of heaven to defend his Prophet but even the basest the most indocible and despicable creatures wherewith to confound his enemies If Goliah stalke forth to defile the God of Israel he shall be confuted with a pebble If Herod swells up to a God God will set his vermine upon him and all the Kings guard cannot save him from them You have heard of râ—â—s that could not be beaten off till they had destroyed that covetous Prelate and of a flie that killed Pope Adrian God hath more ways to punish then hee hath creatures This Lord God of hostes is not properly a title of Creation but of providence All creatures have their existence from God as their Maker and so have they also their order from him as their Governour It referrs not so much to their being as to their martialling not to their naturall but militant estate Nor only as creatures do they owe him for their making but as they are souldiers for their managing Their order is Warlike and they serve under the colours of the Almighty So that here God would be respected not as a Creator but as a Generall His anger therefore seems so much the more fearfull as it is presented to us under so great a Title The Lord God of hostes is angry They talke of Tamberlain that hee could daunt his enemies with the very look of his countenance oh then what terrour dwells in the countenance of an offended God The reprobates shall call to the rocks to hide them d from the wrath of the Lamb If Ira Agni the wrath of the Lamb doth so affright them how terrible is Ira Leonis the wrath of the Lyon It may justly trouble us all to hear that the Lord God of hostes is angry in the sense wherof the Prophet breaks forth here into this expostulation O Lord God of hostes how long wilt thou be angry with thy people that prayeth Wherein we have these five propositions or inferencies naturally arising out of the text 1. That God may bee angry for that is manifestly implyed in the Text He is angry 2. That his anger may last a great while O Lord how long wilt thou be angry 3. That his anger may extend to the whole nation how long wilt thou be angry with the people all the people 4. That his anger may fall upon his owne people even his peculiar and chosen flock How long wilt thou be angry with thy people 5. That his anger may dwel upon them in their devotions and not be removed by their very prayers How long wilt thou be angry with the people that prayeth Yea against their prayer Now God is never angry without a cause he is no froward God of no techy and pettish nature a cause there must be or he would neverbe angry There can be no cause but sin we never read that God was angry for any thing else Some he hath corrected without respect unto sin as he did Job but he was never angry with any man but for the sin of that man It is the sin of the people that hath thus grieved God and it is the anger of God that hath thus grieved the people Sin must be supposed to run along with his anger throughout the text as the eclyptick line does thorow the Zodiake 1. If it were not for sin God would not be angry 2. If it were not for the continuance of sin he would not be so long angry 3. If it were not for the universality of sinne he would not be angry with the whole people 4. If it were not for the unnaturall ingratitude of sinne he would not be angry with his own people 5. If it were not for the base hypocrisie of sin he would not be angry with his people that prayeth Thus then the argument lies fair and plain before us 1 It is sin that makes God angry 2 It is the continuance of sin that makes him long angry 3 It is the generalty of sin that makes him angry with the whole people 4. It is the unthankfulness of sin or the sin of unthankfulnesse that makes him angry with his
owne people 5. Lastly it is the hypocrisie of sin or the sin of hypocrisie that makes him so long angry with his people that prayeth 1. We provoke him by our rebellions and he is angry 2. We continue our provocations against him and he is long angry 3. Wee provoke him universally and so he is angry with us all not with some offenders here and there but with the whole people 4. We provoke him by our unkindnesse for whom he hath done so much good and upon whom hee hath heaped so many blessings and so hee is angry with his own people 5. Lastly we provoke him by our dissimulations approaching to him with our lips and keeping back our hearts we pray unto him and yet live against him we call upon his Name and rebell against his will and so he is angry and long angry and long angry with the whole people and long angry with his own people and long angry with his people that prayeth 1. God may be angry and sin is the cause of his anger that 's the first Proposition Man may be angry without sin not without perturbation God is angry without either preturbation or sin His anger is in his nature not by anthropopathie but properly being his corrective Justice or vindicative Justice Iratus videtur quia tunquam iratus operatur Our anger is an impotent passion His a most clear free and just operation By this affection in our selves wee may guesse at the perfection that is in God The dissolute securitans think that God doth but smile at the absurdities of men that ludit in humanis that their drunkennesse and adulteries rather make him merry then angry Like some carnall father that laughs at the ridiculous behaviour of his children 〈◊〉 to whom their wanton speeches and actions are but a pleasure and in which he rather encourageth then chides e Indeed God is said to Laugh He that sits in heaven laughs them to scorn but woe be to the men at whose fooleries God laughs It is a dissembling falshood in man to smile and betray as Judas began his trechery with a kisse Such are likened to those bottled windy drinks that laugh in a mans face and cut his throat But this laughter in God argues not so much what he does as what they suffer when by frustrating their sinfull purposes he exposeth them to contempt and scorne Dei ridere est hominem ludibrio exponere If a little ant creeping out of a molehill should march forth and proffer to wrastle a fall with a gyant there were yet some proportion in this challenge but there is none of a finite power to an infinite Audacious sinners that dare provoke the Lord of hostes What are all the Armies and Forces of Tyrants to oppose the omnipotent God f He will make a feast of them for the fowles of the Aire whom he invites to the flesh of Captains and to the flesh of Kings Let earth and hell conspire let there be a confederate band of men and divels how easily can he command the one to their dust the other to their chains What power have they of either motion or being but from him against whom they fight Our God is a consuming fire and he will consume them not only in anger but in laughter The Catastrophe of all rebellion is but the Sarcasmos or bitter scorn of God There is no lesse difference between Gods anger and his favour then between death and life death in the most dismall horrour and life in the most comfortable sweetnesse of it g In his favour there is life death in his anger h for when thou art angry all our days are gone There is great light given to contraries by their comparison look first a little upon the favour of God i Oh how excellent is thy loving kindnesse O Lord Thy Saints shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatnesse of thy house and thou wilt make them to drink of the river of thy pleasures What followes upon his favour but satisfaction and peace and joy and eternall life When the deluge of water had defaced that great book of Nature Noah had a copy of every kind of Creature with him in that famous Library the Arke out of which they were reprinted to the world So he that hath the favour of God in the Arke of the Covenant hath the Originall copy of all blessings if they could all have perished yet so they might be restor'd God is the best Store-house the best treasury O happy men that have their estates laid up there Though friends goods and life forsake us yet if Gods gracious countenance shine upon us that wil be life and goods and friends unto us These benefits and comforts flow from his favour But alas how terrible is his anger He hath scourged some in very mercy till they have smarted under his rod Job complaines that the terrours of God do fight against him And David says From my youth up thy terrours have I suffered with a troubled mind If he will do thus much in love what shall be the judgments of his wrath If he hath drawn blood of his dear ones what shall be the plague of wilfull sinners If this be the rod of his children what are the scorpions provided for his enemies what comfort can any find in all the prosperous fortunes upon earth with whom God is angry in Heaven If that mighty Pagan could apprehend this he would finde small safety in his guard of Janisaries and lesse pleasure in his brutish Seraglio's It is a vain conceit of that Potentate who refusing the name of Pius would be called Foelix Happy not Godly But there can bee no felicity without Gods blessing and he will not blesse where he is not blessed But Sylla sirnamed Foelix accounted it not the least part of his fortunes that Metellus sirnamed Pius was his friend Piety is the best friend to Felicity though Felicity doth not alwayes befriend Piety That is but a wretched prosperity upon which God looks in anger If the Sun were wanting it would be night for all the Starrs If God frown upon a man for all the glittering honors of this world he sits in the shadow of death Let him bee never so rich in lands and waters yet his springs have lost their sweetnesse his vines their fruitfulnesse his gold hath lost the colour his precious stones their value and lustre I mean the vertue and comfort of all these are gone away with the favour of God If our house were paved with a floor of gold and walled with pearls and Diamonds and yet the roof wide open to the violence of heaven would these shelter us from storms and tempest Would we be so lodged in cold winter nights Or were our house roofed with Cedar and the walls hung with arras yet if the floore be rotten and under it a bottomlesse pit could we sleep in quiet There can be no safety when God is angry his
wrath may come thundring from heaven and suddenly sink rebellious sinners into hell and then where is all their honour When their mortall part lies in the dishonourable dust and their immortall part suffers in unextinguishable fire Thus terrible is the anger of God now what is he angry withall but sinne That is the perpetuall make-bate betwixt God and us the fuel of the fire of his indignation Your iniquities have separated between you and your God For this cause he looks upon us as a stranger yea as an enemy But they rebelled and vexed his holy spirit therefore he was turned to be their Enemy and he fought against them But they rebelled mans occasion of offending God is but a But a nothing no cause at all Gods occasion of being angry with men is a therefore a cause sufficient and that cause is sin Search the holy Book all over and you shall never find God angry but for sinne Nor doth the flame of his wrath break out upon every sin but when sin grows impudent and past shame We were wont to say that veritas non quae rit angulos but now vitâ—um non quaerit angulos It doth that in a bravery with which the false Prophet was threatned that he should do in fear a it runs from Chamber to Chamber from house to house not to hide it self but to boast it self We so provoke the Lord that we do not only anger him but are angry with him If the winds do not blow and the raine fall as wee would have it if any thing falls out crosse to our desires we even vexe at God himself as if he were bound to wait upon our humours No marvell if God be angry with us when we dare be angry with him by murmuring at his actions and calling his providence into question b Doest thou well to be angry O man No it is exceeding ill and dangerous We may tremble to think that the pot should fall out with the potter and man be angry with his Maker It is the meretricious and shamelesse forehead of sinne that angers God And in this anger wee here finde him but let us not so leave him and yet the next point tells us that his wrath is not suddenly pacified 2. He may be long angry that 's the second Proposition Usque quò Domine It is not for a fit like some flash of powder but may burne long c How long O Lord wilt thou be angry for ever And shall thy Jealousie burne like fire d He visits his own Israel with a long dearth During all those three years of drought and scarctiy Gods Altar smoaked with daily sacrifices and Heaven was solicited with continuall prayers yet still he was angry and why may not David complaine in this Psalme of that famine Wee are not at the first sensible of common evills in Warr Dearth or Pestilence wee thinke onely of shifting for our selves or finding out convenient refuges like Foxes in a storm that runne to the next burroughs and study not how to remove the publick Judgements But the continuance of an affliction sends us to God and calls upon us to ask for a reckoning An evil that is suddenly gone is as suddenly forgotten as men strucken in their sleep cannot quickly find themselves so the blow doth rather astoinsh us then teach us But when the burden lies long upon us we will at last complaine of the weight and seek to ease our selves Indeed there be some sinners more insensible more insensate then beasts if we finde the hungryest ox feeding in the meddow and cannot with many pricks of the goad make him remove from his place we wonder at his stupiditie Yet the insatiate world-affecters though God not only affright them with menaces but even afflict them with many scourges cannot be gotten from their covetous practises So long as they can by any means grow wealthy they will not beleeve that God is angry with them As if there were none e that have more then heart could wish yet live all this while in the sphere of Gods Indignation We can read Gods wrath in a storme not in a calme yet 〈◊〉 may be most angry when he least expresseth it f My Jealousie shall depart from thee and I will be no more angry with thee Oh that is the height of his displeasure 〈◊〉 g The Prophet speaks of a true Peace True were a needlesse epithet if there were not a false peace in carnall hearts How fondly doth the secure sinner flatter himself in the conceit of his own happinesse All is well at home he quarrels not with himselfe for he denies himselfe no sensuall pleasure God quarrells not with him he feels no checks of a chiding conscience he sees no frowns of an angry Judge nothing but prosperity shines upon him He sees no difference in the face of heaven whatsoever he does or says the same entertainment is given to his blasphemies as to his prayers Sure he thinks himself in Gods books above other men And so he is indeed in Gods book of debts in Gods book of arrerages in his book of Judgments so he is farr in Gods books He owes such men a payment and they shall have it Alas this is not the sinners peace but stupidity not the Makers favour but his fury All this while he is very angry though he suspends the execution of his wrath Thus long sin lies like a sleeping bandog at the door of their hearts They look upon the cur as if he would never wake or if he did yet as if hewere so chained clogged muzled that he could never hurt them But when once God rowzeth him then have at their throats then they shal feel what it is to have lived so long in the anger of a God When the Almighty shall put himself into the fearfull formes of vengeance and the everlasting gulph of fire shal open to receive them into intolerable burnings the mercilesse divels seising on their guilty souls and afflicting them with incessant torments It is some favour when we have the respite to cry How long Lord wilt thou be angry with us He is not throughly angry with us when he suffers us to breath forth this expostulation There is some hope of remedy when we once complain of our sicknesse It is not change of climate but change of dyet that recovers us when we grow to forbear the surfets of sin there is a fair possibility of comfort Yet God may be long angry and long continue sensible testimonies of his anger h Forty years long was I grieved with this Generation He had smitten Israel with divers punishments and threatned them with with more grievous calamities that i every man should eat the flesh of his own arme Manasseh Ephraim and Ephraim Manasseh and they both against Judah And yet he had not done with them his anger was not turned away but his hand was stretched out still Davids
Prophets as our vulgar reads In the multitude of the sorrowes that I had in my heart What was the cause of those griefs The slipping of his foot his errors his deviations his sinnes Other sorrowes may disquiet the soul none but these have the promise to be comforted As in martyrdome it is not the sword or torture not what we suffer but why that makes us martyrs So in our sorrowes it is not how deep they penetrate or how sharply they cruciate but wherefore that approves their goodnesse If our sins be the why of our sorrowes we are blessed Blessed are they that thus mourne for they shall be comforted Vaine are the sighes and groanes that proceed onely from the thought of worldly losses A medicine that cureth the eyes we say was made for the eyes and for nothing else We lose our wealth and sorrow for it will sorrow recover it wee are despised or abused and grieve for it I will grief right us We bury our friends and mourn for them will mourning restore them to us we are crossed by our unruly children and weep for it will weeping rectifie them We are anguished in our bodies with paines and sickness and are sorry for it will sorrow heal us nay wil it not rather hurt us All our thoughts and cares and griefes and tears can do us no good no relief in these calamities sorrow was not made for these things But we sin and offend the Lord and we are sorrowfull for it here is the disease for which sorrow is the proper remedy penitent sorrow shall take away sin Quamvis peccavit David quod silent reges tamen poenitentiam egit flevit jejunavit quod non solent reges saith Saint Ambrose who wrote him an apologie While the ground of our lesson is our sinne the choisest descant on it must bee our sorrow Our thoughts and griefes may bee many but if they bee not spent upon our sinnes wee shall not bee comforted 2. The number of them is a multitude wee may say of sorrows as it is said of shrewd turnes they seldome come single Like a volley of folding waves one tumbling upon the neck of another all threatning to overwhelme us Undae super advenit unda It is too scant a name which Leah gave her son calling him Gad a troope cometh and but enough what the demoniacke answered Christ My name is Legion for we are many If they were a multitude and not sorrowes the more the merryer if they were sorrows and not a multitude then the fewer the better cheare But to bee disquieting thoughts and a multitude makes up a terrible agony Many are the troubles of the righteous great or many a great many a great deal too many but for the comfort of the deliverance When Jobs afflictions began they came in troops and hurries so thick that hee could scarce take breath one messenger pressing in with his-wofull relation before the other could have ended his sad tale While he was yet speaking How did that fugitive Prophet amplifie and aggravate his dangers Thou hadst cast mee into the deepe in the midst of the seas and the flouds compassed me about all thy waves and billowes passed over mee It was no shallow river but the sea not neare the shore but in the midst of the sea nor was he floting on the waves but plunged into the deep or bottom the flouds compassing the billows overwhelming to keep him down I need not travel for exemplifications Let him be our instance that spake what he felt and felt what he spake sorrowes enough to break any heart but that which God had framed according to his own His sonne Amnon ravisheth his own sister and is murdered by his own brother that murder is seconded with Treason that Treason with an incestuous constupration the insurrection of his own son hath driven him from his house from his throne from the Arke of God all this went near him that son is slain by his servant and that went nearer him In what a miserable perplexity may wee thinke the heart of this good King all the while Here was thought upon thought thought against thought how at once to spare the sonne of David and to save the Father of Absolom fear against hope north against south wind against tide Arma armis contraria fluctibus undae a multitude of thoughts able to rend the heart in pieces but for that recollection of mercy Thy comforts delight my soul Not seldome fares it thus with us Thought calls to thought jealousie to fear fear to sorrow sorrow to despaire and these furies leap upon the heart as a stage beginning to act their tragicall parts Man hath more wheels moving in him then a clock onely the difference is that the wheeles of a clocke move all one way whereas his faculties like the epicycles have a rapt motion his sensitive appetite gives him one motion his fantasie another his reason a third and his imperious impetuons will crosseth them all driving the chariot of his affections with the fury of Jehu he desires and thinks and chuseth argues consents and dislikes and makes more businesse then time it self There are not so many houres in a year as there may be thoughts in an hour The Philosopher that had shamed himselfe by weakly disputing with Adrian the Emperour thus excused himself to his friend Would you have me contend with him that commands thirty Legions Alas what can quiet that soul which is distracted with such legions and multitudes of thoughts and throngs of sorrowes 3. The Captaine of this troublesome rout is himselfe My thoughts From what suggestion soever our thoughts come wee call them our own Whosoever begot the babe the mother calls it her own child Indeed the praise and propriety of good motions we ascribe onely to God without whom wee cannot so much as think a good thought as the channell may gather filth of it selfe but it cannot have a drop of pure water but from the fountain Bad suggestions though they proceed from Satan we call them our own because they are bred in the womb of our natural corruption stubble is blown by the winde into the fire and being inflamed it becomes fire The Divel tempted David to sin yet he calls it his sin not Satans but his own I will be sorry for my sinne However Epictetus could say when evil happens to a man one of the vulgar would blame others a young Philosopher would blame himself but one that had dived into the depth of nature would blame neither the one nor the other Yet a Christian hath learned to blame himselfe as knowing that all his sorrowes proceed from his sins My thoughts thus easie is it with God to make a man become his own punisher Under whose regiment are all these troubles Under my selfe My thoughts As God threatens Tyre that ancient and glorious City that her owne feet shall carry her a farre off to sojourne
Divine grace applies a more virtuall medicine to thy conscience which shall revive either thy patience or thy repentance The soul shall argue with it self If these imputations be true here is work for my repentance I will weep in secret for my sins If false let them not trouble me It is the slanderers sin not mine neither am I bound to father anothers bastard But still upon this calumnie the world condemns me but thy faith and patience assures thee that thou shalt not be condemned with the world Yea there is yet a higher degree of honour belonging to thy patience Have not the best men been traduced Was not the best of men God and man blasphemed yea even upon the Crosse he was jeered when he dyed by some of them for whom he dyed Thus do the comforts of God requite thee that in all this thou art in thy measure conformable to the sufferings of Christ So dost thou allay all these furious tempests with one breath of faithfull ejaculation Thy comforts delight my soul Another complains I am fallen from an affluent estate to deep indigence I have kept hospitality to entertain friends and made charity the Porch of my house to relieve the needy ones The vessell of my meanes is now drawn out to the bottom there is not sufficient provision left for my own family Inquire of thy heart whether this decay did not come by thy own riot or through the vain-glorious affectation of an abundant hospitality If this or that or any other habituall sin were the cause of it begin with mortification there First mourne for thy sinnes then faithfully depend upon thy Creators providence and thou canst not faile of convenient sustenance But it may be that this is not the complainants case he is not taken with a tabe or wasting of his substance like a scarce sensible consumption of his bodily vitalls But his fall is with a precipice from a sublime Pinacle of honour to a deep puddle of penury Such was Jobs condition so did he fall from being rich and happy in the Adverb to be poor and miserable even to a Proverb He had not only abundance of good about him but Omnia bene all went well with him Yet how suddenly did he fall from this abundant prosperity to the depth of miserable poverty Did he now follow the suggestions of that corrupt nature which lay in his bosome and whispered to him on his pillow Curse God and die No but he apprehended the inspiration of grace Blesse God and live So his last dayes were better then his first That infinite mercy did so crown his patience with triumph that his temporall estate was doubled Yea but what posterity had hee left to enjoy it after him Yes for even the number of his children was doubled too For besides those seven Sons and three Daughters which were now with his Father in Heaven he had also seven Sons and three Daughters with himselfe upon Earth Piety and Patience cannot bee cast downe so low but that the hand of mercy can raise it up againe In the multitude of all my losses and crosses O Lord thy Comforts have delighted my soul But another that hath heard all this sad Story and seen the comfortable end sent of the Lord is not satisfied because himself is not redressed Like a coward in wars that looks for the victory before he gives one stroke in the battell What merchant looks to be landed in the place of traffick before he hath past his adventure upon the seas Still saith such a repiner I am in distresse and want even necessaries But still thou and we all must suffer much more before it can be said of us Here is the faith and patience of the Saints Still O my soul wait thou upon the Lord thy most faithfull Creator he will in his good pleasure open his hand and fill thee with plenteousnesse Be thou penitent before him patient under him confident in him and thou shalt have a bundant cause to bee thankfull to him Thy end shall bee peace and comfort in Jesus Christ Yea even now in this dead low waters of fugitive fortunes my soul confesseth that I have the highest wealth For Christs righteousnesse is my riches his merits is my inexhaustible exchequer his blood hath filld my veins with most lively vigour My treasure is in heaven where no violence can take it from me Stil and for ever O God thy comforts delight my soul It is anothers complaint I am shut up in a close prison where I can neither converse with others abroad nor let in others to communicate with me in this my confined home The sparrow on the house-top hath more freedome then I For that though wanting a mate hath an open aire to flie in and may so invite company to solace her I have no society but my disconsolate thoughts no friend to ask me so much as how I do Yet is thy soul at liberty no barricadoed walls no iron-gates or grates no darke dungeons can imprison that The Jail is a strong prison to thy body and thy body is but in a metaphoricall phrase a prison to thy soul Thy body may not walke abroad thy soul can Spite of all thy cruell creditors and some unmercifull Jailors she can break Prison She hath wings that can mount her through clouds and mountains through orbs and constellations and like to Enoch walke with God in a heavenly contemplation of his infinite goodnesse My ears cannot hear those airy Choristers singing their Creators praise in the groves my soul in speculation can hear the Anthems of Angels in heaven I may not hear the Hosanna's of the Church militant in our materiall Temples below I may conceive that my soul hears the Halleluiahs of the Church triumphant above I may not walk in the green pastures and flowry medows on earth my soul may move in the glorious and melodious galleries of heaven Thus O Lord though in my strictest confinement here below thou hast given me large liberty above Still I will glorifie thee for all thy mercies for thy comforts delight my soul Anothers complaint is I am vexed with a multitude of troubles Not the law of the sword but the sword of the law hath disquieted me Let thy soul aske thy conscience this question who did first breake the peace If thou hast first overwhelmed that truth which should bee apparent thou art thine own enemy For truth smothered in wet straw will at length overcome the danknesse of that suppression and set on fire the smotherers Thou hast forsaken the truth and art therefore forsaken of peace There bee two chief preservers of the soul under the Almighty Creator of it Truth and Peace How invaluable are they together Parted how miserable truth is the precious stone Peace the gold wherein it is both set and preserved Truth is the glorious light of the Sun Peace a clear and serene heaven Peace is a most beautifull body