come to call me to an Account Wo is me I have not minded a God more 2. It serves for our Conviction not only of being sinful but of Sin 's being rooted in us and reigning over us When God fills a Land with Prodigies it argues it guilty of Atheistical Unbelief carnal Security Earthly-mindedness Hard-heartedness and meer Formalness in Religion For 1st God doth nothing in vain he doth not use extraordinary Means when ordinary Means can prevail Isa 5.4 What could have been done more to my Vineyard that I have not done in it I have used all ordinary means of Conviction and Conversion but yet they remain Covetous Por their Work is to joyn House to House They remain profane for they rise early to follow strong Drink they remain hypocritical therefore follows prodigious and extraordinary Methods Their Hills shall tremble and their Carcases shall be torn in the Streets After the same manner and with the very same People doth Christ deal in his time Matth. 11.17 They would neither dance to Piping nor would they lament to Mourning therefore prodigious Judgements destroys the People and lays their City desolate 2ly We find all these People toward whom God used miraculous Dispensations to have been an unbelieving carnal secure People We find three Seasons of Prodigies Moses's time Christ's time and Elijah's time in all of which we have the evident Discoveries of the most rude heard-hearted People that ever was on the Earth after their safe Passage through the Red Sea it is said The People feared the Lord and believed him But it is added They soon forgat his Word Ezek. 16. They were as unteachable as New-born Babes that were neither salted nor swadled 1 Cor. 14.22 Signs are only given for them that believe not hence God did not work Miracles in bringing his People out of Babylon as he did in bringing them out of Egypt 4ly If all Punishment suppose Sin extraordinary Punishment presupposes extraordinary Guilt One of these two we must conclude when God exerciseth a Land with extraordinary Prodigies that all Sin is very vile and hateful in his sight which a carnal Sinner is very unwilling to believe seeing a pure eternal Mind only in the spotted Glass of his own corrupt Mind Or we must conclude that there is a great deal of Sin in us when we see a God of all Grace and all Consolation a Father of Mercies whose very Being is Love unto whose natural Actions Judgement is a Foreign thing to see such an one Thundering in his Power from Heaven and stamping in his Anger upon the Earth untill the Dust of his Footstool ful the Air with Clouds When we see him either visibly threatning by Prodigies and only beating the Ground before us with his Rod of Iron or more surprizingly punishing us as he did Corah Dathan and Abiram we cannot but conclude we have highly offended him An Instance of the latter kind we have heard of with Terror from Jamaica and one of the former we have gently felt according to God's usual Method of patient and merciful dealing with England We have usually but some drops of the Hail that destroys our Neighbours the Rod is but shaken over our Heads while their Backs are severely smitten he deals with us as a Father with his Children to let the Blow fall on the Ground that he seem'd to level at our Face While we behold these things and consider the Nature of God we cannot but conclude Sin is a very evil thing or that we are very guilty 3d Vse That prodigious Presages serve for is to raise our Expectations about great future Judgments or Mercies 1st It puts us in expectation of the great Day of Judgment an Earthquake being one of it's Forerunners Rev. 16.18 Luke 21.26 There are considerable Reasons to perswade us of the Nighness of it tho' we know not the Year or the Day 1. Because the New Heaven and Earth which is to be the Foundation of that long look'd for 1000 years is to come after the Dissolution of the World by Fire 2 Pet. 3.7 The Heavens and the Earth which are now are reserved unto Fire against the Day of Judgment and perdition of ungodly Men ver 13. Nevertheless we look for a new Heaven and a new Earth wherein dwelleth Righteousness Rom. 8.21 The Creature it self also shall be delivered from the Bondage of Corruption into the glorious Liberty of the Sons of God So the Day of Judgment is nearer by a 1000 Years than many expect 2. The Day of Judgment seems partially to begin with the utter ruine of Antichristianism 2 Thes 2.8 The Lord shall destroy him with the brightness of his coming Rev. 19.3 Before the Marriage Supper of the Lamb it is said Her smoak rose up fir ever and ever ver 20. The Beast and the false Prophet are to be cast alive into the Lake of Fire burning with Brimstone Dan. 7.12 After the Body or Nation of the Beast is given to the burning Flame Greece and Asia with it's Inhabitants continue preserved though without Dominion until Christ's everlasting Dominion begins which is the second coming without Sin unto Salvation 3. After the Rise of the Witnesses there is but only one Woe to come and one Trumpet to sound Rev. 10.7 The Angel swore that there should be Time no longer but in the Days of the Voice of the 7th Angel 2ly It ought far more to put us in Expectation of the great Revolutions that must be before then Earthquakes also being Forerunners of them as we see in the Text and ver 19. in the opening of the Temple There are Seven Great Kevolutions at hand 1. The Rise of the Witnesses 2. A plentiful Effusion of the Spirit 3. The Reformation of a Nation or Kingdom 4. A great Military Slaughter of Persons or Civil Death of Papal Dignities 5. An utter Ruine of the Turkish Empire which is a passing away of the Second Woe 6. The Conversion of the Jews which is to be by the coming of the third Woe or drying up the River Euphrates by the Sixth Vial. Lastly The persecuting Arm of the Beast broken though his Life shall be longer continued 3ly It may put all impenitent Sinners whose Reformation neither ordinary means nor such extraordinary has produced in far more certain expectation of dreadful Punishments For 1. No impenitent Nation under such ordinary and extraordinary means continuing impenitent ever escaped Destruction Pharaoh and his Kingdom can witness this The Jews God's own peculiar People can also witness this Matth. 11. John 10. They would not be perswaded by the Miracles and prodigious Signs Christ wrought therefore he brought prodigious Desolations upon them and they remain Prodigies to this Day scattered like the quartered Members of Rebels against their King and preserv'd separate from all the Nations where they dwell that they may be the more visible 2. The God that has Power and cannot lie has sentenc'd utter Ruine for their Lot Because they regard not
the worse if Man had not altered his Allegiance That a most solid Body 7000 Miles thick should be shaken like a Rod and shattered like a tottering Fence is a prodigious Work of God Thirdly There is the supreme and principal Cause GOD he was angry his Nostrils his Mouth the very Pagans own this who ascrib'd sometimes to one God sometimes to another Hence Neptune is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when they think the Water is the Mean of it They who ascribe it to the Fire call all second Causes Vuldan's Tools Ferrum exercebant vasto Cyalopes in Antro Brontesque Steropesque nudils membra Pyrachmon They who ascribe it to the Wind call Aeolus it's Author Aeolus hic Clauso ventorum carcere regnat It is a great Argument against Seneca's Christianity and true Piety too that discoursing of Earthquakes he says Illud quoque proderit presumere animo nihil horum Deos facere nec ira numinum aut Coelum aut Terram concuti It will be our certain Advantage to take it for granted that God is neither Author of Thunder nor Earthquakes But we have a more sure Word of Prophesie that saith God is he who removeth the Mountains and they know not who overturneth them in his Anger who shaketh the Earth out of her place and the Pillans thereof tremble Job 9.6 Also Nahum 1.5 The Mountains quake at him and the Hills melt and the Rocks are thrown down by him So Psal 97.3 c. Reason also assents and says Amen to Scripture 1. From it 's own Weariedness in the greatest Philosphers in it's searching after another Cause The usual Return is Non est inventus We do not know after all Seneca's great Search in his Old Age and second Attempt upon the Earthquake in Campania He brings forth Six May Be 's at a Breath 2. From the greatness of the Effect A moving of that which has the whole Heavens pressing it down and 3000 Miles of Foundation solid as Marble to support it and the greatness of God's Concern in the various Effects of its 3. From the Irregularness as to Time Place Manner or Mean We must either put it under the Conduct of Divine Wisdom or set up Fortune or Chance for another God A gradual Preparation of the very Entrails of the Earth for the Conflagration of the Earth at the great Day does not prove the Orderliness of the Progress For when the Caverns are widened by Earthquake it 's done violently and not gradually So when burning Mountains Sulphureous Lakes Oleous Springs take their Rise it is not by little and little but a powerful Violence 4. It is such an immediate and extraordinary Judgement or Mercy that Reason presently attributes it to the Sovereign Distributer of Rewards and Punishments Hence he sets forth himself in his Word as an immediate Disposer of all those Meteors wherein the Comfort or Ruine of our Life very immediately does consist He is the Father of the Rain and he begets the Drops of Dew The Clouds are his Bottles at his Voice they are open He has Treasures for Snow and Hail he parts the Light and scatters the Wind Job 38. Psal 147. He has his Coals and Furnaces in the Earth Psal 18.8 3ly The Means by which he does it Smoak Fire and Coals If according to our new Philosophers Scripture speaks in things Natural according to the commonly received Opinion of that Time it was wrote in they lose the Honour of New Invention who say the Cause is an Exhalation or a Wind in some Cavern of the Earth penn'd up and rarify'd by the heat of some Sulphureous or combustible matter kindled by accidental Motion which they illustrate by their Copper Globe for this is very Old Philosophy But no doubt the Second Causes or Means are as various as the Forms or Effects though the Variety of the one does not always flow from the Variety of the other 1. Some as Thales think the Earth a great Ship sailing in a vast unknown Ocean either meeting with a cross Wave is disturb'd in it's easie Motion or by it's Weight so presses down the Water that it pierceth through it's Chinks and Crevices and disturbs the Burden or Loading of the Vessel yea breaks forth into great Rivers from the very tops of Mountains 2. Others impute it only to that last Branch viz. The Rivers and Lakes within the Body of the Earth from whence our Rivers above Ground rise These Rivers sometimes leaving their sormer Channel or over-swell'd with Water break down their Banks which produces a Motion in the Earth above them 3. Some Copernicans and others also think the Earth a great Animal and that an Earthquake is a Fever or a Fit of Vapours by which it is distemper'd which may be allow'd metaphorically Rom. 8.22 The whole Creation roaneth and travaileth in pain waiting for the Manifestation of the Sons of God So it is like a Pang of a Travailing Woman in order to the Birth of a New Earth 2 Pet. 3.4 Straton and his Followers call it a Fight between Cold and Heat Hence they are frequent in Spring and Autumn at which time these Particles pass by one another on the outward Crust of the Earth 5. Very many call it a Wind penn'd up And Histories record Wind to have blown out of it's Eruptions and Gulphs that it has made for several Days as it did at Chalcis according to Seneca out of Asclepeadotus and also at Herculea in Pontus Moreover great Winds are frequent after though we know not their Passage and a Calmness usually precedes them Which is a very plausible Account adding Heat to rarifie the Vapour Psal 135.7 He causeth the vapours to ascend from the ends of the Earth he maketh Lightnings for the Rain he bringeth the Wind out of his Treasuries And this he doth in the Seas and all deep places Job 38.24 By what way is the Light parted which scattereth the East Wind upon the Earth 6. Some impute it to Old Age Terra superna tremit magnis concussa rui nis Subter ubî ingentes speluncas subruit Aetas As in old Buildings when there is more Weight above than Strength in the Pillars below occasions either a rebounding Fall from some Rock or some surrounding trembling from a Lake 7. Some to a great Mass of Chymical Spirits fetter'd in some mashy matter like the Distillers Tunn or in some close Cave where the Pores are too narrow for the Particles 8. Vanhelmont refers it to an Eccentration of the Earth but then all Earthquakes should be universal which is both contrary to Scripture and Experience The Effect is solvable by most of these as Means by none as total Cause especially universal ones For if the Caverns be but half a Mile or a Mile deep an Earthquake of an Hundred Miles is impossible without vast Eruptions 2. The removing of Mountains leisurely for two or three Miles space The contemplative Poieret says the Study
of Natural Causes without their relations to to their Creator 1st As their Author 2ly As their Pattern 3ly As their Governour makes but half Philosphers And we find the end of Scripture treating of these is to make us see a God in them and from them Psal 29.6 He maketh Lebanon and Syrion to skip as a young Vnicorn And Job 37. speaking of the Fiery Meteors says They are turned round about by his Councils that they may do what soever he commandeth them upon the Face of the World or in the Earth He causeth it to come whether for Correction or for Mercy c. 4ly The moving Cause which supposes the demeriting because he was wroth who can be angry at nothing but Sin Isa 13.13 I will shake the Heavens and the Earth shall remove out of it's place in the Wrath of the Lord of Hosts and in the day of his fierce Anger and it shall be as the chased Roc. Our Sin and God's Anger for it is a Burden the Earth cannot bear Hence are it's Groans and Travailings in Pam Man is punished in the Earth as a King in his Subjects or a rich Man in his Poslessions Three remarkable Degrees of Punishment the Earth undergoes for Man's Sin 1. The Curse in Adam's time Gen. 3.17 Cursed is the ground for thy sake which we may compare with the 7th Verse The Natively consequential Punishment on Man's Body they both were naked The nearness of the Union and Relation between his Soul and his Body brought the Curse there before the other and without a positive Infliction There was a capacity of ever-living from that harmonious Constitution in his Body but his Constitution is now mortal not only a Disease as Physicians say but Mortality it self is a preternatural state For Perpetuity is a Print or a stroak of Divine Image that became him to put on the Substance of every Creature he made For he cannot deny himself in his Works or in his Word All he does must have a fittedness to represent him and what became him to make became him to continue And Aeviternity of Creatures is the Image of the Eternity of God Death was a conditional Threathing Life was an absolute natural Promise Man had nothing to do but to continue yielding himself to that Inclination that was from the Image of God in him without attempting to do any thing of himself by which he might be something by himself Self denyal which is a Negative Term was the principal Duty 2. There could not but arise from this Immortal Constitution an unspeakable Beauty The most fresh healthy young and vigorous Constitution is like wrinkled old Age in comparison of an Immortal one Old and Young Sickness and Health in a Mortal differs but in Degree but that is a natural capacity of ever living Mortality and Immortality differ like Sin and Holiness Death and Life So much must the greatest Beauty of Mortals sall short of Eve's Secondly If we take measures of this Beauty from what the meanest Man shall be when sinless and the Beauty was a Glory for our very Bodies shall be fashioned like to his Glorious Body and the very reason of it flows from it's incorruptibleness 1 Cor. 15.32 The first Property being always the eminent and emanent Cause of the rest Adam's Immortality was a proper Incorruptibility Thirdly If we compare this Beauty with the remaining Relicts in Plants and Fowls for we cannot suppose the Curse to sall so heavy or to last so long upon any body as the Body of Man for their union with the Soul is nighest and the Property and Dominion greatest it is a kind of Covering for such are their Feathers and Flowers that excells all the Glorious Ornaments that a Solomon could array himself with by reason of their Nativeness flowing from the Constitution of the Creature it adorns Matth. 6.28 29 30. The Privation of this Covering that did consist of Glory or radiant Beams of Light was literally Adam's and Eve's Nakedness which did flow from the Souls Nakedness of the Objective Image of God and the inherent qualitative Image that did flow from it For Man in Regeneration is in part restored to what he was when sinless and this is a changing into a glorious Image by beholding the glorious Image of the Lord in the Glass of our Souls formed there by the Spirit of the Lord. The Curse of Barrenness upon the Earth must be some way proportioned unto this An inward change of the Contexture and Particles at least of the Surface and Crust of the Earth above the great Deep which would necessarily cause an Alteration in the Air the Constitution thereof being ruled by the Vapours and Exhalations of the Earth if it reach'd no higher We may see this from the vast difference of Soils their Barrenness or Fertility ariseth from the Disposition of the Earth and Position of the Sun The Second Degree of Punishment was in Noah's time by the great Deluge where there was made not only a Change of Particles or composure of the Earth but the whole uppermost Sphere or Crust broke in pieces and laid like an Heap of Rubbish or Shipwrack and from this Constitution of it ariseth it's fitness for Conflagration it 's Liableness to Earthquakes Thunder and Lightning Storms and Tempests So that Philosophers ought not only to study it's relation to God but it 's relation to Sin and Punishment it 's constant or natural Constitution is preternatural like a crazy Person Hectick and Consumptive The Third Punishment is yet to come when it shall be wholly burnt up by Fire 2 Pet. 3. And if we may take Measures of what it was before Sin from what it will be after it must certainly have been a glorious Globe When the most solid Gold shall be transparent and the whole new Earth the Foundation of the New Jerusalem more precious and Diaphanous than the most precious Stones some Rudera of this appears in the Chrystalline Stones and other things under Ground and that vast Fire in which all will be burnt up hath an evident Vertue to render it vitrial So much for the Nature of an Earthquake The Second thing to be explained is the Nature of a Prodigy which is superiour to a Sign and is a Miracles Fellow These three explain one another 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Sign 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Prodigy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Miracle Heb. 2.4 Signs Wonders and divers Miracles 1. Signs are Naral as Gen. 1.14 We know how long to Night or Darkness by the place we see the Sun in or to Morning by other Stars So when Spring and Harvest c. When an Eclipse when the Tydes when seasonable to Sail to Fish to Plow to Sow c. The Lights of Heaven are given for Signs of these things So Mat. 16.2 A red Sky is a sign of fair Weather because the Sun shining through it demonstrates it to be thin but if the Clouds in our Horizon be black