others small and scarce visible in the Galaxy of the Church but all are Stars and no Star is without some light If but the Second there are large Tapers and Rush-candles one gives a greater light then the other but all give some Never let them go for either Stars or Candles that neither have nor give light And wo is me if the Light that is in us be darkness how great how dangerous is that darknesse Blessed be God we have a learned able and flourishing Clergy as ever this Church had or I think I may boldly say any other since the Gospel look't forth into the World there have not been clearer Lamps in Gods Sanctuary since their first lighting then our dayes have seen yet why should we stick to confesse that which can neither be concealed nor denyed that there are some amongst so many whose wicke is too much for their Oyle yea rather whose snuffe is more then their Light I mean whose offensive lives shame their holy Doctrines and reproach the Glorious Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ these as we lament so we desire to have top't by just censures but hear you my worthy brethren do not you where you see a thiefe in the Candle call presently for an extinguisher for personal faults do not you condemn an holy calling Oh be you wisely charitable and let us be exemplarily holy Lastly for you Christian hearers think not that this Light may be put off to publick and eminent persons only Each of you must shine too at the least tanquam faces Philip. 2. If they be as Cities up-an Hill the meanest of you must be as Cottages in a Vally though not high-built yet wind-tight and water tight If they be Beacons you must be Lanterns every one must both have a light of his own and impart it to others It is not a charge appropriated to publick Teachers that the Apostle gives to his Hebrewes Exhort one another dayly while it is called to day least any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin Heb. 3.13 Even the privatest person may shine forth in good counsell he that is most obscure may and must do good works in his place and improve his graces to others good These these my beloved are the light which we must both have and give not to have were to have no fellowship with God to have and not to give it were to ingrosse and monopolize grace which God cannot abide Hath any of you Knowledge Let him communicate it and light others Candle at his Hath any man worldly riches let him not be Condus but Promus to do good and distribute forget not Hath any man Zeal Zeal I say not fury not frenzy let him not glow only but shine let him say with Jehu Come see my Zeal for the Lord Hath any man true piety and devotion let him like a flaming brand enkindle the next thus thus shall we approve our selves the Sons of that infinite and communicative Light thus shall we so have fellowship with the God who is Light that shining like him and from him here in Grace we may shine with him hereafter above in everlasting glory which the same God grant to us for the sake of the Son of his love Jesus Christ the righteous to whom with thee O God the Father and thy blessed Spirit one infinite and incomprehensible Lord be given all praise honour and glory now and for ever Amen A SERMON Preacht in the Cathedral at EXCETER UPON The solemn Day appointed for the CELEBRATION OR THE PACIFICATION Betwixt the Two KINGDOMS Viz. Septemb. 7. 1641. By JOS. EXON PSAL. 46.8 Come behold the Works of the Lord what Desolations He hath made in the Earth He maketh warrs to cease unto the ends of the Earih c. IT was doubtless upon the happy end of some warr and the renovation of an established peace that this gratulatory Psalme was penned and therefore fits well with our occasion My text then is an earnest invitation to a serious and thankfull consideration of the great works of God in his contrary proceedings with men Desolations of warr and restaurations of Peace we are called first to a generall survay of Gods wonderfull works and then to a speciall view of the works of his justice first what desolation he hath made upon Earth then of his mercy in composing all the busie broils of the World He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the Earth These must be the subject both of our eyes and of my tongue and your ears at this time We must then behold the works of the Lord but that we may behold them we must come and that we may both come and behold them we are invited to both Come and behold We are naturally full of distractions ready to mind any thing but what we should unless we be called we shall not come and unlesse we come and behold we shall behold to no purpose that which our Saviour saith of Martha is the common case of us all we are troubled about many things One is carking about his household affaires another is busying his thoughts with his law-suits another is racking his mind with ambitious projects another is studying which way to be revenged of his enemy and some other perhaps rather then want work will be troubling themselves with matters of State or other mens affaires that concern them not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 busie Bishops in other mens diocess we had need to be call'd off from these vain unmeet avocations ere we offer to behold the works of God else it will fall out with us as it doth ordinarily with our bodily sight that whiles we have many objects in our eye we see nothing distinctly at all Away therefore with all the distractive yea divulsive thoughts of the World and let us Come and behold the works of the Lord as the Vulgar hath it in the next verse vacate videte Come then from thy counting house thou from thy shop-board thou from thy study thou from thy barr thou from the field and behold the works of the Lord. Indeed how can we look beside them What is there that he hath not done What thing is it that he hath not created or what event can befall any of his Creatures which he hath not contrived Or what act can fall from any Creature of his wherein he is not interested So as unlesse we will wilfully shut our eyes we cannot but behold the works of the Lord But there is more in this charge then so as these works are not meant of the ordinary occurrents so it is not a mere sight that is here called for but a serious and fixed contemplation It is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as I remember Beza distinguishes upon an other occasion a bending of our eyes upon this holy object Solomon the Son interprets his Father David Eccles 7.13 Consider the work
the door of the Tabernacle of the Congregation before the Lord where I will meet you to speak there with thee Lo God meets us in the holy Assemblies Meets us yea stayes with us there Zach. 2.10 The prophet speaking of the dayes of the Gospell Sing and rejoyce saith he O Daughter of Sion for Lo I come and will dwell in the midst of thee saith the Lord Contrarily when he withdrawes from any people the ordinary means of salvation he is truly said to depart from them but this perhaps not at once but by degrees as in Ezekiels vision he removes first to the threshold and from thence to the door of the East-gate and this I would have you know to be done not only in a meer silence but in a corruption of doctrine not only when faithfull mouths are stopped but when mens mouths are lawlesly opened to the venting whether of popish fancies or satyricall invectives against authority for you may not think that all discourses are preaching or all preaching Gospell when men preach themselves and not Christ when they utter their own impetuous fury and not the glad tidings of peace how shall we call this the message of God No God was not in the winde he was not in the fire he was in the soft voice And he that walks betwixt the golden Candlesticks doth not go away only when the light is quite out but when the snuff burns unsavourily in the socket Shortly where the sincere milk of the Gospell is given to Gods babes and the solid meat of true Orthodox and saving doctrine is set before the stronger men there God visits his people in mercy and is drawn nigh to them in his holy Ordinance Secondly in his audience we use to say out of sight out of mind and those that are out of distance what noise so ever they make are not heard The ravished Virgin in the field saith God cryed out and there was none to save her Deut. 22.27 but when we come neer the least groan and sigh is heard Thus God who is never but with us is said to come neer us when he gives proof to us that he comes not only within the ken of our necessities but within the hearing of the softest whisperings of our prayers So David every where The Lord hath heard my supplication the Lord will hear my prayer Ps 6. The Lord will hear me when I call upon him The tender mother is never away from the bed-side of her sick child but if she perceive the disease to grow dangerous now she is more attentive and layes her ear to the mouth of it and listens to every breathing that it fetcheth so doth our heavenly father to us The Lord is nigh to all that call upon him saith the Psalmist Nigh them indeed for he puts into them those holy desires which he graciously hears and answers Contrarily when that sweet singer of Israel findes some stop made of his audience he is then in another tune Wherefore hidest thou thy face and forgettest our affliction and our oppression Psal 44.24 still measuring Gods nearnesse to us by his regard and as it were re-ecchoing to our prayers A third and yet nearer and happier approach of God to us is in his Grace and favour in the other two as in his word and in our prayers he may come near us little to our availe He speaks to many in his word that hear him not or that hear him to their further judgment Our gospell is howsoever a sweet savour to God yet a savour of death unto death to many a soul wo be to thee Chorazin wo be to thee Bethsaida He hears many speak to him in their prayers but for their own punishment and sometimes will not hear in mercy to the petitioner the Devill sues to enter into the Swine and is heard Paul sues to be freed from the buffets of the messenger of Satan and is mercifully not heard the Israelites have Quailes according to their desires but sauced to them with a vengeance But this third appropinquation of God is never other then cordiall and beneficiall It is a sweet word I will dwell amongst the Children of Israell and will be their God Exod. 29.45 Yea this is true happinesse indeed that God will so dwell with us as to be ours St. Paul told the Athenians most truely non longe ab unoquoque he is not far from every one of us how should he when in him we live and move and are but little are we the better for these generall favours which are common to all his creatures if we do not finde in our selves a speciall interest in the presence of his Spirit If he only call on us as a passenger or lodge with us as a stranger or sojourne with us as a guest this can be small comfort to us nor any thing lesse then his so dwelling with us as that he dwell in us and that not as an inmate but as an owner Know ye not that Christ dwells in you saith St. Paul unlesse ye be Reprobates Know ye not that ye are the Temples of the living God his Temples for a perpetuall inhabitation of which he hath said Here shall be my rest for ever Whereupon there will be sure to follow the fourth degree of his appropinquation which is our aid and sweet experience of his mercifull deliverance It was out of a full sense of Gods goodnesse that holy David breaks out into that heavenly Epiphonema The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart and saveth such as be of a contrite Spirit many are the afflictions of the righteous but the Lord delivereth him out of them all Psal 34.18 19. His salvation is nigh to them that fear him that glory may dwell in our Land Psal 85.9 So then the sum of all is this that if we draw nigh unto God he will be sure to draw nigh to us in his Ordinances in his Audience in his Graces in his Aid But what shall we say to the order of these two approaches One would have thought he should have said God drawes near to you therefore draw you near to God For surely his approach to us is the cause that we come near to him and not our approach to him causeth him to come near to us Do not think that God and man strain courtesie who shall begin or that man hath any power to draw to God but from God The true order of our regeneration is that Cantic 1.4 Draw me and I shall run after thee There have been contrary heresies in the Church concerning this point The Manichees held man in all things dragged by a necessity of destiny The Pelagians held man led altogether by his will so as that can alone enable him to do good and to feoffe him in blessednesse And our Semipelagian Papists go not much lesse save that they suppose some help given to the will which it can thus improve The Orthodox Church still hath
reliance upon God yea even with some kind of joy it self for when we are bidden to rejoyce continually Philip. 4.4 even the dismal dayes of our mourning are not excepted Not so only saith the Apostle but we glory in tribulations Rom. 5.3 Yea more then so My brethen saith St. James count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations James 1.2 Thirdly for the manner of our mourning we cannot but take notice that there is a solemn mourning and there is a private and domestical the solemn is by publick indiction of authority That only Power that can command our Persons may command our humiliation and prescribe the circumstances of the Performance of it Niniveh it self had so much divinity as to know and practise this truth How strict a Proclamation was that of the King of that Heathen City Let neither man nor beast herd nor flock tast any thing let them not feed nor drink water but let man and beast be covered with sack-cloth c. As for the choise and punctuality of the time whereto this publick mourning must be limited where should it rest but in the hand of soveraignty whose wisdom is to be presupposed such as to pitch upon the meetest seasons for this Practise It is very remarkable that we finde recorded in the case of Israels Publick mourning Nehem. 8.9 10. Then Nenemiah which is the Tirshatha or governour and Ezra the Priest the Scribe and the Levites that taught the People said unto all the People This daie is holy unto the Lord your God mourne not nor weep Go your way eat the fat and drink the sweet and send portions to them for whom nothing is prepared for this day is holy unto our Lord neither be ye sorrie for the joy of the Lord is your strength A consideration if I may intimate it without presumption meet to be tendred to our Brethren of the neighbour Church who are wont to cast their publick fasts upon the Lords day contrary no less to the determination of the Councels of the Evangelical Churches then the practise of the Jewish For what other is this but Gods holy-day of which we may well take-up the words of the Psalmist This is the Day which the Lord hath made let us rejoice and be glad in it As it would therefore be utterly unseasonable to rejoyce in a day of mourning so must it needs be to mourn in a day of rejoycing The rites and formes of publick mournings may and were wont to vary according to the usages of severall Nations and Churches how ceremonious the Jewes were in this kind I need not tell you here was rending of garments girding with sackcloth muffling of faces prostration on floores covering with ashes houling on the house-tops cutting and tearing of hair wringing of hands and all possible gestures that might expresse depth of passion And so much of this is imitable by us as may in a grave Christian fashion testify our dejection and true sorrow of heart upon the occasion of publick calamities this solemn humiliation then being alwaies joyned with an afflicting the body by fasting for deep sorrow doth both take away appetite and disregards nature so it calls us for the time to an absolute forbearance and neglective forgetfulness of all Earthly comforts In which regard the Popish mock-fasts which allow the greatest dainties in the strictest abstinence and the Turkish which shut up in an evening gluttony are no better then hypocriticall counterfeits of a religious self-humbling those habits then those discourses or actions those contentments which are in themselves perhaps not lawfull only but commendable must now be avoided as unseasonable if not sinful How hainously did the Almighty take this mis-timed pleasure and jollity at the hands of his people the Jewes In that day saith Esay did the Lord God of Hosts call to weeping and to mourning and to baldnesse and to girding with sackcloth And behold joy and gladnesse slaying Oxen and killing Sheep eating flesh and drinking wine let us eat and drink for to morrow we shall dye And what was the issue It was revealed in mine ears by the Lord of Hosts surely this iniquity shall not be purged from you till ye dye saith the Lord God of Hosts Esay 22.12 13 14. In matter of private mournings every man is allowed to be the arbiter of his own Time Place Measure manner of performance alwayes so as that he keep within the just bounds of piety decency discreet moderation as Bernard well adviseth in the like kind so punishing a Rebell that he do not destroy a subject Neither can I apprehend any reason if we entertain a well grounded sorrow Mat. 6.16 why we may not expresse it Not in an hypocritical way of ostentation as the vain Pharisees taxed by our Saviour which disfigured their countenances and did set a sowre face upon a light heart that they might appear unto men to fast but in a wise sober seemly unaffected deportment to instance in the case of the death of those to whom we have the dearest relation there can be no case wherein mourning can be more seasonable it is no lesse then a judgment that God denounceth against King Jehojakin They shall not lament for him saying Ah my Brother or Ah Sister they shall not lament for him saying Ah Lord or Ah his glory Jer. 22.18 And it was an hard word that God spake to Ezekiel Son of man behold I take away from thee the desire of thine eyes with a stroak yet shalt thou neither mourn nor weep neither shall thy tears run down forbear to cry make no mourning for the dead c. Ezek. 24.16 Lo such a wise as it might have been froward disobedient unquiet it had been no greatly difficult charge to have parted with her but it seems Ezekiels was a dear pleasing loving consort even the desire of his eyes and the comfort of his life and therefore to part with her without tears must needs be a double grief to his Soul as therefore 't is unnatural and inhumane not to mourn for Parents Wives Husbands Brothers Sisters Children Friends so it cannot be unmeet to testify our mourning even by our outward habit I could never see a reason why it should not be fit to wear blacks upon funerall occasions Neither Piety nor Charity is an enemy to civill ceremonies This colour and fashion is not indecent nor justly offensive so as the mind be free from superstition and over-nice curiosity such as Balsac jeers at in his vain French Lady who affected to have not her house onely but all the vessels and utensils that belong to it put into that hew Alexand ab Alexandro Genial Dierum l. 3. c. 7. If you tell me that the Heathens mourned thus I must tell you that all did not so some Nations mourned in white others in blew others in purple and if all had done so they are no ill patterns in matters of meer civilities besides that in reason this
taxation of observing dayes and times any one that hath but halfe an eye may see that it hath respect to those Judaicall holy-dayes which were part of the ceremonial law now long since out of date as being of typical signification and shadowes of things to come Should we therefore go about to revive those Jewish feasts or did we erect any new day to an essentiall part of the worship of God or place holiness in it as such we should justly incurr that blame which the Apostle casts upon the Galatian and Colossian false-teachers But to wrest this forbiddance to a Christian solemnity which is merely commemorative of a blessing received without any prefiguration of things to come without any opinion of holiness annexed to the day is no other then an injurious violence Upon all this which hath been said and upon a serious weighing of what ever may be further alledged to the contrary I dare confidently affirm that there is no just reason why good Christians should not with all godly cherefulness observe this which that holy father styled the metropolis of all feasts To which I add that those which by their example and doctrine sleight this day causing their people to dishonour it with their worst cloathes with shops open with servile works stand guilty before God of an high and sinful contempt of that lawâ—ul authority under which they live for as much as by the statutes of our land made by the full concurrence of King and state this day is commanded to be kept holy by all English subjects and this power is backed by the charge of God submit your selves to every ordinance of man for the Lords sake If now after all this I should let my pen loose to the suffragant testimonies whether of antiquity or of modern divines and reformed churches I should trye your patience and instead of a letter send you a volume Let it suffice that ever since the second hundred year after Christ this feast hath without contradiction obtained in the church of God and hath received many noble Elogies and passionate inforcements from the learned and holy Fathers of the church amongst the rest that of Gregory Nazianzen is so remarkable that I may not omit it as that which sets forth the excesse of joyful respect wherewith the antient Christians were wont to keep this day In his oration upon the day of the Nativity of Christ Let us saith he celebrate this feast not in a panegyrical but divine not in a worldly but supersecular manner not regarding so much our selves or ours as the worship of Christ c. And how shall we effect this Not by crowning our doors with garlands nor by leading of dances nor adorning our streets not by feeding our eyes not by delighting our ears with songs not by effeminating our smel with perfumes not with humouring our tast with dainties not with pleasing our touch not with silken and costly clothes c. not with the sparkling of jewels not with the lustre of Gold not with the artifice of counterfeit colours c. let us leave these things to Pagans for their pomps c. But we who adore the word of the father if we think fit to affect delicacies let us feed our selves with the dainties of the law of God and with those discourses especially which are fitting for this present festival So that learned eloquent father to his auditors of Constantinople Whereto let me if you please have leave to add one or two practical instances One shall be of the good Emperour Theodosius lying now for eight moneths under the severe censure of Bishop Ambrose when the feast of the Nativity drew near what moan did that religious Prince make to his courtiers that he was by that reresolute Bishop shut out for his blood-guiltiness from partaking with the assembly in that holy service Histor Trâ—par 〈◊〉 â— c 3â— and what importunate means did he make for his admission had that gracious Emperour been of the diet of these new divines he would have sleighted that repulse and gladly taken this occasion of absence from that superstitious solemnity or had one of these grave monitors been at his elbow he might have saved that pious Prince the expense of many sighes and teares which now he bestowed upon his abstention from that dearly affected devotion The other shall be an history of as much note as horrour Nicephor l. 7. c. 6. too clear a proof of the ancient celebration of this festivall It was under the Tyranny of Dioclesian his co-partner Maximinus that twenty thousand Christans which were met to celebrate the feast of this blessed Nativity in the large Church of Nicomedia were made an Holocaust and burnt together with that goodly Fabrick to ashes on that day Lo so great a multitude as twenty thousand christians of all ages of both sexes had not thus met together in a time of so mortal a danger to celebrate this feast if the holy zeal of their duty had not told them they ought to keep that day which these novellers teach us to contemn Now let these bold men see of how contrary a disposition they are to these blessed Martyrs which as this day sent up their souls like to Manoahs Angel to heaven in those flames After thus much said I should be glad to know since reason there can be none what authority induces these gainsayers to oppose so antient and received a custome in the Church of God you tell me of a double testimony cited to this purpose the one of Socrates the Historian which I suppose is fetcht out of his 5th book of Ecclesiastical story chap. 21. where upon occasion of the feast of Easter he passeth his judgment upon the indifferent nature of all those ancient feasts which were of use in the primitive times shewing that the Apostles never meant to make any law for the keeping of festival dayes nor imposed any mulct upon the not keeping them but left men to the free observation thereof For answer whereunto I do not tell you that this author is wont to be impeached of Novatianisme and therefore may seem fit to yield patronage to such a client I rather say that take him at the worst he is no enemy to our opinion or practise we agree with him that the Apostles would have men free from the servitude of the Jewish observation of dayes that they enacted no law for set festivalls but left persons and places so to their liberty in these cases that none should impose a necessity upon other this were to be pressed upon a Victor Bishop of Rome who violently obtruded a day for the celebration of Easter upon all Churches supposing in the mean while an Easter universally kept of all christians though not on the same day this makes nothing against us who place no holiness in the very hours nor plead any Apostolical injunction for dayes nor tye any person or Church to our strict calender but
way unto but not offering me the expected encouragement of my continuance with him I stayed and preacht on the Sunday following That day Sir Robert Drury meeting with the Lord Denny fell belike into the commendation of my Sermon That religious and Noble Lord had long harboured good thoughts concerning me upon the reading of those poor pamphlets which I had formerly published and long wished the opoâ—tunity to know me to please him in this desire Sir Rob. will'd me to go and tender my service to his Lordship which I modestly and seriously deprecated yet upon his earnest charge went to his Lordships gate where I was not sorry to hear of his Absence Being now full of Cold and Distemper in Drury-lane I was found out by a friend in whom I had formerly no great interest one Mr. Gurrey Tutor to the Earl of Essex P. Henry he told me how well my Meditations were accepted at the Princes Court and earnestly advised me to step over to Richmond and preach to his Highness I strongly pleaded my indisposition of body and my inpreparation for any such work together with my bashfull fears and utter unfitness for such a presence my aversness doubled his importunity in fine he left me not till he had my ingagement to preach the Sunday following at Richmond he made way for me to that awfull Pulpit and encouraged me by the favour of his Noble Lord the Earl of Essex I preacht through the favour of my God that Sermon was not so well given as taken In so much as that Sweet Prince signified his Desire to hear me again the Tuesday following which done that labour gave more contentment then the former So as that gracious Prince both gave me his hand and commanded me to his Service My Patron seeing me upon my return to London lookt after by some great Persons began to wish me at home and told me that some or other would be snatching me up I answered that it was in his power to prevent would he be pleased to make my maintenance but so competent as in right it should be I would never stir from him insteed of condescending it pleased him to fall into an expostulation of the rate of competencies affirming the variableness thereof according to our own estimation and our either raising or moderating the causes of our expences I show'd him the insufficiency of my means that I was forced to write books to buy books Shortly some harsh and unpleasing answer so disheartned me that I resolv'd to embrace the first oportunity of my remove Now whiles I was taken up with these anxious thoughts a messinger it was Sir Robert Wingfield of Northhamptons sonne came to me from the Lord Denny now Earl of Norwich my after-most-honourable Patron entreating me from his Lordship to speak with him No sooner came I thither then after a glad and Noble welcome I was entertained with the earnest offer of Waltham The condicions were like the mover of them free and bountifull I received them as from the munificent hand of my God and returned full of the cheerfull acknowledgments of a gracious providence over me Too late now did my former Noble Patron relent and offer me those termes which had before fastened me for ever I returned home happy in a new Master and in a new Patron betwixt whom I Divided my self and my labours with much comfort and no less acceptation In the second year of mine attendance on his Highness when I came for my Dismission from that monethly service it pleased the Prince to command me a longer stay and at last upon mine allowed departure by the mouth of Sir Thomas Challoner his Governour to tender unto me a motion of more honour and favour then I was worthy of which was that it was his Highness pleasure and purpose to have me continually resident at the Court as a constant attendant whiles the rest held on their wonted vicissitudes for which purpose his Highness would obtain for me such preferments as should yield me full contentment I return'd my humblest thanks and my readiness to sacrifice my self to the service of so gracious a Master but being conscious to my self of my unanswerableness to so great expectation and loath to forsake so Dear and Noble a Patron who had placed much of his Heart upon me I did modestly put it off and held close to my Waltham where in a constant course I preach'd a long time as I had done also at Halsted before thrice in the week yet never durst I climbe into the Pulpit to preach any Sermon whereof I had not before in my poor and plain fashion penned every word in the same Order wherein I hoped to deliver it although in the expression I listed not to be a slave to Syllables In this while my worthy kinsman Mr. Samuel Barton Archdeacon of Glocester knowing in how good terms I stood at Court and pittying the miserable condicion of his Native Church of Wolverhampton was very desirous to engage me in so difficult and Noble a service as the redemption of that captivated Church For which cause he importun'd me to move some of my friends to solicit the Dean of Windsor who by an antient annexation is Patron thereof for the graunt of a particular Prebend when it should fall vacant in that Church answer was return'd me that it was fore-promised to one of my fellow Chaplains I sate down without further expectation some year or two after hearing that it was become void and meeting with that fellow Chaplain of mine I wisht him much joy of the Prebend He askt me if it were void I assured him so and telling him of the former answer delivered to me in my Ignorance of his ingagement wisht him to hasten his Possession of it He delayed not when he came to the Dean of Windsor for his promised dispatch the Dean brought him forth a Letter from the Prince wherein he was desired and charged to reverse his former ingagement since that other Chaplain was otherwise provided for and to cast that favour upon me I was sent for who least thought of it and received the free Collation of that poor dignitie It was not the value of the place which was but ninetene Nobles per annum that we aimed at but the freedome of a goodly Church consisting of a Dean and eight Prebendaries competently endowed and many thousand souls lamentably swallowed up by wilfull Recusants in a pretended Fee-farme for ever O God what an hand hadst thou in the carriage of this work when we set foot in this suit for another of the Prebendaries joyned with me we knew not wherein to insist nor where to ground a complaint only we knew that a Goodly Patrimony was by sacrilegious conveyance detained from the Church But in the pursuit of it such marvelous light opened it self inexpectedly to us in revealing of a counterfeit seal found in the ashes of that burned house of a false Register in the manifestation
the height of rigour wave their former Impeachment of Treason against us and fall upon an Accusation of high Misdemeaners in that our Protestation and will have us prosecuted as guilty of a Premunire although as we conceive the law hath ever been in the Parliamentary proceedings that if a man were impeached as of Treason being the highest crime the Accusant must hold him to the proof of the charge and may not fall to any meaner Impeachment upon failing of the higher But in this case of ours it feâ—l out otherwise for although the Lords had openly promised us that nothing should be done against us till we and our Counsail were heard in our defense yet the next Newes we heard was the house of Commons had drawn up a bill against us wherein they declared us to be Delinquents of a very high Nature and had thereupon desired to have it enacted that all our spirituall Means should be taken away Only there should be a Yearly allowance to every Bishop for his maintenance according to a proportion by them set down wherein they were pleased that my share should come to 400 p. per annum this bill was sent up to the Lords and by them also passed and there hath ever since lyen this being done after some weeks more finding the Tower besides the Restraint chargeable we petitioned the Lords that we might be admitted to bail and have liberty to return to our Homes the Earl of Essex moved the Lords assented took our bail sent to the Lieutenant of the Tower for our discharge How glad were we to flie out of our Cage No sooner was I got to my Lodging then I thought to take a little fresh Air in St. James his Park and in my return to my Lodging in the Deans yard passing through Westminister Hall was saluted by divers of my Parliament acquaintance and welcomed to my liberty whereupon some that look't upon me with an evil eye run into the House and complained that the Bishops were let loose which it seems was not well taken by the house of Commons who presently sent a kind of expostulation to the Lords that they had dismissed so haynous offenders without their knowledg and consent Scarce had I rested me in my lodging when there comes a Messinger to me with the sad newes of sending me and the rest of my brethren the Bishops back to the Tower again from whence we came thither we must go and thither I went with an heavy but I thank God not impatient heart After we had continued there some six weeks longer and earnestly Petitioned to return to our severall charges we were upon 5000 l. Bond dismissed with a clause of Revocation at a short warning if occasion should require Thus having spent the time betwixt New years Even and VVhitsontide in those safe walls where we by turnes preached every Lords Day to a large Auditory of Cittizens we disposed of our selves to the places of our severall abode For my self addressing my self to Norwich whether it was his Majesties pleasure to remove me I was at the first received with more respect then in such times I could have expected there I preached the day after my arivall to a numerous and attentive people nether was sparing of my pains in this kind ever since till the times growing every day more impatient of a Bishop threatned my silencing There though with some secret Murmurs of disaffected persons I enjoyed peace till the ordinance of sequestration came forth which was in the latter end of March following then when I was in hope of receiving the profits of the fore-going half year for the maintenance of my family were all my Rents stopped and diverted and in the Aprill following came the sequestrators viz. Mr. Sothertou Mr. Tooly Mr. Rawly Mr. Greenewood c. To the Palace and told me that by vertue of an ordinance of Paraliment they must seize upon the Palace and all the estate I had both reall and personall and accordingly sent certain men appointed by them whereof one had been burnt in the hand for the mark of his Truth to apprize all the goods that were in the house which they accordingly executed with all diligent severity not leaving so much as a dozen of Trenchers or my Childrens pictures out of their curious Inventory Yea they would have apprized our very wearing clothes had not Alderman Tooly and Sheriff Rawley to whom I sent to require their Judgment concerning the Ordinance in this point declared their opinion to the contrary These goods both Library and houshold stuff of all kinds were appointed to be exposed to publick sale Much inquiry there was when the goods should be brought to the Market but in the mean time Mrs. Goodwin a religious good Gentlewoman whom yet we had never known or seen being moved with compassion very kindly offered to lay down to the Sequestrators that whole summe which the goods were valued at and was pleased to leave them in our hands for our use till we might be able to repurchase them which she did accordingly and had the goods formally delivered to her by Mr. Smith and Mr. Greenwood two Sequestrators As for the books severall Stationers lookt on them but were not forward to buy them at last Mr. Cook a worthy Divine of this Diocess gave bond to the Sequestrators to pay to them the whole summe whereat they were set which was afterwards satisfied out of that poor pittance that was allowed me for my Maintenance as for my evidences they required them from me I denyed them as not holding my self bound to deliver them They nailed and sealed up the door and took such as they found with me But before this the first noise that I heard of my trouble was that one Morning before my servants were up there came to my Gates one Wright a London Trooper attended with others requiring entrance threatning if they were not admitted to break open the Gates whom I found at my first sight strugling with one of my Servants for a Pistol which he had in his hand I demanded his business at that unseasonable time he told me he came to search for Armes and Amunition of which I must be disarm'd I told him I had only two Muskets in the house and no other Military Provision he not resting upon my word searcht round about the house lookt into the Chests and Trunks examined the Vessells in the Cellar finding no other VVarliek furniture he askt me what Horses I had for his Commission was to take them also I told him how poorly I was stored and that my age would not allow me to travell on foot In conclusion he took one Horse for the present and such accompt of another that he did highly expostulate with me afterwards that I had otherwise disposed of him Now not only my Rents present but the Arrerages of the former Years which I had in favour forborn to some Tenants being treacherously confessed to the Sequestrators
we should as we well might expect a dissolution of all things neither hath it lesse horrour in it to feel the Earth stagger under us Whose hair doth not start up at this trepidation and the more a man knowes the more is his astonishment He hangeth the Earth upon nothing saith Job Job 26.7 For a man to feel the Earth that hangs upon nothing but as some vast ball in the midst of a thin yielding air totter under him how can his soul choose but be possessed with a secret fright and confusion Me thinks I tremble but to think of such a trembling Such are the distempers and publick calamities of States though even of particular Kingdoms but so much more as they are more universall they are both unnaturall and dreadfull They are politickly unnaturall For as the end of all motion is rest so the end of all civill and spirituall agitations is peace and settlednesse The very name of a State implies so much which is we know a stando from standing and not from moving The man riding upon the red Horse which stood upon the myrtle trees Zachar. 1.11 describes the condicion of a peacefull government Behold all the Earth sitteth still and is at rest and Micah They shall sit still every man under his vine and figtree Micah 4.4 and none shall make them afraid Particular mens affayres are like the Clouds publick government is as the Earth The Clouds are alwayes in motion it were strange for any of them to stand still in one point of the air so it were to see private mens occasions void of some movings of quarrells or change the publick State is or should be as the Earth a great and solid body whose chief praise is settlednesse and consistence Now therefore when publick stirs and tumults arise in a well ordered Church or Common-wealth the State is out of the socket or when common calamities of war famine pestilence seize upon it then the hearts of men quake and shiver within them then is our prophets Earth-quake which is here spoken of Thou hast made the Earth to tremble To begin with the passive motions of publick calamities they are the shakings of our Earth So God intends them so must we account them and make use of them accordingly what are we I mean all the visible part of us but a peece of Earth besides therefore that magneticall vertue which is operative upon all the parts of it why should or can a piece stand still when the whole moveth Denominations are wont to be not from the greater but the better part and the best part of this Earthen World is man and therefore when men are moved we say the Earth is so and when the Earth in a generality is thus moved good reason we should be so also we must tremble therefore when God makes the Earth to do so What shall we say then to those obdured hearts which are nowhit affected with publick evils Surely he were a bold man that could sleep whiles the Earth rocks him and so were he that could give himself to a stupid security when he feels any vehement concussations of government or publick hand of Gods afflictive judgment But it falls out too usually that as the Philosopher said in matter of affaires so it is in matter of calamities Communia negliguntur Men are like Jonas in the storm sleep it out though it mainly concern them surely besides that we are men bound up each in his own skin we are limbs of a community and that body is no lesse intire and consistent of all his members then this naturall and no lesse sensible should we be of any evill that afflicts it If but the least toe do ache the head feels it but if the whole body be in pain much more do both head and feet feele it Tell me can it be that in a common Earth-quake any house can be free or is the danger lesse because the neighbours roofes rattle also Yet too many men because they suffer not alone neither are singled out for Vengeance are insensible of Gods hand Surely such men as cannot be shaken with Gods judgment are fit for the center the lowest parts of the Earth where there is a constant and eternall unrest not for the surface of it which looks towards an Heaven where are interchanges of good and evill It is notable and pregnant which the prophet Esay hath hear it all ye secure hearts and tremble In that day did the Lord of Hosts call to weeping and mourning and baldnesse and girding with sackcloth and behold joy and gladnesse slaying of Oxen and killing of Sheep eating Flesh and drinking Wine And what of that Surely this iniquity shall not be purged till you die saith the Lord God of Hosts What shall we say to this honourable and beloved wherefore hath God given us his good creatures but that we should injoy them Doth not Solomon tell us there is nothing better then that a man should Eat and Drink and make his soule injoy good in his labour Eccles. 2.24 And why is God so incensed against Israel for doing what he allowes them Know then that it is not the act but the time that God stands upon Very unseasonableness is criminall here and now comforts are sins to be joviall when God calls to mourning to glut our maw when he calls to fasting to glitter when he would have us sackcloth'd and squalid he hates it to the death here we may say with Solomon Of laughter thou art mad and of mirth what is this thou doest He grudges not our moderate and seasonable jolities there is an Ope-tyde by his allowance as well as a Lent Go thy wayes Eat thy Bread with joy and drink thy wine with a merry heart for now God accepteth thy work Lo Gods acceptation is warrant enough for our mirth Now may his saints rejoyce and sing but there is a time to mourne and a time to daunce It was a strange word that God had to the Prophet Ezekiel that he would take away from him his wife the comfort of his life and yet he must not mourne but surely when he but threats to take away from us the publick comforts of our peace and common welfare he would have us weep out our eyes and doth no lesse hate that our hearts should be quiet within us then he hates that we should give him so just cause of our disquiet Here the Prophet can cry out Quis dabit capiti meo aquas And how doth the mournfull prophet now pour out himself into Lamentations How hath the Lord covered the doughter of Sion with a cloud in his anger and cast down from heaven to the earth the beauty of Israel Lament 2.1 Oh that our hearts could rive in sunder at but the dangers of those publick Judgments which we have too well deserved and be lesse sensible of our private concernments then should we make a right use of that dreadfull hand of God of
be the Children of men cursed be they before the Lord And even Josephs Brethren though so ill-natur'd that they could eat and drink whilst their Brother was crying in their pit yet at last as doubtlesse they had done ere then they come with humble prostrations and passionate Supplications to their Brother Gen. ult we pray thee forgive the trespasse of the Servants of thy Fathers God what speak I of these Even Absolom himself though he soon after carried a Traitor in his bosome how earnestly he sued for his restoring to his fathers long denyed presence and out of his impatience caused Joab to pay dear for the delay Oh then how should we be affected with the sence of the displeasure of the holy Spirit of our good God who as he is our best friend so he is a most powerful avenger of wickednesse Surely we do so vex and sadden him with our grievous provocations that he cryes out and makes moan of his insufferable wrong this way Thou hast made me to serve with thy sins and wearied me with thine iniquities Esa 43.24 and Amos 1.13 Behold I am pressed under you as a cart is pressed that is full of Sheaves even so full that the Axeltree creaks and bends and cracks again It must needs be a great weight that the Almighty complaines of and surely so it is could our offences be terminated in men and not strike God thorough them we might well say that all the outrages and affronts that we could put upon a world of men were nothing to the least violation of the infinite Majestie of God and so doth the God against whom they are committed take them by how much more tender the part is so much more painfull is the blow the least wipe of the eye troubles us more then a hard stroak upon the back it is easy to observe that the more holy the person is the more he is afflicted with his own and with others sin Lot vexed his righteous Soul with the unclean conversation of the Sodomites Davids eyes gusht out rivers of waters because men kept not the Law how much more then shall the holy God from whom these good men receive these touches of Godly indignation be vexed to see and hear our profanations of his name and dayes our contempt of his Servants and ordinances our debauched lives our malicious and oppressive practises our wilfull disobediences our shamefull excesses and uncleanesses our uncharitable censures of each other and all that World of wickednesse that we are overborne withall grief is never but an unpleasive passion the rest have some life and contentment in them Not only love and joy which useth to dilate and chear the heart but even hatred it self to a rancorous stomack hath a kinde of wicked pleasure in it but grief is ever harsh and tedious one of St. Augustins two tormentors of Mankinde Dolor et Timor And shall our hearts tell us That we have grieved the good Spirit of God by our sins and shall not we be grieved at our selves that we have grieved him How can there be any true sense of heavenly love and gratitude in us if we be not thoroughly humbled and vexed within our selves to think that we have angred so good a God How can we choose but roar out in the unquietnesse of our soules with the holy Psalmist There is no soundnesse in my flesh because of thine Anger neither is there any rest in my Bones because of my sin for mine iniquities are gone over my head as an heavy burden they are to heavy for me to bear Ps 38.3 4. Certainly it is a signe of a gracelesse Soul to be secure and cheerfull under a known sin that Man that can sleep soundly after a murder that can give merry checks to his Conscience after an act of adultery or theft or any such grievous crimes hath an heart insensible of goodnesse and may prove a fit brand for hell This is that whereof Esay speaks In that Day did the Lord of Hosts call to weeping and to mourning and to baldnesse and to girding with sackcloth and behold joy and gladnesse slaying of Oxen and killing of Sheep eating Flesh and drinking Wine Esa 22.12 13. But it followes next Surely this iniquity shall not be purged till ye die vers 14. these are they that say we have made a covenant with death and with hell we are at an agreement but it followes soon after Their covenant with death shall soon be disanulled and their agreement with hell shall not stand Esa 28.15.18 Far far be this disposition from us that professe to love the Lord let it be with us as with some good natur'd Children whom I have seen even after their whippings unquiet till with their continued tears and importunities they have made their peace with their offended parent And thus much for the displeasure which is in this grieving of the Spirit of God which never goes alone but is attended by those two other consequent effects Aversion and Punishment As those therefore which scent an unsavory breath turne their heads aside and those great and good guests who finde themselves ill used change their Inn so doth the holy Spirit of God upon occasion of our wilfull sins turne away his face and withdraw his presence In a little wrath I hid my face from thee saith God Esa 54.8 This good David found and complained of Thou turnedst away thy face and I was troubled Psal 30.7 And again as if he feard lest God would be quite gone upon those his horrible sins of Adultery and Murder he cryes out passionatly O cast me not away from from thy Presence and take not thine holy Spirit from me Psal 51.11 This is that which Divines call spirituall desertion A course which God takes not seldome when he finds a kind of restiveness and neglect in his Servants or passage given to some haynous sin against the checks of conscience where he intends correction quickning and reclamation the Spouse in the Canticles because she opened not instantly to her Beloved findes her self disappointed I opened to my Beloved but my Beloved had withdrawen himself and was gone and my Soul failed me Cant. 5.6 This is no other then we must make account of and which if we have any acquaintance with God and our selves in our daily experience we have found and shall find if we have given way to any willing sin in that very Act the Spirit is grieved and in that Act of griefe subduced neither can we ever expect comfort in the sense of his return or hope to have his face shine upon us again till we have won him to us and recovered his favour by an unfained Repentance Is there any of us therefore that hath grieved and estranged the holy Spirit from us by any known offence it must cost us warme water ere we can recover him and the light of his countenance upon us neither let us be sparing of our Tears to this
brimstone from heaven upon us now is it high time to mourne for the anteverting of a threatned vengeance shortly therefore to sum up all that we have spoken whether we feel evils of punishment or fear them or be conscious of the evils of sin that have deserved them we cannot but finde it a just time to weep and mourne And now to come home close to our selves can any man be so wilfully blind as not to see that all these are met together to wring tears from us and to call us to a solemn and universal mourning What single men suffer themselves best feel and our old word is The wronged man writes in marble I meddle not with particulars Our pains of body our losses in our estate our demestique crosses our wounds of Spirit as they are kept up in our own breasts so they justly call us to private humiliations if we cast abroad our eyes to more publick afflictions have we not seen that God hath let his sea loose upon us in divers parts of our Land as if for a new judgment upon us he would retract the old word of his decreed limitation Hitherto shalt thou come but no further and here shall thy proud waves be stayed Job 38.11 Hath not God given us in divers parts of our Nation a feeling touch of some of the Egyptian plagues in the mortality of our cattle in the unusual frequencie of noysome and devouring vermine But wo is me all these are but flea-bites in comparison of that destructive sword that hath gone through the Land and sheathed it self in the bowels of hundred thousands of brethren Oh that my head were waters and mine eyes a fountain of tears that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my People Jer. 9.1 Was there ever a more fearful example of divine vengeance against any Nation then to be armed against each other to their mutual destruction that Christian compatriots brethren should pour out each others blood like water in our streets and leave their mangled carcasses for compost in our Fields That none but the sharper sword should be left to be the arbiter of our deadly differences that Fathers and Sons should so put off all natural affection as to think it no violation of piety to cut the throats of each other Oh that we have lived to see the woful havock that the hellish fury of war hath made every where in this flourishing and populous Island the flames of hostile furie rising up in our Towns and Cities the devastation of our fruitful and pleasant Villages the demolition of our magnificent Structures the spoiles and ruines of those fabricks that should be sacred in a word this goodly Land for a great part of it turned to a very Golgotha and Aceldama These these my brethren if our eyes be not made of pumices must needs fetch tears from us and put us into a constant habit of mourning And if our punishments deserve thus to take up our hearts where shall we find room enough for sufficient sorrow for those horrible sins that have drawn down these heavy judgments upon us Truly beloved brethren if we were wholly resolved into tears and if every drop were a stream 1 Kin. 8.38 we could not weep enough for our own sins and the sins of our People Let every man ransack his own breast and finde out the plague of his own heart but for the present let me have leave a little to lay before you though it is no pleasing object that common leprosie of sin wherewith the face of this miserable Nation is over-spread whether in matter of practise or of opinion For the former should I gather up all the complaints of the Prophets which they have taken up of old against their Israel and Juda and apply them to this Church and Nation you would verily think them calculated to this our meridian as if our sins were thiers and their reproofs ours what one sin can be named in all that black bedrole of wickednesse reckoned up by those holily querulos censors which we must not own for ours Of whom do you think the Prophet Esaiah speaks when he sayes Your iniquities have separated between you and your God and your sins have hid his face from you that he will not hear for your hands are defiled with blood and your fingers with iniquity your lips have spoken lies your tongue hath muttered perversnesse Esay 59.2.3 Of whom do ye think the Prophet Micah speaks when he sayes The rich men thereof are full of violence and the inhabitants thereof have spoken lies and their tongue is deceitfull in their mouthes Micah 6.12 Do we think of Epicurisme and self-indulgence Whom do we think the Prophet Amos speaks of when he saies Wo be to them that are at ease in Zion that put farr away the evill day and cause the seat of violence to come near that lye upon beds of Ivory and stretch themselves upon their couches that drink wine in bowles and anoint themselves with the chief ointment but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph Amos 6.1.3.4.6 Tell me brethren was there ever more riot and excesse in diet and clothes in belly-cheer and back-timber then we see at this day Do we think of drunkennesse and surfets Of whom do we think Esay speaks when he saith They have erred through Wine and through strong drink are out of the way the Priest and the Prophet have erred through strong drink Indian smoak was not then known they are swallowed up of wine they are out of the way through strong drink they erre in vision they stumble in judgment for all tables are full of vomit and filthinesse Esay 28.7 Of whom doth the Prophet Hosea speak when he sayes Whoredome and Wine and new Wine take away the heart well may these two be put together for they seldom go asunder but tell me brethren was there ever such abominable beastlinesse in this kinde as raigns at this day since the hedg of all Ecclesiasticall Jurisdiction was throwne open And if we think good to put these and some other of their damnable society together of whom do we think the Prophet Hosea speaks when he sayes The Lord hath a controversy with the Land because there is no truth no mercy no knowledg of God in the Land By swearing and lying and killing and stealing and committing adultery they break out and blood toucheth blood Hos 4.1.2 Do ye think of perjury Of whom do ye think the same Hosea speaks when he sayes They have spoken words swearing falsly in making a covenant Hos 10.4 Do we think of the violation of holy things and places Of whom do we think the Prophet Esay speaks when he sayes Is this house which is called by my name become a den of robbers in your eyes behold even I have seen it saith the Lord Esay 7.11 I could easily tire you if I have not done so already with the odious parallels
colour is most proper for sad occasions for as white comes nearest to light and black to darkness so we know that light and joy darknesse and sorrow are commonly used to resemble and expresse each other Well may we then outwardly profess our inward mourning for the dead but yet not beyond a due moderation It is not for us to mourn as men without hope as the Apostle holily adviseth his Thessalonians Our sorrow must walk in a mid-way betwixt neglect and excess Sarah was the first that we find mourn'd for in Scripture and Abraham the first mourner now the Hebrew Doctors observe that in Genesis 23.2 where Abrahams mourning is specified the letter which is in the midst of that original word that signifies his weeping is in all their Bibles written lesse then all his fellowes which they who find mountains in every tittle of Moses interpret to imply the moderate mourning of that holy Patriark surely he who was the Father of the faithful did by the power of his faith mitigate the sorrow for the loss of so dear a partner Thus much for the manner of our mourning Now for as much as it is the mourner in Sion not in Babylon whom we look after In the fourth place the inseparable concomitant of his mourning must be his holy devotion whether it be in matter of suffering or of sin in both which our sorrow is ill-bestowed if it do not send us so much the more eagerly to seek after our God Thus hath the mourning of all holy souls ever been accompanied the greatest mourner that we can read of was Job who can say My skin is black upon me and my bones are burnt with heat Job 30.30 How doth he lift up his eyes from his dunghill to Heaven and say I have sinned what shall I do to thee O thou Preserver of men Job 6.20 The distresses of David and the depth of his sorrowes cannot be unknown to any man that hath but looked into the book of God and what are his divine ditties but the zealous expressions of his faithfull recourses to the throne of grace good Ezra tells you what he did when he heard of the generall infection of his people with their Heathen matches Having rent my garments and my mantle I fell upon my knees and spread out my hands unto the Lord my God and said O my God I am ashamed and blush to lift up my face to thee O my God for our iniquities are increased over our heads and our trespass is grown up to the Heavens Ezra 9.5.6 And Daniel a no lesse devour mourner then he layes forth himself in as holy a passion I set my face unto the Lord God to seek him by prayer and supplications with fasting and sackcloth and ashes and I prayed unto the Lord my God and made my confession and said O Lord the great and dreadfull God keeping the covenant and mercie to them that love him and to them that keep his commandements we have sinned and have done wickedly and have rebelled even by departing from thy precepts and from thy judgments c. Hereupon it is that praier is ever joyned with fasting in all our humiliations without which the emptinesse of our mawes were but a vain and purposeless ceremony as that which was onely taken up to whet our devotions and to give a sharper appetite to pious duties So as he that mourneth and fasteth without praying is as he that takes the preparative but refuses the medicine that might bring him health or as he that toiles all day in the vineyard and neglects to call for his wages This for the companion of our mourning Fifthly and Lastly The attendant of our mourning is the good use that must be made of it for the bettering of the Soul for surely affliction never leaves us as it findes us if we be not better for our mourning we are the worse He is an unprofitable mourner that improves not all his sorrow to repentance and amendment of life whether his sin be the immediate object of his griefe or his affliction and this is both the intention of our Heavenly Father in whipping us and the best issue of our teares Thus it was with his Israel Their dayes saith the Psalmist did he consume in vanity and their years in trouble when he slew them then they sought him and they returned and inquired early after God vs 35. And they remembred that God was their rock and the high God their Redeemer To the same purpose is that of Jeremiah In those dayes and in that time saith the Lord the children of Israel shall come they and the children of Judah together going and weeping they shall go and seek the Lord their God they shall ask the way to Zion with their faces thitherward saying Come let us joyne our selves to the Lord in a perpetuall covenant that shall not be forgotten Jerem. 50.4.5 Surely as he were an unnaturall parent that would scourge his child with any other purpose then to correct and amend somewhat amiss in him so is he no better then an ungracious child that makes a noise under the rod but amends not his fault Here then let mine eyes run down with tears night and day and let them not cease for the obstinate unproficiency of the sons of my mother under the heavy hand of my God O Lord are not thine eyes upon the truth thou hast stricken them but they have not grived thou hast consumed them but they have refused to receive correction they have made their faces harder then a rock they have refused to return Jerem. 5.3 how sadly dost thou complain of us under the person of thine Israel In vain have I smitten your children they received no correction Jerem. 2.30 Notwithstanding all the fair warnings that thou hast given us We run on resolutely in the course of our wickedness as if those pathes were both safe and pleasing giving thee just cause to renew thine old complaint against the men of Judah and Jerusalem Thus saith the Lord Behold I frame evill against you and devise a devise against you Returne ye now every one from his evill wayes and make your wayes and your doings good And they said There is no hope but we will walk after our own devises and we will every one do the imagination of his evill heart Jerem. 18.11.12 wo is me who sees not that after all the blood that thou hast let out of our vaines we are still full of the deadly inflammations of pride and maliciousnesse that after we have drunk so deep of the cup of thy fury even to the dregs we cease not to be drunk with the intemperate cups of our beastly excess and after strict professions of holynesse have run out into horrible blasphemies of thy sacred name So as we have too just cause to fear lest thou have decreed to make good upon us that wofull word which thy Prophet denounced against thy once-no-less-dear people I will
perfect Mediator betwixt God and man To proclaime the acceptable year of the Lord and the day of vengeance of our God to comfort all that mourn in Zion to give unto them beauty for ashes the oyl of joy for mourning the garment of praise for the spirit of heavinesse Esa 61.2.3 So as all Gods faithfull ones may cheerfully expect the performance of that cordiall promise which the God of truth hath made to his Israel Their soul shall be as a watred Garden and they shall not sorrow any more at all then shall the Virgin rejoyce in the dance both young men and old together for I will turne their mourning into joy and will comfort them and make them rejoyce from their sorrow Jerem. â—1 12 13. But if the justice of God have been so highly provoked by the sinnes of a particular Nation as that there is no remedy but the threatned judgments must proceed against them remember what charge Ezekiel tells you was given to the man clothed in linnen that had the writers inkhorne by his side The Lord said unto him go through the midst of the City through the midst of Jerusalem and set a mark upon the forheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof Ezek. 9.3 4. Lo these marked Jewes owe their life to their tears if they had not wept for their fellowes they had bled with their fellowes If their sighs could not save their people from slaughter yet they have saved themselves their charitable mourning is recompensed with their own preservation Oh then my brethren as we desire the joyes of another World and as we tender our own comfort and safty in this let us not be sparing of our tears let them flow freely out for our own sins first and then for the sins of our people let not our mourning be perfunctory and fashionable but serious hearty and zealous so as that we may furrow our cheekes with our teares Let our devotions that accompany our mourning be fervent and importunate as those that would offer a kind of holy force to Heaven wrestling with the Angel of the covenant for a blessing Let our amendment which should be the effect of our mourning be really conspicuous to the eyes both of God and men And finally that our mourning may be constant and effectuall let us resolve to make it our business and for that purpose let us solemnly vow to set apart some time of each day for this sad but needfull task and which is the main of all since the publique is most concerned in this duty Oh that the trumpet might be blown in Zion fasts sanctified solemn assemblies called that the Ministers of the Lord as the chief mourners might weep aloud in Gods sanctuary Joel 2. â—5 and say Spare thy people O Lord and give not thine heritage to reproach wherefore should the enemies of thy Church say among the people where is their God This were the way to reconcile our offended God to divert his dreadfull judgments to restore us to the blessings of peace and to cause the voice of joy and gladness to be once again heard in our land ON EASTER-DAY AT HIGHAM 1648. 1 COR. 5.7 For Christ our passover is sacrificed for us Therefore let us keep the feast THe feast that is the passover of the Jewes then expiring or the Christians Easter then succeeding indeed I know not whether both be not alluded to for this Epistle is conceived to have been written by the Apostle some 24. Years after our Saviours passion ere which time it is more then probable that the feast of Christs resurrection was solemnly celebrated by the Christian Church this I am sure of that no record in all history mentions the time when it began to be kept and therefore it is most likely according to Augustines received rule to be deduced from the observation of the Apostles There were ancient and eager quarrels betwixt the Eastern and Western Churches about the day whereon it should be kept but whether it should be kept or no there was never yet any question since Christianity look't forth into the World and as that Pasche so this Easter is justly the feast for the eminency of it above the rest for if we do with joy and thankfulnesse according to the Angels message solemnize the day wherein the Son of God our blessed Redeemer being born entred the life of humane nature how much more should we celebrate that day wherein having conquered all the powers of death and Hell he was as it were born again to the life of a glorious immortality But to leave the time and come to the Text. This for that leads it in is both a relative and an illative referring to what he had said in the foregoing words and inferring a necessary consequence of the one clause upon the other Purge out the old leaven for Christ our passover is sacrificed for us The whole Text is Allegoricall alluding to the charge and duty of Gods ancient people the Jewes in the observation of their passover who upon no lesse pain then cutting off from the Congregation of Israel must admit of no leavened bread to be eaten or found in their houses during the whole seven dayes of this celebrity as you may see Exod. 12.17.18 c. As therefore the ceremoniall passover would admit of no materiall leaven So the spirituall passover may not abide any leaven of wickednesse Purge therefore out the old leaven For Christ our passover is sacrificed for us The first work then that we have to do is to cast back our eyes to the ground of this institution and to enquire why no leaven might consist with the Jewish passover And we shall find that there was not the same reason of the first observation of this ceremony and of the following The first was Necessity Devotion was the ground of the rest Necessity first for in that suddain departure which they were put upon there could be no leasure to leaven their dough as you may see Exod. 12.39 Devotion afterward in a gratefull recognition both of their own servile condition and of the gracious providence of God In the former they were called to look back upon their old Egyptian servitude by their unleavned bread for this was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the bread of affliction as we turn it or the bread of the poor as the word signifies which they must now eat to put them in mind of their hard and poor condition in Egypt under their evill task masters all their lives after as Deut. 16.3 to the same purpose it was that they must eat the Lamb not with sowre herbes as it had wont to be turned for a sharp kind of sowrenesse in sawces is esteemed pleasing and tastfull but with bitter herbes yea as the word is in the Originall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cum amaritudinibus with bitternesses In the latter they were minded of a
Here is disorder and sin there perfection of order and holinesse Here we live with men yea beasts yea if on some hands I should say with incarnate Devils I should not be uncharitable there with God and his blessed Angels and the souls of righteous men made perfect Here are continuall changes and successions of sorrow there an eternity of unintermitted and unconceivable joyes Ps 42.1 Oh then how can we choose but say with David as the Hart panteth after the water-brooks Philip. 1. so doth my soul pant after thee O God and with the chosen vessel I desire to depart hence and to be with Christ This for our sojourning here Now for the time of our sojourning Time is the common measure of all things the Universal metwand of the Almighty Eccles 3.1 There is a time for all things saith wise Solomon and but a time for the motions of time are quick and irrevocable ye cannot think of it but with wings It is but a short word a monosyllable yet whiles we are speaking of it it is gone As for the Time of our sojourning Moses reckons it by years Job by moneths and those of vanity old Jacob and David by dayes the Apostle shuts it up closer and cals the very age of the World hora novissima the last hour all imply a quicknesse of passage It is a true observation of Seneca Velocitas temporis saith he the quick speed of time is best discerned when we look at it past and gone and this I can confirm to you by experience It hath pleased the providence of my God so to contrive it that this day this very morning fourscore years ago I was born into the World a great time since ye are ready to say and so indeed it seems to you that look at it forward but to me that look at it as past it seems so short that it is gone like a tale that is told or a dream by night and looks but like yesterday It can be no offence for me to say that many of you who hear me this day are not like to see so many Suns walk over your heads as I have done yea what speak I of this there is not one of us that can assure himself of his continuance here one day we are all Tenants at will and for ought we know may be turned out of these clay cottages at an hours warning oh then what should we do but as wise Farmers who know the time of their lease is expiring and cannot be renewd carefully and seasonably provide our selves of a surer and more during tenure I remember our witty Countryman Bromiard tels us of a Lord in his time that had a fool in his house as many great men in those dayes had for their pleasure to whom this Lord gave a staffe and charged him to keep it till he should meet with one that were more fool then himself and if he met with such a one to deliver it over to him Not many years after this Lord fell sick and indeed was sick unto death His fool came to see him and was told by his sick Lord that he must now shortly leave him And whither wilt thou go said the fool Into another World said his Lord and when wilt thou come again within a moneth No within a year No when then Never Never and what provision hast thou made for thy intertainment there whither thou goest None at all No said the fool none at all Here take my staffe Art thou going away for ever and hast taken no order nor care how thou shalt speed in that other World whence thou shalt never return take my staffe for I am not guilty of any such folly as this and indeed there cannot be a greater folly or madness rather then to be so wholly taken up with an eager regard of these earthly vanities which we cannot hold as to utterly neglect the care of that eternity which we can never forego and consider well of it upon this moment of our life depends that eternity either way My dear Brethren it is a great way to Heaven and we have but a little time to get thither God sayes to us as the Angel said to Elijah Up for thou hast a great journy to go and if as I fear we have loytered in the way and trifled away any part of the time in vain impertinencies we have so much more need to gird up our loynes and to hasten our pace our hearts our false hearts are ready like the Levites servant to show us the World and to say as he did of Jebus Come I pray you let us turn in to the City of the Jebusites and lodge there Jud. 19.12 Oh let us have his Masters resolute answer ready in our mouthes We will not turn aside into a City of strangers neither wâ—ll we leave till we have got the gates of Gods City upon our backs Time is that whereof many of us are wont to be too prodigall we take care how to be rid of it and if we cannot otherwise we cast it away and this we call Pass-time wherein we do dangerously mistake our selves and must know that time is as the first so one of the most precious things that are Insomuch as there are but two things which we are charged to redeem Time and Truth I find that in our old saxon language a Gentleman was called an Idle-man perhaps because those who are born to fair estates are free from those toils and hard labours which others are forced to undergo I wish the name were not too proper to over-many in these dayes wherein it is commonly seen that those of the better rank who are born to a fair inheritance so carry themselves as if they thought themselves priviledged to do nothing and made for mere disport and pleasure But alas can they hope that the great God when he shall call them to give account of the dispensation of their time and estate will take this for a good reckoning Item so many hours spent in dressing and trimming so many in Idle visitings so many in gaming so many in hunting and hawking so many in the play-house so many in the Tavern so many in vain chat so many in wanton dalliance No no my dear Brethren our hearts cannot but tell us how ill an Audit we shall make upon such a wofull computation and how sure we are to hear of a Serve nequam Thou evill Servant and unfaithfull and to feele a retribution accordingly Let us therefore in the fear of God be exhorted to recollect our selves and since we find our selves guilty of the sinfull mispense of our good hours let us whiles we have space obtain of our selves to be carefull of redeeming that precious time we have lost as the Widow of Sarepta when she had but a little oyle left in her cruse and a little meale in her barrell was carefull of spending that to the best advantage so let us considering that
only hold it fit out of our obedience to the lawes both of our church and kingdome to continue a joyful celebration of a memorial day to the honour of our blessed Saviour But that other authority which you tell me was urged to this purpose I confesse doth not a little amaze me it was you say of King James our learned Soveraigne of late and blessed Memory whose testimony was brought in before the credulous people not without the just applause of a Solomon-like wisdome as crying down these festivals and in a certain speech of his applauding the purity of the church of Scotland above that of Geneva for that it observed not the common feasts of Christs Nativity and Resurrection c. Is it possible that any mouth could name that wise and good King in such a cause whom all the world knowes to have been as zealous a patron of those festivals as any lived upon earth and if he did let fall any such speech before he had any Downe upon his chin whilst he was under the serule what candor is it to produce it now to the contradiction of his better experience and ripest judgment Nay is it not famously known that it was one of the main errands of his journy into his native Kingdome of Scotland to reduce that church unto a conformity to the rest of the Churches of Christendom in the observation of these solemn dayes One of the five Articles of Perth and to this purpose was it not one of the main businesses which he set on work in the Assembly at Perth and wherein he employed the service of his worthy Chaplain Doctor Young Dean of Winchester to recall and re-establish these festivalls And accordingly in pursuance of his Majesties earnest desire this way was it not enacted in that Assembly that the said feasts should be duely kept Doubtlesse it was and that not without much wise care and holy caution which act because it cannot be had every where and is well worthy of your notice and that which clears the point in hand I have thought good here to insert the tenor of it therefore is this As we abhorr the superstitious observation of Festival dayes by the Papists and detest all licentious and profane abuse thereof by the common sort of professors so we think that the inestimable benefits received from God by our Lord Jesus Christ his Birth Passion Resurrection Ascension and sending down of the Holy Ghost was commendably and godly remembred at certain particular dayes and times by the whole church of the World and may be also now Therefore the Assembly ordaines that every Minister shall upon these dayes have the commemoration of the foresaid inestimable benefits and make choice of several and pertinent texts of Scripture and frame their doctrine and exhortation there to and rebuke all superstitious observation and licentious profanation thereof I could if it were needful give you other proofes of King James his zeal for these dayes but what should I spend time in proving there is a sun in the Heaven and sight in that Sun The name of that great King suffereth for his excesse this way Shortly then the Church of God his anointed law antiquity reason are for us in this point and I doubt not but you will gladly be on their side away with all innovations and frivolous quarrels we were divided enough before and little needed any new rents The God of peace quiet all these distempers and unite our hearts one to another and all to himself Farwell in the Lord. TO My Reverend and worthily Dear Friend M r. WILLIAM STRUTHERS One of the Preachers of EDINBOURGH THe hast of your Letters my reverend and worthy Mr. Struthers was not so great as their welcome which they might well challenge for your name but more for that love and confidence which they imported thus must our Friendship be fed that it may neither feel death nor age The substance of your Letter was partly Relation and partly Request For the first Rumour had in part prevented you and brought to my ears those Stirs which happened after my departure and namely together with that impetuous Protestation some rude deportment of ill-governed Spirits towards his Majesty Alas my dear Brother this is not an usage for Kings they are the nurses of the Church if the child shall fall to scratching and biting the brest what can it expect but stripes and hunger your Letter professes that his Majesty sent you away in peace and joy and why would any of those rough-hewn Zelots send him away in discontentment But this was I know much against your heart whose often protestations assured me of your wise moderation in these things How earnestly have you professed to me that if you were in the Church of England such was your indifferency in these indifferent matters you would make no scruple of your ceremonies yea how sharp hath your censure been of those refractaries amongst us that would forgo their stations rather then yield to these harmeless impositions So much the more therefore do I marvell how any delator could get any ground from you whereon to place an accusation in this kind But this and the rest of those historicall passages being only concerning things past have their end in my notice Let me rather turn my pen to that part which calleth for my advise which for your sake I could well wish were worthy to be held such as that your self and your collegues might find cause to rest in it howsoever it shall be honest and hearty and no other then I would in the presence of God give to my own soul Matters you think will not stand long at this point but will come on further and press you to a resolution What is to be done will you hear me counselling as a friend as a Brother Since you foresee this meet them in the way with a resolution to intertain them and perswade others There are five points in question The solemn festivities The private use of either Sacrament Geniculation at the Eucharist Confirmation by Bishops For these there may be a double Plea insinuated by way of comparison in your Letters Expedience in the things themselves Authority in the commander some things are therefore to be done because they are commanded some others are therefore commanded because they are to be done obedience pleads for the one justice for the other If I shall leave these in the first rank I shall satisfie but if in the second I shall supererogate which if I do not I shall fail of my hopes Let me profess to you seriously I did never so busily and intentively study these rituall matters as I have done since your Letters called me unto this task Since which time I speak boldly I made no spare either of hours or papers Neque enim magna exiliter nec seria perfunctorie as I have learned of our Nazianzen and besides this under one name seemed a common cause and
four Bishops have dependence upon two Archbishops When was it otherwise Is it not so in all subordinations of government If this be a just inconvenience let all be levelled to an equality and that shall end in a certain confusion but they swear to them Canonicall obedience True but it is only in omnibus licitis honestis mandatis The supposition implyed must needs savour of uncharitableness that the Metropolitans will be still apt to require unlawfull things and the Bishops will ever basely stoop to a servile humoring of them 5. But they have their places only for their lives and therefore not fit to have a legislative power over the honors liberties proprieties of the subject 1. If they have their Bishopricks but for their lives yet there are scarce any of them that have not so much temporall estate in fee as may make them no less capable of a legislative power then many of the house of Commons who claim this right Secondly is the case other now then it hath been all this while yet for so many hundred years there have been good laws and just sentences given by their concurrence notwithstanding this their tenure for Life 3ly If they be honest and conscionable though they had their places but for a year or a day they would not yield to determine ought unjustly And if dishonest and conscienceless it is not the perpetuall inheritance of our places that can make our determinations just 6. If dependencies and expectations of further preferment lie in our way why not equally in many Temporall Lords who are interessed in offices and places in court why should we be more mis-carriageable by such possibilities or hopes then others Especially when our age is commonly such and the charges of removes so great that there is small likelyhood of an equall gaining by he change 7. If severall and particular Bishops have much incroched upon the consciences of his Majesties subjects in matter of their propriety and liberty what reason is there to impute this unto all why should the innocent be punished for the wrongs of the guilty Let those who can be convinced of an offence this way undergo a condigne censure Let not an unjust prejudice be cast upon the whole calling for the errors of a few 8. It is not to be expected but the whole number of 26. should be interessed in the maintenance of that their Jurisdiction which both the laws of Men and Apostolicall institution hath feoffed them in why should they not defend their own lawfull and holy calling against all unjust opposition of gainsayers If their hearts did not assure them their station were warrantable and good they were beasts if they would hold them and if their hearts do assure them so they were beasts if they would not defend them But there are numbers in all the three Kingdomes that crye them down True but there are greater numbers for them perhaps an hundred for one and if some busie factionists of the meaner sort here about a body compounded of Separatists Anabaptists Familists and such like stuffe make some show and noise yet what are these to the whole Kingdom Neither do these men more oppugne our votes in Parliament then our stations in the Church so as this argument will no less hold for no bishops then for no votes as likewise that instance in the practise of Scotland Scotland hath abolisht Episcopacy they say The more pity let them look quo jure and what answer to make unto that God whose ordinance it is But I had thought it should have been a stronger argument England retains Episcopacy therefore Scotland should then Scotland hath abolisht Episcopacy therefore England should do so too Let there be any other Church named in the whole Christian World that hath voluntarily abandoned Episcopacy when it might have continued it and if their practise be herein singular why should not they rather conforme to all the rest of Christendom then we to them 9. But the core of all is that it sets too great a distance between us and our Brethren of the Clergy and so nourishes pride in us discontentment in them and disquietness in the Church An argument that fights equally against all our superiority over our Brethren and against our votes here By this reason we must be all equall none subordinate and what order can there be where none is above other What is this but old Korahs challenge Ye take too much upon you wherefore lift ye up your selves above the Congregation of the Lord Now I beseech you whether was there more pride in Moses and Aaron that governed or in Corah and Dathan that murmured and repined It is pride then that causeth contention but where is this pride whether in those that moderately manage a lawfull superiority or in those that scorn and hate to be under goverment Were those Brethren so affected as they ought they should rather rejoyce that any of their own tribe are advanced to those places wherein they might be capable of doing good offices to them and the Church of God in stead of swelling with envy against their just exaltation and would feel this honor done to their profession and not to the persons Lastly what a mean opinion doth this imply to be conceived of us by the suggesters that we who are old Men Christian Philososophers and Divines should have so little government of our selves as to be puffed up with those poor accessions of titular respects which those who are really and hereditarily possessed of can weild without any such taint or suspicion of transportedness Shortly in all these Nine reasons there is nothing that may induce an indifferent Man to think there is any just ground to exclude Bishops from sitting and voting in Parliament FOR EPISCOPACY AND LITURGY WE cannot be too wary of or too opposite to Popery Antichristianism But let me admonish you in the fear of God to take heed that we do not dilate the name and imputation of these too farr for I speak it with just sorrow and compassion there are some well meaning and seduced souls that are by Erroneous teachers brought into the opinion that the sacred form of the Goverment of the Church and the holy forms of the publick devotions and prayers of the Church and all the favorers of them are worthy to be branded with the title of Popery and Antichristianism For the first my heart bleeds in me to think that that calling which was instituted by the Apostles themselves and hath ever since continued in the universall Church of Christ without interruption to this day should now come under the name of Popery I speak of the calling if the persons of any in this station have been faulty let them bear their own burden but that the calling it self should receive this construction in the opinion of well-minded and conscionable Christians is justly most lamentable I beseech you look back upon the histories of former times look but
warfares to God should not intangle himself with this world it is a sufficient and just conviction of those who would divide themselves betwixt God and the World and bestow any main part of their time upon secular affairs but it hath no operation at all upon this tenet which we have in hand that a man dedicate to God may not so much as when he is required cast a glance of his eye or some minutes of time or some motions of his tongue upon the publick business of his King and Countrey Those that expect this from us may as well and upon the same reason hold that a minister must have no family at all or if he have one must not care for it yea that he must have no body to tend but be all Spirit My Lords we are men of the same composition with others and our breeding hath been accordingly we cannot have lived in the World but we have seen it and observed it too and our long experience and conversation both in Men and in books cannot but have put something into us for the good of others and now having a double capacity qua cives qua Ecclesiastici as members of the common wealth as Ministers and Governours of the Church we are ready to do our best service in both one of them is no way incompatible with the other yea the subjects of them both are so united with the Church and Commonwealth that they cannot be severed yea so as that not the one is in the other but one is the other is both so as the services which we do upon these occasions to the Comonwealth are inseparable from our good offices to the Church so as upon this ground there is no reason of our exclusion If ye say that our sitting in Parliament takes up much time which we might have imployed in our studies or pulpits consider I beseech you that whiles you have a Parliament we must have a convocation and that our attendance upon that will call for the same expense of time which we afford to this service so as herein we have neither got nor lost But I fear it is not on some hands the tender regard of the full scope to our calling that is so much here stood upon as the conceit of too much honour that is done us in taking up the room of Peers and voting in this high Court for surely those that are averse from our votes yet could be content we should have place upon the wool-sacks and could alow us ears but not tongues If this be the matter I beseech your Lordships to consider that this honour is not done to us but our profession which what ever we be in our several persons can not easily be capable of too much respect from your Lordships Non tibi sed Isidi as he said of old Neither is this any new grace that is put upon our calling which if it were now to begin might perhaps be justly grudged to our unworthyness but it is an antient right and inheritance inherent in our station No less ancient then these walls wherein we sit yea more before ever there were Parliaments in the Magna Consilia of the Kingdome we had our places and as for my predecessors ever since the Conquerours time I can show your Lordships a just catalogue of them that have sat before me here and truely though I have just cause to be mean in mine own eyes yet why or wherein there should be more unworthiness in me then the rest that I should be stript of that priviledg which they so long injoyed though there were no law to hold me here I cannot see or confesse What respects of honour have been put upon the prime Clergy of old both by Pagans and Jewes and Christians and what are still both within Christendom and vvithout I shall not need to urge it is enough to say this of ours is not meerly arbitrary but stands so firmely established by law and custome that I hope it neither will nor can be removed except you will shake those foundations which I believe you desire to hold firme and inviolable Shortly then my Lords the church craves no new honour from you and justly hopes you will not be guilty of pulling down the old as you are the eldest sons and next under his Majesty the honourable patrons of the Church so she expects and beseeches you to receive her into your tenderest care so to order her affairs that ye leave her to posterity in no worse case then you found her It is a true word of Damasus Uti vilescit nomen episcopi omnis statua perturbatur Ecclesiae If this be suffered the misery will be the Churches the dishonour blurre of the act in future ages will be yours To shut up therefore let us be taken off from all ordinary trade of secular imployments and if you please abridge us of intermeddling with matters of common justice but leave us possessed of those places and priviledges in Parliament which our predecessors have so long and peaceably injoyed ANTHEMES FOR THE CATHEDRAL OF EXCETER LOrd what am I A worm dust vapor nothing What is my life A dream a daily dying What is my flesh My souls uneasie clothing What is my time A minute ever flying My time my flesh my life and I What are we Lord but vanity Where am I Lord downe in a vale of death What is my trade sin my dear God offending My sport sin too my stay a puffe of breath What end of sin hells horrour never ending My way my trade sport stay and place help up to make up my dolefull case Lord what art thou pure life power beauty bliss Where dwell'st thou up above in perfect light What is thy time eternity it is What state attendance of each glorious sp'rit Thy self thy place thy dayes thy state Pass all the thoughts of powers create How shall I reach thee Lord Oh soar above Ambitious soul but which way should I flie Thou Lord art way and end what wings have I Aspiring thoughts of faith of hope of love Oh let these wings that way alone Present me to thy blissfull throne ANTHEME FOR Christmas Day IMmortall babe who this dear day Didst change thine Heaven for our clay And didst with flesh thy Godhead vail Eternal Son of God All-hail Shine happy star ye Angels sing Glory on high to Heavens King Run Shepherds leave your nightly watch See Heaven come down to Bethleems cratch Worship ye Sages of the East The King of Gods in meanness drest O blessed maid smile and adore The God thy womb and armes have bore Star Angels Shepherds and wise sages Thou Virgin glory of all ages Restored frame of Heaven and Earth Joy in your dear Redeemers Birth LEave O my soul this baser World below O leave this dolefull dungeon of wo And soare aloft to that supernal rest That maketh all the Saints and Angels blest Lo there the God-heads radiant throne Like to ten thousand Suns in one Lo there thy Saviour dear in glory dight Ador'd of all the powers of Heavens bright Lo where that head that bled with thorny wound Shines ever with celestial honor crownd That hand that held the scornfull reed Makes all the fiends infernall dread That back and side that ran with bloody streams Daunt Angels eyes with their majestick beames Those feet once fastened to the cursed tree Trample on death and hell in glorious glee Those lips once drench't with gall do make With their dread doom the world to quake Behold those joyes thou never canst behold Those precious gates of pearl those Streets of gold Those streams of Life those trees of Paradise That never can be seen by mortal eyes And when thou seest this state divine Think that it is or shall be thine See there the happy troups of purest sprights That live above in endless true delights And see where once thy self shalt ranged be And look and long for immortalitie And now before-hand help to sing Allelujahs to Heavens King FINIS BOOKS printed for and to be sold by John Crook at the Sign of the Ship in St Pauls Church-yard ANnales veteris novi Testamenti Aviro Reverend Jacob Usserio Archiepisco Armachano Folio The Annals of the Old and New Testament with the Synchronismus of Heathen story to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans by James Usher D.D. Arch-Bishop of Armagh and Primate of Ireland Folio The Antiquities of Warwikcshire illustrated beautified with Maps prospects and pourtractures by William Dugdale Folio Hymens Preludia or Loves Master piece being the 9th and 10th parts of Cleopatra Folio The History of this Iâ—on Age wherein is set down the Original of all the wars and commotions that have happened from the year of God 1500. Illustrated with the figures of the most Renowned persons of this Time Folio The History of the great and renowned Monarchy of China Fol. The holy History containing excellent observations on the Remarkable passages of the old Testament written Originally in French by N. Caussin S.I. and now rendred into English by a Person of Honour 4. Ejusdem de textus hebraici Veteris Testamenti variantibus Lectionibus ad Lodovicum Capellum Epistola Quarto Usserii de 70. Interpretum versione syntagma Quarto Montagues Miscellanea Spiritualâ—ia 4. second part A Treatise of Gavelkind both name and thing shewing the true Etymology and derivation of the one the nature antiquity and Original of the other by William Sonner Quarto The Holy Life of Mounsier de Renty a late noble man of France 8. Certain discourses viz. of Babylon the present See of Rome of laying on of hands of the old forme of words in Ordination of a set forme of prayer being the judgment of the Late Arch-Bishop of Armagh and Primate of Ireland by N. Bernard D. D. Octavo The Character of England with reflections upon Gallus Castratus 12. The French Gardiner instructing how to cultivate all sorts of Fruit-trees with directions to dry and conserve them in their natural An accomplished peice illustrated with sculpture By whom also all manner of Books are to be sold brought from beyond the Seas
of our sins with Israels Yet one more do we think of the bold intrusion of presumptuous persons into the sacred calling without any commission from God Of whom do we think the Prophet Jeremy speaks The Prophets prophesy lies in my name I sent them not neither have I commanded them nor spake unto them They prophesy unto you a false vision and the deceit of their own heart Jer. 14.14 and again I have not sent these Prophets yet they run I have not spoken to them yet they prophesyed Jer. 23.21 To what purpose should I instance in more as I easily might as practical atheisme falsehood cruelty hypocrisy ingratitude and in a word universal corruption O England England too like to thy sister Israel in all her spiritual deformities if not rather to thy sister Sodome Behold this was the iniquity of thy Sister sodome pride fulnesse of bread and abundance of idlenesse was in her neither did she strengthen the hands of the poor and needy Ezechiel 16.49 Lo thou art as haughty as she and hast committed all her abominations But that which yet aggravates thy sin is thy stubborne incorrigiblenesse and impudence in offending is it not of thee that the Prophet Jeremy speaks This is a Nation that obeyeth not the voice of the Lord their God nor receiveth correction Jer. 7.28 For O our God hast thou not whipt us soundly and drawn blood of us in abundance yet wo is me what amendment hast thou found in us what one excesse have we abated what one sin have we reformed what one vice have we quitted Look forth brethren into the World see if the lives of men be not more loose and lawlesse their tongues more profane their hands more heavily oppressive their conversation more faithlesse their contracts more fraudulent their contempt of Gods messengers more high their neglect of Gods ordinances more palpable then ever it was Yea have not too many amongst us added to their unreformation an impudence in sinning Is it not of these that the Prophet speaketh Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination Nay they were not ashamed at all neither could they blush therefore shall they fall among them that fall in the time of their visitation they shall be cast down saith the Lord Jer. 8.12 By this time I suppose you see how too much cause we have to mourn for those sins of practise which have fetcht down judgments upon us turn your eyes now a little to those intellectual wickednesses which we call sins of Opinion Opinion think some of you now alas what so great offence can there be in matter of conceit and in those results of ours ratiocination which we picht upon in the cases of Religion let me tell you dear Christians what valuation soever you may please to set upon these capital errours of the understanding set abroach for the seduction of simple souls there is more deadly mischief and higher offence to God in them then in those practical evils which honest hearts profess to abhorr These as they are the immediate sins of our spirituall part so they do more immediately strike at the God of Spirits in his Truth and holinesse and as Religion is the highest concernment of the soul so the depravation of Religion must needs be most dangerous and damnable It is no marvell therefore if a truly-zealous Christian could even weep his eyes out to see hear those hellish heresies Atheous paradoxes which have poysoned the very air of our Church wherein they were vented One beats the keys into the sword or hangs them at the Magistrates girdle so as he suspends religion upon the meer will and pleasure of severaignty One allowes plurality or community of Wives another allows a man to divorce that wife he hath upon sleight occasions and to take another One is a Ranter another is a Seeker a third is a Shaker One dares question yea disparage the sacred Scriptures of God another denies the Souls immortality a third the Bodies resurrection One spits his poyson upon the blessed Trinity another blasphemes the Lord Jesus and opposes the eternity of his Godhead One is altogether for inspirations professing himself above the sphere of all Ordinances yea above the blood of Christ himself Another teaches that the more villanie he can commit the more holy he is that only confidence in sinning is perfection of sanctity that there is no hell but remorse To put an end to this list of blasphemies the very mention whereof is enough to distemper my tongue and your ears One miscreant dares give himself out for God Almighty Another for the Holy Ghost Another for the Lord Christ Another a vile adulterous strumpet for the Virgin Mary O God were there ever such frenzies possessed the braines of men as these sad times have yieled Was ever the Devil so prevalent with the sons of men Neither have these prodigious wretches smothered their damnable conceits in their impure breasts but have boldly vented them to the World so as the very presses are openly defiled with the most loathsome disgorgments of their wicked blasphemies Here here my dear brethren is matter more then enough for our mourning If we have any good hearts to God if any love to his truth if any zeal for his glory if any care for his Church if any compassion of either perishing or endangered souls we cannot but apprehend just cause of pouring out our selves into tears for so horrible affronts offered to the dread Majesty of our God for so inexpiable a scandal to the Gospel which we professe for so odious a conspurcation of our holy profession and lastly for the dreadful damnation of those silly souls that are seduced by these cursed impostors Ye have seen now what cause we have of mourning for sins both of Practise and Opinion It remaines now that we consider what cause of mourning we may have from our dangers for surely fear as it is alwayes joyned with grief so together with it is a just provoker of our tears And here if I should abridge all the holy Prophets and gather up out of them all the menaces of judgments which they denounce against their sinfull Israel I might well bring them home to our own doors and justly affright us with the expectation of such further revenge from Divine Justice for how can we otherwise think but that the same sins must carry away the same punishments The holy God is ever constant to his own most righteous proceedings if then our sins be like theirs why should we presume upon a dissimilitude of judgments Here then it is easy to descry a double danger worth our mourning for the one of further smart from the hand of God for our continuing and menacing wickednesse the other of further degrees of corruption from our selves For the first let that sad Prophet Jeremiah tell you what we may justly fear They are not humbled even unto this day neither have they feared nor walked in my law
Therefore thus saith the Lord of Hosts the God of Israel Behold I will set my face against you for evill and to cut off all Judah Jer. 44.10.11 and if ye will have particularities have we not cause to fear that he will make good upon us that fearful word I have taken away my peace from this people saith the Lord even loving kindnesse and mercies Jer. 16.5 This is an ablative judgment and that a heavy one too will ye see a positive one more heavy then that Behold I will utterly forget you and I will forsake you and the City that I gave to you and your forefathers and cast you out of my presence And I will bring an everlasting reproach upon you and a perpetual shame which shall not be forgotten Jer. 23.39 40. Will ye have the specialities of his threatned judgments Behold I will send upon them the sword the famine and the pestilence I will persecute them with all these and will deliver them to be removed to all the Kingdomes of the Earth to be a curse and an astonishment and an hissing and a reproach among all Nations Jer. 29.17 18. But enough enough of these dolefull accents of interminated judgments wherewith if I would follow the steps of the Prophets I might strike your hearts with just horrour See now the no lesse danger that arises from our selves no lesse Yea much greater for the highest revenge of all other that God takes of men is when he punishes sin with sin Let me therefore sadly and seriously tell you that there is just fear we are running apace into two woful mischiefs Atheisme and Barbarisme Oh that I were a false Prophet and did not see too much ground of this fear The multiplicity of these wild opinions in matter of Religion if there be not a speedy restraint can have no other issue but no Religion And if we should live to see discouragements put upon Learning and a substract on or diminution of the maintenance of studied Divines and an allowance of or connivence at unlettered preachers and no care taken of any but some select soules ignorance confusion and barbarity will be the next newes that we shall hear of from the Church of England Brethren if we see not these causes of fear we are blind and if seeing them we be not affected with them we are stupid Let this be enough to be spoken of those grounds that make a just time of our mourning now that our seasonable mourning may not be to no purpose let us inquire a little how this our mourning should be regulated for the due carriage and conditions of it And first for the quantity of it it must be proportioned to the occasion and cause upon which it is taken up for to mourne deeply upon sleight and trivial causes were weak and childish like to those faint hearts that are ready to swoun away for the scratch of a finger on the contrary not to mourne heavily upon a main cause of grief argues an insensate and benummed heart If it be for some vehement affliction of body good Ezekiah is a lawfull precedent for us Like as a Crane or a swallow so did I chatter I did mourne as a dove mine eyes fail with looking upward Isaiah 38.14 If it be for some great publick calamity Jeremie tells you what to do For this gird you with sackcloth lament and howl for the fierce anger of the Lord is not turned back from us Jerem. 4.8 and Gods chosen People are a fit pattern The Elders of the daughter of Zion sit upon the ground and keep silence they have cast up dust upon their heads they have girded themselves with sackcloth the Virgins of Jerusalem hang down their heads to the ground Lament 2.10 and the Prophet beats them company in their sorrow Mine eyes do fail with tears my bowels are troubled my liver is poured upen the earth for the destruction of the daughter of my People Lament 2.11 If it be for some personall and grievous sin that we have been miscarried into Holy David is a meet example for us My bones saith he waxed old through my roaring all the day long for day and night thy hand was heavie upon me my moisture is turned into the drought of Summer Psal 32.3 4. and elsewhere My sore ran in the night and ceased not my soul refused to be comforted I complained and my Spirit was over-whelmed Psal 77.2 3. Where are those pandars of sin the Romish casuists that teach the least measure of sorrow even meer attrition is enough for a penitent Surely had the man after Gods own heart thought so he had spared many a sigh and many a sobbe and many a tear that his sins cost him and so must they do us if ever we hope to recover true comfort to our souls and certainly could we be rightly apprehensive of the dread Majesty of the most high God whom we move to anger with our sin and could consider the hainousness of sin whereby we provoke the eyes of his glory and lastly the dreadfulness of that eternal torment which our sin drawes after it we could not think it easy to spend too much sorrow upon our sins Lastly if from our own private bosome we shall cast our eyes upon the common sins of the times and places wherein we live a tast whereof I have given you in this our present discourse where oh where shall we finde tears enough to bewail them now sack-cloth and ashes sighs and tears weeping and wailing rending of garments yea rending of hearts too are all too little to expresse our just mourning When good Ezra heard but of that one sin wherewith both Priests and Levites and the Rulers and People of Israel were tainted which was their intermarriage with the Heathen so as the holy seed was vitiated with this mixture how passionately was he affected Let himself tell you When I heard this thing saith he I rent my garment and my mantle and pluckt off the hair of my head and of my beard and sat down astonished untill the evening sacrifice Ezra 9.3 4. What would he have done think we if he had seen so many abominations and heard so many and soul blasphemies of his Israel as we have been witnesses of in these last times This for the quantity Now secondly for the quality of our mourning we may not think to rest in a meer sorrow in a pensive kind of sullennesse Worldly sorrow causeth death 2 Cor. 8.10 For by the sorrow of the heart the Spirit is broken Prov. 15.13 and a broken spirit dryeth the bones Prov. 17.22 And this is one main difference betwixt the Christian mourner and the Pagan both equally complain both are sensible of the causes of their complaint but the sorrow of the one is simply and absolutely afflictive as looking no further but to the very object of his grief the other is mixed with divers holy temperaments as with a meekness of Spirit with a faithul