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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A92852	England's preservation or, a sermon discovering the onely way to prevent destroying judgements: preached to the Honourable House of Commons at their last solemne fast, being on May, 25. 1642. By Obadiah Sedgwicke Batchelour in Divinity and minister of Coggeshall in Essex. Published by order of that house.	Sedgwick, Obadiah, 1600?-1658.; England and Wales. Parliament. House of Commons.	1642 (1642)	Wing S2372; Thomason E150_22; ESTC R212706	31,012	58

naught and good for no service It is bettter to cut it downe to the Roote then to hire men many dayes to out off the limbes There are three great mischiefes in all circumstantiall and slight acts One is The greatest causes of wrath are not met with Note A second is in a short time all the plashed evills will by a new influence from their rootes sprout up againe And the third is That when these evils once feele their strength and regaine their opportunity they will become more evill and mischievous then ever Histories and experiences witnesse enough of this Popery was hot in former Kings times but when it got out the bit by the death of Edward the sixth it burst out with more burnings and flaming cruelty in Queen Maries dayes 4. When they are only Coactive I meane such actings unto which there is little or no concurrence of a judicious and active will but are rather the sparkles which are forced out by the collision of flints elicited rather by the impressions of appearing and urging evills like Pharahos Obedience which was forced out of judgements and nothing else Marriners in a storme are very pious but then in a Calme turne as wicked as before the Iewes in their straites were as pliable as could bee desired they would part with any thing and do any thing for God but when the Sunne arose this vaine Cloud and dew were gone and scatterd If a Cloud of wrath bee it which puts us on to be and to do good a few beames Hosea 6. 4. of temporall safety will finde us flat and strangers againe The Acts of men doe spring sometimes from feare and sometimes from love those of feare may bee more strong and stirring for the present like a floud which runnes more violently then a River but those of love are most acceptable and constant voluntary acts though sometimes more slow yet are at all times more successefull Iohn in the Gospell ranne faster then Peter yet being at the Sepulcher Peter went farther then Iohn Iohn lookes downe but Peter goes downe an Arrow flies swifter and a man walkes slower yet a man may sooner walke to the marke then the Arrow can hit it Sirs No private or publike work of Reformation will come to good which is derived onely from a feare of evill and not from a love of good when the circumstances of evill are of the evill heart will shew it selfe evill again 5. When they are hypocriticall and vaine-glorious done by our selves and for our selves It is a strange thing to observe how the spirits of men are ballanced and mounted and keepe paralell with the ends which they propound unto themselves The Art and strength and length of our workings are ever moulded in our owne aimes and respects One man acts for God another acts for himselfe the workes of the one are blest and prosper the attempts of the other quickly languish and are blasted As vitious acts are under GODS curse so vaine-glorious acts are out of his blessing Sinceritie humble sinceritie is that which gives life findes acceptance and is crowned with successe If a man in his religious performances of praying and fasting and humbling of himselfe should seeke not God but himselfe as the Pharisees did his vaine glory would purchase onely the applause of men and rejection with God all his workes will bee lost and come to nothing Verily you have your reward said Christ a poore reward to have breath for breath And so in publike attempts if you should not entirely seeke God His Glory His Truth His Worship but your selves your worke will never prosper It will rest onely on your owne parts to act it and on your own strength to consummate and perfect it and what blessed issue can bee expected where weak man is left alone to bee the Author and finisher of great actions 6. Lastly when they are fickle and inconstant begun perhaps with some fervency but then laid aside by as much tepidity An aguish zeale hot in attempting but cold in effecting One day to act like penitents and the next day to live like sinners one while humbling and praying and after a while cursing and swearing Sometimes offering all our service and strength for CHRIST and Religion and See Hosea 6. 1 4. suddenly intent only to our owne delights and wayes forgetting like them who are much in complements all our zeale and professions What a vanity will this prove What harvest will insue when the Husbandman will one houre sow an handfull of seed and a weeke after goe home and do nothing It is observed in Nature that many remisse acts which have no proportion to effects and some strong acts soone remitted will equally come to nothing If there be to weake a strength in the root or if all the strength shootes out at once little or no fruit will follow yet this deceit cleaves much to mans heart that it wil either be constantly bad or else inconstantly good It hath some degrees of heate to begin but wants that prudence of patient endeavour and comming to finish and perfect like him in the Gospel who began to build but did not make an end Whereupon results a vanity and successelesnesse to our workes the ripenesse of which is betrayd many times more by our owne remissenesse then by others oppositions they sticke and dye in the birth because wee continue not in our strength to helpe and bring them forth I see that the time and your wearied patience call upon mee to hasten and finish Give mee leave to make some usefull application of all this and then I have done the application shall bee in this as in the former part a word First To all of us and then Secondly To you of great employment and publike service 1. To every one of us Vse 1 WEE stand here this day before the Lord and seeme to doe the worke of a solemne Fast-day We confesse Our sinnes Wee pray Wee humble our selves and professe that wee will Repent and reforme and obey the Lord Here hath been much seed sowne prayers are seed Teares are seed Sermons are seed But if all this sowing should bee but a sowing amongst thorns if all this should be so managed by us that our prayers that our confessions that our hearings that our resolvings should come to nothing and prove nothing If after once twice thrice many humblings we yet should not be humbled if after all the changes which befall our times our hearts yet should not be changed but sins remaine as strong and judgements remain as neare If after all this God should not be reconciled unto us our transgressions should not be pardoned judgements should not be withdrawn mercies should not be sent downe what a bitter and sad thing would this be for a man to perish though hee prayes and to bee destroyed though he fasts and a Nation to be made a curse and an hissing and a desolation after it hath seemed to meet the Lord

take it to study the Law to study Conscience to study the Gospell to study mercies to study judgements to study Christ to study all that after all our hearts may bee broken for our sinnes that so God may not breake away from us but continue to be our God and that judgements which looke so blacke upon us may be broken off and plots contriv'd against us may breake asunder and all spirituall and earthly mercies may breake downe in mercy upon us And thus much bee spoken with a respect unto every one that heareth mee this day I have besides all this a particular errand from God to you who are publike persons and have summond me this day unto Vse 2. this publike worke me thinkes that the Lord speakes to you in some respect what once he spake to the Prophet Ieremiah Chap. 1. Verse 10. See I have this day set you over the Nations and over the Kingdomes to roote out and to pull downe and to destroy and to throw downe And blessed bee the Lord and blessed bee your soules and blessed be your endeavours that notwithstanding the infinite difficulty of the worke and the Malignant contrariety you meet with yet your hearts are undaunted and resolved to finish the work as Honourable as ever Parliament undertooke and as profitable to Church and State as ever Christians enterprised your armes shall bee made strong by the blessing of the everlasting God of Iacob let popish and malevolent and ignorant persons say or doe what they can Give me leave 1. To represent unto you The work of the Parliament some publike plots of fallow-ground which you blessed be God have begun to breake neverthelesse they need yet a more full breaking up Secondly to present in all humble fidelity unto you some few intimations and directions 1. The publike plots of Fallow ground which need a further breaking up are especially foure 4. Grounds to be broken up 1. The first lies directly in the valley of Hinnom and it is Idolatry a piece of ground which lies too much in every Shire of this Land what County is there where much Popery is not Sirs you must breake this ground up or it will breake our Land up There is not such a God-povoking sinne a God-removing sin a Church-dissolving sinne a kingdomebreaking sin as Idolatry the soule of God abhorres it down with it down with it even to the ground 2. The second lies neare to Beth-Aven and it is superstition which is but a bawd to grosse Idolatry As rife in practise even now notwithstanding all that you have said and done as if a Parliament had never opened a mouth against it If a due and carefull inquiry bee made I question not but you shall find in too many Churches and publike places as many Altars and as many Crucifixes hanging over them and as many Tapers on the Altars and as much bowing towards the East and Altar almost as many and as much as when you began this Parliament 3. The third lies just upon the coasts of Egypt that Land of darknesse And it is ignorance a very large circuit of ground this is many many places of this land there are which lie Fallow to this day never any husbandman nor Plow have entred in to breake up those grounds A most lamentable thing that since Iesus Christ came into the world and since the Gospell is come into this Land after severall scores of yeares yet how many Parishes in Wales and in the North and in other Counties which scarsely have enjoyed this much mercy as to heare one solid soule working Sermon concerning Christ and salvation by him O Sirs let your hearts bleed in pitty to these poore soules liberties I confesse are precious and so are our estates and so are bodies and lives ô then what are soules what are precious soules which did cost the most precious bloud of the Lord Iesus Christ The fourth ill plot of ground lies on Mizpah or if you please on Mount Taber for there the Priests 4. were a Net and a Snare Hosea 5. 1. And this is an idle and an evill ministry Sirs mistake me not I speake not of our Ministers indefinitely I know that wee have as godly as learned as painefull as profitable Ministers as any in all the Christian world but I speake onely of such whose speciall gifts consist in one of these two things either quietly to read out of a booke and discreetly to gather up their Tythes or malevolently to discountenance all godlinesse and raile against the Parliament Ah worthy Sirs It would amaze any ingenuous man to travaile such a Country as England and passing through many Parishes this after all is his Diurnall the Patron is Popish the Minister is an Idle Dunce or else a drunkard or else a swearer or else a scoffer preaching all holinesse out of his pulpit out of his Church out of his family out of his Parish and his people are like unto him and love to have it so And thus what betweene the Idle Minister and the evill Minister the poore people never come to knowledge or without which knowledge never comes to any thing they never come to the love and practise of any saving good These are the principall fallow grounds in this Land which need your care and paines 2. Now follow the Intimations and directions which I humbly present unto you 1. B Breake them up If ever you will quit your owne soules and the trust reposed in you and 4. Directions about the breaking up of ill grounds the whole land of Judgments spiritual and corporall If ever you desire to gaine ground in your publike intentions for good for the Lords sake breake up these Fallow grounds 2. But then in the next place goe very deepe with your Plow or else you will never breake up these grounds the deeper the better As all good is most strengthened so all evill is most crushed in its causes Take heed of shadow-worke and surface-plowing Gods eyes are upon you and so are the eyes of judicious men which can distinguish twixt scraping and breaking our misery will be but finely laid asleepe a while if your plow goes not deepe Doth a little cringing move you ô then let grosse Idolatry heate and burne your soules Doth boldnesse in a questioned Minister displease you ô then let his grosse wickednesse stirre you utterly to disburden poore peoples soules of him ô let sad complaints have quicke and full redresses 3. And goe over the Fallow grounds which you have broken goe them over againe Yea and againe Fallow grounds must be often broken up with the Plow Even the actions of the most judicious receave more ripenesse by review by often doing wee grow into a better acquaintance with what is to be done our first doings are rather trialls and enterprises the second doings ever prove the best worke besides that our affections also are oftimes too quicke for our eyes the desires of doing some

by solemne confessions and humiliations To perish in the shewes of repentance is a bitter perishing It was a sad greeting which they found from Christ Lord say they we have heard thee preaching in our Synagogues we have eat and drunk in thy presence yet saith Christ unto them depart from me ye workers of iniquity verily I know you not So when we come to die and then come to judgement and say Lord we have heard thy Word we have fasted we have prayed we have afflicted our bodies and soules and yet Christ shall say depart I know you not yee heard my Word indeed but ye did not obey my Word ye confessed your sins but yee never forsook your sins ye gave on towards a little good but ye never became good you professed obedience but you never did care to walk in my wayes and therefore all that you have done shall never doe you any good would not this be a sad and heavy answer to our selfe-deluded soules Nay put the case that now after all our fastings the same judgement or a worse should befall us which befalls our poore Brethren in Ireland that the sword should break forth among us and all the unmercifull and sudden calamities of warre should beleaguer us that in a moment the Gospel should bee banished our liberties should be imbondaged our estates should be exhausted our lands should be dispossessed our houses should be burnt our coffers should be ransack'd our bodies should be tortured and our lives should be threatned Good Lord would we say is all our fasting and humbling come to this we looked for good and not for evill wee looked for peace and not for destruction why and the Lord might answer us when did you fast to me and when did you pray to me Indeed you prayed against judgements but you would never leave your sins which I told you often would pull downe judgements you would have had mercies but I could never perswade you to repent in good earnest you would trust to vaine thoughts of your owne you would never be humbled to purpose you would sow among thornes and see now what ye get by it O Christian thinke seriously of these things God hath called to England once againe often a longer time repent indeed turne from your evill wayes indeed be upright and holy indeed walk with me once at length in truth judgements have called warnings have called consciences still call dangers still call feares still call the Ministers of God as the Prophets of old still call and cry and beseech and weepe turne yet unto the Lord turne not feignedly but with all your hearts sow not among thornes yet Lord who believes our reports and calls the Prophet is reputed a foole and the Spirituall man mad men will be sinfull still they will perhaps one of ten thousand bee seemingly penitent and the issue I feare will bee this the destruction of the transgressors and of the sinners shall be together Isai 1. 28. And while they be folden together as thornes they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry Nahum 1. 10 But Sirs let us yet be perswaded to repent and to reforme our selves to purpose if ever we purpose to repent or would repent to purpose this is the time all within us all without us all abroad all at home beg it at our hearts O that God would work all his works in us that our selfe-reforming work may begin goe on hold out and abound that God may be reconciled to our selves and this sinfull land 2. To you of publique employment MAny excellent works are fallen into your hands some of them you have gone through with already and more we are perswaded had received their seale had not the excellency of your attempts raised against you the enmity of manifold oppositions and contradictions my humble and earnest intreaty of you is only this let not those remaining excellent works if it bee possible so much as in you lies for ever stick in the birth let them not die in meere intentions or propositions but strive to bring them unto their due and much desired perfection you have begun some things 1. About erronious Doctrines 2. Against superstitious practices 3. Against Idolatry and seducing Priests and Jesuits 4. With notorious delinquents and offenders 5. Against scandalous Ministers and Innovations 6. For the setling of a faithfull and laborious Ministry 7. For an honourable maintenance and encouragement of it O never let us stand to the courtesie of the vulgar 8. For the easing of tender consciences 9. For the vindicating of the Lords day 10. For the setling of all distractions and hopes of a Church-Reformation according to the Word of God against which malice it selfe cannot justly open its mouth 11. For the succouring and relieving of poore and distressed Ireland Hasten all that you can lest it prove too late Now God forbid that such works as these should ever fall to the ground after so many yeers misery after so many thousand prayers after so many gracious overtures which you have made let it not be said of you in these works as hee said of his owne Faciebam non feci he was doing of them but they were never done Take up your first thoughts and engage your hearts and resolutions and all your endeavours speedily and successefully to carry on at least this one work of all works a solid Reformation Beleeve me it is the work which will bring a blessing upon all your other works peruse that place well in Haggai 2. 18. Consider now saith the Lord from this day even from the day that the foundation of the Lords Temple was laid consider it vers 19. from this day will I blesse you Now whereas Zerubbabel might reply we would set to this work but that we are afraid of warlike opposition To this the Lord answers in Verse 22. and 23. I will overthrow the Throne of Kingdomes and I will destroy the strength of the Kingdomes of the Heathen and I will overthrow the Charrets and the Horses and the Riders And I will take thee Zerubbabel my servant and I will make thee as a Signet q. d. Look you to that work and I will assuredly look to your persons and safeties Now that you may effectually carry on all these great works and especially that of Church-Reformation so that all may be prosperous and in the event come to something make use of two Two Directions directions which I humbly propound unto you First strip your selves of all the things which will weaken your hearts and make your endeavours still slow and fruitlesse therefore First put off your sinnes or else they will put off your work evill men are seldome apt for or prove successefull in good attempts There is nothing which intricates our actions more than our sinnes which doe likewise ensnarle our souls Enterprises set upon either without God or against God are like arrowes shot up aloft which never doe good but many times

sometimes a wounding sometimes a bruising sometimes a breaking sometimes a renting sometimes a killing and sometimes an humbling and melting of the heart And this is it which God calls for in the Text from the Iewes as a meanes to prevent their utter destruction by the sword of the Caldeans whence the proposition which I shall in the first place insist on is this Doctr. 1 That the breaking up of sinfull hearts Is a singular meanes to prevent the breaking downe of a sinfull Nation THere are three things unto which I shall speake for the explication of this assertion Namely 1. What the right breaking of a sinfull heart is which is so availeable to prevent the breaking downe of a sinfull Nation 2. Some demonstrations that it is a preventing meanes 3. The Reasons why it is so For the first quaere what the right breaking up of a Quest 1. a sinfull heart is Be pleased to know that there is a twofold Breaking of a sinners heart Sol. 1. One is specious only and formall supersicie tenus The heart broken for sin 2 Wayes 1. Formally as Saint Bernard speakes as Artificiall Juglars seem to wound themselves but do not or as Players seeme to thrust themselves through their bodies but the sword passeth only through their clothes There is something done about sins but nothing is done against sins peccata raduntur sed non eradicantur as the same Auhor speaketh which he truely calls a Fiction and vanity As when men onely lop the Trees which thereupon in time grow the faster and thicker Against this breaking the Prophet of old much complained They in Isaiah hung downe their heads and afflicted their soules for a day but for all that they Esa 58. 5 3 still afflicted their poore brethren And they in Hosea did howle but yet they did still rebell against the Hosea 7. 14. Lord And they in Malachy did cry out and cover Malach. 2. 13. 11. the Altar with Teares and yet for all their pretended contrition they did profane the holinesse of their God And though the Pharisees did assume unto themselves a most mortified garbe of humbling especially in their dayes of Fasting disfiguring their faces as Christ reports of them yet their hearts were as loose as full of pride and covetousnesse and envie Matth. 6. 16. and opposition of Christ as ever 2. Another is serious and Reall which is acted most in the hidden man and pierceth like the word Hebr. 4. 12. even to the dividing of soule and spirit of which likewise there are two kindes one is stiled Attrition and the other is styled Contrition by the Schoolemen the former by our Casuists is called a legall breaking and the latter an Evangelicall breaking They difference them thus partly 1. By their objects Penall evill is the object on which Attrition doth worke and sinfull evill is the object on which Contrition worketh the one is conversant about passive evill that is the evill which wee suffer but the other is conversant about Active evill that is the evill which wee have done For sinne hath in it two qualities one to make us unhappie and this Attrition lookes at another to make us unholy and at this doth contrition look 2. By their causes legall Attrition is onely the pinching of servile feare and despaire for it seeth nothing but Sea all that will teare and distract the Conscience but Evangelicall contrition is the melting and lamenting of filiall Love and Hope The frownes of a Revenging Judge causeth that but the smiles of a gracious Father raiseth this In the one the heart is shivered by the flashes of Hell In the other the heart is melted by the beames of Heaven A stroke from guilt brake Judas's heart into despaire but a looke from CHRIST brake Peters heart into teares 3. By their effects an Attrite heart may for that space of time whiles the Conscience burnes and flames with wrath become negatively penitent Non proponit peccare It doth not purpose to sin the sensible anguish for former sinnings may suspend delightfull intentions for future sins but the contrite heart out of a contrariety of nature becomes positively holy proponit non peccare It doth Cordially purpose not to sin any more All which if I mistake not is the same that Cajetan aimes at when hee saith that Attrition produceth velleitatem an imperfect motion of the will but contrition produceth voluntatem a compleat and direct will against sin But this discourse I feare is too speculative for this dayes worke give mee leave therefore to open the nature of this penitentiall heart breaking in a more practicall and profitable way There are severall workings which ordinarily concurre to the full constituting of this heart-breaking worke whereof some are Antecedent some are formally ingredient and some are inseparably consequent 1. The Antecedent workings are such as previously lead the way to the Evangelicall breaking as Antecedents to heart breaking three the Needle doth to the threed and the breaking by the hammer doth to the melting by the fire by way of order only and not by causality These are principally three 1. A Notionall Irradiation The Lord never breakes a sinners heart before hee hath opened a sinners 1. Irradiation eyes the day breakes before the heart breakes light breakes to elevate the soule thus far to discerne and distinguish of evill till then sin is no burden to the Conscience nor trouble to the affections As no good wrapt up in darkenesse excites desire so no evill swath'd up in Ignorance strikes any trouble or sorrow unknowne things have not motive faculty because they are as non entia no things at all And therefore God ever keepes this method to make sin appeare to be sin and afterwards to humble and break our hearts for it 2. A practicall conviction which is nothing else but a personall application of guilt wrath without 2. Conviction which the notion of sin would be no trouble let me open my minde thus unto you That drunkennesse or swearing or whoredome or murder or Sabbath breaking c. are sins And that such persons who are guilty of them without Repentance shall not inherit the kingdome of God All this the sinner knowes already and yet is not troubled for as long as light rests in a bare Notion it is only an addition to his understanding It is no burden at all to his heart But when this light slips downe and chargeth this sinne and this wrath upon this very person and shines so clearely in this charge that the person cannot for his life deny it thou art a drunkard thou art this swearer c. And hereupon in the name of God arrests him with that wrath which God hath threatned unto that sinne and sinner now the sinner begins to consider and tremble and breake When Peter closed with the Jewes and convinced Acts 2. 36 37. them that they in particular crucified Iesus