hower it shall be after all such passages I publish this that all men may see That it was not the confidence of conformity with our Principles that was the foundation of our asserting of the Royal Interest that we bottom not our Allegiance upon the comporting of Authority with our Iudgements that subjection is owned to be our duty although we should fall under the most diametral opposition of Civil Laws and Sanctions to our Principles in the things of God that we will give submission to lawful Powers though we should suffer the deepest affliction by lawful Powers which yet we hope we shall never see Subjection to Authority and subjection to Iesus Christ are not things of inconsistencie but where Christian profession is made up more of the dross of self-interest then of the refined Gold of the Sanctuary Sir I humbly beg your Honours Pardon for this accompt You are one of the Healers of our Breaches You are able to take off the Disguise is put upon us by your own knowledge of our Fidelity when the work of the Lord had little else to support it but prayers and tears You may stand as a Mediator in the behalf of the Church for Peace and Reformation and Moderation That God that honours them that honour him fill your heart more and more with his blessed Grace Spirit Your Soul with Peace Your Family with Prosperity Your Life with Comfort and Your Death with Blessedness Your Memorial with the richest Perfumes Your Example with a Crowd of Followers who treading in Your steps may know how to confederate those two Sacred Interests of CAESAR and GOD. Preston Octob. 31. 1660. Your HONOURS most Humble and most Affectionate SERVANT W. C. Noah's Dove WITH Her Olive-Branch ISAIAH 1. 25 26. And I will turn my hand upon thee and purely purge away thy Dross and take away all thy Tinne And I will restore thy Iudges as at the first and thy Counsellors as at the beginning Afterwards thou shalt be called The City of Righteousness The faithful City IN the midst of those Threats which are given forth from God by the Prophet against Israel for the sin thereof these Words do interweave a Promise of Mercie It 's Calvin's observation on the Text That this is a constant method of God in the Prophecies of Judgement to interlineate some comfortable Promise to give some lucida intervalla and that Ne de Ecclesiâ— pror sus actum esse putent ne terroribus fracti animos despondeant left his People should think he hath cast them off a thing which he so much abhors the very apprehension of Rom. 11. 1. lest their hearts should faint under the hopelesness of deliverance And indeed however both the threats against and present seizures of wrath upon a people be lightly esteemed by the Sons of â—elial the seated sinners of this generation whose Brow hath Brass and whose Heart hath Steel enough toward off and rebound from themselves any the most piercing Arrow that is shot from the Prophets if not pointed and sharpened by that penetrating Spirit of the Almighty Yet upon them who tremble at the word of the Lord it works a necessity of some intermixed Cordials And my Text is one That Mercy that signal and capital Deliverance which is promised here and promised to be as the pregnant Womb of many subordinate Blessings which were to have their birth upon the restauration of this of it the Verses I have read give us to observe 1. The manner of its Production how it is brought to pass And 1 therein is remarkable God would bring it about at such a time and that time was the worst of times a time when rational conjecture would have said Neither shall People nor Prince be any more He that shall consider the resolution of the Lord heightned with some vehemencie of passion if I may so speak of that impassible blessed Deity expressed vers 24. and part of this cannot but admire at the connexion of that with this I will ease me of my adversaries I will turn my hand upon thee and I will restore c. Yet thus it is the way of God to disappoint the fears of his People when they are fed with the deepest discouragements to bring out the greatest hopes when Good and Restoring is in the greatest hazard though we cannot make such a coherence and connexion to be sense yet God can make it to be Reason and Experience doth so in the Text and hath done it at this day At the same time when he is iratâ—â—s peccatis he is propitius peccatoribus as á Lapide comments on the Text. When one would think they had been smitten by God with an incurable blow that they were even dropping into the pit and the grave shutting its mouth upon all their glory for ever yet then saith God even then when Hope is lost and Expectation hath groan'd out its last then I will restore thy Iudges as at the first and thy c. 2. God would bring this about by such means in such a way and by the influence of such things and this is further remarkable in the Text. These means are either 1. More remote he would do it by a sore and deep affliction God his easing of himself is the loading of the People with a burden that shall break their hearts and cause the strongest Axletrees of Government to crush in pieces under it the little finger of his displeasure is heavier then the loyns of humane revenge and yet he will lay his hand his whole hand upon them and yet he will do it again and again for so the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imports reducam reversabo manum and the whole is brought in with this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from God Ita fissores lignorum gravem daturi ictum cum gemitu suspirio eum eliciunt the blow shall be so grievous that he himself shall as it were gather up all his spirits to set it home with the greatest violence so grievous that when he doth but mention it he cries out Alas alas and wo unto the people when it falls And yet by this deadly breach the Lord would binde them up A strange course that that Providence which tends in it self to their utter subversion should be appointed to issue in their happy Establishment that God should order that to contribute to their weal which they could expect onely to contribute to their wo. But this is both usual and easie for that God who can bring from evil good from darkness light from the Eater meat and glorious Beings from nothing or from the most indisposed matter He oftentimes saves a soul through the operation of affliction and unsettlement as Petrus de Valdo from whom the Waldenses was converted by a sudden judgement upon one of his Company and therefore no wonder if by it also he can save a State And indeed where the happiness of people is wrapped up
indispensable free Obligations and Oaths of people are fully satisfied What a people may do if free and as the Apostle speaks of a woman loosed from the Law of her husband Rom. 7. by his death which properly cannot be said of the Supreme Magistracy however under a present force is another case but in the interim the intrusion of the greatest persons into that sacred bed is but the ravishment of the people and of such it may be said as in that of Christ to the woman This which thou hast is not thy husband How much the most powerful and fixed sword of usurpation may under all the terrours it keepeth a people under yet lie under the secret disownings nauseatings and disgusts thereof by them I need not open to you whose hearts have been for many years exercised under that affliction and whose many days of prayer and fasting for deliverance have shewn the reality of such dislikes in your own experiences And yet I do not think that the propriety and title of Kings is dependent on the approbation Oathes and Covenants of their people the title of authority being as it was with Israel as it is with us God hath not left a people liberty to carve out the model of their own authority and take it up or cast it off as their own reason or passion shall dictate to them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Plutarch speaks meddle not with them the duty of Allegiance to Supreme powers is not that which hangs upon the unfixed and wavering principles of humane choice for so there should be as many sorts of Kings as Israel had of gods and as many sorts of Governments as distemper'd brains could fancie to themselves The title of Ieroboam was not the better for the unanimous consent of the ten Tribes in that revolt You inherit as much reason to preserve your Princes as you do by descent to possess your Patrimonies And therefore thirdly I will restore thee Princes such as are thine by designation from God whether accepted or not accepted by thee yet if they come with a mission and unction from God in the active and approbative influx of his will this is a mercy for thee not he whom the people shall chuse for the people chose Absalom and outed David chose Ieroboam and rejected the son of Solomon but he whom God shall chuse And lastly I will restore thee Princes that shall be thine as being such as seek not thine but thee such as do possess that honour splendor power and greatness not for themselves but for thee such as seek thy good and not their own greatness thy profit and not their own praise And surely this is a blessing to purpose and then indeed thy Princes may be called thine when their Magistratical interest is wholly for peoples benefit and advantage 3. The last Branch of the mercy I will restore thy Judges as at the first and thy Magistracy as at the beginning This is the upshot of all The Question is to what time the Prophet relates in those expressions at the first and at the beginning It may refer either to that time when Israel began to be a distinct people from the rest of the Nations and grown up to be a considerable body having overgrown the notion of a Family or a Colony only and that was when God fetched them out of Egypt and set them under the Government of Moses and Ioshua after him or when Israel began to be a distinct Kingdom in the time of David and Solomon It is not much material which of these ways you understand it because I conceive the design of the words herein is not so much to point out some exact platform of the kind and sort of Magistracy as it is to hold forth 1. The Qualification of the persons that God doth promise shall weild the Scepter of Authority they shall be such as Moses and Ioshua and David and Solomon 2. The right of such persons to possess the Crown having a respect to that captivity in which the people for seventy years shoul lie under the Tyranny of usurped powers And so the whole of this promise is When I have by afflicting thee purged away the dross of thy sin then I will restore the settlement of Authority in its rightful hands to whom by the institution and appointment of God it appertains and thy Princes shall be such as was Moses and Ioshua and my servant David And then this promise had its full accomplishment in the Government of Ezra Ioshua Zerubbabel and others though not in that fullnesse of outward pomp and glory as before And so much for the second part of the Text. 3. Lastly The words set before you that influence of this mercy upon the people upon the account whereof it is a mercy of so great and precious value Afterwards thou shalt be called a City of righteousness the faithful City In these last words is considerable First What shall be the effect of that Government so restored by God It shall have this influence upon the people that 1. They shall become a City of righteousness and faithfulnesse A City or People in which dwells righteousnesse justice to men holinesse to God truth and faithfulnesse the very face and countenance of such a Government shall cause errour wickednesse prophanesse falsenesse and deceitfulness to wither away what rooting soever it have got in this interregna in this time of the destruction or usurpation of Authority And 2. they shall not only so become but so be called they shall be taken notice of as a people eminent and famous and remarkable for justice truth and holinesse and all this by the influence of such a restored Magistracy And then secondly the words import this to be as the effect and â—ssue of this deliverance as appears in that expression afterwarde when this comes to passe so also the crown and glory and perfection of it This is that in which thou shalt receive the greatest good by 〈…〉 of thy lawful Princes that their Authority shall be influential and successful to make thee become and be called The City of righteousnesse The whole of these words being thus opened I shall set before you out of that abundance which the Text affords onely three Considerations pâ—â—tinent and proper to the occasion of this Thanksgiving and such as will comprehend in them the main importance of the Text. It is a choice and singular mercy to any Kingdom Nation or People when especially after a breach made upon it God doth restore to them such a Government and Authority as was that of Moses Ioshua David and Solomon to his people Israel The work of this day is to triumph in the Lord and his goodness upon this very reason God his restoring our Judges as at the first and our Counsellors as at the beginning And therefore I shall but cast in these Considerations as to the truth of this Observation each of which carries light enough
of all things else together with the mutation and change of Government What such powers and persons do observe may tend to gratifie and please the people or at least the most active stirring and tumultuous part of it for such usually is that part which is the most corruptly principled or may lay the greatest foundations for their own possession of their unjust Authority this is that Pole-Star by which Usurpation steers its course And therefore wo unto thee thou sacred and blessed interest of truth and true Religion when such disseisures are made of lawful Powers who need not the assistance of such cursed contrivances Machiavilian plots and debauched Consciences to support them And no marvel if usurpation be at least the fountain of a boundless toleration since erronious spirits though the most hateful enemies to a just Authority yet are the fastest friends and fittest Instruments for arbitrary Powers as being principled to own or approve any Authority only as it is fitted to countenance and support their way being not of that antient Christian spirit of which Tertullian speaks of fidelity to Princes never so opposite to Christianity Secondly Usurpation in Magistracy brings a snare upon the People as to their obedience and subjection Alas what woful troubles what scruples to Conscience what wracking and tentering of invention and understanding to finde out nice and subtle distinctions and evasions doth this produce for although the imposition and command of sinful and unlawful things be possible to the most approved and sacred powers yet it is generally an inseparable adjunct of any ones violent intrusion into Supremacy as might be proved at large both in profane and sacred story and might be demonstrated from the very interest of usurpation Upon this ground how many both Priests and People were forced either to quit their Conscience or to quit their house and home and all they had you may read in the case of Ieroboam in 2 Chron. 11. 16. And upon this ground in the imposition of Engagements Oaths Fasts and Thanksgivings some in this Congregation what they have suffered know abundantly But besides all this there lies no small difficulty upon the People of God as to obedience of unlawful Powers in even lawful things what conflicts of the soul betwixt the goodness and necessity of the action on the one hand inducing and perswading to the acting of it and betwixt the illegality of the Power that commands it on the other hand and the unwillingness of any sober spirit to do even good it self to the strengthening of the hands and claim of violence for my part I shall wish we may rather never have occasion to be put to experience and try then any more to be exercised under such temptations But such is the fate and state of usurped Powers as to the case of people Thirdly Usurpation in Magistracy deprives a people of the liberty and opportunity of discharging their real and their confessed duty to their lawful Prince and Soveraign Surely Christians this is no small affliction Princes and legal Powers when under bondage banishment or other separation from their people may look with a troubled eye upon them but alas the people themselves do feel no less affliction and smart in that divorce then they It is as irksome to a Christian people to be forced from their lawful Powers as it is for them to be forced from their people I know no interest that hath deeper impression upon the Conscience and Spirit of the People of God under and below their devotion to God himself and the happiness of their precious souls then their reverence and obedience affection and fidelity to the majesty of their Prince And however the misunderstandings or other fatal providences betwixt them and their lawful Princes may sometimes by the righteous judgment of God as it hath lately been with us produce the distance of each from other yet when the honest and rational ends of men have been abused to the injury and wrong of the Supreme Authority it is not unobserved by every common understanding how much those rapes and violences have sat upon the spirits of the godly in this Land to their deep affliction and grief and the producing of those fervent frequent Fasts and Prayers which have been answer'd from heaven as we now see Whilest a People therefore have so much of grace godliness and fidelity left as not to prostitute themselves to the lust of usurpation and not to take a present suspension of their political husbands power and presence for a dissolution of their matrimonial bond and liberty to admit Invaders into that Virgin undefiled Bed which is a more gross Adultery then that of a Wife from her Husband unless endured by force and ravishment I say whilst this is so what can we imagine of such a People in such dismal violent separations but that they sit solitary as a Widow that hath none to comfort her When it shall be Treason Death Destruction what not so much as to Preach or Pray for their natural Lords nay to mention their very Names with any mark of honour respect or reverence Fourthly Usurpation in Magistracy commonly proves the extirpation of the Ministry in Christian States and Kingdoms amongst a People that worship the true God This is visible enough under the Tyranny of Ieroboam 2 Chron. 11. 14. wherein the Levites either left their possessions or lost their integrity and flock'd in such numbers to Ierusalem from all their Cities I know it is possible for the Ministers of Christ to lie under deep affliction even under lawful Powers and although we are active and laborious to promote the resettlement of his sacred Majesty a thing of so indisputable an obligation upon us all yet we are not without the pre-conception and foresight of the evil use which evil men may make of this deliverance to vassallize and persecute the dearest of the Truths Ordinances and Interests and Ministers of Jesus Christ. Yet in usurped Powers there lies a kind of fatal necessity of persecution against such For besides that obligation which lies upon usurped Powers to serve the satisfactions of such a Clergy as have been the Stirrâ—p to help them to mount the Saddle of Authority the very truth of God which is and ought to be in the mouth of his faithful Prophets that be sure never speaks good of or to either wicked or usurping Princes is a continual torture and vexation to their spirits a continual dissettlement and disquiet to their Power I know the intermeddling of us with matters of State hath been mightily cried against as a thing out of the Commission of the Ministers of the Gospel as if we were not as well to Preach against the sins of great as small of Powers as of the People under them When Ieroboam had set up his Idols the Prophet and he was sent of God cried out to his face against his Idols and Idolatry Oh Altar Altar 1 King 13. Although