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A91815
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A sermon preached in Christ's-church, Dublin, on the 23d of October, 1695 being the anniversary thanksgiving for putting an end to the Irish Rebellion, which broke out on that day, 1641 : before the House of Lords / by Henry Lord Bishop of Killaloo.
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Rider, Henry, d. 1696.
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1695
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Wing R1441; ESTC R15253
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11,158
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Bones of Rottenness and Corruption for he has not so much as one of those good Qualities he pretends to take him but into the tiring Room strip him and lay aside his Robes pull off his Mask and Vizard that Paint and Fucus which he lays on with so much Art and Cunning he will then be seen as he is a deform'd shrivel'd Piece a miserable Spectacle indeed and yet for all that he hopes he shall come off very well and claps and applauds himself And therefore in the next place we shall consider what grounds he has for his hopes and from whence they do proceed First Then the Hypocrites Hopes may proceed from this he has found by long experience That his bare Pretences to Virtue have served his turn very well in this World promoted his Interest and been as advantagious to him as if it had been real He has acquired it may be a great Estate Honours and Preferments by the appearance of being a good Man got his Fathers Blessing by the smoothness of his Carriage sound Favour in the Eyes of his Prince by Dissimulation and Flattery and with Absolom stollen the Hearts of all the People by his fair Speeches his courteous and obliging Behaviour his Honesty such as it is as far as he knows has never been Mistrusted and he hope still to carry on the Cheat to deceive Heaven as well as he has done Man and concludes That the same Arts which have Enabled him to go beyond his Brother may do him the like Service in Over-Reaching and Abusing of his God He has been Blest with the Fat of the Earth and the Dew of Heaven the Sun has Shin'd as Warmly and the Showers of Rain Refresh'd him as much as the best of his Neighbours he prospers in the World and has Riches in Possession and he cannot but look upon such Blessings as an earnest of some future Favour By the large share he has of the things of this Life he judges what proportion he may expect in the next and from every lucky hit still draw this inference That he who has been so Fortunate and had so much Goods laid up for many years here must have some Happiness hereafter at least a Childs Portion in Reversion But suppose the worst seeing the Tares grow together with the Wheat he hopes that at the general Harvest he may be thrown into the Barn among the other Sheaves that the Counterfet may not be discern'd in so great a heap of Precious Stones that the goodness of the Foyl may give it such a Lustre that it may sparkle even in the Eyes of God himself and pass without suspition when he comes to make up the fairest of his Jewels Secondly The Hypocrite may hope upon this account His constant endeavours have been to set himself handsomly off to acquire all the outward visible signs of Piety and Holiness without any regard to the inward purity of his Heart and he has been so long used to dissemble with others that he has even forgot to deal honestly and sincerely with himself The foolish Actor who was to personate a King when he saw himself surrounded with Guards and Attendance with all the pomp and solemnity of a Court tho he had not one Royal Quality or Princely Virtue nothing of that largeness of Soul none of those generous and noble Thoughts which are absolutely necessary to so considerable a Dignity to so high a Calling He began to fancy that he was born for some great Designs that he was cut out for a Crown and really was the mighty Person he represented So our Religious Player tho he has none of the qualifications of a Saint nor any Truth in his inward Parts Tho he is utterly a stranger to all the great Duties of Religion and never heartily bewailed or truly repented of any of the Errors of his life yet he has worn the Robes of Rightteousness so long that from the colour of his Habit he judges of the cleanness of his Heart from the whiteness of his Garments that he has kept himself unspotted from the World and at last is given up to the strongest of Delusions to believe himself and concludes with the proud Pharisee That he is not as other Men are That God cannot forget to be gracious to him but will accept his person and receive him into his mercy and favour Thirdly The Hypocrite may hope imagining that there is some recompense due to the good Figure He has made in the World and that there is something of merit even in his dissimulation Religion in his opinion gets some credit by the respect Men only seem to pay it It is one proof of his virtuous Inclinations that he hides and conceals his Vices and surely think He the outward Expressions of Piety the borrow'd disguise of Devotion has a better Title to forgiveness than down right Atheism and Profaness a counterfeit zeal for the service of God such a one as Naaman's in the house of Rimmon must be much less offensive than to kick at his Sacrifices pollute his Sanctuary and Convert that Holy Place into an House of Merchandize a den of Thieves For thus he may be willing to justifie and argue for Himself He constantly frequents the Church no Man comes with more reverence and humility or crys louder Lord Lord than He doth He fasts twice in the week and makes little or no provision for the flesh He is nicely Exact in observing all the minutest circumstances of the Law had rather starve than gather a few Sticks rather perish with Hunger than pluck a few Ears of Corn on the Sabbath Day He gives Tythes of all that He possesses It is a weighty matter in his Opinion to scruple the payment of so just a Debt a robbing of God Himself and He would not be guilty of Sacriledge no not in that sense for all the World He gives alms and has lent considerable Sums unto the Lord and believes He has put his Money into good hands He never turns so much as his Face from any poor Man and he trusts that the Face of the Lord shall never be turned away from him For his part He cannot but think he has contributed some thing to the honour of God and the Interest of Religion and could wish there were many more such Hypocrites as he is That all our Leopards would rather conceal their Spots and our Ethiopians change their Skins than that they should publish their Transgressions make their Crimes their Reputation declares their Sins as Sodom and Glory in their shame Thus the Hypocrite tho he has not liv'd up to the strictest Rules of our most holy Religion nor made his Heart bend to the severer Precepts of the Gospel yet for as much as his good deeds have been transacted in the sight o fall the People and in the face of the Sun and his bad ones in his secret chambers or in those darker recesses of his Soul That his life may have
Thursday 24th of October 1695. By the Lords Spiritual Temporal in Parliament Assembled ORDERED On motion that the Earl of Mount-Alexander and the Lord Viscount Charlemount do give the Thanks of this House to the Lord Bishop of Killaloo for his Sermon Preached before this House at Christ's-Church Yesterday being the Anniversary of the Three and Twentieth of October And that his Lordship be desired to cause his Sermon to be Printed Gerard Bor. Cler. Parliamentorum A SERMON PREACHED In CHRIST's-CHURCH DUBLIN On the 23d of October 1695. Being the Anniversary Thanksgiving for putting an End to the IRISH REBELLION which broke out on that Day 1641. BEFORE THE HOUSE of LORDS By HENRY Lord Bishop of KILLALOO DUBLIN Printed by and for J. Ray and are to be Sold by the Booksellers in Dublin 1695 A SERMON Preached on the 23d of October 1695. Job 8.13 The Hypocrite's Hope shall Perish IT was the saying of a Great and Wise Man that most of the Creatures are worthy of our best Thoughts and deserve our serious Observation That something is to be Learn'd from every one of them as well from the smallest Insect under our Feet as from the glittering Canopy over our Heads as well from the least Atome in the Sun Beams as from the Glorious Lustre of the Moon and Stars Naturalists tells us That the Engle taught us Architecture and drew the first Model of an handsom and convenient House That the Spider shew'd the Weaver the use of the Shuttle and the Loom the good Housewife to manage the Spindle and the Wheel That Swallows were the first Profess'd Oculists That the River-Horse taught us how to breath a Vein and that we are oblig'd to several other Animals for many excellent Discoveries both in Chirurgery and Physick We find too many of the Creatures instructing us in things that more nearly do concern us Reading Lectures to us and Discoursing with us like so many Professors in Divinity The Prophets direct us to the Stork the Turtle and the Crane to the Ox and to the Ass to learn us Gratitude and our time of returning unto the Lord. Solomon sends us to the Ant to Preach to us Frugality and Thrift and a Greater and Wifer than Solomon to the Serpent and the Dove for Innocence and Wisdom Nay all the Trees the Plants and Flowers of the Field from the Cedars of Lebanon to the Hyssop that springeth out of the Wall are spoken of by the Holy Pen-Men who condescending to our Capacities borrow many handsom Allusions from things that we are intimately acquainted with from the Vine and the Fig-Tree the Thistle and the Thorn and indeed from almost all the Herbs and Greens of the Earth Thus Bildad introduces the Words Read unto you Can the Rush grow without Mire Can the Flag grow without Water whilst it is yet in its Greeness and not cut down it withereth before any other Herb so are the Paths of all that forget God and the Hypocrite's Hope shall Perish In the Words we shall consider First The Person the Hypocrite Secondly What his Hopes are and how he comes to Hope Lastly The End and Consequence of his Hopes they shall Perish This indeed may be thought no very proper Subject for the occasion the Tragical Story of the day the horrid Cruelties Barbarous Murders and unspeakable Sufferings the poor Protestants groan'd under might very well have been expected to have been fairly represented to our View When Saul's Sword against the Amalekites seem'd to be drawn among us and to act with that large Commission to slay both Man and Woman Infant and Suckling Ox and Sheep Camel and Ass only with this difference that our implacable Enemies spared not so much as the best of the Sheep and Oxen When the merciless Persecutors of our Fore-fathers had not always so much goodness as to Kill so much Humanity as utterly to destroy But prolong'd their miserable Lives took care that they might linger under their Torments and feel themselves dye and at last out of the abundance of their Compassion dispatch'd them with a Stab at their Hearts and that dreadful Imprecation Thy Soul to the Devil When the Blood of the Innocent was shed like Water on every Side Lamentations and Wailings were Echo'd from every Corner and our weeping Rachils sate bemoaning themselves and had none to comfort 'em When the Cry in most Places was something louder than that of Egypt for there was scarce an English Family in which there was not more than one Dead when the dead Bodies of Gods Servants that lay weltring in their own Gore were denied the common kindness of the Grave and were given to be Meat unto the Fowls of the Air and the flesh of his Saints unto the Beasts of the Field and the most brutish fury of that bloody Crew was esteem'd Meritorious and thought to deserve not only the Encomiums of a Conclave but the Apostolical Benediction It may I say be expected that I should enlarge upon these particulars but hope that the Task may be equally ungrateful to us all That as we delight not in the Effusion of any Mans Blood so we Sympathize too far with the Sufferings of our Ancestors to disturb the weary that are at rest to lay open their Bleeding VVounds to revive those persuasive Calls to Revenge those Cries and fearful Screeches which run Parallel to nothing but that in the Revelation How long Lord Holy and True wilt thou not Judge and Avenge our Blood VVe shall therefore proceed according to the Method laid down and as we insist upon the several parts of the Text take some notice of the Hypocrisie and Dissimulation of our false Brethren show you what their Hopes were and that they also fell short of all their Expectations First Then we shall consider the Person the Hypocrite the word Hypocrite in its Natural and Genuine Sense signifies an Actor or a Player one who upon the Publick Stage personates another imposes upon the Spectators and pasles for the Man he only represents And indeed as the Heathen long since observed the whole VVorld is a Large Theatre where the generality of Men do no more than decently represent the Persons they would be thought to be and the very best of them may put the same Question to themselves that the Emperor Augustus did to his Friends when he lay a dying have not I acted the play of Life very well For they are disguised into a thousand several shapes are all mere shew face and appearance and he that knows not how to act his part to play the Hypocrite and Dissembler knows neither how to Rule nor to Obey he will make but an awkard Monarch a rough unaccomplish'd Courtier and in most Professions will want many of those Qualifications which usually polish and recommend a Man to the good opinion of the mistaken World But then the word Hypocrite signifies a Religious Cheat a Wolf in sheeps cloathing a Devil in the habit of a Saint in