Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n
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A70902
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A sermon preached before the King and Queen at White-Hall, April XVI, 1690 being the fast-day / by ... Symon, Lord Bishop of Chichester.
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Patrick, Simon, 1626-1707.
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1690
(1690)
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Wing P849; ESTC R22929
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18,665
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44
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were such an Heart in them that they would fear me and keep my Commandments always that it might be well with them c. Where he speaks as if it were not in his own Power to bless them unless they would fear and obey him always because God cannot do that at all which he cannot do consistently with his Wisdom Justice and Honour And however Divine Providence may please to order things in those Nations who are not so nearly related to him yet we cannot but think he will deal with us Christians who are now become what they were his peculiar People by the very same Measures he dealt with them that is Bless us or Curse us according as we observe or break his Holy Laws But I see no reason to question his making this distinction even among Infidels who know not the Laws of Jesus Christ if we may judge of what he doth now by what he did in ancient times When the Heathens themselves observed this difference as appears by the Writers of the Roman Story who take notice that while they were strict observers of the Law of Nations and continued Religious frugal industrious sober and moderate as they were in their beginning God's Blessing rested upon them and they prospered wonderfully whithersoever they went But when they grew impious luxurious broke their Faith abounded with all manner of Vice they soon dwindled grew weak and lost their large Dominions they had in the World And had they been at the first rise of their Empire as vain as the Greeks to use the Words of a great Divine of our own in the days before us Dr. Jackson as Luxurious as the Asiaticks as Perfidious as the Carthaginians as uncivil and Barbarous as many other Nations whom they conquer'd they could not have been so constantly fortunate in their Enterprizes at home and abroad as they were for many years God indeed is a debter to no body but such is his Bounty such his love to Righteousness of whatsoever sort it be That he will not suffer moral Vertue civil Justice Honesty and Truth and constant execution of Laws which in their kind and degree are good to be wholly unrewarded But by such means any Nation in the World may be exalted above those who are otherways disposed How much more then may Christian People expect this Favour from the Lord in the faithful observance of his holy Laws Did true Righteousness for instance prevail in this Christian Kingdom what an happy People might we be As happy as we have made our selves notorious to all the World for the Punishments God hath inflicted on us What were the late Civil Wars and the woful Effects of them but the Calamities which God sent upon a sinful People for our disobedience to him And since the wonderful Restoration of the Royal Family and the Monarchy What were the Pestilence the Fire and other Judgments which presently ensued but tokens of God's continued displeasure against us for our abuse of his loving-kindness We rioted upon his Mercies We waxed fat and kicked against him we abandon'd our selves to Lust Pride and Idleness and to all manner of Debauchery nay to Irreligion Atheism and Infidelity for which cause those heavy Calamities fell upon us And what was the effect of them After we had felt the smart of so many terrible Judgments we fell into such implacable Animosities and deadly Hatreds one against another that we drew upon our selves the greatest Plague of all that of Popery Which had set up its Chappels Schools and Convents among us and had not God's Mercy prevented by our late marvellous Deliverance would have brought in those Whipps and Gibbets and Racks and Fires and other Instruments of Crueity wherewith we have seen it torturing the Bodies and Souls of innumerable good Men and Women in France and in other places And shall we still adventure to continue an unreformed Nation because God hath spared us from utter ruine After all this is come upon us for our evil Deeds as Ezra speaks and for our great Trespass and after he hath given us such a Deliverance as this which we have lately received shall we again break his Commandments What a strange thing will it be not to believe our own Experience though we would not believe God's Holy Word Which now one would think should have greater credit with us when we have seen it so fully verified in our selves that Sin is a reproach to any People Which in reason should move us to try the Truth of the other part of my Text of which I have now treated and by working Righteousness satisfy our selves how it will exalt us As I have proved it will not only by its own natural Consequences there being no Vertue which tends not to greaten a Nation that lives in the practice of it but by the special Blessing of the Almighty whose Method this is which he constantly observes to bless the righteous and compass him with his favour as with a shield Hear this Wise-man once more Prov. x. 29. The way of the Lord is strength to the upright but destruction shall be to the workers of iniquity The way of the Lord that is this is the divine Method to give strength and power to upright men or the very observance of the Rules of vertue which may be meant here by the way of the Lord the keeping close to God's Laws and walking in his ways inspires the Upright with courage and resolution when any evil threatens them but the workers of iniquity are seeble and poor spirited and shall be broken in pieces by that destruction which is coming upon them His Father gives the reason of it Psal xii ult The righteous Lord loveth righteousness his countenance doth behold the upright Let us love righteousness then that we may be beloved of the Lord. And if we have any Authority let upright men have our countenance and favour as the glory and strength of the Nation the Chariots and Horse-men for the safegard of their Countrey that the righteous Lord may countenance us in all our ways and proceedings and we may find him propitious to us on all occasions That 's the use we ought to make of what hath been said 1. First Let every one of us being convinced of these Truths and seriously reflecting on them resolve to consult the safety and happiness of the Kingdom of which we are Members by betaking our selves hereafter to a religious course of life in all holiness and righteousness all our days Let us begin it this day by making it a day not only of humiliation but of serious and unfeigned repentance Let it conclude in solemn Resolutions of amendment of life That as by Wickedness this Nation hath been laid low and made despicable in the eyes of all our Neighbours who neither loved nor feared us because we had forsaken both our own and their true Interest so we may raise the Reputation of it and make it great eminent