Selected quad for the lemma: heaven_n
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A43857
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A sermon preached in the parish church of Newbury, Berks, on the 26th of July, 1685 being the day of Thanksgiving for His Majesty's late victory over the rebels / by John Hinton.
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Hinton, John, d. 1720.
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1685
(1685)
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Wing H2068; ESTC R13017
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19,821
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38
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would have had it or that Absalom harkened to more Dilatory Counsels and slower Methods of Sedition than his were however that he died before this Horrid and Trayterous Conspiracy came to an Head and having before he Died set his House in Order being buried too in the Sepulchre of his Father near to the very place where our Rebellion began I could tell you of others delivered up to Slaughter or to Justice to Prison or to Death and of a general Dispersion of all the rest contemptible pieces of Mortality that are gone that are vanished like a Shadow and there place can no where be found I could tell you in the next place of the Suddenness as well as the Entireness of their Defeat how that their Calamity has risen as suddenly and as unexpectedly to themselves as their Rebellion did to us that they are speedily fallen themselves into the Pit they designed for others and were not so swift to shed Blood but they have brought upon themselves as swift Destruction I could tell you yet farther and I ought That the Providence of God has appeared likewise very wonderfully and signally on our King's side and That Heaven has manifestly fought for us too as it did for David and Judah in old time that we have vanquished a numerous Army with the loss of a Few so very few that perhaps no modern Story can parallel the Disproportion that if an hundred have not chased a Thousand nor two put two Thousand to Flight yet that for ought we hear with the loss of not many more than two Hundred we have routed more than twice two Thousand I could tell you of many other Instances of the Divine Mercy toward us that might make us with David sing for joy * Ps 86.10 Thou O Lord art great and dost wondrous things thou art God alone * Ps 77.14 Thou hast declared thy power among the People Thou hast mightily delivered thy People even the sons of Jacob and Joseph But the time would fail me and now I fear your Patience too should I insist upon these things or other things of this Nature and what I have hinted to you already is so well known to the Nation and to all of you here present that having drawn one Line to your Hands you may save me the Labour in drawing out the Parallel your selves Only I shall pray that you and I may continue the Parallel to the end in our Thanksgiving for the Defeat which is indeed the Last but should be the Chief Part of our Task What therefore remains my Brethren but that with Ahimaaz in my Text we also Bless the Lord our God who has delivered up the Men that lift up their Hands against our Lord the King and after the * Ps 124.6 Example of David give him our just Praises that he has not given us over as a Prey unto their Teeth Our King has himself given us his Royal Example He has given us his Royal Command for so doing You have lately heard by This Proclamation that upon due considerations hereof he does with all Humility admire and adore the late Mercy and Goodness of God in giving Victory to his Arms and Delivering him and his Kingdoms from the Miseries and Calamities that might and that constantly do ensue an Intestine and Unnatural Rebellion And that considering such Signal and Publick Mercies are an invitation from Heaven to render the most Publick and Chearful Expressions of Thankfulness to the Divine Goodness that we who equally share in the Blessings and Joys of this Deliverance may be United in the Devotions which are offered for it 't is his Will that the just Tribute of Praise and Thanksgiving to his and our Great Soveraign the King of Heaven and Earth be return'd by himself and us for the late Mercy Let then our Joy let our Praise be as Publick be as Universal as the Occasion Let us with David let us with our King ascriâ—e the Honour of the Victory to God let us offer Thanks and Praise unto God who has given us the Victory Let us give unto the Lord my Friends let us give unto the Lord Glory and Honour let us give unto the Lord the Glory due unto his Name Oh! Praise the Lord with me and let us Magnify his Name together High and Low Rich and Poor Young Men and Maidens Old Men and Children let us all Praise the Name of the Lord for his Name only is Excellent and his Praise above Heaven and Earth Oh! sing Praises sing Praises unto our God sing Praises unto our King sing Praises for God is the King of all the Earth sing ye Praises with Vnderstanding Let us Praise him with our whole Hearts let us Praise him among much People let as shew forth his Praise not only with our Lips but in our Lives by giving up our selves to his Service and by serving him without Fear Let the Righteous be glad and rejoyce before God Let them also be merry and joyful Rejoyce in the Lord ye Righteous yea and again I say rejoyce Shout unto God with the Voice of Triumph shout for joy all ye that are upright in Heart that he has not made our Foes to Triumph over us nor delivered us into the Hands of the Wicked whose very Mercies are Cruel This is the Day that the Lord has made let us rejoyce and be glad in it and be glad with exceeding Joy But let us not shew our Joy by our Excesses Nor let Gladness transport us beyond the Bounds of Sobriety and Discretion For true Joy as Seneca tells us is a * Sen. Epist 23.59 Severe a Serious and a Sober thing and can no where be found but in a temperate a just and a good Man Whoever rejoyces to Intemperance rejoyces to Madness rejoyces to his Sorrow he must one day be sorry for his very Joy And surely all such Rejoycing is Evil. This is not Rejoycing in God For 't is as Impossible as Absurd while we Rejoyce in his Mercy to Provoke his Wrath. * Eccl. 7.14 In this day of Prosperity therefore let us be Joyful but let our Joy be Religious let our Joy be Serious or to use the Expression of King David let us * Psal 2.11 rejoyce with Reverence Let us so rejoyce for past that we do not render our selves unworthy of future Mercies And if our Joy proceed from Gratitude let it appear by our Obedience by our Obedience to God by our Obedience to the King by performing the vows that we promised with our Lips and spake with our Mouths when we were in Trouble God of his Infinite Mercy hath delivered us from the Rebels and let not us rebel our selves against the God of our Deliverance nor against the King whom God has delivered But let us be thankful to God for his Goodness to our Sovereign let us be thankful to our Sovereign for his Goodness to us And let us Express our Thankfulness to the one and to the other by Honouring and by Fearing Both that he who has already delivered us may continue to deliver us from our Enemies and from the Hands of all that hate us till he settle us at length in the Holy Land the Land of Rest and Peace where no Absaloms no Achitophels nor any of their Associates dwell where even Conspiracies are Impossible and Rebellion has no place FINIS
Flight by an equally strange and just Judgment of God upon him was taken and hanged * Verse 9. Hang'd in an unaccountable manner among the thick Boughs of a great Oak between Heaven and Earth as unworthy of both as fit for neither forsaken of God and Man and even of the Beast that carried him for the * Ibid. very Beast he rode on forsook him too and fled and in going away from under him sufficiently rebuked the madness of the Rebel who hung there by the hair of his Head in the Tree till * Verse 14 15. Joab one of the King's Officers with his Servants did Execution upon him His chief Commander and fellow Rebel the treacherous and perfidious Amasa was fled too for fear the engagement being too hot for him and had left both Absalom and the Army to shift for himself but was found too and * Chap. 19.13 left to the mercy of the King And as for his Tutor Achitophel the Author of the Association and the Ring-leader of all this Villainy having done all the mischief he could because he found he could do no more he had prevented Justice and * Chap. 17.23 hanged himself or as some say died for grief sometime before this engagement and before Amasa was made General of the Rebel Army For sowe read That when Achitophel saw that his Counsel was not followed that is that Absalom was not for making so quick a Dispatch of the Business as he would have had him he arose and gat him home to his House and put his Household in order made his Will and Hang'd himself so our English and other Translators say but some will have it he * Vide Grotii Annot. in Loc. and in Matth. 27.5 died out of Grief and Indignation that the Rebel would not take his Measures at last and others that he * V. Menoch and Sanctii Comment in Loc. was Suffocated or Strangled with some Disease according to the Tradition of several of the Hebrews However 't is sure enough He dyed and was buried in the Sepulchre of his Father I suppose at Giloh near to the Place where this Rebellion began Chap. 17.23 And now Achitophel's Wisdom being turn'd into Foolishness indeed even to a degree beyond David's Prayer his master the Devil having made a Fool of him too who never yet taught any Man to be wise for himself Achitophel's Wisdom being so signally turned into Foolishness and all the Heads of the Conspiracy as signally delivered up into the Hands of Justice to convince them and their Associates That Conspiring against God and the King was in effect but Conspiring against themselves I say the Counsels of the Wicked being brought to Nought and the Counsellors to Justice after so many Thousands of the Rebels killed and as many Thousands taken no wonder that we do not hear any more of the Rebellion It had been a wonder indeed if we had For surely this was enough to give 'em an Entire Defeat And so it did So that the King had the most Absolute Victory over the Rebels that his Heart could wish and that too without so much as any the least hazard to his own Royal Person For tho' his Majesty had a great mind to have gone into the Army himself his People would not suffer him He being more worth as they say very well than Ten Thousand of them Verse 3. But to magnifie the Mercy of the Deliverance as 't was an entire so I presume 't was 2. A speedy Defeat For tho' in all the Narrative of the Rebellion we have no Relation of the Exact time it lasted yet one may rationally conclude it did not last long especially considering the vast Army that the Rebel had gathered which we cannot compute to be much less than * Verse 7 8. 30000 Men and that in all this time with all these Numbers there was but this one Pitch'd Battle viz. this that gave 'em the Defeat which in all probability there would have been had not their Ruin been almost as sudden as 't was Great For besides that Ju'dea was so small a spot of Ground being but Fourscore Miles in breadth and but Two Hundred in the utmost length of it that two such great Armies as the King 's and the Rebel 's were could not well be maintain'd in any part of the Country for any long Space the Armies were never much above Forty Miles apart that we know of during the Rebellion It being but Forty Four Miles from Jerusalem whereabouts Absalom and his Party lay most part of the time to Mahanaim where David was and near which the Battle was fought So that the History mentioning but this one Engagement it may rationally be supposed the Armies being so near one another all the while that it was not long â—'re the Rebels were Defeated However this we are sure of 3. That 't was a very signal and wonderful Defeat and that there was a very particular Providence presided over the King's Forces and appeared all along of the King's side For nothing less than that Almighty Power that interests it self in the Protection of Righteous and Religious Kings and States professing his Holy and Eternal Truth nothing less than that Omnipotent Arm which stills at once the Rageing of the Sea and the more Rageing Madness of the People I say nothing less than the Divine and Almighty Power could preserve the Royal Army from the Treachery and Force of so many Blood-thirsty and Deceitful Men. We read that all the Men of Israel were with Absalom Chap. 17.24 All we have reason to believe from * Chap. 17.11 Dan even to Beersheba And the King tells us himself in the 38th and the 69th and in other Psalms that he composed during this Unnatural Rebellion That * Psal 38.11 his Lovers and his Neighbours stood looking upon his Trouble and his Kinsmen stood affar off That * Psal 38.19 his Enemies lived and were Mighty and that they who hated him wrongfully were many in Number * Psal 69.4 That they who hated him without a Cause were more than the Hairs of his Head With many other Expressions to the same purpose They were no doubt a Numerous and had God been on their side had been an Invincible Army But it appeared God was not for 'em Heaven could not favour so Bad a Cause 'T is said The Lord had appointed to Defeat the Counsel of Achitophel to this very Intent that he might bring evil upon Absalom Chap. 17.14 That he might shew the Justice of his Providence in the Destruction of him and all such Unrighteous Rebles And accordingly 't was shewn The Victory was so signal that Providence it self seem'd to be engaged in the Fight They Fought from Heaven The Stars in their Courses as once * Judg. 5.20 against Sisera about 260 years before the Stars in their Courses Fought against Absalom The Lord himself Eminently asserted the Right of his