XXX. RATHER FOLD OVER THAN FALL SHORT.

SOLOMON’S temple was seven years in building, 1 Kings vi. 38. And such who seriously consider the magnificence thereof, will more wonder that it was done so soon, than doing so long.

Now had Solomon at the beginning of this building abolished the tabernacle made by Moses, because too mean and little for so mighty and so numerous a nation, God had been seven years without any place of public service.

But that wise prince continued the tabernacle to all uses and purposes until the temple was finished, and then, 1 Kings viii. 4, They brought up the ark of the Lord, and the tabernacle of the congregation, and all the holy vessels that were in the tabernacle, even those did the priests and the Levites bring up. And as it followeth afterwards, ver. 6: They brought in the ark of the covenant of the Lord unto his 270place, into the oracle of the house. And certainly all the rest of the tabernacle, consisting of such materials as might be taken down and kept in chests and coffers, were deposited in the temple, though it may be no use was made thereof.

It had been well if, before the old government of the Church was taken down, a new one had first been settled. Yea, rather let God have two houses together, than none at all; lest piety be starved to death with cold, by lying out of doors in the interval betwixt the demolishing of an old, and the erecting of a new church discipline.