these worldly things that a man pursues with the greatest eagerness and intention of mind imaginable he finds not half the pleasure in the actual possession of them that he proposed to himself in the expectation Which shews that there is a great Cheat or Lye which over spreads the World while all things here below beguile mens expectations and their expectations cheat their experience Let this therefore be the first thing in which the Foolishness of this worldly wisdom is manifest Namely that by it a man proposes to himself an end wholly unsutable to his condition as bearing no proportion to the measure of his duration or the Vastness of his desires The other thing in which Foolishness is seen is a man's pitching upon means unsutable to that which he has made his end And here we will for the present suppose the things of the world to have neither that shortness nor emptiness in them that we have indeed proved them to have But that they are so adaequate to all the concerns of an intelligent Nature that they may be rationally fixt upon by men as the Ultimate end of all their Designs yet the folly of this Wisdom appears in this that it suggests those means for the acquisition of these enjoyments that are no ways fit to compass or acquire them and that upon a double account 1. That they are in themselves unable and Insufficient for And 2. That they are frequently opposite to a successfull attainment of them 1. And first for their Insufficiency Let Politicians contrive as accurately project as deeply and pursue what they have thus contrived and projected as diligently as it is possible for Human Wit and industry to do Yet still the success of all depends upon the favour of an over-ruling hand For God expresly claims it as a special part of his Prerogative to have the intire disposal of Riches Honours and whatsoever else is apt to command the desires of mankind here below Deuteronomy 8.18 It is the Lord thy God that giveth thee power to get wealth And in 1 Sam. 2.30 God peremptorily declares himself the Sole Fountain of Honour telling us that Those that Honour him shall be Honoured and that those that despise him shall be lightly esteemed And then for Dignities and Preferments we have the word of one that could dispose of these things as much as Kings could do Prov. 29.26 where he tells us that many seek the Rulers favour That is apply themselves both to his Interest and Humour with all the arts of Flattery and Obsequiousness the surest and the readiest ways one would think to advance a man and yet after all it follows in the next words that every man's judgment cometh of the Lord. And that whatsoever may be expected here 't is resolved only in the Court of Heaven whether the man shall proceed Favourite in the Courts of Princes and after all his Artificial attendance come to sit at the Right hand or be made a Footstool So that upon full Tryal of all the courses that Policy could either devise or practise the most experienced Masters of it have been often forced to sit down with that complaint of the Disciples We have toiled all night and have caught nothing For do we not sometimes see that Traytors can be out of favour and Knaves be beggars and lose their Estates and be stript of their offices as well as honester Men And why all this Surely not always for want of craft to spy out where their game lay nor yet for want of irreligion to give them all the scope of ways lawfull and unlawfull to prosecute their intentions But because the providence of God strikes not in with them but dashes and even dispirits all their Endeavours and makes their designs heartless and ineffectual So that it is not their feeing this man their belying another nor their sneaking to a third that shall be able to do their business when the designs of Heaven will be served by their disappointment And this is the true cause why so many politick conceptions so elaborately formed and wrought and grown at length ripe for delivery doe yet in the issue miscarry and prove abortive for being come to the Birth the all-disposing providence of God denies them strength to bring forth And thus the Authors of them having missed of their mighty aims are fain to retreat with frustration and a baffle and having played the Knaves unsuccessfully to have the ill luck to pass for Fools too The means suggested by Policy and worldly Wisdom for the attainment of these Earthly enjoyments are unfit for that purpose not only upon the account of their insufficiency for but also of their frequent opposition and contrariety to the accomplishment of such ends Nothing being more usual than for these unchristian fishers of men to be fatally caught in their own Nets For does not the Text expresly say that God taketh the Wise in their own Craftiness And has not our own experience sufficiently Commented upon the Text when we have seen some by the very same ways by which they had designed to rise uncontroulably and to clear off all obstructions before their ambition to have directly procured their utter downfall and to have broke their necks from that very Ladder by which they had thought to have climb'd as high as their Father Lucifer and there from the top of all their greatness to have look'd down with scorn upon all below them Such Persons are the proper and lawfull objects of Derision for as much as God himself laughs at them Haman wanted nothing to compleat his greatness but a Gallows upon which to hang Mordecai But it matter'd not for whom he provided the Gallows when providence designed the Rope for him With what contempt does the Apostle here in the 20 th verse of this 3 d. ch of the 1 Ep. to the Corin. repeat those words of the Psalmist concerning all the fine Artifices of worldly Wisdom The Lord says he knoweth the thoughts of the Wise that they are vain All their contrivances are but thin slight despicable things and for the most part destructive of themselves Nothing being more equal in Justice and indeed more Natural in the direct consequence and connexion of Effects and Causes than for men wickedly Wise to outwit themselves and for such as Wrestle with Providence to trip up their own heels It is clear therefore that the charge of this second sort of Foolishness is made good upon worldly Wisdom for that having made men pitch upon an end unfit for their condition it also makes them pitch upon means unfit to attain that end And that both by reason of their Inability for and frequent contrariety to the bringing about such designs This I say has been made good in the General but since particulars convince with greater life and evidence we will resume the forementioned Principles of the Politician and shew severally in each of them how little efficacy they have to
be buried privately But when a man's folly must be spread open before the Angels and all his baseness ript up before those pure Spirits this will be a double Hell to be thrust into utter Darkness only to be punished by it without the benefit of being concealed When Christ shall compare himself who was denied and the thing for which he was denied together and parallel his merits with a lust and lay Eternity in the Balance with a trifle then the folly of the sinners choice shall be the greatest sting of his destruction For a man shall not have the advantage of his former Ignorance and Error to approve his sin Things that appeared amiable by the light of this world will appear of a different odious hue in the clear discoveries of the next As that which appears to be of this colour by a dim candle will be found to be of another look'd upon in the day So when Christ shall have cleared up men's apprehensions about the value of things he will propose that worthy Prize for which he was denyed He will hold it up to open view and call upon Men and Angels Behold look here 's the things here 's that piece of dirt that windy applause that poor transitory pleasure that contemptible danger for which I was dishonoured my Truths disowned and for which Life Eternity and God himself was scorned and trampled upon by this sinner Judge all the world whether what he so despised in the other life he deserves to enjoy in this How will the condemned sinner then crawl forth and appear in his filth and shame before that undefiled Tribunal like a Toad or a Snake in a King's presence Chamber Nothing so irksome as to have ones folly displayed before the Prudent ones impurity before the Pure And all this before that company surrounding him from which he is neither able to look off nor yet to look upon A disgrace put upon a man in company is unsupportable it is heightened according to the greatness and multiplied according to the number of the persons that hear it And now as this circumstance before his Father fully speaks the shame so likewise it speaks the danger of Christ's then denying us For when the accusation is heard and the person stands convict God is immediately lifting up his hand to inflict the eternal blow and when Christ denies to exhibit a ransome to step between the stroak then coming and the sinner it must inevitably fall upon him and sink his guilty soul into that deep and bottomless gulph of endless perdition This therefore is the summ of Christ's denying us before his Father viz. unsupportable shame unavoidable destruction I proceed now to the Uses which may be drawn from the Truths delivered And here Right Honourable not only the present occasion but even the words themselves seem eminently to address an Exhortation to your Honours As for others not to deny Christ is openly to profess him so for you who are invested with Authority not to deny him is to defend him Know therefore that Christ does not only desire but demand your defence and that in a double respect 1. In respect of his Truth 2. Of his Members 1. He requires that you should defend and confess him in his Truth Heresie is a Tare sometimes not to be pulled up but by the Civil Magistrate The word Liberty of Conscience is much abused for the defence of it because not well understood Every man may have Liberty of Conscience to think and judge as he pleases but not to vent what he pleases The reason is because Conscience bounding it self within the thoughts is of private concernment and the cognizance of these belong only to God but when an opinion is published it concerns all that hear it and the publique is endammaged and therefore becomes punishable by the Magistrate to whom the care of the publique is intrusted But there is one truth that concerns both Ministery and Magistracy and all which is opposed by those who affirm That none ought to Govern upon the Earth but Christ in person Absurdly as if the Powers that are destroyed his as if a Deputy were not consistent with a King as if there were any Opposition in Subordination They affirm also that the Wicked have no right to their Estates but only the Faithfull that is themselves ought to possess the Earth And it is not to be questioned but when they come to explain this principle by putting it into execution there will be but few that have estates at present but will be either found or made Wicked I shall not be so urgent to press you to confess Christ by asserting and owning the Truth contrary to this since it does not only oppose Truth but Property and here to deny Christ would be to deny your Selves in a sence which none is like to doe 2. Christ requires you to own and defend him in his members and amongst these the chief of them and such as most fall in your way the Ministers I say that despised abject oppressed sort of men the Ministers whom the world would make Antichristian and so deprive them of Heaven and also strip them of that poor remainder of their Maintenance and so allow them no portion upon the Earth You may now spare that distinction of Scandalous Ministers when it is even made Scandalous to be a Minister And as for their discouragement in the Courts of the Law I shall onely note This that for these many years last past it has been the constant observation of all That if a Minister had a Cause depending in the Court it was ten to one but it went against him I cannot believe your Law justles out the Gospel but if it be thus used to undermine Christ in his Servants beware that such Judgments passed upon them doe not fetch down God's Judgments upon the Land and that for such abuse of the Law Christ does not in anger deprive both you and us of its use My Lords I make no doubt but you will meet with many suits in your course in which the persons we speak of are concerned as it is easie to prognosticate from those many worthy Petitions preferred against them for which the well-afficted Petitioners will one day receive but small Thanks from the Court of Heaven But however their Causes speed in your Tribunals know that Christ himself will recognize them at a greater And then what a different face will be put upon things When the usurping devouring Nimrods of the world shall be cast with scorn on the left hand And Christ himself in that great consistory shall daign to step down from his Throne and single out a poor despised Minister and as it were taking him by the hand present him to and openly thus confess him before his Father Father here is a poor servant of mine who for doing his duty impartially for keeping a good conscience and testifying my truths in an Hypocritical pretending age
from God who is Truth it self and with whom no shadow of Falshood can dwell He that telleth Lyes says David in Psalm 101.7 shall not tarry in my Sight and if not in the Sight of a poor Mortal man who could sometimes lye himself how much less in the Presence of the Infinite and All-knowing God A Wise and Good Prince or Governour will not vouchsafe a Lyar the Countenance of his Eye and much less the Privilege of his Ear. The Spirit of God seems to write this upon the very Gates of Heaven and to state the Condition of Men's Entrance into Glory chiefly upon their Veracity In Psalm 15.1 Who shall ascend into thy Holy Hill says the Psalmist To which it is answered in vers 2. He that worketh Righteousness and that speaketh the Truth from his Heart And on the other side how Emphatically is Hell described in the Two last Chapters of the Revelation by being the great Receptacle and Mansion-house of Lyars whom we shall find there ranged with the vilest and most detestable of all Sinners appointed to have their Portion in that Horrid place Revel 21.8 The Unbelieving and the Abominable and Murderers and Whoremongers and Sorcerers and Idolaters and all Lyars shall have their part in the Lake which burns with Fire and Brimstone And in Revel 22.15 Without are Dogs and Sorcerers c. and whosoever loveth and maketh a Lye Now let those consider this whose Tongue and Heart hold no Correspondence Who look upon it as a Piece of Art and Wisdom and the Master-piece of Conversation to over-reach and deceive and make a Prey of a credulous and well-meaning Honesty What do such Persons think Are Dogs Whoremongers and Sorcerers such desirable Company to take up with for ever Will the Burning Lake be found so tolerable Or will there be any one to drop Refreshment upon the false Tongue when it shall be tormented in those Flames Or do they think that God is a Lyar like themselves and that no such Things shall ever come to pass but that all these fiery Threatnings shall vanish into Smoak and this dreadfull Sentence blow off without Execution Few certainly can lye to their own Hearts so far as to imagine this But Hell is and must be granted to be the Deceiver's Portion not only by the Judgment of God but of his own Conscience too And comparing the Malignity of his Sin with the Nature of the Punishment allotted for him all that can be said of a Lyar lodged in the very Nethermost Hell is this That if the Vengeance of God could prepare any Place or Condition worse than Hell for Sinners Hell it self would be too good for him And now to summ up all in short I have shewn what a Lye is and wherein the Nature of Falshood does consist that it is a Thing absolutely and intrinsecally Evil that it is an Act of Injustice and a Violation of our Neighbour's Right And that the Vileness of its Nature is equalled by the Malignity of its Effects It being this That first brought Sin into the World and is since the Cause of all those Miseries and Calamities that disturb it and further that it tends utterly to dissolve and overthrow Society which is the greatest Temporal Blessing and Support of Mankind and which is yet worst of all that it has a strange and particular Efficacy above all other Sins to indispose the Heart to Religion And lastly That it is as dreadfull in its Punishments as it has been pernicious in its Effects For as much as it deprives a Man of all Credit and Belief and consequently of all Capacity of being usefull in any Station or Condition of Life whatsoever and next that it draws upon him the Just and Universal Hatred and Abhorrence of all Men here and finally subjects him to the Wrath of God and Eternal Damnation hereafter And now if none of all these Considerations can recommend and endear Truth to the Words and Practices of Men and work upon their Double Hearts so far as to convince and make them sensible of the Baseness of the Sin and Greatness of the Guilt that Fraud and Falshood leaves upon the Soul Let them Lye and Cheat on till they receive a fuller and more effectual Conviction of all these Things in that Place of Torment and Confusion prepared for the Devil and his Angels and all his Lying Retinue by the Decree and Sentence of that God who in his Threatnings as well as in his Promises will be True to his Word and cannot Lye To whom be rendred and ascribed as is most due all Praise Might Majesty and Dominion both now and for evermore Amen FINIS BOOKS Newly printed for Tho. Bennet at the Half-Moon in St. Paul's Church-Yard AThenae Oxonienses or an Exact History of all the Writers and Bishops who have had their Education in the Ancient and Famous University of Oxford from 1500 to the End of the Year 1690 Representing the Birth Fortune Preferments and Death of all those Authors and Prelates the great Accidents of their Lives the Fate and Character of their Writings The Work being so compleat that no Writer of Note of this Nation for near Two hundred years past is omitted fol. 2 Vol. Dr. Pocock on Ioel. With the rest of his Commentaries A Critical History of the Text and Versions of the New Testament wherein is firmly Establish'd the Truth of those Acts on which the Foundation of Christian Religion is laid By Father Simon of the Oratory Together with a Refutation of such Passages as seem contrary to the Doctrine and Practice of the Church of England Memoirs of the Court of France by the late famous French Lady The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus the Roman Emperor Translated out of Greek into English with Notes by Dr. Casaubon To this Edition is added the Life of the said Emperor with an Account of Stoick Philosophy As also Remarks on the Meditations All newly written by the famous Monsieur and Madam Dacier The Works of the Learned or an Historical Account and Impartial Judgment of the Books newly Printed both Foreign and Domestick together with the State of Learning in the World Published Monthly by I. de la Crose a late Author of the Universal Bibliotheque This first Volume beginning in August last is compleated this present April with Indexes to the whole The Bishop of Chester's Charge to his Clergy at his Primary Visitation May 5. 1691. Five Sermons before the King and Queen by Dr. Meggot Dean of Winchestor Mr. Atterbury's Sermon before the Queen May 29. 1692. * In the Parliament 1653 it being put to the Vote whether they should support and encourage A godly and learned Ministery the latter word was rejected and the vote passed for a Godly and Faithful Ministery * A noted Independant Divine when Ol. Cromwel was sick of which sickness he dyed declared that God had Revealed to him that he should recover and live 30 years longer for that God had raised him up for a work which could not be done in less time But Oliver's Death being published two days after the said Divine publickly in Prayer expostulated with God the Defeat of his Prophecy in these words Lord thou hast lyed unto us yea thou hast lyed unto us * Very credibly reported to have been done in an Independant Congregation at Oxon. * Whensoever any Petition was put up to the Parliament in the year 1653. for the Taking away of Tythes the thanks of the House were still returned to them and that by the Name and Elogy of the well-affected Petitioners * U. C. A Colonel of the Army the perfidious cause of Penruddock 's Death and sometime after High-Sheriff of Oxfordshire openly and frequently affirmed the uselessness of the Vniversities and that three Colledges were sufficient to answer the occasions of the Nation for the breeding of men up to Learning so farr as it was either necessary or usefull * Cromwel a lively Copy of Jeroboam did so * Gaspar Streso Cromwell ☜ * Of which last see an Instance in the 13 Session of this Council In which it Decrees with a non obstante to Christ's express Institution of the Blessed Eucharist in both Kinds That the contrary Custom and Practice of receiving it only in one Kind ought to be accounted and observed as a Law and that if the Priest should Administer it otherwise he was to be Excommunicated * Colonel Axtell * He particularly mention'd those of Brooks and Calamy ☞