they in whomsoever not in person or appearance disliking the same thing in this person and countenancing it in another If ye desire to see your sin This is thy sin O England All our thoughts all our wayes all our motions all our imaginations have bin are will be found before the Righteous God in this Day of his clear Judgment that is coming upon thee evil onely evil and that continually thou canst not turn thee to any one of them to find the least comfort and satisfaction of a good and righteous working and operation in them for How can an evil tree bring forth good fruit or a bitter fountain send forth sweet water Thy fountain is bitter thy root is rottennesse This I must testifie against thee from the Lord. Not but that thou hast done Gods work and fullfil'd and executed his pleasure upon Kings Nobles Bishops and all the slain and poyled of the Land Thou hast dressed the Lord's sacrifice but thou hast done it in thine own spirit and so art no better then Jeroboam then John then Nebuchadnezar and art accountable for all that thou hast done And God hath now taken thee in the snare of thy own heart and hath spread thy filthynesse thy unrighteousnesse thy ambition thy partiality thy hypocrisie in the sight of the Sun Thou art returned with the Dog to the vomit and with the Sow to the wallowing in the mire Thou hast corrupted thy self and art become abominable Judah hath justified Samaria Thy sins are as Scarlet they are of a double dye to the sins of the former generation which God hath cast out before thy face Thou sawest the Judgments of God on them for the wayes of pride unjustice oppression which thou walkest in and wast the Rod in his hand the Instrument of his vengeance upon them shalt thou therefore escape O! I dread to think what a sad reckoning this Generation hath to make I can see no glimpse of Comfort for us in any promise or prophecy or example or record in Scripture unlesse God powre out a spirit of grace and supplication a spirit of deep contrition and humiliation upon us but our Carcases must fall in the wildernesse as Israel's did Loruhamah and Loammi must be named upon us Israel shall be as Ethiopia and the bringing up of the Phlistins from Caphtor and the Assyrians from Kir shall be of as sacred memory as our Victories and successes the successes of the great Turk as holy things as all our deliverances I say unlesse God make us ashamed not onely of our sins but of our selves and of the spirit and root we have growen upon and acted from in all this I speak not now to natural men I know God judges every one by the light and law that they are under but I speak to the Saints of England that would be thought and call'd so many moral men have done bravely and faithfully and those that have corrupted in those principles having profest no higher shall be judged no deeper But you that say Ye see you that have discern'd and cryed up a Cause of God not civil liberties onely as men but a Cause of God in civil liberties all for God for the glory of God for the Kingdome of God I say you shall be judged out of your own mouths Is this the Cause of God Is this the Kingdome of God You in the Council you in the Army Is this the Cause of God now your turn is served Moral men shall onely be judged for their work not prosecuting the Cause but letting it fall but you shall be judged for no better a spirit unless you judge your selves I say there is no hope for you unlesse a spirit of judgment and burning arise up within you and cleanse your blood and filthynesse from you And ye shall pay not onely for your spirit but for that guilt also wherein ye are in Common with others for not prosecuting but letting fall this Cause when so far carryed on though darkly and blindly by you and in the letter For the same evil made you desist namely self-Interest that made you manage it in unrighteousnesse For be it known unto you The Cause of God is amongst us and shall go on and is carrying on through all these dark Meanders and Intricacies whilst you sleep on your down Pillows and stretch your selves upon your beds of Ivory and the next advance of it will be the routing of you Except God awaken you to meet him by speedy Repentance God will glorifie himself in his Judgments on you as upon the Cavaleirs before you Therefore trust not in vain Visions and cry not The Temple of the Lord. Is there any truth mercy and justice in the Land Are not the necessities of the poor as great as ever are not the oppressions as many is not pride luxury and profannesse as rife are not the Courts of Justice as corrupt Is not the spirit of God restrained and persecured Is Christ in the Throne Will ye call this a Reformation that ye are made Kings and Princes No! the Lord will not own it This is your work and your Cause it is none of his and God will make you know one day ye had power to have reformed these things but used it not forsooth because you would have offended this great man and tother useful Interest ye must have broak with a broken shatter'd World which will not be able to afford you the least shelter in the day when God shall visit you God will carry on his own Cause if we had never a tongue in the Parliament to plead it nor never a pen in the Nation to contend for is but what will become of you I know not How God will do it I know not but by his own appearing It is the day of His Power the day of the Spirit that is to have its turn next not Man's day but God's not Man's spirit but God's and whom He will use as his Instruments I know not if any of this Generation it must be by a Regeneration of them new moulding new framing new spiriting new principling of them The new wine must have new bottles but I see little towards any such thing in any of you Yet I believe God hath a remnant among you whom He will lead on to farther things but it will be with weeping and supplications with great brokennesse of heart and poverty of spirit with self-judging and self-abhorring and then what revenge will ye take of your selves what restitution will ye make to the Nation what right will ye do to all men even to your enemies Then will ye throw away your Idols of Gold and Silver to the Moles and to the Bats Then the lofty looks shall be humbled and the haughtinesse of man shall be laid low and the Lord alone exalted in that day Till the Spirit be thus powred forth from on high I look for no salvation to be wrought but the people shall labour in the fire
the bringing of all things in Earth to answer the minde of God as is done in Heaven A thing not done at once nor presently but by degrees nor to be perfected but by the appearance of Jesus Christ as he lets down the spiritual knowledge and revelation of himself unto us in the opening of the Scriptures We are to be preparing and occupying our Measures and Talents till he come and put the finishing hand to Crown his own work 3. To direct us in the Way of serving this Cause That we go not forth headily and rashly presumptuously and self-confidently in our own wit will wisdom or rage there hath been too much of this but humbly waiting upon God watching and looking up to him what door he opens what way he leads what means he puts into our hands and not to be troubled if we cannot see to the end of our way distinctly but from step to step If we be brought to an obedient following of him our way shall be as the encreasing light growing to perfect day This was the way God perswaded the Parliament unto at first we had never else taken down Bishops not being provided of a Discipline in their room but God carryed us over this Objection then And so this was the way the Army professed themselves to be lead in and they prospered wonderfully Those were the days of innocency and simplicity though much weakness and childishness and God may upbraid us with that time as once he did Israel Jer. 2. I remember thee the kindness of thy youth in the day of thy espousals when thou followedst me in a Land that was not sowed When thou knewest not how thou shouldst live but hadst every meal from Heaven Israel was holinesse to the Lord c. And this is a great thing we have Covenanted and engaged to the Lord. It is no new thing ye are exhorted to but the Vowes of God are upon us The Lord hath had livery and seizin of us we have lived upon him and he hath found us in a Desert Land and hath borne us upon Eagles wings and why should it not be so again To conclude let us consider what a Name and a Praise we began to be made in the Earth What people were like England a People saved by the Lord Shall we begin in the Spirit and seek to be made perfect in the flesh Shall we that have been assisted and carryed forth to assert the Cause of God against the corrupt usurpations of the World when they had so long prescription a King of ancient Descent that had such a fouundation of the National Constitution the Laws an Army to stand upon the Spirit of the world in its vigour to maintain and uphold them Shall we that did not then shrink but wrought our Cause through the fire and through Seas of blood shall we now after we have conquered all these real difficulties be afraid of a thing of nought of the shaddows of our own unbelieving fears that have no foundation or bottome of reason or righteousnesse or consent or constitution to urge themselves upon us Where is the King of whose frown ye should be afraid Where 's his Power Where 's his Army What is become of the Great men and Mighty men Who shall hurt you if ye be followers of that that is good If any be stept up into their places and shall offer to oppose the Canse of God ye need not wish for weaker Adversaries for they will be self-condemned They stand upon a Bogg which will swallow them up having no righteous foundation And for your Comfort let me add this one Word The World ye are to grapple with hath lost a great strength of late It s very Heart-strings are broke This I must say for Him that is gone It was He that bare up this old ruinous Frame which in likelihood had fallen before this if His Parts His Courage His Religion had not supported it Whether He did well or ill in it judge ye Indeed it broke him at length and he fainted under the weight of it but He was a strong Buttresse to it when it was sinking in the time of the little Assembly The Law and the Clergy had then crackt if he had not put thereto his shoulder I am not against the Honest Interest of the Ministery or Law if that Interest be publique if it be the Interest of Righteousnesse and of the Spirit I call them old and rotten in the corrupt State of them wherein at present they stand But I say while that Prop of them lasted there was no attempting against them for God had given him to be a prolonging of days unto them And as he that stood in the way did lett the revealing of the Man of sin till he was taken out of the way so the Spirit of God in his poor Witnesses had not full play against this old and corrupt State of things while that Great Spirit acted the Defence of them A Word to the Reader to remove Prejudice MY ayme is to give my witnesse against the Present Apostacy whether this Generation will hear or whether they will forbear I have believed therefore have I spoken These things are not ministred but with some Faith that God will appear and revive this Cause and his poor people and as I know not which way so I am not Solicitous I would be loath to blow the Coals of another Intestine War But better our Peace be interrupted then Truth perish which is more our Life than the blood that runs in our Veynes I know it must be not by Might nor Power but by the Spirit that our deliverance is wrought whether in War or Peace I should hope the present Vsurpations should be too much self-condemned in the Practisers of them to bear a quarrel and that if we knew once but how to Value our Cause and the ground we are upon our Opposites would quickly rebate their Courage seeing the day is so farre risen I am not against Monarchy as an unlawful Government we find it owned of God and honoured to be a Type of the Reign of Christ but I am upon this Dilemma withall the Promoters of it here Either we did well and were guided by a divine hand in taking it down or not If not why do we not ask the World mercy and restore the old Family again If we were directed by God to remove it let us see the same divine hand leading to the restoring it else What a scandal is it to our Cause to build again the things we destroyed That God leads us not to it appears 1. Because his people consent not in it and Governments for the forme of them are to be founded upon Consent The people that adhered and are yet faithful to this Cause have not onely their Interest among others but Paramount to the rest of the Nation 2. Our Condition calls not for unnecessary charge Taxes lye heavy on the Commoners The poor of the
Land that want bread are numerous 3. Kingly Government is a kind of Scourge and at best an allay of the freedome of a people a sacred thing esteem'd of difficult accesse Idolatrously adored an occasion of great superfluity excesse and vanity unsuitable to this day that is upon us and lastly makes the Person too stour and haughty to fall under the reproofs of the poor mean servants of Christ that come to them onely in the name of the Lord and so exalts their hearts to their own destruction in the end and the people's smart in the mean time 4. The Kings of Judah were Types but Types are Ceased Kingship is now to be preserved in the Person of Christ He will administer it in Truth in the truth of his own righteous and royal spirit not in figure and shadow through pitiful poor base men servants of lusts The poorest Saint that Cobbles under a Stall hath more of true Majesty and is more a King then the greatest Prince among them that is under the power of lust in his own soul I might give many other Reasons as the Impolitiquenesse of it to make a Family-quarrel the unsafeness of it for the person or family we should so set up But I leave politiques to Statesmen I am chiefly exercised in the Conscience of the thing The like I say for Lords I am not against Lords simply But they are thrown out It concerns us to consider by what hand and on what grounds before we admit them again If they were unnecessary and hinderful of our Cause and proceedings either we have altered our Cause or they are so still It was not the Persons we animadverted against but the Power How unrighteous is it if our Judgments be altered of the Power to place it in New Persons when many of the Ancient Peers are yet living as deserving as the New Is not this the way to breed a quarrel between Peers and Peers as between King and King 2. Walk not in the way of the Gentiles The Judgment of God made Kings Kings made Lords They were onely to help the King to inslave the people What people that had their choice would set up either Lords without Lands can do no more service for God nor their Country then other men 3. I am not against a Distinction of Ranks of men Variety is the beauty of the universe and an exercise of Vertue Where would bounty and humility be if there were not Rich And where were patience and contentation of mind if there were not mean men I would have every one have their Rights no industrious men want all honest men free I would not affectedly set up mean men against the wealthy nor would Itye wisdome and understanding to men of Estate Liberal and generous Education is a good quality but let it not go alone in the choice of men to rule but look for the spirit of Government 4. It is far from me to Monopolize or ingrosse in my judgment the priviledges and advantages of that Righteous Kingdome which God is setting up over the Earth to Saints onely which shall be shared among all that submit to it and oppose it not so far as they are Capable much lesse do I reckon of Saintship by any form of words that men expresse themselves in And though I dare not abett all that are zealous for this Cause for Saints yet I must professe my faith is shaken concerning those that desert it and it is an argument of some more Noble if not divine thing in men through all Shocks of temptations on the one hand and the other to preserve their Integrity And this I am perswaded As many have bin already shaken off as untimely figgs so few or none will hold out with this good Cause to the end but those that are of an Incorruptible seed whom therefore I shall desire to know by their fruits and judge of them according to their works 5. And as I am not able to say but a spirit of righteous Government as to things between man and man may be found in some who are not Saints upon the Strictest account of regeneration who may therefore for ought I know have the exercise of their talent allowed them even in the Kingdom of Christ subjecting that Rule of theirs in due subserviency to the spirit Spiritual affaires so can I not on the other hand admitt that to be the proper Rule and Government of Christ be it exercised by whomsoever though the Highest Professors in Religion and on never so high an account that is contrary to the light of Scripture rightly understood or the light of incorrupt Reason in any sort of men The Demonstration of the spirit and the righteousness of that Kingdome justifying its self undeniably to the conscience of the natural man in things that are under his Judgment as well as to the spiritual Christian in things which are proper to his discerning So as there is no Arbitrariness here in this Kingdome but all by Rule and that Rule is so clear and undenyable as nothing can rise up against it in any mans conscience Lastly I desire I may be believed that I have not bin led by any prejudice against his present Highnesse in this Testimony which I bear who as He hath not by any Publique Act of his Government disobliged any that I know of so by his affability and Courtesie wins upon all if any private passages have not bin so to the Rule I would not mention them because I would not multiply them As the Place he is in sought him not he it so I desire He may lay it and himself at the feet of Christ to dispose of him and his Interest as may be most for his glory So is he sure not to be layd-by dishonourably if any could have a heart or stomach so to do Christ himself must give up the Kingdome to God and so must all Rulers and Potentates unto Christ else Wo be to them THE Cause of God AND Of these Nations CHAP. I. Of the deplorable Estate of the Nation at this day after so fair advantages as were put into our hands IT is a certain truth No man is made unhappy but by his own choice God hath not bin wanting to let us find that all the power of our enemies either at home or abroad could not destroy us while we had hearts and were watchfull to use the means to preserve our seivs confidence in men and distrust in God commonly go together and are much of like dangerous Issue and Consequence We have lost more in this seven years Peace by trusting too much to a friend then we did in all our twelve years war while we conflicted with hoasts of enemies inasmuch as we have been still losing our liberty by little and little which all the time of the wars we went on gaining more and more and if we get no more by losing him but resolution to take up our trust we shall be confiderable
gainers I am I confesse so much a Leveller that in this corrupt state of mens principles and minds corruptible at the best it is safer for Laws to govern than Men. Not but that that blessed day of the Lord 's own righteous Reign may be neerer the dawning upon us than perhaps the present dark and cloudy complexion of our thoughts and affairs would seem to hold forth Therefore I would not have the door of a lively expectation shut against our Lord's appearing as I would not that in the mean time though we knew He were to come to morrow we should throw away our Reason and put out our Lights as men and despise those liberties he hath given us as advantages for our serving of him The late violent turns and changes that have befallen this poor Commonwealth since our Arms rested from the common enemy have to my apprehension lookt more like the Trumpets in the Apocalypse that with gallantry and state brought in Corruption than the Vials that work it out These pour not forth themselves at once with observation but leisurely and secretly wast and consume long-rooted Usurpations And all that either the Civil or Military power hath to do is but to maintain us in peace and freedom that so we may attend unto that Light of God which according to the prophecies of Scripture is breaking forth which will certainly undermine and destroy the State Anti-christian as well as the Church Anti christian for there is both and both shall be destroyed with the Spirit of Christ's mouth and the brightnesse of his Appearing And without his appointment it will never be done by secular Sword or Arm. When I say The Powers are to maintain our peace and freedom I am aware what I say and that it implyes We were in the possession of them and indeed so we were and they were given us of God If it be demanded when we were so and wherein it appeared I answer When our Arms were victorious over all our enemies in the field which was not till after Worcester fight Then was there nothing in our way visibly but Mercy and Truth Righteousnesse and Peace might have embraced each other The Enemy was subdued in England before that but there was a remnant of him in Scotland and Ireland And then the Rent that was made among us by the taking off the King weakned the honest Interest much as the Action it self gave opportunity to the ambitious aspirings and designs of some when that place was empty to get into it at least wise such jealousies there were Perhaps when that action shall be reveiw'd by us in Cooler Spirits we may see Cause to acknowledge that the King was not so ripe for the Capital Justice of man in those passive Circumstances wherein he then stood as a Prisoner of War till he had forfeited the security we might have laid upon him I am sure our Eager policy in that Action for self-preservation hath little succeded or answered our desires However the sickle of Divine Justice cutting him down it was not adviseable for honest men when they had discharged their judgments and consciences in a saithful testimony to divide thereupon But notwithstanding this breach we were again as I said upon fair advantages after the Battle at Worcester when nothing was wanting but a Spirit and wisdome to manage so great an opportunity A time like that of Augustus Caesar When our Saviour was born all the World was quiet So was all our little world for the Saviour to be born into it the 2d time Tyrants both in Church and State expel'd their Armyes vanquisht The Nations like wax ready to receive any good and righteous impression yea the Parliament it self expecting what good thing would be required of them to do having power to refuse nothing should have bin demanded The Lawyers quaked the formal Clergy were down in the Mouth the Malignant trembled the loose Nobility and Gentry lookt pale All men were frighted into a fear and awe of God and the hearts and expectations of all good men were up exceedingly But wherefore is a price put into the hand of a fool when there is no heart Now was the time that God said unto us as once unto Israel Go up and possesse the Land which I have sworn that I would give you Go fill the Land with Righteousnesse plant my Name and my Truth there Drive out all profannesse unmercifulnesse injustice oppression ease the burdens break the yokes relieve the necessities of my people stamp my Image upon the Nation consecrate it to me whatever thing in your minds that is honest and just and good and merciful bring it forth and fear not for the Lord your God which goeth before you He shall fight for you according to all that He did for you in Egypt He that brought you up from under Regal Tyranny and Episcopal domination that hath vanquished the Enemy in the three Nations before you and all their formidable hosts He is with you 4. This was the possessing of the Land which the Lord called his people then unto Even to fill the seats of Judicature and all places and things with the presence of God not to satisfie our selves to possesse the King's and Bishops Lands and Deane and Chapters Lands or rather to be possessed by them All men must here needs understand that I charge the Army And indeed I do so though not them alone but many of the then Parliament who took a new scent of the Honors promotions and Advantages of those whom God had cast out before them and lost the scent of the Cause yea and many of the zealous people of the Nation too were taken off by these things These were the Moabitish snares that inveigled the Princes And what hath followed thereupon is sad to behold at this day We having lost in a manner all that we had got and being relapst deeper into bondage then heretofore in the Kings time He is not an Englishman that doth not bleed to see how since that Liberty is lost Property expos'd to Arbitrary Lust and Will The Publique Cause and Interest laid-by A Private Cause and Interest set up Men sworn to it Judged by it not only as to liberty and livelyhood Officers being Casher'd the Army and others put out of Places of Trust but some put to death for not preferring it before the publique Malignants countenanced and taken into favour occasion given to the formal yea the profane spirit to lift up its head while publique spirits and the precious of the Land were discouraged yea that very spirit whereby our Cause rose and obtain'd so far lookt upon as an Enemy and watcht over with a jealous eye Tryers set up to keep it out of the Pulpit good Justices removed and the old spirit of the Gentry brought in play again worldly greatnesse again affected by those that sometime seemed to set their face another way The burdensome pompe and vanity of a Court again revived
Curae leves loquuntur ingentes stupent But few go to the Root of our distemper we must go lower yet Sure that which hath blasted all our hopes and made us return and sit down as men ashamed re infectâ must be discovered and this Light I am apt to think must come out of the Sanctuary Those that have travelled through the like passages in their own hearts and have known the depths of Satan the admirable shapes he transforms himself into and what an absolute Newness of life and frame of Spirit is requisite for the carrying on the work of the Kingdom of God steadily and without starting back they may tell us something of importance and siguificancy in our Case In searching out the Root of our Distemper we may profitably reflect upon many things which might be partly Causes of it and have a hand in bringing us thus low when we were in so hopeful a way as was hinted before Such as are a carnal Succumbency of Spirit lying down in the advantanges attained and so making the Kingdom of God a thing too outward consisting in worldly and outward ease honour and the like and neglecting it within 2. Making it too private and narrow contenting our selves with our own not travelling of others deliverance the poor remaining yet in streights in our own Land through want of justice to help them to their own and want of mercy to extend something of ours to them 3. Unwatchfulness of Spirit through which the enemy got an advantage to work in the night of our security and sloth to undo all again while we were sleeping and shorting in our private advantages And many such like Reasons might be assigned which if we should be exact to muster up we might be lost in them But they being infirmities of all Times common to all as Men they have their easier and more ordinary censure and pardon from the Lord and cannot be supposed to be so severely animadvered against by the hand of his justice as to cause him after such intimacy to turn his back upon a people And therefore we must search for some other blacker and fowler thing to charge this great Desertion and sorsaking of us upon And as Physitians use to inquire of their Patients the time when their diseases seized upon them and the Manner of its on-set how and where it found them where they had bin what they had bin doing what they had eaten or drank that day or what exercise they had bin at and such like Circumsiances so let us do We may remember that it was a constant observation which was again and again inculcated upon us both by the Lord himself and those that were wise observers of his providences and dispensations that when ever we began to consult with flesh and blood and to deal wisely to restrain or deal hardly with the true Israel of God The Lord did alwayes animadvert against us with some losse ill successe or disappointment in our publique affaires which was as that voice unto us Touch not mine annointed and do my Prophets no harme It is for their sakes that God doth all that he rebukes Kings He gives Nations for them and therefore not to discern this the Lords body whose good and deliverance is the scope and aime of all God's works and dispensations No wonder if it cast us into a sick and weak and languishing Estate By these we rose with these we thrived It may be remembred Our affaires never succeeded till they came to be managed by these hands in the Army and then we had not any considerable stop or Check that did dwell upon us till the salvation of the three Nations was wrought out and accomplished But when God had Vanquished our Enemies I dowell remember an evil spirit grew up against the people of God we grew jealous of them we were glad to be Saved by them but afraid they should Rule over us And therefore as their weaknesse unwatchfulnesse and unheedfulnesse to this spirit gave way those that should have prevented and forbid being otherwise privately taken up and employed or wanting such a sense and value of themselves in the Lord as was requisite to keep off the World from presuming and incroaching upon them by little and little they grew from jealousie to Emnity and to plant their Engines against that people and that spirit that had bin their Raepart and defence in all assaults that had bin made against their peace and safety Nay then sayes God if this be your Requital of me if you that have bin fellow Souldiers in one Cause fellow servants in one house know no better how to use your peace and liberty but fall a beating your fellow servants I will make one among you or I will send in One upon you that shall seize and secure things you so abuse not to be restored again till you know how to make a better use of them You love your Liberty you love your property you are not for Me nor will give my Saints their Liberty and free breathing among you if ye drive me away from you if I go up from you these go with me And as for those you Maligne I will be a little Sanctuary to them And there is this thing farther in it which is worthy our observation The spirit we were so jealous of was that growing light in the people of God which we knew not where it would end being a free born Creation that had no name nor form for that which was formed we could admit and grew pretty familiar with though at first we were shy of some of them as Independents Anabaptists c. But this namelesse thing this Virgin that was not espoused nor determined to or by any forme This spirit that owned no Father but God no Master but one and He in Heaven that was in a pure absolute and constant dependance on him that professed to follow the Lamb whithersoever he should go that had resigned its will its wisdome the Conduct of it self wholly to him This was the Offence Top and keep down this spirit let not this get the head of us if it do we are undone our Religion our Consistency is gone we shall be the most tossed wavering uncertain fluid ridiculous people in the World No Nation will value us none of the Potestant Churches will own us Let not this Man let not any men in this spirit Rule over us nor be suffered among us Now mark what God did He took one that was in no form neither Presbyterian Independent nor Anapatist and sets him up in despight of all this wit and contrivance to the contrary And so the very thing that generation so studiously avoyed fell unto them The thing they feared as Iob saies came unpon them and that very life they sought to save they assuredly lost This was the first thing But this is not all In the next place God committs into his hand a Rule not heavenly Divine and spiritual