reformation but we should begin it at the right end our own wicked hearts and lives and not at the Heads of our Superiors to complain that the days are evil with a design by such complaints to make them worse to search after remote and secret causes and overlook those that are so near and obvious in our own bosoms and with the Harlot in Solomon having overlayed her own child to accuse a tender mother 1 Kings 3.20 and seek to deprive her of her living child is a subtle design but such as could not stand the Test of Solomon and a greater than Solomon will judge such men It was observed by the Royal Martyr that whoever intended to bring forth confusion in a Church or State have used the Midwifry of complaints and tumults By this Artifice Absalom stole the hearts of the people from his Father David See thy cause is right but there is no man deputed of the King to do thee justice 2 Sam. 13.3 when the design was O that I were judge in Israel And to facilitate his design he remembreth his Vow at Hebron that under pretence of Piety to God he might strengthen his party and the more impunely cast off his obedience to his Father By the like art Jeroboam had stoln the hearts of Solomon's Subjects and made a great part of Israel to sin with him For though the foundations of Solomons Government were such as might have made all Israel as firm as Mount Sion which could not be moved though in his days there was a confluence of all those blessings whereof one or two might have made another Nation happy yet by their whining murmurings and restless complaints of heavy yoaks and approaching Idolatry of the hainous sins and imminent dangers of the Nation they did tantum non fail but a little of subverting the whole frame of the best established Government in the world But Solomon had a jealous ear which heard all these things and was assisted with more than humane prudence and power to suppress them He crusheth this Cockatrice in the Egg and discovers the folly and impiety of it Thou dost not inquire wisely c. which brings us to the last part of the Text non ex sapientiâ Witty men there might be among such ingeniosi in malum publicum but they were neither wise nor good men in the sence of Solomon For whether by wisdom we understand moral prudence or as most Expositors true piety and the fear of God they who thus causlesly murmured against the King had neither they acted both against Reason and Religion First against Reason For what is more irrational than solicitously to enquire after the causes of those things that are not They might as well ask why the Sun had lost its light or the foundations of the earth were removed which were as true as that the former days were better than those of Solomon which will appear by a short view of the Church and State of Israel in the days of Solomon For 1. In riches and wisdom Solomon exceeded all the Kings of the earth that were before him 1 Kings 10.27 The Vessels and Utensils of Gods House as well as the Kings were of beaten Gold for Gold was as common as silver and silver as the stones in the streets of Jerusalem 1 Kings 9.28 And his Royal Navy commanded the Trade of the world and kept his Exchequer always full and running over bringing home 666 Talents of Gold at a time besides the rich merchandize from Tyre and Egypt There was also a general peace to injoy this great plenty for Solomon was in this a Type of Christ there was neither adversary nor evil occurrence 1 Kings 4. but all Judah and Israel which made a prey of each other in the days of David were united and dwelt safely every man under his own Vine and under his own fig-tree from Dan to Beersheba there was a general and perpetual peace all the dayes of Solomon ver 25. Which peace was the more admirable because that though Adonijah had usurped the Kingdom and strengthned himself by the heads of divers factions Joab among the souldiers and Abiathar among the Priests and Shimei chief of the Benjamites yet was he setled on his Fathers Throne without shedding of bloud or any opposition His League also with Hiram deserves a remark being a friend to the True Religion and the most potent and skilful in Sea-affairs But what is especially to be noted is that all these blessings were confirmed to him by a promise from God for his father Davids sake 1 Kings 11.12 2. His clemency did adorn his peace for he pardoned such offenders as could obtain pardon from themselves Adonijah that had usurped the Kingdom and Joab that had barbarously slain Abner and Amasa Captains of his Fathers Host and Abiathar a revolted Priest that had strengthned the hands of the Usurper and Shimei also who having got the upper ground of David spit his venome in his Royal face reviling him maledictione forti with all the virulence he could 2 Sam. 16.7 Yet 3. His clemency was seasoned with justice which was inflicted on incorrigible offenders without respect of persons high and low natives and strangers particularly on Shimei for that horrid fact on the person of his father whom he commanded to be slain by the hand of Benaiah and the kingdom was thereby established in the hand of Solomon 4. His Maximes of Government were of infallible and eternal verity such as these Mercy and truth preserve the King and by righteousness shall his throne be established Pro. 20.28 It is the honour of a King to search out a matter Pro. 25.2 In the multitude of Counsellors there is peace But where no counsel is the people fall 11.14 Righteousness exalteth a Nation but sin is a reproach to any people Pro. 14.34 And his men were suited to his Maxims men of gravity and experience of prudence piety and moderation such as would have secured the Crown to Rehoboam had he not rejected them and inclined to greener heads that were brought up with him All these blessings he dispensed with great wisdom having a heart as capacious as the sand on the Sea-shore Which wisdom he acquired partly by giving his heart to it but it was perfected by the gift of God This made his face to shine so as he attracted the admiration of all the Kings of the Earth and the Queen of the South came from far to be an Ear witness of it and envyed the happiness of his Subjects This wisdom he demonstrated to be better than strength by suppressing strife and contention in the first rise of it He carefully observed all the motions of the people and neglected not in times of peace to make provision for war He had many fortified Cities and 40000 stalls for the horses of his Chariots and 40000 horse and his people were as the sand as for number Notwithstanding all this preparation of Chariots
Ark of God setled in the beauty of holiness could say with Mephibosheth Let them take all for as much as my Lord the King is come to his house in peace 2 Sam. 19.30 and were found faithful and peaceable in the Land They were the murmurers who as Ziba Sauls servant had made themselves great with the spoils of the Crown and Church lands but were made to refund a part of it Though they still enjoyed not only the publick blessings of peace and plenty and a rich trade and were received not only to mercy but into favour and did partake of the Wealthy and Honourable Offices of the Nation equally if not beyond those that had better deserved them did yet think themselves not duly rewarded as in truth they were not and on all occasions reproached the footsteps of Gods anointed and did not only turn their backs on the Ordinances of the King but lift up their heels against the Ordinances of God also 6. It is unreasonable to murmur and repine at those things in others which they practised and allowed in themselves They complained that Solomon chastised them with Rods when they wounded him with Scorpions They accused him for endeavouring to rule by an Arbitrary power though he governed himself according to the known Laws of God and the Nation and often relaxed the severity and suspended the execution of them while they lived in a bold contempt and violation of them all Great cries were raised against the Oath of God and the King and against Uniformity to the Temple Worship when they thought they were all ingaged by Jeroboams Covenant to bring all within the Kings Dominions to an Uniformity according to his Directory for Worship A Toleration was thought intolerable when Jeroboam had set up his Calves and he himself burnt Incense and made Priests of the lowest of the people lest the Kingdom should return to the house of David for the true worship of God would reduce them to obedience to their lawful King 1 Kings 12.26 2 Kings 12.28 But under the Temple service a Toleration is pleaded for as necessary for the ease and liberty of the people and if it be denyed they complain of Tyranny and Persecution when by this means Jeroboam and a few dissenters under him deluded the people and making them believe that he and his Calves were the Gods that brought them out of Fgypt ver 28. led them directly thither and betrayed them to that abominable Idolatry So that in truth the Indulgence which was granted them did produce more mischief than all the punishments inflicted by Solomon which they causlesly called persecution Wherefore thou art inexcusable O man whoever thou art that judgest for wherein thou judgest another thou condemnest thy self seeing thou dost the same or worse things And though thou escape the judgment of man yet think not that thou shalt escape the judgment of God Rom. 2.1 3. 7. What is more unreasonable than for men to take occasion to grow more troublesome from those things which should quiet them as discontented spirits are wont to do Let favour be shewed to the wicked and he is the more bold and presumptuous They turn the grace of God and the King too into wantonness Every indulgence as to froward children makes them more pettish and insolent every concession and yielding is used as a step for them to ascend higher and press forward until they get uppermost The craving humor increaseth by being fed and with Solomons horse-leech thy cry Give Give though they have swallowed so much that they are ready to burst Never was any thing in the world so well established but there were some envious men that found fault with it Lastly It is irrational because it is an incurable evil It is opprobrium medicorum such a plague of the heart as the best State Physicians have not been able to cure It will not admit a plaister or a medicine to be applied to it This evil spirit though it be not dumb yet is it so deaf that it will not hear the voice of any Charmer though he charm never so wisely Neither the mercies nor judgments of God nor the meekness nor miracles of Moses could convince the murmuring Israelites And when some of them saw Corah and his company swallowed up of the earth yet as if there had been a transmigration of their Souls into their Survivors the next morning they murmur again saying Ye have slain the people of the Lord. The worst sort of Spirits that we read of might be cast out by Prayer and Fasting but this kind can fast and pray and seemingly reform and sweep and garnish the house and then admit seven worse than it self and at the end is worse than in the beginning The Scripture compares this murmuring and rebellious spirit to the sin of Witchcraft which is seldom reclaimed to a pious or sober temper for like men in a Consumption they seem pleased with the disease and as Jonah they think they do well to be angry with God himself which is the next particular it is not only irrational but irreligious First because these men make lyes their refuge and seek to hide their sin under false pretences for it were easie to prove that no times before Solomon were so prosperous as his Though David his Father was a man after Gods own heart yet neither he nor the Ark of God could find a resting place It was yet worse in the days of Saul between whom and the house of David there was continual war and before that in the days of Samuel when God himself was their King we find that they rejected not Samuel only but God himself And in the times of Anarchy when there was no King in Israel there was no peace to him that went out or to him that came in but every man did what seemed good in his own eyes Before this how long did God bear with the murmuring Israelites not in the wilderness only under Moses the meekest man upon Earth and Aaron the Saint of the Lord but in Canaan against God himself And from the beginning Cain slew Abel and so it will be to the end of the world So that it was a false pretence that the former days were better than Solomons 2. It was irreligious because Religion teacheth us with all thankfulness to acknowledge the blessings of God and to say with Jacob I am less than the least of all thy mercies and not to undervalue them and expostulate with God why am I thus and what is the cause as if the Almighty had not rewarded us according to our deserts or ought to do nothing but what our reason approves of They ought to have considered how happy they might have been under such a King the Son of such a Father upon whom God had set such Signatures of his own wisdom Clemency and justice whom God made his Jedidiah from his birth and appeared more than once or twice in
many wonderful deliverances of him against the Conspiracies of Jeroboam the discontents of Joab Abiathar and Shimei who went to Gath to confer with fugitives and imbroil the kingdom again If we read of Solomons faults we read of his repentance also this Book of Eccles being a record of his Penitentials So that indeed the greatest cause of Evil in his later days was the libertinism of some who like sons of Belial would indure no yoak nor were satisfied till they had got an Indulgence and were more unsatisfied after they had it How much better had it been for them while the true Religion and publick peace were in safety to have been humble and thankful to God and the King to reform their own iniquities and to mourn in secret for the Vanities of the Court 3. If Solomons days had been as bad as the sins of these men deserved yet were it a point of piety to submit to the mighty hand of God and bear his indignation This was Solomons prescript approved by God himself 2 Chron. 6.24 c. If the people flee before their enemies if there be famine or pestilence What is to be done surely not as they did in the Prophet Jer. 8.20 who did fret themselves and curse God and the King and look upward as if they would be revenged on all that were above them but every man should search out the plague of his own heart and repent and make his supplication in Gods house saying I have sinned and done perversly and committed iniquity and then God promised to hear their prayers to forgive their sins and heal their land Thus did King David in his distress he saw the hand of God in it and opened not his mouth because it was the Lords doing Ps 9.39 and with this God quieted the men of Judah and Benjamin in the case of Jeroboam This thing is from me 1 Kings 12.24 And though they did not think so of King Solomon yet they ought to think that God was wise enough to dispose of all things for the good of his Church and people God and his Vicegerents have their Arcana imperii not to be rashly censured or curiously inquired into We should do our duty and leave the conduct of publick affairs to God whose Providence over-rules all and it is much better that things should be as God would have them than as we would for he acts all towards wise and gracious ends to which though humane actions like the lower Spheres have a contrary tendency of their own yet the first mover makes them all tend to his decrees who brings order out of Confusion and all whose ways are mercy and truth to them that keep his Covenant Non est judicandum de operibus Dei ante quintum actum we are short-sighted and cannot see to the end of Gods works which are begun in secret sometime carried on by contrary means by weak and divers agents but he knows how to bring light out of darkness and harmonyout of discord and all his providences shall end in Holiness and beauty too This is that which Solomon observed Eccles 3.11 God hath made every thing beautiful in its season when it comes to its perfection Some may think there is no necessity of Thunder and Lightning Storms and Tempests Frosts and Cold yet these contribute to the cleansing of the Air the health of our bodies and the fruitfulness of the year as much as calm and Sun-shine days In checker-work the variety of black and white adds to the beauty and some works of Providence like the China vessels are wrought and perfected in the bowels of the earth and require an age for their Perfection but then they come forth so transparent that every one that considers them may say This is the Lords doing and it is marvellous in our eyes 4. It is irreligious as being the ready way to destroy Religion and if that be ruined we may write Ichabod on all things else And this is not more easily destroyed than by our murmurings and contentions about it this Dove cannot fall but by a dart feathered from her own wing The little Foxes within that undermine the Hedge of Discipline make way for the wild Boar to break in and root up our pleasant Vines 'T is our crumbling into little factions under pretence of Religion that exposeth us to the enemies of it If the dangers we fear could but make us unite our Union would make us safe against all the attempts of our common adversaries 5. It is a tempting and provoking of God in a high degree to complain of those evils whose causes and remedies are in our own power But while we complain of them with our lips we draw them down with both our hands This is to do as the Jews who cryed out Venient Romani while they were Crucifying the Prince of Peace and so made way for those Roman Armies that brought a perpetual desolation on them If we only make an out-cry against Popery and instead of making up the breaches still inlarge them by quarrelling with such as are more ready and skilful to do it than our selves that Roman Eagle may make a prey of us all But if as God hath founded us upon a rock and compassed us about with his Salvation as with Walls and Bulworks we would be as Jerusalem a people at unity among our selves if as St. Paul adviseth we would do our duties to God and the King without murmurings and disputings those proud Waves that oppose themselves would be dasht in pieces as hitherto they have been and neither the gates of Rome nor of Hell prevail against us Lastly It is irreligious because it destroys the whole Analogy of Christian Faith it reflects on Gods Providence as if he wanted Wisdom or Goodness to Govern the world and sets their mouths against Heaven as that proud Alfonsus who said of the Creation that if he had been present he could have disposed of things in a better method It undermines the foundation of all Government in Church and State and Families if Inferiors should be allowed to question the Commands and Actions of their Superiors it makes those Christian graces of meekness patience and obedience which are injoyned towards evil Governours impossible It robs the Soul of that tranquillity and peace which it might have by resigning it self to God in well-doing The spirit of grace and peace will not enter into a discontented spirit God was not in the earthquake or the whirlwind but in the still voice 1 Kings 19.11 in the sedate and chearful Soul And therefore Moses calls the murmuring Israelites sinners against their own Souls i.e. against their peace and comforts of their life Numb 36.38 The Serpent will devour the Dove and these meager thoughts like Pharaohs lean kine eat up better thoughts and affections To a murmuring Soul wisdom will not enter And in a word it would make the Christian Religion to stink among the heathen and therefore thou dost not wisely to inquire after such things I have now finished my Discourse on the Text and if my hearers will but apply the things spoken of Solomons Kingdom to our own as every ordinary capacity may do there needs no other Application I shall end therefore as I begun Ne dicas Say not thou a confederacy to them that say a confederacy to thee be not allured by their promises nor affrighted by their threats for their feet are swift to shed bloud destruction and misery are in their ways the way of peace they have not known and there is no fear of God before their eyes Learn we of the men of Isachar in Davids days who had under standing of the times to know what Israel ought to do 1 Chron. 12.32 Penes vos est rcrum Arbitrium nobis relicta est obsequii Gloria Fear God and Honour the King and meddle not with them that are given to change but leave the Administration of publick affairs and the care of Succession of Crowns and Kingdoms to God and our Superiors who are more concerned in them and will provide better for them than we can do Let us set bounds to our Passions by Reason to our Fears and jealousies by Religion to our Errors by Truth to our Schism by Charity and an unanimous consent in the Worship of God and to our Murmurings by a cheerful improvement of the blessings we enjoy that the voice of the Turtle may be heard in our Land even Praises to our God for the wonderful mercies of This day and for the continuance of them Prayers for our King in the words of Solomons Subjects 1 Kings 8.66 The Lord make the name of Solomon better than the name of David and his Throne greater than the throne of David and they went to their tents joyful and glad of heart for all the goodness that God had done for Solomon his servant and for Israel his people Amen THE END