no warning either from the sonne of God or by the calamities of their brethren Now if any amongst us be as great hypocrites as they were they bee as grievous sinners as guilty of Christs bloudy death and liable to as grievous punishments either in this life or in the life to come as they were A Pharisaicall hypocrite none can be unlesse his soule bee so wedded to some branches as hee conceives them of holy doctrine or zeale to Gods word that he would rather suffer his soule and body to be dissolved then be divorced from his opinions That will not be ready as opportunity serves to persecute all such even unto death as will not comply with him or maintaine his faction And this kind of hypocrisie alwaies presupposeth some other sinnes which breed it alwaies include some other sins or errors which feed and strengthen it That error which breeds hypocrisie is a zealous desire to be extreamly contrary in all or most points unto them whom they undoubtedly know to contradict the truth as well in some opinions as practises Satan may instill other erroneous opinions into his scholars and yet must be inforced to play the sophister before hee can draw them to admit of his intended conclusions that is lewd or wicked practises but if he can once insinuate immature perswasions or strong presumptions of their irreversible estate in Gods favour hee needs no help of Sophistry to inferre his intended conclusions This antecedent being swallowed hee can inforce the conclusion by good Logicke by rules of reason more cleere then any Syllogisme can make it then any philosophicall or mathematicall demonstration For it is an unquestionable rule of reason presupposed to all rules of Syllogisme◠or argumentations that an universall negative may bee simply converted as if no man can be a stone then no stone can be a man the rule is as firme in divinity that if no hypocrite no envious or uncharitable man can enter into the Kingdome of heaven then no man that must enter into the Kingdome of heaven that is irreversibly ordained to eternall life can bee an hypocrite can be an envious or uncharitable man Whence againe it will cleerely follow that if the former opinions concerning mens personall or nationall irreversible estate in Gods favour have possessed mens soules and braines before its due time albeit they doe the selfe same things that rebels doe that hypocrites that envious or uncharitable men doe yet so long as this opinion stands unshaken they can never suspect themselves to be rebellious to be hypocrites or uncharitable That which indeed and in the language of the holy ghost is rebellion will bee favourably interpreted to be the liberty of concience in defence of Gods lawes envy hatred and uncharitablenesse towards men will goe current for zeale towards God and true religion To illustrate or confirme these observations touching the originall Symptomes of pharisaicall hypocrisie by the example practice of these Iewes according to the order in which they have been now proposed The first originall was in the overprising of the rigid reformation of their forefathers prophanesse Their father 's worshipped stocks and stones the images or statues of heathen Gods these latter sought to bee so extreamly contrary to the heathen or to the practises of 〈◊〉 forefathers in this particular that they would 〈…〉 any civill use of pictures and their unrelenting zeale to maintaine this rigid reformation was the originall of that rebellion wherein they perished after they had continued it seventy yeares more or lesse For Herod the great having erected a golden eagle upon the wals of the Temple not with purpose to have it adored but in testimony of his gratitude and alleageance to the Roman Emperour some of their Rabbins or great masters did teach their schollars to deface it though they dyed for it and death in this holy quarrell was accounted Martyrdome Afterwards they were pressed to admit a statue of the Roman emperour in their Temple but not urged as I take it to adore it And this did blow the coales of former dissention and was the originall of that finall rebellion under Nero. Now if they had not apprehended this rebellion as an holy warre or had not affected to become Martyrs in defence of true religion they might easily have deprecated this eye-sore or grievance at the Roman deputies hands as the wiser sort of them sometimes had done But howsoever these latter Iewes almost from the time of their returne from Babilon did increase the measure of their forefathers grosser sinnes by too nice and rigid reformation of them and added pharisaicall hypocrisie unto them as a new disease of the soule scarce heard of before yet this hypocrisy though epidemicall to this Nation had not the strength to bring forth that monster of uncharitablenesse which did portend the ruine of this mighty people untill they were invaded by the Romans For from the time that this Nation was brought into subjection by Pompey the great their Church-governours did allow and appoint dayly sacrifices to be offered for the peace and tranquillity of the Roman empire and security of the emperours But a little before the fulfilling of this prophecy in my text there arose a sect which did condemne this custome after an hundred yeares continuance as unlawfull as contrary to the Law of God as a pollution of the Temple And it is a point observable by such as read the history of Iosephus that of all the iregularities or prodigious villanies committed in the Temple during the time of the siege as the tumultuous deposition of their high Priests and murther of them and others of better place the faction surnamed by themselves the Zealous were the chiefe Authors and a betters The fruit of this their blind and misguided zeale was to misinterpret the murther of their brethren which would not comply with them in their furious projects to bee the best service the only sacrifice then left to offer unto God for the daily sacrifice of beasts did cease for want of provision they having plenty or sufficiency of nothing but of famine Now to parallel the sinnes of our Nation of this present generation specially with the sinnes of the latter Iewes As for sinnes against the second table no man of unpartiall understanding or experience can deny that wee farre exceed them unlesse it bee for murther only disobedience to parents to magistrates adultery fornication theft false witnesse-bearing and coveting their neighbours goods are farre more rife amongst us then they were or could be amongst them at least in the practice The keene edge of some few give us occasion to conjecture what the bloudy issue of misguided zeale would be could it once get as strong a back as it had in these Iewes when there was no King in Israel or in that Anarchy wherein every one did that which was pleasing in his owne eyes Againe no man not surprized with a Iewish slumber but may cleerly see how
us For the unerring eye of his all-seeing providence and omnipotently stedfast hand by which he wields the scales of justice would not have suffered his consuming wrath to come any nearer to us then we were come unto the full measure of our iniquity 10 The first thing which then was or now is to be enquired after is what were the extraordinary and speciall sinnes which drew Gods iudgements so neare upon us These were not the cruelty of lawes enacted against professors of that religion which these traitors professed as they as foolishy as impiously alleadge nor was the negligence or connivence of such as were put in trust with the execution of these lawes the cause of the iudgement then threatned as some others out of misguided zeale suspect Of such negligence or omission or of whatsoever else may give any advantage to the adversaries of our peace and religion there were some positive causes in our selves God only knowes how many but of these we cannot but take notice which the Prophet Micah expresseth or some like unto them as sacriledge oppression and bribery in the layty Simony and time-serving in the Clergy luxury prophanenesse and hypocrisie in both Now when the professors of true religion shall give undoubted proofe of their constant and impartiall zeale against these foule enormities or for enquiring after the most enormous delinquents in all these kindes there will bee good hope that the lawes already enacted or projected against idolatry against superstition and false religion shall have their wished successe But suppose that upon the occasion or opportunity which these idolatrous miscreants had in a manner thrust into the hands of our law-makers the suppression of idolatry and superstition throughout this land had been more exact and more compleat then that which Hezekiah in the beginning of his raigne had wrought in Judah Was there any probability that those other diseases which Micah mentions would have beene one jot abated any likely-hood that the most amongst us would not have learned that song or ditty by heart is not the Lord now amongst us or the Antiphony unto it would have been no evill can come upon us Other grosse exorbitancies usually come within the stroake of the civill sword and lye open to the execution of wholesome lawes but for snipping this secret hypocrisie or presumptuous leaning upon the Lord though in the professors of true religion the severest execution of wholesome lawes or exercise of the civill sword hath no force or dint the cure of this disease properly belongs unto the Divine and the method to cure it is contrary to the ordinary course of law or physicke wee must breake a generall custome of this people and teach them not to rare their affections unto truth by their opposition unto false-hood not to measure their zeale and love to true religion by their hatred of false religion These be the very rootes of that hypocrisie or presumption which Micah so deeply taxeth in the state of Iudah the chiefe ingredient in the leaven of the Pharisees But lest more of this people should slide into an errour too common unto many as if such a reformation of religion as they affect would acquit or secure the state and kingdome from all danger of Gods threatned judgements let us here behold the severity and mercy of our gratious God Mercy I say towards us and severity towards our brethren professors of reformed religion in neighbour nations whom he hath of late subiected to the enemies sword and other calamities of warre for what transgression in particular hee only knowes but surely not for those transgressions which some out of discontented zeale conceive to be the only cause of his displeasure against this nation whensoever any crosse or calamity befals themselves for no man can suspect those foraine Churches which he hath visited of late were deepely guilty either of connivance to superstition or to much favouring Arminianisme However the righteous Lord by chastising them doth fore-warne us to examine and judge our selves and if we find no other causes or probable occasions to feare the approach of the like Iudgements upon our selves yet even this alone will in the day of visitation make a great addition to our generall accompt that we did not humble our selves with feare and trembling whilst the Lord did humble and correct them whilst his hand was heavy upon such of our nation as were sent abroad for their succour Our consciences will one day accuse us when wee shall have occasion to seeke the Lord that we have not for the yeares late past besought his goodnesse with greater feare and devotion to remoove the rod of his wrath from them But did the Lord in this interim direct no messengers of his wrath unto us within our own coasts Did mortality and famine only follow the campe abroad or townes besieged in other nations The famine Gods name be praised for it hath not for many yeares beene either universally spread throughout this land or extraordinary grievous upon any greater portion of it and yet hath left so deepe impression in some native members of this great body as may evidently convince the rest of great stupidity in not sympathizing more deepely with them And stupidity or dulnesse in any member whilst other suffer is an infallible Symptome of a dangerous disease oft-times a certaine prognosticke of death and hee were but an indocile Christian that could not by those knowne calamities which much people of this land have suffered from this messenger instruct himselfe how easie it is for the righteous Iudge to bring such calamity upon this kingdome by this messenger alone as would move even the most malicious and cruell enemies that we have had to bemoane our case although we were fully assured of a constant peace with all other neighbour-nations that have any power or ability to annoy us by the sword or any practice of hostility Rome in her growth in her height of greatnesse and in her declining dayes had received many grievous wounds was subiect in all estates to fearefull calamities and disasters yet never in such a lamentable and ruefull plight as the famine had brought her to if wee may iudge of her inward griefe either by her bitter outcries or by the deiected and gastly dresse in which one of her sonnes then living hath set her forth Si mea mansuris meruerunt moenia nasci Iupiter auguriis si stant immota Sibillae Carmina Tarpeias si nec dum despicis arces Advenio supplex non ut proculcet Oaxen Consul ovans nostraeve premant pharetrata secures Susa nec ut rubris aquilas figamus arenis Haec nobis haec antè dabas nunc pabula tantùm Poscimus ignoscas miserae pater optime genti Extremam defende famem satiavimus iram Siqua fuit lugenda Getis flenda Suëvis Hausimus ipsa meos horreret Parthia casus After a solemne resignation of all clayme title or interest to all former victories
or wonted triumphes shee takes upon her the beggers garbe and becomes an humble suppliant for bread and for that not in iust competency but in such a measure as might asswage or prevent extremity of hunger of which shee had suffered so much as shee thought would have given full satisfaction either to her ancient and inveterate foes or to the most malignant of her moderne enemies enough as shee thought to have drawne sighes from the barbarous Getes or to have wrung teares from the mercilesse Swab or to have cast Parthia her selfe into a swoon so shee might have beene a spectatour of her ruefull and tragicall plight yet all this evill came upon her not by observation it was not preventible by any forecast or policy besides that which Ezekiah here uses this would have sufficed so it had beene practised in time But it is not the representation of that which hath befallen others long since or may hereafter befall our selves which will so much affect us as the recognition of that which we our selves have formerly suffered It will not then I hope be unseasonable to put you in minde how in these later times whilst neighbour nations addresse their Embassadors to to this court either to condole the death of our Soveraignes or to congratulate our ioy for the happy continuance of royall succession there still hath come one unwelcome or unexpected Embassador either with them or before them to this people And however he seeme to plead for the grave yet his message is from heaven and for our peace though he find audience for the most part with needy sicke or dying men yet his instructions are principally directed to the living and potent amongst us and the tenure of them is in effect thus thinke you that those whom the Lord hath wounded with his poisonous arrowes were greater sinners then your selves or that they have suffered more then they have deserved I tell you nay but except yee repent yee shall all likewise perish unlesse you prepare your hearts to meet the Lord while hee is on the way a greater plague then the plague of pestilence is comming against you Yet hath that plague beene twice in our memory more fearefull then in the daies of our forefathers To omit that great mortality which was almost universall throughout this land about twenty seaven yeares agoe The calamities which followed upon the 2d arrivall or returne of this Embassadour about 5 yeares agoe did leave a live print or character of that feare by which the Prophet Amos describes the day of the Lord. Amos. 5. v. 18. 19. The day of the Lord saith he is darknesse and not light as if a man did flye from a Lion and a Beare met him and went into the house and leane his hand on the wall and a Serpent bit him Many fled from the great city as a man would flye from a Lion and thought themselves safe if they could get into a ship for some other port but sped no better then if they had met with a Beare death being as ready as they were to imbarque it selfe as a passenger for every port authorized to execute his commission as well by sea as by land others comming to the shore were more harbourlesse in the wished for haven then if they had committed themselves to the mercilesse waves of the sea which way soever they tooke their case was like unto a stricken deare haeret lateri letalis arundo They could not shift aside from Gods arrow which still tooke up some vitall part for his marke Some after their arrivall in their native soyle wandred without companions to support them in their weaknesse and lastly dyed in the fresh and open aire without that comfort which the infected places from which they fled might have afforded them without consorts in their sighes and grones without such mutuall expressions of griefe as Sympathy of nature brings forth in the beastes of the field But amongst the wofull spectacles which the calamity of those times presented none me thinkes more apt to imprint the terrour of Gods iudgements deeper then to have seen men otherwise of undaunted spirits men whom no enemies lookes or braggs could afright afrayd to hold parley with their native countrey-men that came unto them with words of love and peace more agast to embrace their dearest friends or nearest kinsfolks then to graspe an adder or a snake The plague of pestilence is above all other diseases catching and such as have beene most observant of it's course tell us men of covetous mindes or unseasonably greedy of gaine are usually soonest caught by it though exposed to no greater or more apparent visible danger then others are The course which this messenger of death observes if these mens observation of it be true may leade our conjecture to one speciall cause why it was sent amongst us with such large commission surely if in the daies of health and peace it had not beene usuall for one neighbour to prey upon another and to verifie the saying homo homini lupus the neighbour-hood and presence of men of the same nation and profession would not have become more terrible unto others then if their habitations had beene amongst Wolves or Lions or other ravenous creatures But to what end soever this fearefull messenger was sent amongst us the tenor of his message either was not well understood or is not perfectly remembred And for this reason his commission hath beene renewed of late in the times of our hopes and joy for the continuance of royall succession in a straight line But Gods name be ever blessed who hath hitherto so tempered his judgements with mercy that we have more just cause of joy and thanksgiving for the birth of one then of sorrow for the death of many Yet let not this I beseech you abate our feare of future judgements or occasion us to thinke that the Lord either hath repented or will repent of the evill which hee hath so often threatned whereof he hath given this land and people so many warnings untill wee bring forth better fruites of our repentance then hitherto wee have done That thus we may doe let us pray continually to the Lord that hee would teach us to feare as Hezekias did that he would teach us to pray as Hezekias did As for him hee is the same Lord still the same loving Father to us that he was to Iudah and cannot forget to repent whensoever wee shall truly turne unto him Convert us O Lord we shall be converted IER 26. 19. And the Lord repented him of the evill which he had pronounced against them Thus might we procure great evill against our soules THIS is the resolution of a controversie debated from the beginning of this chapter vnto this place between the Priests the Prophets and the people and the Princes of the land whether the Prophet Ieremy were to be put to death for saying the Lord would make his temple like Shiloh and the
forbid yea our Saviour who is both our Lord and God hath in my text forbidden us to passe the like censure either upon them or upon any in after ages on whom the like judgements have beene visibly executed That the men of Bethshemesh did grievously sinne in looking into the arke of God no Christian can no Iew doth deny But that they were more grievous sinners in this than a great part of men Christians by profession are in this our age none but an Hypocrite will affirme Leaving their persons to be judged by God this their particular sinne is more than doubled by all such as having neither lawfull calling nor abilities to discerne sacred mysteries will take upon them not only to looke into the arke of God but to determine of his covenant of life and death that is of election and reprobation the very grammaticall notion of which termes they understand not As for the sinne of Vzzah it was for nature and quality the very same as if a parish clearke in our dayes should intrude himselfe into a Deacons office as if a Deacon should usurpe the function of a Presbyter or a Presbyter the office of a Bishop Now the delinquents in both these kinds are at this day more than tenne to one in comparison of the men of Bethshemesh to all the men of Iudah or in comparison of Vzzah to all the Levites of his time which were not guilty of like sinnes in particular The judgments which God did shew upon the men of Bethshemesh and upon Vzzah though extraordinary were yet judgements tempered with mercy For God in thus punishing them did forewarne all posterity not to trespasse in the like kind as they did lest a more grievous punishment either in this life or in the life to come doe befall them For as our Apostle 1. Cor. 10. 6. in the like case saith all these were our examples But many in this last age more than in any age since our Saviour dyed and more in this kingdome than in any one Kingdome under heaven have palpably transgressed after the manner of Vzzah and the men of Bethshemesh May we hence therefore conclude that these men are more grievous sinners than any others of this age or Nation which have not transgressed in particular after these mens example No the Lord hath forbidden us to passe this censure or judgement upon them Such as are most free from these presumptuos sinnes must ever remember that they have often grievously transgressed the Law of God in some one kind or other All of us must lay that saying of our Saviour to heart unlesse wee repent wee shall all likewise perish But though this place prohibites rash censure and judgment upon particular sinners may not wee which are Gods embassadors pronounce the like universall sentence which our Saviour here doth against all the inhabitants of Galilee and Ierusalem with the same limitation against this or any other Christian Nation except yee repent yee shall all perish after the same disastrous manner that the Iewish Nation did I tell you nay this is beyond our commission beyond our instructions whom God hath appointed for his embassadors Our Saviour himselfe hath put in a caveat against all such presumptuous conjectures or pretended divinations The calamities and distresses of Galilee and Ierusalem of the whole Iewish Nation were so generall and so tragicall as no Nation since the beginning of the world had suffered the like no other shall suffer the like unto the worlds end But then all Nations unlesse they repent shall perish after a more fearefull and visibly disastrous manner than Galilee and Ierusalem did But may wee not in the meane time say that these Galileans and inhabitants of Ierusalem in whom this prophecy in my text was literally fulfilled were sinners above all other Nations or generations in the world because they suffered such things as no other Nation or generation had either suffered or shall suffer unto the worlds end I tell you nay But this present generation of the Iewes did put our Saviour the sonne of God the God of their forefathers to an ignominious death And this was the most grievous sinne quoad speciem for its specificall quality that could be committed A sinne that could not bee committed againe for he was to dye but once death hath no more dominion over him But though the sonne of God could dye but once yet many this day living may bee as guilty of his death as Iudas or Pilat as the most malitious amongst the chiefe Priestes the Scribes and Pharises were Or admit that those Iewes were more deeply guilty of our Saviours bloud than any generation since yet hee that would hence inferre his death to have beene the chiefe or only cause of all the calamities which be fell that present generation of the Iewes wherein he dyed should only proue himselfe to be more skilfull in laying the charge then in making the iust exoneration he should shew-himselfe to be but halfe an accoumptant but of this elsewhere But in what sense soeuer the putting our Saviour to death was the cause of Ierusalem's destruction yet this particular sinne in putting our Saviour to death was not the sinne or any part of the sinnes of which they are forewarned by our Saviour to repent for this sinne was not as yet committed nor so much as thought upon by those Galileans whose bloud Pilat mingled with their sacrifices or by those eighteene upon whom the tower in Siloe fell And no question but these men did perish for such sinnes as the Nation was for the most part guilty of and were forewarned of by exemplary punishments inflicted upon these Galileans The persecution of our Saviour was but a Symptome of those other sinnes of whose deadly issue without repentance they were forewarned by these and the like signes of the time The reason why they hated the light of the world after hee had done so much good unto them was because their deeds were evill Joh. 3. v. 19. And this is the condemnation that light is come into the world and men loved darknesse rather then light because their deeds were evill What then were those capitall sinnes whereof they were warned in particular such in the first place was their present rebellious disposition for which sinne in particular these Galileans did thus perish But was this all No it is one thing to be rebellious another to bee unrelentingly rebellious This unrelentance presupposeth some other fouler sin then rebellion As what Hypocrisie specially when our Saviour upbraids them with this title of Hypocrisie as when he saith Luk. 12. v. 54. Mat. 16. Yee Hypocrites yee can discerne the face of the skie and of the earth how is it that yee cannot discerne the signes of the time His speech implies that their hypocrisy was the chiefe cause why they did not discerne the signes of the time Why they were so unrelentingly rebellious against God and man that they would take