Selected quad for the lemma: kingdom_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
kingdom_n	david_n	israel_n	judah_n	1,785	5	9.8153	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A63119	A sermon preached before the Right Honourable the Lord-Mayor, and Court of Aldermen, of the city of London, at St. Mary le Bow, on the 29th of May, 1694 by John Trenchard ...	Trenchard, John, 1662-1723.	1694 (1694)	Wing T2114; ESTC R23483	18,711	37

'T is undoubtedly one main instance of God's special Favours and Goodness to a Nation and such as ought to be a standing motive of their Repentance nay such Mercies being Probationary ones are to be look'd upon as design'd to make proof of our Gratitude and Obedience to that Infinite Goodness who does freely bestow them out of the Riches of his Mercy upon us So on the contrary when Evil and Tyrannical ones domineer and rule over us 't is an Argument of God's great Displeasure and Anger to a People For such as these and such have these Nations felt are indeed very heavy and deplorable Judgments and consequently are upon occasion the best Lectures that can be enlarged upon in order to correct the Popular Vices of the Age and to reform the Publick and Crying Sins of a Nation In a word 'T was God that in mercy to the Israelites rejected Saul and promoted David 'T was he that divided the Kingdom of the Jews into Israel and Judah That chose Jeroboam to be King over the Tribes that revolted and afterwards upon due provocation overthrew Ahab and Anointed Jehu to be King 'T was he that called in the Medes and Persians to afflict the Israelites for their Idolatry and other Abominations and who afterwards upon due humiliation removed the Yoke of that insupportable State of Bondage And 't was no less than God himself according to the Prediction of his Prophets that rais'd up the Medes and Persians against the Caldeans The Graecians against the Persians and lastly the Romans against all other Nations to work out and carry on the great Designs and Purposes of Infinite Power and Wisdom To conclude It was likewise God alone that facilitated the Attempts of Edward IV. and Henry VII for the recovery of these Kingdoms when they had been a long time banish'd from and dispossest of them and when they landed with the Foreign Assistance of 〈◊〉 above 2000 Soldiers and regain'd the Crown And 't was the same Good Providence of God which in mercy to a distracted divided and almost undone People effected this Day 's Restoration with little or no opposition I may say with less Blood In short 'T was this that brought us all back again to our true Constitution when the many notorious Male-Administrations and Violent Measures of the Late Reign had justly allarm'd our Fears and put us upon the necessity of a Natural State wandring Minds and Self-defence In a word 'T was this that when the Axe was laid to the Root of our Government prevented the deadly design'd Blow and prepared a way for the Resettlement of our Church and State as we now blessed be God do enjoy it This was marvellous in our eyes and was most certainly and undoubtedly the Lord's doing I come in the last place to shew the reasonableness of our present Joy and the Duty of this Day 's Thanksgiving I have been I must confess somewhat longer on the first part of this Discourse because I take it to be the most useful and edifying Enquiry of the two in these Sceptical and Atheistical Times wherein we now live which indeed are Times so desperately wicked as to require new Proofs and Establishment from us for the more effectual maintaining and asserting the very Fundamentals of our Religion 'T is an Age this which has Impudence and Prophaneness enough in store to explode and ridicule upon all occasions the True and Orthodox Notions of a Superintending Providence as if the God that made the World had nothing at all to do in the Appointment and Administration of the great Affairs in it Or as if he who created man at first was no ways concern'd either to govern us by his own Eternal Decrees of Providence or to see us governed by fit and proper Substitutes of his own designation But I am apt to think that the succession of such Mercies as have befallen these Kingdoms especially the happy Circumstances of our Present Establishment are so many standing and convincing Evidences of such a Providence which I have been so long a contending for To conclude therefore with the reasonableness of our present Joy and the Duty of this Day 's Thanksgiving in as few words as I can conveniently use on this Grand Occasion give me leave to observe That though God's Mercies to these Kingdoms have hapned to be liable to several Abuses as all Blessings are when bestowed on any Person or Persons who afterwards prove ungrateful and though they have been perverted perhaps to many evil and pernicious purposes viz. to the apparent hazard of this State and Kingdom and to the notorious scandal of our Church and Religion Yet this ought not in reason to abate the first obligations of our Gratitude nor in the least measure to impair that natural notion or grateful sense of God's Goodness which all Mankind either actually have or ought to have for Signal Benefactions and Providential Deliverances Nor would I be understood to contend altogether for particular days and periodical returns for Persons and Names or for mere forms nor for the sake of any Politick and State-compliance only but rather for a constant and Religious sence of our thankfulness to God upon the account of his publick Benefits and National Mercies as likewise for a substantial and devout expression of our Joy upon all solemn Occasions to him for the same I need not press home any Arguments for the particular duty of Gratitude as the occasion of this days Jubilee and Thanksgiving might otherwise require from me because I hope that in so refined an Age we are none of us grown such Apostates to good Manners and true Religion as to scruple the returning due Thanks and Acknowledgments for the Benefits which the extraordinary Providence of God has already vouchsafed to us and which we trust he will still continue to vouchsafe to these Nations The reasonableness therefore of our present Joy will be best evinc'd from these following Reflections In the First place The great and chiefest Blessing of our Restoration for I know of no other significant enough to be mentioned in this place was That it reduced our Confusions and composed our Disorders That from the mischiefs of Anarchy it improved our condition to the benefits of a certain and fixed Form of Government That from no King no Lords and no Commons I mean duly Assembled in Parliament it brought us to what was anciently what is now and what we hope will ever be Recognized as our true Constitution a Mixt or Limited Government made up of each of the Three particular Forms viz. a Monarchical Aristocratical and Democratical Power A Form of Government this if well Administred and justly Adhered to that affords all Conveniencies and Advantages imaginable that can be reap'd or enjoyed from under any of the Three distinct Species and yet secures us from all the Inconveniences and Disadvantages that through an Unlimited Jurisdiction can possibly result from either of them apart In short a

excellent and many useful Arts and Sciences were most happily begun and prepared for the universal benefit and satisfaction of Mankind Upon this very account we may presume it was that he permitted the Roman Eagle in times past to spread out her victorious Wings over the greatest part of the then known World for the sake of a general improvement and propagation of Arts and Sciences and that by the general reception of the Roman Laws and Language when the Emperors of Rome should become Christians as afterwards they did the great Mystery of Godliness and the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ might obtain an easier passage and a more agreeable admittance amongst them To this Head I cannot forbear to refer one Instance more and though some persons may think it too foreign to the Argument in hand yet with submission I think it sufficiently vindicates the interposition of a Divine Providence in the disposal and administration of Human Affairs For thus Augustus Caesar seems to have been purposely directed by the special Providence of God to tax the world Luke 2.1 in that uncustomary manner as he did that so every man repairing to his own City Christ by that means might be born at Bethlehem a City of Judah according as it was foretold by the Prophet Micha 5.5 And so likewise to verify the Prediction of another Prophet was the very same Person confirm'd and establish'd in the free and undisturbed possession of his Empire to the end that as an Instrument wherewith to accomplish the Eternal and Irreversible Decrees of a Superintending Providence he might shut the Temple of Janus and settle an Universal Peace throughout the World against that time when the great Prince of Peace was to be born in it But to wind up the whole thread of this Argument Let us further reflect on these following Particulars each of which well adverted to will abundantly illustrate the truth of what I have thus in general terms endeavoured to assert Had it ever constantly so fell out in the administration of a National and Publick Trust as it very usually does in the Transactions of a Domestick and Private Capacity And had there ever been so many uninterrupted Successions of Wise and Warlike Princes to inherit a Crown and to manage the weighty Affairs of some large Dominion correspondent to what may be observed in many private Families where there has been it may be a continual Generation of such as by their great Prudence and sagacious Conduct have encreas'd and conveyed down an Improv'd Estate to their Posterities The whole World would have truckled long since to the Arbitrary Subjection of some mighty Nimrod's Race And all the Kingdoms or particular Forms of Government that are now extant among us had but been so many precarious Tenures under some one great and Invincible Monarch In Popular Governments there may be perhaps for so 't was among the Romans a longer Succession of Worthy Magistrates and Brave Generals the Condition and necessity of such Governments requiring it should be so to secure men against the common danger of Foreign and Intestine Wars But in this Case too there is commonly a due Crisis which puts a period to the Success and Prosperity of their Sate For thus the excessive Wealth of Great men does either insensibly betray and deliver them over to Luxury Licenciousness and the most despicable degrees of Effeminacy in their Conduct or else in time their Boundless Ambition and Mutual Contention among one another for Superiority will effectually prepare a way as well for their own ruin as the final Subversion of their admired Leviathan But to reassume the first Observation if we consider the Successions that have hapned in most Countries we may well conclude from it that God's Providence for the Reason already suggested is very nearly and intimately concern'd in them all For seeing God Almighty whose Wisdom is unsearchable and his Ways past finding out is privy to and has eternally foreseen all the Natural Consequences and probable Event of Things and knows very well that in case he should give to this or that Nation a continual Race of Virtuous and Victorious Princes that then neither the Rivers nor Seas the Mountains nor Deserts would contain them or restrain their unbridled Ambition from invading the Territories of a Neighbouring Prince He therefore the better to keep the Ballance even between them and to preserve the distinct or separate Interest of Governments and Countries in the same manner as he hath long since established and setled it does very rarely bless any one Kingdom with Two Princes of the same Mind or the like Virtues Agreeable to which method of his Providence it was that Rehoboam succeeded Solomon that after Hezekiah came Manasses and so on in the several Reigns and Successions of the Kings of Judah and Israel The like happen'd as we read in Prophane History among the Romans when Tiberius succeeded Augustus and Domitian to Titus c. And there might be in the History of our own Nation a Collection made by those that are better at leisure than my self to do it of some Unhappy Princes that have not come up to the true Bravery the exact Justice and approved Wisdom of their Renowned Predecessors Much to the same purpose I might reflect on the many instances of unexpected Revolutions which have befallen the several States and Kingdoms of the World and so put it upon the experiment whether 't is possible for them to fail of giving your Conscience a due and sufficient Conviction that God is the only Judge upon Earth and Supream Governor of the World For we read in all Histories of Persons of all Ranks and Orders the Ignoble and Base as well as the first and high born that have been suddenly and unaccountably advanc'd to a Supream and Soveraign Power Now therefore to conjecture after all this that such important Occurences as these have happen'd only by chance in the World or that the God who numbreth the Hairs of our Head and without whose Knowledg and Privity so inconsiderable a Creature as a Sparrow does not fall to the Ground I say to think That such an Infinite and Perfect Being as God is who is Lord of all Things and Judge of all Men should sit by altogether unconcern'd as one that had no hand in these Affairs which have so immediate a tendency to the Happiness or Infelicity of Mankind would be a thought too too hard and absurd for a rational Creature to entertain of him who is Infinite in Power Wisdom and Goodness nay and I had almost said That 't was as good for us to have no God at all as to admit the Notion of such an one that either cannot or does not or will not concern himself to direct and appoint fit and proper Substitutes to govern the World under him When Good and Just Princes are exalted and promoted to a Throne 't is a publick Benefit and an inestimable Mercy to a People

Hymn of his own penning wherein he does very religiously acknowledge the special vouchsafement of God's Mercy and Goodness towards him in that he was advanced so miraculously and providentially from the low and despicable State of a Shepherd nay from the mean degree of a Fugitive or banished Person to sway the Scepter of God's People and in the room of his Father Saul to be another King over Israel My Text 't is true is not uncommonly nor improperly understood by all Divines agreeable with that application of it to the same purpose which the Apostle makes in Acts 4.11 to refer to Christ who being the stone which the builders i. e. the Jews refused and the Person which they did afterwards most despitefully Crucify is now being risen from the dead become the head stone of the corner or the chief Pillar and Foundation of the Church of God And therefore in a Prophetical Rapture being especially assisted thereunto by the Divine Spirit the Royal Psalmist is supposed hereby to celebrate even before it came to pass the Resurrection of Christ our Redeemer from the dead and to congratulate that most beneficial advancement of his Person to the Regalia and Supream Authority next under God his Father in the Kingdom of Heaven But waving this typical and figurative Interpretation though no question sufficiently intended by our Royal Prophet in this Psalm I shall take these words at present only in a literal sense as they are part of that grateful and devout acknowledgment which Holy David did humbly offer to the Divine Majesty for those repeated Deliverances which the watchful Eye of Providence had ever afforded him amidst all his manifold Dangers and Tribulations but more especially for that unexpected and surprizing Revolution in the Exaltation of his Person and Family to the Throne and Scepter of Israel Considering the extraordinary pre-eminence of King David above all other Kings as well upon the account of his Prophetical Spirit as of the peculiar designation by an immediate Divine Appointment that he and his Family should sway the Scepter of Israel which was such a Title to a Crown as no Kings out of the Jewish Oeconomy have ever since been able with the utmost assistance of all their Mercenary Advocates for Arbitrary Government to justify a claim to I say considering this and his other many personal Merits especially his Exemplary Devotions and the tender regard which he always had to the Profession of God's True Religion it may perhaps be a just Scruple to some how far such an occasional Comparison might be well prosecuted which my Text invites me to make between King David and that Prince whose wonderful and happy Restoration to these Kingdoms we are this day conven'd by the Order of our Government to commemorate and out of a religious sense of the great Blessing to return unto God the Author and Procurer of it our devoutest Acknowledgments and most pious Thanksgivings And though some Persons in the former Reigns have been perhaps too free and audacious in their Panegyrical Strains at such Anniversary Entertainments as this when they thought it not amiss to draw both these Princes in the same Colours making them Rivals and Competitors for the same Heroic Perfections and Kingly Qualifications as if the latter not unlike the former had been a man and what is more a King too after God's own heart yet it will be pardonable I hope in me if I make not too forward a step in dawbing over the Characters of Princes But however this I will be bold to affirm That if we examine the Journals of their persecuted and broken Fortunes how very difficult and alike Providential the Circumstances of their Escape were from the deep-laid Treachery and Machinations of their Enemies and how after their being forc'd to retire to Achish the King of Gath for Protection they were wonderfully brought back again in Peace to their own Countrey and alike rewarded with the Donation of a Crown for their Travel If we consider these broken pieces of Story with regard had to the special Providence of their unexpected Promotion the Choice of these Words on the present Solemnity may admit of a very tolerable justification In discoursing therefore on the Words of my Text as I have accounted for them I shall in the first place observe how eminently the Providence of God is concern'd in the Revolution and Alteration of Government For thus the stone which the builders refused became the head stone of the corner and thus a Prince that had been formerly forced into Banishment was afterwards recalled and triumphantly brought back pursuant to the then general Vote and Desire of the English Nation to the Throne and Scepter of his Ancestors And this was the Lord's doing and was marvellous in our eyes 2dly I shall shew the Reasonableness of our present Joy and the Duty of this Day 's Thanksgiving This is the day which the Lord hath made we will rejoice and be glad in it I shall in the first place observe How eminently the Providence of God is concerned in the Revolution and Alteration of Government For thus the stone which the builders refused became the head stone of the corner and thus a Prince that had been formerly forced into banishment was afterwards recalled and triumphantly brought back pursuant to the then Genral Vote and Desire of the English Nation to the Throne and Scepter of his Ancestors And this was the Lord's doing and was marvellous in our eyes The Notion of a God and Providence are so reciprocally and so inseparably dependent upon each other that there is no possibility of arriving at a rational perception of the one without the necessary result and supposition of the other For the Belief of the real existence of the one does effectually establish the consequent Hypothesis of the universal Influence and Actuation of the other as on the contrary to deny either is to take away the common Belief and Assent which is due to both Because God and Providence are words of the same import and signification though with this only difference that one denotes the Person or Infinitely Powerful Being that made the World at first out of nothing and the other expresses that necessary and essential Attribute of the Deity his Infinite Wisdom by which he presides continually over us watching and ordering all things in it for the best so as to prevent what must otherwise unavoidably come to pass a general Ruin and Confusion amongst us For were it true which the Fools affirm in their hearts when they say that there is no God and had there been no first and infinite Being to have given life by his bare fiat to all the other beings that are now Existing in the World all things had for ever been locked up in the womb of an eternal and silent Chaos and they would have still remained in the same unactive and insensible State as they were once in before the Eternal Word gave