are crost in that which they most desire They desire nothing more then that they may prosper and thrive in the world and they think they shall prosper and thrive the better while they conceal their sins which if they were known would impair their credit and estimation But God crosses them in that which they most desire Iosh 7.21 for they shall not prosper No doubt but Achan thought to prosper the better when he stole the two hundred shekels of silver the wedge of gold and the Babylonish garment and hid them in his tent but it thrived not with him Iosh 7.25 for God brought it to light and Achan was stoned to death for it No doubt but Gehazi thought to prosper the better by the bribes he took of Naaman 2 King 5.23 and would not confesse that he had taken them but it thrived not with him for though he â—id his sin 2 King 5.27 yet he could not hide his leprosie which he got with them No doubt but Jezabel thought to prosper the better when she caused Naboth to be stoned to death and got his vineyard and yet covered her sin under pretence that Naboth had deserved to be stoned for having blasphemed God and the King but it thrived not with her for God brought it to light and her to a miserable end for it So Herod no doubt thought to prosper the better when hearing that the King of the Jews was born he intended to murther him to prevent the danger of losing his kingdome and yet to cover his sin willed the Wisemen as soon as they had found the babe to bring him word Matth. 2.8 pretending that he also would go to worship him but it thrived not with him for God both brought to light his murderous intent and himself to shame and disgrace by it And not to instance in too many examples the Scribes and Pharisees no doubt thought to prosper the better while they devoured widows houses and to cover their sin made long prayers that so they might be thought to be devout and religious but it thrived not with them for Christ both discovered what they did Matth. 13.14 and denounced a wo against them for it Thus God finds them out and brings them to light that cover their sins not suffering them to prosper and so crossing them in that which they most desire Yet when or wherein they shall not prosper is not here set down but onely in generall that they shall not prosper to the intent that they may never be secure but may still expect while they cover their sins that God will punish them some way or other either in their own persons or in their children or in their goods or in their good name or in them all together Secondly here we may observe that to prosper is the gift of God who therefore denyes it to them that sin against him by covering their sins Therefore the Psalmist saith of the godly man that look whatsoever he doth it shall prosper Psal 1.3 but for the ungodly he saith It is not so with them So it is said of Joseph that he was a prosperous man Gen. 39.3 and that the Lord made all that he did to prosper in his hand So it is said of that good King Hezekiah That the Lord was with him 2 King 18.7 and he prospered whither soever he went forth I might instance in others But some man may say may not the like be said of the wicked do not they often prosper in the world and have successe in that which they take in hand Iob 21.7.9 was it not for this which Job complained that the wicked are mighty in pomer that they spend their dayes in mirth that their houses are safe from fear and that the rod of God is not upon them And was it not for this that David envied the wicked That they prosper in the world Psal 7 3.12 that they have riches in possession and that they come in no misfortune like other men We must therefore understand first that though to prosper be the gift of God yet in his wisdome he gives in sometimes to the godly and sometimes to the wicked For that which St. Augustine saith of wealth may be said of prosperity Ne putetur esse mala datur bonis ne putetur esse summum bonum datur malis Lest prosperitie should be thought to be evill it is sometimes given to those that are good and lest it should be thought to be the chief good it is sometimes given to those that are bad If onely the wicked and none of the godly should prosper in the world it would be a means to draw many to ungodlinesse that they might prosper by it And if onely the godly and none of the wicked should prosper here it would be thought they were godly for no other end but that they might prosper This was that which the devill ye know objected against Job for his serving God Doth Job saith the devill fear God for nought Hast thou not made an hedge about him and about his bouse and about all that he hath on every side thou hast blest saith he the works of his hands and his substance is increased in the land But put forth thy hand and touch all that he hath and he will curse thee to thy face And thus if God should give prosperitie to none but the godly the wicked would be readie to object against them that they therefore served God because God would prosper them and that otherwise they would be as ungodly as others Whereas the godly indeed do as well serve God in the time of adversitie as they do in prosperitie as Job when all that he had was taken from him did blesse God as well as he did when he had them The Lord saith he hath given and the Lord hath taken blessed be the name of the Lord. And therefore prosperitie is commonly given indifferently by God sometimes to the godly and sometimes to the wicked But yet there is great difference between their prosperitie for the prosperitie of the wicked continues not long but is soon gone They may cover their sins and prosper for a time but God at one time or other either here or hereafter brings their sins to light and themfelves to confusion Therefore Solomon ye see speaks not here of the present time but of the future he doth not say they do not but that they shall not prosper because though they may prosper for a while in this world yet at last they come to a miserable end and miserable ye know is that prosperitie which ends in miserie Such was the prosperitie of Haman and Herod they prospered for a while but their end was miserable But the godly on the contrarie prosper more and more though their beginning be good yet as Job was their end is better Marke saith David Psal 37 37. Psalme 37. the perfect man and behold
the Sonne of God that thou so little regardest him He loved us so dearly that he thought not his life too dear for us but suffered a most shamefull and accursed death to free us from the curse which was due unto us yet we for requitall of this his love though love be requited with nothing but love as fire is kindled with nothing but fire do so little regard him that we preferre our friends our pleasures our wealth and riches and for the most part whatsoever we love before him How farre are such from being able to say truly as the Church here doth I sought him whom my soule loves Her love unto Christ was not verbal and outward from the rine of the lipps but real and inward from the root of the heart from her soule and spirit her soule loved him she loved him as the Church Esay 26. desired and sought him with my soule have I desired thee in the night Esay 26.9 yea with my spirit within me will I seek thee early She loved him as the blessed virgin magnified him My soule doth magnifie the Lord Luke 1.46.47 and my spirit hath rejoyced in God my Saviour She loved him as the Prophet David praysed him Prayse the Lord O my soule and all that is within me prayse his holy name Psal 103.1 Outward love from the lips may be false and counterfeâ— but inward love from the soule is alwayes unfained And such a love it is which Christ doth require and no other that we love him with the heart and with the soule with all the heart and with all the soule So precious doth he account our love that he will not have so much as the least grain of it lost but will have it all He hath millions of Angels that are inflamed with his love who love him far better then we do or can and our love unto Christ is no benefit to him he reapes no prophet nor advantage by it only because he loves us he desires again to be beloved of us and that unfainedly from our very soules He will not have the soule and love divided he likes not that soule that is without love nor that love which comes not from the soule If love come unto him and not from the soule before he admit it he will first aske whence it came as Micha asked the Levite before he received him And if the soule come unto him without love he will forbid it to come as Joseph forbad his Brethren Judges 17.9 Gen. 43. to come unto him without their Brother Benjamin And therefore if we will come unto Christ Gen. 43.3 we must come with love with love from our soules as the Church here doth I sought him whom my soule loves To draw then to a conclusion that we may be the more carefull to seek Christ let us meditate on those things which may kindle and inflame our love towards him by considering how he desires our love and deserves the same If a man have shewed us any extraordinary kindness and hath deserved our love we could not but condemn our selves of unthankfulness if we did not love him Nay though he have not deserved our love by any kindness he hath shewed us yet if we do but heare that he is desirous of our love because this is an argument that he loves us we will love him again But Christ doth both desire our love and deserve the same He desires our love not for his own but for our good that he might have occasion to requite our love And therefore he useth most forcible Reasons to procure our love Sometimes intreating us and making it his earnest suit that we would love him 2 Cor. 5.20 We saith the Apostle are Embassadors for Christ as God beseeching you by us we pray you in Christs stead but for what to be reconciled unto God Here is the strongest sute that ever was made God and man were fallen out man is the party that hath offended and God is the party that sues to be reconciled man that should intreat God that he would forgive him is intreated by God that he would be content to be forgiven Thus he sues for our love that should sue for his Nay he useth not onely intreaty to procure our love but likewise the promise of infinit rewards The eye saith the Apostle hath not seen the eare hath not heard neither hath it entred into the heart of man what God hath prepared but for whom for them that love him Was it ever heard of since the World began that any man ever came to a poor begger and offring him meat that was ready to starve and to perish for hunger should intreat him to eat it and not onely so but witâ—al should promise to reward him for it But God though it be for our good that we love him for otherwise we cannot but everlastingly perish yet he intreats us that we would love him and not onely so but promiseth withall to reward our love with the Kingdom of Heaven So earnestly doth he desire our love And as he desires so he deserves our love If we should give a man but his diet or houseroome we would think we deserved he should loâ—e us for it How then doth he deserve our love that gives us every thing The very bread which we eat nay the breath which we breath we have it from him in whom we live and move and have our being and cannot live a minute without his blessing The least blessing he gives us deserves our love and we have nothing but our love to give him for all that he gives us So abundantly doth he deserve our love Great reason have we then to require his love in some measure by loving him unseignedly as the Church here doth I sought him whom my soule loves FINIS The Twelveth SERMON PROVERBS 30.8 Give me neither poverty nor riches THese words are part of Agurs Prayer and his Prayer in the whole verse consists of two parts a deprecation of evil and a Petition of good The evil which he deprecates or prayes against is of two sorts either such as is simply evil in it own nature as vanity and lying against which he prayes in the beginning of this verse Remove farre from me vanity and lies Or such as are not simplie evill in their own nature but yet may be occasions of evil as riches and poverty against which he prayes in the next words Give me neither poverty nor riches The good which he prayes for is a competent Estate in the end of this verse a mediocrity between the two extreams of want and superfluity Feed me with food convenient for me And these are the parts of the whole verse Here then he prayes that God would give him neither poverty nor riches neither over little nor over much that he may neither live in want nor yet in abundance not because these in themselves are evil but because they may be and
presently acknowledged his sins unto God and so by his confession obtain'd pardon whereupon he wrote this Psalm and gave it this Title A Psalm of David to give instruction shewing thereby both the Maker of this Psalme and that is David and the end why he made it to give instruction The instruction which he gives is of no ordinary matter but of one of the greatest matters that ever fell into controversie and that is mans felicity teaching us in the first and second verses wherein we are to repose our felicity and happinesse not in those things which the Philosophers taught but in that which they never once thought upon the forgivenesse of sins For the Philosophers being guided only by the eye of reason which is more then purblinde in matters of religion hence it came to passe that while they aimed at felicity every one shot his bolt so wide at the mark one placing felicity in honour a second in pleasure a third in riches in a word so many Philosophers so many felicities But David here a divine Philosophâ—â—â— in regard of whom all the rest were but naturals confutes them all by his own example for David here that lived in more true pleasure then the best of them that had more riches then any of them more honour then all of them he leaves all these and ascribes felicity in the first and second verses of this Psalm to the pardon of sin Blessed saith he is he Whose wickednesse is forgiven and whose finis covered Blessed is the man to whom the Lord imputeth no sin Now as a cunning and skilfull builder if he have any goodly building in hand he will be sure to lay a very sound foundation So David here having so weighty a Doctrine to instruct us in as the felicity of man he grounds the same upon a very excellent reason a reason drawn from his ovvn experience because he found himselfe to be most miserable and wretched till his sins were pardoned For saith he in the third and fourth verses while I held my tongue my bones consumed so that I roared all the day long for thy hand was heavy upon me day and night and my moisture was turned into the drought of summer Whereby he shews That while he plai'd the hypocrite and cloaked his sin while he held his tongue agagg'd as it were his own conscience that he might not confesse his sin what a coile God had with him how he was fain to lay him as it were upon the rack and to stretch him asunder almost every joynt from other before he could bring him to acknowledge his sin and to ask for pardon And this was the misery which David was in while he continued in sin Then in the fift verse he shews how he was freed and delivered from this misery and that is by the confession and acknowledgement of his sin I said saith he I will confesse my sin and thou forgavest me the punishment thereof Dixi confitebor I did but say or I had no sooner said I will confesse my sin but thou O Lord that mightest have taken me at the vantage and condemned me out of mine owne mouth thou forgavest me the punishment of my sin Whereupon being struck with admiration of Gods mercy he infers in this sixt verse a notable consequence out of the former Doctrine That seeing he had sped so well by the confession of his sin that therefore others should be moved by his example to do as he did and to obtain pardon Therefore saith he shall every one that is godly pray unto thee therefore wherefore why because thou hast been so gracious unto me that was so grievous a sinner because thou hast met me as it were in thy mid-way with thy mercy so that I could no sooner think to confesse my sin but thou likewise thoughtest to forgive me my sin therefore shall every godly man though he have committed never so many sins against thee be incouraged by my example to pray unto thee And thus we see the coherence of these words with the former In the words for order we may observe these four things Division First The reason why men shall come unto God implyed in this first word therefore Secondly The persons that shall come unto him every one that is godly Thirdly The manner how they shall come namely by prayeâ— And lastly the time when they shall come unto him in a time When he may be found Therefore shall every one that is godly pray unto thee in a time when thou mayest be found And first for the reason why men shall come unto God the reason is drawn from Davids own example as if David had said thus As I did to obtain mercy when I had sinned against God so shall every godly man do but I did pray unto God in a time when he might be fouÌ„d Therfore shall every one that is godly pray unto thecin a time when thou mayest be found Thus David alledges his own example to encourage us to come with considence to God for the pardon of our sins though we have been never so hainous sinners And from hence we may learn That it is our duty to use well the examples of others and to apply Gods dealing with them to our selves For therefore have the holy men of God set their examples before our eyes that we might be bettered by their experience For as they which first sailed over the seas gave proper names unto dangerous places where they themselves hardly escaped with their lives as the Sage-bed the Lavander-bed with other like names best known unto Saylers And as wain-men use to set up some bush or other like marke where their waggons stuck fast for a caveat to them that should come after them So have the holy men of God furthered us in the Scripture by their experience and taught us to eschew many incumbrances which they could not so easily see and avoid because they broke the ice first themselves The whole Scripture is written for our instruction and there is not so much as one example in the whole book of God but a man may make excellent use of it if he will apply it unto himself For to what end are there set down in the Scripture so many examples of the judgements of God upon unrepentant sinners but that their examples might be a bridle to us to restraine us from falling into the like sinnes for feare we undergo the self same punishment When we read of the rich-man that is tormented in hell because he did not relieve poor Lazarus Luke 16. are we not to apply this example to our selves that if God have given us wealth and riches and yet we will not relieve those that are in want necessity the like judgement will befall us which befell him When we reade of that unmercifull Servant Mat. 18. who when his master had forgiven him ten thousand talents he afterwards meeting with a fellow-servant of his that
Rev. 16.5.6 for they have shed the bloud of Saints and Prophets and thou hast given them bloud to drink for they are worthy And thus much for the persons by vvhom Steven vvas here martyred namely the Jews I come novv from their impiety in martyring Steven to Stevens great piety in his martyrdome vvhich he shevvs as I said in a double prayer vvhich he makes the one for himselfe the other for his persecutors Doct. And from hence we may observe before I come to his prayers in particular in that he called upon God while the Jews were stoning him The happy condition of a godly man that he is able to pray and call upon God in the greatest extremity that can befall him The wicked may rage and persecute the godly they may cast them in prison and lay bolts upon them they may bring them to the stake and burn or stone them but they cannot hinder them from praying unto God this comfort they can never take from them Paul and Silas may be scourged and imprisoned and put in the stocks Elias may be persecuted by Ahab and Iezabell till he be ready to famish Iob may have his body afflicted by the devill with sores and ulcers Sampson may have his eyes put out by the Philistins and Steven may here be stoned by the Iews yet God leaves them not destitute of this comfort that they are able to pray and call upon God in their greatest dangers Nay the greater extremity and danger they are in God inables them to pray with the more fervency unto him Hezekiah did never pray more fervently then when the sentence of death was pronounced against him and he lay a dying I beseech thee saith he O Lord remember now how I have walked before thee As if he had said now O Lord when I am ready to die and no other can succour me 2 King 20.3 now when Physick and art do faile me now when my strength is diminished and nature decayed now when thou hast pronounced the sentence of death against me now O Lord now now remember me But it is not so with the ungodly they call not upon God they are least able of all to pray in their greatest necessity Psal 14.4 1 Sam. 25.37 If they be in danger or hear any ill tidings their hearts like Nabals begin to die within them and become as stones For this is the priviledge of none but the godly and an infallible argument of Gods mercy towards them in that he inables them when they are in any perill to pray unto him Therefore David Psal 66. the last verse Blessed be God saith he that hath not turned away my prayer nor his mercy from me Upon which words Saint Augustine Quamdin Deus non tollit a te oration em tuam non amovebit a te misericordiam suam As long as God doth not take thy praying from thee he will not remove his mercy from thee because it is his mercy that inables thee to pray If therefore when thou art in any great danger thou canst call upon God for his help and assistance and canst say with the Disciples Mat. 8.25 Psal 6.2 Lord save us we perish if when thou liest sick and keepest thy bed thou canst pray with David Lord be mercifull unto me for I am weak Lord heale me for my bones are vexed If when thou art drawing toward thy end and art to leave the World thou canst willingly resigne thy soule unto God and pray as Steven did Lord Iesus receive my spirit Thou mayest well conceive great comfort therein because only the godly are inabled in their greatest extremity to call upon God as Steven here did But let us come to his prayer Lord Jesus receive my spirit He called upon God saying Lord Jesus which invicibly proves that Christ is God This the Arrians and some other Hereticks have blasphemously denied and this the Jews to this day will not be brought to acknowledge But the Scripture is not more plain in any thing then it is in this For besides that the Scripture gives him the Title and Name of God that he is Deus in carne manifestatus i Tim. 3.16 Rom. 9.5 John 14.1 John 14.14 Mat. 28.19 John 5.23 Luke 8.28.31 Mat. 8.26 Mat. 4.23 Mat. 10.1 God manifested in the flesh and Deus in saecula benedictus God blessed for ever And besides that we are taught in the Scripture to ascribe unto him divine honour that we must believe in him that we must pray unto him that we must be baptized in his Name and that we must honour him as we honour the Father The very works and miracles which he did do testifie of him and prove him to be God For if he were not God how did the devills stand in aw of him how did the windes and the seas obey him how did he cure all manner of diseases and inable his Disciples to do the like in his Name Did ever any man by his own power raise himself being dead Did ever any man since the beginning of the World as the blind man saith John 2.19 John 9.32 John 9. open the eyes of any that was born blind but these things we know were done by Christ and do prove him to be God If he were not God how did he pardon and forgive sins Mat. 9.2 Mat. 9.4 Colos 1.16 which is proper to God how did he know the thoughts of mens hearts which is proper to God and how is he said to have created the World which is the peculiar work of God And therefore Steven praying to the Lord Iesus is said here to call upon God He called upon God saying Lord Iesus receive my spirit The Papists do commonly at their death commend their souls to the Virgine Mary So did Father Garnet so did Thomas Becket Archbishop of Canterbury two that are reputed for speciall Martyrs in the Church of Rome though they suffered for treason they commended their soules at the time of their death to the blessed Virgine And it is a common prayer among them Maria mater gratiae tu nos ab hoste protege hora mortis suscipe Mary the Mother of grace do thou defend us from the enemy and receive us at the hour of death But Steven here the first Martyr commended not his soule to the Virgine Mary when he died but to Christ that redeemed it Lord Iesus saith he receive my spirit And he joyns these two Lord Jesus together acknowledging Christ to be both both his Lord and his Saviour Some disjoyne these they will acknowledge Christ to be their Jesus they vvill say they look to be saved by him but they do not acknowledge him for their Lord they will not serve him Such are they who go on in their sins and follow the lusts of their own hearts and yet do look to be saved by grace But such do greatly deceive themselves For either Christ will be our Lord or he will be our Jesus
that which is poured out of it comes but guttatim drop by drop and is long coming out So it is when god punishes his punishments come slowly that even while he is punishing men might be drawn to repentance And if they repent how many soever their sinnes have been hovv hainous soever and hovv long soever they have continued therein he is ready to forgive them You will say indeed if I could repent of my sins I doubt not but God who is so infinitely mercifull would receive me into favour and be reconciled unto me in Christ Iesus but I have so hard a heart that still I go on and continue in sinne and cannot repent I would therefore aske thee But art thou not displeased with the hardnesse of thy heart and doest thou not desire to forsake thy sins and to be reconciled unto God Oh this you vvill say is that which I desire above all things in the World Then knovv for thy comfort that thy state is better then thou supposest and I may say unto thee from Christ as Christ said to the Scribe Mark iâ— 34. Marke 12. Thou art not far from the Kingdom of God For could'st thou be displeased vvith the hardnesse of thy heart if thy heart vvere hardned could'st thou be desirous to forsake thy sinnes if thou vvert not weary of them and could'st thou desire to be reconciled unto God If thou didst not love him for these though thou thinkest thou canst not repent are signes of thy repentance vvhich though it be weake yet he who hath promised that he will not break the bruised reed nor quench the smeaking flax will accept of it and notwithstanding thy sinnes will he gracious unto thee as he was here unto Jonas And so from Gods gracious renewing of Jonas his Commission I proceed to the Charge which God gave Jonas which containes two things First The place which God sends him unto Arise and go to Nineveh that great City Secondly The work which God appoints him to do Preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee The place which God sends him unto is Nineveh The Ninevites were so hainous sinners that their wickednesse as we heard before was come up before God and cried up to Heaven unto God for vengeance yet God would not destroy them before he had sent unto them that before their destruction they might have warning Doct. Here then observe Gods dealing with sinners He commonly first sends to admonish them of their sinnes before he inflicts his judgements upon them God might if he pleased and that without any breach of justice be revenged on the sudden upon the wicked without sending unto them and giving them warning but first he threatens before he punishes to teach them thereby to avoid his judgements Deut. 20.10 God made this Law Dent. 20. That no City should be destroyed before that peace had been offered unto it that before their destruction they might have warning and might imbrace if they would the conditions of peace to prevent their ruine As God will have us to deale in mercy with our enemies so he himselfe likewise deales with sinners First Giving them warning and threatning his judgements before be inflicts them Though God was highly offended with Pharaoh for dealing so cruelly with the Children of Israel yet God would not send his judgements upon him till Moses was sent to fore-tell him of them Though God vvere so offended with the old World for their sins that he purposed to overwhelme it with water and by an universall deluge to destroy all flesh yet he vvould not do it till Noah had forvvarn'd and admonisht them of it And at the end of the World when the World shall be destroyed and consumed by fire Luke 21.25 yet there shall be vvarning of it for there shall be signes in the Sun the Moon and the Starres as our Saviour saith that the very Heavens may become Preachers as it vvere unto us to admonish us to repent by fore-warning us of the end of the World and the day of judgement And here though the Ninevetes vvere so hainous sinners yet he sends unto them that being fore-warned of the danger they were in they might repent and avoid the same Now Nineveh vvhereunto God sends Jonas is here said to be a great City And so it is else-vvhere called in the Scripture Thus Moses speaking of Nineveh Gen. 10. Gen. 10.12 The same saith he is a great City and here in the next verse it is called an exceeding great City of three dayes journey And by that which Histories report of it it seems to have been the greatest City in the World and fevv ever since for largenesse and beauty have been compared to it Indeed if it be true which some vvrite of the City Quinsai in the Kingdom of China it vvas a City far larger then Nineveh as being in compasse a hundred miles but aftervvards it vvas overthrown by an earthquake and another Quinsai built but far lesse being but thirty miles in compasse which is just halfe of that bignesse which Nineveh was For Nineveh was in compasse no lesse then four hundred and fourscore furlongs which make threescore miles The Walls of Nineveh were an hundred foot high and they were of that thicknesse that three Carts might go side-long together upon them and upon the Walls were fifteen hundred Turrets and each of them an hundred foot higher then the Walls The City of Babylon was so great that Aristotle in his Politicks calls it a Countrey rather then a City and vvrites that when it vvas besieged and the enemy had taken one part of it some part of the City did not heare thereof till three dayes after so large was Babylon from the one end to the other Yet Babylon was not so large as Nineveh but lesse in compasse by almost an hundred furlongs Nineveh was many years in building and by no fewer at once then ten thousand work-men and it was so populous that God tells Jonas in the next Chapter the last verse That there were six-score thousand in it that knew not their right hand from their left and therefore if there were so many infants what a multitude were there of all other ages no doubt but many more in that one City then there are now in some Kingdoms But now what must Jonas do vvhen has was come to Nineveh Preach saith God unto it the preaching that I bid thee What this was which he was to preach we see afterwards in the fourth verse namely That Nineveh should be overthrown after forty dayes This God commanded him to preach and gave him his message And from hence we may observe That the Prophets had their direction from God what they were to deliver God put into their mouths what they were to speak and they spake onely that which they were appointed by God 2 Pet. 1.21 So saith Saint Peter That Prophecy came not in old time by the will of man but the
the upright for the end of that man is peace and in the next verse But the end of the wicked shall be cut off For God being the just Judge of the world it cannot be otherwise but that between the end of the godly and the end of the wicked there must needs be great difference Therefore when Abraham prayed for Sodom that it might be spared for the righteous sake that were therein Gen. 18.23.25 wilt thou saith he Gen. 18. destroy the righteous with the wicked that be far from thee to do after this manner to slay the righteous with the wicked and that the righteous should be as the wicked that be farre from thee shall not the judge of all the earth do right to shew that it cannot stand with the justice of God to respect them alike and to make no difference between the godly and the wicked We see many times that the wicked do flourish and prosper in the world and live in great credit and estimation the godly on the contrary are many times vilified and privily slander'd whereby their good name which is the godly mans Heire is much called into question but God who never failes to help them to right that do suffer wrong at one time or other brings the wicked to shame and makes the innocency of the godly known This is that which God promises Psal 37.6 Psal 37. He shall bring forth thy righteousnesse as the light and thy judgement or just dealing as the noon-day the meaning is that though thy innocency and just dealing may be obscured and hidden for a time as the light in the night yet God will bring it forth like the light in the morning and make it more and more to appear like the Sun at noone whereby both thy innocencie and the falshood of those that unjustly accuse thee shall be openly known This we see by the example of Daniel who was cast by his accusers into the Lyons Den Dan. 6.16 Dan. 3.21 and by those who were cast into the fiery furnace yet God miraculously made known their innocency and brought those that accused them to shame and destruction It is very memorable which we find recorded to this purpose in the Ecclesiasticall Histories Three grace leâ—e Companions accused Narcissus a holy Bishop of an hainous crime and used fearfull imprecations against themselves if the thing were not true whereof they accused him The first wished that if it were not true he might be burnt The second that he might die of some grievous Disease And the third wisht that he might lose his sight And not long after God was reveng'd on every one of them in the same manner For the first had his house set a fire in the night where both himself and his houshold were burnt to death The second fell sick of a fearfull disease and died of it And the third seeing what 〈◊〉 befallen his Companions confessed how they had wrongfully accused the Bishop and with weeping and mourning lost his sight Whereupon the Bishop who had been deposed upon their accusation was restored unto his Bishoprick God having thus made his innocency known and brought them to shame that so falsly accused him And thus much for the former part of these words the description of an impenitent sinner who is described as you have heard both by his property that he covers his sinne and by his condition that he shall not prosper The penitent person is described by a double property he confesseth his sinnes and withall forsakes them and his condition is that he shall have mercy I will speak briefly of them in a word or two Those words of St. John 1 John 1.9 If we confesse our sinnes he is faithfull and just to forgive us our sinnes and to cleanse us from all unrighteousnesse are as it were a commentary upon my Text and the one place may serve well to explain the other St. John names onely our confessing our sinnes If saith he we confesse our sinnes implying under confessing our sinnes our forsaking of them because as St. Ambrose saith Confessio peccati est professio desinendi our confessing of sinne is a profession of leaving the same Solomon in my Text doth name them both who so confesses and forsakes his sins and so expresses what St. John implies And Solomon addes that he shall have mercy but what mercy he doth not shew St. John therefore shewes what this mercy is that God will forgive him his sinnes and will cleanse him from all unrighteousnesse which you know is the greatest mercy For if we consider how highly God is offended with sinners how deeply we are indebted unto God by our sinnes or the great benefit we reape by Gods forgiving us we cannot but see Gods infinite mercy in forgiving our sinnes upon so easie a condition and requiring no more of us for the forgivenesse of our sinnes but that we confesse them If a Creditor should require no more of his Debtor that were indebted in a great summe unto him but to acknowledge the debt he would freely forgive him would not every man magnifie the Creditors bounty in releasing his Debtor upon so easie a condition but thus deales God with us he requires no more of us but to confesse our sinnes and promises to forgive us If saith St. John we confesse our sinnes God is faithfull and just to forgive us our sinnes faithfull and just and so we need not make any doubt thereof because his faithfulnesse and justice are ingaged upon it But some may say it may seeme that seeing God is just he should rather punish us then forgive us our sinnes because his justice requires that we make him satisfaction and that he reward us according to our deserts We are therefore to remember that confession of our sinnes and faith in Christ for the pardon of them do alway go together so that we cannot truly confesse our sins but we must needes have an eye unto Christ for the forgivenesse of our sinnes God therefore cannot but forgive us our sinnes because he is just for otherwise he should be unjust to his Sonne who hath made satisfaction to God in our roome and by his active and passive obedience hath merited for us that our sinnes should be forgiven And herein appeares the admirable wisdome and goodnesse of God in so contriving the work of our redemption that his justice should plead for the forgivenesse of our sinnes which pleaded before for our condemnation For if ye aske why God should condemn us for our sinnes the Reason is because he is just and justice requires that having offended him we should make him satisfaction And yet if ye aske why he should forgive us our sinnes the reason is here given by St. John because he is just and justice requires that Christ having made satisfaction for us we should be forgiven And so we see what mercy it is which he shall have who confesseth his sinnes namely the