Chaplyn Major Jovis XXXImo die Janarii 1677. Annoque Carol. Secundi Angliae c. XXXmos This Court doth desire Mr. Hesketh to Print his Sermon preached yesterday at the Guild-hall Chappel before the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of this City Wagstaffe A SERMON Preached before the Right Honorable Lord Mayor AND ALDERMEN OF THE CITY of LONDON AT Guild-Hall Chappel ON JANUARY 30th 1677 8 By Henry Hesketh Rector of Charlewood in Surrey LONDON Printed for Will. Leach at the Crown in Cornhill near the Royal Exchange 1678. Imprimatur Guil. Jane R. P. D. Hen. Epis Lond. a Sacris Dom. Feb. 2. 1677. 2 SAM 1.17 18. And David lamented with this lamentation o-over Saul and over Jonathan his son Also he bad them teach the children of Judah the use of the bow behold it is written in the book of Jasher AMong all Nations in the World that have been blessed with any sober sense of things we shall find this ever to have been a fixed and constant Custom to signalize times of extraordinary Occurrences with some special Marks and Characters which might commend them to more than common observation judgeing it very becoming and proper that such Times should not pass only in the comnon crowd but that as the Accidents of them were extraregular so mens entertainments thereof should be according And on the other hand Seasons of great sufferings and signal disasters have been spent in and afterwards remembred by deep and afflictive resentments and these men have called Fasts and marked them in their Calendars for Times of publick Mourning This is a Custom which as it may serve to many excellent ends of Prudence and advance many great Purposes of publick Good so it seems to carry a good tincture of Religion upon it and to derive a sufficient warranty from it For since it ought to be the care as well as it is much the duty of all good men that have a due veneration of God and any becoming sense of a Divine Providence superintending the World and all the affairs of men in it to permit the passages of no day to pass unobserved it will much more become matter of their care not to suffer extraordinary and signal Disposes of Providence to do so Especially since God intends all these things as Lessons and Instructions to the World to awaken men to due thoughts of Himself and more concerning regards to their own Duty It is therefore laid down in holy Scripture as a sure character of an evil man to be regardless and unobservant of Gods common judgements but it is a rank sign of Irreligion and next to an Atheistical contempt of God not to be deeply affected when his hand is lifted up in greater chastisements and not to entertain a very humble sense of his severer Inflictions It is the just Honour of this day that its Institution is founded upon all these great Reasons of Prudence and Religion and warranted by Precedents among all sober Nations of Prudence to impress by the observation of it upon men the deeper sense of the sad accidents thereof and of Religion in entertaining such great afflictions with those humiliations and tears which both they and the sins of this Nation that occasion'd them do most justly call for And it will be no prejudice nor disparagement to it to observe that it stands warranted by precedent and may plead its vindication from the suitable practice of the best and wisest and most religious persons in all Ages of the World and particularly of one no less eminent for all these then David the Prophet as well as King who upon the sad news ef the tragical death of Saul effected by the Arms of the Philistins upon those unhappy plains of Gilboa lamented over him with this lamentation following Also he bad them teach the children of Judah the use of the bow behold it is written in the book of Jasher In which words I take notice of these three principal Observables 1. David's instituting a Form of Lamentation for the death of Saul King of Israel And David lamented with this lamentation over Saul and over Jonathan his son 2. His enjoyning the people to be taught to joyn with him in it Also he bad them teach the children of Judah the use of the bow 3. His recording of it for the Notice and Imitation of successive Generations Behold it is written in the book of Jasher Of all which three observables I shall beg patience while I speak something 1. In their more independent and absolute sense or at least only as they relate to their own matter and are a History to us of what is past and gone 2. In their relative sense and as they have an aspect upon us and the business of this day in which sense we may call this the Application of the matter of them to our selves First I begin with them in the first sense and therein with 1. The first observable in them David Instituting a Form of Lamentation for the death of Saul And David lamented with this lamentation over Saul and over Jonathan his son In speaking to which I do not desire to be interrupted with the clamorous objection of this age against all publick Forms in any thing relative to Divine Service It is very well and a happy thing that the great starters of the dispute have sufficiently confuted their own Maximes and the imposing a publick Directory will make ridiculous all general Arguments against Liturgy It is sufficient that the Institution of this stands warranted by and may claim a right in all those great Reasons for a standing Liturgy which yet do and I am confident will stand unassoil'd to the great dissolution And if there be any man that thinks otherwise he hath now a fair opportunity to signalize himself and gain the reputation of a daring Goliah by challenging all the Armies of Israel and I little doubt but he shall meet with the fate of his great Denominator and I am the more confirmed herein because here is a David that stands ready to take up the Gantlet And it may not perhaps be impertinent or unpleasant to observe that as if there were some secret Magick or Charm in the name of David all that relates to him hath never been controverted and of all the parts in the Liturgy the Psalms the Metrical composures of David which are so great a part of it have least of all been disputed and I cannot guess at a reason of this unless it be that their pretences to the Spirit would hence have received their own confutation and all men see it was not the Spirit of God that acted them for there is no doubt but that can indite Metre as well as harangues in Prose but their fears of this would never permit them yet to put it unto tryal But I pass all this and proceed to consider this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the consideration of which we shall meet with a complication of Reasons every
one of which might justly occasion a lamentation 1. For first to dye to leave these splendid habitations for a cold grave to leave dear friends to converse with putrefaction and rottenness to have these beautiful Piles tumbled into confusion and dust to have our vast Possessions and Manors shrunk up into a few feet of Earth a pitchy Sheet and a strait Coffin are to most men living sad stories and the thoughts of them rarely entertain'd without sighs and a tear Mourning is therefore one attendant always upon Funerals Amongst the Jews there was always a set of common Mourners that their mourning might be more solemn and their lamentations more affective and I find it threatned as a judgement to Jehojakim that he should have an inglorious and contemptible Burial and should have none to make formal lamentation for him Jer. 22.18 And whoever consults the Genius of the Christian Religion will find its compassions are as great its affections as quick and its sense as tender as before and all it designs in this case is not to dam up the Fountain but take care that it flow only in due measures not that we sorrow not at all but that we sorrow in due proportions according to the measures of faith and with the abatements and intermixtures of Christian hope for that I take to be the meaning of that limitation in the Apostolical Canon That ye sorrow not as the Gentiles which have no hope 1 Thess 4.13 But this is but a small matter and the least of these considerations for if death be just matter of Lamentation certainly the death of a King is much more so when the Tall Cedars bow and the strong Oaks crack and are made to stoop low and compelled to lie prostrate upon the breast of their common Mother then as the storm is more strong so it is more awakening and summons the most serious regards and most real resentments And so it is also in this matter for when death knocks but at the common door the Mourners strike but the common key but when it rifles Palaces and enters into the Chambers of Kings and those that are gods die like men and fall equal Trophies to this rude Conqueror and are dragged after the wheels of his triumphing Chariot there you shall see always the Scene is dressed with all the solemnities of the deepest sorrow the croud of Mourners is great and the Herald's skill is needful to marshal the troops and to preserve order in the great confusion And this wants not good appearances of reason to plead its justification for as the wise Jews accounted David worth ten thousand of them his life of more value than the lives of thrice so many thousand of common persons So indeed have all wise civilized Nations accounted after the same rate and as they have solemnized the Natalitia of their Kings with all expressions of publick joy so they have observed the days of their death with as great demonstrations of Mourning when David in solemn manner lamented the death of Abner he gave a sufficient reason he thought for it in saying Know ye not that there is a Prince and a great man fallen this day in Israel and certainly if the fall of a Prince much more the fall of a King also will warrant mourning and if David might justly lament the death of Abner he might more justly do so upon the death of Saul But this also is much short of what yet remains unconsidered for if the death of Kings be just matter of sorrow then the more untimely and violent and preternatural the death is the more afflictedly ought it still to be resented When the Taper dies regularly having consumed all its oyl and exhausted all its store of moysture it expires quietly and no man is much concerned at it but when it meets with an interruption by the rude caresses of an impetuous blast then its snuff grows offensive and all men take notice of it and are concerned at the disaster And so it is with Kings in this case when they come into their Sepulchers as shocks of corn fully ripened and in their season as Eliphaz elegantly Job 5.26 when they die the common death of all men and go down to the grave in a good old age having honourably passed all the stages and periods of humane life there we pay them commonly but a common tribute and drop a tear upon their Hearse and bewail them upon the stock of common frailty and our grief that they are gone receives a just abatement from the remembrance that God spared them to us so long but when these fall like untimely fruit shaken by an unseasonable violent unkind wind there the chanels are full the streams run high the Accents are deep the Minstrels strike the dolefullest note and as it is said of David here men commonly ever exceed in their expressions of grief for so when good Josiah fell by the Arms of the Assyrians at the River Euphrates the people lamented the sad Accident at Megiddo with a sorrow that for the greatness of it became proverbial And yet the greatest of these considerations is behind for if all these things happen without any fault or concurrence of ours then our sorrow even from thence receives a great extenuation but if we have any ways been contributive to the mischief or been negligent and failing to do our utmost towards preventing of it then indeed our sorrow is much more just yea it is necessary I put these two together in one period and consideration you see and truly I do not know well how to part or distinguish betwixt them for though it be certain that there is a difference betwixt them absolutely considered and he that actually embrues his hands in blood is more guilty than he that passed by and did not endeavour to rescue though even he be greatly guilty also Yet in this case I am now upon there is little or no difference at all for Subjects are as equally obliged to assist their Kings in all straits and dangers as not to resist or rise up against them to bring them into the same and their failure in the first is as criminal as doing the second and only differs from it as the cause from the effect for therefore some men are encouraged to attempt the latter because others are negligent and failing in the former upon which reason it is certain if either exceed in guilt it is the former I take this occasion to discourse a little this matter because of a great and a most dangerous mistake that I observe to be Epidemical and common about it For as some men boast they obey the Law if they quietly submit to the penalty and pay the forfeiture as well as he that performs the positive duty for the neglect of which the former penalty is threatned So other men are apt to commend their Loyalty as much for not resisting as others do theirs for protecting their King
seeking to justifie his treason because his Majesty once in haste switched him for crossing his way as he was riding hard at Hunting And yet his greatest Enemies could never pretend any such shew of unkindness and I am confident in believing he never did any man more harm But now according to the Doctrine I am opposing all these stories should be cancelled and expunged out of History the Honour of Triumph should be denied to those Worthies and their Merits equalled to theirs who could unconcernedly behold the danger of their Kings and stand quietly by with their Arms folded up and their Hands in their Bosom But it is too great an honour to so dull a Doctrine to stay so long in its confutation any degree of Honour will detest and abhor it And as the Loyalty of those Persons who were so happily instrumental in that Miracle of our present King 's strange preservation will be remembred with Eulogies and Blessing and Honour as long as Loyalty rests in the Bosom of this Nation So it will be an evidence to the World that all true Englishmen abhor such a thin and base loyalty as shall think it enough to abstain only from offending but not to interpose at all in defending their King But I return to the matter before us in the Text and from what hath been said we may safely infer that if it were thus David might well lament Sauls death that is if he had either been contributive directly to it or failing in his endeavours to prevent it For all the former considerations made this matter but an infelicity but this renders it a great guilt and therefore justly to be sorrowed for we may justly sorrow for our miseries but when we pull down these upon us by our own sins we may much more do so we lawfully may lament our infelicities but we needs must lament our sins Now thus it is too evident it was with David in this case for first he had been actually in arms against Saul and though much may be said for it considering some circumstances yet considering the whole matter we may safely pronounce of it that it was certainly unjustifiable for there were more safer ways of avoyding the displeasure and anger of Saul than by raising an Army of out-laws and vitious persons and appearing in actual rebellion against him Especially also if he used those arms directly against Saul and that he either did or at least offered to do we are assured from the proffer and boast he made to Achish thereof 1 Sam. 28.2 and it will fix a deep guilt on the fact whatever the intention was for if he promised this and intended not to perform it he was an hypocrite and if he did he was a Traytor and a Rebel But if none of this were true yet the least evil that can be said is that he yielded not that assistance unto Saul which he might have done and by which possibly he might have averted this sad fate for who knows how far the arms of David in this juncture might have contributed to the overthrow of the Philistines and who knows not but that this might have been a happy means of a firm reconciliation betwixt him and Saul and an occasion of more endearing himself to all the people and occasioning the Daughters of Israel once more to sing his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And there is little reason to doubt but these considerations stuck close to him and gave a deep accent to every period in his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for he whose conscience was so justly tender as to be touched with a sense of guilt when he had but offered violence to the utmost Garment of Saul may well be supposed to be burthened now with that sense when he could not but know that he had either been actually contributive to his fall or at least had suspended that assistance which probably might have preserved him from it From all which Considerations it will appear too clearly what great cause David had to mourn on this sad occasion and to lament with this lamentation over Saul and over Jonathan his son But it seems he thought not himself alone concerned in this matter but judged others also had cause to joyn in this Lamentation with him and therefore accordingly he takes care and gives order that they should Also he bad them teach the children of Judah the use of the Bow which is the second General I observed In speaking to which I shall be concerned to do these two things 1. To assure this Interpretation and Sense that I have given of the words 2. To account for the reasonableness of the thing 1. Then that this is the true Import and Genuine meaning of this Parenthesis I can see no reason of moment to enduce me at all to doubt but some very great ones to make me confident in believing In order to the making of which to appear to you also I must desire you to consider that it was a common thing among the Jews to affix special Titles to their Songs whether they were Eucharistical or Hilasterial i e. whether they were designed to give praise for mercies or whether they were intended to bewail guilt and depricate punishments for of both natures you shall meet with Songs in the holy Scriptures and many of these with some particular names and titles affixed to them of which in the Book of Psalms we meet with many Instances i. e. of Psalms with such Superscriptions as these to the chief Musician Neginoth Shoshannim Altashith c. just as this to the chief Musician Kesheth or the Bow the plain meaning of which is this he bad the chief Musicians such as Heman Ethan and Jeduthun to teach the common people to sing this Song of Mourning for the death of Saul And this name of the Bow is given to it with respect perhaps to the Philistine Archers by whom this slaughter was made as the precedent Chapter tells us but more especially with respect to the Bow of Jonathan of which mention is made in it also and by three Arrows shot out of which by that truest of friends David had notice of his danger and warning given him to provide for his safety So that you see I make here the Bow to be the name of a Song and not to denote that piece of Armature that is expressed by that name and so the learning the people the use of the Bow is the learning them to sing devoutly and Musically this Song And this Interpretation may be made good from these two Arguments 1. The authority of some very considerable Versions and Expositors 2. The unreasonableness of the contrary Exposition 1. By the authority of some very considerable Translations of this place Such is that of the 72 Interpreters and the Vulgar Latine i. e. in all the Ancient Copies and Manuscripts of it as the Learned Gregory from his own Observation intimates in his Notes upon this place from whom I am
not ashamed to acknowledge that I receive great help and direction in finding out this sense and such also is that not to be contemned ancient Translation of Tindal in our own tongue And consonant to this sense is it understood by some very Learned Expositors and would have been so by all were it not that a fondness to follow some trifling Rabbies have betraied them into the contrary I do not desire to be told for I have hinted it my self that some of the Jewish Masters understand this place otherwise I know it and that they also have understood many others very ridiculously and have miserably trifled and said many very unreasonable things upon them And none more so than what they have delivered with respect to Kings and therefore something relative to our present matter as perhaps you may hear more fully by and by I do not speak this to disparage all Jewish Learning I would have it encouraged by some but not therefore idolized by others I would not bring an Odium upon all the Rabbies but I would not have their sayings made Oracular and the great Standard of Truth For when God hath blessed us with a clear and full relation and given us a key by which to unlock more clearly all their mysteries then ever they themselves could I do not know how to account it a due veneration of that Revelation to forsake it to go and grope in Umbrages and Shadows and Types and in fabulous Traditions and Legends such as most of their Books are stuffed much with if not wholly composed of Besides experience hath attested the dangerous consequences hereof it hath been made evident of late by a learned pen how most of our Christian errors have derived from an over valuation and too great a fondness of Jewish doctrines and customs and truly I think it neither difficult nor injurious to give the same Origine to our late woful state rebellions and to shew the doctrines of the late Usurpers to be but the transcripts of what the latter Jews do fabulously report of the power of their Sanhedrim over Kings But I must beg pardon for this digression and hasten to show the unreasonableness of the contrary Exposition and that not only 1. From the impropriety and inelegancy of the Speech and the strangeness of the Apostrophe which is apparent in bringing in David beginning a publick lamentation and then breaking off with an impertinent command to teach the children of Judah the use of the Bow But secondly and chiefly from the improbability of the thing for it cannot reasonably be thought that the men of Judah were now to learn the use of the Bow or ignorant of it it was the common tactick practice over all the East And both Saul and Jonathan were excellent Archers themselves And the use and knowledge of the Bow was so very common that as Bread in the Hebrew Dialect is commonly used to signifie all Food so was the Bow to denote all sorts of Armature This therefore now I take to be the granted sense of these words and truly cannot but wonder if any one that hears it do not presently see the great consonancy of it and therefore from the reasonableness of the sense I proceed 2. To account for the equitableness of the thing And certainly if there was reason for David's lamenting the death of Saul there was so also for the peoples joyning in consort with him and joyntly singing this sad Expicedium For certainly that man hath a strange notion of Superiority and Government that thinks it not Instituted for the good and benefit of those that live under it but for the Grandeur and State of those that exercise it Vain men that judge by appearances and shadows and look only on the outsides of things are apt to stare at the Port of Kings admire the rich Embroidery of their Robes and those sparkling Diamonds that embellish their Crowns and Diadems But wise men that see those Thorns that are stuck in their Ermins and those great cares that their Crowns are lined withal do very well know and wisely consider for whom these heavy Crowns are worn and who they are that reap the benefit of all this state and that is certainly the people who therefore have great reason to condole their death and lament their loss as being really their own That Kings are great Blessings to their people besides the concurrent sense of all Nations might be made evident from those many great benfits that accrue to their Subjects from their Protection and Government without which experience hath too often taught the World what a scene of things would presently take place for the sight of which I would remit every one here to the four last Chapters in the Book of Judges but that our own fresh and yet bleeding experiences can tell more and may justly supersede all other notices of these things The wise Greeks took care to transmit the notice of these things by those very names that Kings and Crowns were expressed by for the Diadem is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the people and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Foundation that assures the peoples safety and experience hath commonly attested the Wisdom of the Word in shewing how tottering the common safety is still when these are weakn'd And almost all Nations have used appellatives of analogous significations for therefore have they been called Shepherds and Guardians and Fathers and Gods not only to denote the happiness of enjoying them but to express the exposed condition of these that want them And it will add mightily to our sense of this to consider that God himself hath used every one of these appellations yea even the highest of them for Kings are commonly called Elohim in holy Scripture and that not only because they are Images of God's Power and Greatness but because they are instruments of his goodness and convey blessings to people so great as justly to be entitled Divine There is a place in the Psalms that I have offen admired and it is pertinent to our present matter 't is Psal 65.7 Who stilleth the raging of the sea and the noise of his waves and the madness or tumult in last translation of the people as if the quieting of people and preserving them in order were as argumentative of a Divinity as the stilling the rage of the sea and that as both bespeak the same Power in effecting of them so the happy consequences bespeak the same goodness And for these reasons all Nations almost in the World have been studious to pay the biggest Honours possible to their Kings nay have thought no mortal honours big enough for them but have ascribed them into the number of their gods and at their death contended for their Apotheosis And this hath been one chief reason of idolatry men thinking they could never enough honour their Princes unless they turned idolators of them which though it were an ill requital
they may never come into the sad circumstances of suffering it themselves But then if there be a great guilt occasioning this evil as Religion teacheth us still to believe for God afflicts not causlesly the sons of men and great judgments never proceed from God but when great sins in men call for them Then indeed the ends of Religion in commending this Sorrow even to Posterity are great and importing For then this may serve as an excellent method to impress on men the greater dread of all such sins and the stricter care to beware of them for so good men set up marks where wracks have been made to give notice that the next Passengers may avoid them And so wise Religion by enjoyning us to bewail the sins of our Fore-fathers doth excellently contrive for the rendring us more heedful of them And yet it will be religious upon another great score i. e. in order to the escaping the punishments due even to the posterity of such great sinners for some sins are of such great guilt and so extreamly facinorous that they cannot be expiated by the punishment of one only Generation and in such cases what is defective in the sufferings of the Fathers will be supplied in the sufferings also of the Children after them and the intayled curse cannot be cut off but by a signal sorrow and eminent repentance But this Discourse will perhaps be more seasonable some Ages hence when innocent Posterity shall be told the story of these things and find our present most just Lamentation written in the Book of Jasher 2. And now I have done with the words in that first sense I proposed to speak to them and shall in hopes of your patience proceed to speak to them something in the second in which I shall not need to be so long as I have been in the former For I no way question but your thoughts have already prevented much of what might be said in the application of them to this day and the sad business of it I shall therefore content my self to tell you that as we have the same thing to lament that David had in the Text so all those reasons that stand strong for the one do so also for the other and as they warrant this Lamentation of his so they will do the same thing for ours For we have the untimely death of a King to lament as well as he and for the same reasons too so that so far we are equal But there are two Circumstances in which our case exceeds this mightily and I name them because they both make our Lamentation more just and needful 1. The first is the great difference between the persons whose deaths are lamented 2. The second is the difference between the persons by whom their deaths were effected 1. There was a great difference between the persons it is not to me a pleasure to rake into the imperfections of any man much less to uncover a Fathers nakedness it is no way becoming to reproach Kings nor strike them with the tongue against whom a secret thought can hardly be innocent I do not intend to advance the Honour of our King upon the ruins of Saul But yet as one Star differeth from another in glory though all be lucid and glorious so though there were many great excellencies considerable in Saul yet it will be no dishonour to his memory to say there were more in our King and which is more these were never sullied by any one known vice as they were in the other I dare not venture at his character nor go about to draw his Image before you lest it should suffer by so rude a hand and lest I should Profane what I purpose to Honour for he that praiseth weakly and imperfectly doth in truth dishonour and disparage It shall therefore suffice me to tell you and I have reason to believe it that whatever was requisite to make him good as a Man and honourable as a King God had bestowed upon him in measures as great as humane imperfection is well capable here of And if one of his glorious Predecessors were Canonized and is remembred to this day under the Honourable Title of Confessor he doth justly deserve the same Glory and will ever be remembred by all good men under the as glorious name of the Holy Royal Martyr 2 But secondly there 's a great difference between the Instruments by which their deaths were effected I do not know how to make any comparison between them unless it be in calling both Amalekites and truly it will concern them to consider if they do not deserve the name and I pray God give them Grace to consider whether the curse of Amaleck be not justly their portion But here is the difference mighty and great Saul fell by the hands of strangers from whom no better things could be expected were it in their power to do it But our Martyr fell by the unnatural violence of his own Subjects from whom all the World might expect better by men who must first offer violence to themselves martyr their own consciences chase all remains of justice and compassion out of their own breasts before they could do this murther and cease wholly to be men that they might commence Devils For truly I do not know how they can expect any better name whom no tyes of Laws no bands of Conscience no Obligations of solemn Oaths can hold or restrain from the greatest of wickednesses If St. Peter were called Satan for but out of a mistaken expression of Love endeavouring to save his Master from running into danger how much more justly must the cursed Iscariot be called Devil for betraying the same Master into that danger But my business is not to upbraid nor aggravate the guilts of these men it is rather to bury them in a Sea of Tears and beg us by our Christian Lamentation and Sorrow to cast a Mantle over them that they may no more come into Gods remembrance And to excite us all to the most passionate doing of this I shall beg the Patience of this Honourable Assembly whilst I endeavour to evinee the becomingness and necessity of it from these four great Christan Topicks 1. The vindicating the Honour of our excellent Religion from any Imputations of being accessary ro this fact 2. The Expiation of that guilt that it may dye the Nation in and prevailing with God for the full pardon of it 3. The prevention of those punishments that yet may be impending for it 4. The deeper impressing a care upon us all to prevent with the greatest concernedness all incidences into the like heinous sin for the future First for the vindicating our Holy and Excellent Religion from any imputations of being accessary to this direful fact And truly among all the sad consequences of this day there are few or none that we should be more concern'd for than the dishonour that seemed to be done to Religon by it and none
desire to be told that we have other sins enough to deserve these and worser Judgements I know it too well and could wish mine eyes fountains of tears to weep for them But then I say it ill becomes penitents in their Humiliations and Mournings not to account for all known sins especially if great and heinous And it is a sad sign when those that would be accounted the only true Mourners in Israel and can be so exact in telling God their other crimes should never think fit to take this into their confessions and yet I am sure they have most cause to do so But because they do not I am sure we should and make up by our repentances and mournings what is wanting in theirs But I have something more to say to these men I suppose they will not be brought to say they suffer'd for this sin before the Restauration They were then indeed those that made others suffer and the sufferings of the King being by them thought too little they were made up in heaping them upon all those who either did or could be pretended to have adhered to him And since that time it seems in these mens account all our sufferings have been for other crimes Therefore according to them this sin hath never been punished at all yet and perhaps they think never must And yet they must either grant it to have been a great sin or else quit Humanity and consequently expect the punishment or by Repentance seek to avert it or else they must quit their claim to Christianity If it be said as I doubt not but it will that our most signal Judgements have been since the Restauration I readily grant it but yet think it a great advantage Indeed till then we were sufficiently punished by these men they made our loads heavy enough and God was pleased in mercy not to make them heavier And therefore since hath only been the time in which these Judgements could well be inflicted Especially if we consider that when the first means were used for the expiation of this guilt and Humiliations appointed to succeed them Then the murmurings of these men began and just like as after the execution upon Corah and his Complices complaints were made that the Lords people were slain and men lost the sense of their former sins and began to contrive how to commit them again So that it was then Gods time to step in and let an unthankful Nation feel his hand and reckon with them for their former dismal great miscarriages And therefore we may thank these mens murmurings and unthankfulness that this sin was so signally and yet is not sufficiently punished And because we have just cause to fear it is not we have as just cause to continue our most passionate Humiliations and Tears if thereby we may propitiate God and prevail with him for a final suspention of what is behind 4. For the deeper impressing upon us all a great care to beware of all future incidences into the same Sins This is the end and this is the effect of all godly sorrow for men do not sorrow in Gods account when they sin and sorrow and sin again but when they so sorrow as to sin no more And to let this days Humiliation have this effect upon us will render it truly Divine and procure Gods gracious acceptation and blessing But without this it will be but pageantry and and add hypocrisie to our other guilts and be but just like the Jews adorning the Sepulchres of the Prophets which their Fathers had slain when themselves retain'd the same Principles and were designing to murther the greatest of all Prophets themselves And truly if we lament the death of the Father and yet retain the same rebellious principles against the Son our very lamentations are but mocking of God aggravating our guilt provoking his anger and the more certainly assuring our own plagues Then only will our tears attone this guilt when they drown and take away those evil lusts that did occasion it And here I cannot but express my sorrow that there is any need to mention these things and certainly it is a wounding reflexion that all our great experiences should be no better improved and should not have long ago superseded all need of any addresses to us of this Nature A man might reasonably think that English men had tasted too largely the bitter effects of rebellion to hanker after it again and experienc'd the great blessings of Loyalty and Subjection so fully as to endear them to it and fix them in it beyond all possibility of being removed And if it be not thus it must needs be very strange But so that sottish people the Jews grew quickly weary of the mild Government of Moses and in their hearts yea and words too returned into Egypt whose bondage they so very lately groaned under and above all things wished deliverance from and it will fix the same reproach of sottishness or something worse upon those men who grow weary and impatient under the golden Scepter of a gracious King and are fond of the Iron Rod of an imperious Usurper To all such I must take liberty to say as Moses did to his people in much what a like a case Do you thus requite the Lord O foolish people and unwise Do you no better know your own mercies Have you so poor a sense of those Miracles of kindness that have blessed you with them Do you wish with the murmuring Jews that you had died in Egypt Take heed of provoking God you may have your wishes too soon But I would fain hope that I am needlesly invective against these things and I am loath to have any thing to accuse my Nation of I would fain in spight of the common proverb suppose them men that are able to apprehend and judge truly of things that do so widely differ And if so it will soon appear a great truth that Loyalty is the interest as well as duty of English men their being true to Monarchy is their happiness as well as their honour past experiences have attested how happy they have been under it and late experiences have demonstrated how impossible it is for them to live under any other Government and then the inference from both these one would think were easie And I cannot but congratulate the happiness of the English Genius in this for it is the just honour and prelation of Monarchy that its safety consists in the wealth and happiness of its Subjects when few instances can be given of any Common Wealths that have flourished much longer than while necessity and poverty were their ligatures and cements and it is the good hap of a people to be so naturally inclined to that which is much their interest and their felicity But I am called this day to speak before this Great City I would therefore crave leave to conclude with a short address to it I do not come to doubt the Loyalty of it
no but to congratulate it rather and I take the so religious observation of this day to be a standing evidence of it And I can no way question but such wise men that have signalized themselves by their prudent Government of this City and preserving Order in it to such measures that no such City in Europe can boast the like and have received just marks of honor for it from a King that can never fail to reward Merit do very well understand their own duty and know how to demean themselves accordingly and will never sully the glory of these actions and the honour gotten by them by any thing unworthy of either It is justly to be hoped that as the late fire hath truly refined this City it rising up in a splendor much greater than was before so that it hath melted down all faeces and dregs of undutifulness that were formerly in the hearts of any of its Inhabitants And that as Justice seems written on your Gates so Lonalty will be the Imbellishments of your Palaces And I am the more confident in my hopes of these things because all considering men will clearly see these three great things to depend upon it and be secured by it 1. The honour and safety of the King 2. The honour and welfare of this City 3. The welfare and quietness of the whole Kingdom all these next to God's blessing will be secured by the Loyalty of this Capital City 1. The honour and safety of the King for as the honour of a King is in the multitude of his Subjects so his safety consists in the love and affection and loyalty of these Subjects and the greater the number of Subjects that are embodied is the more conducive to his safety is the love of them since they can always be more ready as well as able to yield him assistance and to strike despair into any that would attempt against him 2. The honour and welfare of this City it self he that will search into the causes of the decay or ruine of Royal Cities will soon find their separating from their King to be one great one I cannot multiply instances because I have not time of this I shall only beg you to call to your remembrance an instance in our next Kingdom of France it will be hard for any man without tears to read the misery of that City not very long ago but the cause is obvious it was being separated from their King by the Faction of the House of Guise and by the bewitching charms of a Holy League if you will recollect your own miseries in the late times which I have seen some of you weep for you will be able to ascribe it to the same cause effected also by the same means viz. the enchanting Sorcery of a Solemn Covenant Honourable and Beloved this is a great truth the safety of the King depends upon the welfare of this City and the welfare of this City depends upon the safety of the King And if men would look into the truth of things they would soon perceive that their interests are complicated and indeed the same The safety of all Bodies next ever to God's blessing consists in the firm cohesion of its parts And it is true in experience as well as speculation And who ever will trace either the ruine of the King or subsequent misery of this City to their first Origins will soon find the Artifice of some men in separating them from each other effected both And you may see the same things plainly still for these men that design now the same things again do pursue them still by the same method it is here that they first spread their Nets and place their Engins and their disappointment here will cause despair and unsuccesfulness ever to attend their mis-chievous devices And therefore my assurance that I speak to wise men gives me assurance also of their great care still to disappoint these men For as Solomon saith Surely in vain the Net is spread in the sight of any Bird So say I if we permit the same men by the same methods to trapan us again into the same crimes and make us serve to the same evil purposes again we then make our ruine our own guilt as well as our misery and must perish as unpitied fools for ever But God I hope hath reserved us to better purposes and will give us grace to pursue wiser Counsels A few days past have given good hopes that the Genius of the English Nation is recovering it self and your hearty compliance with those great and I hope wise Counsels will be mighty contributive in order to giving effect to these hopes 3. But the effects of your Loyalty will not be confined in so narrow a room but will be extended to the benefit also of all the Kingdom It is you that stamp the practice of all the Nation by your carriage they take their measures and make your Actions their Presidents So that you 'll not only save your selves by your signal Loyalty but you 'll be influential also in saving the many thousands of Israel The seeds of Loyalty sown in this plot of ground will quickly spring up into a Tree whose branches will extend to the distant shores which together with the Royal Cedar will make a Shadow under which your selves and all the Nation may sit safely and sing praises to God chearfully and be happy in the Contemplation of your great Bliss And now I have done but that methinks I see something in the countenances of this Audience which incourageth me not only to beg that you would but prophecy also that you will exercise your selves in these Tacticks sing this Lamentation with such hearty accents of pious sorrow as may reach even to the Throne of God and be accepted by him and prevail with him for pardon of the guilt of the death of the Father and a Blessing to descend upon the head of the Son and that God will graciously please to add those years to the life of this which he was pleased to suffer to be substracted from the life of the other That we will all learn to shoot skilfully in this Bow such Arrows as shall be sharp in the experience as well as midst of the Kings and our Enemies That as English Archers have been renown'd for their Chivalry in earth so they may ever be blessed for their Loyalty in Heaven That all our names may be recorded in the Book of Jasher and be found written in that Book of the Upright and Just Ones at the last day and our portions of Bliss be eternal with theirs in Heaven for ever more Which God of his infinite Mercy grant for Christ Jesus his sake To whom c.