without money in the case as is generally too evident how should houses Haud facile emergunt quarum virtutibus obstat Res angusta domus is as true as if it had been domi that is it holds as certain in houses as in men It is mony must raise them But what shall they do that have it not nor can by any means procure it I know no way but one viz. they must fell their ground but there is the misery who will give them to the worth of it They that know they must or are forced to sell think to buy it as they list or at some such rates as too many have bought Debenters it may be at a Noble for the worth and value of each pound Thus poor men are bought and sold as the Prophet expresseth it for a pair of shoes Amos 2.6 A rich commodity in a poor mans hand is nothing worth so barbarously are men upon the catch taking their utmost advantages one against another which is to make a vice instead of a vertue of necessity I mean a vice to themselves out of the necessity of others For doubtless he that buyeth out poor men so cheaply selleth himself to work wickedness Well what said Ahab to Naboth 1 Kin. 21.2 Give me thy Vineyard and I will give thee for it a better Vineyard than that or if it seem good to thee I will give thee the worth of it in money He offered a valuable consideration for Naboths ground will you be worse than that Ahab If your Brethren be hungry will you take occasion thereby to purchase their Birth-right for a mess of pottage as Jacob did who was many wayes crossed afterwards in one kind and in another What blessing can be expected or rather what curse may not be lookt for upon those houses the foundations of which are laid in oppression and grinding the faces of the poor who in order to bread are forced to suffer their own faces to be ground Are no merciful men to be found who in consideration of the necessity of poor men will give them for their ground rather more than it is worth at leastwise full as much yea why should not every man be so far forth merciful sith the latter of the two is but to be just Art thou in a purchasing case buy poor mens ground at a full rate build upon it and when that is done if they be able to pay a moderate Rent and it may be a courtesie to them become their Landlord He may prove a sufficient Tenant who is not able to build his own house and his Landlord may have a blessing for his sake for blessed is he that considereth the poor Psa 40.1 Be not you discouraged if you cannot build your selves another mans house may be as commodious for you as one of your own erecting and if there happen to be inconveniencies in it they will not so much upbraid and vex you as if they had been contracted by your own misbuilding as they might have been Nam quae non fecimus ipsi haud ea nostra voco you are not chargeable with the faults of those houses which you did not make or build your selves I have one thing more to say to such as must sell their ground and are dejected at the thoughts of so doing Were you not so far undone that you could not attempt to build who knows whither you as many others have been and it is supposed will be might not be undone by building DISCOURSE XI That a strict observation of the Lords day might greatly promote the rebuilding of the City THe Lords Day is not that Sabbath which was first so called for that was the last day of the week whereas it is the first yet a Sabbath it is and doubtless injoyned in and by the same Commandment that the Jewish Sabbath was viz. the fourth for whosoever doth not acknowledge it so to be must either say that there is no Sabbath at all or day of holy rest to be kept under the New Testament and consequently that there are now but nine Commandments in the Moral Law the fourth being abrogated and expired whereas Christ hath told us That till heaven and earth pass one jot shall in no wise pass from that Law Mat. 5.18 or else they must say that the last day of the week is that which ought alwayes to be observed by Christians as it is by Jews for the only Sabbath and weekly holy day that is for ever to be celebrated in obedience to that Command Most Christians are averse from Judaizing in taking Saturday for their Sabbath chusing rather to imitate the practise of the Apostles whose manner it was to observe not the last but first day of the week which we conclude they would not have done but by Warrantie and Commission from Christ who alone was Lord of the Sabbath so to do Yet some few Christians there are who symbolize with the Jews in their Saturday-Sabbath and keep the same day as holy as they can And verily if in this case I may speak my mind freely they are much less too blame who keep a Saturday Sabbath than they who keep none at all who understand that Commandment as the Jews do than they who make as if it were abrogated and disannulled But he that shall fall into neither of the extremes aforesaid but shall confess that the first day of the week is that which was instituted for Christians by the fourth Commandment must needs own it to be a Sabbath because instituted and appointed by and under that name Exod. 20.8 Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy and v. 11. The Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it That it was necessary I should prove there is a Sabbath yet in being and that the day which men ought weekly to observe as holy to the Lord thoroughout all Ages is called the Sabbath to the end I might shew that the Promises made and incouragements given to such as have kept or shall keep holy the Sabbath day are not insignificant and out of date as to us who live under the New Testament Having done that it will be easie to prove what I have affirmed in the Title of this Chapter viz. that a strict observation of the Sabbath for so is the Lords day to Christians would greatly promote the building of the City witness that pregnant promise which of its self were a sufficient testimony Isa 58.12 13. And they that shall be of thee shall build the wast places thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations and thou shalt be called the repairer of the breach and restorer of paths to dwell in If thou turn away thy foot from my Sabbath from doing thy pleasure on my holy day and call the Sabbath a delight the holy of the Lord honourable and shalt honour him not doing thine own wayes nor finding thine own pleasure nor speaking thine own words v. 14. I will cause thee to ride
of the loyns of those few persons that did remain of the old Who knows but that God may have pleaded all that controversie which as yet he meaneth to plead with us in and by the burning of that one City The destroying of Cities and the not suffering of them to be restored is no other then continued destruction as they say of Conservation that it is continued Creation is not work that God doth do every day it is his act indeed but his strange act he is usually long about it and as it were deliberating with himself as when he said of old How shall I give thee up O Ephraim c. True it is that sin had overspread the City like a Leprosie and like that disease gotten into the very walls of the several houses thereof but when the walls of the most leprous house were once pulled down or the house its self demolished as this poor City hath been there was an end nor do I any where find that it was forbidden or spoken of as dangerous to build another house in the same place or upon the same ground Levit. 14.45 Let men charge what they can upon the late City as some in spight do charge upon it what it never deserved what is now in hand is not that City nor shall it ever partake of its plagues and punishments unless it be afresh polluted with its sins or some others as great That God was pleased to spare a remnant of the City of London that it might not be like to Sodom and Gomorrah in point of total destruction for the present is to me a further argument of hope that it shall not be like those places in point of perpetual desolation for the future that it shall not suffer the vengeance of eternal fire in such sense as that phrase is applyed to the places themselves meaning they should alwayes lye in ashes God having spared eight and no more of mankind when he brought the Deluge and but seven of any other kind of Creature reared up a new World out of that small remainder of the old which he had reserved as a seed for that purpose which it is like to Noah and his Family was also a pledge that God intended so to do Methinks London ever since the Fire hath been like a person frighted into a swoun whose vital spirits are for the present concentrated and contracted into a narrower room as are the Inhabitants of that Relique of a City at this day and if it be but so why should we dispair but it will come to its self again or shall I compare it to one that hath a dead Palsie who hath sense and motion in some parts of his body though he have little or none in the rest The remainder of the old City as small as it is doth not a little facilitate and incourage the building of that part that must be new according to the old saying Facile est inventis addere it is easie to add Give me said Archimedes but where to set my foot in the mean time and I will turn the World round Londoners by virtue of that remainder of a City have where to set their foot which is no small advantage I cannot but reflect upon that passage Isa 65.8 Thus saith the Lord as the new Wine is found in the Cluster and one saith destroy it not for a blessing is in it so will I do for my servants sake that I may not destroy them all The meaning seemeth to be this as when a Vine is grown so barren that scarce any good Cluster of Grapes seemeth to be discerned on it whereby it may be deemed to have life in it and the Husbandman is above to cut it down if one chance to espy some one cluster that hath Grapes with liquor in them whereby it may appear there is life yet he may thereby be induced to forbear the utter rooting out or hewing down of it being told there is a blessing in it that is to say some life and sap giving hope of its recovery and growing fruitful again This is the case of London at this day though the greatest part of it be withered and burnt up yet there is some new Wine found in a Cluster so that one may say there is a blessing in it and may hope from thence that God will not destroy it but will say concerning it as of Jacob v. 9. I will bring forth a seed out of Jacob that is those who shall be as seed which though small is apt to grow numerous and great Neither is it less pertinent to this occasion to allude it to that Prophesie of David concerning Solomon and his Kingdome Psa 72.16 There shall be a handful of corn in the earth upon the top of the Mountains the fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon and they of the City shall flourish like grass of the earth Say London be at the present but as a handful of Corn in the top of a barren Mountain whereas it is rather as so much Corn in a fruitful Valley yet may it hereafter by the blessing of God come to shake like Lebanon and flourish like the grass of the earth Is London the first City that ever was burnt and built again I rather think that most of the famous Cities in the world that were of antient foundation have passed thorough the fire first or last it may be more then once and Phoenix-like have been raised out of their ashes The Scripture tells us of the burning of Jerusalem by the King of Babylon besides the captivity of the people and yet in that self-same place was there so goodly a City and Temple in our Saviours time as did move his Disciples to admiration He that shall but glance upon History may furnish himself with instances enough of that nature nor will I so far prejudge my Reader as to enumerate them seeming thereby to think him ignorant of a thing so obvious Who knows not that London its self hath been burnt several times formerly as in my Treatise of the burning of London I have shewed and yet how Noble a City was it before it was burnt the last time viz. in 1666. One while it lay in ashes above 80 years and by that time one would have thought it should have been buried in perpetual filence and forgetfulness and some other place have been unalterably possessed of the preheminence but after that in all likelihood it was a body not only dead but rotten the very bones and ashes whereof are scare to be found yet did it lift up its head again and became greater then ever as it lately was Now what Maxime in Logick more evident then this A fuisse ad posse valet consequentia What hath been may be again God hath raised London out of the dust several times he is raising it and let us trust in him that he will in due time compleatly raise it again I have charity and respect enough for
multitudes of Instances This practice of theirs is one of the names of Blasphemy written in their foreheads and by such means as these they go beyond us But the mony which is given upon the two last accounts is certainly the result and product not of real bounty but of woful blindness and ignorance That which is such a kind of cheat in the receivers can hardly be called charity in the givers Then may we draw to this conclusion Papists have waies to cheat men of their mony which Protestants have not yet scorn to use but Papists have no Arguments truely deduced either from Scripture or sound reason wherewith to invite men to works of charity that Protestants have not and they alone well used and mannaged are and will be sufficient If Papists will take upon them to be wiser than God and to teach him who is only wise how to furnish the World with better motives to charity and good works than ever yet he hath done so will not Protestants It were better London should continue in ashes than have its foundation laid in such Blasphemous Impostures but that it need not do neither for want of Scriptural Arguments mighty through God to pull down the strong holds of mens unmercifulness and to bring into captivity every thought which exalteth it self against obedience thereunto We that are Protestants can tell men according to our Principles that the least work of true charity shall have a great reward that the reward of persons truely charitable shall be no less than eternal life that every such work shall follow good men when they dye and add to the weight of their Crown of Glory We can tell rich men that if they will not make to themselves friends of the unrighteous Mammon they shall not be received into everlasting habitations of glory that if they shut up their bowels against poor Lazaruses they shall fare no better than Dives did who denied his crumbs of bread and was himself denied a drop of water We can freely tell every man that it is as possible for him to get to Heaven without faith as without charity and as impossible for him to be saved without charity as without faith Then I appeal to every mans reason whether it be not an act of charity and piety to help up with this poor City and particularly with the Hospitals and Churches thereto belonging Though our Religion be by Papists reproached as Hannah was by Peninnah with barrenness namely in reference to good works it may hereafter come and I hope it will to sing as Hannah did in 1 Sam. 2.5 The barren hath born seven and she that hath many Children is waxed feeble DISCOURSE XV. Upon the looks and prospect of London whilst but some few houses are built here and there and others but building in the midst of many ruinous heaps O London what is thy present hue how many other things art thou like unto at this day but how unlike thy self unlike what thou wert yea unlike what thou art if we compare one part with another Mulier formosa supernè desinit in piscem what a motley linsey woolsey exchequered thing art thou at this day One while methinks thou lookest like a forrest in which are some tall trees some shrubs some meer stumps otherwhere all pluckt up by the roots or may I not liken thee to an old orchard in which are some trees that have ripe fruit upon them other have but buds others but meer blossoms but the greater part are dead and withered nor dost thou less resemble a great common field in which some early corn is at full growth elsewhere that which was latter sown hath yet but peept out of the ground and very many acres up and down lie quite fallow We read of the waters of the sanctuary how that some of them were but to the ancles others to the knees others up to the loins Ezek. 47.4 That it may be was successively but this all at once Thus in a family where are many children ordinarily there are some at the estate of men and women some boyes and girles some infants and some one or more that are yet but in the mothers womb Is London a village that I see the houses in it stand so scatteringly and at so great a distance one from another scarce enough together to make that number which is said to make a conventicle 1. Having been degraded for a while must it commence a village before it commence a City As in a through-fare village standing upon a great road most houses are Inns or Alehouses to entertain strangers so may we observe that the major part of houses built upon the ruines are let out to Alehouse-keepers and Victuallers to entertain workmen imployed about the City How easily doth the present condition of London bring France to mind where a middle sort of people are scarce to be found but all are said to be either Princes as it were or Peasants Gentlemen or slaves Our stately-houses may serve for an emblem of the former our ruinous heaps of the latter or one may represent the flourishing papists in that Country and the other the oppressed Hugonites they and their Churches lying together in ashes Would I give scope to phantasy I could adde that London now looks like Euclids Elements or some such books in which are all sorts of schemes and figures as straight lines crooked lines triangles quadrangles hexangles and what not or like a book of Anatomy full of cuts representing in one page the shape of a head in another of an arm in a third of a legg c. So in one place there is as it were the head or beginning of a street in another place the feet or end thereof by its self elsewhere the arm or breast or belly of a street the middle I mean standing all alone A goodly uniformity there is in so much of it as is built together but ruines and confusion round about it which represents it like a beautiful face stuck with black patches which is very lovely so far as it is seen but all the rest is ugliness and deformity manifest pride and concealed beauty Neither is London at this day unlike the month of April in which I am writing this consisting of quick vicissitudes of rain and sunshine one part of the Heavens smiling another frowning and lowring So one part of the street smiles upon us almost throughout the ruines but the rest of it frowneth and looks ghastly If we compare it to one that is rising out of his sepulchre it must be to one that hath his grave cloaths about him for so hath London But when all is said London at this day represents nothing more then our own divisions together with the ill effects and consequences thereof For first of all is it not unquoth and dolesome to live in houses that stand at such a distance one fom another Some of them like a cottage in a garden of cucumbers
nearer for having conceived and bred with much sickness and sorrow if she cannot go out half her time can she rejoyce in the untimely fruit of her womb such a thing is London if you now break off What discouraged by the burning of one house The Israelites when by Gods command they went to fight against the Benjamites were twice defeated and lost two and twenty thousand men the first and eighteen thousand the second time Judg. 20.21 25. and yet they went up the third time and prospered v. 30. God would teach us an humble dependance upon himself by some rebukes at first when yet he hath kind intentions towards us afterwards I hear the Gentleman whose house was burnt is building it again as fast as he can and he is to be commended for it If the daughters of Sarah be not afraid of any amazement as it is 1 Pet. 3.6 Why should they who profess themselves the sons of Abraham He hath been twice burnt out you but once why should you be more afraid to build the second time than he to build the third God grant him success answerable to his courage and others a courage as good as his Men so resolved would make those weary of burning who think to make them weary of building Who would comply with the design of an enemy and gratifie him at the first dash So do they who are so far discouraged by the burning of that one house as to desist from building or from the thoughts of it for they give them what they desire whom they presume to have kindled that fire for no other end but to discourage those who had an intent to build A wise man will not seem to be moved at those things which are done or spoken on purpose to make him angry as knowing he shall vex his enemy if he can make him think that he is not vexed by him Mical put an edge upon David when she thought to make him leave dancing before the Ark by scoffing at him as if he made himself vile causing him to answer her 2 Sam. 6.22 I will be yet â—ore vile than thus c. It were better for us to resolve that for every house they burn we will build two God permitting than that we will build no more If there be incendiaries that burn houses on purpose ten to one but they will be taken naping and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as they say one time or other and when the actors are discovered the snare will be broken and we for the future delivered If London were once up again being built as now it is with brick c. It would not be so easy to burn it as it was before though God could melt it down if it were all of solid Gold I say in an ordinary way a general conflagration would be with much more difficulty and as for particular burnings men did always venture them and build as chearfully as if they had been liable to no such thing The excellent way of blowing up houses little confided in but rather dreaded before having gotten into use and credit since the burning of London is I am perswaded a great discouragement to the masters of powder plots from making any more attempts of that nature with hope of a general success so that if they still design our destruction they will take some other course in reference to which either to build or not to build may be all a case I mean to which neither building will expose us nor yet forbearing to build will from thence exempt us Not to rebuild London for fear of enemies and their new attempts is no better pollicy than for an army that were routed to refuse to rally and come into order again though they could for fear of a fresh onset from the enemy whom they are in no capacity to withstand or to defend themselves unless they rally again and stand to order My humble advice upon the whole matter is this Be not terrified at a probable conjecture so as if it were an absolute certainty It is yet undemonstrated how that house came burnt though much feared and suspected to have been by treachery Bless God it went no farther Build not alone but get as many as you can to build near and about you Get up the whole City as fast as you can The more of it gets up the harder it will be to get it down Buds are not so easily destroyed as blossoms or ripe fruit as either of them DISCOURSE XLII That the due exercise of mercy and charity would promote the building of the City AS cruelty is a desolating sin Mat. 23.37 Your house is left unto you desolate said Christ to Jerusalem upon that account so mercy on the other hand is a building grace It was an act of mercy in the Egyptian midwives and that contrary to a command but a cruel one with respect to which we read that God built them houses viz. For saving those poor infants whom Pharoah had appointed them to drown One of the best ways to prevail with God for whatsoever mercy we desire for our selves whereof the building of London at this day is one is to shew mercy to others With the merciful thou wilt shew thy self merciful saith the Psalmist speaking of God Ps 18.25 We find a bundle of promises Ps 41.1 2 3. Made to him that confidereth the poor and amongst the rest these two viz. That God will deliver him in the time of trouble and that we shall be blessed upon the earth and that God will not deliver him to the will of his enemies It is yet a time of trouble with London it lieth still as upon â—â—e bed of sickness or languishing the will of its â—â—emies doubtless is that it should never be rebuilt Let it therefore be merciful to it self in being â—erciful to others that God may deliver it in the time of trouble strengthen it upon the bed of languishing and not deliver it into the will of his enemies It is one of Solomons proverbs That the merciful â—an doeth good to his own soul Prov. 1.17 meaning himself In being charitable to others we are most of all so to our selves One of the Psalmists characters of a good man is He is ever merciful and â—â—ndeth Ps 37.26 his counsel is Depart from evil â—nd do good that is be merciful v. 27. the inâ—ouragement followeth and dwell for evermore Christ his counsel is Make to your selves friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness that when ye fail they may â—â—ceive you into everlasting habitations Luk. 16.9 and â—hall they want temporal habitations who make to â—emselves friends of that Mammon But where is mercy and charity to be found may we not cry out with the Psalmist Ps 12.1 Help Lord for the merciful man ceaseth for so the word chasid translated godly doth signifie May we not say as the Prophet of old The Lord hath a conâ—â—oversy with the land because there is no mercy in the â—and
tenderness others with too much neglect and hardship the latter of these will certainly envy the former as Joseph's brethren envied him because his Father had made him a parti-coloured coat which he had done for none of the rest especially if parents do respect those children most which seem to deserve least it will create a world of envy witness that passage of the prodigals brother who when he saw how his broster was treated beyond what himself had ever been said to his Father Loe these many years do I serve thee neither transgressed I at any time thy commandments and yet thou never gavest me a Kid that I might make merry with my friends Luk. 15.29 Brethren and sisters must not be suffered to father odious and invidious names upon one another least thereby they be exposed to each others hatred We read of Josephs brethren that They said one to another behold this dreamer or master of dreams cometh Gen. 37.19 and the next words are Come now therefore and let us slay him and cast him into the pit It was not for nothing that Christ was pleased to say Whosoever shall say to his brother Raca shall be in danger of the councel but whosoever shall say thou fool shall be in danger of Hell fire Mat. 5.22 Our Saviour well knowing the provoking nature of disgraceful names Brethren must not be suffered to put ensnaring questions to one another like that riddle which Sampson put to the Philistines merely to insnare and take an occasion against them Judg. 14.12 And Sampson said I will now put forth a riddle if ye cannot declare it me ye shall give me thirty sheets and thirty chang of garments but what came of it see v. 15. It came to pass on the seventh day that they said unto Sampsons wife entice thy husband that he may declare unto us the riddle least we burn thee and thy Fathers house with fire have ye called us to take what we have is it not so What did it end in but wrangling when they saw themselves insnared Therefore I say parents must not suffer their children to pore and puzzle one another with hard and unnecessary questions to ingage one another in intricate disputes upon great penalties to the loosing side for certain it is that will end in quarrelling and that quarrelling in hatred and detestation Parents must not put their children upon doing ill offices one to another though they are such as are necessary to be done by some other hand for that will make them hate one another What wise Father if he had a Sergant to his son would imploy him to arrest his own brother though for ever so great and just a debt as knowing it would be worse taken from him than from a stranger and that it is an office ill taken from whomsoever doth it How angry were Davids brethren with him when they did but suspect him to have come towards them in the nature of a spy It would be unseemly for one brother to be made to scourg another whatsoever his fault were a Father would not be hated for doing it himself upon a just occasion but so would a brother Parents must not incourage their children to complain of one another and to tell tales of one another unless the fault committed be manifest and considerable It is said that Joseph brought to his father their evil report viz. The evil report of his brethren with whom he fed sheep but did he not lose their love by so doing is it not probable that was one reason for which they hated him viz. for that they lookt upon him as a tell-tale and an informer which sort of people are always odious especially where the thing informed against is not universally odious and therefore saving in great cases had need to be taken up by none but those whose office it is and they had need be well paid for it Greatly discountenance that hatred and disaffection which doth at any time discover it self in brethren or sisters one against another and let them see you cannot bear it especially if you discern one to hate another for that for which they should love them viz. for their goodness for being better than themselves The spirit of Cain is in too many families of whom we read that he was of that wicked one and slew his brother and wherefore slew be him because his own works were evil and his brothers righteous 1 John 3.12 There are that speak evil of others because they run not with them into the same excess of riot Let all superfluous occasions of wrangling be taken out of the way Saul adjured the people that when the Israelites were in pursuit of the Philistines that no body should eat any food that day till the evening now suppose that hundreds of the people being faint and weary had done as Jonathan did and thereupon Saul had caused the rest to have informed against them that had so done what a deal of hatred and heart-burning had that procured and how much better had it been that the people had never been so adjured Some humoursome schoolmasters have made such useless rules and orders for their schollars to observe as have procured nothing but perpetual trouble to themselves from the complaints of boies given to tell tales and hatred to those boies that were so given The like it may be have some parents done amongst their own children who afterwards have seen their errour If any differences arise amongst your children take notice of them interpose and compromise them presently least the wound of anger and dissension not taken in time should fester into hatred As soon as they begin to be foes make them friends again for as Solomon saith The beginning of strife is as when one letteth out water therefore leave of contention before it be medled with Clap down the slluce presently remembring that proverb Prov. 13.19 brother offended viz. so long as till he hath fortified himself in the Castle of his anger is harder to be moon than a strong City and their contentions are like the bars of a Castle Small heats and differences in the Church I mean that were such at first when no course hath been taken for reconciliation have in several ages broke out into a great flame which hath made woful havock How much more may a particular family be ruined by an unregarded difference which was but small at the first Lastly as you would not that your children should hate one another never suffer them to aveng themselves how much soever they be or think themselves to be wronged I say let them never be their own judges and avengers but submit themselves to the determination of their parents He upon whom wrong is taken for the present will seek to be revenged again of him that took it for though persons will acquiesce in the decision of a lawful judg as a Father is amongst his children yet they will never admit of him for a
were laid up I say consider them under that threefold notion and you will see no cause to wonder that so much care should be taken of those demolished Temples as to rebuild them of those lost members as to restore them and of those scattered ashes and dispersed dust as to gather them together again Most houses of note as publick Halls c. and wherein persons of considerable quality were concerned that were lately burnt down are like to be built again and the owners thereof do think that in point of honour they can do no less and shall not the Temples of God which are the bodies of his Saints I say shall not they be rebuilt is it not for the honour of the great God that it should be so I have shewed how much more glorious the new houses of the Saints I mean their new bodies will be than were their old ones oh then how glorious a City will the new Jerusalem that is Heaven be which shall consist of all such stately houses as the bodies of the Saints are designed to be even so glorious as the firmament would be if every Star therein were as big and as bright as is the Sun it self Mat. 13.43 Then shall the righteous shine â—orth as the Sun in the kingdom 〈…〉 fathe◠〈◊〉 I question whether at that time when Christ was transfigured before some of his Disciples his body did appear so glorious as it doth in Heaven and yet we read Mat. 17.2 That then his face did shine as the Sun and his raiment was white as the light The glory of the body of Christ in Heaven may be more than that which is there described if cannot be less and what saith the Scripture 1 John 3.2 When he shall appear we shall be like him and our vile bodies fashioned like his glorious body Who would be able to know the bodies and visages of those Saints that he shall meet in Heaven or any one of them unless it shall be revealed to him being so much changed for the better as then they will be Abraham will not of himself discern that that was the house in which Isaac dwelt or that the materials thereof are the same nor Isaac that his Father Abraham when upon the earth dwelt in that house I mean in that very body for doubtless for substance it will be the same Job 19.27 whom mine eyes shall behold and not another which will then appear as much more magnificent than it was in the world as is the pallace of a Prince than the cottage of a poor peasant We know what manner of house Lazarus dwelt in when he was in the world so patcht so leprous that I had almost said the very dogs began to pity him of whom it is said that they lickt his sores yet that despicable house of his will at the Resurrection be metamorphosed into so stately a dwelling as would even dazle Dives or the rich mans eyes if he should have leave to behold it What matter is it if the souls of divers good men dwell but meanly and ill-favouredly in this world 〈◊〉 is 〈◊〉 â—andsom and deformed bodies â—ith 〈◊〉 they do 〈◊〉 sojourn as it were in teâ—â— and what if they be black as the tents of Kedar what 〈◊〉 the houses which they now live in be scarce wind-tide or water-tide will scarce keep them â—arm or dry What if the keepers of the house do â—remble and the strong men bow themselves What if the â—lver cord be loosened or the golden bowl be broken or the itcher be broken at the fountain or the wheel be broken â—t the cistern which are Solomons expressions to set forth bodily infirmities what if their present â—wellings be ever so homely siâ—h they are not their â—ome these their earthly tabernacles will soon be â—estroyed and when they come to be built again â—hey shall be as the pallaces of Princes fit for them who must live and raign with Christ for ever Had â—ur Soveraign then been sure to possesse hâ—s throne as now he doth it would but little have troubled â—m that he was forced to hide for a time in a holâ—ow tree since called the Royal Oak and as litâ—le should the inconvenient habitation of Christians â—ouble them I mean the weakness or uncomliâ—ess of their bodies for the present sith these â—ld houses of theirs shall quickly be pulled down â—nd the new ones which shall be provided for them â—t the Resurrection of the dead will be past all exâ—eptions I see no reason on the other hand why ungodly â—en and women should pride themselves in those lately houses in which their Souls do now dwell I mean in the amiableness and beautifulness of â—heir bodies sith those houses must shortly be â—abitations for worms where they will breed and â—ed and boord and dye and rot and be buried even â—n those fine bodies which they are now so proud â—f and when those houses come to be built again I mean those bodies to be raised from the dead then will they be in worse condition then ever that is eternally hanted and possessed by Devils worse than vermine for what less can those children of disobedience expect in whom Satan now ruleth It is a consideration which may greatly comfort good men that at the Resurrection they shall not only have better houses then ever they had before but those houses shall have far better inhabitants than they formerly had even the Souls of just men made perfect whereas their former houses were inhabited by the Souls though of just men yet full of imperfections It will then be their happiness to have Sanam mentem in corpore Sano Souls and bodies prospering both alike What troublesome houses are our present bodies which need repairing every day by meat and drink and every night by rest and sleep which are in continual danger of being thrown down by one means and by another but those new houses or bodies which believers shall enter into at the Resurrection will need no meats or drinks wherewith to repair them for then shall they be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is as the Angels of God Mat. 22.30 shall be obnoxious to no element whether fire or water or to any other creature shall be uncapable of being destroyed for they shall be raised incorruptible 1 Cor. 15.52 and Luk. 20.36 Neither can they dye any more How strange is it then that we should read of any which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world and that resurrection from the dead the state of the resurrection being so glorious as it is well may it be said they are children of God being the children of the resurrection for so the better resurrection is called the resurrection by way of eminency though besides the resurrection of life there is also a resurrection of condemnation John 5.29 Two extreams there are which may prejudice the Doctrine of the Resurrection One is a vein of allegorising every thing We read of some who