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A30449 A sermon preached before the King at Whitehall, on Christmas-Day, 1696 by the Right Reverend Father in God, Gilbert Lord Bishop of Sarum. Burnet, Gilbert, 1643-1715. 1697 (1697) Wing B5905; ESTC R21549 13,405 35

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PRINTED By His Majesty's Special Command A SERMON Preached before the KING At WHITEHALL ON CHRISTMAS-DAY 1696. By the Right Reverend Father in God GILBERT Lord Bishop of SARUM LONDON Printed for Ri. Chiswell at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard MDCXCVII THE BISHOP of SALISBURY's Sermon before the KING ON CHRISTMAS-DAY 1696. A SERMON Preached before the KING GAL. IV. VER 4. But when the fulness of the time was come God sent forth his Son made of a Woman THE Mysteries of God's Providence are of all others the most Amazing A small Measure of true Reason with good Degrees of Humility and Modesty will easily bring one over to Submit to Matters of Doctrine relating to the Divine Essence if it appears that they are expresly Revealed though the forming Distinct Apprehensions of them be above our Faculties which God knows are Weak and Short-sighted but it is a more obvious as well as a more pressing Difficulty that arises from the Methods of God's Governing the World There is no great matter in that which is drawn from the Varieties and seeming Partialities of Providence The Prosperity of Bad Men and the Afflictions of the Just have often such visible tendencies in this Life and are followed with such a just Distribution of Rewards and Punishments in another State that this is no formidable Objection But that the world should be as it were abandoned so great a part of it being as it were delivered up in Bulk to Ignorance Idolatry Immorality and Magick so small a part of it being enlightned and of that so very small a part being either guided or bettered by that Light carries in it a Train of Difficulties which we can never hope to see through till welcome at that Light to which we cannot now approach Why the world was let run into so much Corruption for about 4000 Years before the Son of God was sent forth into it Why this Light has not Shined into all the Corners of the world ever since And that which is the most Amazing of all is Why do those who enjoy it value it so little and are so little reformed by it are indeed Mysteries that we cannot see through Yet though we cannot quite comprehend them we have some hints given us to shew us that there was a certain Conduct and by Consequence a wise Direction in this great Transaction A time was prefixed for it long before it happened and the Accomplishment did punctually Answer the Predictions I shall name only Two of the most Remarkable About 1800 Years before it Jacob when dying had foretold That the Scepter should not depart from Iudah till Shiloh should come by whom the Gentiles were to be called to the Knowledge of God The Importance of which was That the Tribe of Judah should continue to be God's People under their peculiar Laws and Government till the Messias should come to whom the Gentiles were to be gathered The other Tribes were for the greater part so lost that scarce any Remnant of them was left But the Tribe of Judah still remained a visible Body of Men Governed by their peculiar Laws till the time of our Saviour's coming into the world Herod had been made their King by the Roman Senate and was afterwards Confirmed by Augustus they were thereby brought under Subjection though Herod Governed them indeed according to Mose's Law Augustus ordered a Taxing of all the Empire of the Tributary or Subjected Provinces as well as of that which was incorporated into the Empire And this happened precisely at the time of our Saviour's Birth Soon after that Judea was made a Province their Current Money was only the Roman Coin Pontius Pilate the Roman Procurator Condemned our Saviour and by that time according to the Prediction the Gentiles were called to the Knowledge of God through this Shiloh the Messias the Jewish Nation was Destroyed their Temple burnt down their City razed down to the ground and they scattered to the Four Winds of Heaven but far the greater part adhering firmly to their Religion still owned the Prophecies which we hope are to have at last a Glorious effect upon them for their final Conversion Here is one Character of the Time and we see the fulness of it was come Another is yet more express given out about 500 Years before the Accomplishment It was revealed to Daniel That within Sixty nine Weeks after the going forth of the Commandment to build and restore Ierusalem Messiah the Prince should come and be cut off That by Weeks are meant so many Sevens of Years is confessed by the Jews and can easily be proved to have been a common form of designing such a Period of time among them The commandment to build Ierusalem was given in the 20th year of Artaxerxes Longimanus the Edict given out before by Cyrus and confirmed by Darius being only for the building the Temple and for the worshipping of God in it Sixty nine Weeks of Years are just 483 Now we have the certain Characters of those times left by which we are sure That from the 20th year of Artaxerxes to the 19th of Tiberius in which our Saviour suffered there were just so many years neither more nor less according to the Calculation of Years that we know the Caldeans then reckoned by of 360 Days to a Year which they divided into Twelve Months assigning Thirty Days to every Month which we see by Jeremiah was likewise the measure that the Jews counted by and of such Years only can that Prophecy of Daniel's be understood Here are two evident Characters that the Fulness of the time was come that a time was prefixed to this great Transaction long before and that it happen'd punctually according to it We do likewise find in the state of the Gentile world a great Conjuncture of favourable Circumstances previous to its Appearance The Roman Empire was as calm at this time as it was great The World was conquer'd and after a course of many years Wars Janus Temple was shut It was a Constitution made up of Justice and Morality but was under a Religion that was then so strangely corrupted that the Tempers as well as Laws of that Nation did very much dispose them to an aversion to that Religion or rather to that mixture of all Religions which the wiser and better sort among themselves could not but despise and abhor By consequence this prepared them to receive a Religion that not only agreed to all their Notions of Morality but that tended to improve and exalt them all Thus we who cannot know why this was the time marked for the Appearance of the Son of God yet do certainly know that it was precisely marked out and was as exactly fulfilled and from that we have reason to acknowledge and adore that Wisdom in it which we cannot yet discover I go next to the Great Article of the Christian Religion mentioned in the Text That the Messias who was sent forth was the