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           Title: The Sermons of John Owen
      Creator(s): Owen, John (1616-1683)
     Print Basis: The Banner of Truth Trust, Edinburgh, 1965, 1967. 1968.
   CCEL Subjects: All; Classic; Sermons
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Preface.

   The two following volumes contain, it is believed, the most complete
   collection of Dr Owen's Sermons which has ever been published.

   The first volume (vol. viii.) includes all the Discourses which were
   published during the lifetime of the author. Among these there will be
   found his "Humble Testimony to the Goodness and Severity of God;" which
   -- though, from its length, it might rank as a separate treatise -- is
   comprehended in this volume, as it was the substance of some
   discourses, and is entitled by Owen himself a Discourse. Another
   valuable sermon, which we have discovered in the "Morning Exercises
   against Popery, at Southwark," though omitted in every previous
   collection of his Sermons, and in Russell's edition of his Works, we
   have not hesitated to include in the present collection, our conviction
   that it belongs to Owen resting on the high authority of Calamy, [1]
   who must have had the best opportunities of knowing what sermons, in a
   publication so important and celebrated as the "Morning Exercises,"
   were the productions of our author. We are strengthened in this
   conviction by the circumstance, that the Rev. T. H. Horne, also, in the
   recent admirable edition of the "Morning Exercises," expressly ascribes
   this sermon to Owen. It is entitled, "The Testimony of the Church not
   the only nor the chief Reason of our Believing the Scripture to be the
   Word of God." On the contrary, we have assigned to the subsequent
   volume, which contains the Posthumous Discourses of our author, a
   sermon entitled, "Human Power Defeated," though we find it mentioned by
   Mr Orme in his list of the works which Owen himself committed to the
   press. Our reason for accounting it posthumous, is not simply that we
   have not met with it in its original form (for in a few other instances
   we have been unable to discover copies of original editions), but in
   the folio volume of Owen's Sermons, published in 1721, and edited so
   carefully by five Independent ministers, who assure us that the
   posthumous sermons contained in it were the genuine productions of
   Owen, "a great part of them having been transcribed from his own
   copies, and the rest taken from his mouth by a gentleman [2] of honour
   and known integrity," it is ranked among the posthumous sermons, which
   had then for the first time been given to the public.

   The other volume (vol. ix.) embraces all the Posthumous Sermons of our
   author, -- viz., the "Seasonable Words for English Protestants,"
   printed separately in 1690; the posthumous sermons published in 1721;
   others which issued from the press in 1756, and were prepared from the
   manuscripts of Sir John Hartopp, which his granddaughter, Mrs Cooke of
   Stoke Newington, had supplied for the purpose; and, finally, the
   sermons derived through the same channel, and published in 1760.

   An attempt has been made in this edition, by prefatory notes and
   running annotations, to connect the different sermons (especially in
   vol. viii.) with the life of Owen, and with the circumstances in which
   they were originally delivered. Much of the interest and value of a
   discourse lies in its suitableness to the occasion which called it
   forth.

   There are discourses attributed to Owen on Ps. cxvi. 12, and on 2 Sam.
   xviii. 20; and said to have been published, the former in 1742, and the
   latter in 1746. They are not mentioned by Mr Orme. There is a reference
   to them in Cooke's "Preacher's Assistant;" but after a diligent search,
   we have failed to recover them.

   The merits of Owen as a preacher have not been sufficiently
   appreciated. In this respect he seems to have stood higher in the
   estimation of his contemporaries than he has subsequently done. No
   edition of his Sermons has been published in a form and at a price
   which placed them within the reach of all classes in the community.
   Perhaps the value of his other works diverted attention from his minor
   productions; and his style of careful and elaborate, though often
   prolix and cumbrous, discussion, was deemed incompatible with the
   condensation of statement and the vigour of appeal which constitute the
   main value and charm of a good discourse. From the accounts transmitted
   to us, however, whether by his various friends and admirers, such as
   Clarkson, his colleague and successor, or by those even who were quite
   opposed to him in principle and sentiment, such as Anthony Wood, the
   ability with which Owen could secure and sustain the attention of an
   audience must have been great. [3] The effects of his preaching in some
   instances attest his usefulness in this department of his public
   labours. John Rogers, in his singular work, "The Heavenly Nymph,"
   records the cases of two individuals, Dorothy Emett and Major
   Mainwaring, who ascribed their conversion to the preaching of Owen when
   he was in Dublin. Mr Orme remarks, that the circumstance confutes a
   saying attributed to Owen, that he never knew an instance of a sinner
   converted through his instrumentality; though the saying might so far
   be true, that he himself might be ignorant of the extent of his own
   usefulness. His congregation in London after the Restoration, though,
   from the severe measures adopted against Dissent, necessarily small,
   seems to have been made up of persons altogether superior in character
   and attainments. Another source of evidence as to the popularity and
   acceptance of our author in preaching the gospel, presents itself in
   the frequency with which he was called to officiate in this capacity
   before the House of Commons. He was generally summoned to this duty in
   connection with some event or crisis of great importance. On examining
   the journals of the House, we have found that he preached before it on
   several occasions besides those on which he delivered sermons that were
   afterwards published. He usually receives the thanks, or "the hearty
   thanks," of the House, for "his great pains" taken in the discourses
   preached before them. Nor were such "orders" of the Parliament, that he
   should be thanked for his services, mere form and indiscriminate
   courtesy. There is a curious record which we may quote, as showing that
   the Parliament exercised some measure of discrimination in voting
   thanks on these occasions:--

   "Die Veneris, 14 Martii, 1650.

   "The question being propounded, That thanks be given to the ministers
   that preached yesterday before the Parliament, and the question being
   put, That that question be now put?' it passed with the negative."

   There are no means of ascertaining what ministers actually preached on
   the occasion here referred to. The ministers who had been appointed to
   preach were Mr Owen, Mr John Simson, and Mr Leigh; but it is clear from
   the journals, that Owen sometimes was not in circumstances to fulfil
   such appointments after they had been made. Perhaps, were all the facts
   known, it would have been to his credit that he had incurred what wears
   the aspect of a vote of censure from the House; although we learn, from
   certain entries elsewhere in its journals, that he was so much of a
   favourite with Parliament, that they settled "lands of inheritance of
   the clear value of £100 per annum in Ireland on John Owen, Doctor of
   Divinity, and his heirs."

   His Discourses themselves, however, will best illustrate the position
   and rank to which he is entitled among the lights and ornaments of the
   British pulpit. In judging of them, we must remember how often his
   singular aptitude for the management of affairs drew him into public
   business, interrupting and disturbing the leisure requisite for
   elaborate composition. The amount of time and thought expended on more
   important works might interfere with the care due to the preparation of
   a single discourse. He himself informs us that his public discourses
   were frequently delivered under some sudden call to the duty, and at
   the spur of some great emergency, when brief space was allowed him to
   prepare them carefully; so that, to use his own similitude, they were
   often "like Jonah's gourd, the offspring of a night." Although they
   cannot, therefore, be regarded as models of finished composition and
   careful preparation, they nevertheless abound in many cardinal
   excellencies. The doctrine illustrated and urged in them is commonly
   founded on a sifting and masterly exposition of that portion of
   Scripture from which the text is selected. So much was it his habit to
   investigate Scripture, with the view of ascertaining the precise import
   of its statements, that he often sheds new and striking light on other
   passages besides the one which it may be the object of the sermon to
   explain and enforce. Singular tact is evinced in eliciting the general
   truths or principles raised for consideration by the text. While there
   are many indications of haste and negligence, it may be safely
   affirmed, that there is not a paragraph of worthless or frivolous
   matter which any reader could have wished away, and passages often
   occur conceived in no common strain of eloquence; while, even amidst
   the tamest sentences, burning thoughts are found, thrown out freely and
   at random by the author, as if unconscious of the effect they would
   produce, or careless whether they produced any effect at all. The
   depths of Christian experience are admirably unfolded, and the general
   spirit and tenor of his statements are calculated to tell with power
   upon the unconverted, and to commend themselves with acceptance to the
   enlightened conscience. No feature, indeed, in his sermons is more
   prominent and remarkable, -- especially in the sermons delivered
   towards the close of his life, and which labour under the disadvantage
   of never having been intended for the press, -- than the skill with
   which he can scrutinize character and motives, till his hearers must
   have felt as if, in gauging, their inward being, the preacher had laid
   his hand, with intuitive discernment, on the deepest secrets of their
   bosom. Nor does this result from an affected refinement of metaphysical
   discussion and analysis; but from the simple adaptation of truth, so as
   to tell on the wide variety of human character. Among uninspired
   authors, it is pre-eminently true of Owen, that, by the manifestation
   of the truth, he commends himself to every man's conscience in the
   sight of God. At the same time, the highest qualities of thought and a
   rare knowledge of human nature are often evinced; and on perusing the
   sermons on Popery, "The Chamber of Imagery," and, "On the Authority of
   Scripture," the reader will be struck with the powers of sagacious and
   philosophic analysis displayed in the former, and with the logical
   point and acumen of the latter, -- stamping on them a freshness and
   value as continued and enduring as the importance of the great
   controversy itself to which they relate. The more, in short, these
   Discourses of Owen are studied, it will be found that their chief
   blemish -- if it be a blemish -- is the tendency of the author, in the
   fertility of his resources, to compress within the limits of one sermon
   what, to minds less affluent, would have furnished precious materials
   for several sermons; and though some may desiderate in them the minor
   graces of composition, it would be unwise to forget that, apart from
   any shapes of elegance and utility into which it may be fashioned by
   art, sterling gold, in the broad market of the world, will always
   command a value of its own.

   Editor.
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   [1] See Calamy's Account of Ministers Ejected, vol. ii. p. 56.

   [2] Sir John Hartopp. See vol. ix., p. 18.

   [3] See some excellent observations on his character as a pulpit
   orator, in the "Life of Owen," vol. i. p. 106.
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   Sermon I.

   A vision of unchangeable, free mercy, in sending the means of grace to
   undeserving sinners:

   wherein God's uncontrollable eternal purpose, in sending and continuing
   the gospel unto this nation, in the midst of oppositions and
   contingencies, is discovered; his distinguishing mercy in this great
   work exalted, asserted against opposers, repiners.

   whereunto is annexed

   a short defensative about church government, (with a country essay for
   the practice of church government there) toleration, and petitions
   about these things.
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Prefatory note.

   The occasion on which this sermon was delivered is mentioned in the
   "Life of Owen," vol. i., p. 34. From the title-page of the original
   edition of the sermon, Owen appears to have been "minister of the
   gospel at Coggeshall, in Essex," when it was published. By some
   inadvertency, Mr Orme, in his valuable memoir of our author, represents
   him as called to preach this sermon to the House of Commons before he
   left the parish of Fordham; a statement which can be reconciled with
   the original title-page only by the supposition that his removal to
   Coggeshall had occurred in the interval before the publication of the
   sermon. Asty, however, distinctly informs us that he was settled at
   Coggeshall when he first preached before the House of Commons.

   The sermon was preached on Wednesday the 29th of April 1646; and the
   time is important, as it was the close of the first civil war. During
   the previous month, Hopton and Astley, the last generals who kept the
   field in the interest of Charles I., had been compelled to surrender.
   "You have now done your work," said Astley to his victors, "and may go
   to play, -- unless you will fall out among yourselves." So truly was
   the work done, that Oliver Cromwell had returned to his place
   Parliament on the 22d of April, and on the following Monday the king
   left Oxford in disguise, and, after some hesitation of purpose, found
   his way to the Scots army.

   A sufficient interval had hardly elapsed to give Owen an opportunity of
   exhibiting in his sermon any reflection of these memorable events. It
   is perhaps more to his credit, that, when summoned from the obscurity
   of his pastoral duties at Coggeshall to preach the gospel in "the chief
   place of concourse," and before the rulers of the land, he seizes the
   opportunity to portray the spiritual destitution which existed in
   Wales, and large districts of England, and to make an appeal for
   "help," in a strain of holy fervour and commanding eloquence, that will
   bear comparison with the best productions of the British pulpit. The
   reasoning at the outset is somewhat abstract, -- not unsuited, perhaps,
   to an assembly of the leading men in the country; but throughout the
   discourse there is conspicuous that happy combination of argument and
   declamation which constitutes genuine oratory. Bogue and Bennett have
   remarked, "Those who are only acquainted with the general strain of
   Owen's writings, would not suppose him capable of pouring forth that
   flood of lucid, glowing, popular eloquence, which is displayed in this
   sermon." -- History of Dissenters, vol. 2, p. 228.

   In the "Defensative," or preface to the "Country Essay," etc., Owen
   assigns reasons on account of which he had not felt himself free to
   petition Parliament in reference to the establishment of an
   ecclesiastical polity for England. In the "Country Essay," etc., he
   condemns very strongly the infliction of civil penalties for religious
   belief. In the first part of it, he describes a form of church
   government which commended itself to his judgment. Owen purposely
   refrained from describing it either as Presbytery or Independency,
   deeming himself competent to satisfy all men respecting it; "unless
   such as shall be so simple or malicious as to ask whether this way be
   that of the Presbyterians or Independents." By his own admission, the
   scheme proposed in the "Essay" would not exactly agree with either of
   the two forms of church government which were then competing for
   national favour and the sanction of the state. There can be no doubt,
   however, that he was at this time undergoing the change of view which
   led him in the end to profess Congregationalism. It is simple justice
   to add, that a comparison of the "Country Essay" with his "Inquiry into
   Evangelical Churches," published towards the close of his life,
   effectually redeems his name from any charge of vacillation in regard
   to his church principles. The peculiar modifications which appear in
   the Congregationalism of Owen, are conspicuous elements in the first
   scheme of ecclesiastical polity which he ever broached. See also his
   "Review of the Nature of Schism," chap. ii., vol. xiii. -- Ed.
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   AMPLISSIMO

   SENATUI,

   INCLYTISSIMO POPULI ANGLICANI CONVENTUI,

   OB

   PRISCA ANGLO-BRITANNORUM JURA STRENUE ET FIDELITER ASSERTA;

   LIBERTATEM PATRIAM (NEFARUS QUORUNDAM MOLITONIBUS PÆNE PESSUNDATAM)
   RECUPERATAM;

   JUSTITIAM FORTITER, isos, epieikos, aprosopoleptos ADMINSITRATAM;

   Archen IN ECCLESIASTICIS anieroturanniken DISSOLUTAM,

   RITUS PONTIFICIOS, NOVITIOS, ANTICHRISTIANOS ABOLITOS; PRIVILEGIA
   PLEBIS CHRISTIANÆ POSTLIMINIO RESTITUTA;

   POTISSIMUM

   PROTECTIONEM DEI O. M. HIS OMNIBUS, ALUSQUE INNUMERIS, CONSILIO, BELLO,
   DOMI, FORAS GILATIOSE POTITAM;

   TOTO ORBE JURE MERITISSIMO CELEBERRIMO, TOTI HUIC INSULÆ ÆTERNA MEMORIA
   RECOLENDO,

   VIRIS ILLUSTRIBUS, CLARISSIMUS, SELECTISSIMIS, EX ORDINE COMMUNIUM IN
   SUPREMA CURIA PARLIAM, CONGREGATIS,

   CONCIONEM HANC SACRAM, HUMILEM ILLAM QUIDEM, IPSORUM TAMEN VOTO
   JUSSUQUE PRIUS CORAM IPSIS HABITAM, NUNC LUCE DONATAM,

   D.D.C.

   JOANNES OWEN.
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   Die Mercurij 29 Aprilis, 1646.

   Ordered, by the Commons assembled in Parliament, That Mr Jenner and Sir
   Peter Wentworth do from this House give thanks to Mr Nalton and Mr Owen
   for the great pains they took in the sermons they preached this day, at
   the entreaty of this House (it being a day of public humiliation), at
   Margaret's, Westminster; and to desire them to print their sermons. And
   it is ordered that none shall presume to print their sermons without
   license under their handwriting.

   H. Elsyinge, Cler. Parl. D. Com.
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Sermon I. A vision of unchangeable, free mercy, in sending the means of grace to
undeserving sinners.

   "And a vision appeared to Paul in the night: There stood a man of
   Macedonia, and prayed him, saying, Come over into Macedonia, and help
   us." -- Acts xvi. 9.

   The kingdom of Jesus Christ is frequently in the Scripture compared to
   growing things, [4] -- small in the beginning and first appearance, but
   increasing by degrees unto glory and perfection. The shapeless stone
   [5] cut out without hands, having neither form nor desirable beauty
   given unto it, becomes a great mountain, filling the whole earth, Dan.
   ii. 35. The small vine brought out of Egypt quickly covers the hills
   with her shadow, -- her boughs reach unto the sea, and her branches
   unto the river, Ps. lxxx. 8. The tender plant [6] becomes as the cedars
   of God; and the grain of mustard-seed to be a tree for the fowls of the
   air to make their nests in the branches thereof. Mountains are made
   plains before it, every valley is filled, and the crooked paths made
   straight, that it may have a passage to its appointed period; -- and
   all this, not only not supported by outward advantages, but in direct
   opposition to the combined power [7] of this whole creation, as fallen
   and in subjection to the "god of this world," the head thereof. As
   Christ was "a tender plant," [8] seemingly easy to be broken; and "a
   root out of a dry ground," not easily flourishing, yet liveth for ever;
   [9] so his people and kingdom, -- though as a "lily among thorns," [10]
   as "sheep among wolves," [11] as a "turtledove" among a multitude of
   devourers, [12] -- yet stands unshaken, at least unshivered.

   The main ground and foundation of all this is laid out, verses 6-9 of
   this chapter, -- containing a rich discovery how all things here below,
   especially such as concern the gospel and Church of Christ, are carried
   along through innumerable varieties and a world of contingencies,
   according to the regular motions and goings forth of a free, eternal,
   unchangeable decree: as all inferior orbs, notwithstanding the
   eccentrics and irregularities of their own inhabitants, are orderly
   carried about by the first Mover.

   In verse 6, the planters of the gospel are "forbidden to preach the
   word in Asia" [13] (that part of it peculiarly so called); and, verse
   7, assaying to go with the same message into Bithynia, they are crossed
   by the Spirit in their attempts; but in my text are called to a place
   on which their thoughts were not at all fixed:-- which calling and
   which forbidding were both subservient to His free determination "who
   worketh all things according to the counsel of his own will," Eph. i.
   11.

   And no doubt but, in the dispensation of the gospel throughout the
   world, unto this day, there is the like conformity to be found to the
   pattern of God's eternal decrees; though to the messengers not made
   known aforehand by revelation, but discovered in the effects, by the
   mighty working of Providence.

   Amongst other nations, this is the day of England's visitation, "the
   Dayspring from on high" having visited this people, and "the Sun of
   righteousness" arising upon us "with healing in his wings;" [14] -- a
   man of England hath prevailed for assistance, and the free grace of God
   hath wrought us help by the gospel.

   Now, in this day three things are to be done, to keep up our spirits
   unto this duty, of brining down our souls by humiliation.

   First, To take us off the pride of our own performances, endeavours, or
   any adherent worth of our own: "Not for your sakes do I this, saith the
   Lord God, be it known unto you: be ashamed and confounded for your own
   ways, O house of Israel," -- O house of England! Ezek. xxxvi. 32.

   Secondly, To root out that atheistical corruption which depresses the
   thoughts of men, not permitting them, in the highest products of
   Providence, to look above contingencies and secondary causes; -- though
   God "hath wrought all our works for us," Isa. xxvi. 12; and "known unto
   him are all his works from the beginning of the world," Acts xv. 18.

   Thirdly, To show that the bulk of this people are as yet in the
   wilderness, far from their resting-place, like sheep upon the
   mountains, as once Israel, Jer. l. 6, -- as yet wanting help by the
   gospel.

   The two first of these will be cleared by discovering how that all
   revolutions here below -- especially every thing that concerns the
   dispensation of the gospel and kingdom of the Lord Jesus -- are carried
   along according to the eternally fixed purpose of God, free in itself,
   taking neither rise, growth, cause, nor occasion, from any thing
   amongst the sons of men.

   The third, by laying open the helpless condition of gospel-wanting
   souls, with some particular application; to all which my text directly
   leads me.

   The words in general are the relation of a message from heaven unto
   Paul, to direct him in the publishing of the gospel, -- as to the place
   and persons wherein and to whom he was to preach. And in them you have
   these four things:--

   1. The manner of it; it was by vision -- "A vision appeared."

   2. The time of it, -- "In the night."

   3. The bringer of it, -- "A man of Macedonia."

   4. The matter of it, -- help for the Macedonians, interpreted, verse
   18, to be by preaching of the gospel.

   A little clearing of the words will make way for observations.

   1. For the manner of the delivery of this message, -- it was by vision.
   Of all the ways that God used of old to reveal himself unto any in an
   extraordinary manner, -- which were sundry and various, Heb. i. 1, --
   there was no one so frequent as this of vision. Wherein this did
   properly consist, and whereby it was distinguished from other ways of
   the discovery of the secrets of the Lord, I shall not now discuss. In
   general, visions are revelations of the mind of the Lord concerning
   some hidden things, present or future, and not otherwise to be known.
   And they were of two sorts.

   (1.) Revelations merely by word [15] or some other more internal
   species, [16] without any outward sensible appearance; which, for the
   most part, was the Lord's way of proceeding with the prophets; -- which
   transient light, or discovery of things before unknown, they called a
   vision. [17]

   (2.) Revelations accompanied with some sensible apparitions, and that
   either, --

   [1.] Of things; as usually, among the prophets, rods and pots, [18]
   wheels and trees, [19] lamps, axes, vessels, rams, goats, and the like,
   were presented unto them.

   [2.] Of persons; and those, according to the variety of them, of three
   sorts.

   1st, Of the second person of the Trinity; and this either, --

   First, In respect of some glorious beams of his Deity; as to Isa. vi.
   1, with John xii. 41; -- to Dan. x. 5, 6, -- as afterward to John, Rev.
   i. 13-15; to which you may add the apparitions of the glory of God not
   immediately designing the second person, as Ezek. i. 1.

   Secondly, With reference to his humanity to be assumed; as to Abraham,
   Gen. xviii. 1, 2; -- to Josh. v. 13-15, etc.

   2dly, Of angels; as unto Peter, Acts xii. 7; -- to the women, Matt.
   xxviii. 5; -- to John, Rev. xxii. 8, etc.

   3dly, Of men; [20] as in my text.

   Now, the several advancements of all these ways in dignity and
   pre-eminence, according as they clearly make out intellectual verity,
   or according to the honour and exaltation of that whereof apparition is
   made, are too fruitless a speculation [21] for this day's exercise.

   Our vision is of the latter sort, accompanied with a sensible
   appearance, and is called horama. There be two words in the New
   Testament signifying vision, horama and optasia, coming from different
   verbs, but both signifying to see. Some distinguish them, and say that
   optasia is a vision, -- kath' hupar, an appearance to a man awake;
   horama, -- kath' onar, an appearance to a man asleep, called sometimes
   a dream, Job xxxiii. 15, -- like that which was made to Joseph, Matt.
   ii. 19. But this distinction will not hold, our Saviour calling that
   vision which his disciples had at his transfiguration, when doubtless
   they were waking, horama, Matt. xvii. 9. So that I conceive Paul had
   his vision waking; -- and the night is specified as the time thereof,
   not to intimate his being asleep, but rather his watchfulness, seeking
   counsel of God in the night which way he should apply himself in the
   preaching of the gospel. And such I suppose was that of latter days,
   whereby God revealed to Zuinglius a strong confirmation of the doctrine
   of the Lord's supper, from Exod. xii. 11, against the factors for that
   monstrous figment of transubstantiation.

   2. For the second, or time of this vision, I need say no more than what
   before I intimated.

   3. The bringer of the message, -- aner tis en Makedon hestos, he was a
   man of Macedonia in a vision. The Lord made an appearance unto him as
   of a man of Macedonia, discovering even to his bodily eyes a man; and
   to his mind, that he was to be conceived as a man of Macedonia. This
   was, say some, [22] an angel; -- the tutelar angel of the place, say
   the popish expositors, [23] or the genius of the place, according to
   the phrase of the heathens, of whom they learned their demonology; --
   perhaps him, or his antagonist, that not long before appeared to Brutus
   [24] at Philippi. But these are pleasing dreams; -- us it may suffice
   that it was the appearance of a man, the mind of Paul being enlightened
   to apprehend him as a man [25] of Macedonia; and that with infallible
   assurance, such as usually accompanieth divine revelations in them to
   whom they are made, as Jer. xxiii. 28, -- for upon it Luke affirmeth,
   verse 10, they assuredly concluded that the Lord called them into
   Macedonia.

   4. The message itself is a discovery of the want of the Macedonians,
   and the assistance they required, which the Lord was willing should be
   imparted unto them. Their want is not expressed, but included in the
   assistance desired, and the person unto whom for it they were directed.
   Had it been to help them in their estates, they should scarcely have
   been sent to Paul, who, I believe, might for the most part say, with
   Peter, "Silver and gold have I none;" [26] -- or had it been with a
   complaint that they -- who from a province of Greece, in a corner of
   Europe, had on a sudden been exalted into the empire of the eastern
   world -- were now enslaved to the Roman power and oppression, they
   might better have gone to the Parthians, then the only state in the
   world formidable to the Romans. Paul, though a military man, yet fought
   not with Nero's legions, the then visible devil of the upper world; but
   with legions of hell, of whom the earth was now to be cleared. [27] It
   must be a soul-want, if he be entrusted with the supplying of it. And
   such this was, -- help from death, hell, Satan, from the jaws of that
   devouring lion. Of this the Lord makes them here to speak, what every
   one in that condition ought to speak, -- Help, for the Lord's sake. It
   was a call to preach the gospel.

   The words being opened, we must remember what was said before of their
   connection with the verses foregoing, -- wherein the preachers of the
   gospel are expressly hindered from above from going to other places,
   and called hither. Whereof no reason is assigned, but only the will of
   Him that did employ them; and that no other can be rendered I am
   farther convinced, by considering the empty conjectures of attempters.

   God foresaw that they would oppose the gospel, says our Beda. So, say
   I, might he of all nations in the world, had not he determined to send
   his effectual grace [28] for the removal of that opposition; besides,
   he grants the means of grace to despisers, Matt. xi. 21. -- They were
   not prepared for the gospel, says OEcumenius. As well, say I, as the
   Corinthians, whose preparations you may see, 1 Cor. vi. 9-11; or any
   other nation, as we shall afterward declare: yet to this foolish
   conjecture adhere the Papists and Arminians [29] -- God would have
   those places left for to be converted by John, says Sedulius; yet the
   church at Ephesus, the chief city of those parts, was planted by Paul,
   says Ignatius and Irenæus. [30] -- He foresaw a famine to come upon
   those places, says Origen, from which he would deliver his own; and
   therefore, it seems, left them to the power of the devil. More such
   fancies [31] might we recount, of men unwilling to submit to the will
   of God; but upon that, as the sole discriminating cause of these
   things, we rest, and draw these three observations:--

   I. The rule whereby all things are dispensed here below, -- especially
   in the making out of the means of grace, -- is the determinate will and
   counsel of God. Stay not in Asia, go not into Bithynia, but come to
   Macedonia. "Even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight."

   II. The sending of the gospel to any nation, place, or persons, rather
   than others, as the means of life and salvation, is of the mere free
   grace and good pleasure of God. "Stay not in Asia;" etc.

   III. No men in the world want help, like them that want the gospel.
   "Come and help us."

   I. Begin we with the first of these: The rule whereby, etc. All events
   and effects, especially concerning the propagation of the gospel and
   the Church of Christ, are, in their greatest variety, regulated by the
   eternal purpose and counsel of God. [32]

   All things below in their events are but the wax, [33] whereon the
   eternal seal of God's purpose hath left its own impression; and they
   every way answer unto it. It is not my mind to extend this to the
   generality of things in the world, nor to show how the creature can by
   no means deviate from that eternal rule of providence whereby it is
   guided; -- no more than an arrow can avoid the mark, after it hath
   received the impression of an unerring hand, -- or well-ordered wheels
   not turn according to the motion given them by the master-spring, -- or
   the wheels in Ezekiel's vision [34] move irregularly to the spirit of
   life that was in them. Nor yet, secondly, how that, on the other side,
   doth no way prejudice the liberty of second causes, [35] in their
   actions, agreeable to the natures they are endued withal. He who made
   and preserves the fire, and yet hinders not but that it should burn, or
   act necessarily agreeable to its nature; by his making, preserving, and
   guiding of men, hindereth not, yea, effectually causeth, that they work
   freely, agreeable to their nature. Nor yet, thirdly, to clear up what a
   straight line runs through all the darkness, confusion, and disorder in
   the world, [36] -- how absolutely, in respect of the first fountain and
   last tendency of things, there is neither deformity, fault, nor
   deviation, every thing that is amiss consisting in the transgression of
   a moral rule, which is the sin of the creature, [37] the first cause
   being free:-- as he that causeth a lame man to go, is the cause of his
   going, but not of his going lame; -- or the sun exhaling a smell from
   the kennel, is the cause of the smell, but not of its noisomeness; for
   from a garden his beams raise a sweet savour. Nothing is amiss but what
   goeth off from its own rule; which he cannot do who will do all his
   pleasure, [38] and knows no other rule.

   But omitting these things, I shall tie my discourse to that which I
   chiefly aimed at in my proposition; viz., to discover how the great
   variety which we see in the dispensation of the means of grace,
   proceedeth from, and is regulated by, some eternal purpose of God,
   unfolded in his word. To make out this, we must lay down three things.

   1. The wonderful variety in dispensing of the outward means of
   salvation, in respect of them unto whom they were granted, used by the
   Lord since the fall; -- I say, since the fall, for the grace of
   preserving from sin, and continuing with God, had been general,
   universally extended to every creature; but [as] for the grace of
   rising from sin, and coming again unto God, that is made exceeding
   various, by some distinguishing purpose.

   2. That this outward dispensation being presupposed, yet in effectual
   working upon, particular persons, there is no less variety; for "he
   hath mercy on whom he will have mercy."

   3. Discover the rules of this whole administration.

   1. For the first, The promise was at first made unto Adam, and by him
   doubtless conveyed to his issue, and preached to the several
   generations which his eyes beheld proceeding from his own loins; [39]
   but yet by the wickedness of the old world, all flesh corrupting their
   ways, we may easily collect that the knowledge of it quickly departed
   from the most; -- sin banishing the love of God from their hearts,
   hindered the knowledge of God from continuing in their minds. [40]
   After many revivings, by visions, revelations, and covenants, it was at
   length called in from the wide world, and wholly restrained to the
   house, family, and seed of Abraham, [41] with whom alone all the means
   of grace continued for thrice fourteen generations. They alone were in
   Goshen, and all the world besides in thick darkness; -- the dew of
   heaven was on them as the fleece, when else all the earth was dry. God
   "showeth his word unto Jacob, his statutes and his judgments unto
   Israel. He hath not dealt so with any nation," Ps. cxlvii. 19, 20. The
   prerogative of the Jews was chiefly in this, that to them were
   committed the oracles of God, Rom. iii. 1. To them pertained "the
   adoption, and the glory, the covenants, and the giving of the law, and
   the service of God, and the promises," Rom. ix. 4. But when the fulness
   [42] of time came, the Son of God being sent in the likeness of sinful
   flesh, drew all men unto him; and God, who had before winked at the
   time of their ignorance, then called them every where to repent,
   commanding the gospel to be preached to the universality of reasonable
   creatures, and the way of salvation to be proclaimed unto all; -- upon
   which, in few years, the sound of the gospel went out into all nations,
   [43] and the Sun of righteousness displayed his beams upon the
   habitable parts of the earth. But yet once more this light, by Satan
   and his agents, persecutors and seducers, is almost extinguished, as
   was foretold, 2 Thess. ii., -- remaining but in few places, and burning
   dim where it was, -- the kingdom of the beast being full of darkness,
   Rev. xvi. 10. Yet God again raiseth up reformers, and by them kindles a
   light, we hope, never to be put out. But, alas! what a spot of ground
   doth this shine on, in comparison of the former vast extents and bounds
   of the Christian world! Now, is all this variety, think you, to be
   ascribed unto chance, as the philosopher thought the world was made by
   a casual concurrence of atoms? or hath the idol free-will, with the new
   goddess contingency, ruled in these dispensations? Truly neither the
   one nor the other, no more than the fly raised the dust by sitting on
   the chariot wheel; -- but all these things have come to pass according
   to a certain unerring rule, given them by God's determinate purpose and
   counsel.

   2. Presupposing this variety in the outward means, how is it that
   thereupon one is taken, another left? The promise is made known to Cain
   and Abel; -- one the first murderer, the other the first martyr. Jacob
   and Esau had the same outward advantages; but the one becomes Israel,
   the other Edom, -- the one inherits the promises, the other sells his
   right for a mess of pottage. At the preaching of our Saviour, some
   believed, some blasphemed; -- some said he was a good man; others said,
   nay, but he deceived the people. Have we not the word in its power this
   day, and do we not see the like various effects, -- some continuing in
   impenitency, others in sincerity closing with Jesus Christ? Now, what
   shall we say to these things? What guides these wheels? who thus steers
   his word for the good of souls? Why, this also, as I said before, is
   from some peculiarly distinguishing purpose of the will of God.

   3. To open the third thing proposed, I shall show, -- (1.) That all
   this variety is according to God's determinate purpose, and answereth
   thereunto; (2.) The particular purposes from whence this variety
   proceedeth.

   (1.) Eph. i. 11, "He worketh all things according to the counsel of his
   own will." As a man may be said to erect a fabric [44] according to the
   counsel of his will, when he frameth it before in his mind, and maketh
   all things in event answer his preconceived platform, -- all things
   (especially ta panta, all those things of which the apostle there
   treateth, gospel things) have their futurition and manner of being from
   his eternal purpose: [45] -- whence also is the idea in the mind of God
   of all things, with their circumstances, [46] that shall be; that is,
   the first mover, continuing itself immovable, giving to every thing a
   regular motion, according to the impression which from that it doth
   receive: "For known unto him are all his works from the beginning of
   the world," Acts xv. 18.

   If any attendants of actions might free and exempt them from the
   regular dependence we insist upon, they must be either contingency or
   sin; but yet for both these we have, besides general rules, clear,
   particular [47] instances. What seems more contingent and casual than
   the unadvised slaying of a man with the fall of the head of an axe from
   the helve, as a man was cutting wood by the way side? Deut. xix. 5; yet
   God assumes this as his own work, Exod. xxi. 13. The same may be said
   of free agents and their actions. And for the other, see Acts iv. 27,
   28, -- in the crucifying of the Son of God's love, -- all things came
   to pass according as his counsel had before deter -- mined that it
   should be done. Now, how in the one of these liberty is not abridged,
   the nature of things not changed in the other, sin is not countenanced,
   [48] belongs not to this discourse. "The counsel of the Lord," then,
   "standeth for ever, the thoughts of his heart unto all generations,"
   Ps. xxxiii. 11. "His counsel standeth, and he will do all his
   pleasure," Isa. xlvi. 10. For he is the Lord, and he changeth not, Mal.
   iii. 6. With him is neither variableness nor shadow of turning, James
   i. 17. All things that are, come to pass in that unchangeable method in
   which he hath laid them down from all eternity.

   (2.) Let us look peculiarly upon the purposes according to which the
   dispensations of the gospel, both in sending and withholding it, do
   proceed.

   [1.] For the not sending of the means of grace unto any people, whereby
   they hear not the joyful sound of the gospel, but have in all ages
   followed dumb idols, as many do unto this day. In this chapter of which
   we treat, the gospel is forbidden to be preached in Asia and Bithynia;
   -- which restraint, the Lord by his providence as yet continues to many
   parts of the world. Now, the purpose from whence this proceedeth, and
   whereby it is regulated, you have, Rom. ix. 22, "What if God, willing
   to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much
   long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction?" compared
   with Matt. xi. 25, 26, "Thou hast hid these things from the wise and
   prudent. Even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight;" and with
   Acts xiv. 16, -- he "suffered all nations to walk in their own ways."
   [49] Now, God's not sending the truth, hath the same design and aim
   with his sending the efficacy of error; viz., "that they all may be
   damned" who have it not; "there being no other name under heaven,
   whereby they may be saved," but only that which is not revealed unto
   them; -- God, in the meantime, being no more the cause [50] of their
   sins, for which they incur damnation, than the sun is the cause of cold
   and darkness, which follow the absence thereof: or he is the cause of a
   man's imprisonment for debt, who will not pay his debt for him, though
   he be no way obliged so to do. So, then, the not sending of the gospel
   to any people, is an act regulated by that eternal purpose of God
   whereby he determineth to advance the glory of his justice, by
   permitting some men to sin, to continue in their sin, and for sin to
   send them to their own place; -- as a king's not sending a pardon to
   condemned malefactors is an issue of his purpose that they shall die
   for their faults. When you see the gospel strangely, and through
   wonderful varieties and unexpected providences, carried away from a
   people, know that the spirit which moves in those wheels is that
   purpose of God which we have recounted.

   [2.] To some people, to some nations, the gospel is sent. God calls
   them to repentance and acknowledgment of the truth, -- as in my text,
   Macedonia: and England, the day wherein we breathe. Now, there is in
   this a twofold aim. 1. Peculiar, towards some in their conversion. 2.
   General, towards all, for conviction. And therefore it is acted
   according to a twofold purpose, which carries it along, and is
   fulfilled thereby.

   First, His purpose of saving [51] some in and by Jesus Christ,
   effectually to bring them unto himself, for the praise of his glorious
   grace. Upon whomsoever the seal of the Lord is stamped, that God knows
   them, and owns them as his, to them he will cause his gospel to be
   revealed. Acts xviii. 10, Paul is commanded to abide at Corinth, and to
   preach there, because God had much people in that city. Though the
   devil had them in present possession, [52] yet they were God's in his
   eternal counsel. And such as these they were for whose sake the man of
   Macedonia is sent on his message. Have you never seen the gospel hover
   about a nation, now and then about to settle, and anon scared and upon
   wing again; yet working through difficulties, making plains of
   mountains and filling valleys, overthrowing armies, putting aliens to
   flight, and at length taking firm root like the cedars of God? Truly if
   you have not, you are strangers to the place wherein you live. Now,
   what is all this but the working of the purpose of God to attain its
   proposed end, of gathering his saints to himself? In the effectual
   working of grace also for conversion and salvation, whence do you think
   it takes its rule and determination, in respect of particular objects,
   that it should be directed to John, not Judas, -- Simon Peter, not
   Simon Magus? Why, only from this discriminating [53] counsel of God
   from eternity, to bring the one and not the other to himself by Christ.
   "The Lord added to the church such as should be saved," Acts ii. 47.
   The purpose of saving is the rule of adding to the church of believers.
   And Acts xiii. 48, "As many believed as were ordained to eternal life."
   Their fore-ordaining to life eternal gives them right to faith and
   belief. The purpose of God's election is the rule of dispensing saving
   grace.

   Secondly, His purpose of leaving some inexcusable [54] in their sins,
   for the farther manifestation of his glorious justice, is the rule of
   dispensing the word unto them. Did you never see the gospel sent or
   continued to an unthankful people, [55] bringing forth no fruits meet
   for it? Wherefore it is so sent, see Isa. vi. 9, 10; -- which prophecy
   you have fulfilled, John xii. 37-41; in men described, Jude 4, and 1
   Pet. ii. 8. But here we must strike sail, the waves swell, and it is no
   easy task to sail in this gulf. The righteousness of God is a great
   mountain, easy to be seen; but his judgments are like the great deep:
   who can search into the bottom thereof? Ps. xxxvi. 6. And so I have, I
   hope, discovered how all things here below, concerning the promulgation
   of the gospel, are, in their greatest variety, straightly regulated by
   the eternal purposes and counsel of God.

   The uses of it follow.

   Use 1. To discover whence it is that the work of reforming the worship
   of God, and settling the almost departing gospel, hath so powerfully
   been carried along in this nation; -- that a beautiful fabric is seen
   to arise in the midst of all oppositions, with the confusion of axes
   and hammers sounding about it, though the builders have been forced
   oftentimes, not only with one hand, but with both, to hold the weapons
   [56] of war; -- that although the wheels of our chariots have been
   knocked off, and they driven heavily, yet the regular motions of the
   superior wheels of providence have carried on the design towards the
   resting-place aimed at; -- that the ship hath been directed to the
   port, though the storm had quite puzzled the pilots and mariners:--
   even from hence, that all this great variety was but to work out one
   Certain fore-appointed end, proceeding in the tracts and paths which
   were traced out for it from eternity; which, though they have seemed to
   us a maze or labyrinth, such a world of contingencies and various
   chances hath the work passed through, yet, indeed, all the passages
   thereof have been regular and straight, answering the platform laid
   down for the whole in the counsel of God. Dan. ix. 1, makes his
   supplication for the restoration of Jerusalem; verse 23, an angel is
   sent to tell him, that "at the beginning of his supplication the
   commandment came forth," -- viz., that it should be accomplished. It
   was before determined, and is now set on work; but yet what mountains
   [57] of opposition, what hinderances lay in the way! Cyrus must come to
   the crown by the death or slaughter of Darius, [58] -- his heart be
   moved to send some to the work: in a short time Cyrus is cut off. Now,
   difficulties arise from the following kings:-- what their flattering
   counsellors, what the malignant nations about them conspired, the books
   of Nehemiah and Ezra sufficiently declare. Whence, verse 25, the angel
   tells Daniel, that from "the commandment to restore and build Jerusalem
   unto Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and sixty-two weeks; the
   street shall be built again, and the wall, in troublesome times;" that
   is, it shall be seven weeks to the finishing of Jerusalem, and thence
   to Messiah the Prince sixty-two weeks; -- seven weeks, that is,
   forty-nine years; for so much it was from the decree of Cyrus [59] to
   the finishing of the wall by Nehemiah: of which time the temple, as the
   Jews affirmed, was all but three years in building, John ii. 20. During
   which space, how often did the hearts of the people of God faint in
   their troubles, as though they should never have seen an end! And
   therefore, ever and anon they were ready to give over, as Hag. i. 2.
   But yet we see the decree was fixed, and all those varieties did but
   orderly work in an exact method for the glorious accomplishment of it.

   England's troubles have not yet endured above half the odd years of
   those reformers' task; yet, good God! how short-breathed are men! What
   fainting is there! what repining, what grudging against the ways of the
   Lord! But let me tell you, that as the water in the stream will not go
   higher than the head of the fountain, no more will the work in hand be
   carried one step higher or beyond the aim of its fountain, the counsel
   of God, from whence it hath its rise. And yet, as a river will break
   through all oppositions, and swell to the height of mountains, to go to
   the sea from whence it came; so will the stream of the gospel, when it
   comes out from God, break down all mountains of opposition, and not be
   hindered from resting in its appointed place. It were an easy thing to
   recall your minds to some trembling periods of time, when there was
   trembling in our armies, and trembling in our councils, -- trembling to
   be ashamed, to be repented of, -- trembling in the city and in the
   country; and men were almost at their wits' end for the sorrows and
   fears of those days: and yet we see how the unchangeable purpose of God
   hath wrought strongly through all these straits, from one end to
   another, that nothing might fall to the ground of what he had
   determined. If a man, in those days, had gone about to persuade us that
   all our pressures were good omens, that they all wrought together for
   our good, we could have been ready to cry, with the woman who, when she
   had recounted her griefs to the physician, and he still replied they
   were good signs, oi moi agathon apollumai, "Good signs have undone me,"
   -- These good signs will be our ruin: yet, behold, we hope the
   contrary. Our day hath been like that mentioned, Zech. xiv. 6, 7, -- a
   day whose light is neither clear nor dark, -- a day known only to the
   Lord, seeming to us to be neither day nor night. But God knew all this
   while that it was a day, -- he saw how it all wrought for the appointed
   end; and in the evening, in the close, it will be light, so light as to
   be to us discernible. In the meantime we are like unskilful men, [who]
   going to the house of some curious artist, so long as he is about his
   work, despise it as confused; but when it is finished, admire it as
   excellent:-- whilst the passages of providence are on us, all is
   confusion; but when the fabric is reared, glorious.

   Use 2. Learn to look upon the wisdom of God in carrying all things
   through this wonderful variety, exactly to answer his own eternal
   purpose; -- suffering so many mountains to lie in the way of reforming
   his churches and settling the gospel, that his Spirit may have the
   glory, and his people the comfort in their removal. It is a high and
   noble contemplation, to consider the purposes of God, so far as by the
   event revealed, and to see what impressions his wisdom and power do
   leave upon things accomplished here below, -- to read in them a
   temporary history of his eternal counsels. Some men may deem it
   strange, that his determinate will, which gives rule to these things,
   and could in a word have reached its own appointment, should carry his
   people so many journeys in the wilderness, and keep us thus long in so
   low estate. I say, -- not to speak of his own glory, which hath
   sparkled forth of this flinty opposition, -- there be divers things,
   things of light, for our good, which he hath brought forth out of all
   that darkness wherewith we have been overclouded. Take a few instances.

   (1.) If there had been no difficulties, there had been no deliverances.
   And did we never find our hearts so enlarged towards God upon such
   advantages, as to say, Well, this day's temper of spirit was cheaply
   purchased by yesterday's anguish and fear; -- that was but a being sick
   at sea?

   (2.) Had there been no tempests and storms, we had not made out for
   shelter. Did you never run to a tree for shelter in a storm, and find
   fruit which you expected not? Did you never go to God for safeguard in
   these times, [60] driven by outward storms, and there find unexpected
   fruit, the "peaceable fruit of righteousness," [61] that made you say,
   Happy tempest, which cast me into such a harbour? It was a storm [62]
   that occasioned the discovery of the golden mines of India; -- hath not
   a storm driven some to the discovery of the richer mines of the love of
   God in Christ?

   (3.) Had not Esau come against him with four hundred men, Jacob had not
   been called Israel; -- he had not been put to it to try his strength
   with God, and so to prevail. Who would not purchase with the greatest
   distress that heavenly comfort which is in the return of prayers? The
   strength of God's Jacobs in this kingdom had not been known, if the
   Esaus had not come against them. Some say, this war hath made a
   discovery of England's strength, what it is able to do. I think so
   also, -- not what armies it can raise against men, but with what armies
   of prayers and tears it is able to deal with God. Had not the brethren
   strove in the womb, Rebekah had not asked, "Why am I thus?" -- nor
   received that answer, "The elder shall serve the younger." Had not two
   sorts of people struggled in the womb of this kingdom, we had not
   sought, nor received, such gracious answers. Thus do all the various
   motions of the lower wheels serve for our good, and exactly answer the
   impression they receive from the master-spring, the eternal purpose of
   God. Of this hitherto.

   II. The sending of the gospel to any one nation rather than another, as
   the means of life and salvation, is of the mere free grace and good
   pleasure of God.

   Now; before I come to make out the absolute independency and freedom of
   this distinguishing mercy, I shall premise three things.

   1. That the not sending of the gospel to any person or people is of
   God's mere good pleasure, [63] and not of any peculiar distinguishing
   demerit in that person or people. No man or nation doth "majorem ponere
   obicem," lay more or greater obstacles against the gospel than another.
   There is nothing imaginable to lay a block in the passage thereof but
   only sin. Now, these sins are, or may be, of two sorts; -- either,
   first, Against the gospel itself, which may possibly hinder the
   receiving of the gospel, but not the sending of it, which it
   presupposeth: secondly, Against the covenant they are under, and the
   light they are guided by, before the beams of the gospel shine upon
   them. Now, in these generally all are equal, [64] all having sinned and
   come short of the glory of God; and in particular sins against the law
   and light of nature, no nations have gone farther than they which were
   soonest enlightened with the word, as afterward will appear: so that
   the sole cause of this is the good pleasure of God, as our Saviour
   affirmeth, Matt. xi. 25, 26.

   2. That sins against the covenant of works, which men are under before
   the gospel [65] comes unto them, cannot have any general demerit, that
   the means of life and salvation by free grace should not be imparted to
   them. It is true, all nations have deserved to be turned into hell, and
   a people that have had the truth, and detained it in ungodliness,
   deserve to be deprived of it; -- the first, by virtue of the sanction
   of the first broken covenant; the other, by sinning against that which
   they had of the second. But that men in a fallen condition, and not
   able to rise, should hereby deserve not to be helped up, needeth some
   distinction to clear it.

   There is, then, a twofold demerit and indignity; -- one merely
   negative, or a not deserving to have good done unto us; the other
   positive, deserving that good should not be done unto us. The first of
   these is found in all the world, in respect of the dispensation of the
   gospel. If the Lord should bestow it only on those who do deserve it,
   he must for ever keep it closed up in the eternal treasure of his own
   bosom. The second is found directly in none, in respect of that
   peculiar way which is discovered in the gospel, because they had not
   sinned against it; which, rightly considered, gives no small lustre to
   the freedom of grace.

   3. That there is a right in the gospel, and a fitness in that gracious
   dispensation to be made known to all people in the world; that no
   singular portion of the earth should be any longer a holy land, or any
   mountain of the world lift up its head above its fellows. And this
   right hath a double foundation.

   (1.) The infinite value and worth of the blood of Christ, giving
   fulness [66] and fitness to the promises founded thereon to be
   propounded to all mankind; for through his blood remission of sins is
   preached to whosoever believes on him, Acts x. 43, -- "to every
   creature," Mark xvi. 15. God would have a price of that infinite value
   for sin laid down, as might justly give advantage to proclaim a pardon
   infinitely to all that will come in and accept of it, -- there being in
   it no defect at all (though intentionally only a ransom for some), but
   that by it the world might know that he had done whatsoever the Father
   commanded him, John xiv. 31.

   (2.) In that economy and dispensation of the grace of the new covenant,
   breaking forth in these latter days, whereby all external distinction
   of places and persons, [67] people and nations, being removed, Jesus
   Christ taketh all [68] nations to be his inheritance, dispensing to all
   men the grace of the gospel, bringing salvation, as seemeth best to
   him, Tit. ii. 11, 12. For being lifted up, he drew all unto him, having
   redeemed us with his blood, "out of every kindred and tongue, people
   and nation," Apoc. v. 9. And on these two grounds it is that the gospel
   hath in itself a right and fitness to be preached to all, even as many
   as the Lord our God shall call.

   These things being premised, I come to the proof of the assertion.

   Deut. vii. 7, 8. Moses is very careful in sundry places to get this to
   take an impression upon their spirits, that it was mere free grace that
   exalted them into that condition and dignity wherein they stood, by
   their approach unto God, in the enjoyment of his ordinances; -- in this
   most clearly rendering the cause of God's love in choosing them,
   mentioned, verse 7, to be only his love. Verse 8, his love towards them
   is the cause of his love, -- his free love eternally determining, his
   free love actually conferring, those distinguishing mercies upon them.
   It was not for their righteousness, for they were a stiff-necked
   people, Deut. ix. 6.

   Matt. xi. 25, 26: Our Saviour laying both these things together, the
   hiding of the mysteries of salvation from some, and revealing them to
   others, renders the same reason and supreme cause of both, of which no
   account can be rendered, only the good pleasure of God: "I thank thee,
   O Father." And if any will proceed higher, and say, Where is the
   justice of this, that men equally obnoxious should be thus unequally
   accepted? we say, with Paul, "That he will have mercy on whom he will
   have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth. And who art thou, O man,
   that disputest against God?" "Si tu es homo, et ego homo, audiamus
   dicentem, O homo, Tu quis?" [69] To send a pardon to some that are
   condemned, suffering the rest to suffer, hath no injustice. If this
   will not satisfy, let us say, with the same apostle, O bathos, Rom. xi.
   33, "O the depth," etc.

   Yea, so far is it from truth, that God should dispense and grant his
   word and means of grace by any other rule, or upon any other motive,
   than his own will and good pleasure, [70] that we find in Scripture the
   direct contrary to what we would suppose, even mercy showed to the more
   unworthy, and the more worthy passed by; reckoning worthiness and
   unworthiness by less or greater sin, with less or more endeavours.
   Christ preaches to Chorazin and Bethsaida, which would not repent; and
   at the same time denies the word to Tyre and Sidon, which would have
   gotten on sackcloth and ashes, when the other continued delicate
   despisers, Matt. xi. 21. Ezekiel is sent to them that would not hear
   him, passing by them that would have hearkened, chap. iii. 5; which is
   most clear, Rom. ix. 30, 31, "The Gentiles, which followed not after
   righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness
   which is of faith; but Israel, which followed after the law of
   righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness." If, in
   the dispensation of the gospel, the Lord had had any respect to the
   desert of people, Corinth, that famous place of sinning, had not so
   soon enjoyed it, -- the people whereof, for worship, were led away with
   dumb idols, 1 Cor. xii. 2; and for their lives, you have them drawn to
   the life, 1 Cor. vi. 9-11, "Fornicators, idolaters, adulterers;
   effeminate, abusers of themselves with mankind, thieves, covetous,
   drunkards, revilers, extortioners," kai tauta tines ete, which is to be
   repeated, apo tou koinou, -- "Some of you were fornicators, some
   idolaters; but ye are sanctified." Seem not these to the eye of flesh
   goodly qualifications for the gospel of Jesus Christ? Had these men
   been dealt withal according as they had disposed themselves, not fitter
   fuel for hell could the justice of God require; but yet ye see to these
   the gospel comes with the first, "a light shines to them that sit in
   darkness and in the shadow of death."

   If God send or grant the gospel, which is the means of grace, upon any
   other ground but his mere good pleasure, then it must be an act of
   remunerative justice. [71] Now, there is no such justice in God towards
   the creature, but what is founded upon some preceding covenant, or
   promise of God to the creature, -- which is the only foundation of all
   relation between God and man, -- but only those that attend creation
   and sovereignty. Now, what promise do you find made to, or covenant
   with, a people as yet without the gospel; -- I mean conditional
   promises, inferring any good to be bestowed on any required performance
   on their part? Free, absolute promises there are innumerable, that
   light should shine to them that were in darkness, and those be called
   God's people which were not his people; but such as depend on any
   condition on their part to be fulfilled, we find none. God bargains
   [72] not with the creature about the gospel, knowing how unable he is
   to be merchant for such pearls. If a man had all that goodness which
   may be found in man without Jesus Christ, they would not in the least
   measure procure a discovery of him.

   I deny not but God may, and perhaps sometimes doth, reveal himself to
   some in a peculiar and extraordinary manner. Whereunto tends that story
   in Aquinas, [73] of a corpse taken up in the days of Constantine and
   Irene, with a plate of gold, and this inscription on it, "Christus
   nascetur ex virgine, ego credo in illum. O sol sub Irenæ et Constantini
   temporibus iterum me videbis." But that this should be regular unto men
   living, meta logou, in Justin Martyr's phrase, [74] or using their
   naturals aright (which is impossible they should, the right use of
   naturals depending on supernaturals), is wide from the word.

   If there be any outward motive of granting the gospel unto any, it is
   some acceptable performances of theirs, holding up to the rule and will
   of God. Now, this will and rule having no saving revelation but by the
   gospel, which should thus be procured by acts agreeable unto it, makes
   up a flat contradiction, -- supposing the revelation of the gospel
   before it be revealed. Doubtless, according to all rules of justice to
   us made known, it is an easier thing to deserve heaven by obedience now
   under the covenant of works, than being under that covenant, to do any
   thing that might cause a new way of salvation, such as the gospel is,
   to be revealed.

   With some observations I descend to application.

   [1.] There is the same reason of continuing the gospel unto a people as
   of sending it; especially if oppositions rise high, apt and able in
   themselves for its removal. Never nation as yet enjoyed the word that
   deserved the continuance of the word. God hath always [75] something
   against a people, to make the continuing of his grace to be of grace,
   the not removing of his love to be merely of love, and the preaching of
   the gospel to be a mercy of the gospel, free and undeserved. Though
   there be work, and labour, and patience for Christ's sake at Ephesus;
   yet there is somewhat against Ephesus, Rev. ii. 4, 5, for which he
   might justly remove his candlestick; and if he doth it not, it is of
   the same mercy that first set it there. As God lays out goodness and
   grace in the entrance; so patience, long-suffering, and forbearance in
   the continuance. He bears with our manners, whilst we grieve his
   Spirit. Look upon the face of this kingdom, and view the body of the
   people; think of the profaneness, villany, trampling upon the blood of
   Jesus, ignorance, contempt of God and his ways, despising his
   ordinances, reviling his servants, branding and defaming the power of
   godliness, persecuting and tearing one another, -- and yet hear the
   joyful sound of the word in every corner; and you will quickly
   conclude, that you see a great fight of God's love against our sins,
   and not of our goodness for his love.

   [2.] There is the same reason of the reformation and the doctrine of
   the gospel corrupted with error, and of the worship of God collapsed
   with superstition, as of the first implantation of the gospel. God, in
   his just judgment of late ages, had sent upon the western world the
   efficacy of error, that they should believe lies, because they received
   not the love of the truth; as he foretold, 2 Thess. ii. 1. Now, whence
   is it that we see some of the nations thereof as yet suffered to walk
   in their own ways, others called to repentance, -- some wildernesses
   turned into green pastures for the flock of God, and some places made
   barren wildernesses for the wickedness of them that dwell therein? How
   comes it that this island glories in a reformation, and Spain sits
   still in darkness? Is it because we were better than they, or less
   engaged in antichristian delusions? Doubtless no. No nation in the
   world drank deeper of that cup of abomination. It was a proverbial
   speech amongst all, "England was our good ass" (a beast of burden) for
   (Antichrist whom they called) the Pope. Nothing but the good pleasure
   of God and Christ, freely coming to refine us, Mal. iii. 1-4, caused
   this distinction.

   [3.] Though men can do nothing towards the procuring of the gospel, yet
   men may do much for the expulsion of the gospel. If the husbandmen
   prove idle or self-seekers, the vineyard will be let to others; and if
   the people love darkness more than light, the candlestick will be
   removed. Let England beware! Now this men may do, either upon the first
   entrance of the gospel, or after some continuance of it. The gospel
   spreading itself over the earth, finds entertainment, like that of
   men's seeking plantations amongst barbarous nations; sometimes kept out
   with hideous outcries at the shore, -- sometimes suffered to enter with
   admiration, and a little after violently assaulted.

   1st, In the first way, how do we find the Jews putting far from them
   the word of life, and rejecting the counsel of God at its first
   entrance, -- calling for night at the rising of the sun! Hence, Acts
   xiii. 41, Paul concludes his sermon to thorn with, "Behold, ye
   despisers, and wonder, and perish;" -- and verse 46, it was necessary
   the word should be preached to them; but seeing they judged themselves
   unworthy, they were forsaken; -- and verse 51, they shake off the dust
   of their feet against them, -- a common symbol in those days of the
   highest indignation and deepest curse. The like stubbornness we find in
   them, Acts xxviii.; whereupon the apostle wholly turned himself to the
   Gentiles, verse 28. How many nations of Europe, at the beginning of the
   Reformation, rejected the gospel of God, and procured Christ, with the
   Gadarenes, to depart as soon as he was entered, will be found at the
   last day written with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus that suffered
   amongst them!

   2dly, After some continuance. So the Church of Laodicea, having for a
   while enjoyed the word, fell into such a tepid condition, -- so little
   moved with that fire that Christ came to send upon the earth, Rev. iii.
   15, 16, -- that the Lord was even sick and weary with bearing them. The
   Church of Rome, famous at the first, yet quickly, by the advantage of
   outward supportments and glorious fancies, became head of that fatal
   rebellion against Jesus Christ, [76] which spread itself over most of
   the churches in the world; -- God hereupon sending upon them the
   "efficacy of error to believe a lie, that they all might be damned that
   believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness," 2 Thess.
   ii. 1, -- suffering them to retain the empty names of Church and
   Gospel; which, because they usurp only for their advantage here, to
   appear glorious, the Lord will use for the advancing of his justice
   hereafter, to show them inexcusable. O Lord, how was England of late,
   by thy mercy, delivered from this snare! A captain being chosen for the
   return of this people into Egypt, O how hath thy grace fought against
   our backsliding! And let none seek to extenuate this mercy, by
   catalogues of errors still amongst us: there is more danger of apostasy
   against Christ, and rebellion against the truth, in one Babylonish
   error, owned by men pretending to power and jurisdiction over others,
   than in five hundred scattered amongst inconsiderable, disunited
   individuals. I would to God we could all speak and think the same
   things, -- that we were all of one mind, even in the most minute
   differences that are now amongst us. But yet the truth is, the kingdom
   of Jesus Christ never shakes amongst a people until men, pretending to
   act with a combined mixed power of heaven and earth, unto which all
   sheaves must bow or be thrashed, do, by virtue of this trust, set up
   and impose things or opinions deviating from the rule. As it was in the
   Papacy, errors owned by mixed associations, civil and ecclesiastical,
   are for the most part incurable, be they never so absurd and foolish;
   of which the Lutheran ubiquities and consubstantiation are a tremendous
   example. These things being presupposed, --

   Use 1. Let no flesh glory in themselves, but let every mouth be
   stopped; for we have all sinned and come short of the glory of God. Who
   hath made the possessors of the gospel to differ from others? or what
   have they that they have not received? 1 Cor. iv. 7. Why are these
   things hidden from the great and wise of the world, and revealed to
   babes and children, but because, O Father, so it pleased thee? Matt.
   xi. 26. "He hath mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he
   hardeneth," Rom. ix. 18. Ah, Lord, if the glory and pomp of the world
   might prevail with thee to send thy gospel, it would supply the room of
   the cursed Alkoran, and spread itself in the palaces of that strong
   lion of the east who sets his throne upon the necks of kings; but,
   alas! Jesus Christ is not there. If wisdom, learning, pretended
   gravity, counterfeit holiness, real policy, were of any value in thine
   eyes to procure the word of life, it would be as free and glorious at
   Rome as ever; but, alas! Antichrist hath his throne there. Jesus Christ
   is not there. If will-worship and humilities, neglect of the body,
   macerations, superstitions, beads, and vainly-repeated prayers, had any
   efficacy before the Lord, the gospel, perhaps, might be in the cells of
   some recluses and monks; but, alas! Jesus Christ is not there. If moral
   virtues to an amazement, exact civil honesty and justice, that soul of
   human society, could have prevailed aught, the heathen worthies in the
   days of old had had the promises; but, alas! Jesus Christ was far away.
   Now, if all these be passed by, to whom is the report of the Lord made
   known? to "whom is his arm revealed?" Why, to a handful of poor sinners
   amongst the nations formerly counted fierce and barbarous. [77] And
   what shall we say to these things? -- O bathos, "O the depth," etc.

   Use 2. Let England consider with fear and trembling the dispensation
   that it is now under; -- I say, with fear and trembling, for this day
   is the Lord's day, wherein he will purge us or burn us, according as we
   shall be found silver or dross:-- it is our day, wherein we must mend
   or end. Let us look to the rock from whence we were hewed, and the hole
   of the pit from whence we were digged. Was not our father an Amorite,
   and our mother an Hittite? Are we not the posterity of idolatrous
   progenitors? [78] -- of those who worshipped them who by nature were no
   gods? How often, also, hath this land forfeited the gospel! God having
   taken it twice away, who is not forward to seize upon the forfeiture.
   In the very morning of the gospel, the Sun of righteousness shone upon
   this land; and they say the first potentate on the earth that owned it
   was in Britain. [79] But as it was here soon professed, so it was here
   soon abused; that part of this island which is called England being the
   first place I read of which was totally bereaved of the gospel, -- the
   sword of the then pagan Saxons fattening the land with the blood of the
   Christian inhabitants, [80] and in the close wholly subverting the
   worship of God. Long it was not ere this cloud was blown over; and
   those men who had been instruments to root out others submitted their
   own necks to the yoke of the Lord; and, under exceeding variety in
   civil affairs, enjoyed the word of Mace, until, by insensible degrees,
   like summer unto winter, or light unto darkness, it gives place to
   antichristian superstition, and left the land in little less than a
   paganish darkness, drinking deep of the cup of abominations mingled for
   it by the Roman harlot. And is there mercy yet in God to recover a
   twice over lost backsliding people? Might not the Lord have said unto
   us, What shall I do unto thee, O island? How shall I make thee as
   Admah? how shall I set thee as Zeboim? But his heart is turned within
   him, his repentings are kindled together: the dry bones shall live, and
   the fleece shall be wet, though all the earth be dry. God will again
   water his garden, once more purge his vineyard, -- once more of his own
   accord he will take England upon liking, though he had twice deservedly
   turned it out of his service. So that, "coming as a refiner's fire, and
   as fuller's soap, to purify the sons of Levi, to purge them as gold and
   silver, to offer to the Lord an offering in righteousness," to reform
   his churches, England, as soon as any, hath the benefit and comfort
   thereof. Nay, the reformation of England shall be more glorious than of
   any nation in the world, being carried on neither by might nor power,
   but only by the Spirit of the Lord of hosts. But is this the utmost
   period of England's sinning, and God's showing mercy, in continuing and
   restoring of the gospel? No, truly: we again in our days have made
   forfeiture of the purity of his worship, by an almost universal
   treacherous apostasy; from which the free grace and good pleasure of
   God hath made a great progress again towards a recovery.

   There are two sorts of men that I find exceedingly ready to extenuate
   and lessen the superstition and popish tyranny of the former days, into
   which we were falling.

   (1.) Such as were industriously instrumental in it, whose suffrages had
   been loud for the choice of a captain to return into Egypt, -- men
   tainted with the errors and loaded with the preferments of the times;
   with all those who blindly adhere to that faction of men who as yet
   covertly drive on that design:-- to such as these all was nothing, and
   to them it is no mercy to be delivered. And the truth is, it is a
   favour to the lamb, and not the wolf, to have him taken out of his
   mouth; but these men have interest by those things which have no ears,
   against which there is no contending.

   (2.) Such as are disturbed in their optics, or have gotten false
   glasses, [81] representing all things unto them in dubious colours.
   Which way soever they look, they can see nothing but errors, -- errors
   of all sizes, sorts, sects, and sexes, -- errors and heresies from the
   beginning to the end; which have deceived some men, not of the worst,
   and made them think that all before was nothing, in comparison of the
   present confusion. A great sign they felt it not, or were not troubled
   at it; as if men should come into a field, and seeing some red weeds
   and cockle among the corn, should instantly affirm there is no corn
   there, but all weeds, and that it were much better the hedges were
   down, and the whole field laid open to the boars of the forest: but the
   harvest will one day show the truth of these things. But that these
   apprehensions may not too much prevail, to the vilifying and
   extenuating of God's mercy, in restoring to us the purity and liberty
   of the gospel, give me leave, in a few words, to set out the danger of
   that apostasy from which the good pleasure of God hath given us a
   deliverance. I shall instance only in a few things. Observe then, that,
   --

   [1.] The darling errors of late years were all of them stones of the
   old Babel, closing and coupling with that tremendous fabric which the
   man of sin had erected to dethrone Jesus Christ, -- came out of the
   belly of that Trojan horse, that fatal engine, which was framed to
   betray the city of God. They were popish errors, such as whereof that
   apostasy did consist which only is to be looked upon as the great
   adverse state of the kingdom of the Lord Christ. For a man to be
   disorderly in a civil state, yea, oftentimes through turbulency to
   break the peace, is nothing to an underhand combination with some
   formidable enemy for the utter subversion of it. Heedless and headless
   errors may breed disturbance enough, in scattered individuals, unto the
   people of God; but such as tend to a peace and association "cum
   ecclesia malignantium," tending to a total subversion of the sacred
   state, are far more dangerous. Now, such were the innovations of the
   late hierarchists. In worship, their paintings, [82] crossings,
   crucifixes, bowing, cringings, altars, tapers, wafers, organs, anthems,
   litany, rails, images, copes, vestments, -- what were they but Roman
   varnish, an Italian dress for our devotion, to draw on conformity with
   that enemy of the Lord Jesus? In doctrine, the divinity of Episcopacy,
   auricular confession, free-will, predestination on faith, yea, works
   foreseen, "limbus patrum," justification by works, falling from grace,
   authority of a church, which none knew what it was, canonical
   obedience, holiness of churches, and the like innumerable, -- what were
   they but helps to Sancta Clara, to make all our articles of religion
   speak good Roman Catholic? How did their old father of Rome refresh his
   spirit, to see such chariots as those provided to bring England again
   unto him! This closing with Popery was the sting in the errors of those
   days, which cause pining, if not death, in the episcopal pot.

   [2.] They were such as raked up the ashes of the ancient worthies,
   whose spirits God stirred up to reform his church, and rendered them
   contemptible before all, especially those of England, the most whereof
   died in giving their witness against the blind figment of the real
   presence, [83] and that abominable blasphemy of the cursed mass. In
   especial, how did England, heretofore termed ass, turn ape to the pope,
   having set up a stage, and furnished it with all things necessary for
   an unbloody sacrifice, [84] ready to set up the abomination of a
   desolation, and close with the god Maozim [mzym? Mauzzim, god of
   forces, Dan. xi. 38], who hath all their peculiar devotion at Rome?

   [3.] They were in the management of men which had divers dangerous and
   pernicious qualifications: as, --

   1st, A false repute of learning; I say, a false repute for the greater
   part, especially of the greatest. And yet, taking advantage of vulgar
   esteem, they bare out as though they had engrossed a monopoly of it, --
   though I presume the world was never deceived by more empty pretenders,
   especially in respect of any solid knowledge in divinity or antiquity;
   but yet their great preferments had got them a great repute of great
   deservings, -- enough to blind the eyes of poor mortals adoring them at
   a distance, and to persuade them, that all was not only law, but gospel
   too, which they broached: and this rendered the infection dangerous.

   2dly, A great hatred of godliness in the power thereof, or any thing
   beyond a form, in whomsoever it was found; yea, how many [85] odious
   appellations were invented for bare profession, to render it
   contemptible! -- especially in the exercise of their jurisdiction,
   thundering their censures against all appearance of zeal, and closing
   with all profane impieties; for were a man a drunkard, a swearer, a
   Sabbath-breaker, an unclean person, so he were no Puritan, and had
   money, -- "patet atri janua ditis," the Episcopal heaven was open for
   them all. Now, this was a dangerous and destructive qualification,
   which, I believe, is not professedly found in any party amongst us.

   3dly, Which was worst of all, they had centred in their bosoms an
   unfathomable depth of power, civil and ecclesiastical, to stamp their
   apostatical errors with authority, -- giving them not only the
   countenance of greatness, but the strength of power, violently urging
   obedience; and to me the sword of error never cuts dangerously but when
   it is managed with such a hand. This I am sure, that errors in such are
   not recoverable, without the utmost danger of the civil state.

   Let now, I beseech you, these and the like things be considered,
   especially the strong combination that was throughout the [86] papal
   world for the seducing of this poor nation (that I say nothing how this
   vial was poured out upon the very throne [87] ), and then let us all be
   ashamed and confounded in ourselves, that we should so undervalue and
   slight the free mercy of God in breaking such a snare, and setting the
   gospel at liberty in England. My intent was, having before asserted
   this restoration of Jerusalem to the good pleasure of God, to have
   stirred you up to thankfulness unto him, and self-humiliation in
   consideration of our great undeserving of such mercy; but, alas! as far
   as I can see, it will scarce pass for a mercy; and unless every man's
   persuasion may be a Joseph's sheaf, the goodness of God shall scarce be
   acknowledged. But yet let all the world know, and let the house of
   England know this day, that we lie unthankfully under as full a
   dispensation of mercy and grace as ever nation in the world enjoyed,
   and that without a lively acknowledgment thereof, with our own
   unworthiness of it, we shall one day know what it is (being taught with
   briers and thorns) to undervalue the glorious gospel of the Lord Jesus.
   Good Lord! what would helpless Macedonians give for one enjoyment? O
   that Wales! O that Ireland! O that France! -- where shall I stop? I
   would offend none, but give me leave to say, O that every, I had almost
   said, O that any, part of the world had such helps and means of grace
   as these parts of England have, which will scarce acknowledge any mercy
   in it! The Lord break the pride of our spirits before it break the
   staff of our bread and the help of our salvation. O that the bread of
   heaven and the blood of Christ might be accounted good nourishment,
   though every one hath not the sauce he desireth! I am persuaded that if
   every Absalom in the land, that would be a judge for the ending of our
   differences, were enthroned (he spoke the people's good, though he
   intended his own power), the case would not be much better than it is.
   Well, the Lord make England, make this honourable audience, make us
   all, to know these three things:--

   First, That we have received such a blessing, in setting at liberty the
   truths of the gospel, as is the crown of all other mercies, yea,
   without which they were not valuable, yea, were to be despised; for
   success without the gospel, is nothing but a prosperous conspiracy
   against Jesus Christ.

   Secondly, That this mercy is of mercy; this love, of free love; and the
   grace that appeareth, of the eternal, hidden, free grace of God. He
   hath showed his love unto us because he loved us, and for no other
   reason in the world; this people being guilty of blood and murder of
   soul and body, adultery, and idolatry, and oppression, with a long
   catalogue of sins and iniquities.

   Thirdly, That the height of rebellion against God is the despising of
   spiritual gospel mercies. Should Mordecai have trodden the robes under
   his feet that were brought him from the king, would it not have been
   severely revenged? Doth the King of heaven lay open the treasures of
   his wisdom, knowledge, and goodness for us, and we despise them? What
   shall I say? I had almost said, hell punishes no greater sin: the Lord
   lay it not to our charge! O that we might be solemnly humbled for it
   this day, before it be too late!

   Use 3. To discover unto us the freedom of that effectual grace which is
   dispensed towards the elect, under and with the preaching of the word;
   for if the sending of the outward means be of free, [88] undeserved
   love, surely the working of the Spirit under that dispensation for the
   saving of souls is no less free; for "who hath made us differ from
   others? and what have we that we have not received?" O that God should
   say unto us in our blood, Live; -- that he should breathe upon us when
   we were as dry bones, dead in trespasses and sins! Let us remember, I
   beseech you, the frame of our hearts and the temper of our spirits, in
   the days wherein we knew not God and his goodness, but went on in a
   swift [89] course of rebellion. Can none of you look back upon any
   particular days or nights, and say, Ah, Lord, that thou shouldst be so
   patient and so full of forbearance, as not to send me to hell at such
   an instant! But, O Lord, that thou shouldst go farther, and blot out
   mine iniquities, for thine own sake, "when I made thee serve with my
   sins! "-- Lord, what shall I say it is? It is the free grace of my God!
   What expression transcendeth that, I know not.

   Use 4. Of caution. England received the gospel of mere mercy; let it
   take heed lest it lose it by justice; -- the placer of the candlestick
   can remove it. The truth is, it will not be removed unless it be
   abused; and woe to them from whom mercies are taken for being abused,
   -- from whom the gospel is removed for being despised! It had been
   better for the husbandmen never to have had the vineyard, than to be
   slain for their ill using of it: there is nothing left to do them good
   who are forsaken for forsaking the gospel.

   The glory of God was of late by many degrees departing from the temple
   in our land. That was gone to the threshold, yea, to the mount. If now
   at the return thereof, it find again cause to depart, it will not go by
   steps, but all at once. This island, or at least the greatest part
   thereof, as I formerly intimated, hath twice lost the gospel; -- once,
   when the Saxons wrested it from the Britons, -- when, if we may believe
   their own doleful, moaning [90] historian, they were given over to all
   wickedness, oppression, and villainy of life; which doubtless was
   accompanied with contempt of the word; though for faith and persuasion
   we do not find that they were corrupted, and do find that they were
   tenacious enough of antique discipline, as appeared in their following
   oppositions to the Roman tyranny, as in Beda. Secondly, It was lost in
   regard of the purity and power thereof, by blind superstition and
   antichristian impiety, accompanied also with abominable lewdness,
   oppression, and all manner of sin, in the face of the sun; so that
   first profaneness working a despising of the gospel, then superstition
   ushering in profaneness, have in this land showed their power for the
   extirpation of the gospel. Oh, that we could remember the days of old,
   that we could "consider the goodness and severity of God; -- on them
   which fell severity, but towards us goodness, if we continue in that
   goodness; for otherwise even we also shall be cut off!" Yet here we may
   observe, that though both these times there was a forsaking in the
   midst of the land, yet there was in it a tenth for to return "as a
   teil-tree, and as an oak, whose substance is in them when they cast
   their leaves;" so was the holy seed the substance thereof, Isa. vi. 13.
   As in the dereliction of the Jews, so of this nation, there was a
   remnant that quickly took root, and brought forth fruit, both in the
   one devastation and the other. Though the watcher and the holy one from
   heaven had called to cut down the tree of this nation, and to scatter
   its branches from flourishing before him; yet the stump and root was to
   be left in the earth with a band of iron, that it might spring again.
   Thus twice did the Lord come seeking fruit of this vine, doing little
   more than pruning and dressing it, although it brought forth wild
   grapes; but if he come the third time and find no fruit, the sentence
   will be, "Cut it down, why cumbereth it the ground?" Now, to prevent
   this, I shall not follow all those gospel-supplanting sins we find in
   holy writ, only I desire to cautionate you and us all in three things.

   (1.) Take heed of pretending or holding out the gospel for a covert or
   shadow for other things. God will not have his gospel made a
   stalking-horse for carnal designs. Put not in that glorious name, where
   the thing itself is not clearly intended. If in any thing it be, let it
   have no compeer; if not, let it not be named. If that you aim at be
   just, it needs no varnish; if it be not, it is the worse for it. Gilded
   pills lose not their bitterness, and painted faces are thought to have
   no native beauty. All things in the world should serve the gospel; and
   if that be made to serve other things, God will quickly vindicate it
   into liberty.

   From the beginning of these troubles, right honourable, you have held
   forth religion and the gospel, as whose preservation and restoration
   was principally in your aims; and I presume malice itself is not able
   to discover any insincerity in this. The fruits we behold proclaim to
   all the conformity of your words and hearts. Now, the God of heaven
   grant that the same mind be in you still, in every particular member of
   this honourable assembly, in the whole nation, especially in the
   magistracy and ministry of it; -- that we be not like the boatmen, --
   look one way, and row another; -- cry "Gospel," and mean the other
   thing, -- "Lord, Lord," and advance our own ends; -- that the Lord may
   not stir up the staff of his anger and the rod of his indignation
   against us, as a hypocritical people.

   (2.) Take heed of resting upon and trusting to the privilege, however
   excellent and glorious, of the outward enjoyment of the gospel. When
   the Jews cried, "The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord," the
   time was at hand that they should be destroyed. Look only upon the
   grace that did bestow, and the mercy that doth continue it. God will
   have none of his blessings rob him of his glory; and if we rest at the
   cistern, he will stop at the fountain.

   (3.) Let us all take heed of barrenness under it: "For the earth that
   drinks in the rain that cometh upon it, and beareth thorns and briers,
   is rejected, and nigh unto cursing, whose end is to be burned," Heb.
   vi. 7, 8. Now, what fruits doth it require? Even those reckoned, Gal.
   v. 22, 23, "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace,
   long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance." O
   that we had not cause to grieve for a scarcity of these fruits, and the
   abundant plenty of those works of the flesh recounted, verses 19-21! O
   that that wisdom which is an eminent fruit of the gospel might flourish
   amongst us! -- it is "first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be
   entreated;" -- that we might have less writing, and more praying! --
   less envy, and more charity! that all evil surmisings, which are works
   of the flesh, might have no toleration in our hearts, but be banished
   for nonconformity to the golden rule of love and peace! James iii. 17.
   But apecho. Come we now to the last proposition.

   III. No men in the world want help like them that want the gospel; or,
   of all distresses, want of the gospel cries the loudest for relief.

   Rachel wanted children, and she cries, "Give me children, [91] or I
   die;" -- but that was her impatience; she might have lived, and have
   had no children; yea, see the justice of God, -- she dies so soon as
   ever she hath children. Hagar [92] wants water for Ishmael, and she
   will go far from him, that she may not see him die; -- a heavy
   distress; and yet if he had died, it had been but an early paying of
   that debt which in a few years was to be satisfied. But they that want
   the gospel may truly cry, Give us the gospel, or we die; and that not
   temporally with Ishmael, for want of water, but eternally in flames of
   fire.

   A man may want liberty, and yet be happy, as Joseph was; a man may want
   peace, and yet be happy, as David was; a man may want children, and yet
   be blessed, as Job was; a man may want plenty, and yet be full of
   comfort, as Micaiah was; -- but he that wants the gospel, wants every
   thing that should do him good. A throne without the gospel is but the
   devil's dungeon. Wealth without the gospel is fuel for hell.
   Advancement without the gospel is but a going high to have the greater
   fall.

   Abraham [93] wanting a child, complains, "What will the Lord do for me,
   seeing I go childless, and this Eliezer of Damascus must be my heir?"
   Much more may a man without the means of grace complain, What shall be
   done unto me, seeing I go gospel-less; and all that I have is but a
   short inheritance for this lump of clay, my body?

   When Elisha [94] was minded to do something for the Shunammite who had
   so kindly entertained him, he asks her whether he should speak for her
   to the king or the captain of the host. She replies, she dwelt in the
   midst of her own people, she needeth not those things; but when he
   finds her to want a child, and tells her of that, she is almost
   transported. Ah! how many poor souls are there who need not our word to
   the king or the captain of the host; but yet being gospel-less, if you
   could tell them of that, would be even ravished with joy!

   Think of Adam [95] after his fall, before the promise, hiding himself
   from God, and you have a perfect portraiture of a poor creature without
   the gospel. Now this appeareth, --

   1. From the description we have of the people that are in this state
   [96] and condition -- without the gospel. They are a people that sit in
   darkness, yea, in the region and shadow of death, Matt. iv. 16, 17;
   they are even darkness itself, John i. 5, -- within the dominion and
   dreadful darkness of death. Darkness was one of Egypt's plagues; but
   yet that was a darkness of the body, a darkness wherein men lived; --
   but this is a darkness of the soul, a darkness of death; for these men,
   though they live, yet are they dead. They are fully described, Eph. ii.
   12, "Without Christ, aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers
   from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the
   world." Christless men, and Godless men, and hopeless men, -- and what
   greater distress in the world? Yea, they are called dogs, and unclean
   beasts. The wrath of God is upon them; they are the people of his curse
   and indignation. In the extreme north, one day and one night divide the
   year; but with a people without the gospel it is all night, -- the Sun
   of righteousness shines not upon them; it is night whilst they are
   here, and they go to eternal night hereafter. What the men of China say
   concerning themselves and others, that they have two eyes, the men of
   Europe one, and all the world besides is blind, may be inverted too.
   The Jews had one eye, sufficient to guide them; they who enjoy the
   gospel have two eyes; but the men of China, with the rest of the
   nations that want it, are stark blind, and reserved for the chains of
   everlasting darkness.

   2. By laying forth what the men that want the gospel do want with it.

   (1.) They want Jesus Christ, for he is revealed only by the gospel.
   Austin refused to delight in Cicero's "Hortensius," because there was
   not in it the name of Jesus Christ. [97] Jesus Christ is all, and in
   all; and where he is wanting there can be no good. Hunger cannot truly
   be satisfied without manna, the bread of life, which is Jesus Christ;
   [98] -- and what shall a hungry man do that hath no bread? Thirst
   cannot be quenched without that water or living spring, which is Jesus
   Christ; -- and what shall a thirsty soul do without water? A captive,
   as we are all, cannot be delivered without redemption, [99] which is
   Jesus Christ; -- and what shall the prisoner do without his ransom?
   Fools, as we are all, cannot be instructed without wisdom, which is
   Jesus Christ; -- without him we perish in our folly. All building
   without him is on the sand, which will surely fall. All working without
   him is in the fire, where it will be consumed. All riches without him
   have wings, and will away. "Mallem ruere cum Christo, quam regnare cum
   Cæsare," said Luther. A dungeon with Christ, is a throne; and a throne
   without Christ, a hell. Nothing so ill, but Christ [100] will
   compensate. The greatest evil in the world is sin, and the greatest sin
   was the first; and yet Gregory feared not to cry, "O felix culpa, quæ
   talem meruit redemptorem!" -- "O happy fault, which found such a
   Redeemer!" All mercies without Christ are bitter; and every cup is
   sweet that is seasoned but with a drop of his blood; -- he truly is
   "amor et deliciæ humani generis," -- the love and delight of the sons
   of men, -- without whom they must perish eternally; "for there is no
   other name given unto them, whereby they may be saved, Acts iv. 12. He
   is the Way; [101] men without him are Cains, wanderers, vagabonds:-- he
   is the Truth; men without him are liars, like the devil, who was so of
   old:-- he is the Life; [102] without him men are dead, dead in
   trespasses and sins:-- he is the Light; without him men are in
   darkness, and go they know not whither:-- he is the Vine; those that
   are not grafted in him are withered branches, prepared for the fire:--
   he is the Rock; men not built on him are carried away with a flood:--
   he is Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the author and the
   ender, the founder and the finisher of our salvation. He that hath not
   him, hath neither beginning of good, nor shall have end of misery. O
   blessed Jesus! how much better were it not to be, than to be without
   thee! -- never to be born, than not to die in thee! A thousand bells
   come short of this, eternally to want Jesus Christ, as men do that want
   the gospel.

   (2.) They want all holy communion with God, wherein the only happiness
   of the soul doth consist. He is the life, light, joy, and blessedness
   of the soul; -- without him the soul in the body is but a dead soul in
   a living sepulchre. It is true, there be many that say, "Who will show
   us any good?" [103] but unless the Lord lift up the light of his
   countenance upon us, we perish for evermore. "Thou hast made us for
   thyself, O Lord; and our heart is unquiet until it come to thee." You
   who have tasted how gracious the Lord is, who have had any converse and
   communion with him in the issues and goings forth of his grace, those
   delights of his soul with the children of men, would you live -- would
   not life itself, with a confluence of all earthly endearments, be a
   very hell -- without him? Is it not the daily language of your hearts,
   "Whom have we in heaven but thee? and on earth there is nothing in
   comparison of thee?" The soul of man is of a vast, boundless
   comprehension; so that if all created good were centred into one
   enjoyment, and that bestowed upon one soul, because it must needs be
   finite and limited, as created, it would give no solid contentment to
   his affections, nor satisfaction to his desires. In the presence and
   fruition of God alone there is joy for evermore; at his right hand are
   rivers of pleasure, the well-springs of life and blessedness. Now, if
   to be without communion with God in this life, wherein the soul hath so
   many avocations from the contemplation of its own misery (for earthly
   things are nothing else), is so unsupportable a calamity; ah! what
   shall that poor soul do that must want him for eternity? -- as all they
   must do who want the gospel.

   (3.) They want all the ordinances of God, -- the joy of our hearts
   [104] and comfort of our souls. Oh! the sweetness of a Sabbath! the
   heavenly raptures of prayer! -- oh! the glorious communion of saints,
   which such men are deprived of! If they knew the value of the hidden
   pearl, and these things were to be purchased, what would such poor
   souls not part with for them?

   (4.) They will at last want heaven and salvation. They shall never come
   to the presence of God in glory, never inhabit a glorious mansion; --
   they shall never behold Jesus Christ, but when they shall call for
   [105] rocks and mountains to tall upon them, to hide them from his
   presence; -- they shall want [106] light in utter darkness, want life
   under the second death, want refreshment in the midst of flames, want
   healing under gnawing of conscience, want grace continuing to
   blaspheme, want glory in full misery; -- and, which is the sum of all
   this, they shall want an end of all this; for "their worm dieth not,
   neither is their fire quenched."

   3. Because being in all this want, they know not that they want any
   thing, and so never make out for any supply. Laodicea knew much; but
   yet because she knew not her wants, [107] she had almost as good have
   known nothing. Gospel-less men know not that they are blind, and seek
   not for eye-salve; they know not that they are dead, and seek not for
   life. Whatever they call for, not knowing their wants, is but like a
   man's crying for more weight to press him to death; and therefore, when
   the Lord comes to any with the gospel, he is "found of them that sought
   him not, and made manifest to them that asked not after him," Rom. x.
   20. This is a seal upon their misery, without God's free mercy, like
   the stone laid upon the mouth of the cave by Joshua, to keep in the
   five kings, until they might be brought out to be hanged." [108] All
   that men do in the world is but seeking to supply their wants; --
   either their natural wants, that nature may be supplied; or their
   sinful wants, that their lusts may be satisfied; or their spiritual
   wants, that their souls may be saved. For the two first, men without
   the gospel lay out all their strength; but of the last there is amongst
   them a deep [109] silence. Now this is all one as for men to cry out
   that their finger bleeds, whilst a sword is run through their hearts,
   and they perceive it not; -- to desire a wart to be cured, whilst they
   have a plague-sore upon them. And hence perhaps it is that they are
   said to go to [110] hell "like sheep," Ps. xlix. 14, -- very quietly,
   without dread, as a bird hasting to the snare, and not knowing that it
   is for his life, Prov. vii. 23, -- and there lie down in utter
   disappointment and sorrow for evermore.

   4. Because all mercies are bitter judgments to men that want the
   gospel; -- all fuel for hell, -- aggravations of condemnation; -- all
   cold drink to a man in a fever, pleasant at the entrance, but
   increasing its torments in the close; -- like the book in the
   Revelation, sweet in the mouth, but bitter in the belly. When God shall
   come to require his bread and wine, his flax and oil, peace and
   prosperity, liberty and victories of gospel-less men, they will curse
   the day that ever they enjoyed them. So unspiritual are many men's
   minds, and so unsavoury their judgments, that they reckon men's
   happiness by their possessions, and suppose the catalogue of their
   titles to be a roll of their felicities, calling the proud happy, and
   advancing in our conceits "them that work wickedness," Mal. iii. 15;
   but God will one day come in with another reckoning, and make them know
   that all things without Christ are but as ciphers without a figure, --
   of no value. In all their banquets, where Christ is not a guest, "their
   vine is of the vine of Sodom, and of the field of Gomorrah; their
   grapes are grapes of gall, their clusters are bitter," Deut. xxxii. 32,
   33; -- their palaces, where Christ is not, are but habitations of ziim
   and ochim, dragons and unclean beasts; -- their prosperity is putting
   them into full pasture, that they may be fatted for the day of
   slaughter, the day of consumption decreed for all the bulls of Bashan.
   The gospel bringing Christ, is the salt that makes all other things
   savoury.

   Use 1. To show us the great privilege and pre-eminence which, by the
   free grace of God, many parts of this island do enjoy. To us that sat
   in darkness and in the shadow of death a great light is risen, to guide
   us into the ways of peace. Let others recount the glories, benefits,
   profits, outward blessings of this nation; let us look only upon that
   which alone is valuable in itself, and makes other things so to be, --
   the gospel of Christ. It is reported of the heralds of our neighbour
   monarchs, that when one of them had repeated the numerous titles of his
   master of Spain, the other often repeated, France, France, France!
   intimating that the dominion which came under that one denomination
   would counterpoise the long catalogue of kingdoms and dukedoms
   wherewith the other flourished. Were we to contend with the grand
   seignior of the east about our enjoyments, we might easily bear down
   his windy, pompous train of titles with this one, -- which "millies
   repetitum placebit," -- The gospel, the gospel! Upon all the other
   things you may put the inscription in Daniel, "Mene, mene, tekel," they
   are "weighed in the balances, and found wanting;" but proclaim before
   those that enjoy the gospel, as Haman before Mordecai, "Lo, thus shall
   it be done to them whom the Lord will honour!" The fox in the fable had
   a thousand wiles to save himself from the hunters; but the cat knew
   "unum magnum," "one great thing" that would surely do it. Earthly
   supports and contentments are but a thousand failing wiles, which will
   all vanish in the time of need; the gospel, and Christ in the gospel,
   is that" unum magnum," that "unum necessarium," which alone will stand
   us in any stead. In this, this island is as the mountain of the Lord,
   -- exalted above the mountains of the earth. It is true, many other
   nations partake with us in the same blessing. Not to advance our own
   enjoyments in some particulars, -- wherein perhaps we might justly do
   it, -- but take all these nations with us, and what a molehill are we
   to the whole earth, overspread with Paganism, Mohammedanism,
   Antichristianism, with innumerable foolish heresies! And what is
   England, that it should be amongst the choice branches of the vineyard,
   the top-boughs of the cedars of God?

   Use 2. Shows that such great mercies, if not esteemed, if not improved,
   if abused, will end in great judgments. Woe be to that nation, that
   city, that person, that shall be called to an account for despising the
   gospel! Amos iii. 2, "You only have I known of all the families of the
   earth." What then? surely some great blessing is coming to that people
   whom God thus knows, so owns, as to make himself known unto them. No;
   but, "therefore will I visit upon you all your iniquities." However
   others may have some ease or mitigation in their punishments, do you
   expect the utmost of my wrath. Luther said, he thought hell was paved
   with the bald skulls of friars. I know nothing of that; yet of this
   sure I am, that none shall have their portion so low in the nethermost
   hell, none shall drink so deep of the cup of God's indignation, as they
   who have refused Christ in the gospel. Men will curse the day to all
   eternity wherein the blessed name of Jesus Christ was made known unto
   them, if they continue to despise it. He that abuseth the choicest of
   mercies, shall have judgment without mercy. What can help them who
   reject the counsel of God for their good? If now England has received
   more culture from God than other nations, there is more fruit expected
   from England than other nations. A barren tree in the Lord's vineyard
   must be cut down for cumbering the ground; the sheep of God must "every
   one bear twins, and none be barren amongst them," Cant. iv. 2. If,
   after all God's care and husbandry, his vineyard brings forth wild
   grapes, he will take away the hedge, break down the wall, and lay it
   waste. For the present, the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house
   of England; and if it be as earth which, when the rain falls upon it,
   brings forth nothing but thorns and briers, it is nigh unto cursing,
   and the end thereof is to be burned, Heb. vi. 8. Men utterly and for
   ever neglect that ground which they have tried their skill about, and
   laid out much cost upon, if it bring not forth answerable fruits. Now
   here give me leave to say, and the Lord avert the evil deserved by it!
   that England (I mean these cities and those other places which since
   the beginning of our troubles have enjoyed the gospel in a more free
   and plentiful manner than heretofore) hath showed itself not much to
   value it.

   (1.) In the time of straits, though the sound of the gospel passed
   through all our streets, our villages enjoying them who preached peace
   and brought glad tidings of good things, so that neither we, nor our
   fathers, nor our fathers' fathers, ever saw the like before us, --
   though manna fell round about our tents every day; yet, as though all
   were lost, and we had nothing, manna was loathed as light bread, -- the
   presence of Christ made not recompense for the loss of our swine, --
   men had rather be again in Egypt, than hazard a pilgrimage in the
   wilderness. If there be any here that ever entertained thoughts to give
   up the worship of God to superstition, his churches to tyranny, and the
   doctrine of the gospel to episcopal corruptions, in the pressing of any
   troubles, let them now give God the glory, and be ashamed of their own
   hearts, lest it be bitterness in the end.

   (2.) In the time of prosperity, by our fierce contentions about mint
   and cummin, whilst the weightier things of the gospel have been
   undervalued, languishing about unprofitable questions, etc.; but I
   shall not touch this wound, lest it bleed.

   Use 3. For exhortation, that every one of us, in whose hand there is
   any thing, would set in for the help of those parts of this island that
   as yet sit in darkness, yea, in the shadow of death, and have none to
   hold out the bread of life to their fainting souls. Doth not Wales cry,
   and the north cry, yea, and the west cry, Come and help us? -- we are
   yet in a worse bondage than any by your means we have been delivered
   from; -- if you leave us thus, all your protection will but yield us a
   more free and jovial passage to the chambers of death. Ah! little do
   the inhabitants of Goshen know, whilst they are contending about the
   bounds of their pasture, what darkness there is in other places of the
   land; how their poor starved souls would be glad of the crumbs that
   fall from our tables! O that God would stir up the hearts, --

   (1.) Of ministers, to cast off all by-respects, and to flee to those
   places where, in all probability, the harvest would be great, and the
   labourers are few or none at all! I have read of a heretic that swam
   over a great river in a frost to scatter his errors; the old Jewish,
   and now popish Pharisees, compass sea and land to make proselytes; the
   merchants trade not into more countries than the factors of Rome do to
   gain souls to his holiness. East and west, far and wide, do these
   locusts spread themselves, not without hazard of their lives as well as
   the loss of their souls, to scatter their superstitions; -- only the
   preachers of the everlasting gospel seem to have lost their zeal. O
   that there were the same mind in us that was in Jesus Christ, who
   counted it his meat and drink to do his Father's will, in gaining
   souls!

   (2.) Of the magistrates, -- I mean, of this honourable assembly, -- to
   turn themselves every lawful way for the help of poor Macedonians. The
   truth is, in this I could speak more than I intend; for perhaps my zeal
   and some men's judgments would scarce make good harmony This only I
   shall say, that if Jesus Christ might be preached, though with some
   defects in some circumstances, I should rejoice therein. O that you
   would labour to let all the parts of the kingdom taste of the sweetness
   of your successes, in carrying to them the gospel of the Lord Jesus;
   that the doctrine of the gospel might make way for the discipline of
   the gospel, without which it will be a very skeleton! When manna fell
   in the wilderness from the hand of the Lord, every one had an equal
   share. I would there were not now too great an inequality in the
   scattering of manna, when secondarily in the hand of men; whereby some
   have all, and others none; -- some sheep daily picking the choice
   flowers of every pasture, others wandering upon the barren mountains,
   without guide or food. I make no doubt but the best ways for the
   furtherance of this are known full well unto you; and you therefore
   have as little need to be petitioned in this as other things. What,
   then, remains, but that for this, and all other necessary blessings, we
   all set our hearts and hands to petition the throne of grace?
     __________________________________________________________________

   [4] "Ecclesia sicut luna defectus habet, et ortus frequentes; sed
   defectibus suis crevit, etc. Hæc est vera Luna, quæ de fratris sui luce
   perpetua, lumen sibi immortalitatis et gratiæ mutuatur." -- Amb. Hex.,
   lib. iv. cap. 2. Ps. lxviii. 13.

   [5] Isa. liv. 11; Zech. iv. 7.

   [6] Isa. liii. 2-5.

   [7] 1 John iii. 13; Rev. ii. 10; 2 Cor. iv. 4.

   [8] Isa. liii. 2.

   [9] Heb. vii. 25.

   [10] Cant. ii. 2.

   [11] Matt. x. 16.

   [12] Ps. lxxiv. 19.

   [13] "Eo ipso tempore, quo ad omnes gentes prædicatio Evangelii
   mittebatur, quædam loca apostolis adire prohibebatur ab eo qui vult
   omnes homines salvos fieri.'?" -- Prosp. Ep. ad Rufin. [cap. xv]. Dios
   eteleieto boule. -- Hom. i. 5.

   [14] Mal. iv. 2.

   [15] Isa. i. 1.

   [16] Amos i. 1.

   [17] Nahum i. 1; Obad. 1.

   [18] Jer. i. 11, 13.

   [19] Ezek. i. 5-7; Zech. i. 8, iii. 9, 10, etc.; Dan. vii. 8, 9.

   [20] Zech. ii. 1.

   [21] Vid. Aquin. 2, 2, q. 174, art. 3, 4. Scot. in dist. tert.

   [22] Mede, Apost. of Later Times.

   [23] À Lapide, Sanctius in locum, etc.

   [24] Plutarch. in Vit. Bruti.

   [25] Calvin. in locum. "Dicebat se discernere (nescio quo sapore, quem
   verbis explicare non poterat) quid interesset inter Deum revelantem,"
   etc. -- Aug. Confes.

   [26] Acts iii. 6.

   [27] Plutarch de Defect. Oracu.

   Hebraios keletai me pais makaressin anasson,

   Ton de domon prolipein kai hodon palin authis hikesthai.
   Respons. Apoll. apud Euseb. Niceph.

   [28] "A nullo duro corde resistitur, quia cor ipsum emollit." -- Aug.,
   Ezek. xxxvi. 26; Deut. xxx. 6.

   [29] Lapide. Sanctius in loc. Rom. Script. Synd. ar. 1.

   [30] Humeis men oun este toioutoi, hupo toionde paideuton
   stoicheiothentes, Paulou tou Christophorou. -- Ignat. Epist. ad Eph.;
   Iren., lib. iii. cap. 3.

   [31] "Qui causam quæ sit voluntatis divinæ, aliquid majus eo quærit."
   -- Aug. "Voluntas Dei nullo modo causam habet." -- Aquin, p. q. 12, a.
   5.

   [32] Theia panton arche, di' hes a panta kai esti, kai diamenei.
   Theophrast. apud Picum de Provid.

   [33] "Providentia est ratio ordinis rerum ad finem." -- Th. p. q. 22,
   a. 1, 6.

   [34] Ezek. i. 1.

   [35] Non tantum res, sed rerum modos.

   [36] "Videtur ergo quod non sit aliqua deordinatio, deformitas, aut
   peccatum simpliciter in toto universo, sed tantummodo respectu
   interiorum causarum, ordinationem superioris causæ volentium, licet non
   valentium, perturbare." -- Brad. de Caus. Dei, lib. i. cap. 34.

   [37] Hehamartia estin he anomia.

   [38] "Adeo summa justitiæ regula est Dei voluntas, ut quicquid vult, eo
   ipso quod vult, justum habendum sit." -- Aug., Isa. xlvi. 10.

   [39] Gen. iii. 15, v. 26.

   [40] Gen. vi. 5.

   [41] Gen. v. 24, vi. 18, xii. 1, xviii. 1, 2; Ps. lxxvi. 1, 2; John iv.
   22.

   [42] Gal. iv. 4; John xii. 32; Acts xvii. 30; Mark xvi. 15; Mal. iii.
   4; Prov. viii. 31.

   [43] See Tertullian, Lib. ad Jud., reckoning almost all the known
   nations of the world, and affirming that they all, -- that is, some in
   them, -- in his days, submitted to the sceptre of Christ. He lived in
   the end of the second century.

   [44] Piscat. in loc.

   [45] Panta de lego ta ouk eph' hemin, ta gar eph' hemin, ou hemin
   pronoias, alla tou hemeterou autexousiou. -- Damascen. Satis impie.

   [46] Matt. x. 29; Job xiv. 5; Prov. xvi. 33, xxi. 1, 30, xix. 21.
   "Nihil fit nisi omnipotens fieri velit, vel ipse faciendo, vel sinendo
   ut fiat." -- Aug.

   [47] Gen. iv. 5-7, 1 Kings xxii. 19-21; 2 Kings v. 18, 19; Ps. lxxvi.
   10; Eccles. vii. 26; Isa. vi. 9-11, etc.

   [48] "Deus non operatur in malis, quod ei displicet; sed operatur per
   eos quod ei placet, recipientur veto non pro eo, quod Deus bene usus
   est ipsorum operibus malis, sed pro eo, quod ipsi male abusi sunt Dei
   operibus bonis." -- Fulgent. ad Monim.

   [49] 2 Thess. ii.; Acts iv.

   [50] "Liberatur pars hominum, parte pereunte. Sed cur horum sit
   misertus Deus -- illorum non misertus, quæ scientia comprehendere, quæ
   potest investigare sapientia? Latet discretionis istius ratio, sed non
   latet ipsa discretio." -- Prosp. de Vocat. Gen., [lib. i. cap. 15.]

   [51] Rom. viii. 28, 29, Eph. i. 4, 2 Tim. ii. 19.

   [52] Eph. ii. 1, 11.

   [53] "Non ob aliud dicit, non vos me elegistis, sed ego vos elegi, nisi
   quia non elegerunt eum, ut eligeret eos; sed ut eligerent eum, elegit
   eos. Non quia præscivit eos credituros, sed quia facturus ipse fuerit
   credentes. Electi sunt itaque ante mundi constitutionem, eâ
   prædestiuatione, quâ Deus ipse sua futura facta prævidit: electi sunt
   autem de mundo, eâ vocatione, quâ Deus id, quod prædestinavit,
   implevit." -- August. de Prædest. Sanctorum. cap. xvi., xvii.

   [54] Matt. xi. 21; Acts xiii. 46.

   [55] Luke ii. 34; 1 Pet. ii. 7; Ezek. ii. 5; Matt. xxiv. 14; Rom. ix.
   22, 23.

   [56] Neh. iv. 17.

   [57] Zech. iv. 7.

   [58] Scal. de Emend. Temp.

   [59] I follow in this the vulgar or common account, otherwise there is
   no part of Scripture chronology so contended about as these weeks of
   Daniel; most concluding that they are terminated in the death of
   Christ, happening about the midst of the last week. But about their
   original, or rise, there is no small debate. Of the four decrees made
   by the Persian kings about the building of Jerusalem, -- viz., 1st, by
   Cyrus, 2 Chron. xxxvi. 22, 23; 2dly, by Darius, Ezra vi. 8, 3dly, by
   Artaxerxes, Ezra vii.; of the same to Nehemiah chap. ii., -- following
   the account of their reign set down in profane stories, the last only
   holds exactly. Tertullian ad Jud. begins it from Darius, when this
   vision appeared to Daniel, whom, it seems, he conceived to be Darius
   Hystaspes, that followed the Magi, and not Medus, that was before
   Cyrus; and so with a singular kind of chronology makes up his account.
   -- Vid. Euseb. Demon. Evan., lib. viii. cap. Func. Com. in Chron.
   Beroald. Chron., lib. iii. cap. 7, 8. Montacut. Apparat.

   [60] Prov. xviii. 10.

   [61] Heb. xii. 11.

   [62] Pet. Mart. de Relig. Jud. decad, i. lib. 1.

   [63] "Qui liberatur, gratiam diligat, qui non liberatur, debitum
   agnoscat." -- Aug. de Bon. Persev., cap. viii. "Ex nequissimis in ipso
   vitæ exitu gratia invenit quos adoptet, cum tamen multi, etiam qui
   minus nocentes videantur, doni hujus alieni sunt." -- Pros. de Voc.
   Gen., lib. i. cap. 17.

   [64] 1 Cor. i. 25, 26.

   [65] Acts xiv. 16, 17, xvii. 30, 31.

   [66] Rom. viii. 32; Joel ii. 28; John xvii. 22; Rom. i. 5, xvi. 26.

   [67] Rom. ix. 13.

   [68] Eph. iii. 14, 15; Matt. xxvii. 19.

   [69] August.

   [70] "Si hoc voluntatum meritis voluerimus ascribere, ut malos
   neglexisse gratia, bonos autem elegisse videatur, resistet nobis
   innumerabilium causa populorum, quibus per tot secula, nulla coelestis
   doctrinæ annunciatio corruscavit. Nec meliores fuisse eorum posteros
   possumus dicere, de quibus scriptum est, Gentium populus qui sedebat in
   tenebris, lucem vidit magnam.'?" -- Prosp. de Voc. Gen., lib. i. cap.
   15.

   [71] "Si de debito quæratur respectu creaturæ, in Deum cadere non
   potest, nisi ex aliqua suppositione ipsi Deo voluntaria, quæ non potest
   esse nisi promisso aut pacto aliquo, ex quibus fidelitatis aut justitiæ
   debitum oriri solet." -- Suarez. de Libert. Div. Vol., disp. 1, sect.
   2, num. 5.

   [72] "Deus nulla obligatione tenetur, autequam ipse fidem suam
   astringat, ergo ante promissionem nulla justitia distributiva in Deo
   reperitur." -- Vasq. in q. 21, a. 1, disp. 86.

   [73] Aquin. 2, 2, q. 2, art. 7.

   [74] Kai ohi meta logou biosantes Christianoi eisi. -- Justin., Apol.
   ii.

   [75] Hos. xi. 8, 9.

   [76] Nun de estin apostasia, apeStesan gar hoi anthropoi tes orthes
   pisteos. Cyrillus Hieros. Katechesis.

   [77] "Britannorum inaccessa Romanis loca, Christo vero subdita." --
   Tertul.

   [78] "Britanniam in Christianam consentire religionem." -- Origen. Hom.
   iv. in Ezek.

   [79] Niceph., lib. ii. cap. 40. Epist. Eleuth. ad Lucium, an. 169, apud
   Bar.

   [80] Anno 469 the Saxons entered.

   [81] "Nunc igitur si nominis odium est, quis nominum reatus? quæ
   accusatio vocabulorum? nisi aut, barbarum sonat aliqua vox nominis, aut
   maledicum aut impudicum." -- Tertul. Apol. ad Gen., cap. iii.

   [82] See Canterburian self-conviction. See Ld. Dee. Coll., etc.

   [83] Coal from the Altar.

   [84] Altare Christianum. Antidotum Lincoln. Case of Greg.

   [85] Sapientior sis Socrate; doctior Augustino, etc.; Calvinianus si
   modo dicare clam vel propalam, mox Tartaris, Moscis, Afris, Turcisque
   sævientibus, et jacebis execratior, etc.

   [86] Rome's Master-piece.

   [87] Royal favourite.

   [88] "Non libertate gratiam, sed gratia libertatem consequimur." --
   Aug.

   [89] Ezek. xxxvi. 26; Acts xvi. 14; Phil. i. 29, ii. 13.

   [90] Gildas de Excid. Britanniæ. "Omnia quæ Deo placebant, et
   displicebant, æquali lance pendebantur, non igitur admirandum est
   degeneres tales patriam illam amittere, quam prædicto modo maculabant."
   -- Hist. M.S., apud Foxum.

   [91] Gen. xxx. 1, xxxv. 18.

   [92] Gen. xxi. 16.

   [93] Gen. xv. 2.

   [94] 2 Kings iv. 13, 14.

   [95] Gen. iii. 8.

   [96] Matt. vi. 23; Luke i. 79; Acts xxvi. 18; Rom. ii. 19; Eph. v. 8;
   Col. i. 13; 1 Pet. ii. 9.

   [97] Nomen Jesu non erat ibi.

   [98] John vi. 50; Rev. ii. 17; John iv. 14; Cant. iv. 12.

   [99] John vii. 37, 38; 1 Cor. i. 30.

   [100] "Pauca igitur de Christo." -- Tertul.

   [101] John xiv. 6.

   [102] John i. 3-5; Eph. iv. 18; John xv. 5; Matt. vii. 26, 27; Matt.
   xvi. 18.

   [103] Ps. iv. 6.

   [104] Ps. xlii. 1, 2, xxxiv. 1-4, etc.

   [105] Rev. vi. 16.

   [106] Matt. xxii. 13; Luke xvi. 24; Mark ix. 43, 44; Isa. lxvi. 24.

   [107] Rev. iii. 17.

   [108] Josh. x. 18.

   [109] "Ego propero ad inferos, nec est ut aliquid pro me agas." --
   Advocatus quidam moriens, apud Bel. de arte mor., lib. ii. cap. 10.

   [110] ls'vl?.
     __________________________________________________________________

A short defensative about church government, toleration, and petitions about
these things.

   Reader,

   This, be it what it will, thou hast no cause to thank or blame [111] me
   for. Had I been mine own, it had not been thine; my submission unto
   others' judgments being the only cause of submitting this unto thy
   censure. The substance of it is concerning things now doing, in some
   whereof I heretofore thought it my wisdom modestly hæsitare (or at
   least not with the most, peremptorily to dictate to others my
   apprehensions), as wiser [112] men have done in weightier things; and
   yet this not so much for want of persuasion in my own mind, as out of
   opinion that we have already had too many needless and fruitless
   discourses about these matters. Would we count agree to spare perishing
   paper! [113] and for my own part, had not the opportunity of a few
   lines in the close of this sermon, and the importunity of not a few
   friends, urged, I could have slighted all occasions and accusations
   provoking to publish those thoughts which I shall now impart. The truth
   is, in things concerning the church (I mean things purely external, of
   form, order, and the like), so many ways have I been spoken, that I
   often resolved to speak myself, desiring rather to appear (though
   conscious to myself of innumerable failings) what indeed I am, than
   what others incuriously suppose. But yet the many I ever thought
   unworthy of an apology, and some of satisfaction, -- especially those
   who would make their own judgments a rule for themselves and others,
   impatient that any should know what they do not, or conceive otherwise
   than they of what they do, in the meantime, placing almost all religion
   in that which may be perhaps a hindrance of it, -- and being so valued,
   or rather overvalued, -- is certainly the greatest, Nay, would they
   would make their judgments only so far as they are convinced, and are
   able to make out their conceptions to others, and not also their
   impotent desires, to be the rule; that so they might condemn only that
   which complies not with their minds, and not all that also which they
   find to thwart their aims and designs! But so it must be. Once more
   conformity is grown the touchstone (and that not in practice, but
   opinion) amongst the greatest part of men, however otherwise of
   different persuasions. Dissent is the only crime; [114] and where that
   is all that is culpable, it shall be made all that is so. From such as
   these, who almost hath not suffered? but towards such the best defence
   is silence. Besides, my judgment commands me to make no known quarrel
   my own; but rather if it be possible, and as much as in me lieth, live
   peaceably with all men. Hieron polemon, I proclaim to none but men
   whose bowels are full of gall. In this spring of humours, lenitives for
   our own spirits may perhaps be as necessary as purges for others'
   brains. Farther, I desire to provoke [115] none; more stings than combs
   are got at a nest of wasps; even cold stones, smitten together, sparkle
   out fire: "The wringing of the nose bringeth forth blood." Neither do I
   conceive it wisdom, in these quarrelsome days, to intrust more of a
   man's self with others than is very necessary. The heart of man is
   deceitful; some that have smooth tongues have sharp teeth: such can
   give titles on the one side and wounds on the other. Any of these
   considerations would easily have prevailed with me "stultitiâ hac
   caruisse," had not mine ears been filled, presently after the preaching
   of the precedent sermon, with sad complaints of some, and false reports
   of others, neither of the lowest rank of men, as though I had helped to
   open a gate for that which is now called a Trojan horse; though
   heretofore counted an engine likelier to batter the walls of Babylon
   than to betray the towers of Zion. This urged some to be urgent with me
   for a word or two about church government, according to the former
   suggestions, undermined, and a toleration of different persuasions, as
   they said, asserted. Now, truly, to put the accusers to prove the
   crimination -- for so it was, and held forth a grievous crime in their
   apprehensions (what is really so God will judge) -- had been
   sufficient. [116] But I could not so evade; and therefore, after my
   sermon was printed to the last sheet, I was forced to set apart a few
   hours, [117] to give an account of what hath passed from me in both
   these things, which have been so variously reported; hoping that the
   reading may not be unuseful to some, as the writing was very necessary
   to me. And here, at the entrance, I shall desire at the hands of men
   that shall cast an eye on this heap of good meaning, these few, as I
   suppose, equitable demands:--

   First, Not to prosecute men into odious appellations, and then
   themselves, who feigned the crime, pronounce the sentence, -- like him
   who said of one brought before him, If he be not guilty, it is fit he
   should be; -- involving themselves in a double guilt, of falsehood and
   malice; and the aspersed parties in a double misery, of being belied in
   what they are, and hated for what they are not. If a man be not what
   such men would have him, it is odds but they will make him what he is
   not; -- if what he really is do not please, and that be not enough to
   render him odious, he shall sure enough be more. Ithacius will make all
   Priscillianists who are any thing more devout than himself. [118] If
   men do but desire to see with their own eyes, presently they are
   enrolled of this or that sect; every mispersuasion being beforehand, in
   petitions, sermons, etc., rendered odious and intolerable; -- in such a
   course, innocency itself cannot go long free. Christians deal with one
   another in earnest, as children in their plays clap another's coat upon
   their fellow's shoulders, and pretending to beat that, cudgel him they
   have clothed with it. "What shall be given unto thee, thou false
   tongue?" If we cannot be more charitable, let us be more ingenuous.
   Many a man hath been brought to a more favourable opinion of such as
   are called by dreadful names than formerly, by the experience of false
   impositions on himself.

   Secondly, Not to clothe our differences with expressions fitting them
   no better than Saul's armour did David; nor make them like a little man
   in a bombast coat upon stilts, walking about like a giant. Our little
   differences may be met at every stall, and in too many pulpits, swelled
   by unbefitting expressions into such a formidable bulk as poor
   creatures are even startled at their horrid looks and appearance;
   whilst our own persuasions are set out rhemasi bussinois, [119] with
   silken words and gorgeous apparel, as if we sent them into the world
   a-wooing. Hence, whatever it is, it must be temple building, -- God's
   government, -- Christ's scepter, throne, kingdom, -- the only way, that
   for want of which, errors, heresies, sins, spring among us, plagues,
   judgments, punishments come upon us. To such things as these all
   pretend, who are very confident they have found out the only way. Such
   big words as these have made us believe that we are mortal adversaries
   (I speak of the parties at variance about government), -- that one
   kingdom, communion, heaven cannot hold us. Now, truly, if this course
   be followed, -- so to heighten our differences, by adorning the truth
   we own with such titles as it doth not merit, and branding the errors
   we oppose with such marks as in cold blood we cannot think they
   themselves, but only in their (by us supposed) tendence, do deserve, --
   I doubt not but that it will be bitterness unto us all in the end. And,
   query, whether by this means many have not been brought to conceive the
   kingdom of Jesus Christ, which himself affirms to be within us, to
   consist in forms, outward order, positive rules, and external
   government. I design none, but earnestly desire that the two great
   parties at this day litigant in this kingdom, would seriously consider
   what is like to be the issue of such proceedings; and whether the
   mystery of godliness, in the power thereof, be like to be propagated by
   it. Let not truth be weighed in the balance of our interest. Will not a
   dram of that turn the scale with some against many arguments? Power is
   powerful to persuade.

   Thirdly, Not to measure men's judgments by their subscribing or
   refusing to subscribe petitions in these days about church government.
   For subscribers, would that every one could not see, with what a
   zealous nescience and implicit judgment many are led! And for refusers,
   though perhaps they could close with the general words wherewith
   usually they are expressed, yet there are so many known circumstances
   restraining those words to particular significations, directing them to
   by and secondary tendencies, as must needs make some abstain. For mine
   own part, from subscribing late petitions about church government, I
   have been withheld by such reasons as these:--

   1. I dare not absolutely assert, maintain, and abide by it (as rational
   men ought to do every clause in any thing owned by their subscription),
   that the cause of all the evils usually enumerated in such petitions is
   the want of church government, taking it for any government that ever
   yet was established amongst men, or in notion otherwise made known unto
   me; yea, I am confident that more probable causes in this juncture of
   time might be assigned of them. Neither can any be ignorant how
   plentifully such evils abounded when church discipline was most
   severely executed. [120] And, lastly, I am confident that whoever lives
   to see them suppressed by any outward means (when spiritual weapons
   shall be judged insufficient), will find it to be, not any thing either
   included in, or necessarily annexed unto, church discipline that must
   do it; but some other thing, not unlike that which, in days of yore,
   when all the world wondered after the beast, suppressed all truth and
   error, but only what the arch enemy of Jesus Christ was pleased to hold
   out to be believed. But of this afterward.

   2. I dare not affirm that the Parliament hath not established a
   government already, for the essentials of it; themselves affirming that
   they have, [121] and their ordinances about rulers, rules, and persons
   to be ruled (the "requisita" and materials of government), being long
   since extant. Now, to require a thing to be done by them who affirm
   that they have already done it, argues either much weakness or supine
   negligence in ourselves, not to understand what is effected; or a
   strong imputation on those that have done it, either fraudulently to
   pretend that which is false, or foolishly to aver what they do not
   understand. Yet, though I have learned to obey, as far as lawfully I
   may, my judgment is exceedingly far from being enslaved; and according
   to that, by God's assistance, shall be my practice; which, if it run
   cross to the prescriptions of authority, it shall cheerfully submit to
   the censure thereof. In the meantime, all petitioning of any party
   about this business seems to thwart some declarations of the House of
   Commons, whereunto I doubt not but they intend for the main inviolably
   and unalterably to adhere. Add hereunto, that petitioning in this kind
   was not long since voted breach of privilege, in them who might justly
   expect as much favour and liberty in petitioning as any of their
   brethren in the kingdom; and I have more than one reason to suppose
   that the purpose and design of theirs and others was one and the same.

   3. There are no small grounds of supposal that some petitions have not
   their rise from amongst them by whom they are subscribed, but that the
   spring and master-wheels giving the first motion to them are distant
   and unseen; myself having been lately urged to subscription upon this
   ground, that directions were had for it from above (as we used to speak
   in the country); -- yea, in this I could say more than I intend, aiming
   at nothing but the quieting of men's spirits, needlessly exasperated;
   only I cannot but say, that honest men ought to be very cautious how
   they put themselves upon any engagement that might make any party or
   faction in the kingdom suppose that their interest, in the least
   measure, doth run cross to that of the great Council thereof; thereby
   to strengthen the hands or designs of any, by occasioning an opinion
   that, upon fresh or new divisions, (which God of his mercy prevent!) we
   would not adhere constantly to our old principles, walking according to
   which we have hitherto found protection and safety. And I cannot but be
   jealous for the honour of our noble Parliament, whose authority is
   every day undermined, and their regard in the affections of the people
   shaken, by such dangerous insinuations; as though they could in an hour
   put an end to all our disturbances, but refuse it. This season, also,
   for such petitions seems to be very unseasonable, the greatest
   appearing danger impendent to this kingdom being from the contest about
   church government; which, by such means as this, is exceedingly
   heightened, and animosity added to the parties at variance.

   4. A particular form of church discipline is usually, in such
   petitions, either directly expressed or evidently pointed at and
   directed unto, as that alone which our covenant engageth us to embrace;
   yea, as though it had long since designed that particular way, and
   distinguished it from all others, the embracing of it is pressed, under
   the pain of breach of covenant, -- a crime abhorred of God and man.
   Now, truly, to suppose that our covenant did tie us up absolutely to
   any one formerly known way of church discipline, -- the words formally
   engaging us into a disquisition out of the word of that which is
   agreeable to the mind and will of God, -- is to me such a childish,
   ridiculous, selfish conceit, as I believe no knowing men will once
   entertain, unless prejudice, begotten by their peculiar interest, hath
   disturbed their intellectuals. For my part, I know no church government
   in the world already established amongst any sort of men, of the truth
   and necessity whereof I am convinced in all particulars; especially if
   I may take their practice to be the best intepreter of their maxims.

   Fourthly, Another "postulatum" is, that men would not use an
   overzealous speed, upon every small difference, to characterize men
   (otherwise godly and peaceable) as sectaries; knowing the odiousness of
   the name, [122] among the vulgar, deservedly or otherwise imposed, and
   the evil of the thing itself, rightly apprehended, whereunto lighter
   differences do not amount. Such names as this I know are arbitrary, and
   generally serve the wills of the greater number. They are commonly
   sectaries who, "jure aut injuriâ," are oppressed. Nothing was ever
   persecuted under an esteemed name. Names are in the power of many;
   things and their causes are known to few. There is none in the world
   can give an ill title to others, which from some he doth not receive.
   The same right which in this kind I have towards another, he hath
   towards me; unless I affirm myself to be infallible, not so him. Those
   names which men are known by when they are oppressed, they commonly use
   against others whom they seek to oppress. I would, therefore, that all
   horrid appellations, as increasers of strife, kindlers of wrath,
   enemies of charity, food for animosity, were for ever banished from
   amongst us. Let a spade be called a spade, so we take heed Christ be
   not called Beelzebub. I know my profession to the greatest part of the
   world is sectarism, as Christianity; amongst those who profess the name
   of Christ, to the greatest number I am a sectary, because a Protestant;
   [123] amongst Protestants, at least the one half account all men of my
   persuasion Calvinistical, sacramentarian sectaries; amongst these,
   again, to some I have been a puritanical sectary, an Arian heretic,
   because anti-prelatical; yea, and amongst these last, not a few account
   me a sectary because I plead for presbyterial government in churches:
   and to all these am I thus esteemed, as I am fully convinced,
   causelessly and erroneously. What they call sectarism, I am persuaded
   is "ipsissima veritas," the "very truth itself," to which they also
   ought to submit; that others also, though upon false grounds, are
   convinced of the truth of their own persuasion, I cannot but believe:
   and therefore, as I find by experience that the horrid names of
   heretic, schismatic, sectary, and the like, have never had any
   influence or force upon my judgment, nor otherwise moved me, unless it
   were unto retaliation, so I am persuaded it is also with others; for
   "homines sumus:" forcing them abroad in such liveries doth not at all
   convince them that they are servants to the master of sects indeed, but
   only makes them wait an opportunity to cast the like mantle on their
   traducers. And this usually is the beginning of arming the more against
   the few with violence, impatient of bearing the burdens which they
   impose on others' shoulders; by means whereof Christendom hath been
   made a theatre of blood, and one amongst all, after that by cruelty and
   villany he had prevailed above the rest, took upon him to be the only
   dictator in Christian religion. But of this afterward.

   Now, by the concession of these, as I hope, not unequitable demands,
   thus much at least I conceive will be attained, viz., that a peaceable
   dissent in some smaller things, disputable questions, not absolutely
   necessary assertions, deserves not any rigid censure, distance of
   affections, or breach of Christian communion and amity. In such things
   as these, "veniam petimusque damusque vicissim:" if otherwise, I
   profess I can hardly bring my mind to comply and close in with them
   amongst whom almost any thing is lawful but to dissent.

   These things being premised, I shall now set down and make public that
   proposal which heretofore I have tendered, as a means to give some
   light into a way for the profitable and comfortable practice of church
   government; drawing out of general notions what is practically
   applicable, so circumstantiated as of necessity it must be. And herein
   I shall not alter any thing, or in the least expression go off from
   that which long since I drew up at the request of a worthy friend,
   after a discourse about it; and this, not only because it hath already
   been in the hands of many, but also because my intent is not, either to
   assert, dispute, or make out any thing farther of my judgment in these
   things than I have already done (hoping for more leisure so to do than
   the few hours assigned to the product of this short appendix will
   permit), but only, by way of a defensative, to evince that the rumours
   which have been spread by some, and entertained by others too greedily,
   about this matter, have been exceeding causeless and groundless; so
   that though my second thoughts have, if I mistake not, much improved
   some particulars in this essay, yet I cannot be induced, because of the
   reason before recounted (the only cause of the publication thereof), to
   make any alteration in it; only I shall present the reader with some
   few things which gave occasion and rise to this proposal. As, --

   (1.) A fervent desire to prevent all farther division and separation,
   -- disunion of minds amongst godly men, -- suspicions and jealousies in
   the people towards their ministers, as aiming at power and unjust
   domination over them, -- fruitless disputes, languishings about
   unprofitable questions, breaches of charity for trifles, exasperating
   the minds of men one against another; -- all which growing evils,
   tending to the subversion of Christian love and the power of godliness,
   with the disturbance of the state, are too much fomented by that sad
   breach and division which is here attempted to be made up.

   (2.) A desire to work and draw the minds of all my brethren (the most,
   I hope, need it not) to set in for a thorough reformation, and for the
   obtaining of holy communion, -- to keep off indifferently the unworthy
   from church privileges and profaning of holy things. Whereunto I
   presumed the discovery of a way whereby this might be effected, without
   their disturbance in their former station, would be a considerable
   motive.

   (3.) A consideration of the paucity of positive rules in the Scripture
   for church government, with the great difficulty of reducing them to
   practice in these present times (both sufficiently evidenced by the
   endless disputes and irreconcilable differences of godly, precious, and
   learned men about them), made me conceive that the practice of the
   apostolical churches, doubtless for a time observed in those
   immediately succeeding, would be the best external help for the right
   interpretation of those rules we have, and pattern to draw out a church
   way by. Now, truly, after my best search and inquiry into the first
   churches and their constitution, framing an idea and exemplar of them,
   this poor heap following seems to me as like one of them as any thing
   that yet I have seen; nothing at all doubting but that if a more
   skilful hand had the limning of it, [124] the proportions, features,
   and lines would be very exact, equal and parallel; yea, did not extreme
   haste now call it from me, so that I have no leisure so much as to
   transcribe the first draught, I doubt not but by God's assistance it
   might be so set forth as not to be thought altogether undesirable, if
   men would but a little lay aside beloved pre-conceptions. But the
   printer stays for every line; only I must entreat every one that shall
   cast a candid eye on this unwillingly-exposed embryo and rude abortion,
   that he would assume in his mind any particular church mentioned in the
   Scripture, as of Jerusalem, Corinth, Ephesus, or the like; consider the
   way and state they were then and some ages after, in respect of outward
   immunities and enjoyments, and tell me whether any rational man can
   suppose that either there were in those places sundry particular
   churches, with their distinct, peculiar officers, acting in most
   pastoral duties severally in them, as distinguished and divided into
   entire societies, but ruling them in respect of some particulars
   loyally in combination, considered as distinct bodies; or else that
   they were such single congregations as that all that power and
   authority which was in them may seem fitly and conveniently to be
   intrusted with a small handful of men, combined under one single
   pastor, with one, two, or perhaps no associated elders. More than this
   I shall only ask, whether all ordinary power may not, without danger,
   be asserted to reside in such a church as is here described, reserving
   all due right and authority to councils and magistrates? Now, for the
   fountain, seat, and rise of this power, for the just distribution of it
   between pastors and people, this is no place to dispute; these
   following lines were intended merely to sedate and bury such contests,
   and to be what they are entitled, --
     __________________________________________________________________

   [111]

   "Laudatur ab his, culpatur ab illis."
   [Hor. Sat., lib. i. 2, 11.]

   [112] See August., Ep. 7, 28, 157, De Orig. Anim.

   [113]

   "Deferar in vicum vendentem thus et odores,

   Et piper, et quicquid chartis amicitur ineptis."
   [Hor. Epist., lib. ii. 1.]

   "Occidit miseros crambe repetita magistros."
   [Juv.]

   "Semper ego auditor tantum?"
   [Juv. Sat. i.]

   [114]

   "Immortale odium et nunquam sanabile vulnus,

   Ardet adhuc, Ombos et Tentyra. Summus utrinque

   Inde furor vulgo, quad numina vicinorum

   Odit uterque locus."
   Juven., [xv. 35.]"Græcè scire, aut politè loqui, apud illos hæresis
   est." -- Eras. de Scholiast.

   [115] "Noli irritare crabrones. Si lapides teras nonne ignis erumpit?"
   -- Ambros., lib. i. cap. 21; Prov. xxx. 33; Job xiii. 13; Prov. xxv.
   18. Vid. Remed. contra Gravam. Nationis Germanicæ. Luth. præfat, ad
   Lib. de Concil. Protest. 34 ministrorum. 4. Conclus. And generally all
   writers at the beginning of the Reformation.

   [116] Si accusasse sufficiet, quis erit innocens?

   [117]

   "Nec nos obniti contrà, nec tendere tantùm

   Sufficimus."
   [Virg. Æ. v. 21.]

   [118] Sulp. Sever. Epist. Hist. Eccles.

   [119] Plut. Apophth.

   [120] Vid. catal. hæret, apud Tertul. de præscript. Epiphan. Aug.
   Vincent.

   [121] "Ego ancillæ tuæ fidem habui: nonne tu impudens, qui nec mihi
   ipsi credis?" -- Philos. apud Plut. Apophth.

   [122] "Nunc vero si nominis odium est, quis nominum reatus? quæ
   accusatio vocabulorum? nisi aut Barbarum sonat aliqua vox nominis, aut
   maledicum, aut impudicum?" -- Tertul. Apol.

   [123] Acts xxiv. 14, xxviii. 22. -- "Hæresis Christianorum." Tertul.,
   -- "Secta Christ." Id., -- "Hæresis catholica, et hæresis sanctissima,"
   Constant. Epist. Chr. Syriac. Tileni Syntagma, -- quo probate conatur
   Calvinianos esse hæreticos, Hun. Calv. Tur. Andrews. Epist. ad Molin.

   [124] Hamerai d' epiloipoi martures sophotatoi. -- Pind., Od. i. Olym.,
   54, 55.
     __________________________________________________________________

A country essay for the practice of church government there.

   Our long expectation of some accommodation [125] between the dissenting
   parties about church government being now almost totally frustrate, --
   being also persuaded, partly through the apparent fruitlessness of all
   such undertakings, partly by other reasons not at this time seasonable
   to be expressed, that all national disputes tending that way will prove
   birthless tympanies, -- we deem it no ungrateful endeavour, waiving all
   speculative ideas, to give an essay, in such expressions as all our
   country friends concerned in it may easily apprehend, of what we
   conceive amongst us may really be reduced to comfortable and useful
   practice: concealing for a while all arguments for motives and
   inducements unto this way, with all those rocks and shelves, appearing
   very hideous in former proposals, which we strive to avoid; until we
   perceive whether any of our giants in this controversy will not come
   and look, and so overcome it, that at first dash the whole frame be
   irrecoverably ruined.

   Neither would we have any expect our full sense to each particular
   imaginable in this business, -- it being only a heap of materials,
   mostwhat unhewed, that we intend, and not a well-compacted fabric; and
   if the main be not condemned, we are confident no difference will ensue
   about particulars, which must have their latitude. However, if it be
   received as candidly as it is offered, no inconvenience will ensue.
   Now, that the whole may be better apprehended, and the reasons, if not
   the necessity, of this undertaking intimated, we shall premise some
   things concerning the place and persons for whose use is this proposal.

   First, For ministers. The place having all this while, through the
   goodness of God, been preserved in peace and quietness; and by the rich
   supply of able men sent hither by Parliament, there are in many
   parishes godly, orthodox, peace-loving pastors.

   Secondly, For the people.

   1. Very many, as in most other places, extremely ignorant, worldly,
   profane, scandalously vicious.

   2. Scarcely any parish where there are not some visibly appearing, of
   all ages, sexes, and conditions, fearing God, and walking unblamably
   with a right foot, as beseemeth the gospel; though in some places they
   are but like the berries after the shaking of an olive-tree.

   3. Amongst these, very few gifted, fitted or qualified for government.

   4. Many knowing professors, and such of a long standing, inclined to
   separation, unless some expedient may be found for comfortable
   communions; and in this resolution seem to be settled, to a contempt of
   allurements and threatenings.

   5. Seducers everywhere lying in wait to catch and deceive well-meaning
   souls, any thing discontented with the present administration of church
   affairs.

   6. Upon all which it appears, that comfortable communion is not to be
   attained within the bounds of respective parishes.

   Farther to carry on our intentions, we would desire of authority, --

   1. That our divisions may not be allotted out by our committees, --
   who, without other consideration, have bounded us with the precincts of
   high constables, -- but be left to the prudence of ministers, and other
   Christians, willingly associating themselves in the work.

   2. That men placed in civil authority may not, by virtue of their
   authority, claim any privilege in things purely ecclesiastical.

   In the several parishes let things be thus ordered:--

   1. Let every minister continue in his station, taking especial care of
   all them that live within the precincts of his parish; preaching,
   exhorting, rebuking, publicly, and from house to house; warning all, --
   using all appointed means to draw them to Jesus Christ and the faith of
   the gospel; waiting with all patience on them that oppose themselves,
   until God give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth; and
   in so doing, rest upon the calling he hath already received.

   2. Let the respective elders of the several parishes, to be chosen
   according to the ordinance of Parliament (annually, or otherwise), join
   with the ministers in all acts of rule and admonition, with those other
   parts of their charge which the parochial administration doth require.

   3. Let all criminal things, tending to the disturbance of that church
   administration which is amongst them be by the officers orderly delated
   to such as the civil magistrate shall appoint to take cognizance and
   determine of such things.

   And thus far have we proposed nothing new, nothing not common; neither
   in that which follows is there any thing so indeed, may it be but
   rightly apprehended.

   For the several combinations of ministers and people:--

   1. Let the extremes of the division not be above eight or ten miles
   distant and so the middle or centre not more than four or five miles
   from any part of it, -- which is no more than some usually go to the
   preaching of the word, and in which space Christians are generally as
   well known to one another in the country as almost at the next door in
   cities; but yet this may be regulated according to the number of
   professors fit for the society intended, -- which would not be above
   five hundred, nor under one hundred.

   2. In this division let there be, in the name of Christ and the fear of
   God, a gathering of professors (visible saints, men and women of good
   knowledge and upright conversation, -- so holding forth their communion
   with Christ), by their own desire and voluntary consent, into one body,
   -- uniting themselves, by virtue of some promissory engagement or
   otherwise, to perform all mutual duties, to walk in love and peace,
   spiritual and church communion, as beseemeth the gospel.

   3. Let every one so assembling have liberty, at some of the first
   meetings, to except against another, whether minister or others, so it
   be done with a spirit of meekness, and submission of judgment; or to
   demand such questions for satisfaction as shall be thought fit to be
   propounded.

   4. When some convenient number are thus assembled, let the ministers,
   if men of approved integrity and abilities, be acknowledged as elders
   respectively called to teach and rule in the church by virtue of their
   former mission, and be assumed to be so to this society by virtue of
   their voluntary consent and election.

   5. Let the ministers engage themselves in a special manner to watch
   over this flock, every one according to his abilities, both in
   teaching, exhorting, and ruling, so often as occasion shall be
   administered, for things that contain ecclesiastical rule and church
   order; acting jointly and as in a classical combination, and putting
   forth all authority that such classes are entrusted with.

   6. If it be judged necessary that any officers be added to them for the
   purpose before named, let them be chosen by the consent of the
   multitude.

   7. If not, let the ministers have the whole distributed among
   themselves respectively, according to the difference of their gifts, --
   reserving to the people their due and just privileges.

   8. Let this congregation assemble at the least once in a month, for the
   celebration of the communion, and other things them concerning; the
   meeting of the ministers may be appointed by authority, for those of a
   classis.

   9. If any one after his admission be found to walk unworthily, let him,
   after solemn, repeated admonition, be by joint consent left to his
   former station.

   10. Let any person, in any of the parishes combined as before, that is
   desirous to be admitted into this society, as is thought fit, be
   received at any time.

   11. If the number in process of time appear to be too great, let it be
   divided and subdivided, according to conveniency.

   12. Any one of the ministers may administer the sacrament, either to
   some or all of these, in their several parishes or at the common
   meeting, as opportunity shall serve.

   13. Let the rules of admission into this society and fellowship be
   scriptural, and the things required in the members only such as all
   godly men affirm to be necessary for every one that will partake of the
   ordinances with profit and comfort, -- special care being taken that
   none be excluded who have the least breathings of soul in sincerity
   after Jesus Christ.

   Now, beyond these generals for the present we judge it needless to
   express ourselves, or otherwise to confirm what we have proposed, each
   assertion almost directly pointing out unto what, in that particular,
   we do adhere; which being sufficiently confirmed by others, were but a
   superfluous labour to undertake. Neither shall we trouble you with a
   catalogue of conveniences, -- whereof men are put upon an express
   annumeration, when otherwise they do not appear, -- but commit the
   consideration of the tendence of the whole to every one's judgment, and
   conclude with the removal of a few obvious objections; being resolved
   hereafter, by God's assistance, to endeavour satisfaction about this
   way unto all, -- unless to such as shall be so simple or malicious as
   to ask whether this way be that of the Presbyterians or Independents.

   Obj. 1. By this means parishes will be unchurched.

   Ans. 1. If by churches you understand such entire societies of
   Christians as have all church power, both according to right and
   exercise, in and amongst themselves, as Independents speak of
   congregations; then they were never churched by any.

   2. If only civil divisions of men that may conveniently be taught by
   one pastor, and ruled by elders, whereof some may be fit to partake of
   all the ordinances, some not, as Presbyterians esteem them; then by
   this way they receive no injury, nor are abridged of any of their
   privileges.

   Obj. 2. This is to erect churches amongst churches, and against
   churches.

   Ans. No such thing; but a mere forming of one church with one
   presbytery.

   Obj. 3. It is against the Parliament's ordinance to assume a power of
   admitting and excluding of church members not exactly according to
   their rule, nor subordinate to the supervising of such as are appointed
   by them.

   Ans. 1. For the rules set out by ordinance, we conceive that the church
   officers are to be interpreters of them, until appeal be made from
   them, unto which we shall submit; and if it be so determined against
   us, that any be put on our communion "ipsi viderint," we shall labour
   to deliver our own souls.

   2. Though the Parliament forbid any but such authoritatively to be
   excluded, yet it doth not command that any be admitted but such as
   desire it; and we shall pray for such a blessing upon the work of our
   ministry as will either prepare a man for it or persuade them "pro
   tempore" from it; unless they be stubbornly obstinate, or openly
   wicked, -- against whom we hope for assistance. To objections arising
   from trouble and inconvenience, we answer, It cost more to redeem their
   souls.

   The God of peace and unity give the increase!


   "-- Si quid novisti rectius istis,

   Candidus imperti, si non, his utere."

   [Hor. Ep., i. 6, 67, 68.]

   And this is all which, for the present, I shall assert in this
   business; and this also is my own vindication. Time and leisure may
   give me advantage hereafter (if God permit) to deal seriously in this
   cause. In the meantime, it is not unknown to many, that so much as this
   was necessary for me to do; and I will not add now any thing that is
   not necessary.

   Now for the other head of the accusation, about toleration of errors,
   "philosophare volo, sed paucis." Something I shall add of my own
   present judgment in this matter; but with willing, express submission
   unto those whom the use and experience of things, with knowledge of
   foreign parts, skill in the rules of commonwealths, acquaintedness with
   the affections and spirits of men, have enabled to look punctually into
   the issues and tendencies of such a toleration. The main prejudice
   against it arises from the disturbances which it naturally (they say)
   produceth in civil states. I conceive no sort of men more unfit to
   judge of this than those whose abilities of learning do properly put
   them upon the discussing of this, and other controversies, as far as
   they are purely ecclesiastical, -- no men more frequently betraying
   narrowness of apprehension and weakness in secular affairs. For other
   consequences, I shall not be much moved with them, until it be clearly
   determined whether be worse, heretics or hypocrites, into maintain an
   error or counterfeit the truth; and whether profession upon compulsion
   be acceptable to God or man. [126] Laying those aside, let the thing
   itself be a little considered.

   Peace ecclesiastical, quiet among the churches (which without doubt
   would be shaken by a universal toleration), is that which most men aim
   at and desire. And truly he that doth not, scarcely deserves the name
   and privilege of a Christian. Unity in the Scripture is so pressed, so
   commanded, and commended, that not to breathe after it argues a heart
   acted by another spirit than that which moved the holy penmen thereof.
   But yet every agreement and consent amongst men professing the name of
   Christ, is not the unity and peace commended in the Scripture. That
   which some think to be Christ's order, may perhaps be anti-Christian
   confusion; the specious name of unity may be a cloak for tyranny.
   Learned men have reckoned up a sevenfold unity [127] in the Papacy; all
   which, notwithstanding, are far enough from that true evangelical unity
   which we are bound to labour for. Again, that which is good must be
   sought in a right manner, Or it will not be so to us. Peace and quiet
   is desirable; but there must be good causes and very urgent, to make us
   build our habitations out of others' ruins, and roll our pillows in
   their blood. I speak of things ecclesiastical. The historian [128]
   makes it a part of the oration spoken by Galgacus, the chieftain of the
   British forces, to stir them up against the Roman insolency, that when
   they had finished their depopulations, then they said they had peace.
   The same men have set up bishoprics in the Indies, as their forefathers
   did colonies here and elsewhere, with fire and sword. I know not how it
   comes to pass, but so it is, this proceeding with violence in matters
   of religion hath pleased and displeased all sorts of men, however
   distinguished by a true or false persuasion, who have enjoyed a
   vicissitude of the supreme power in any place, in supporting or
   suppressing of them. "Ure, seca, occide," is the language of men backed
   with authority: "Quod tibi fieri non vis, alteri ne feceris," say the
   same men under oppression. To give particular instances, were to lay
   open that nakedness which I suppose it my duty rather to coven What,
   then, you will say; shall every one be suffered to do what he pleaseth?
   [129] You mean, think or believe what he pleaseth, or that which he is
   convinced to be a truth. Must all sorts of men and their opinions be
   tolerated? -- These questions are not in one word to be resolved: many
   proposals are to be confirmed, many notions distinguished and retained,
   before a positive answer can be given. Take them in their whole
   latitude, and they may serve all men's turns. A negative universal
   resolution may tantamount unto, -- "The many intrusted with authority,
   or having that to back them, ought not to tolerate any of different
   persuasions from them, if they suppose them erroneous." Now truly, for
   my part, were I in Spain or Italy, a native of those places, and God
   should be pleased there to reveal that truth of his gospel unto me
   which he hath done in England, I believe those states ought to tolerate
   me, though they were persuaded that I were the most odious heretic
   under heaven; and what punishment soever they should impose on me for
   my profession would be required at their hands; -- unless they can
   convince me that God allows men to slay his servants for professing the
   gospel, if they believe them to be heretics: and so also excuse the
   Jews in crucifying his dear Son, because they esteemed him as an
   impostor. Christ was once crucified amongst thieves: he may be again,
   in them that are so supposed. I shall therefore summarily set down what
   I conceive in answer to these questions, premising a few things, if I
   mistake not, universally granted.

   And yet a word or two concerning toleration itself, that some guess may
   be given at what we aim and intend, must interpose. Much discourse
   about toleration hath been of late days amongst men; some pleading for
   it, more against it, was it always must be. Toleration is the alms of
   authority; yet men that beg for it, think so much at least their due.
   Some say it is a sin to grant it; others, that it is no less to deny
   it. Generally, the pleaders of each side have their interest in the
   cause. I never knew one contend earnestly for a toleration of
   dissenters, but was so himself; nor any for their suppression, but were
   themselves of the persuasion which prevaileth: for if otherwise, this
   latter would argue a Circumcellion [130] fury, willfully to seek their
   own ruin; the former so much charity, and commiseration of the
   condition of mortality as in these days would procure of the most no
   other livery but a fool's coat. Who almost would not admire at such
   new-discovered antipodes as should offer to assert an equal regiment of
   Trojans and Tyrians, [131] -- a like regard and allowance from
   authority for other sects as for that whereof themselves are a share?
   Now, amongst these contesters, few (nay, not any) have I found, either
   on the one side or the other, clearly and distinctly to define what
   they mean by toleration, or what is the direct purpose, signification,
   and tendency of non-toleration (a word in its whole extent written only
   in the forehead of the man of sin), -- what bounds, what terriers are
   to be assigned to the one or to the other, -- unto what degrees of
   longitude [132] or latitude their pole is to be elevated. Some,
   perhaps, by a toleration understand a universal, uncontrolled license,
   "vivendi ut velis," in things concerning religion; that every one may
   be let alone, and not so much as discountenanced in doing, speaking,
   acting, how, what, where, or when he pleaseth, "in agendis et credendis
   fidei," in all such things as concern the worship of God, articles of
   belief, or generally any thing commanded in religion; and in the
   meantime the parties at variance, and litigant about differences,
   freely to revile, reject, and despise one another, according as their
   provoked genius shall dispose their minds thereunto. Now truly, though
   every one of this mind pretends to cry for mercy to be extended unto
   poor afflicted truth, yet I cannot but be persuaded that such a
   toleration would prove exceeding pernicious to all sorts of men, and at
   last end in a dispute, like that recounted by Juvenal between two
   cities in Egypt, about their differences between their garden and river
   deities; [133] or like the contest related by Vertomannus in his
   travels amongst the Mohammedans, about Haly and Homar, the pretended
   successors to their grand impostor, where every one plied his
   adversary, "Hastisque clypeisque et saxis grandibus," cleaving their
   skulls, and making entrance for their arguments by dint of sword: and I
   wish experience did not sufficiently convince us that the profession of
   Christianity, where the power of godliness is away, will not prevent
   these evils: "Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum."

   Others there are that press for a non-toleration of any thing that
   opposes or contradicts the truth in any part, themselves being in their
   own judgments fully possessed of all, -- their tenets being unto them
   the only form of wholesome words. Moreover (for these things recounted
   make not the difference, for it is so with all sects of men), the
   magistrates, or those who are intrusted with all the power over men
   which, for the preservation of human society, God hath been pleased to
   make out from himself, are also of the same persuasion with them. These
   they supplicate that an effectual course may be taken (asserting not
   only that they are intrusted with power from above so to do, but also
   that it is their great sin if they do it not) whereby all sectaries and
   erroneous persons may not only not be countenanced or kept within
   bounds, and not be forborne in any disturbing, insolent miscarriage;
   but also, that all that doctrine which is not publicly owned may be
   sure to be supplanted by the restraint and punishment of the
   dissenters, whether unto imprisonment, confiscation of goods, or death
   itself; for they must not cease, nay (if the thing is to be effected),
   they cannot rationally assign where to stay in punishing, before they
   come to the period of all, death itself, which is the point and centre
   wherein all the lines of this sentence meet; [134] wherein, to me,
   truly there is nothing but "luctus ubique, pavor, et plurima mortis
   imago." I know it is coloured with fair pretences; [135] but "quid ego
   verba audiam, facta cum video?" It is written with red letters, and the
   pens of its abettors are dipped in the blood of Christians. Doubtless
   between these extremes lies the way.

   Again, some by a toleration understand a mutual forbearance in
   communion, though there be great differences in opinion; and this the
   generality of the clergy (as heretofore they were called) did usually
   incline unto, -- viz., that any men almost might be tolerated, whilst
   they did not separate. And these lay down this for a ground, that there
   is a latitude in judgment to be allowed; so that the communion may be
   held by men of several persuasions, in all things, with an allowance of
   withdrawing in those particulars wherein there is dissent amongst them:
   and this the Belgic Remonstrants pressed hard for, before they were
   cast out by the Synod of Dort.

   Others plead for a toleration out of communion; that is, that men
   renouncing the communion of those whose religion is owned and
   established by authority, may yet peaceably be suffered to enjoy the
   ordinances in separation.

   Moreover, by communion some understand one thing, some another. Some
   think that is preserved sufficiently, if the dissenters do acknowledge
   those from whom they do dissent to be true churches, to enjoy the
   ordinances of Christ, to have the means of life and salvation in them,
   closing with them in all substantials of doctrine; but yet, because of
   some disorders in and amongst them, they dare not be as of them, -- but
   yet only separate from those disorders.

   Others, again, think that communion is utterly dissolved if any
   distinctions of persons be made, more than all acknowledge ought to be,
   -- any differences in the administration of the ordinances, -- any
   divisions in government at all.

   Now, all these things, and many more that might be added, must clearly
   be distinguished and determined by him that would handle his matter at
   large and exactly, that we may know what he means by those ambiguous
   words, and in what acceptation he owns them. Until this be done, a man
   may profess to oppose both toleration and non-toleration without any
   contradiction at all, because in their several senses they do not
   always intend the same.

   For my part, as on the one side; -- if by toleration you mean
   "potestatem vivendi ut velis" (as the Stoics defined liberty), a
   universal concession of an unbounded liberty, [136] or rather, bold,
   unbridled licentiousness, for every one to vent what he pleaseth, and
   to take what course seems good in his own eyes, in things concerning
   religion and the worship of God, I cannot give my vote for it; -- so,
   if by non-toleration you mean that which the gloss upon that place,
   "Hæreticum hominem de vita," intended by adding "supple tolle," [137]
   to make up the sense, -- as if they were not to be endured in any place
   who dissent only in not-fundamentals from that which is established,
   but to be hated "ad furcas et leones," as the Christians of old, or to
   have their new derided lights extinguished in that light, "qua stantes
   ardent, qui fixo gutture fumant," in a Nero's bonfire, -- into the
   secrets of them that are thus minded let not my soul descend. "In their
   anger they will slay a man, and in their self-will they dig down a
   wall.

   Cursed be their anger, for it is fierce; and their wrath, for it is
   cruel." These things, then, being so ambiguous, doubtful, and
   uncertain, we dare not be too peremptorily dogmatical, nor positively
   assert but only what is certainly true; as are these following:--

   1. That heresies and errors ought not to be tolerated; -- that is, men
   ought not to connive at, or comply with, those ways and opinions which
   they are convinced to be false, erroneous, contrary to sound doctrine,
   and that form of wholesome words which is delivered unto us as (next
   unto Christ) the greatest treasure of our souls, -- especially if
   credibly supposed to shake any fundamentals of the common faith; but
   with all their strength and abilities, in all lawful ways, upon every
   just call, to oppose, suppress, and overthrow them, -- rote root them
   up and east them out, that they may not, as noxious weeds and tares,
   overgrow and choke the good corn, amongst which they are covertly
   scattered. All predictions of "false Christs, false prophets, false
   teachers to come," and "to be avoided," all cautions to "try spirits,
   avoid heretics, beware of seducers, keep close to the truth received,
   -- to hate the doctrine of Nicolaitanes, to avoid endless disputes,
   strife of words, old fables, languishing about unprofitable questions,"
   -- the epithets given to, and descriptions made of, heresies, that they
   are "pernicious, damnable, cankers, works of the flesh," and the like,
   -- are all incitations and encouragements for the applying of all
   expedient means for the taking out of the way these stumbling-blocks.
   Let, then, the Scriptures be searched, and all ways embraced which the
   gospel holdeth forth, for the discovering, convincing, silencing,
   reproving, confuting of errors and persons erring, by admonitions,
   reproofs, mighty Scripture convictions, evidencing of the truth, with
   fervent prayers to Almighty God, the God of truth, that he would give
   us one heart and one way; and if these weapons of our warfare do not
   prevail, we must let them know that one day their disobedience will be
   revenged with being cut off, and "cast out as unprofitable branches,
   fit to be cast into the fire."

   2. That any doctrine tending undeniably in its own nature (and not by
   strained consequences) to the disturbance of the civil state may be
   suppressed, by all such means as are lawfully to be used for the
   conservation of the peace and safety of the state. Jesus Christ, though
   accused of sedition, taught none, practised none. His gospel gives not
   control to magistracy, righteous laws, or any sort of lawful government
   established amongst men; and therefore they whose faith is faction, and
   whose religion is rebellion, -- I mean Jesuits and Jesuitical Papists,
   -- some of the articles of whose creeds are directly repugnant to the
   safety, yea, being, of any commonwealths, wherein themselves and men of
   their own persuasion do not domineer and rule, may be proceeded against
   by them who bear not the sword in vain. The like may be said of men
   seditious, under any pretences whatsoever, -- like the Anabaptists at
   Munster.

   3. That such heresies or mispersuasions as are attended with any
   notorious sin in practice (I mean, not in consequences, but owned by
   their abettors, and practised accordingly, beyond Epicurus, whose
   honest life was not corrupted by his foul, dishonest opinion), -- like
   the Nicolaitanes, teaching, as most suppose, promiscuous lust; and the
   Papists' express abominable idolatry, -- may be in their authors more
   severely punished than such crimes not owned and maintained do singly
   deserve. To pretend conscience in such a case will not avail; "the
   works of the flesh are manifest," easy to be discerned, known to all.
   Apologies for such, argue searedness, not tenderness: such "evil
   communication" as "corrupteth good manners," is not to be tolerated.

   4. No pretences whatsoever, nor seeming colour, should countenance men
   dissenting from what is established, to revile, traduce, deride, or
   otherwise expose to vulgar contempt, by words or actions, the way owned
   by authority (if not evidently fallen off from Jehovah to Baal), or
   fasten bitter, uncharitable appellations on those who act according to
   that way; that is, the public ministers and ministry, acknowledged,
   owned, and maintained by the supreme magistrate, where they both are.
   Here, by the way, I cannot but complain of want of ingenuity and candid
   charity in those men who, having a comfortable maintenance arising
   another way, do yet, "ad faciendum populum," continually, in pulpits
   and other public places, inveigh against that way of maintenance which
   is allowed by the magistrate, and set apart for those that labour in
   the word and doctrine; unto whom I wish no farther evil, but only
   forced patience when their neighbouring tradesmen shall have persuaded
   the people about them that preachers of the gospel ought to live by the
   work of their hands, and so the contribution for their maintenance be
   subducted.

   Such men as these do show of what spirit they are, and what they would
   do if they were lions; seeing they bark so much, being but snarling
   dogs. And therefore, truly, if some severe course were used for the
   restraint of those who in our days strive to get themselves a name, and
   to build up their repute, by slighting, undervaluing, and, by all
   uncharitable, malicious ways, rendering odious those from whom they
   dissent, I should not much intercede for them: these are evil works,
   fruits of the flesh, evident to all. Now these, and such things as
   these, are acknowledged by all even-spirited men. Some few I shall now
   add, I hope not unlike them. As, --

   5. That it is a most difficult undertaking to judge of heresies and
   heretics, -- no easy thing to show what heresy is in general; --
   whether this or that particular error be a heresy or no, -- whether it
   be a heresy in this or that man; especially if such things as
   stubbornness, and pertinacy upon conviction, with the like, be required
   to make a man a heretic, -- for such things cannot be evidenced or made
   out, but only (for the most part) by most obscure conjectures, and such
   as will scarcely satisfy a charitable judgment. Papists, indeed, who
   have laid it down for a principle, that a contradiction of the doctrine
   of the church, known to be so, and continued in after admonition, doth
   infallibly make a man a heretic, are very clear, uniform, and settled
   in that which they have made the ground, warrant, and foundation of
   slaying millions of men professing the name of Christ: but for all
   other Christians, who acknowledge an infallibility in the rule, but no
   infallibility in any for the discovery of the truth of that rule
   (though exceeding clear and perspicuous in things necessary), -- for
   them, I say, understanding and keeping close to their own principles,
   it is a most difficult thing to determine of heresy, with an assurance
   that they are so out of danger of erring in that determination as to
   make it a ground of rigorous proceedings against those of whom they
   have so concluded. Some things, indeed, are so clearly in the Scripture
   laid down and determined, that to question or deny them bespeaks a
   spirit self-condemned in that which he doth profess. That twice two
   makes four, that he that runneth moveth, are not things more evident to
   reason than many things in the Scripture are to every captivated
   understanding; -- a wilful deviation in such, merits no charity. But
   generally, errors are about things hard to be understood, not so
   clearly appearing, and concerning which it is very difficult to pass
   the sentence of heresy. No judge of heresy since the apostles' days,
   but hath been obnoxious to error in that judgment; and those who have
   been forwardest to assume a judicature and power of discerning between
   truth and error, so as to have others regulated thereby, have erred
   most foully. Of old it was generally conceived to be in councils. Now,
   I should acknowledge myself obliged to any man that would direct me to
   a council since that Acts xv. 1 -- which I may not be forced from the
   word to assert that it, in some thing or other, went astray.

   Luther feared not to affirm of the first and best of general synods,
   that he "understood not the Holy Ghost to speak in it;" and that the
   canons thereof were but plain hay and stubble; [138] -- yea, and Beza,
   that such was the "folly, ignorance, ambition, wickedness of many
   bishops in the best times, that you would suppose the devil to have
   been president in their assemblies;" [139] insomuch as Nazianzen
   complained that he never saw a [140] good end of any, and affirmed that
   he was resolved never to come at them more. And in truth, the fightings
   and brawls, diabolical arts of defamation and accusing one another,
   abominable pride, ambition, and affectation of pre-eminence, which
   appeared in most of them, did so far prevail, that in the issue they
   became (as one was entitled) dens of thieves, rather than conventions
   of humble and meek disciples of Jesus Christ, until at length, the holy
   dove being departed, an ominous owl overlooked the Lateran fathers; and
   though with much clamour they destroyed the appearing fowl, yet the
   foul spirit of darkness and error wrought as effectually in them as
   ever. But to close this discourse. Ignorance of men's invincible
   prejudices, of their convictions, strong persuasions, desires, aims,
   hopes, fears, inducements, -- sensibleness of our own infirmities,
   failings, misapprehensions, darkness, knowing but in part, should work
   in us a charitable opinion of poor erring creatures, that do it perhaps
   with as upright, sincere hearts and affections as some enjoy truth.
   Austin [141] tells the Manichees, the most paganish heretics that ever
   were, that they only raged and were high against them who knew not what
   it was to seek the truth and escape error. With what ardent prayers the
   knowledge of truth is obtained! And how tender is Salvian [142] in his
   judgment of the Arians! "They are," saith he, "heretics, but know it
   not, -- heretics to us, but not to themselves; nay, they think
   themselves so catholic that they judge us to be heretics: what they are
   to us, that are we to them. They err, but with a good mind; and for
   this cause God shows patience towards them."

   Now, if any should dissent from what I have before asserted concerning
   this particular, I would entreat him to lay down some notes whereby
   heresies may infallibly be discerned to be such; and he shall not find
   me repugning.

   6. That great consideration ought to be had of that sovereign dictate
   of nature, the sum of all moral duties. "Quod tibi fieri non vis,
   alteri ne feceris;" -- "Do not that unto others which you would not
   have done to you, were you in the mine condition with them." In the
   business in hand, we are supposed by others to be in that estate
   wherein we suppose those to be of whom we speak; those others being to
   us what we are to them. Now truly, if none of the former inconveniences
   and iniquities which we recounted (assertion 2, 3, 4, or the like), do
   accompany erring persons, it will be something difficult to make it
   appear how we may, if enjoying authority over them, impose any
   coercion, restraint, or punishment on them, which we would not
   acknowledge to be justly laid on us by others (supposing it should be
   laid) having authority over us, convinced that our persuasion differing
   from them is false and erroneous. No sort of Christians but are
   heretics and schismatics to some Christians in authority; and it may be
   their lot to live under the power and jurisdiction of men so persuaded
   of them, where they ought to expect that the same measure will be given
   unto them which, in other places, they have consented to mete out to
   others.

   But men will say, and all men pleading the cause of non-toleration in
   its full extent do say, That they are heretics and erroneous persons
   whom we do oppose: we ourselves are orthodox; and no law of nature, no
   dictate of the Scriptures, requires that we should think it just to
   render unto them that are orthodox as unto them that are heretics,
   seducers, and false teachers. Because thieves are punished, shall
   honest men fear that they shall be so too? -- But a thief is a thief in
   all the world, unto all men: in opinions it is not so. -- He is a
   heretic that is to be punished. -- But to whom? in whose judgment? in
   his own? -- no more than we are in ours. -- But he is so to them that
   judge him. -- True. Put the case, a Protestant were to be judged by a
   Papist, as a thousand saints have been: is he not the worst of heretics
   to his judge? These things turn in a circle: what we are to ourselves,
   that he is to himself: what he is to us, that we are unto others that
   may be our judges. But however, you will say, we are in the truth, and
   therefore ought to go free. Now, truly, this is the same paralogism:
   who says we are in the truth? others? no, ourselves. Who says erroneous
   persons (as so supposed) are heretics, or the like? they themselves?
   no, but we: and those that are to us as we are to them, say no less of
   us. Let us not suppose that all the world will stoop to us, because we
   have the truth, as we affirm, but they do not believe. If we make the
   rule of our proceedings against others to be our conviction that they
   are erroneous; others will, or may, make theirs of us to be their rule
   of proceeding against us. We do thus to them, because we so judge of
   them; will not others, who have the same judgment of us as we of them,
   do the like unto us? Now here I profess that I do not desire to extend
   any thing in this discourse to the patronizing of any error whatsoever,
   -- I mean, any thing commonly so esteemed in the reformed churches, --
   as myself owning any such; much less to the procuring of a licentious
   immunity for every one in his way; and least of all, to countenance men
   walking disorderly in any regard, especially in the particulars before
   recounted; -- but only to show how warily, and upon what sure
   principles, that cannot be retorted on us, we ought to proceed, when
   any severity is necessarily required, in case of great danger; and how
   in lesser things, if the unity of faith may in some comfortable measure
   be kept, then to assert the proposition in its full latitude, urging
   and pleading for Christian forbearance, even in such manner to be
   granted as we would desire it from them whom we do forbear; for truly
   in those disputable things, we must acknowledge ourselves in the same
   series with other men, unless we can produce express patents for our
   exemptions. But some, perhaps, will say, that even in such things as
   these Gamaliel's counsel is not good; better all go on with punishing
   that can; truth will not be suppressed, but error will. Good God! was
   not truth oppressed by antichristian tyranny? was not outward force the
   engine that for many generations kept truth in corners? But of this
   afterward.

   Now, I am mistaken if this principle, that the civil magistrate ought
   to condemn, suppress, and persecute every one that he is convinced to
   err, though in smaller things, do not at length, in things of greater
   importance, make Christendom a very theatre of bloody murders, killing,
   slaying, imprisoning men round in a compass; until the strongest
   becomes dictator to the rest, and he alone be supposed to have
   infallible guidance, -- all the rest to be heretics, because overcome
   and subdued. (When I speak of death and killing in this discourse, I
   understand not only forcible death itself, but that also which is
   equivalent thereunto, as banishment, or perpetual imprisonment.) I had
   almost said, that it is the interest of mortality to consent generally
   to the persecution of a man maintaining such a destructive opinion.

   7. That whatsoever restraint or other punishment may be allowed in case
   of grosser errors, yet slaying of heretics for simple heresy, as they
   call it, for my part I cannot close withal; nor shall ever give my vote
   to the burning, hanging, or killing of a man, otherwise upright,
   honest, and peaceable in the state, merely because he misbelieveth any
   point of Christian faith. Let what pretences you please be produced, or
   colours flourished, I should be very unwilling to pronounce the
   sentence of blood in the case of heresy. I do not intend here to
   dispute; but if any one will, upon Protestant principles and Scripture
   grounds, undertake to assert it, I promise (if God grant me life) he
   shall not want a convert or an antagonist. I know the usual pretences:
   Such a thing is blasphemy. -- But search the Scripture, look upon the
   definitions of divines, and by all men's consent you will find heresy,
   in what head of religion soever it be, and blasphemy properly so
   called, to be exceedingly distant. Let a blasphemer undergo the law of
   blasphemy; but yet I think we cannot be too cautious how we place men
   in that damnable series calling heaven and earth to witness the
   contrary. But again: To spread such errors will be destructive to
   souls. -- So are many things, which yet are not punishable with
   forcible death. Let him that thinks so go kill Pagans and Mohammedans.
   As such heresy is a canker, but a spiritual one, let it be prevented by
   spiritual means. Cutting off men's heads is no proper remedy for it. If
   state physicians think otherwise, I say no more, but that I am not of
   the college, and what I have already said I submit to better judgments.

   8. It may be seriously considered, upon a view of the state and
   condition of Christians, since their name was known in the world,
   whether this doctrine of punishing erring persons with death,
   imprisonment, banishment, and the like, under the name of heretics,
   hath not been as useful and advantageous for error as truth; nay,
   whether it hath not appeared the most pernicious invention that ever
   was broached. In the first, second, and third ages, we hear little of
   it, -- nothing for it, -- something against it:-- much afterward
   against it, in Austin and others. [143] Marlinus, the famous French
   bishop, rejected the communion of a company of his associate bishops,
   because they had consented, with Maximus the emperor, unto the death of
   the Priscillianists, -- as vile heretics as ever breathed. At the end
   of the fourth and beginning of the fifth century, when the Arians and
   orthodox had successively procured the supreme magistrate to join with
   them, men were killed and dismembered like beasts: banishments,
   imprisonments, plunderings, especially by the Arians, were as frequent
   as in new subdued kingdoms. But never was this tragedy so acted to the
   life, as by the worshippers of images on the one side, and their
   adversaries on the other: [144] which difference rose about the year
   130, and was carried on with that barbarous outrage on both sides,
   especially by the Iconolatræ (as the worst were ever best at such
   proceedings), as is wonderful to consider. Now, excepting only those
   idolatrous heretics in the last, who were paid home in their own coin
   for a thousand years together, this doctrine was put in practice
   against none almost but the martyrs of Jesus. The Roman stories of the
   killing of heretics, are all martyrologies; thousands slain for
   heretics now lie under the altar, crying for vengeance, and shall one
   day sit upon thrones, judging their judges. So that where one man hath
   suffered for an error, under the name of a heretic, five hundred under
   the same notion have suffered for truth; a principle would seem more
   befitting Christians to spare five hundred for the saving of one
   guiltless person. Truth hath felt more of the teeth of this scorpion
   than error; and clearly it grew up by degrees, with the whole mystery
   of iniquity. In the gospel we have nothing like it: the acts of Christ
   purging the temple, Peter pronouncing the fate of Ananias, and Paul
   smiting Elymas with blindness, seem to me heterogeneous. The first laws
   of Constantine speak liberty and freedom. [145] Pecuniary mulcts
   afterward were added, and general edicts against all sects; and so it
   is put over into the hands of the Arians, who exceedingly cherished it:
   yet for a good while pretences must be sought out, -- Eustathius of
   Antioch must be accused of adultery, Athanasius of sedition, magic, and
   I know not what, that a colour might be had for their persecution.
   [146] The Arian kings in Africa were the first that owned it, gugne
   kephale, and acted according to their persuasions. Methinks I hear the
   cries of poor dismembered, mangled creatures, for the faith of the holy
   Trinity! Next to these, through a few civil constitutions of some weak
   emperors, it wholly comes to reside in the hands of the pope; kings and
   princes are made his executioners, and he plays his game to the
   purpose. Single persons serve not this Bel and dragon, -- whole nations
   [147] must be slaughtered, that he may be drunk with blood. He sends
   whole armies to crucify Christ afresh, -- he gives every one of his
   soldiers a cross; hence followed cruel sights, bloody battles, wasting
   of kingdoms, raging against the names, ashes, sepulchres of the dead,
   with more than heathenish cruelty. Such evil fruits hath this bitter
   root sent forth, the streams of this fountain have all been blood; so
   that it cannot be denied but that a judicature of truth, and the
   contrary assumed, with a forcible backing of the sentence, was the
   bottom-stone in the foundation and highest in the corner of the tower
   of Babel: and I believe that upon search it will appear, that error
   hath not been advanced by any thing in the world so much as by usurping
   a power for its suppression. In divers contests that the pope had with
   others, the truth was on his side (as in the business of Athanasius and
   others in the east deposed by the Arians [148] ). Now, who would not
   have thought, that his standing up with all earnestness for the truth
   would not have been the ruin of the devil's kingdom of darkness, and
   almost have spoiled the plot of the mystery of iniquity? when the truth
   is, the largest steps that ever the man of sin took towards his throne
   was by usurping of power to suppress errors and heresies. It would be a
   great encouragement to use that way for the extirpation of errors (if
   any such be, besides the preaching of the gospel, and convictions from
   thence), which any one could produce and give assurance that it hath
   not been tried, or been tried and proved ineffectual for the
   supplantation of truth; and if such a way be not produced, what if both
   should grow together until harvest?

   9. Let us not be too hasty in pressing any opinion arising and divulged
   with odious consequences of sedition, turbulency, and the like, because
   tumults and troubles happen in the commonwealth where it is asserted. A
   coincidence of events is one of the principal causes of error and
   misjudgings in the world: because errors and tumults arise together,
   therefore one is the cause of the other, may be an argument "a baculo
   ad angulum." It is a hard thing to charge them with sedition who
   protest against it, and none can make it appear that it is "contraria
   factis" by any of their actions, but only because it is fit they should
   bear the blame of what happeneth evilly in their days. Upon every
   disaster in the empire, the noise of old was, "Christianos ad leones."
   [149] For our part, we ought to remember that we were strangers in
   Egypt. It is but little more than a hundred years since all mouths were
   opened and filled with reproaches against that glorious Reformation
   wherein we rejoice. Was it not the unanimous voice of all the
   adversaries thereof, that a new religion was brought in, tending to the
   immediate ruin of all states and commonwealths, -- attended with
   rebellion, the mother of sedition? Have we not frequent apologies of
   our divines for the confutation of such false, malicious, and putid
   criminations? It is true, indeed, the light of the gospel breaking out
   was accompanied with war, and not peace (according to the prediction of
   our Saviour); whereof the gospel was no more the cause, than John
   Diazius was of that horrible murder, when his brains were chopped out
   with an axe by his brother Alphonsus, [150] because he professed the
   gospel. Hence Luther, the vehemency of whose spirit gave no way to
   glosses and temporizing excuses, plainly affirms those tumults to be
   such necessary appendices of the preaching of the gospel, that he
   should not believe the word of God to be abroad in the world, if he saw
   it not accompanied with tumults; which he had rather partake in, than
   perish under the wrath of God in an eternal tumult. [151] The truth
   must go on, though thereby the world should be reduced to its primitive
   chaos and confusion. Were it not a perpetual course, for men of every
   persuasion to charge sedition, and the like, upon that which they would
   have suppressed, knowing that no name is more odious unto them who have
   power to effect their desire; and did I not find that some, who have
   had much ado, whilst they were sheep, to keep off that imputation from
   themselves, within a few years, becoming lions, have laid it home upon
   others as peaceable as they; I might perhaps be more rigid than now
   these discoveries will suffer me to be. Far be it from me to apologize
   for truth itself, if seditious; -- only I abhor those false, malicious
   criminations, whereby God's people in these days wherein we live have
   exceedingly suffered. It hath pleased God so to order things in this
   kingdom, that the work of recovering his worship to its purity, and
   restoring the civil state to its liberty, should be both carried on at
   the same time by the same persons. Are there none now in this kingdom
   to whom this reforming is an almost everting of God's worship? And are
   there none that have asserted that our new religion hath caused all
   those tumults and bloodshed? And doth not every unprejudiced man see
   that these are hellish lies and malicious accusations, having indeed
   neither ground nor colour, but only their coincidence in respect of
   time? Is any wise man moved with their clamours? Are their aspersions
   considerable? Are we the only men that have been thus injuriously
   traduced? Remember the difference between Elijah and Ahab, -- what was
   laid to the charge of Paul; see the apologies of the old Christians,
   and speak what you find.

   Much might here be added concerning the qualifications, carriages,
   humility, peaceableness, of erring persons; all which ought to be
   considered, and our proceedings towards them to be, if not regulated,
   yet much swayed by such considerations. Some I have known myself, that
   I dare say the most curious inquirer into their ways, that sees with
   eyes of flesh, would not be able to discover any thing but mere
   conviction and tenderness of conscience that causeth them to own the
   opinions which, different from others, they do embrace. Others, again,
   so exceeding supercilious, scorning, proud, selfish, -- so given to
   contemning of all others, reviling and undervaluing of their
   adversaries, -- that the blindest pity cannot but see much carnalness
   and iniquity in their ways. These things, then, deserve to be weighed,
   all passion and particular interest being set aside. And then, if the
   die be cast, and we must forward, let us take along with us these two
   cautions:--

   (1.) So to carry ourselves in all our censures, every one in his sphere
   (ecclesiastical discipline being preserved as pure and unmixed from
   secular power as possible), that it may appear to all that it is the
   error which men maintain which is so odious unto us, and not the
   consequent or their dissent from us, whether by subducting themselves
   from our power or withdrawing from communion. For if this latter be
   made the cause of our proceeding against any, there must be one law for
   them all, -- all that will not bow, to the fiery furnace! Recusancy is
   the fault; and that being the same in all, must have the same
   punishment, -- which would be such an unrighteous inequality as is fit
   for none but Antichrist to own.

   (2.) That nothing be done to any, but that the bound and farthest end
   of it be seen at the beginning, and not leave way and room for new
   persecution upon new pretences. "Cedo alteram et alteram," one stripe
   sometimes makes way for another, and how know I that men will stay at
   thirty-nine? "Principiis obsta."

   All these things being considered, I cannot so well close with them who
   make the least allowance of dissent to be the mother of abominations.
   Words and hated phrases may easily be heaped up to a great number, to
   render any thing odious which we have a mind to oppose; but the proving
   of an imposed evil or absurdity is sometimes a labour too difficult for
   every undertaker. And so I hope I have said enough to warrant my own
   hesitancy in this particular. Some might now expect that I should here
   positively set down what is my judgment concerning errors and erroneous
   persons dissenting from the truth received and acknowledged by
   authority, with respect unto their toleration: unto whom I answer, That
   to consider the power of the magistrate about things of religion, and
   over consciences; the several restraints that have been used in this
   case, or are pleaded for; -- the difference between dangerous
   fundamental errors and others; -- the several interests of men, and
   ways of disengaging; -- the extent of communion, and the absolute
   necessity of a latitude to be allowed in some things; -- with such
   other things as would be requisite for a full handling of the matter in
   hand, -- ask a longer discourse, and more exactness, than the few hours
   allotted to this appendix can afford. Only for the present I ask, if
   any will take the pains to inform me, -- 1. What they mean by a
   non-toleration? whether only a not countenancing nor holding communion
   with them; or if crushing and punishing them, then how? to what degree?
   by what means? where they will undoubtedly bound? 2. What the error is
   concerning which the inquiry is made? the clear opposition thereof to
   the word of God? the danger of it? the repugnancy that is in it to
   peace, quietness, and the power of godliness? 3. What or who are the
   erring persons? how they walk? in what manner of conversation? what is
   their behaviour towards others not of their own persuasion? what gospel
   means have been used for their conviction? what may be supposed to be
   their prejudices, motives, interests, and the like? And then, if it be
   worth asking, I shall not be backward to declare my opinion. And truly,
   without the consideration of these things, and other such
   circumstances, how a right judgment can be passed in this case, I see
   not.

   And so, hoping the courteous reader will look with a candid eye upon
   these hasty lines, rather poured out than written; and consider that a
   day's pains in these times may serve for that which is but for a day's
   use; the whole is submitted to his judgment by him who professeth his
   all in this kind to be, -- the love of truth and peace.
     __________________________________________________________________

   [125] The form being given to this essay at the first, I thought not
   good to alter any thing about it.

   [126] "Hostiæ ab animo libenti accipiuntur." -- Tertul.

   [127] "1. Satanica; 2. Ethnica; 3. Belluina; 4. Iscariotica; 5.
   Tyrannica; 6. Herodiana; 7. Ventris causa." -- Illyricus, de Variis
   Sectis ap. Papistas.

   [128] "Solitudinem ubi faciunt, pacem appellant." -- Tacitus Vita Agr.
   cap. x.

   [129] "Humani juris, et naturalis potestatis est, unicuique quod
   putaverit colere." -- Tertul. "Quis imponet mihi necessitatem aut
   credendi quod nolim, aut quod velim non credendi!" -- Lactan.

   [130] The Circumcelliones, from which this epithet is derived, were
   fanatics in North Africa, who, in the course of the fourth century,
   prowled around the huts (circum cellas) of the peasantry, despising
   labour, and subsisting on alms. They were much under the influence of
   the Donatists, and often, by their rash demolition of pagan idols,
   exposed themselves to martyrdom. --Ed.

   [131] "Tros, Tyriusque mihi nullo discrimine agetur." -- [Virg. Æ., i.
   578.]

   [132]

   "Late sibi summovet omne

   Vulgus ut in vacuâ regnet Basiliscus arenâ"
   [Lucan, i. 9, 725.]

   [133]

   "O Sanctas genres quibus hæc nascantur in hortis

   Numina!"
   [Sat. xv. 10]

   [134]

   "Inventus, Chrysippe, mi finitor acervi."
   [Persi, vi. 80.]

   [135]

   Echthros gar moi' keinos homos aidao pulesin,

   Hos ch' heteron men keuthei eni phresin, allo de bazei.
   [Hom. Il., ix. 312, 313.]

   [136] Exousia autopragias? -- [Diog. Laert. in Stoic. Dogm., rendered
   as above by Cicer. Paradox. Sto. v. 1.]

   [137] Tolle de vita.

   [138] "Hic prorsus non intelligo Sanctum Spiritum in hoc concilio: hi
   omnes articuli fænum, stramen, ligna, stipulæ fuerunt." -- Luth.

   [139] "In optimis illis temporibus, ea fuit nonnullorum episcoporum,
   partim ambitio, partim futilitas et ignorantia," etc. -- Beza, præfat,
   ad Nov. Testa.

   [140] "Ego, si vera scribere oportet, ita animo affectus sum, ut omnia
   episcoporum concilia fugiam, quoniam nullius concilii finem lætum
   faustumque vidi: nec quod depulsionem malorum potius quam accessionem
   et incrementum habuerit." -- Greg. Naz. Ep. ad Procop.

   [141] "Illi in vos sæviunt, qui nesciunt cum quo labore inveniantur, et
   quam difficile caveantur errores," etc. -- Aug.

   [142] "Apud nos sunt hæretici, apud se non sunt: quod ergo illi nobis
   sunt, hoc nos illis," etc. -- Salv. de Prov. etc.

   [143] Tous misountas ton Theon, misein chre kai humas, kai epi tois
   echthrois autou ektekesthai; ou men kai tuptein autous e diokein,
   kathos ta ethne ta me eidota ton Kurion kai Theon; all' echthrous men
   hegeisthai, kai chorizesthai ap' auton. -- Ignat. Epist. ad Philad.

   [144] Theophanes. Histor. Miscel., lib. xxii. cap. 30.

   [145] Euseb. Vit. Const., lib. ii. cap. 27.

   [146] Socrat. Evag. Rufinus. Sozom.

   [147] Albigenses, Waldenses, Bohemians.

   [148] Socrat., lib. ii. cap. 11.

   [149] Arnob.

   [150] Sleid. Com.

   [151] "Ego nisi tumultus istos viderem, verbum Dei in mundo non esse
   dicerem. Præeligimus temporali tumultu collidi, quam æterno tumultu sub
   ira Dei conteri." -- Luth. de Ser. Arb. cap. xxxii.-xxxiv.
     __________________________________________________________________
     __________________________________________________________________
     __________________________________________________________________

   Sermon II.

   Ebenezer:

   a memorial of the deliverance

   of

   Essex county, and committee.

   In two sermons
     __________________________________________________________________

Prefatory note.

   The ancient town of Colchester, which had at an early period in the
   civil wars declared in favour of the Parliament, was besieged and
   obliged to surrender to the Royal forces. Lord Fairfax, the general of
   the Parliamentary army, and a nobleman of high reputation, whom both
   Milton and Hume unite in praising, after an ineffectual attempt to
   regain the town by storm, changed his tactics into a rigorous blockade.
   The Royalists maintained the defence with signal gallantry for nearly
   eleven weeks, till all their provisions were spent, and they had
   nothing on which to subsist but horses, dogs, and other animals. At
   length they surrendered at discretion, when two of their officers, Sir
   Charles Lucas and Sir George Lisle, suffered military execution on the
   spot. A fine of £14,000 was imposed on the town.

   Owen, at this time pastor of an Independent congregation at Coggeshall,
   which is not far from Colchester, and which was the head-quarters of
   Fairfax during the siege, seems to have officiated as chaplain to the
   Parliamentary general; and on the fall of the town, a day of
   thanksgiving was observed, when he preached before Fairfax and his
   victorious army, from Hab. iii. 1-9. A committee of Parliament bad been
   sitting at Colchester when the Royalists seized it, and had been under
   imprisonment during the siege. They also engaged in the same exercise
   of thanksgiving for their deliverance at Rumford, on September 28,
   1648. Owen preached to them another discourse from the same text. Both
   discourses were published as one. They take the shape of a running
   comment upon a very sublime passage of Scripture. The verses are
   expounded in order, and the author educes from them a series of general
   principles or observations, which he illustrates with tact and power.
   Exegetic statements are made the basis of important principles, and
   relieved by eloquent expressions, and maxims of practical wisdom.
   Though necessarily brief, some of the appeals interwoven with the
   details of exposition are specimens of close and urgent dealing with
   the conscience.

   Objection has been taken by Mr Orme to the warlike tone of the preacher
   in some parts of the discourse. There is certainly but slight reference
   to the evils and horrors of war. Regret might have been expressed that
   no course was open to the nation in the pending quarrel with its king,
   but the stern arbitration of the sword. Still, the objection is hardly
   just. The audience of Owen consisted of men who, at the call of duty,
   had been hazarding their lives for the best interests of the nation,
   and except on the principle that all war is unlawful, the preacher
   could not be expected to utter sentiments which might have sounded in
   their ears as a condemnation of their conduct. Moreover, while he could
   not but allude to military operations, he abstains from all fulsome
   eulogy of the skill and valour of the conquerors, and ascribes the
   praise of the victory and deliverance to God; so much so, that he has
   been charged with committing himself in this discourse to the erroneous
   principle of inferring the goodness of a cause from the success that
   may have attended it. Mr Orme conclusively repels the insinuation, by
   quoting Owen's own explicit disclaimer of the sentiment thus imputed to
   him:-- "A cause is good or bad before it hath success, one way or
   other; and that which hath not its warrant in itself, can never obtain
   any from its success. The rule of the goodness of any cause is the
   eternal law of reason, with the legal rights and interests of men." See
   Owen's "Reflections on a Slanderous Libel," vol. xvi. -- Ed.
     __________________________________________________________________

To his Excellency, Thomas Lord Fairfax, etc.

   Sir,

   Almighty God having made you the instrument of that deliverance and
   peace which in the county of Essex we do enjoy, next to his own
   goodness, the remembrance thereof is due unto your name. "Those who
   honour him he will honour; and those who despise him shall be lightly
   esteemed," 1 Sam. ii. 30. Part of these ensuing sermons being preached
   before your excellency, and now by providence called forth to public
   view, I am emboldened to dedicate them unto your name, as a small mite
   of that abundant thankfulness, wherein all peace-loving men of this
   county stand obliged unto you.

   It was the custom of former days, in the provinces of the Roman empire:
   to erect statues and monuments of grateful remembrance [152] to those
   presidents and governors who, in the administration of their authority,
   behaved themselves with wisdom, courage, and fidelity; yea, instruments
   of great deliverances and blessings, through corrupted nature's folly,
   became the Pagans' deities.

   There is scarce a county in this kingdom wherein, and not one from
   which, your excellency hath not deserved a more lasting monument than
   ever was erected of Corinthian brass. But if the Lord be pleased that
   your worth shall dwell only in the praises of his people, it will be
   your greater glory, that being the place which himself hath chosen to
   inhabit. Now, for a testification of this is this only intended. Beyond
   this towards men, God pleading for you, you need nothing but our
   silence; the issue of the last engagements, whereunto you were called
   and enforced, answering, yea, outgoing, your former undertakings,
   giving ample testimony of the continuance of God's presence with you in
   your army, having stopped the mouths of many gainsayers, and called to
   the residue in the language of the dumb-speaking Egyptian hieroglyphic,
   O ginomenoi kai apoginomenoi, Theos misei anai.deian, [153] -- "Men of
   all sorts know that God hateth impudence."

   It was said of the Romans, in the raising of their empire, that they
   were "sæpe prælio victi, bello nunquam." So naked hath the bow of God
   been made for your assistance, that you have failed neither in battle
   nor war.

   Truly, had not our eyes beheld the rise and fall of this latter storm,
   we could not have been persuaded that the former achievements of the
   army under your conduct could have been paralleled. But He who always
   enabled them to outdo not only others but themselves, hath in this
   carried them out to outdo whatever before himself had done by them,
   that they might show more kindness and faithfulness in the latter end
   than in the beginning. The weary ox treadeth hard; -- dying bites are
   often desperate; -- half-ruined Carthage did more perplex Rome than
   when it was entire; -- hydra's heads in the fable were increased by
   their loss, and every new stroke begat a new opposition. Such seemed
   the late tumultuating of the exasperated party in this nation.

   In the many undertakings of the enemy, -- all which themselves thought
   secure, and others esteemed probable, -- if they had prevailed in any
   one, too many reasons present themselves to persuade they would have
   done so in all. But to none of those worthies which went out under your
   command to several places in the kingdom, can you say, with Augustus to
   Varus, upon the slaughter of his legions by Arminius in Germany,
   "Quintile Vare, redde legiones," God having carried them all on with
   success and victory.

   One especially, in his northern expedition, I cannot pass over with
   silence, who although he will not, dare not, say of his undertakings,
   as Cæsar of his Asian war, "Veni, vidi, vici," knowing who works all
   his works for him; nor shall we say of the enemy's multitude, what
   Captain Gam did of the French, being sent to spy out their numbers
   before the battle of Agincourt, that there were of them enough to kill,
   and enough to take, and enough to run away; yet of him and them both he
   and we may freely say, "It is nothing with the Lord to help, either
   with many, or with them that have no power."

   The war being divided, and it being impossible your excellency should
   be in every place of danger, according to your desire, the Lord was
   pleased to call you out personally unto two of the most hazardous,
   dangerous, and difficult undertakings; [154] where, besides the travel,
   labour, watching, heat and cold, by day and night, whereunto you were
   exposed, even the life of the meanest soldier in your army was not in
   more imminent danger than oftentimes was your own. And indeed, during
   your abode at the leaguer amongst us, in this only were our thoughts
   burdened with you, -- that self-preservation was of no more weight in
   your counsels and undertakings. And I beseech you pardon my boldness,
   in laying before you this expostulation of many thousands (if we may
   say to him who hath saved a kingdom what was sometime said unto a
   king), "Know you not that you are worth ten thousands of us? why should
   you quench such a light in Israel?"

   Sir, I account it among those blessings of Providence wherewith the
   days of my pilgrimage have been seasoned, that I had the happiness for
   a short season to attend your excellency, in the service of my master,
   Jesus Christ; as also, that I have this opportunity, in the name of
   many, to cast in my chaire into the kingdom's congratulations of your
   late successes. What thoughts concerning your person my breast is
   possessed withal, as in their storehouse they yield me delightful
   refreshment, so they shall not be drawn out, to the disturbance of your
   self-denial. The goings forth of my heart, in reference to your
   excellency, shall be chiefly to the Most High, that, being more than
   conqueror in your spiritual and temporal warfare, you may be long
   continued for a blessing to this nation, and all the people of God.

   Sir,

   Your Excellency's

   Most humble and devoted Servant,

   John Owen.

   Coggeshall, Essex,
   Oct. 5, 1648.
     __________________________________________________________________

   [152] Lubens meritoque.

   [153] Plut. de Iside et Osir.

   [154] Kent, Essex.
     __________________________________________________________________

To the worthy and honoured Sir William Masham, Sir William Rowe, with the rest
of the gentlemen of the committee lately under imprisonment by the enemy in
Colchester; as also, to the honoured Sir Henry Mildmay of Wansted, Col. Sir
Thomas Honeywood, with the rest of the gentlemen and officers, lately acting and
engaged against the same enemy.

   Sirs,

   The righteous judgments of God having brought a disturbance and noise
   of war, for our security, unthankfulness, murmuring, and devouring one
   another, upon our country, those who were intrusted with the power
   thereof turned their streams into several channels. Troublous times are
   times of trial.

   "Many shall be purified, and made white, and tried; but the wicked
   shall do wickedly; and none of the wicked shall understand, but the
   wise shall understand," Dan. xii. 10. Some God called out to suffer,
   some to do, -- leaving "treacherous dealers to deal treacherously."

   Of the two first sorts are you. This honour have you received from God,
   either with patience and constancy to undergo, involuntarily a
   dangerous restraint; or with resolution and courage voluntarily to
   undertake a hazardous engagement, to give an example that faith and
   truth, so shamefully despised in these evil days, have not altogether
   forsaken the sons of men.

   It is not in my thoughts to relate unto yourselves what some of you
   suffered, and what some of you did, -- what difficulties and
   perplexities you wrestled withal, within and without the walls of your
   enemies (the birds in the cage and the field having small cause of
   mutual emulation); for that which remains of these things is only a
   returnal of praise to Him by whom all your works are wrought.

   It cannot be denied but that Providence was eminently exalted in the
   work of your protection and delivery; yet truly, for my part, I cannot
   but conceive that it vails to the efficacy of grace, in preventing you
   from putting forth your hands unto iniquity, in any sinful compliance
   with the enemies of our peace. The times wherein we live have found the
   latter more rare than the former. What God wrought in you hath the
   pre-eminence of what he wrought for you; -- as much as to be given up
   to the sword is a lesser evil than to be given up to a treacherous
   spirit.

   What God hath done for you all, all men know; -- what I desire you
   should do for God, I know no reason why I should make alike public, --
   the general and particular civilities I have received from all and
   every one of you advantaging me to make it out in another way. I shall
   add nothing, then, to what you will meet withal in the following
   discourse, but only my desire, that you would seriously ponder the
   second observation, with the deductions from thence. For the rest, I no
   way fear but that that God who hath so appeared with you, and for you,
   will so indulge to y spirits the presence and guidance of his grace, in
   these shaking times, that if any speak evil of you as of evil-doers,
   they may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conversation in
   Christ, and glorify God in the day of visitation.

   For these following sermons, one of them was preached at your desire,
   and is now published upon your request. The first part of the labour I
   willingly and cheerfully underwent; -- the latter, merely in obedience
   to your commands, being acted in it more by your judgments than mine
   own. You were persuaded (mean as it was) it might be for the glory of
   God to have it made public; whereupon my answer was, and is, That for
   that, not only it, but myself also, should, by his assistance, be ready
   for the press. The failings and infirmities attending the preaching and
   publishing of it (which the Lord knows to be very many) are mine; --
   the inconveniences of publishing such a tractate from so weak a hand,
   whereof the world is full, must be yours; -- the fruit and benefit both
   of the one and other is His, for whose pardon of infirmities, and
   removal of inconveniences, shall be, as for you, and all the church of
   God, the prayer of,

   Sirs,

   Your most humble and obliged Servant

   In the work of the Lord,

   John Owen.

   Coggeshall, Oct. 5, 1648.
     __________________________________________________________________

Sermon II. A memorial of the deliverance of Essex county, and committee.

   "A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet upon Shigionoth. O Lord, I have heard
   thy speech, and was afraid: O Lord, revive thy work in the midst of the
   years, in the midst of the years make known; in wrath remember mercy.
   God came from Teman, and the Holy One from mount Paran. Selah. His
   glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of his praise. And
   his brightness was as the light; he had horns coming out of his hand:
   and there was the hiding of his power. Before him went the pestilence,
   and burning coals went forth at his feet. He stood, and measured the
   earth: he beheld, and drove asunder the nations; and the everlasting
   mountains were scattered, the perpetual hills did bow: his ways are
   everlasting. I saw the tents of Cushan in affliction: and the curtains
   of the land of Midian did tremble. Was the Lord displeased against the
   rivers? was thine anger against the rivers? was thy wrath against the
   sea, that thou didst ride upon thine horses, and thy chariots of
   salvation? Thy bow was made quite naked, according to the oaths of the
   tribes, even thy word. Selah. Thou didst cleave the earth with rivers."
   -- Hab. iii. 1-9.

   Of this chapter there are four parts.

   First, The title and preface of it, verse 1.

   Secondly, The prophet's main request in it, verse 2.

   Thirdly, Arguments to sustain his faith in that request, from verse 3
   to 17.

   Fourthly, A resignation of himself, and the whole issue of his desires
   unto God, from verse 17 to the end.

   We shall treat of them in order.

   The prophet [155] having had visions from God, and pre-discoveries of
   many approaching judgments, in the first and second chapters, in this,
   by faithful prayer, sets himself to obtain a sure footing and quiet
   abode in those nation-destroying storms.

   Verse 1. "A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet;" that is the title of it.

   And an excellent prayer it is, full of arguments to strengthen faith,
   -- acknowledgment of God's sovereignty, power, and righteous judgments,
   -- with resolutions to a contented, joyful, rolling him upon him under
   all dispensations.

   Observation I. Prayer is the believer's constant, sure retreat in an
   evil time, in a time of trouble.

   It is the righteous man's wings to the "name of the Lord," which is his
   "strong tower," Prov. xviii. 10, -- a Christian [156] soldier's sure
   reserve in the day of battle: if all other forces be overthrown, here
   he will abide by it, -- no power under heaven can prevail upon him to
   give one step backward. Hence that title of Ps. cii. 1, "A prayer of
   the afflicted, when he is overwhelmed." 'Tis the overwhelmed man's
   refuge and employment: when "he swooneth with anguish" (as in the
   original), this fetches him to life again. So also, Ps. lxi. 2, 3. In
   our greatest distresses let neither unbelief nor self-contrivances
   jostle us out of this way to the rock of our salvation.

   II. Observation. Prophets' discoveries of fearful judgments must be
   attended with fervent prayers.

   That messenger hath done but half his business who delivers his errand,
   but returns not an answer. He that brings God's message of threats unto
   his people, must return his people's message of entreaties unto him.
   Some think they have fairly discharged their duty when they have
   revealed the will of God to man, without labouring to reveal the
   condition and desires of men unto God. He that is more frequent in the
   pulpit to his people than he is in his closet for his people, is but a
   sorry watchman. Moses did not so, Exod. xxxii. 31; -- neither did
   Samuel so, 1 Sam. xii. 23; -- neither was it the guise of Jeremiah in
   his days, chap. xiv. 17. If the beginning of the prophecy be (as it is)
   "The burden of Habakkuk," -- the close will be (as it is) "The prayer
   of Habakkuk." Where there is a burden upon the people, there must be a
   prayer for the people. Woe to them who have denounced desolations, and
   not poured out supplications! Such men delight in the evil which the
   prophet puts far from him, Jer. xvii. 16, "I have not desired the
   woeful day, [O Lord], thou knowest."

   Now this prayer is "upon Shigionoth;" that is, -- 1. It is turned to a
   song; 2. Such a song.

   1. That it is a song, penned in meter; and how done so. (1.) To take
   the deeper impression; (2.) To be the better retained in memory; (3.)
   To work more upon the affections; (4.) To receive the ingredients of
   poetical loftiness for adorning the majesty of God with; (5.) The use
   of songs in the old church; (6.) And for the present; (7.) Their times
   and seasons, as among the people of God, so all nations of old. Of all,
   or any of these, being besides my present purpose, I shall not treat.

   2. That it is "upon Shigionoth," a little may be spoken. The word is
   once in another place (and no more) used, in the title of a song, and
   that is Ps. vii., "Shigionoth of David;" and it is variously rendered.
   It seems to be taken from the word sgh?, "erravit," to err, or wander
   variously, Prov. v. 19. The word is used for delight, to stray with
   delight: "In her love (tsgh?) thou shalt err with delight," -- we have
   translated it, "be ravished;" noting affections out of order. The word,
   then, holds out a delightful wandering and variety; -- and this
   literally, because those two songs, Ps. vii. and Hab. iii., are not
   tied to any one certain kind of metre, but have various verses, for the
   more delight; which, though it be not proper to them alone, yet in them
   the Holy Ghost would have it especially noted.

   But now surely the kernel of this shell is sweeter than so. Is not this
   written also for their instruction who have no skill in Hebrew songs?
   The true reason of their meter is lost to the most learned. Are not,
   then, God's variable dispensations towards his held out under these
   variable tunes, -- not all fitted to one string? not all alike pleasant
   and easy? Are not the several tunes of mercy and judgment in these
   songs? Is not here affliction and deliverance, desertion and recovery,
   darkness and light in this variously? Doubtless it is so.

   III. Observation. God often calls his people unto songs upon
   Shigionoth.

   [157] He keeps them under various dispensations, that so, drawing out
   all their affections, their hearts may make the sweeter melody unto
   him. They shall not have all honey, nor all gall; -- all judgment, lest
   they be broken; nor all mercy, lest they be proud. "Thou answeredst
   them, O Lord our God: thou wast a God that forgavest them, though thou
   tookest vengeance of their inventions," Ps. xcix. 8. Here is a song
   upon Shigionoth! They are heard in their prayers, and forgiven; --
   there is the sweetest of mercies. Vengeance is taken of their
   inventions, -- there's tune of judgment. "By terrible things in
   righteousness wilt thou answer us, O God of our salvation," Ps. lxv. 5;
   [which] is a song of the same tune. To be answered in righteousness,
   what sweeter mercy in the world? Nothing more refreshes the panting
   soul than an answer of its desires; but to have this answer by terrible
   things, -- that string strikes a humbling, a mournful note. Israel hear
   of deliverance by Moses, [158] and at the same time have their bondage
   doubled by Pharaoh, -- there's a song upon Shigionoth. Is it not so in
   our days? -- precious mercies and dreadful judgments jointly poured out
   upon the land? We are clothed by our Father, like Joseph by his, in a
   party-coloured coat, Gen. xxxvii. 3; -- here a piece of unexpected
   deliverance, and there a piece of deserved correction. At the same hour
   we may rejoice at the conquest of our enemies, and mourn at the close
   of our harvest, -- victories for his own name's sake, and showers for
   our sins' sake; both from the same hand at the same time. The cry of
   every soul is like the cry of the multitude of old and young at the
   laying the foundation of the second temple: many shouted aloud for joy,
   and many wept with a loud voice; so that it was a mixed noise, and the
   several noises could not be distinguished, Ezra iii. 12, 13. A mixed
   cry is in our spirits, and we know not which is loudest in the day of
   our visitation. I could instance in sundry particulars, but that every
   one's observation will save me that easy labour. And this the Lord
   doth, --

   1. To fill [159] all our sails towards himself at once, -- to exercise
   all our affections. I have heard that a full wind behind the ship
   drives her not so fast forward as a side wind, that seems almost so
   much against her as with her; and the reason, they say, is, because a
   full wind fills but some of her sails, which keep it from the rest that
   they are empty; when a side wind fills all her sails, and sets her
   speedily forward. Which way ever we go in this world, our affections
   are our sails; and according as they are spread and filled, so we pass
   on, swifter and slower, whither we are steering. Now, if the Lord
   should give us a full wind, and continual gale of mercies, it would
   fill but some of our sails, some of our affections, -- joy, delight,
   and the like; but when he comes with a side wind, -- a dispensation
   that seems almost as much against us as for us, then he fills all our
   sails, takes up all our affections, making his works wide and broad
   enough to entertain them every one; -- then are we carried freely and
   fully towards the haven where we would be. [160] A song upon Shigionoth
   leaves not one string of our affections untuned. It is a song that
   reacheth every line of our hearts, to be framed by the grace and Spirit
   of God. Therein hope, fear, reverence, with humility and repentance,
   have a share; as well as joy, delight, and love, with thankfulness.
   Interchangeable dispensations take up all our affections, with all our
   graces; for they are gracious affections, exercised and seasoned with
   grace, of which we speak. The stirring of natural affections, as merely
   such, is but the moving of a dunghill to draw out a stinking steam, --
   a thing the Lord neither aimeth at nor delighteth in. Their joys are
   his provocation, and he laugheth in the day of their calamity, when
   their fear cometh, Prov. i. 26, 27.

   2. To keep them in continual [161] dependence upon himself. He hath
   promised his own daily bread, -- not goods laid up for many yearn Many
   children have been undone by their parents giving them too large a
   stock to trade for themselves; it has made them spendthrifts, careless,
   and wanton. Should the Lord intrust his people with a continued stock
   of mercy, perhaps they would be full, and deny him, and say, "Who is
   the Lord?" Prov. xxx. 9. Jeshurun did so, Deut. xxxii. 14, 15. Ephraim
   "was filled according to their pasture, and forgot the Lord," Hos.
   xiii. 6. Neither, on the other side, will he be always chiding. "His
   anger shall not burn for ever" -- very sore. It is our infirmity at the
   least, if we my, God hath forgotten to be gracious, and shut up his
   tender mercies in displeasure, Ps. lxxvii. 9. But laying one thing
   against another, he keeps the heart of his in an even balance, in a
   continual dependence upon himself, that they may neither be wanton
   through mercy, nor discouraged by too much oppression. Our tender
   Father is therefore neither always feeding nor always correcting. "And
   it shall come to pass in that day, that the light shall not be clear,
   nor dark: but it shall be one day which shall be known to the Lord, not
   day nor night; but it shall come to pass, that at evening time it shall
   be light," saith the prophet Zech. xiv. 6, 7, seeking out God's
   dispensations towards his, ending in joy and light in the evening.

   Use. Labour to have your hearts right tuned for songs on Shigionoth,
   sweetly to answer all God's dispensations in their choice variety. That
   instrument will make no music that hath but some strings in tune. If
   when God strikes with mercy upon the string of joy and gladness, we
   answer pleasantly; but when he touches upon that of [162] sorrow and
   humiliation, we suit it not; -- we are broken instruments, that make no
   melody unto God. We must know how to receive good and evil at his hand.
   "He hath made every thing beautiful in its time," Eccles. iii. 11, --
   every thing in that whole variety which his wisdom hath produced. A
   well-tuned heart must have all its strings, all its affections, ready
   to answer every touch of God's finger, to improve judgments and mercies
   both at the same time. Sweet harmony ariseth out of some discords. When
   a soul is in a frame to rejoice with thankful obedience for mercy
   received, and to be humbled with soul-searching, amending repentance
   for judgments inflicted at the same time, -- then it sings a song on
   Shigionoth, then it is fit for the days wherein we live. Indeed, both
   mercies and judgments aim at the same end, and should be received with
   the same equal temper of mind. A flint is broken between a hammer and a
   pillow; -- an offender is humbled between a prison and a pardon; -- a
   hard heart may be mollified and a proud spirit humbled between those
   two. In such a season the several rivulets of our affections flow
   naturally in the same stream. When hath a gracious soul the soundest
   joys, but when it hath the deepest sorrows? "Habent et gaudia vulnus."
   When hath it the humblest melting, but when it hath the most ravishing
   joys? Our afflictions, which are naturally at the widest distance, may
   all swim in the same spiritual channel Rivulets rising from several
   heads are carried in one stream to the ocean. As a mixture of several
   colours make a beautiful complexion for the body; so a mixture of
   divers affections, under God's various dispensations, gives a comely
   frame unto the soul. Labour, then, to answer every call, every speaking
   providence of God, in its right kind, according to the intention
   thereof; and the Lord reveal his mind unto us, that so we may do.

   Having passed the title, let us look a little on those parts of the
   prayer itself that follow.

   Verse 2. The beginning of it in verse 2 hath two parts.

   1. The frame of the prophet's spirit in his address to God: "O Jehovah,
   I have heard thy speech, and was afraid."

   2. His request in this his condition: "O Lord, revive thy work in the
   midst of the years, in the midst of the years make known; in wrath
   remember mercy."

   1. In the first you have, --

   (1.) Particularly his frame; -- he was afraid, or trembled; which he
   wonderfully sets out, verse 16, "When I heard, my belly trembled; my
   lips quivered at the voice: rottenness entered into my bones, and I
   trembled in myself."

   (2.) The cause of this fear and trembling; -- he "heard the speech of
   God."

   If you will ask what speech or report this was that made the prophet
   himself so exceedingly quake and tremble, I answer, it is particularly
   that which you have, chap. i. 5-11, -- containing a dreadful
   denunciation of the judgments of God against the people of Israel, to
   be executed by the proud, cruel, insulting Chaldeans. This voice, this
   report of God, makes the prophet tremble.

   IV. Observation. An appearance of God in anger and threats against a
   people, should make his choicest secret ones among them to fear, to
   quake, and tremble.

   Trembling of man's heart must answer the shaking of God's hand. At the
   delivery of the law with all its attending threats, so terrible was the
   sight, that Moses himself (though a mediator then) did "exceedingly
   fear and quake," Heb. xii. 21. God will be acknowledged in all his
   goings. If men will not bow before him, he will break them. They who
   fear not his threatenings, shall feel his inflictings; if his word be
   esteemed light, his hand will be found heavy. -- For,

   1. In point of deserving who can say, [163] I have purged my heart, I
   am clean from sin? None ought to be fearless, unless they be senseless.
   God's people are so far from being always clear of procuring national
   judgments, that sometimes [164] judgments have come upon nations for
   the sins of some of God's people amongst them; -- as the plague in the
   days of David.

   2. And in point of [165] suffering, who knows but they may have a deep
   share? The prophet's book is written within as well as without, with
   "lamentation, mourning, and woe," Ezek. ii. 10. If "the lion roars, who
   can but fear?" Amos iii. 8, -- fear, to the rooting out of security,
   not the shaking of faith, -- fear, to the pulling down of carnal
   presidence, not Christian confidence, -- fear, to draw out our souls in
   prayer, not to swallow them up in despair, fear, to break the arm of
   flesh, but not to weaken the staff of the promise, fear, that we may
   draw nigh to God with reverence, not to run from him with diffidence;
   in a word, to overthrow faithless presumption, and to increase gracious
   submission.

   2. Here is the prophet's request. And in this there are these two
   things:--

   (1.) The thing he desireth: "The reviving God's work, the remembering
   mercy."

   (2.) The season he desireth it in: "In the midst of the years."

   (1.) For the first, -- that which in the beginning of the verse he
   calls God's work, in the close of it he termeth mercy; and the reviving
   his work is interpreted to be a remembering mercy. These two
   expressions, then, are parallel. The reviving of God's work towards his
   people is a reacting of mercy, a bringing forth the fruits thereof, and
   that in the midst of the execution of wrath; as a man in the midst of
   another, remembering a business of more importance, instantly turneth
   away, and applieth himself thereunto.

   V. Observation. Acts of mercy are God's proper work towards his people,
   which he will certainly awake, and keep alive in the saddest times.

   Mercy, you see, is his work, his proper work, as he calleth "judgment
   his strange act," Isa. xxviii. 21. "He retaineth not his anger for
   ever, because he delighteth in mercy," Mic. vii. 18. This is his proper
   work. Though it seem to sleep, he will awake it; though it seem to die,
   he will revive it. "Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she
   should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, they may
   forget, yet will I not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the
   palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me," Isa. xlix. 15,
   16.

   (2.) For the season of this work, -- he prays that it may be
   accomplished "in the midst of the years;" upon which you may see what
   weight he lays, by his repetition of it in the same verse. It is
   something doubtful what may be the peculiar sense of these words; --
   whether "the midst of the years" [166] do not denote the whole time of
   the people's bondage under the Chaldeans (whence Junius renders the
   words "interea temporis," noting this manner of expression, "the midst
   of the years," for a Hebraism), during which space he intercedes for
   mercy for them; or whether "the midst of the years" do not denote some
   certain point of time, as the season of their return from captivity,
   about the midst of the years between their first king and the coming of
   the Messiah, putting a period to their church and state. Whether of
   these is more probable is not needful to insist upon: this is certain,
   that a certain time is pointed at; which will yield us, --

   VI. Observation. The church's mercies and deliverance have their
   appointed season.

   In the midst of the years it shall be accomplished. As there is a
   decree bringing forth the wicked's destruction, Zeph. ii. 1, 2; so
   there is a decree goes forth in its appointed season for the church's
   deliverance, which cannot be gainsaid, Dan. ix. 23. Every "vision is
   for its appointed" season and time, Hab. ii. 3; then "it will surely
   come, it will not tarry." There is a determination upon the weeks and
   days of the church's sufferings and expectations, Dan. ix. 24, "Seventy
   weeks are determined upon thy people." As there are three
   transgressions, and four, of rebels, for which God "will not turn away
   their punishment," Amos i. 3; so three afflictions, and four, of the
   people of God, after which he will not shut out their supplications.
   Hence that confidence of the prophet, Ps. cii. 13, 14, "Thou shalt
   arise, and have mercy upon Zion: for," saith he, "the time to favour
   her, yea, the set time, is come." There is a time, yea, a set time, for
   favour to be showed unto Zion: as a time to break down, so a time to
   build up, -- an acceptable time, a day of salvation. "It came to pass,
   at the end of four hundred and thirty years, even the self-same day it
   came to pass, that all the hosts of the Lord went out of Egypt," Exod.
   xii. 41. As a woman with child goes not beyond her appointed months,
   but is pained to be delivered, -- no more can the fruitful decree cease
   from bringing forth the church's deliverance in the season thereof.

   1. Because there is an appointed period of the church's humiliation and
   bearing of her iniquities. Israel shall bear their iniquities in the
   wilderness; but this is exactly limited to the space of forty years.
   When their iniquity is pardoned, their warfare is accomplished, Isa.
   xl. 2. They say some men will give poison that shall work insensibly,
   and kill at seven years' end. The great Physician of his church knows
   how to give his sin-sick people potions that shall work by degrees, and
   at such an appointed season take away all their iniquity: then they can
   no longer be detained in trouble. God will not continue his course of
   physic unto them one day beyond health recovered. This is all the fruit
   of their afflictions, to take away their iniquities, Isa. xxvii. 9; and
   when that is done, who shall keep bound what God will loose? When sin
   is taken away from within, trouble must depart from without.

   2. Because the church's sorrows are commensurate unto, and do
   contemporize with, the joys and prosperity of God's enemies and hers.
   Now, wicked men's prosperity hath assured bounds: "The wickedness of
   the wicked shall come to an end." There is a time when the "iniquity of
   the Amorites comes to the full," Gen. xv. 16. It comes up to the brim
   in the appointed day of slaughter. When their wickedness hath filled
   the ephah, a talent of lead is laid upon the mouth thereof, and it is
   carried away on wings, Zech. v. 6-8, swiftly, certainly, irrecoverably.
   If, then, the church's troubles contemporize, rise and fall with their
   prosperity, and her deliverance with their destruction, -- if the fall
   of Babylon be the rise of Zion, -- if they be the buckets which must go
   down when the church comes up, -- if they be the rod of the church's
   chastisement, -- their ruin being set and appointed, so also must be
   the church's mercies.

   Use. In every distress learn to wait with patience for this appointed
   time. "He that believeth will not make haste." "Though it tarry, wait
   for it, it will surely come." He that is infinitely good hath appointed
   the time; and therefore it is best. He that is infinitely wise hath
   determined the season; and therefore it is most suitable. He who is
   infinitely powerful hath set it down; and therefore it shall be
   accomplished. Wait for it believing, wait for it praying, -- wait for
   it contending. Waiting is not a lazy hope, a sluggish expectation. When
   Daniel knew the time was come, he prayed the more earnestly, Dan. ix.
   2, 3. You will say, perhaps, What need he pray for it, when he knew the
   time was accomplished? I answer, The more need. Prayer helps the
   promise to bring forth. Because a woman's time is come, therefore shall
   she have no midwife? nay, therefore give her one. He that appointed
   their return, appointed that it should be a fruit of prayer. Wait,
   [167] contending also in all ways wherein you shall be called out; and
   be not discouraged that you know not the direct season of deliverance.
   "In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine
   hand; for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that,
   or whether they both shall be alike good," Eccles. xi. 6.

   But proceed we with the prophet's prayer.

   From verse 3 to 17, he layeth down several arguments, taken from the
   majesty, power, providence, and former works of God, for the supporting
   of his faith to the obtaining of those good things and works of mercy
   which he was now praying for. We shall look on them, as they lie in our
   way.

   Verse 3. "God came from Teman, the Holy One from mount Paran. Selah.
   His glory covered the heavens, the earth was full of his praise."

   Teman [168] was a city of the Edomites, whose land the people of Israel
   compassed in the wilderness, when they were stung with fiery serpents,
   and healed with looking on a brazen serpent, set up to be a type of
   Christ. Teman is put up for the whole land of Edom; and the prophet
   makes mention of it for the great deliverance and mercy granted there
   to the people when they were almost consumed; -- that's God's coming
   from Teman. See Num. xxi. 5-9. When they were destroyed by fiery
   serpents, he heals them by a type of Christ, -- giving them corporeal,
   and raising them to a faith of spiritual, salvation.

   Paran, [169] the next place mentioned, was a mountain in the land of
   Ishmael, near which Noses repeated the law; and from thence God carried
   the people immediately to Canaan; -- another eminent act of mercy.

   Unto these he addeth the word Selah; as it is a song, a note of
   elevation in singing; as it respects the matter, not the form, a note
   of admiration and special observation. Selah, -- consider them well,
   for they were great works indeed. Special mercies must have special
   observation.

   Now, by reason of these actions the prophet affirms that the glory of
   God covered the heavens, and the earth was full of his praise; -- lofty
   expressions of the advancement of God's glory, and the fulness of his
   praise amongst his people of the earth, which attended that merciful
   deliverance and gracious assistance. Nothing is higher or greater than
   that which covers heaven, and fills earth. God's [170] glory is
   exceedingly exalted, and his praise increased everywhere, by acts of
   favour and kindness to his people.

   That which I shall choose, from amongst many others that present
   themselves, a little to insist upon, is, that --

   VII. Observation -- Former mercies, with their times and places, are to
   be had in thankful remembrance unto them who wait for future blessings.

   Faith is to this end separated by them. "Awake, awake, put on strength,
   O arm of the Lord; awake, as in the ancient days, in the generations of
   old. Art thou not it that hath cut Rahab, and wounded the dragon? art
   thou not it which hath dried the sea, the waters of the great deep;
   that hath made the depths of the sea a way for the ransomed to pass
   over?" Isa. li. 9, 10. The breaking of Rahab, -- that is, Egypt, so
   called here, and Ps. lxxxvii. 4, lxxxix. 10, for her great strength,
   which the word signifies, -- and the wounding of the dragon, that great
   and crooked afflicter, Pharaoh, is remembered, and urged for a motive
   to a new needed deliverance. So Ps. lxxiv. 13, 14, "Thou brakest the
   heads of leviathan in pieces, and gavest him to be meat to the people
   inhabiting the wilderness." Leviathan, -- the same dragon, oppressing,
   persecuting Pharaoh, -- thou brakest his heads, his counsels, armies,
   power; and gavest him for meat, that the people for forty years
   together might be fed, sustained, and nourished with that wonderful
   mercy. "Out of the eater came forth meat; out of the strong came forth
   sweetness."

   In this reciprocation God walketh with his people. Of free grace he
   bestoweth mercies and blessings on them; by grace works the returns of
   remembrance and thankfulness unto himself for them; then showers that
   down again in new mercies. The countries which send up no vapours,
   receive down no showers. Remembrance with thankfulness of former
   mercies is the matter, as it were, which by God's goodness is condensed
   into following blessings. For, --

   1. Mercies have their proper end, when thankfully remembered. What more
   powerful motive to the obtaining of new, than to hold out that the old
   were not abused? We are encouraged to cast seed again into that ground
   whose last crop witnesseth that it was not altogether barren. That sad
   spot of good Hezekiah, that he rendered not again according to the
   benefit done unto him, is set down as the opening a door of wrath
   against himself, Judah, and Jerusalem, 2 Chron. xxxii. 25. On the other
   side, suitable returns are a door of hope for farther mercies.

   2. The remembrance of them strengthens faith, and keeps our hands from
   hanging down in the time of waiting for blessings. When faith is
   supported, the promise is engaged, and a mercy at any time more than
   half obtained. "Faith is the substance of things hoped for," Heb. xi.
   1. "God," saith the apostle, "hath delivered us from so great a death,
   and doth deliver." Now, what conclusion makes he of this experience? --
   "In whom we trust that he will yet deliver us," 2 Cor. i. 10. It was a
   particular mercy with its circumstances, as you may see verse 9, which
   he made the bottom of his dependence. In the favours of men we cannot
   do so; they may be weary of helping, or be drawn dry, and grow
   helpless. Ponds may be exhausted, but the ocean never. The infinite
   fountains of the Deity cannot be sunk one hair's breadth by everlasting
   flowing blessings. Now, circumstances of actions, time, place, and the
   like, ofttimes make deep impressions; mercies should be remembered with
   them. So doth the apostle again, 2 Tim. iv. 17, 18, "He did deliver me
   from the mouth of the lion," -- Nero, that lion-like tyrant. And what
   then? "He shall deliver me from every evil work." David esteemed it
   very good logic, to argue from the victory God gave him over the lion
   and the bear, to a confidence of victory over Goliath, 1 Sam. xvii. 37.

   Use. The use of this we are led unto, Isa. xliii. 16-18, "Thus saith
   the Lord, which maketh a way in the sea, and a path in the mighty
   waters; which bringeth forth the chariot and horse, the army, and the
   power; They shall lie down together, they shall not rise: they are
   extinct, they are quenched as tow. Remember ye not the former things,
   neither consider the things of old." Let former mercies be an anchor of
   hope in time of present distresses. Where is the God of Marston Moor,
   and the God of Naseby? is an acceptable expostulation in a gloomy day.
   O what a catalogue of mercies hath this nation to plead by in a time of
   trouble! God came from Naseby, and the Holy One from the west. Selah.
   "His glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of his praise."
   He went forth in the north, and in the east he did not withhold his
   hand. I hope the poor town wherein [171] I live is more enriched with a
   store-mercy of a few months, than with a full trade of many years. "The
   snares of death compassed us, and the floods of ungodly men made us
   afraid," Ps. xviii. 4; but "the Lord thundered in the heavens, the
   Highest gave his voice; hailstones and coals of fire. Yea, he sent out
   his arrows, and scattered them; and he shot out lightnings, and
   discomfited them. He sent from above, he took us, he drew us out of
   many waters. He delivered us from our strong enemy, and from them which
   hated us: for they were too strong for us," verses 13, 14, 16, 17. How
   may we say with the same Psalmist, in any other distress, "O my God, my
   soul is cast down within me: therefore will I remember thee from the
   land of Jordan, and of the Hermonites, from the hill Mizar!" Ps. xlii.
   6. "Where is the Lord God of Elijah," -- who divides anew the waters of
   Jordan? 2 Kings ii. 14.

   The following verses set forth the glory and power of God, in the
   accomplishment of that great work of bringing his people into the
   promised land, with those mighty things he performed in the wilderness.

   Verse 4, if I mistake not, sets out his glorious appearance on Mount
   Sinai; of which the prophet affirms two things:--

   1. That "his brightness was as the light."

   2. That "he had horns coming out of his hand, and there was the hiding
   of his power."

   1. For the first. Is it not that brightness which appeared when the
   mountain burned with fire to the midst of heaven, Deut. iv. 11, -- a
   glorious fire in the midst of clouds and thick darkness? The like
   description you have of God's presence, Ps. xviii. 11, 12, "He made
   darkness his secret place," and brightness was before him: as the
   light, the sun, the fountain and cause of it, called "light," Job xxxi.
   26. Now, this glorious appearance holds out the kingly power and
   majesty of God in governing the world, which appeareth but unto few.
   "The Lord reigneth; let the earth rejoice. Clouds and darkness are
   round about him. A fire goeth before him; his lightnings enlightened
   the world," Ps. xcvii. 1-4.

   2. "He had horns coming out of his hand." So the words most properly,
   though by some otherwise rendered. That horns in Scripture are taken
   for strength and power, [172] needs no proving. The mighty power of
   God, which he made appear to his people, in that glorious
   representation of his majesty on Mount Sinai, is by this phrase
   expressed. There his chariots were seen to be twenty thousand, even
   many thousands of angels; and the Lord among them in that holy place,
   Ps. lxviii. 17. There they perceived that "he had horns in his hand;"
   -- an almighty power to do what he pleased. Whence it is added, "And
   there was the hiding of his power." Though the appearance of it was
   very great and glorious, yet it was but small to the everlasting hidden
   depths of his omnipotency. The most glorious appearance of God comes
   infinitely short of his own eternal majesty as he is in himself; -- it
   is but a discovery that there is the hiding of infinite perfection; or,
   there his power appeared to us, which was hidden from the rest of the
   world.

   VIII. Observation. When God is doing great things, he gives glorious
   manifestations of his excellencies to his secret ones.

   The appearance on Sinai goes before his passage into Canaan: "Surely
   the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his
   servants the prophets," Amos iii. 7. When he is to send Moses for the
   deliverance of his people, he appears to him in a burning, unconsumed
   bush, Exod. iii. 2, -- a sign manifesting the presence of his power to
   preserve his church unconsumed in the midst of burning, fiery
   afflictions. Unto this very end were all the visions tint are recorded
   in the Scripture, all of them accommodated to the things which God was
   presently doing. And this he doth, --

   1. That they may thereby be prepared to follow him, and serve him in
   the great works he hath for them to do. Great works are not to be done
   without great encouragements. If God appears not in light, who can
   expect he should appear in operation? He that is called to serve
   Providence in high things, without some especial discovery of God,
   works in the dark, [173] and knows not whither he goes, nor what he
   doth. Such a one travels in the wilderness without a directing cloud.
   Clear shining from God must be at the bottom of deep labouring with
   God. What is the reason that so many in our days set their hands to the
   plough, and look back again? -- begin to serve Providence in great
   things, but cannot finish? -- give over in the heat of the day? They
   never had any such revelation of the mind of God upon their spirits,
   such a discovery of his excellencies, as might serve for a bottom of
   such undertakings. Men must know that if God hath not appeared to them
   in brightness, and showed them "the horns in his hand," hid from
   others, though they think highly of themselves, they'll deny God twice
   and thrice before the close of the work of this age. If you have no
   great discoveries, you will wax vain in great undertakings. New
   workings on old bottoms, are like new wine in old bottles, -- both are
   spoiled and lost. The day is the time of work, and that because of the
   light thereof; -- those who have not light may be spared to go to bed.

   2. That they may be the better enabled to give him glory, when they
   shall see the sweet harmony that is between his manifestations and his
   operations, -- when they can say with the Psalmist, "As we have heard,
   so have we seen," Ps. xlviii. 8. As he revealeth himself, so he
   worketh. When his power and mercy answer his appearance in the bush, it
   is a foundation to a prayer: "The good-will of him that dwelt in the
   bush bless thee." When a soul shall find God calling him forth to
   employments, perhaps great and high, yet every way suiting that light
   and gracious discovery which he hath given of himself, one thing
   answering another, it sets him in a frame of honouring God aright.

   This might be of rich consideration could we attend it. For, --

   Use 1. Hence, as I said before, is apostasy from God's work. He appears
   not unto men; -- how can they go upon his employment. Men that have no
   vision of God, are in the dark, and know not what to do. I speak not of
   visions beyond the Word; but answers of prayers, gracious applications
   of providences, with wise consideration of times and seasons. Some drop
   off every day, some hang by the eyelids, and know not what to do: the
   light of God is not sent forth to lead and guide them, Ps. xliii. 3.
   Wonder not at the strange backslidings of our days: many acted upon by
   engagements, and for want of light, know not to the last what they were
   a-doing.

   Use 2. Hence also is the suiting of great light and great work in our
   days. Let new light be derided whilst men please, he will never serve
   the will of God in this generation, who sees not beyond the line of
   foregoing ages.

   Use 3. And this, thirdly, may put all those whom God is pleased to
   employ in his service upon a diligent inquiry into his mind. Can a
   servant do his master's work without knowing his pleasure? We live for
   the most part from hand to mouth, and do what comes next; few are
   acquainted with the designs of God.

   The going forth of the Lord with his people towards their rest, with
   reference to his harbingers, is described, verse 5.

   Verse 5. "Before him went the pestilence, and burning coals went forth
   at his feet."

   "Before him," -- at his face. "The pestilence:" This is often reckoned
   amongst the weapons wherewith God fighteth with any people to consume
   them; [174] and as speeding an instrument of destruction it is as any
   the Lord ever used towards the children of men. "At his feet went forth
   burning coals;" -- a redoubling, say some, of the same stroke, --
   burning coals for burning diseases. When one blow will not do the work
   appointed, God redoubles the stroke of his hand, Lev. xxvi. 22-25. Or,
   burning, coals, dreadful judgments, mortal weapons, as fire and flames,
   are often taken in other descriptions of God's dealing with his
   enemies, Ps. xi. 6, xviii. 8. Prevailing fire is the most dreadful
   means of destruction, Heb. xii. 29; Isa. xxxiii. 14. In Exod. xxiii.
   28, God threateneth to send the hornet upon the Canaanites, before the
   children of Israel; some stinging judgments, either on their
   consciences or bodies, or both:-- something of the same kind is
   doubtless here held out. He sent plagues and diseases among them, to
   weaken and consume them, before his people's entrance. His presence was
   with Israel; and the pestilence consuming the Canaanites before their
   entrance is said to be lphnyv?, -- "at his faces," or appearances,
   before him, before the entrance of the presence of his holiness. And
   the following judgments, that quite devoured them, were "the coals
   going out at his feet," which he sent abroad when he entered their land
   with his own inheritance, to cast out those "malæ fidei possessores."
   Sicknesses, diseases, and all sorts of judgments, are wholly at God's
   disposal. "Affliction cometh not forth of the dust, neither doth
   trouble spring out of the ground; yet man is born to trouble, as the
   sons of the burning coal lift up in flying," Job v. 6, 7. When God
   intends the total destruction of a people, he commonly weakens them by
   some previous judgments. Let the truth of this be found upon them that
   hate us, and the interpretation thereof be to the enemies of this
   nation; but the Lord knows all our hearts may well tremble at what will
   be the issue of the visitations of the last year.

   IX. Observation. God never wants instruments to execute his anger, and
   ruin his enemies.

   His treasury of judgments can never be exhausted. If Israel be too weak
   for the Amorites, he will call in the pestilence and burning diseases
   to their assistance. What creature hath not this mighty God used
   against his enemies? An angel destroys Sennacherib's host, Isa. xxxvii.
   36, and smites Herod with worms, Acts xii. 23. Heaven above sends down
   a hell of fire and brimstone on Sodom and Gomorrah; Gen. xix. 24. The
   stars in their courses fought against Sisera, Judges v. 20. Devils do
   his will herein; he sent evil angels among the Egyptians, Ps. lxxviii.
   49. Fire consumes persecuting Ahaziah's companies, 2 Kings i. 10, 11.
   The water drowns Pharaoh and his chariots, Exod. xiv. 28. Earth
   swallows up Korah, with his fellow-rebels, Num. xvi. 32. Bears rend the
   children that mocked Elisha, 2 Kings ii. 24. Lions destroy the strange
   nations in Samaria, 2 Kings xvii. 25. Frogs, lice, boils, hail, rain,
   thunder, lightning, destroy the land of Egypt, Exod. viii. 9, 10.
   Locusts are his mighty army to punish Israel, Joel ii. 25. Hailstones
   destroy the Canaanites, Josh. x. 11. Stones of the wall slay the
   Syrians, 1 Kings xx. 30. Pestilence and burning diseases are his
   ordinary messengers. In a word, all creatures serve his providence, and
   wait his commands for the execution of his righteous judgments. Neither
   the beasts of the field nor the stones of the earth will be any longer
   quiet than he causeth them to hold a league with the sons of men.

   Use 1. To teach us all to tremble before this mighty God. Who can stand
   before him, -- "qui tot imperat legionibus?" If he will strike, he
   wants no weapons; if he will fight, he wants no armies. All things
   serve his will. He saith to one, Come, and it cometh; to another, Go,
   and it goeth; to a third, Do this, and it doth it. He can make use of
   ourselves, our friends, our enemies, heaven, earth, fire, water, any
   thing, for what end he pleaseth. There is no standing before his
   armies, for they are all things, and himself to make them effectual.
   There is no flying from his armies, for they are every where, and
   himself with them. Who would not fear this King of nations? He that
   contends with him shall find "as if a man did flee from a lion, and a
   bear met him; or went into the house, and leaned his hand on the wall,
   and a serpent bit him," Amos v. 19. No flying, no hiding, no
   contending. Worms kill Herod; a fly choked Adrian, etc.

   Use 2. To be a bottom of confidence and dependence in an evil day. He
   that hath God on his side, hath also all things that are seen, and that
   are not seen. The mountain is full of fiery chariots for Elisha's
   defence, when outwardly there was no appearance, 2 Kings vi. 17. All
   things wait their Master's beck, to do him service, -- as for the
   destruction of enemies, so for the deliverance of his. What though we
   had no army in the time of war? God hath millions, many thousands of
   angels, Ps. lxviii. 17, -- one whereof can destroy so many thousands of
   men in a night, Isa. xxxvii. 36. He can choose (when few others will
   appear, with him against the mighty, as in our late troubles) "foolish
   things to confound the wise, and weak things to confound the strong."
   Sennacherib's angel is yet alive, and the destroyer of Sodom is not
   dead: and all those things are at our command, if their help may be for
   our good. "Judah ruleth with God," Hos. xi. 12, -- hath a rule by
   faithful supplications over all those mighty hosts. Make God our
   friend, and we are not only of the best, but also the strongest side.
   You that would be on the safest side, be sure to choose that which God
   is on. Had not this mighty, all-commanding God, been with us, where had
   we been in the late tumults? So many thousands in Kent, so many in
   Wales, so many in the north, so many in Essex, -- shall they not speed?
   shall they not divide the prey? is not the day of those factious
   Independents come? was the language of our very neighbours. The snare
   is broken, and we are delivered.

   The Lord having sent messengers before him into Canaan, stands himself
   as it were upon the borders, and takes a view of the land.

   Verse 6. "He stood, and measured the earth: he beheld, and drove
   asunder the nations; and the everlasting mountains were scattered, the
   perpetual hills did bow: his ways are everlasting."

   Two things are here considerable:--

   1. The Lord's exact foreview of the promised land: "He stood, and
   measured the earth, and beheld the nations."

   2. His operation at that time: "He drove asunder the nations," etc.

   1. "He stood and measured:" The prophet here representeth the Lord on
   the frontier of Canaan, as one taking view of a piece of land, and
   exactly measuring it out, as intending it for his own; weighing and
   considering the bounds and limits of it, to see if it will answer the
   end for which he purposeth it. God's exact notice and knowledge of his
   people's possession is in those words held out. He views where the
   lines of every tribe shall run. Nothing happens or is made out to any
   of God's people, without his own careful providential predisposition.
   He views the circuit of the whole, where and how divided, and separated
   from the dwellings of the unclean, and habitations of the
   uncircumcised. Fixed bounds, measured limits of habitation is a
   necessary ingredient to the making up of a national church.

   2. What he did, which is two ways expressed: (1.) In reference to the
   inhabitants; (2.) To the land itself.

   (1.) For the inhabitants: He drove them asunder, vytr? "and he made to
   leap" out of their old channels. Those nations knit and linked together
   amongst themselves, by leagues and civil society, he separated,
   disturbed, divided in counsels and arms (as in the case of the
   Gibeonites [175] ), persecuted by the sword, that they suddenly leaped
   out of their habitations, the residue wandering as no people. God's
   justly nation-disturbing purposes are the bottom of their deserved
   ruin.

   (2.) For the land: "The everlasting mountains," etc., those strong,
   firm, lasting mountains of Canaan, not like the mountains of sand in
   the desert where the people were, but to continue firm to the world's
   end, as both the words here used, d? and vlm?, "perpetuity" and
   "everlasting," do in the Scripture frequently signify. Now, these are
   said to be scattered, and to bow, because of the destruction of the
   inhabitants of those lasting hills, being many of them high and mighty
   ones, [176] like perpetual mountains; they being given in possession to
   the sons of Israel, even "the chief things of the ancient mountains,
   and the precious things of the lasting hills," Deut. xxxiii. 15.

   X. Observation. God takes an exact foreview of his people's portion and
   inheritance.

   Like a careful father, he knows beforehand what he intends to bestow
   upon them. He views it, measures it, prepares it to the utmost bounds.
   They shall not have a hair's breadth which he hath not allotted them,
   nor want the least jot of their designed portion.

   Use. Learn to be contented with your lot. He is wise also who took a
   view of it, and measured it, and found it just commensurate to your
   good:-- had he known that a foot's breadth more had been needful, you
   would have had it. Had he seen it good, you had had no thorns in your
   lands, no afflictions in your lives. O how careful, how solicitous are
   many of God's people! how full of desires! -- Oh, that it were with me
   thus or thus! Possess your souls in patience; as you cannot add to, no
   more shall any take from your proportion. He took the measure of your
   wants and his own supplies long since. That which be hath measured out
   he will cut off for you. He knows how to suit all his children.

   XI. Observation. It is dangerous encroaching, for any of the sons of
   men, upon God's people's portion, lot, privileges, or inheritance.

   God hath measured it out for them, and he will look that they enjoy it.
   Shall men remove his bounds and land-marks, [177] and be free? will it
   be safe trespassing upon the lands of the Almighty? will it be easy and
   cheap? will he not plead his action with power, -- especially seeing he
   hath given them their portion? If he hath given Seir to Edom, what doth
   he vexing and wasting Jacob? Shall they not possess what the Lord their
   God gives them to possess? Judges xi. 24. He hath cautioned all the
   world, kings and others, in this kind, "Touch not mine anointed, do my
   prophets no harm," Ps. cv. 14, 15. Touch them not, nor any thing that
   is theirs: harm them not in any thing I bestow on them. They have
   nothing but what their Father gives them, and Christ hath bought for
   them. Will a tender father, think you, contentedly look on, and see a
   slave snatch away his children's bread? If a man hath engaged himself
   to give a jewel to a dear friend, will he take it patiently to have an
   enemy come and snatch it away before his face? God is engaged to his
   people for all their enjoyments, and will he quietly suffer himself to
   be robbed, and his people spoiled? Shall others dwell quietly in the
   land which he hath measured for his own?

   Use 1. See whence the great destructions of people and nations in these
   latter ages have come. Is it not for touching these forbidden things?
   The holy vessels of the temple at Jerusalem ruined Babylon. Is not the
   wasting of the western nations at this day from hence, that they have
   served the whore to deck herself with the spoils of the spouse? helped
   to trim her with the portion of God's people, taking away their
   liberties, ordinances, privileges, lives, to lay at her feet? Doubtless
   God is pleading with all these kingdoms for their encroaching. They who
   will not let him be at peace with his, shall have little quiet of their
   own. The eagle that stole a coal from the altar fired her nest I know
   how this hath been abused to countenance the holding of Babylonish
   wedges. God will preserve to his people his own allowance, not Rome's
   supplement. This nation hath yet itching fingers, and a hankering mind
   after the inheritance of God's people. Let them take heed; he hath
   knocked off their hands a hundred times, and sent them away with bloody
   fingers. O that we were wise, that we be not quite consumed! Of you I
   hope better things, and such as accompany salvation; yet give me leave
   to cautionate you a little.

   (1.) As to privileges and liberties of this life. Their liberties and
   estates are not as other men's, but more exactly measured for their
   good, and sanctified to them in the blood of Christ. If in these things
   God hath called you to the defence and protection of his, he will
   expect a real account, You had better give away a kingdom that belongs
   to others, than the least of that which God hath made for his saints.
   Think not any thing small which God accounts worthy to bestow on his.
   If he hath meted out liberty for them, and you give them slavery, you
   will have a sad reckoning.

   (2.) In point of ordinances, and Christ-purchased privileges. Here it
   is dangerous encroaching indeed. [178] God exactly measured Canaan,
   because it was to be the seat of a national church, If you love your
   lives, if you love your souls, be tender on this point. Here if you
   meddle with that which belongs not unto you, were you kings, all your
   glory would be laid in the dust, 2 Chron. xxvi. 18. Woe to them who cut
   short the saints of God in the least jot of what he hath allotted to
   them in spirituals! Is it for any of you, O ye sons of men! to measure
   out God's children's portion, long since bequeathed them by Christ? Let
   them alone with what is given them. If God call Israel out of Egypt to
   serve him, shall Pharaoh assign who, and how they shall go, -- first
   men only, then all, without their cattle? "Nay," says Moses, "we will
   go as God calls," Exod. x. 26.

   Was not one main end of the late tumults to rob God's people of their
   privileges, -- to bring them again under the yoke of superstition What
   God brake in war, do not think he will prosper in peace. If you desire
   to thrive, do not the same, nor any thing like it. Take they any thing
   of yours that belongs to Cæsar, the civil magistrate, restrain them,
   keep them within bounds; but if they take only what Christ hath given
   them, -- O touch them not, harm them not! The heap is provided for
   them, let them take for themselves. Think it not strange that every one
   should gather his own manna. The Lord forbid that I should ever see the
   magistrates of England taking away liberties, privileges, ordinances,
   or ways of worship, from them to whom the Almighty hath made a free
   grant of them!

   (3.) If in taking what God hath measured out for them, they should not
   all comply with you in the manner and measure of what they take, do
   them no harm, impoverish not their families, banish them not, slay them
   not. Alas! [179] your judgments, were you kings and emperors, is not a
   rule to them. They must be tried by their own faith. Are their souls,
   think you, more precious to you than themselves? You say they take
   amiss; -- they say, No, and appeal to the Word. [180] Should you now
   smite them? Speak, blood; is that the way of Jesus Christ? Should it be
   as you affirm, you would be puzzled for your warrant. To run when you
   are not sent, surely in this case is not safe. But what if it should
   prove, in the close, that they have followed divine directions? Do you
   not then fight against God, wound Jesus Christ, and prosecute him as an
   evil-doer? I know the usual colours, the common pleas, that are used
   for the instigation of authority to the contrary. They are the very
   same, and no other, that have slain the saints of God this twelve
   hundred years. Arguments for persecution are dyed in the blood of
   Christians for a long season; -- ever since the dragon gave his power
   to the false prophet, they have all died as heretics and schismatics.
   Suppose you saw in one view all the blood of the witnesses of Christ,
   which had been let out of their veins by vain pretences, -- that you
   heard in one noise the doleful cry of all pastorless churches, dying
   martyrs, harbourless children of parents inheriting the promise,
   wilderness-wandering saints, dungeoned believers, wrested out by
   pretended zeal to peace and truth; -- and perhaps it may make your
   spirits tender as to this point.

   Use 2. See the warrantableness of our contests for God's people's
   rights. It was Jephthah's only argument against the encroaching
   Ammonites, Judges xi. 1. By God's assistance they would possess what
   the Lord their God should give them. If a grant from heaven will not
   make a firm title, I know not what will. Being called by lawful
   authority, certainly there is not a more glorious employment than to
   serve the Lord in helping to uphold the portion he hath given his
   people. If your hearts be upright, and it is the liberties, the
   privileges of God's saints, conveyed from the Father, purchased by
   Christ, you contend for, -- go on and prosper, the Lord is with you.

   XII. Observation. The works and labours of God's people are transacted
   for them in heaven, before they once undertake them.

   The Israelites were now going to Canaan: God doth their work for them
   beforehand; they did but go up and take possession. Joshua and Caleb
   tell the people, not only that their enemies' defence was departed from
   them, but that they were but bread for them, Num. xiv. 9, -- not corn
   that might be prepared, but bread, ground, made up, baked, ready to
   eat. Their work was done in heaven. "Known unto God are all his works
   from the beginning of the world," Acts xv. 18. All that is done here
   below, is but the writing of a visible copy, for the sons of men to
   read, out of the eternal lines of his own purpose.

   Use. Up and be doing, you that are about the work of the Lord. Your
   enemies are bread ready to be eaten and yield you refreshment. Do you
   think if our armies had not walked in a trodden path, they could have
   made such journeys as they have done of late? Had not God marched
   before them, and traced out their way from Kent to Essex, from Wales to
   the north, their carcasses had long ere this been cast into the field.
   Their work was done in heaven before they began it. God was gone over
   the mulberry-trees, 2 Sam. v. 24. The work might have been done by
   children, though he was pleased to employ such worthy instruments. They
   see, I doubt not, their own nothingness in his all-sufficiency. Go on,
   then; but with this caution, search by all ways and means to find the
   footsteps of the mighty God going before you.

   The trembling condition of the oppressing nations round about, when God
   appeared so gloriously for his people, is held out, verse 7.

   Verse 7. "I saw the tents of Cushan in affliction: the curtains of the
   land of Midian did tremble."

   You have here three things considerable.

   1. The mention of two nations, enemies of the church: Cushan and
   Midian.

   2. The state and condition of those nations: the tents of the one in
   affliction, and the curtains of the other in trembling.

   3. The view the prophet had of this, -- I saw it, saith he: "I saw,"
   etc.

   1. For the first; -- these two nations, Cushan and Midian, were the
   neighbouring people to the Israelites, being in the wilderness when God
   did such great things for them.

   (1.) Cushan; that is, the tent-dwelling Arabians on the south side,
   towards Ethiopia, -- being, as the Ethiopians, of the posterity of Cush
   (thence called Cushan), the eldest son of scoffing Ham, Gen. x. 6;
   enemies and opposers of the church (doubtless) all the way down from
   their profane ancestors. [181] These now beheld the Israelites going to
   root out their allies and kindred, the Amorites of Canaan, the
   posterity of Canaan, the younger brother of their progenitor Cush, Gen.
   x. 6.

   (2.) Midian was a people inhabiting the east side of Jordan, on the
   borders of Moab; so called from their forefather, Midian, the son of
   Abraham by Keturah, Gen. xxv. 2. These obtained a temporal blessing for
   a season, from the love borne to their faithful progenitor. In the days
   of Jacob they were great merchants, Gen. xxxvii. 28. At this time, in
   less than four hundred years, they were so multiplied, that they had
   five kings of their nation, Num. xxxi. 8. Some knowledge of the true
   God was retained, as it should seem, until now, amongst some of them,
   being received by tradition from their fathers. Moses' father-in-law
   was a priest of this country, Exod. ii. 15, 16, -- not altogether
   unacquainted with Jehovah, Exod. xviii. 1, -- and was himself, or his
   son, persuaded to take up his portion in Canaan, Num. x. 29, 30. But
   for the generality of the nation, being not heirs of the promise, they
   were fallen off to superstition and idolatry. Exceeding enemies they
   were to the people in the wilderness, vexing them with their wiles, and
   provoking them to abominations, that the Lord might consume them, Num.
   xxv. 18. None so vile enemies to the church as superstitious apostates.
   These two nations then set out all manner of opposers; -- gross
   idolaters, as Cushan; and superstitious, envious apostates, as Midian.

   2. Their state and condition severally.

   (1.) "The tents of Cushan" were in affliction; the tents, the Arabian
   Ethiopians of Cush, dwelling in tents, the habitation for the
   inhabitant, by a hypallage. They were "in affliction, under vanity,
   under iniquity, the place of vanity," so variously are the words
   rendered, tcht 'vn?, "under affliction, vanity, or iniquity." Sin and
   the punishment of it are frequently in the Scripture of the same name,
   so near is the relation. 'vn? is properly and most usually iniquity;
   but that it is here taken for the consequent of it, -- a consuming,
   perplexed, vexed condition, -- can be no doubt. The Cushanites, then,
   were in affliction, full of anguish, fear, dread, vexation, to see what
   would be the issue of those great and mighty things which God was doing
   in their borders for his people: [182] -- afflicted with Israel's
   happiness and their own fears; as is the condition of all wicked
   oppressors.

   (2.) "The curtains of the land of Midian," for the Midianites dwelling
   in curtained tabernacles, by the same figure as before. They trembled,
   -- yrgzvn?, "moved themselves, were moved;" that is, shaken with fear
   and trembling, as though they were ready to run from the appearance of
   the mighty God with his people. The story of it you have in the Book of
   Numbers, [183] as it was prophetically foretold by Moses concerning
   other nations, Exod. xv. 14-16, "The people shall hear, and be afraid:
   sorrow shall take hold on the inhabitants of Palestine. Then the dukes
   of Edom shall be amazed; the mighty men of Moab," etc. God filled those
   nations with anguish, sorrow, and amazement, at the protection he
   granted his people.

   3. The prophet's view of all this: "I saw" it, or "I see" it. Though it
   were eight hundred and seventy years before, supposing him to prophesy
   about the end of Josiah or beginning of Jehoiakim, yet, taking it under
   the consideration of faith, he makes it present to his view.

   Faith looketh backwards and forwards, -- to what God hath done, and to
   what he hath promised to do. Abraham saw the day of Christ, so many
   ages after, because he found it by faith in the promise. Habakkuk saw
   the terrors of Cushan and Midian so many days before, because faith
   found it recorded among the works of God, to support itself in seeking
   the like mercies to be renewed. So that this is the sum of this verse:
   "O Lord, faith makes it evident, and presents it before my view, how in
   former days, when thou wast doing great things for thy people, thou
   filledst all thine and their enemies with fear, vexation, trembling,
   and astonishment."

   XIII. Observation. Faith gives a present subsistence to forepast works
   as recorded, and future mercies as promised, to support the soul in an
   evil day.

   I have made the doctrine, by analogy, look both ways, though the words
   of the text look but one.

   The apostle tells us, that "faith is the substance of things hoped for,
   the evidence of things not seen," Heb. xi. 1.

   1. "Of things hoped for." It looks forward to the promises, and so
   gives the substance of them in present possession, confirming our minds
   and hearts, that they may have a subsistence, as it were, within us,
   though not actually made out unto us.

   2. It is "the evidence of things not seen." It extends itself not only
   to things promised, but, taking for its object the whole word of God,
   it makes evident and present things that are past also. The faith
   commended, verse 3, is of things long since done, -- even the "making
   of the things that are seen of the things that do not appear." "Abraham
   saw my day," saith our Saviour, John viii. 56. He saw it as Habakkuk
   saw the tents of Cushan in affection; -- faith made it present to him;
   all the ages between him and his promised seed were as nothing to his
   keen-sighted faith. Hence the apostle puts the mercies of the promise
   all in one form and rank, as already wrought, though some of them were
   enjoyed, and some of them in this life cannot be, Rom. viii. 30, "Whom
   he hath justified, them he hath glorified:" he hath done it for them
   already, because he hath made them believe it, and that gives it a
   present subsistence in their spirit. And for forepast works, they are
   still mentioned by the saints as if they had been done in their days,
   before their eyes. Elisha calls up to remembrance a former miracle, to
   the effecting the like, 2 Kings ii. 14.

   There be three things in the past or future mercies which faith makes
   present to the soul, giving, in the substance of them, -- (1.) Their
   love; (2.) Their consolation; (3.) Their use and benefit.

   (1.) The love of them. The love that was in former works, and the love
   that is in promised mercies, that faith draws out, and really makes
   ours. The love of every recorded deliverance is given to us by faith.
   It looks into the good-will, the free grace, the loving-kindness of
   God, in every work that ever he did for his, and cries, Yet this is
   mine:-- this is the kernel of that blessing, and this is mine; for the
   same good-will, the same kindness he hath towards me also. Were the
   same outward actings needful, I should have them also. The free love of
   every mercy is faith's proper object. It makes all Joshua's great
   victories present to every one of us. The promise that had the love and
   grace in it, which ran through them all, is given him, Josh. i. 5, "I
   will be with thee, I will not fail thee, nor forsake thee." Now the
   apostle tells us that the truth and love of this promise is ours, Heb.
   iv. 8. Faith may, doth assure itself, that what good-will soever was in
   all the great mercies which Joshua received upon that promise, is all
   ours. All the good-will and choice love of, "I will never leave thee
   nor forsake thee," is mine and thine, if we are believers. He that hath
   this present, hath all Joshua's victories present. The very glory of
   the saints in heaven is ours in the love of it. We enjoy that love
   which gave them glory, and will crown us also in due time.

   (2.) In their comforts and refreshments: "Thou gavest leviathan to be
   meat to the people in the wilderness," Ps. lxxiv. 14. They fed their
   souls full of the sweetness of that mercy, the destruction of their
   oppressing tyrant; we chew the cud upon the blessings of former ages.
   Who hath not, with joy, delight, and raised affections, gone over the
   old preservations of the church in former years? How does David run
   them over with admiration, closing every stop with, "His mercy endureth
   for ever!" Ps. cxxxvi. And for things, to come, as yet in the promise
   only, -- whether general to the whole church, as the calling of the
   Jews, the coming in of the fulness of the Gentiles, the breaking out of
   light, beauty, and glory upon the churches and saints, the confusion of
   nations not subjecting themselves to the standard of the gospel, etc.,
   -- or in particular, farther assurance of love than at present enjoyed,
   nearer communion with Father and Son, being with Christ, freed from
   misery and corruption, dwelling with God for ever; -- how does faith
   act over these and the like things in the heart, leaving a savour and
   relish of their sweetness continually upon the soul? O how sweet are
   the things of the world to come unto poor believers! Christ leads the
   soul by faith, not only into the chambers of present enjoyed loves, but
   also into the fore-prepared everlasting mansions in his Father's house.
   Thus it gives poor mortal creatures a sweet relish of eternal joys; --
   brings heaven into a dungeon, glory into a prison, a crown into a
   cottage, Christ into a slaughter-house. And this arises, --

   [1.] From the nature of faith. Though it do not make the thing believed
   to be (the act cannot create its own object), yet applying it, it makes
   it the believer's. It is the bond of union between the soul and the
   thing promised. He that believes in Christ, by that believing receives
   Christ, John i. 12; -- he becomes his. It is a grace uniting its
   subject and object, -- the person believing and the thing believed.
   There needs no ascending into heaven, or descending; the word of faith
   makes all things nigh, even within us, Rom. x. 6-8. Some glasses will
   present things at a great distance very near; faith looking through the
   glass of the gospel, makes the most remote mercies to be not only in a
   close distance, but in union. It "is the subsistence of things hoped
   for;" -- that which they have not in themselves, it gives them, -- in
   the full-assured minds of believers.

   [2.] From the intendment of all mercies. They are for every believer.
   All things are theirs, -- "world, life, death, things present, things
   to come," 1 Cor. iii. 22. All promises being made to every believer,
   and all mercies being the fruit of these promises, they must all belong
   to every believer. Now, if all these should be kept from us, at that
   distance wherein they fail in their accomplishment in respect of time,
   what would they avail us? God, therefore, hath appointed that they
   shall have a real, though not a natural presence and subsistence at all
   times, to all believers.

   Use 1. See hence what use you make of past mercies, deliverances,
   blessings, with promised incomings; -- carry them about you by faith,
   that you may use them at need. "Where is the Lord God of Elijah?"
   "Awake, awake, O arm of the Lord!" etc. "I saw the tents of Cushan."
   Take store mercies along with you in every trial. Use them, or they
   will grow rusty, and not pass in heaven. Learn to eat leviathan many
   years after his death. Forget not your perils; -- scatter not away your
   treasure; -- be rich in a heap of mercies, -- faith will make you so.
   The love, the comfort, the benefit, of all former and future blessings
   are yours, if you know how to use them. Oh, how have we lost our
   mercies in every hedge and ditch! Have none of us skill to lay up the
   last eminent deliverance against a rainy day?

   Use 2. Learn how to make the poorest and most afflicted condition
   comfortable and full of joy. Store thy cottage, thy sick-bed, by faith,
   with all sorts of mercies; they are the richest furniture in the world.
   Gather up what is already cast out, and fetch the rest from heaven.
   Bring the first-fruits of glory into thy bosom. See the Jews called, --
   the residue of opposers subdued, the gospel exalted, -- Christ
   enthroned, -- all thy sins pardoned, -- corruption conquered, -- glory
   enjoyed. Roll thyself in those golden streams every day. Let faith
   fetch in new and old; -- ancient mercies for thy supportment,
   everlasting mercies for thy consolation. He that hath faith, hath all
   things.

   XIV. Observation. God's dealing with his enemies in the season of his
   church's deliverance is of especial consideration.

   "I saw the tents," etc. So did the Israelites behold the Egyptians dead
   on the shore, Exod. xiv. 30, 31. "The heathen raged, the kingdoms were
   moved: he uttered his voice, the earth melted. The Lord of hosts is
   with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah. Come, behold the works
   of the Lord, what desolations he hath made in the earth," Ps. xlvi.
   6-8. The enemies' undertaking, verse 6, -- God's protection to his
   people, verse 7, -- a view of the adversaries' desolation, verse 8, --
   are all orderly held out.

   The Lord tells Moses that he will harden the heart of Pharaoh, that he
   might show his power; to this very end, that it might be considered,
   and told to one another, Exod. x. 2, 3. How many psalms have we, that
   are taken up in setting forth God's breaking, yoking, befooling,
   terrifying his adversaries at such a season! The remembrance of the
   slaughter of the firstborn of Egypt was an ingredient in the chiefest
   ordinance the ancient church enjoyed, Exod. xii. The reasons of this
   are, --

   1. Much of the greatness and intenseness of God's love to his own is
   seen in his enemies' ruin, Isa. xliii. 3, 4, "I gave Egypt for thy
   ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee. Since thou wast precious in my
   sight, thou hast been honourable, and I have loved thee; therefore will
   I give men for thee, and people for thy life." When God gives such
   mighty kingdoms for a small handful, it appears they are precious to
   him: "Whosoever shall gather together against thee, shall fall for thy
   sake," Isa. liv. 15. When God will maintain a quarrel with all the
   world, -- swear that he will never have peace with Amalek until he be
   consumed, -- break nations, kings, and kingdoms, -- stretch out his
   hand in judgment round about, -- and all to save, preserve, prosper,
   protect a small handful; -- surely he hath endeared affections for
   them. In the days wherein we live, can we look and see wise men
   befooled, mighty warriors vanquished, men of might become as children,
   their persons slain and trodden down in the field, -- can we but cry,
   "Lord, what are we, and what is our house, that thou shouldst do such
   things for us?" A serious view of what God hath done in this nation of
   late, -- what armies he hath destroyed, what strongholds demolished,
   what proud, haughty spirits defeated, what consultations made vain, --
   is enough to make us admire the riches of his love all our days. We may
   know what esteem a man sets upon a jewel, by the price he gives for it.
   Surely God values them for whom he hath given the honours, the parts,
   the polities, the lives of so many tall cedars, as of late he hath
   done. The loving-kindness of God to his church is seen, as in a glass,
   in the blood of their persecutors.

   2. The manifestation of God's sovereignty, power, and justice, is as
   dear to him as the manifestation of his mercy. The properties he lays
   out in destruction are equally glorious with those he lays out in
   preservation.

   In the proclamation of his glorious name he omits them not, Exod.
   xxxiv. 6, 7. In these he triumpheth gloriously when he hath overthrown
   the horse and his rider in the sea, Exod. xv. 1.

   Use. Let not our eyes in the late deliverance be always on the light
   side of the work, our own mercies; -- the dark side of terror and
   judgment is not without its glory. The folly that was in their
   counsels, the amazement that was in their armies, the trembling that
   accompanied all their undertakings, the tympanous products of all their
   endeavours, do all cry out, "Digitus Dei est hìc." Had not God showed
   infinite wisdom, they had not been so abundantly foolish: had not he
   been infinite in power, the many thousands of enemies had not been so
   weak.

   In the late engagement in this country, when God stirred us up, with
   some others in these parts, to make some opposition to the enemy
   gathering at Chelmsford, what were, think you, the workings of God's
   providences against them? How came it to pass that we were not
   swallowed up by them? For, --

   1. They were desirous to ruin us, if we may judge their desires to
   answer their interest; or their expressions, with the language of their
   friends round about us, to answer their desires.

   2. They were able to do it. They had from the beginning, and so all
   along, near as many thousands as we had hundreds; -- of them very many
   old, experienced soldiers; with us not three men that had ever seen any
   fighting.

   3. They were resolved to do it. Witness their own confessions, and
   frequent declarations of their purposes, whilst the business was in
   agitation.

   4. They were provoked to it. For the first and only considerable
   opposition was made to them in this place; -- first, By hindering their
   assistance from Colchester; which how much they valued, witness the
   senseless letter they would have forced the committee to subscribe, to
   persuade us not to disturb their levies there; -- secondly, Suppressing
   and discouraging all those affected to them and their designs in these
   parts of the country; restraining some, disarming others, awing all; --
   thirdly, Hastening the coming of the army, lest their friends should
   suffer; -- fourthly, Encouraging their coming, by declaring that they
   had friends here: by which, and the like, they were abundantly
   provoked.

   5. That they were also invited to it, though by persons somewhat
   inconsiderable, with promises of a full party of friends to assist
   them, which they might have had, and a rich booty from their enemies to
   support them, which they might have found, is too apparent.

   Now, being thus advantaged, thus encouraged, thus provoked and
   resolved, why did they not attempt it, why did they not accomplish
   their desires? Is it not worth the while to consider how they were
   restrained? [184] Was not much of God's wisdom seen in mixing a spirit
   of giddiness and error in the midst of them, that they knew not well
   how to determine, nor at all to execute their determinations? Was not
   his power seen in causing experienced soldiers, as they were, with
   their multitudes, to be afraid of a poor handful of unskilful men,
   running together because they were afraid to abide in their houses? Was
   not his justice exalted in keeping them only for the pit which they had
   digged for others? Doubtless the hand of God was lifted up. O that we
   could all learn righteousness, peculiarly amongst ourselves of this
   place! Is there nothing of God to be discerned in the vexations,
   birthless consultations, and devices of our observers? -- nothing of
   power in their restraint? -- nothing of wisdom in the self-punishment
   of their anxious thoughts? -- nothing of goodness, that after so long
   waiting for advantage, they begin themselves to think that neither
   divination nor enchantment will prevail?

   XV. Observation. The measuring out of God's people's portion fills
   Cushan with affliction and Midian with trembling.

   Their eye is evil, because God is good. Israel's increase is Pharaoh's
   trouble, Exod. i. 10. When Nehemiah comes to build the walls of
   Jerusalem, it grieved the enemy exceedingly "that there was come a man
   to seek the welfare of the children of Israel," Neh. ii. 10. This is
   the season of that dispensation which you have mentioned, Isa. lxv.
   13-15, "Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, my servants shall eat, but ye
   shall be hungry: behold, my servants shall drink, but ye shall be
   thirsty: behold, my servants shall rejoice, but ye shall be ashamed:
   behold, my servants shall sing for joy of heart, but ye shall cry for
   sorrow of heart, and shall howl for vexation of spirit. And ye shall,"
   etc.

   The reasons of this are taken, -- 1. From their envy; 2. From their
   carnal fear; -- the two principles whereby they are acted in reference
   to the saints of God.

   1. Their envy. They have a devouring envy at them, [185] which at
   length shall shame them and consume them, Isa. xxvi. 11. They are of
   their father the devil, and he (through envy) was a "murderer from the
   beginning," John viii. 44. The portion God measureth out unto his
   people is in distinguishing mercies, differencing blessings, -- in such
   things as the world hath not, giveth not. Now, this is that which envy
   takes for its proper object. That others should have enjoyments above
   them, beyond them, this envious men cannot bear. God accepts Abel, not
   Cain; presently Cain is wroth, and his countenance falls, Gen. iv. 6.
   Jacob gets the blessing, and this fills the heart of Esau with
   murderous revenge, Gen. xxvii. 41. Upon all God's appearances with the
   apostles, how were the Jews cut to the heart, vexed, perplexed! God
   gives distinguishing mercies to his people, such protections, such
   deliverances; -- this Cushan and Midian cannot bear.

   2. Their carnal fear. They have all of them that conclusion in their
   breasts which Haman's wise men and wife made to him, Esth. vi. 13. If
   they begin to fall before the seed of the Jews, utter ruin will follow.
   When God begins to own his people, as them in the Acts v. 24, "they
   doubt whereunto this will grow;" -- their hearts tell them secretly
   they are usurpers of all they have, and when God owns any, they
   instantly fear lest for their sakes they should be called to account.
   When a distinction begins to be made in ordinances, privileges,
   deliverances, protections, evidently given to some peculiar ones, they
   tremble within that they are set apart for no good. This picking and
   choosing of men by the Lord, Ps. iv. 3, they cannot bear with. Such
   mighty works attend the Israelites! what, thinks Midian, will be the
   end of this? It is true, their pride calls on them to act openly more
   of their malice than their fear; but yet this lies at the bottom, like
   a boasting Atheist's nightly thoughts. [186] The chief priests and
   Pharisees having gotten the apostles before them, -- what big words
   they use to countenance the business! "Who gave you this power?" Acts
   iv. 7. But when they are by themselves, they cry, "What shall we do?"
   and, "Whereunto will this grow?" This lies at the bottom with many at
   this day; -- though they boast, and lift up their mouth to heaven,
   their hearts do tremble as an aspen leaf.

   Use. Learn not to be troubled at the great tumultuating which is
   amongst many against the ways of God at this day. God is measuring out
   his children's portion, giving them their bread in season, viewing for
   them the lot of their inheritance. Men of the world, profane
   Cushanites, superstitious, apostatical Midianites, will not, cannot be
   quiet. Vexed they are, envious, and afraid, and will act according to
   those principles. Cushanites see religion owned, Midianites theirs
   disclaimed, and both are alike provoked. The Lord convert them, or
   rebuke them; or the one will have the armies, the other their wiles.
   Only judge not their hearts by the outward appearance always. They seem
   gallant to you; -- indeed they are frighted, galled, vexed. I have seen
   a galled horse, under dressing, leap and curvet as though it had been
   out of mettle and spirit, when indeed it was pain and smart that made
   him do it. They pretend to despise us, when they envy us. They look
   like contemners, but are tremblers. Be not troubled at their outward
   appearance, they have inward anguish; -- they bite others, but are
   lashed themselves.

   XVI. Observation. The season of the church's deliverance being come,
   Cushan and Midian must wax vain, and perish.

   That there is such a season, I told you before. When four hundred and
   thirty years are expired, Egypt must be destroyed, the Amorites rooted
   out, and all the nations round made to tremble. When seventy years of
   captivity expire, Babylon must be ruined, and the Chaldean monarchy
   quite wasted, that the Jews may return. The church being to be
   delivered, Haman must be hanged. This you have fully set out, Rev. vi.
   12-17. It is the fall of heathenish tyranny, by the prevailing of the
   gospel, which you have there described. Rome and Constantinople, Pope
   and Turk, are preserved for a day and an hour wherein they shall fall,
   and be no more. If the season of enjoying ordinances and privileges be
   come to this nation, that the tabernacle of God will be here amongst
   men; woe be to Cushanites! woe be to Midianites! -- open opposers, and
   secret apostates. They shall not be able to be quiet, nor to prevail;
   God will not let them rest, nor obtain their purposes. The story of
   Haman must be acted over again; their hearts shall be stirred up to
   their own ruin, Rev. xx. 8. This is the frame of perishing Babylonians
   in the day of Zion's restoration. The reasons are:--

   1. Because at the deliverance of his people, God will plead with their
   enemies for their oppressions. "It is the day of the Lord's vengeance,
   the year of recompenses for the controversy of Zion," Isa. xxxiv. 8. It
   is the vengeance of the Lord and his temple that lights upon them in
   that day, Jer. l. 28. "The violence done to me and my flesh be upon
   Babylon, shall the inhabitant of Zion say; and, My blood upon the
   inhabitants of Chaldea, shall Jerusalem say," Jer. li. 35. In this day
   great Babylon must come into remembrance, Rev. xvi. 19, 20.

   2. The discerning trial that shall and doth come along with the
   church's vindication, will cut off all superfluous false professors, so
   that they also shall perish, Mal. iii. 2, 3. Christ comes with a fan,
   to send away the chaff in the wings of the wind. Have we not seen this
   end of many zealots?

   3. The Amorites live in Canaan, and must be removed. Oppressors and
   hypocrites enjoy many rites of the church, which must be taken from
   them. Rome and her adherents shall not have so much left as the name or
   title, appearance or show of a church. The outward court, which they
   have trodden down and defiled, shall be quite left out in the measuring
   of the temple, Rev. xi. 2.

   Use. Bring this observation home to the first from this verse, and it
   will give you the use of it: proceed we to the next verse.

   Verse 8. "Was the Lord displeased against the rivers? was thine anger
   against the rivers? was thy wrath against the sea, that thou didst ride
   upon thine horses, and thy chariots of salvation?"

   "Was the Lord displeased?" chrh? "kindled," did he burn? -- that is, in
   wrath. Heat is a great ingredient in the commotion of anger in us, here
   alluded to, or because the effects of anger are so often compared to
   fire. "Against the rivers" or floods? Again: "Was thine anger?" 'pk?
   "thy nose or face, or thine anger," 'ph? signifies both. The face [187]
   is the seat of anger's appearance: fury comes up into the face. "Was
   thine anger, thy troubling anger" (so the word) "against the sea," --
   the Red sea, through which thy people passed; "that thou didst ride
   upon thy horses, and thy chariots of salvation?" or, "thy chariots were
   salvation, -- currus salutares,' thy safety-bringing chariots."

   The words are an admiring expostulation about the mighty works of the
   Lord for his people, upon the sea, rivers, and inanimate creatures.

   1. The rivers:-- Jordan and its driving back is doubtless especially
   intended. The Lord showed his power in disturbing that ancient river in
   his course, and making his streams run backward. The story of it you
   have Josh. iii. 15, 16. The people being to enter into Canaan, the Lord
   divides the waters of that river, making them beneath to sink away, and
   those above to stand on a heap. This the prophet magnifies, Ps. cxiv.
   5, "What ailed thee, O Jordan, that thou wast driven back?" What
   marvellous, powerful, disturbing thing is happened to thee, that,
   contrary to thy ancient natural course, thy streams should be frighted,
   and run back to the springs from whence they came?

   2. The sea:-- that is, the Red sea, which, in like manner, was divided,
   Exod. xiv. 21; which the prophet also admires in the fore-cited psalm:
   "The sea saw it, and fled. What ailed thee, O thou sea, that thou
   fleddest?" What strong, mighty impression of power was on thee, that
   the multitudes of thy waters should be parted, and thy channel
   discovered dry to the bottom?

   3. "That thou didst ride upon thine horses, and thy chariots of
   salvation" This you have again, verse 15, "Thou didst walk through the
   sea with thine horses." These were those clouds and winds which the
   Lord sent before the Israelites, to the sea and Jordan, to drive them
   back. "He maketh the clouds his chariot, and walketh upon the wings of
   the wind," Ps. civ. 3. So Ps. xviii. 10, "He did fly upon the wings of
   the wind." After the manner of men, God is represented as a mighty
   conqueror, riding before his armies and making way for them. The power
   and majesty of God was with and upon those clouds and winds which went
   before his people, to part those mighty waters, that they might pass
   dry; and therefore they are called his saving chariots, because by them
   his people were delivered. Or by horses and chariots here you may
   understand the angels, who are the host of God. Ps. lxviii. 17, "The
   chariots of God are twenty thousand, even thousands of angels." They
   have appeared as horses and chariots of fire, 2 Kings vi. 17. And their
   ministry, no doubt, the Lord used in these mighty works of drying
   rivers and dividing seas. Either way, the glorious power and majesty of
   God, in his delivering instruments, is set forth.

   Thus the words severally; -- now jointly.

   This admiring interrogation includes a negation. "Was the Lord kindled
   against the rivers? was thy face against the rivers," etc. Was it that
   the deep had offended the Most High, that, by thine angels, winds, and
   clouds, thou didst so disturb the floods in their ancient course, and
   madest naked their hidden channels, until the hoary deep cried out for
   fear, and lifted up his aged hands to the Almighty, as it were, for
   pity? verse 10. No, surely, no such thing. All those keep the order by
   thee unto them appointed; it was all for the salvation and deliverance
   of thy people. God was not angry with Jordan when he drove it back, nor
   with the sea when he divided it; but all was effected for Israel's
   deliverance.

   XVII. Observation. The very senseless creatures are, as it were,
   sensible of the wrath and power of the Almighty.

   Effects of anger being in and upon the deep, "he utters his voice, and
   lifts up his hands on high," verse 10. God often in the Scripture sets
   forth his power and majesty by the trembling of heaven and the shaking
   of the earth, the vanishing of mountains and the bowing of perpetual
   hills, the professed humble subjection of the most eminent parts of the
   creation. The sea shall fly, as afraid; the rocks, as weak, rend and
   crumble; the heavens be darkened; the mountains skip like rams, and the
   little hills like young sheep, Ps. cxiv. 4.


   Tremei d' ore, kai pelorios

   Buthos thalasses, koreon hupsos mega,

   Hotan epeblepse gorgon omma despotou.

   Æsch. apud Justin., Apol. ii.

   "The earth shook, the heavens dropped at the presence of God," Ps.
   lxiii. 8. The almighty Creator holds the whole frame of the building in
   his own hand, and makes what portion he pleaseth, and when he pleaseth,
   to tremble, consume, and vanish before him. Though many things are not
   capable of sense and reason, yet he will make them do such things as
   sense and reason should prompt the whole subjected creation unto, to
   teach that part their duty who were endued therewith. A servant is
   beat, to make a child learn his duty.

   Use. See hence the stoutness of sinful hearts, -- more stubborn than
   the mountains, more flinty than the rocks, more senseless than the
   great deep. Friend, art thou stronger than Horeb? yet that trembled at
   the presence of this mighty God, whom it never had provoked. Are thy
   lusts like the streams of Jordan? yet they ran back from his chariots
   of salvation. Are thy corruption? more firmly seated on thy soul than
   the mountains on their bases? yet they leaped like frighted sheep
   before that God against whom they had not sinned. And wilt thou, a
   small handful of sinful dust, that hast ten thousand times provoked the
   eyes of his glory, not tremble before him, coming on his horses and
   chariots of salvation, -- his mighty works and powerful word? Shall a
   lion tremble, and thou not be afraid, who art ready to tremble with a
   thought of that poor creature? Shall the heavens bow, the deep beg for
   mercy, and thou be senseless? Shall all creatures quake for the sin of
   man, and sinful man be secure? Know you not that the time is coming
   wherein such men will desire the trembling rocks to be a covert to
   their more affrighted souls?

   XVIII. Observation. No creatures, seas nor floods, greater or lesser
   waters, shall be able to obstruct or hinder God's people's deliverance,
   when he hath undertaken it.

   Is the sea against them? it shall be parted. Is Jordan in the way? it
   shall be driven back. Both sea and Jordan shall tremble before him.
   Euphrates shall be dried up, to give the kings of the east a passage,
   Rev. xvi. 12. Waters in the Scriptures are sometimes afflictions,
   sometimes people and nations. Be they seas (kings and princes), or be
   they rivers (inferior persons), they shall not be able to oppose. God
   has decked his house, and made it glorious with the spoils of all
   opposers. There you have the spoils of Pharaoh, gathered up on the
   shore of the Red sea, and dedicated in the house of God, Exod. xv. 1.
   There you have all the armour of Sennacherib's mighty host, with the
   rest of their spoils, hung up to show, 2 Chron. xxxii. 21. There you
   have the glory, and throne, and dominion of Nebuchadnezzar, himself
   being turned into a beast, Dan. iv. 33. There you shall have the
   carcasses of Gog and Magog, with all their mighty hosts, for coming to
   encamp against the city of God, Ezek. xxxix. 1. There you have the
   imperial robes of [188] Diocletian and his companion, abdicating them
   -- selves from the empire for very madness that they could not prevail
   against the church. Kings of armies shall fly apace; and she that
   tarries at home shall divide the spoil, Ps. lxviii. 12. All opposers,
   though nations and kingdoms, shall perish and be utterly destroyed,
   Isa. lx. 12, Rev. xix. 18.

   God will not exalt any creature unto a pitch of opposition to himself,
   or to stand in the way of his workings. The very end of all things, in
   their several stations, is to be serviceable to his purposes towards
   his own. Obedience in senseless creatures is natural, even against the
   course of nature, in the season of deliverance. "Sun, stand thou still
   upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon," Josh. x. 12.
   "Who art thou, O great mountain? before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a
   plain," Zech. iv. 7. The most mountainous opposers shall be levelled,
   when the Spirit of God sets in for that purpose. There is a strength in
   every promise and engagement of God unto his people, that is able to
   carry the whole frame of heaven and earth before it. If they can
   believe, all things are possible to them that believe. When the decree
   is to bring forth the fruit of the promise, it will overturn empires,
   destroy nations, divide seas, ruin armies, open prisons, break chains
   and fetters, and bear down all before it; as the wind shut up in the
   earth will shake the pillars, as it were, of its mighty body, but it
   will find or make a passage. The least promise of deliverance, if the
   season thereof be come, though it were shut up under strong and mighty
   powers, crafty counsels, dungeons, and prisons, like the doors and
   lasting bars of the earth, the truth and power of God shall make them
   all to tremble, and give birth to his people's deliverance.

   Use 1. Have we seen nothing of this in our days? -- no seas divided? no
   Jordans driven back? no mountains levelled? no hills made to tremble?
   Whence, then, was the late confusion of armies? casting down of mighty
   ones? reviving of dead bones? opening of prison doors? bringing out the
   captives appointed to be slain? Is it not from hence, that nothing can
   stand against the breaking out of a promise in its appointed season?
   "Was the Lord displeased with the rivers?" was his anger against the
   walls and houses, "that he rode upon his horses, and chariots of
   salvation?"

   Use 2. Let faith be strengthened in an evil time. Poor distressed soul,
   all the difficulty of thy deliverance lies in thine own bosom! If the
   streams of thy unbelief within be not stronger than all seas of
   opposition without, all will be easy. O learn to stand still with
   quietness, between a host of Egyptians and a raging sea, to see the
   salvation of God! Be quiet in prison, between your friends' bullets and
   your enemies' swords; God can, God will, make a way. If it were not
   more hard with us to believe wonders than it is to the promise to
   effect wonders for us, they would be no wonders, so daily, so
   continually, would they be wrought.

   XIX. Observation. God can make use of any of his creatures to be
   chariots of salvation.

   This is the other side of that doctrine which we gathered from verse 5,
   "Winds and clouds shall obey him." Ravens [189] shall feed Elijah, that
   will not feed their own young. The sea shall open for Israel, and
   return upon the Egyptians. And this both in an ordinary way, as Hos.
   ii. 21, 22; and in an extraordinary way, as before. So many creatures
   as God hath made, so many instruments of good hath he for his people.
   This is farther confirmed, verse 9.

   Verse 9. "Thy bow was made quite naked, according to the oaths of the
   tribes, even thy word. Selah. Thou didst cleave the earth with rivers."

   "With nakedness thy bow was made naked." The rest is elliptical, and
   well supplied in the translation.

   The verse hath two parts.

   1. A general proposition: "Thy bow was made naked," etc.

   2. A particular confirmation of that proposition by instance: "Thou
   didst cleave the earth with rivers."

   1. The proposition holds out two things.

   (1.) What God did: "He made his bow quite naked."

   (2.) The rule he proceeded by herein: "According to the oaths of the
   tribes, even his word."

   The assertion of this verse is not of some particular act or work, as
   the former, but a general head or fountain of those particular works
   which are enumerated in the following verses.

   (1.) A bow is a weapon of war, an instrument of death; and being
   ascribed to God, after the manner of men, holds out his strength,
   power, might, and efficacy, to do whatever he pleaseth. And this is
   said to be quite naked. When a man goes about to use his bow, he pulls
   it out of his quiver, [190] and so makes it naked. The exercising of
   God's power is the making naked of his bow. This he did in all those
   wonders wherein he stretched out his hand, in bringing his people into
   the promised land, here pointed at. And it is said that with nakedness
   it was made naked, because of those very high dispensations and
   manifestations of his almighty power. This is the making naked of his
   bow.

   (2.) For the rule of this, it is "the oaths of the tribes;" or as
   afterward, "his word," -- the oaths of the tribes, that is, the oaths
   made to them, -- the word he stood engaged to them in. The promise God
   made by oath unto Abraham, that he would give him the land of Canaan
   for an inheritance, even to him and his posterity, Gen. xiii. 14-17, is
   here intimated. This promise was often renewed to him and the following
   patriarchs. Hence it is called oaths, though but the same promise often
   renewed: and it had the nature of an oath, because it was made a
   covenant. Now, it was all for the benefit of the several tribes, in
   respect of actual possession, and was lastly renewed to them, Exod.
   iii. 17; hence called "the oaths of the tribes," not which they sware
   to the Lord, but that which the Lord sware to them. So afterward it is
   called his word, -- "Thy word." This, then, is the purport of this
   general proposition, "O Lord, according as thou promisedst, and
   engagedst thyself by covenant to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, with their
   posterity, that thou wouldst give them the land of Canaan to be theirs
   for an inheritance; so by the dispensation of thy mighty power thou
   hast fully accomplished it." And this he layeth down for the
   supportment of faith in a time of trouble.

   The words would afford many observations; I shall insist only on one.

   XX. Observation. The Lord will certainly make good all his promises and
   engagements to his people, though it cost him the making of his bow
   quite naked, -- the manifestation of his power in the utmost
   dispensations thereof.

   God's workings are squared to his engagements. This is still the close
   of all gracious issues of providence, -- God hath done all according
   "as he promised," Josh. xxii. 4; 2 Sam. vii. 21. He brought out his
   people of old with a mighty hand, with temptations, signs, and wonders,
   and a stretched-out arm; and all because he would keep the oath which
   he had sworn, and the engagement which he had made to their fathers,
   Deut. vii. 8. What obstacles soever may lie in the way, he hath done
   it, he will do it. Take one instance; particular places are too many to
   be insisted on. It was the purpose of his heart to bring his elect home
   to himself, from their forlorn condition. This he engageth himself to
   do, Gen. iii. 15, -- assuring Adam of a recovery from the misery he was
   involved in by Satan's prevalency. This, surely, is no easy work. If
   the Lord will have it done, he must lay out all his attributes in the
   demonstration of them to the uttermost. His wisdom and power must bow
   their shoulders, as it were, in Christ unto it. He was "the power of
   God, and the wisdom of God;" [191] his engaged love must be carried
   along through so many secret, mysterious marvels, as the angels
   themselves "desire to look into," [192] and shall for ever adore.
   Though the effecting of it required that which man could not do, and
   God could not suffer; yet his wisdom will find out a way, that he shall
   both do it and suffer it who is both God and man. To make good his
   engagement to his elect, he spared not his only Son: and in him were
   hid, and by him laid out, "all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge."
   [193]

   Now, this is a precedent of God's proceeding in all other engagements
   whatsoever. Whatever it cost him, he will spare nothing to make them
   good to the uttermost. He is our rock, and his work is perfect. A good
   man, if he want not power, will go through with his serious promises,
   though he be engaged to his own hurt, Ps. xv. 4. The power of the
   mighty God is serviceable to his will to the uttermost. He cannot will
   what he cannot do: his will and power are essentially the same. And his
   power shall not be wanting to execute what his goodness hath moved him
   to engage unto for his own glory. The reasons of this are, --

   1. Deut. xxxii. 4, "He is the Rock, his work is perfect; all his ways
   are judgment: a God of truth, and without iniquity." Here are many
   attributes of God to make good this one thing, that his work is
   perfect, -- this autarkeia, self-sufficiency, perfection,
   righteousness. I will pitch on one, -- he is a God of truth. So he is
   again called, Ps. xxxi. 5, and in other places. The truth of God in his
   promises and engagements requires an accomplishment of them, whatever
   it cost, what power soever is required thereunto. This the saints make
   their bottom to seek it: "Where are thy loving-kindnesses, which thou
   swarest in thy truth," Ps. lxxxix. 49. It is impossible but that should
   come to pass which thou hast sworn in thy truth. No stronger plea than
   "Remember the word wherein thou hast caused thy servants to put their
   trust." Jacob says, he is less than all the mercy and all the truth of
   God, Gen. xxxii. 10. He sees God's truth in all his mercy, by causing
   all things to come to pass which he hath promised him. It is true, some
   particular promises have their conditions, whose truth consists not in
   the relation between the word and the thing, unless the condition
   intercede. But the great condition under the gospel being only the good
   of them to whom any engagement is made, we may positively lay down,
   that God's truth requires the accomplishment of every engagement for
   his people's good, Rom. viii. 28. It is neither mountain nor hill,
   king, kingdom, nor nation, hell nor mortality, nor all combined, that
   can stand in the way to hinder it, Matt. xvi. 18.

   2. His people stand in need of all that God hath engaged himself to
   them for. God's promises are the just measure of his people's wants.
   Whatever he hath promised, that his people do absolutely want; and
   whatsoever they want, that he hath promised:-- our wants and his
   promises are every way commensurate. If thou knowest not what thou
   standest in need of, search the promises and see: whatever God hath
   said he will do for thee, that thou hast absolute need should be done.
   Or if thou art not so well acquainted with the promises, search thine
   own wants: what thou standest absolutely in need of for thy good, that
   assuredly God hath promised. If, then, this be the case of engagements,
   they shall all be made good. Think you, will God let his people want
   that which they have absolute necessity of? By absolute necessity I
   mean such as is indispensable, as to their present estate and
   occasions. That may be of necessity in one generation which is not in
   another, according to the several employments we are called to. Does
   God call forth his saints "to execute vengeance upon the heathen, and
   punishments upon the people; to bind their kings with chains, and their
   nobles with fetters of iron; to execute upon them the judgment
   written," as Ps. cxlix. 7-9? -- doth he bring them forth to burn the
   whore, to fight with the beast, and overcome him and his followers? --
   it is of indispensable necessity that he give them glorious assistance
   in their undertakings. They shall be assisted, protected, carried on,
   though it cost him the making of his bow quite naked. According to the
   several conditions he calls them to, the several issues of providence
   which he will have them serve in, so want they his appearance in them,
   with them, for them; and it shall be present. Let them be assured they
   are in his way, and then, though some prove false and treacherous, some
   base and cowardly, -- though many combine and associate themselves
   against them in many places, in all places, -- though whole kingdoms
   and mighty armies appear for their ruin, -- be they reviled and
   clamoured by all round about them, -- all is one; help they need, and
   help they shall have, or God will make his bow quite naked.

   Use. 1. This day is this doctrine fulfilled before us. God's bow is
   made quite naked, according to his word. We are less than all the truth
   he hath showed unto us. Though great working and mighty power hath been
   required, such as he hath not shown in our days, nor in the days of our
   fathers; yet the Lord hath not stood at it, for his word's sake,
   wherein he hath made us to put our trust. I speak of the general
   mercies we have received. The surrender of Colchester, the particular
   celebrated this day, though marching in the rear for time, is for the
   weight in the van, -- a mercy of the first magnitude. Essex hath seen
   more power in a three months' recovery than in the protection of six
   years. That the mouths of men are stopped, and their faces filled with
   shame, who made it their trade to revile and threaten the saints of
   God; -- that the adverse strength, which hath lain hid these seven
   years, should be drawn forth, united, and broken to pieces; -- that the
   people of God, divided, and naturally exasperated through their abuse
   of peace, should, by the sword of a common enemy and the help of a
   common friend, have their wrath abated, their counsels united, and
   their persons set in a hopeful way of closing or forbearance; -- that
   God by their own counsels should shut up men, collected from sundry
   parts to ruin others, in a city with gates and walls, for their own
   ruin; -- that they should deny peace tendered upon such conditions,
   because of the exigencies of the time, as might have left them power as
   well as will for a farther mischief; -- that such salvation should go
   forth in other parts as that the proceedings here should not be
   interrupted; -- that the bitter service which men here underwent should
   ever and anon be sweetened with refreshing tidings from other places,
   to keep up their spirits in wet, watching, cold, and loss of blood:--
   all these, I say, and sundry other such-like things as these, are "the
   Lord's doing, and marvellous in our eyes."

   Especially let us remember how in three things the Lord made his bow
   quite naked in his late deliverance.

   (1.) In leavening the counsels of the enemy with their own folly.

   (2.) In ordering all events to his own praise.

   (3.) By controlling with his mighty power the issue of all
   undertakings.

   (1.) In leavening their counsels with their own folly. God's [194]
   power and the efficacy of his providence is not more clearly manifested
   in any thing than in his effectual working in the debates, advices,
   consultations, and reasonings of his enemies, compassing his ends by
   their inventions. When God is in none of the thoughts of men by his
   fear, he is in them all by his providence. The sun is operative with
   his heat where he reacheth not with his light, and hath an influence on
   precious minerals in the depths and dark bottoms of rocks and
   mountains. The all-piercing providence of God dives into the deep
   counsels of the hearts of the sons of men, and brings out precious gold
   from thence, where the gracious light of his countenance shines not at
   all. Men freely advise, debate, use and improve their own reasons,
   wisdom, interests, not once casting an eye to the Almighty; and yet all
   this while do his work more than their own. All the counselings,
   plottings of Joseph's brethren, -- all the transactions of the Jews,
   Herod, and Pilate, about the death of Christ, with other the like
   instances, abundantly prove it. [195] Take a few instances wherein God
   "made his bow quite naked" in the counsels of his and our enemies.

   In general, they consult to take arms, wherein God had fully appeared
   against them, -- when, in all probability, their work would have been
   done without them. Had they not fought, by this time they had been
   conquerors. One half-year's peace more, -- which we desired on any
   terms, and they would on no terms bear, -- in all likelihood had set
   them where they would be. Their work went on, as if they had hired the
   kingdom to serve them in catching weather. What with some men's folly,
   others' treachery, all our division, -- had not their own counsels set
   them on fighting, -- I think we should suddenly base chosen them and
   theirs to be umpires of our quarrels. God saw when it was time to deal
   with them. In their undertaking in our own county, I could give sundry
   instances how God mixed a perverse spirit of folly and error in all
   their counsels. A part of the magistracy of the county is seized on.
   Therein their intention towards the residue is clearly discovered; yet
   not any attempt made to secure them, -- which they might easily have
   accomplished, -- although they could not but suppose that there were
   some gentlemen of public and active spirits left that would be
   industrious in opposition unto them. Was not the Lord in their counsels
   also, when they suffered a small, inconsiderable party, in a little
   village within a few miles of them, to grow into such a body as at
   length they durst not attempt, when they might have broken their whole
   endeavour with half a hundred of men? Doubtless, of innumerable such
   things as these we may say, with the prophet, "The princes of Zoan are
   become fools, the princes of Noph are deceived; they have also seduced"
   the people, "even they that are the stay of the tribes thereof. The
   Lord hath mingled a perverse spirit in the midst thereof; and they have
   caused" the people "to err in every work thereof, as a drunken man
   staggereth in his vomit," Isa. xix. 13, 14. Doubtless the wrath of man
   shall praise the Lord, and the remainder of it will he restrain.

   (2.) In ordering all events to his own praise. The timing of the
   enemies' eruptions in several places is that which fills all hearts
   with wonder, and all mouths with discourse, in these days. From the
   first to the last they had their season. Had they come together, to the
   eyes of flesh the whole nation had been swallowed up in that deluge. In
   particular, let Essex take notice of the goodness of God. The high
   thoughts and threats of men, which made us for divers weeks fear a
   massacre, were not suffered to break out into open hostility until the
   very next day after their strength was broken, in the neighbour county
   of Kent; -- as if the Lord should have said, "I have had you in a chain
   all this while: though you have showed your teeth, you have not
   devoured; now go out of my chain, -- I have a net ready for you." For
   the armies coming to our assistance, I cannot see how we needed them
   many days sooner, or could have wanted them one day longer. Farther,
   these home-bred eruptions were timely seasoned, to rouse the
   discontented soldiery and divided nation to be ready to resist the
   Scottish invasion; -- God also being magnified in this, that in this
   sweet disposal of events unto his glory, the counsels of many of those
   in whom we thought we might confide ran totally cross to the appearance
   of God in his providence. What shall we say to these things? If the
   Lord be for us, who shall be against us? All these things came forth
   from the Lord of hosts, who is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in
   operation, Isa. xxviii. 29. Whoso is wise will ponder them, and they
   shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord.

   (3.) In controlling mighty actions, -- I mean, giving success to his
   people in all their undertakings. The commander-in-chief of all the
   forces in this kingdom, since his sitting down before Colchester, was
   proffered a pass to go beyond the seas for his security. Whence is it
   that he hath now the necks of his enemies, and hath given any of them
   their lives at their entreaty? Greater armies than this have been
   buried under lesser walls. Did not the number of the besieged at first
   exceed the number of the besiegers? were not their advantages great?
   their skill in war, amongst men of their own persuasion, famous and
   renowned? so that the sitting down before it was judged an action meet
   only for them who could believe they should see the bow of God made
   quite naked. It had been possible, doubtless, to reason's eye, that
   many of those fictions wherewith a faction in the great city fed
   themselves, -- of the many routings, slaughters, and destructions of
   the army, -- might have been true. Some of them, I say; for some were
   as childish as hellish. In brief, they associated themselves, and were
   broken in pieces; -- high walls, towering imaginations, lofty threats,
   -- all brought down. "So let all thine enemies perish, O Lord: but let
   them that love him be as the sun when he goeth forth in his might;" and
   let the land have rest for many years, Judges v. 31.

   Use 2. This will discover unto us the bottom and rise of all God's
   appearances for his people, -- even the engaging of his own free grace.
   He doth not "make his bow quite naked," according to their deservings,
   but his own word; not because they of themselves are better than
   others, but because he loves them more than others. Were God's
   assistances suited to our walkings, they would be very uneven; but his
   good-will is constant; so are our deliverances.

   Use 3. Be exhorted to thankfulness; not verbal, [196] but real; not the
   exultation of carnal affections, but the savoury obedience of a sound
   mind. There are many ingredients in thanksgiving; -- suitable and
   seasonable obedience to answer the will of God in his mercies is
   doubtless the crown of all. Look, then, under the enjoyment of
   blessings in general, to close walking with God in the duties of the
   covenant, -- and in particular, to the especial work of this your
   generation, -- and you are in the way to be thankful.

   Use 4. Be sedulously careful to prevent that which God hath mightily
   decried by our late mercies, -- viz., mutual animosities, strife,
   contention, and violence against one another; [197] I mean, of those
   that fear his name. God hath interposed in our quarrels from heaven The
   language of our late deliverance is, Be quiet, "lest a worse thing
   happen unto you." Our poor brethren of Scotland would not see the
   hatefulness of their animosities towards their friends, until God
   suffered that very thing to be the means to deliver them up to the
   power of their enemies. The weapons they had formed were used against
   themselves. Let us learn betimes to agree about our pasture, lest the
   wolves of the wilderness devour us. Persecution and idolatry have
   ruined all the states of the Christian world.

   2. Of the assertion we have spoken hitherto: come we now to the
   particular confirmation of it by instance. "Thou didst cleave the earth
   with rivers," -- cleave the earth, or make channels in the earth, for
   waters to flow in.

   Another most eminent work of almighty power is here set forth, --
   eminent in itself, and eminent in its typical signification. And the
   same thing being twice done, hath a plural expression, -- "rivers."

   (1.) Eminent of itself. The bringing of streams of waters from the
   rock, for the thirsty people in the wilderness, is that which is here
   celebrated. Now this the Lord did twice:-- First, Exod. xvii. 6, when
   the people were in Rephidim, in the first year after their coming from
   Egypt, they fainted in their journeys for want of water, and (according
   to the wonted custom of that rebellious people) complained with
   murmuring. So they extorted all their mercies; and therefore they were
   attended with such sore judgments. Whilst the meat was in their mouths,
   the plague was on their bones. Mercies extorted by murmurings,
   unseasoned with loving-kindness, though they may be quails in the
   mouth, will be plagues in the belly. Let us take heed lest we repine
   the Almighty into a full harvest and lean soul, Ps. cvi. 15. Get and
   keep mercies in God's way, or there is death in the pot.

   Forty years after this, when the first whole evil generation was
   consumed, the children, who were risen up in their fathers' stead, fall
   a murmuring for water in the wilderness of Zin, and, with a profligacy
   of rebellion, wish they had been consumed with others in the former
   plagues, Num. xx. 4. Here also the Lord gives them water, and that in
   abundance, verse 11. Now, of this observe, --

   [1.] The places from whence this water marvellously issued. They were
   rocks that, in all probability, never had spring from the creation of
   the world. Farther, they are observed to be rocks of flint, Ps. cxiv.
   8, "Which turned the rock into a standing water, the flint into a
   fountain of waters:" so Deut. viii. 15. A rock into a pool, and a flint
   into a stream, is much beyond Samson's riddle of sweetness from the
   eater.

   [2.] The abundance of waters that gushed out, -- waters to satisfy that
   whole congregation, with all their cattle, consisting of some millions.
   Yea, and not only they, but all the beasts of that wilderness were
   refreshed thereby also, Isa. xliii. 20, "The beast of the field shall
   honour me, the dragon and the owl; because I give waters in the
   wilderness, rivers in the desert, to give drink to my people, my
   chosen." The very worst of the sons of men, dragons and owls, fare the
   better for God's protecting providence towards his own. [198]

   And all this was in such abundance, that it was as plentiful as a sea.
   "He clave the rocks in the wilderness, and gave them drink as out of
   the great depths. He brought streams also out of the rock, and caused
   waters to run down like rivers," Ps. lxxviii. 15, 16. So also it is
   celebrated, Isa. xli. 18, xlviii. 21, Hos. xiii. 5, and in many other
   places. Great deliverances call f or frequent remembrances.

   Thus were rivers brought out of the rocks, and with or for these rivers
   God did cleave the earth; -- that is, either he provided channels for
   those streams to run in, that they might not be wasted on the surface
   of that sandy wilderness, but preserved for the use of his people; or
   else the streams were so great and strong, that they pierced the earth,
   and parted channels for themselves. Great rivers of water, brought out
   of flinty rocks, running into prepared channels, to refresh a sinful,
   thirsty people, in a barren wilderness, I think, is a remarkable mercy.

   (2.) As it was eminent in itself, so likewise is it exalted in its
   typical concernment. Is there nothing but flints in this rock? nothing
   but water in these streams? nothing but the rod of Moses in the blows
   given to it? Did the people receive no other refreshment, but only in
   respect of their bodily thirst? Yes, saith the apostle, "They drank of
   that spiritual rock which followed them; and that rock was Christ," 1
   Cor. x. 4. Was not this rock a sign of that Rock of Ages on which the
   church is built? Matt. xvi. 18. Did not Moses' smiting hold out his
   being smitten with the rod of God? Isa. liii. 4, 5. Was not the pouring
   out of these plentiful streams as the pouring out of his precious
   blood, in a sea of mercy, abundantly sufficient to refresh the whole
   fainting church in the wilderness? "Latet Christus in petra;" -- "Here
   is Christ in this rock." Had Rome had wisdom to build on this Rock,
   though she had not had an infallibility as she vainly now pretends, she
   might have had an infallibility (if I may so speak), yea, she had never
   quite failed. Give me leave to take a few observations from hence. As,
   --

   [1.] Sinners must be brought to great extremities, to make them desire
   the blood of Jesus; -- weary and thirsty, before rock-water come.
   Thirst is a continually galling pressure. When a soul gaspeth like a
   parched land, and is as far from self-refreshment as a man from drawing
   waters out of a flint, then shall the side of Christ be opened to him.
   You that are full of your lusts, drunk with the world, here is not a
   drop for you. If you never come into the wilderness, you shall never
   have rock-water.

   [2.] Mercy to a convinced sinner seems ofttimes as remote as rivers
   from a rock of flint. The truth is, he never came near mercy, who
   thought not himself far from it. When the Israelites cried, We are
   ready to die for thirst, then stood they on the ground where rivers
   were to run.

   [3.] Thirsty souls shall want no water, though it be fetched for them
   out of a rock. Panters after the blood of Jesus shall assuredly have
   refreshment and pardon, through the most unconquerable difficulties.
   Though grace and mercy seem to be locked up from them, like water in a
   flint, -- whence fire is more natural than water; yet God will not
   strike the rock of his justice and their flinty hearts together, to
   make hell-fire sparkle about their ears; but with a rod of mercy on
   Christ, that abundance of water may be drawn out for their refreshment.

   [4.] The most eminent temporal blessings, and suitable refreshment
   (water from a rock for them that are ready to perish), is but an
   obscure representation of that love of God, and refreshment of souls,
   which is in the blood of Jesus. Carnal things are exceeding short of
   spiritual, -- temporal things of eternal.

   [5.] The blood of Christ is abundantly sufficient for his whole church
   to refresh themselves, -- streams, rivers, a whole sea.

   These, and the like observations, flowing from the typical relation of
   the blessing intimated, shall not farther be insisted on; -- one only I
   shall take from the historical truth.

   XXI. Observation. God sometimes bringeth plentiful deliverances and
   mercies for his people from beyond the ken of sense and reason; yea,
   from above the ordinary reach of much precious faith.

   I mean not what it ought to reach, which is all the omnipotency of God;
   but what ordinarily it doth, as in this very business it was with
   Moses. I say, plentiful deliverances, mercies like the waters that
   gushed out in abundant streams, until the earth was cloven with rivers,
   -- that the people should not only have a taste and away, but drink
   abundantly, and leave for the beasts of the field, -- from beyond the
   ken of sense and reason, by events which a rationally wise man is no
   more able to look into, than an eye of flesh is able to see water in a
   flint; or a man probably suppose that divers millions of creatures
   should be refreshed with waters out of a rock where there was never any
   spring from the foundation of the world.

   Now, concerning this, observe, --

   1. That God hath done it.

   2. That he hath promised he wall yet do it.

   3. Why he will so do.

   1. He hath done it. I might here tire you with precedents. I could lead
   you from that mother deliverance, the womb of all others, the
   redemption that is in the blood of Jesus, down through many
   dispensations of old and of late, holding out this proposition to the
   full One shall suffice me; and if some of you cannot help yourselves
   with another, you are very senseless.

   Look upon Peter's deliverance, Acts xii. 1. The night before he was to
   be slain, he was kept safe in a prison, -- a prison he had neither will
   nor power to break. He was bound with two chains, beyond his skill to
   unloose or force asunder. Kept he was by sixteen soldiers, doubtless
   men of blood and vigilancy, having this to keep them waking, that if
   Peter escaped with his head, they were to lose theirs. Now, that his
   deliverance was above sense and reason himself intimates, verse 11, "He
   hath delivered me from the expectation of the Jews." The wise, subtle
   Jews, concluded the matter so secure, that, without any doubts or
   fears, they were in expectation of his execution the next day. That it
   was also beyond the ready reach of much precious faith, you have an
   example in those believers who were gathered together in the house of
   Mary, verse 12, calling her mad who first affirmed it, verse 15, and
   being astonished when their eyes beheld it, verse 16; -- the whole
   seeming so impossible to carnal Herod, after its accomplishment, that
   he slays the keepers as false in their hellish trust; -- a just
   recompense for trusty villains.

   The time would fail me to speak of Isaac, [199] and Joseph, Gideon,
   Noah, Daniel, and Job, -- all precedents worthy your consideration.
   View them at your leisure; and you will have leisure, if you intend to
   live by faith.

   2. He hath said it. It is a truth abounding in promises and
   performances. I shall hold out one or two; it will be worth your while
   to search for others yourselves. He that digs for a mine finds many a
   piece of gold by the way.

   Isa. xli. 14-16, "Fear not, thou worm Jacob, and ye few men of Israel.
   Behold, I will make thee a new sharp thrashing instrument having teeth:
   thou shalt thrash the mountains, and beat them small, and shalt make
   the hills as chaff. Thou shalt fan them," etc. To make a worm a
   thrashing instrument with teeth, to cause that instrument to beat
   mountains and hills into chaff, that chaff to be blown away with the
   wind, that that worm may rejoice in God; -- to advance a small handful
   of despised ones to the ruin of mountainous empires and kingdoms, until
   they be broken and scattered to nothing, -- is a mercy that comes from
   beyond the ken of an ordinary eye. Ezek. xxxvii. 3, the prophet
   professeth that the deliverance promised was beyond his apprehension:
   "Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou
   knowest." The Lord intimates in the following verses that he will
   provide a means for his church's recovery when it seemeth as remote
   therefrom as dry bones scattered upon the face of the earth are from a
   mighty living army. This he calls opening their graves, verses 12, 13.

   3. The reasons of this are, --

   (1.) Because he would have his people wholly wrapt up in his
   all-sufficiency, not to straiten themselves with what their faith can
   ken in a promise, much less to what their reason can perceive in
   appearance. In the application of promises to particular trials and
   extremities, faith oftentimes is exceedingly disturbed, either in
   respect of persons, or things, or seasons; but when it will wholly
   swallow up itself in all-sufficiency, the fountain of all promises,
   there is no place for fear or disputing. Have your souls in spiritual
   trials never been driven from all your out-works unto this main fort?
   Hath not all hold of promises in time of trial given place to
   temptations, until you have fallen down in all-sufficiency, and there
   found peace? God accounts a flight to the strong tower of his name to
   be the most excellent valour. This is faith's first, proper, and most
   immediate object. To particular promises it is drawn out on particular
   occasions; here is, or should be, its constant abode, Gen. xvii. 1.
   And, indeed, the soul will never be prepared to all the will of God,
   until its whole complacency be taken up in this sufficiency of the
   Almighty. Here God delights to have the soul give up itself to a
   contented losing of all its reasonings, even in the infinite
   unsearchableness of his goodness and power. Therefore will he sometimes
   send forth such streams of blessings as can flow from no other
   fountain, that his may know where to lie down in peace. Here he would
   have us secure our shallow bottoms in this quiet sea, this infinite
   ocean, whither neither wind nor storm do once approach. Those
   blustering temptations which rage at the shore, when we were half at
   land and half at sea, -- half upon the bottom of our own reason and
   half upon the ocean of providence, -- reach not at all unto this deep.
   Oh, if we could in all trials lay ourselves down in these arms of the
   Almighty, his all-sufficiency in power and goodness! Oh, how much of
   the haven should we have in our voyage, how much of home in our
   pilgrimage, -- how much of heaven in this wretched earth! Friends,
   throw away your staves, break the arm of flesh, lie down here quietly
   in every dispensation, and you shall see the salvation of God. I could
   lose myself in setting out of this, wherein I could desire you would
   lose yourselves in every time of trouble. "Hast thou not known, hast
   thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the
   ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? there is no
   searching of his understanding. He giveth power to the faint; and to
   them that have no might he increaseth strength. Even the youths shall
   faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall: but they that
   wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with
   wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; they shall walk, and
   not faint," Isa. xl. 28-31.

   (2.) To convince the unbelieving world itself of his power, providence,
   and love to them that put their trust in him, that they may be found to
   cry, "Verily there is a reward for the righteous; verily he is a God
   that judgeth in the earth," Ps. lviii. 11.

   When the Egyptian magicians see real miracles, beyond all their
   juggling pretences, they cry out, "This is the finger of God," Exod.
   viii. 19.

   Profane Nebuchadnezzar, beholding the deliverance of those three
   worthies from the fiery furnace, owns them for the "servants of the
   most high God," Dan. iii. 26. Daniel being preserved in the lions' den,
   Darius acknowledgeth the power and kingdom of "the living God," Dan.
   vi. 26.

   Glorious appearances of God for his people, beyond the reach of reason,
   wrest from the world amazement or acknowledgment; and in both God is
   exalted. He will appear in such distresses, as that he win be seen of
   his very enemies. They shall not be able, with the Philistines, to
   question whether it be his hand or a chance happened to them, 1 Sam.
   vi. 9; but conclude, with the Egyptians, that fly they must, for God
   fights for his people, Exod. xiv. 25. If God should never give
   blessings but in such a way as reason might discover their dependence
   on secondary causes, men would not see his goings, nor acknowledge his
   operations. But when he mightily makes bare his arm, in events beyond
   their imaginations, they must vail before him.

   Use 1. Consider whether the mercy celebrated this day ought not to be
   placed in this series of deliverances, brought from beyond the ken of
   sense and reason, from above the reach of much precious faith. For the
   latter, I leave it to your own experience; -- to the former let me for
   the present desire your consideration of these five things.

   (1.) By whom you were surprised and put under restraint. Now these were
   of two sorts: [1.] The heads and leaders; [2.] The tumultuous
   multitude.

   [1.] For the first, some of them being dead, and some under durance, I
   shall not say any thing. "Nullum cum victis certamen, et æthere
   cassis." I leave the stream from the flint to your own thoughts.

   [2.] For the multitude, -- an enraged, headless, lawless, godless
   multitude, gathered out of inns, taverns, alehouses, stables, highways,
   and the like nurseries of piety and pity. Such as these having got
   their superiors under their power, governors under their disposal,
   their restrainers under their restraint, their oppressors, as they
   thought, under their fury, -- what was it that kept in their fury and
   their revenge, which upon the like occasions and advantages hath almost
   always been executed? Search your stories, -- you will not find many
   that speak of such a deliverance. For a few governors prevailed on unto
   durance, by a godless rout, in an insurrection, and yet come off in
   peace and safety, is surely a work of more than ordinary providence.

   (2.) Consider the season of your surprisal; -- when all the kingdom was
   in an uproar, and the arm of flesh almost quite withered as to supply,
   -- the north invaded, the south full of insurrections, Wales unsubdued,
   [200] the great city at least suffering men to lift up their hands
   against us; so that, to the eye of reason, the issue of the whole was,
   if not lost, yet exceedingly hazardous, and so your captivity endless.
   Had they gone on, as was probable they would, whether you had this day
   been brought out to execution, or thrust into a dungeon, or carried up
   and down as a pageant, I know not; but much better condition, I am
   sure, rationally you could not expect.

   (3.) The end of your surprisal. Amongst others, this was apparently
   one, to be a reserve for their safety who went on in all ways of ruin.
   You were kept to preserve them in those ways wherein they perished.
   Whether could reason reach this or no, that you being in their power,
   kept on purpose for their rescue if brought to any great strait, with
   the price of your heads to redeem their own, -- that they should be
   brought to greater distress than ever any before in this kingdom, and
   you be delivered, without the least help to them in their need? It was
   beyond your friends' reason, who could not hope it; -- it was beyond
   our enemies' reason, who never feared it: if you believed it, you have
   the comfort of it.

   (4.) The refusal of granting an exchange for such persons as they
   accounted more considerable than yourselves, and whose enlargement
   might have advantaged the cause they professed to maintain exceedingly
   more than your restraint, -- what doth it but proclaim your intended
   ruin?

   This was the way of deliverance which for a long season reason chiefly
   rested on, the main pillar of all its building; -- which, when it was
   cut in two, what could be seen in it but desolation.

   (5.) The straits you were at length reduced to, between your enemies'
   swords and your friends' bullets, which, intended for your deliverance,
   without the safeguard of Providence might have been your ruin, piercing
   more than once the house wherein you were. Surely it was, then, an
   eminent work of faith, to "stand still, and see the salvation of God."

   The many passages of Providence, evidently working for your
   preservation, which I have received from some of yourselves, I
   willingly pass over. What I have already said is sufficient to declare
   that to reason's eye you were as dead bones upon the earth. For our
   parts, who were endangered spectators at the best, we were but in the
   prophet's frame; and to any question about your enlargement, could
   answer only, The Lord alone knows. And now, behold, the Lord hath
   chosen you out to be examples of his loving-kindness, in fetching mercy
   for you from beyond the ken of reason; yea, from above the reach of
   much precious faith. He hath brought water for you out of the flint.
   Reckon your deliverance under this head of operations, and I hope you
   will not be unthankful.

   Use 2. You that have received so great mercy, we that have seen it, and
   all who have heard the doctrine confirmed, let us learn to live by
   faith Live above all things that are seen; subject them to the cross of
   Christ. Measure your condition by your interest in God's
   all-sufficiency. Do not in distress calculate what such and such things
   can effect; but what God hath promised. Reckon upon that, for it shall
   come to pass. If you could get but this one thing by all your
   sufferings and dangers, to trust the Lord to the utmost extent of his
   promises, it would prove a blessed captivity. All carnal fears would
   then be conquered, all sinful compliances with wicked men removed, etc.

   Use 3. Be exhorted to great thankfulness, [201] you that have been made
   partakers of great deliverances. In great distresses very nature
   prompts the sons of men to great promises. You have heard the
   ridiculous story of him who in a storm at sea promised to dedicate a
   wax candle to the blessed Virgin as big as the mast of his ship, which
   he was resolved when he came on shore to pay with one of twelve in the
   pound! Let not the moral of that fable be found in any of you. Come not
   short of any of your engagements. No greater discovery of a
   hypocritical frame, than to flatter the Lord in trouble, and to decline
   upon deliverance, in cold blood. The Lord of heaven give you strength
   to make good all your resolutions:-- as private persons, in all
   godliness and honesty, following hard after God in every known way of
   his; -- as magistrates, in justice, equity, and faithful serving the
   kingdom of Christ. Especially, let them never beg in vain for help at
   your hands, who did not beg help in vain for you at the hands of God.

   Use 4. Consider, if there be so much [202] sweetness in a temporal
   deliverance, oh! what excellency is there in that eternal redemption
   which we have in the blood of Jesus! If we rejoice for being delivered
   from them who could have killed the body, what unspeakable rejoicing is
   there in that mercy whereby we are freed from the wrath to come! Let
   this possess your thoughts, let this fill your souls, -- let this be
   your haven from all former storms. And here strike I sail, in this to
   abide with you and all the saints of God forever.
     __________________________________________________________________

   [155] The time of this prophecy is conceived to be about the end of
   Josiah's reign, not long before the first Chaldean invasion.

   [156] "Preces et lacrymæ sunt arma ecclesiæ." -- Tertul.

   [157] "Graviter in eum decernitur, cui etiam ipsa conneetlo denegatur."
   -- Prosp. Sent.

   [158] Duplicantur lateres quando venit Moses.

   [159]

   "Namque bonos non blanda inflant, non aspera frangunt,

   Sed fidei invictæ gaudia vera juvant."
   Prosp. Epig. in Sent. August.

   [160] Ps. cxix. 67; Hos. v. 15; Heb. xii. 10, 11; 1 Pet. i. 6.

   [161] "In cælo non in terra mercedem promisit reddendam. Quid alibi
   poscis, quod alibi dabitur!" -- Ambros. Offic., lib. i. cap. 16.

   [162] "Cum vexamur ac premimur, tum maxime gratias agimus
   iudulgentissimo patri, quod corruptelam nostram non patitur longius
   procedere: hinc intelligimus nos esse Deo curæ." -- Lactan.

   [163] Job xiv. 4, xv. 15, 16; Prov. xvi. 2, xx. 9.

   [164] 2 Sam. xxiv. 15; 2 Chron. xxxii. 25.

   [165] "Omnes seculi plagæ, nobis in admonitionem, vobis in
   castigationem à Deo veniunt." -- Tertul. Apol., cap. xlii.

   [166] bqrv snym?, in the inward of years

   [167] "Bonum agonem subituri estis, in quo agonothetes Deus vivus est:
   Christarchos Spiritus Sanctus, corona æternitatis brabium, epithetes
   Jesus Christus." -- Tertul. ad Mar.

   [168] Gen. xxxvi. 15; Jer. xlix. 7; Obad. 9.

   [169] Deut. i. 1.

   [170] "Gloria est frequens de aliquo fama cum laude." -- Cic. lib. ii.,
   De Inv. "Consentiens laus bonorum, incorrupta vox bene judicantium de
   excellente virtute." -- Idem. Tusc., lib. iii.

   [171] No place in the county so threatened; no place in the county so
   preserved: small undertakings there blessed; great opposition blasted.
   Non nobis, Domine, non nobis.

   [172] Deut. xxxiii. 17; Ps. lxxv. 10; Zech. i. 18.

   [173] John xii. 35; Rev. xvi. 10.

   [174] Exod. ix. 15; Lev. xxvi. 25; 2 Sam. xxiv. 13; Ezek. xiv. 19;
   Matt. xxiv. 7.

   [175] Josh. ix. 3.

   [176] Numb. xiii. 33.

   [177] Vid. Tertul. ad Scapulam, de persecutione.

   [178] "Nero primus in Christianos ferociit, tali dedicatore damnationis
   nostræ etiam gloriamur, qui enim scit ilium, intelligere potest, non
   nisi aliquod bonum grande à Nerone damnatum." -- Tertul. Apol.

   [179] "Nova et inaudita est ista prædicatio, quæ verberibus exigit
   fidem." -- Greg., Epist. lii.

   [180] Magistrum neminem habemus nisi solum Deum; hic ante te est, nec
   abscondi potest, sed cui nihil facere possis.

   [181] 2 Kings xix. 9; Jer. xiii. 23; Joseph. Antiq.; Isa. xxxvii. 9.

   [182] "Tantos invidus habet poenâ justâ tortores, quantos invidiosus
   habuerit laudatores." -- Prosp. de Vita Contemplativa.

   [183] Numb. xxv., xxxi.

   [184] Gen. xx. 6; Ps. lxxvi. 10.

   [185] "Quis facile potest, quale sit hoc malum, verbis exprimere, quo
   invidus odio hominis persequitur divinum munus in homine?" -- Pros.
   Vit. Cont. "Invidia est tristitia de bono proximi, prout proprium malum
   æstimatur et est diminutivum proprii boni." -- Aq 22, æ. q. 36, A. 1,
   c.

   [186] Noctu dubitant.

   [187] "Cætera licet abscondere, et in abdito alere; ira se profert, et
   in faciem exit." -- Senec. de ira.

   [188] Euseb. Vit. Con. Const. Orat.

   [189] Echballei tous neottous ho chorax. -- Arist. Hist. Anima., vi.
   "Pellunt nidis pullos sicut et Corvi." -- Plin. Nat. Hist.

   [190] [The gorytus or bow-case; so explained by Grotius, Drusius, etc.
   Sir J. Chardin states, that the oriental bows were usually carried in a
   case of cloth or leather attached to the girdle. -- Harmer, ii. 513.
   Vid. Hom. Odys., xxi. 53, 54.]

   [191] 1 Cor. i. 24.

   [192] 1 Pet. i. 12.

   [193] Col. ii. 3.

   [194] "Quod homines peccant eorum est, quod peccando hoc vel illud
   agant ex virtute Dei est, tenebras prout visum est dividentis." --
   Aug., de Præd. "Oportet hæreses esse, sed tamen non ideo bonum hæreses,
   quia eas esse oportebat, quasi non et malum oportuerit esse; nam et
   Dominum tradi oportebat, sed væ traditori!" -- Tertul., Præf. ad Hær.

   [195] Gen. xlv. 7, l. 20; Acts iv. 27, 28.

   [196] "In beneficio reddendo plus animus, quam census operatur." --
   Ambr. Offi., lib. i. cap. 32.

   [197] He diaphonia tes nesteias, ten homonoian tes pisteos sunistesin.
   -- Iren. Epist. ad Vict. apud Euseb., lib. v. cap. 23. Philonikoi este
   adelphoi kai zelotai peri me anekonton eis soterian. -- Clem. Ep. ad
   Cor.

   [198] "Vir bonus commune bonum." -- Gen. xxxi. 3.

   [199] Gen. xxii. 14, xxxix. 1, etc.

   [200] "Idem huic urbi dominandi finis erit, qui parendi fuerit." --
   Senec. de Rom.

   [201] "Erunt homicidæ, tyranni, fures, adulteri, raptores, sacrilegi,
   proditores; infra ista omnia, ingratus est." -- Senec. Benef., lib. i.
   "Gratiarum cessat decursus, ubi recursus non fuerit." -- Bern. Serm 50.

   [202] "Si tanti vitrum, quanti Margaritum?" -- Tertul.
     __________________________________________________________________
     __________________________________________________________________
     __________________________________________________________________

   Sermon III.

   Righteous Zeal Encouraged

   by

   divine protection:

   with

   a discourse about toleration, and the duty of the civil magistrate
   about religion, thereunto annexed.
     __________________________________________________________________

Prefatory note.

   The following sermon was preached before the House of Commons on
   January 31, 1648, which had been appointed as a day of solemn
   humiliation in connection with the event of the preceding day, -- the
   decapitation of Charles I. Accordingly, no sermon of Owen has excited
   keener discussion. Because he consented to preach in these
   circumstances, he is held to have connived at a great crime, and
   actually invested it with the sanctions of religion. In the opinion of
   Dr M'Crie (see "Miscellaneous Writings," p. 501), his conduct in this
   instance was "the greatest blot on his public life," and both his text
   and the title of his sermon could not fail to be interpreted as
   encouragement to those who had been accessory to the destruction of the
   unhappy monarch. On the other hand, some, like Mr Orme, urge that Owen
   preached by command; that no sentiment of the sermon can be construed
   as approval of the regicide; and that the very passages (see paragraph
   at the foot of p. 134 and on p. 136) adduced in proof that Owen
   concurred in it, indicate his desire to keep free and aloof from the
   expression of any positive opinion on the subject. A bolder line of
   defence has been instituted, according to which Owen, like Milton,
   might have regarded the death of Charles as only the appropriate
   penalty for a long career of violence and duplicity, during which he
   had made the blood of the best subjects in the realm to flow like
   water; and that our author, in preaching on this occasion, might have
   acted under a sense of duty, while discharging a task solemn and
   painful certainly, but still a task to which he might feel himself
   bound by higher considerations than mere regard to the authority which
   enjoined it. The argument to this effect is stated with great point and
   ability in his "Life," etc., vol. i., p. 40. This much is clear, that
   after the Restoration he was never called to account for his public
   appearance on this occasion by a government whose measures of
   vindictive retaliation against the Puritans are notorious. Asty's
   explanation of the fact has obvious weight:-- "His discourse was so
   modest and inoffensive, that his friends could make no just exception,
   nor his enemies take an advantage of his words another day." --
   Memoirs, p. 8. The only public expression of displeasure at this sermon
   was given in 1683, about a month before the grave closed over its
   author. In the school quadrangle of the University, -- not too rich in
   honours to repudiate without serious loss the lustre shed upon it from
   the name of its great Puritan Vice-Chancellor, -- a document containing
   some positions, extracted from the sermon and denounced as pernicious
   and damnable, was publicly burned. He suffered in good company; for
   propositions from the works of Knox, Buchanan, Baxter, and others, were
   condemned in the same decree, and committed to the same flames. Some
   reparation for the insult offered in this mean revenge was made, too
   late to soothe his feelings, had he needed solace under the affront,
   but tending so far to rescue his memory from unjust reproach, when, in
   1710, by an order from the House of Lords, the Oxford decree was burned
   by the hands of the common hangman.

   It is strange, that the appendix to a sermon preached, as some think,
   in the very consummation of license and misrule, should be an earnest
   and able pleading for toleration, in a tone of calmness and moderation
   rare at any time in controversy, and especially rare in the
   controversies of that stormy age.

   The entire body of the Independents have been blamed for consenting to
   the death of Charles I., because Owen, the chief ornament of their
   denomination, was called, in such critical and delicate circumstances,
   to preach before the House of Commons. Mr Orme successfully disproves
   the justice of the charge. Whatever offence Owen may thus have
   committed, to visit it upon the religious body with which he generally
   acted, is in accordance neither with the principles of justice nor the
   facts of history. -- Ed.
     __________________________________________________________________

   Die Mercurii, 31 Januarii 1648.

   Ordered by the Commons assembled in Parliament, That Mr Allen do give
   the thanks of this House to Mr Owen for the great pains he took in his
   sermon preached before the House this day at Margaret's, Westminster;
   and that he be desired to print his sermon at large; wherein he is to
   have the like privilege of printing it as others in the like kind
   usually have had.

   Hen. Scobell, Cler. Parl. Dom. Com.
     __________________________________________________________________

To the right honourable the Commons of England, assembled in Parliament.

   Sirs,

   It hath always suited the wisdom of God to do great things in difficult
   seasons. He sets up walls in troublous times, Dan. ix. 25. His builders
   must hold swords and spears, as well as instruments of labour, Neh. iv.
   16. Yea, while sin continueth in its course here (which began in
   heaven, and, having contemporized with the earth, shall live forever in
   hell), great works for God will cause great troubles amongst men. The
   holy, harmless Reconciler of heaven and earth bids us expect the sword
   to attend his undertakings for and way of making peace, Matt. x. 34.
   All the waves in the world arise to their height and roaring from the
   confronting of the breath of God's Spirit and the vapours of men's
   corruptions. Hence seasons receive their degrees of difficulty
   according to the greatness and weight of the works which in them God
   will accomplish. To their worth and excellency is man's opposition
   proportioned. This the instruments of his glory in this generation
   shall continually find true, to their present trouble and future
   comfort.

   As the days approach for the delivery of the decree, to the shaking of
   heaven and earth, [203] and all the powers of the world, to make way
   for the establishment of that kingdom which shall not be given to
   another people (the great expectation of the saints of the Most High
   before the consummation of all); so tumults, troubles, vexations, and
   disquietness, must certainly grow and increase among the sons of men.

   A dead woman (says the proverb) will not be carried out of her house
   under four men. Much less will living men of wisdom and power be easily
   and quietly dispossessed of that share and interest in the things of
   Christ which long-continued usurpation hath deluded them into an
   imagination of being their own inheritance. This, then, being shortly
   to be effected, and the scale being ready to turn against the man of
   sin, notwithstanding his balancing it, in opposition to the witness of
   Jesus, with the weight and poise of earthly power; no wonder if heaven,
   earth, sea, and dry land, be shaken, in their giving place to the
   things that cannot be moved. God Almighty having called you forth,
   right honourable, at his entrance to the rolling up of the nation's
   heavens like a scroll, [204] to serve him in your generation in the
   high places of Armageddon, [205] you shall be sure not to want
   experience of that opposition which is raised against the great work of
   the Lord, which generally swells most against the visible instruments
   thereof.

   And would to God you had only the devoted sons of Babel to contend
   withal, -- that the men of this shaking earth were your only
   antagonists, -- that the malignity of the dragon's tail had had no
   influence on the stars of heaven, to prevail with them to fight in
   their courses against you! [206] But "jacta est alea," -- the
   providence of God must be served, according to the discovery made of
   his own unchangeable will, and not the mutable interests and passions
   of the sons of men. For verily "the Lord of hosts hath purposed to
   pollute the pride of all glory, and to bring into contempt all the
   honourable of the earth," Isa. xxiii. 9.

   The contradictions of sinners against all that walk in the paths of
   righteousness and peace, with the supportment which their spirits may
   receive (as being promised) who pursue those ways, notwithstanding
   those contradictions, are in part discovered in the ensuing sermon. The
   foundation of that whole transaction of things which is therein held
   out, in reference to the present dispensations of Providence, -- being
   nothing but an entrance into the unravelling of the whole web of
   iniquity, interwoven of civil and ecclesiastical tyranny, in opposition
   to the kingdom of the Lord Jesus, -- I chose not to mention. Neither
   shall I at present add any thing thereabout, but only my desire that it
   may be eyed as the granted basis of the following discourse. Only, by
   your very favourable acceptation of the making out those thoughts, --
   which were the hasty conception, and, like Jonah's gourd, the child of
   a night or two (which, with prayer for a rooting in the hearts of them
   to whom they were delivered, had certainly withered in their own
   leaves, had they not received warmth and moisture from your commands in
   general, and the particular desires of many of you, to give them a life
   of a few days longer), -- I am encouraged to the annexing of a few
   lines, as a free-will offering to attend the following product of
   obedience.

   Now, this shall not be as to the opposition which you do and shall yet
   farther meet withal; but as to the causes, real or pretended, which are
   held forth as the bottom of that contradiction wherewith on every side
   you are encompassed.

   The things in reference whereunto your procedence is laden with such
   criminations as these sad days of recompense have found to be comets
   portending no less than blood, are first civil, then religious.

   For the first, as their being beyond the bounds of my calling gives
   them sanctuary from being called forth to my consideration; so neither
   have I the least thoughts with Absalom of a more orderly carrying on of
   affairs, might my desires have any influence into their disposal.
   Waiting at the throne of grace, that those whom God hath intrusted
   with, and enabled for, the transaction of these things, may be directed
   and supported in their employment, is the utmost of my undertaking
   herein.

   For the other, or religious things, the general interest I have in them
   as a Christian, being improved by the superadded title of a minister of
   the gospel (though unworthy the one name and the other), gives me not
   only such boldness as accrueth from enjoyed favour, but also such a
   right as will support me to plead concerning them before the most
   impartial judicature.

   And this I shall do (as I said before) merely in reference to those
   criminations which are laid by conjectural presumptions on your
   honourable assembly, and made a cause of much of that opposition and
   contradiction you meet withal. Now, in particular, it is the toleration
   of all religions, or invented ways of worship, -- wherein your
   constitutions are confidently antedated in many places of the nation;
   the thing itself, withal, being held out as the most enormous
   apprehension, and desperate endeavour, for the destruction of truth and
   godliness, that ever entered the thoughts of men professing the one and
   the other. The contest hereabout being "adhuc sub judice," and there
   being no doubt but that the whole matter, commonly phrased as above,
   hath (like other things) sinful and dangerous extremes, I deemed it not
   amiss to endeavour the pouring a little cold water upon the common
   flames which are kindled in the breasts of men about this thing. And
   who knows whether the words of a weak nothing may not, by the power of
   the Fountain of beings, give some light into the determination and
   establishment of a thing of so great concernment and consequence as
   this is generally conceived to be? What is in this my weak undertaking
   of the Lord, I shall beg of him that it may be received; -- what is of
   myself, I beg of you that it may be pardoned. That God Almighty would
   give you to prove all things that come unto you in his way, and to hold
   fast that which is good, granting you unconquerable assistance in
   constant perseverance, is the prayer of,

   Your devoted Servant

   In our dearest Lord,

   John Owen.

   Coggeshall, Feb. 28.
     __________________________________________________________________

   [203] Heb. xii. 26, 27; Dan. vii. 27. "Ego nisi tumultus istos viderem,
   verbum Dei in mundo non esse dicerem." -- Luth.

   [204] Isa. xxxiv. 4, 5.

   [205] Rev. xvi. 16.

   [206] Rev. xii. 4.
     __________________________________________________________________

Sermon III. Righteous zeal encouraged by divine protection.

   "Let them return unto thee; but return not thou unto them. And I will
   make thee unto this people a fenced brasen wall; and they shall fight
   against thee, but they shall not prevail against thee: for I am with
   thee to save thee, and to deliver thee, saith the Lord." -- Jer. xv.
   19, 20.

   The words of my text having a full dependence upon, and flowing out
   from, the main subject-matter of the whole chapter, I must of necessity
   take a view thereof, and hold out unto you the mind of God contained
   therein, before I enter upon the part thereof chiefly intended. And
   this I shall do with very brief observations, that I may not anticipate
   myself from a full opening and application of the words of my text.

   And this the rather are my thoughts led unto, because the whole
   transaction of things between the Lord and a stubbornly sinful nation,
   exceedingly accommodated to the carrying on of the controversy he is
   now pleading with that wherein we live, is set out (as we say) to the
   life therein.

   Of the whole chapter there be these five parts:--

   First, The denunciation of fearful wasting, destroying judgments
   against Judah and Jerusalem, verse 3, and so on to verse 10.

   Secondly, The procuring, deserving cause of these overwhelming
   calamities, verses 4 and 6.

   Thirdly, The inevitableness of these judgments, and the inexorableness
   of the Lord as to the accomplishment of all the evils denounced, verse
   1.

   Fourthly, The state and condition of the prophet, with the frame and
   deportment of his spirit under those bitter dispensations of
   Providence, verse 10, and 15-18.

   Fifthly, The answer and appearance of God unto him upon the making out
   of his complaint, verses 11-14, and 19-21.

   My text lieth in the last part, but yet with such dependence on the
   former as enforceth to a consideration of them.

   First. There is the denunciation of fearful wasting, destroying
   judgments, to sinful Jerusalem, verse 2, and so onwards, with some
   interposed ejaculations concerning her inevitable ruin, as verses 5, 6.

   Here's death, sword, famine, captivity, verse 2; -- banishment, verse
   4; -- unpitied desolation, verse 5; -- redoubled destruction,
   bereaving, fanning, spoiling, etc., verses 6-9. That universal
   devastation of the whole people which came upon them in the Babylonish
   captivity is the thing here intended, -- the means of its
   accomplishment by particular plagues and judgments, in their several
   kinds (for the greater dread and terror), being at large annumerated,
   -- the faithfulness of God, also, being made hereby to shine more clear
   in the dispersion of that people; -- doing not only for the main what
   before he had threatened, but in particular executing the judgments
   recorded, Luke xxi. 24, etc.; Deut. xxviii. 15-57, -- fulfilling hereby
   what he had devised, accomplishing the word he had commanded in the
   days of old, Lam. ii. 17.

   That which hence I shall observe is only from the variety of these
   particulars, which are held out as the means of the intended
   desolation.

   Observation. God's treasures of wrath against a sinful people have
   sundry and various issues for the accomplishment of the appointed end.

   When God walks contrary to a people, it is not always in one path; he
   hath seven ways to do it, and will do it seven times, Lev. xxvi. 24. He
   strikes not always with one weapon, nor in one place. As there is with
   him poikile charis, "manifold and various grace," 1 Pet. iv. 10, --
   love and compassion making out itself in choice variety, suited to our
   manifold indigencies; so there is orge tethesaurismene, Rom. ii. 5, --
   stored, treasured wrath, suiting itself in its flowings out to the
   provocations of stubborn sinners.

   The first emblem of God's wrath against man was a "flaming sword
   turning itself every way," Gen. iii. 24. Not only in one or two, but in
   all their paths he meeteth them with his flaming sword. As a wild beast
   in a net, [207] so are sinners under inexorable judgments; the more
   they strive, the more they are enwrapped and entangled; they shuffle
   themselves from under one calamity, and fall into another: "As if a man
   did flee from a lion, and a bear met him; or went into the house, and
   leaned his hand on the wall, and a serpent bit him," Amos v. 19. Oh!
   remove this one plague, saith Pharaoh. [208] If he can escape from
   under this pressure, he thinks he shall be free; -- but when he fled
   from the lion, still the bear met him; and when he went into the house,
   the serpent bit him. And as the flaming sword turns every way, so God
   can put it into every thing. To those that cry, Give me a king, God can
   give him in his anger; and from those that cry, Take him away, he can
   take him away in his wrath, Hos. xiii. 10, 11.

   Oh, that this might seal up instruction to our own souls! What variety
   of calamities have we been exercised withal, for sundry years! What
   Pharaoh-like spirits have we had under them! Oh, that we were delivered
   this once, and then all were well! How do we spend all our thoughts to
   extricate ourselves from our present pressures! If this hedge, this pit
   were passed, we should have smooth ground to walk on; -- not
   considering that God can fill our safest paths with snares and
   serpents. Give us peace, give us wealth, -- give us as we were, with
   our own, in quietness. Poor creatures! suppose all these desires were
   in sincerity, and not, as with the most they are, fair colours of foul
   and bloody designs; yet if peace were, and wealth were, and former
   things were, and God were not, what would it avail you? Cannot he
   poison your peace, and canker your wealth? and when you were escaped
   out of the field from the lion and the bear, appoint a serpent to bite
   you, leaning upon the walls of your own house? In vain do you seek to
   stop the streams, while the fountains are open; turn yourselves whither
   you will, bring yourselves into what condition you can, nothing but
   peace and reconciliation with the God of all these judgments can give
   you rest in the day of visitation. You see what variety of plagues are
   in his hand. Changing of condition will do no more to the avoiding of
   them, than a sick man's turning himself from one side of the bed to
   another; during his turning, he forgets his pain by striving to move,
   -- being laid down again, he finds his condition the same as before.

   This is the first thing, -- we are under various judgments, from which
   by ourselves there is no deliverance.

   Secondly. The second thing here expressed is, the procuring cause of
   these various judgments, set down, verse 4, "Because of Manasseh, son
   of Hezekiah king of Judah, for that which he did in Jerusalem."

   The sins of Manasseh filled the ephah of Judah's wickedness, and caused
   the talent of lead to be laid on the mouth thereof. [209] Oftentimes in
   the relation of his story doth the Holy Ghost emphatically express
   this, that for his sin Judah should be destroyed, 2 Kings xxi. 11. Yea,
   when they had a little reviving under Josiah, and the bowels of the
   Lord began to work in compassion towards them; yet, as it were
   remembering the provocation of this Manasseh, he recalls his thoughts
   of mercy, 2 Kings xxiii. 26, 27. The deposing of divine and human
   things is oftentimes very opposite. [210] God himself proceeds with
   them in a diverse dispensation. In the spiritual body the members
   offend, and the Head is punished: "The iniquity of us all did meet on
   him," Isa. liii. 1. In the civil politic body the head offends, and the
   members rue it: Manasseh sins, and Judah must go captive.

   Three things present themselves for the vindication of the equity of
   God's righteous judgments, in the recompensing the sins of the king
   upon the people.

   1. The concurrence and influence of the people's power into their rule
   and government: they that set him up may justly be called to answer for
   his miscarriage. The Lord himself had before made the sole bottom of
   that political administration to be their own wills: "If thou wilt have
   a king, after the manner of the nations," Deut. xvii. 14; 1 Sam. viii.
   7. Though for particulars, himself (according to his supreme
   sovereignty) placed in many [appointed many of the kings], by peculiar
   exemption; otherwise his providence was served by their plenary
   consent, or by such dispensation of things as you have related, 1 Kings
   xvi. 21, 22, "Then were the people of Israel divided into two parts:
   half of the people followed Tibni, the son of Ginath, to make him king;
   and half followed Omri. But the people that followed Omri prevailed
   against the people that followed Tibni; so Tibni died, and Omri
   reigned." Now, they who place men in authority to be God's vicegerents,
   do undertake to God for their deportment in that authority, and
   therefore may justly bear the sad effects of their sinful miscarriages.

   2. Because, for fear of Manasseh's cruelty, or to flatter him in his
   tyranny for their own advantage, the greatest part of the people had
   apostatized from the ways and worship of Hezekiah, to comply with him
   in his sin; as at another time "they willingly walked after the
   commandment," Hos. v. 11. And this is plainly expressed, 2 Kings xxi.
   9, "Manasseh seduced the people to do more evil than the nations." When
   kings turn seducers, they seldom want good store of followers, Now, if
   the blind lead the blind, both will, and both justly may, fall into the
   ditch. When kings command unrighteous things, and people suit them with
   willing compliance, none doubts but the destruction of them both is
   just and righteous. See verse 6 of this chapter.

   3. Because the people, by virtue of their retained sovereignty, did not
   restrain him in his provoking ways So Zuinglius, Artic. 42, "Qui non
   vetat, cum potest, jubet." When Saul would have put Jonathan to death,
   the people would not suffer him so to do, but delivered Jonathan, that
   be died not, 1 Sam. xiv. 45. When David proposed the reducing of the
   ark, his speech to the people was, "If it seem good unto you, let us
   send abroad to our brethren everywhere, that they may gather themselves
   to us: and all the congregation said that they would do so: because the
   thing was fight in the eyes of all the people," 1 Chron. xiii. 2, 4. So
   they bargain with Rehoboam about their subjection, upon condition of a
   moderate rule, 1 Kings xii. By virtue of which power, also, they
   delivered Jeremiah from the prophets and priests that would have put
   him to death, Jer. xxvi. 16. And on this ground might they justly feed
   on the fruit of their own neglected duty. See Bilson on Obed., part 3,
   page 271.

   Be it thus, or otherwise, by what way soever the people had their
   interest therein, certain it is, that for the sins of Manasseh, one way
   or other made their own, they were destroyed. And therefore, these
   things being written for our example, it cannot but be of great
   concernment to us to know what were those sins which wrapped up the
   people of God in irrevocable destruction Now, these the Holy Ghost
   fully manifesteth in the story of the life and reign of this Manasseh,
   and they may all be reduced unto two chief heads.

   (1.) False worship or superstition: "He built high places, made altars
   for Baal, and a grove, as did Ahab," 2 Kings xxi. 3.

   (2.) Cruelty: "He shed innocent blood very much, till he had filled
   Jerusalem with blood from one end of it to another," verse 16.

   Whether this cruelty be to be ascribed to his tyranny in civil affairs,
   and so the blood shed is called innocent because not of malefactors; or
   to his persecution in subordination to his false worship, instituted as
   before (as the pope and his adherents have devoured whole nations "in
   ordine ad spiritualia"), is not apparent; but this is from hence and
   other places most evident, that superstition and persecution,
   will-worship and tyranny, are inseparable concomitants. [211]

   Nebuchadnezzar sets up his great image, and the next news you hear, the
   saints are in the furnace, Dan. iii. 20. You seldom see a fabric of
   human-invented worship, but either the foundation or top-stone is laid
   in the blood of God's people. "The wisdom" (religion, or way of
   worship) "that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle,
   easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without
   partiality, and without hypocrisy," James iii. 17; -- when the other is
   "earthly, sensual, devilish, bringing along envying, strife, confusion,
   and every evil work," verse 16. Persecution and blood is the genuine
   product of all invented worship. I might from hence name and pursue
   other observations, but I shall only name one, and proceed.

   Observation. When false worship, with injustice by cruelty, have
   possessed the governors of a nation, and wrapped in the consent of the
   greatest part of the people who have been acquainted with the mind of
   God; that people and nation, without unprecedented mercy, is obnoxious
   to remediless ruin.

   Those two are the Bel and dragon that, what by their actings, what by
   their deservings, have swallowed that ocean of blood which has flowed
   from the veins of millions slain upon the face of the earth. Give me
   the number of the witnesses of Jesus whose souls under the altar cry
   for revenge against their false worshipping murderers [212] and the
   tale of them whose lives have been sacrificed to the insatiable
   ambition and tyranny of blood-thirsty potentates, with the issues of
   God's just vengeance on the sons of men for compliance in these two
   things; and you will have gathered in the whole harvest of blood,
   leaving but a few straggling gleanings upon other occasions. And if
   these things have been found in England, and the present administration
   with sincere humiliation do not run across to unravel this close-woven
   web of destruction, all thoughts of recovery will quickly be too late.
   And thus far sin and providence drive on a parallel.

   Thirdly. The inevitableness of the desolation threatened, and the
   inexorableness of God in the execution of it, verse 1, is the third
   thing considerable: "Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my
   mind could not be toward this people."

   Should I insist upon this, it would draw me out unto Scripture
   evidences of a nation's travelling in sin beyond the line of God's
   patience, and so not to be exempted from ruin; but, instead thereof, I
   shall make it a part of my daily supplications, that they may be to our
   enemies, if God's enemies, and the interpretation of them to those that
   hate us.

   In brief, the words contain an impossible supposition, and yet a
   negation of the thing for whose sake it is supposed. Moses and Samuel
   were men who, in the days of their flesh, offered up strong
   supplications, and averted many imminent judgments from a sinful
   people. As if the Lord should say, All that I can do, in such a case as
   this, I would grant at the intercession of Moses and Samuel, or others
   interceding in their spirit and zeal; but now the state of things is
   come to that pass, the time of treaty being expired, the black flag
   hung out, and the "decree having brought forth," Zeph. ii. 2, that,
   upon their utmost entreaty, it cannot, it shall not, be reversed.

   Observation. There is a time when sin grows ripe for ruin: "For three
   transgressions, and for four, the Lord will not turn away the iniquity
   of a people," Amos i. 9.

   When the sin of the Amorites hath filled the cup of vengeance, they
   must drink it, Gen. xv. 16. England, under several administrations of
   civil government, hath fallen twice, yea thrice, into nation-destroying
   sins. Providence hath once more given it another bottom; if you should
   stumble (which the Lord avert) at the same block of impiety and
   cruelty, there is not another sifting to be made, to reserve any grains
   from the ground. I doubt not but our three transgressions, and four,
   will end in total desolation. The Lord be your guide; -- poor England
   lieth at stake.

   Observation. The greatest difficulty that lieth in bringing of total
   destruction upon a sinful people, is in the interposition of Moses and
   Samuel.

   If Moses would but have stood out of the gap, and let the Almighty go,
   he had broken in upon the whole host of Israel, Exod. xxxii. 9, 10. And
   let it by the way be observed, of the spirit of Samuel, that when the
   people of God were most exorbitant, he crieth, "As for me, God forbid
   that I should sin against the Lord in ceasing to pray for you," 1 Sam.
   xii. 23. Scarce answered by those who, if their interest be not served,
   or at least their reason satisfied, will scarce yield a prayer for,
   yea, pour out curses against, their choicest deliverers. The Lord lay
   it not to their charge! For us, seeing that praying deliverers are more
   prevalent than fighting deliverers (it is, Though Moses and Samuel, not
   Gideon and Samson, stood before me), as some decay, let us gather
   strength in the Lord, that he may have never the more rest for their
   giving over, until he establish mount Zion a praise in the earth.

   Fourthly. Come we now to the fourth thing in this chapter, the
   prophet's state and condition, with the frame and deportment of his
   heart and spirit under these dispensations. And here we find him
   expressing two things of himself:--

   1. What he found from others, verse 10.

   2. What he wrestled withal in his own spirit, verses 15-18.

   1. What he found from others. He telleth you it was cursing and
   reproach, etc.: "I have neither lent on usury, nor have men lent to me
   on usury, yet every one of them doth curse me," verse 10.

   Now this return may be considered two ways.

   (1.) In itself: "Every one (saith he) of this people doth curse me."

   (2.) In reference to his deportment: "I have neither borrowed nor lent
   on usury, yet they curse me."

   (1.) From the first, observe:--

   Observation. Instruments of God's greatest works and glory are
   oftentimes the chiefest objects of a professing people's cursings and
   revenges.

   The return which God's labourers meet withal in this generation is in
   the number of those things whereof there is none new under the sun. Men
   that, under God, deliver a kingdom, may have the kingdom's curses for
   their pains.

   When Moses had brought the people of Israel out of bondage, by that
   wonderful and unparalleled deliverance, being forced to appear with the
   Lord for the destruction of Korah and his associates, who would have
   seduced the congregation to its utter ruin, he receives at length this
   reward of all his travail, labour, and pains, -- all the congregation
   gathered themselves against him and Aaron, laying murder and sedition
   to their charge; telling them they had "killed the people of the Lord,"
   Num. xvi. 41, 42; -- a goodly reward for all their travails. If God's
   works do not suit with the lusts, prejudices, and interests of men,
   they will labour to give his instruments the devil's wages. Let not
   upright hearts sink because they meet with thankless men. "Bona agere,
   et mala pati, Christianorum est." A man may have the blessing of God
   and the curse of a professing people at the same time. "Behold, I and
   the children whom God hath given me, are for signs and for wonders in
   Israel," Isa. viii. 18. "Cum ab hominibus damnamur, a Deo absolvimur."
   [213] Man's condemnation and God's absolution do not seldom meet upon
   the same persons, for the same things. If you labour to do the work of
   the Lord, pray think it not strange if among men curses be your reward,
   and detestation your wages.

   (2.) In reference to the prophet's deportment: "He had neither lent,
   nor had any lent to him, upon usury." He was free from blame among
   them, -- had no dealings with them in those things which are usually
   attended with reproaches; as he shows by an instance in usury, a thing
   that a long time hath heard very ill.

   Observation. Men every way blameless, and to be embraced in their own
   ways, are oftentimes abhorred and laden with curses for following the
   Lord in his ways.

   "Bonus vir Caius Sejus, sed malus quia Christianus." What precious men
   should many be, would they let go the work of God in this generation!
   No advantage against them but in the matter of their God; -- and that
   is enough to have them to the lions, Dan. vi. 5. He that might be
   honoured for compassing the ends suiting his own worldly interest, and
   will cheerfully undergo dishonour for going beyond, to suit the design
   of God, hath surely some impression upon his spirit that is from above.

   2. You have the prophet's deportment, and the frame of his spirit
   during those transactions between the Lord and that sinful people; and
   this he holds out, in many pathetical complaints, to be fainting,
   decaying, perplexed, weary of his burden, not knowing how to ease
   himself, as you may see at large, verses 15-18.

   Observation. In dark and difficult dispensations of providence, God's
   choicest servants are oftentimes ready to faint under the burden of
   them.

   How weary was David when he cried out in such a condition, "Oh that I
   had wings like a dove! for then would I fly away, and be at rest," Ps.
   lv. 6. Long had he waited for a desired issue of his perplexed state,
   and had perhaps oftentimes been frustrated of his hope of drawing to a
   period of his miseries; and now, finding one disappointment to follow
   on the neck of another, he is weary, and cries, What! nothing but this
   trouble and confusion still? "Oh that I had wings like a dove!" -- a
   ship to sail to a foreign nation (or the like), there to be at peace.
   In the like strait another time, see what a miserable conclusion he
   draws of all his being exercised under the hand of God; Ps. lxxii. 13,
   "Verily I have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in
   innocency." And again, Ps. cxvi. 11, he saith, in the perturbation of
   his mind, "All men are liars;" that all the promises, all the
   encouragements, which in his way he had received from God, should fail
   of their accomplishment.

   It is not with them as it was with that wicked king of Israel, who,
   being disappointed of peace and deliverance in his own time, cries out,
   "This evil is of the Lord; what should I wait for the Lord any longer?"
   2 Kings vi. 33. The season of deliverance suited not his expectation;
   therefore he quite throweth off the Lord and his protection:-- not
   unlike many among ourselves, whose desires and expectations being not
   satisfied in the closing of our distractions, according to the way
   which themselves had framed for the Lord to walk in, are ready to cast
   off his cause, his protection, to comply with the enemies of his name,
   "Si Deus homini non placuerit, Deus non erit." But it may be observed,
   that deliverance came not to that people until Jehoram was weary of
   waiting, and then instantly God gives it in. When God hath tired the
   patience, of corrupted men, he will speak peace to them that wait for
   him. Thus it is not with the saints of God; only, being perplexed in
   their spirits, dark in their apprehensions, and fainting in their
   strength, they break out ofttimes into passionate complaints (as
   Jeremiah for a cottage in the wilderness), but yet for the main holding
   firm to the Lord.

   And the reasons of this quailing are, --

   (1.) The weakness of faith, when the methods of God's proceedings are
   unfathomable to our apprehensions. While men see the paths wherein the
   Lord walketh, they can follow him through some difficulties; but when
   that is hid from them, though providence so shut up all other ways that
   it is impossible God should be in them, yet if they cannot discern (so
   proud are they) how he goeth in that wherein he is, they are ready to
   faint and give over. God is pleased sometimes to make darkness his
   pavilion and his secret place. "A fire devours before him, and it is
   very tempestuous round about him," Ps. l. 3. When once God is attended
   with fire, darkness, and tempest, because we cannot so easily see him,
   we are ready to leave him. Now, this the Lord usually doth in the
   execution of his judgments, "Thy righteousness is like the great
   mountains; thy judgments are a great deep," Ps. xxxvi. 6. His
   righteousness, his kindness, is like a great mountain that is easy to
   be seen, -- a man cannot overlook it, unless he wilfully shut his eyes;
   but his judgments are like the great deep. Who can look into the bottom
   of the sea, or know what is done in the depths thereof? God's works in
   their accomplishment are oftentimes so unsuited to the reasons and
   apprehensions of men, that very many who have been strong in their
   desires, and great in expectation of them, upon their bringing forth to
   light, have quite rejected and opposed them as none of his, because
   distant from what they had framed to themselves. It is evident from the
   gospel, that the people of the Jews were full of expectation and
   longing for the great work of the coming of the Messiah just at the
   season wherein he came; yet being come, because not accommodated to
   their pre-imaginations, they rejected him, as having neither form nor
   comeliness in him to be desired, Isa. liii. 2. And the prophet Amos
   telleth many who desired the day of the Lord, that that day should be
   darkness to them, and not light, Amos v. 18, 20. So in every generation
   many desirous of the accomplishment of God's work are shaken off from
   any share therein, by finding it unsuited to their reasons and
   expectations.

   Now, when the Lord is pleased thus to walk in darkness, many not being
   able to trace him in his dispensations, are ready to lie down and sink
   under the burden. David seems to profess that he had nothing at such a
   time to uphold him but this, that God must be there, or nowhere. I had
   said (saith he) that it was in vain to walk as I do, but that I should
   have condemned the generation of thy children, Ps. lxxiii. 15. And
   truly God never leaves us without so much light, but that we may see
   clearly where he is not; and so, by recounting particulars, we may be
   rolled where he is, though his goings there be not so clear. Ask if God
   be in the counsels of men who seek themselves, and in the ways of those
   who make it their design to ruin the generation of the just. If you
   find him there, seek no farther; if not, let that give you light to
   discern where he makes his abode, that you turn not aside to the flocks
   of others.

   (2.) A reducing the works of Providence to inbred rules of their own.
   But this I cannot pursue.

   Be tender toward fainters in difficult seasons. If they leave waiting
   on the Lord because the evil is of him, -- if they cast in their lot
   with the portion of the ungodly, -- they will in the end perish in
   their gainsaying; but as for such as, what for want of light, what for
   want of faith, sit down and sigh in darkness, be not too hasty in
   laying farther burdens on them. When first the confederacy was entered
   into by the Protestant princes in Germany against Charles V., Luther
   himself for a season was bewildered, and knew not what to do, until,
   being instructed in the fundamental laws of the empire, he sat down
   fully in that undertaking, though the Lord gave it not the desired
   issue. [214] Our Saviour Christ asks, if, when he comes, he shall find
   faith on the earth, Luke xviii. 8. It is his coming with the spirit of
   judgment and burning, a day of trial and visitation, he there speaks
   of. Now, what faith shall he want which will not be found in that day?
   Not the faith of adherence to himself for spiritual life and
   justification, but of actual closing with him in the things he then
   doth; that shall be rare, -- many shall be staggered and faint in that
   day.

   And thus, by the several heads of this chapter, have I led you through
   the very state and condition of this nation at this time.

   First, Variety of judgments are threatened to us, and incumbent on us;
   as in the first part. Secondly, Of these, false worship, superstition,
   tyranny, and cruelty, lie in the bottom, as their procuring causes;
   which is the second. Thirdly, These, if renewed under your hand, will
   certainly bring inevitable ruin upon the whole nation; which is the
   third. Fourthly, All which make many precious hearts, what for want of
   light, what for want of faith, to fail, and cry out for "the wings of a
   dove;" which is the fourth.

   Fifthly, I come, in the fifth place, to God's direction to you for the
   future, in this state and condition; which being spread in divers
   verses, as the Lord gives it to the prophet, I shall meddle with no
   more of it than is contained in the words which at our entrance I read
   unto you: "Let them return," etc.

   In the words observe four things, --

   I. God's direction to the prophet, and in him to all that do his work
   in such a season as this described: "Let them return to thee; return
   not thou to them."

   II. Their assistance and supportment in pursuance of that direction: "I
   will make thee to this people a brasen fenced wall."

   III. The opposition, with its success and issue, which in that way they
   should meet withal: "They shall fight against thee, but shall not
   prevail."

   IV. Their consolation and success from the presence of the Lord: "For I
   am with thee to deliver thee," etc.

   I. There is God's direction.

   Many difficulties in this troublesome season was the prophet intricated
   withal. The people would not be prevailed with to come up to the mind
   of God; -- they continuing in their stubbornness, the Lord would not be
   prevailed with to avert the threatened desolation. What now shall he
   do? To stand out against the bulk of the people suits not his earthly
   interest; -- to couple with them answers not the discharge of his
   office; -- to wait upon them any longer is fruitless; -- to give up
   himself to their ways, comfortless. Hence his complaints, hence his
   moanings; -- better lie down and sink under the burden, than always to
   swim against the stream of an unreformable multitude. In this strait
   the Lord comes in with his direction: "Let them return unto thee," etc.
   Keep thy station, perform thy duty, comply not with the children of
   backsliding. But whatever be the issue, if there be any closing
   wrought, let it be by working them off from their ways of folly. All
   condescension on thy part, where the work of God is to be done, is in
   opposition to him. If they return, embrace them freely; if not, do thy
   duty constantly.

   That which is spoken immediately to the prophet, I shall hold out to
   all, acting in the name and authority of God, in this general
   proposition:--

   Observation. Plausible compliances of men in authority with those
   against whom they are employed, are treacherous contrivances against
   the God of heaven, by whom they are employed.

   If God be so provoked that he curseth him who doth his work
   negligently, what is he by them that do it treacherously? -- when he
   gives a sword into the hands of men, and they thrust it into his own
   bowels, his glory and honour, those things so dear to him? He that is
   intrusted with it, and dares not do justice on every one that dares do
   injustice, is afraid of the creature, but makes very bold with the
   Creator. Prov. xxv. 2, "It is the glory of God to conceal a thing; but
   the honour of kings is to search out a matter." That which God aimeth
   to be glorious in, to manifest his attributes by, is the concealing and
   covering our iniquities in Christ; but if the magistrate will have
   glory, if he will not bring upon himself dishonour by dishonouring God,
   he is to search and find out the transgressions with whose cognizance
   he is intrusted, and to give unto them condign retribution. If the Lord
   curse them who come not forth to his help against the mighty, Judges v.
   23 -- what is their due who, being called forth by him, do yet help the
   mighty against him? For a man to take part with the kingdom's enemies,
   is no small crime; but for a commission-officer to run from them by
   whom he is commissionated, to take part with the adversary, is death
   without mercy. Yet have not some in our days arrived at that stupendous
   impudence, that when, as private persons, they have declaimed against
   the enemies of the nation, and by that means got themselves into
   authority, they have made use of that authority to comply with and
   uphold those by an opposition to whom they got into their authority?
   which is no less than an atheistical attempt to personate the Almighty,
   unto such iniquities as without his appearance they dare not own. But
   "he that justifieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even
   they both are abomination to the Lord," Prov. xvii. 15; and not only to
   the Lord, but to good men also: "He that saith to the wicked, Thou art
   righteous; him shall the people curse, nations shall abhor him," Prov.
   xxiv. 24.

   I speak only as to the general (for me, let all particulars find
   mercy), with a sad remembrance of the late workings of things amongst
   us, with those vile, sordid compliances, which grew upon the spirits of
   magistrates and ministers, with those whose garments were dyed with the
   blood of God's saints and precious ones, -- as formerly they were
   called, for now these names are become terms of reproach. And would
   this complying went alone; but pretences and accusations must be found
   out against such as follow with them. When they begin to call darkness
   light, they will ere long call light darkness; by which means our eyes
   have seen men of their own accord laying down the weapons wherewith at
   first they fought against opposers, and taking up them which were used
   against themselves; as hath happened more than once to penmen, both in
   our own and our neighbour nation.

   Now, this revolting from principles of religion and righteousness, to a
   compliance with any sinful way or person, is a treacherous opposition
   to the God of heaven. For, --

   It cannot be done but by preferring the creature before the Creator,
   especially in those things which are the proximate causes of deviation.

   Two principal causes I have observed of this crooked walking.

   (1.) Fear.

   (2.) That desire of perishing things which hath a mixture of
   covetousness and ambition.

   The first maketh men waxy what they do against men; the other maketh
   them weary of doing any thing for God, as whereby their sordid ends are
   not like to be accomplished.

   (1.) Fear. When once magistrates begin to listen after "quid
   sequitur's," and so to withdraw from doing good for fear of suffering
   evil, paths of wickedness are quickly returned unto, and the authority
   of God despised. "Let this man go, and take heed of Cæsar," John xix.
   12, did more prevail on Pilate's treacherous heart than all the other
   clamours of the Jews. Yea, was not the whole Sanhedrim swayed to
   desperate villainy for fear the Romans should come and take away their
   kingdom? John xi. 48. When men begin once to distrust that God will
   leave them in the briers, to wrestle it out themselves (for unbelief
   lieth at the bottom of carnal fear), they quickly turn themselves to
   contrivances of their own for their own safety, their own prosperity;
   which commonly is by obliging those unto them by compliances, in an
   opposition to whom they might oblige the Almighty to their assistance.
   Surely they conclude he wants either truth or power to support them in
   his employment.

   If a prince should send an ambassador to a foreign state, to treat
   about peace, or to denounce war; who, when he comes there, distrusting
   his master's power to make good his undertaking, should comply and wind
   up his interest with them to whom he was sent, suffering his
   sovereign's errand to fall to the ground, -- would he not be esteemed
   as arrant a traitor as ever lived? And yet, though this be clipped coin
   among men, it is put upon the Lord every day as current.

   From this principle of carnal fear and unbelief, -- trembling for a man
   that shall die, and the son of man that shall be as grass, forgetting
   the Lord our maker, Isa. li. 12, -- are all those prudential follies
   which exercise the minds of most men in authority, making them,
   especially in times of difficulties, to regulate and square all their
   proceedings by what suits their own safety and particular interests, --
   counselling, advising, working for themselves, quite forgetting by whom
   they are intrusted, and whose business they should do.

   (2.) A desire of perishing things tempered with covetousness and
   ambition. Hence was the sparing of the fat cattle and of Agag by Saul,
   1 Sam. xv. 1.

   When those two qualifications close on any, they are diametrically
   opposed to that frame which of God is required in them, -- viz., "That
   they should be men fearing God, and hating covetousness." The first
   will go far, being only a contrivance for safety; but if this latter
   take hold of any, being a consultation to exalt themselves, it quickly
   carrieth them beyond all bounds whatsoever. The Lord grant that
   hereafter there may be no such complaints in this nation, or [that
   they] may be causeless, as have been heretofore, -- viz., that we have
   poured out our prayers, jeoparded our lives, wasted our estates, spent
   our blood, to serve the lusts and compass the designs of ambitious,
   ungodly men!

   The many ways whereby these things intrench upon the spirits of men, to
   bias them from the paths of the Lord, I shall not insist upon; it is
   enough that I have touched upon the obvious causes of deviation, and
   manifested them to be treacheries against the God of all authority.

   Use. Be exhorted to beware of relapses, with all their causes and
   inducements, and to be constant to the way of righteousness; and this I
   shall hold out unto you in two particulars.

   1. Labour to recover others, even all that were ever distinguished and
   called by the name of the Lord, from their late fearful returning to
   sinful compliances with the enemies of God and the nation. I speak not
   of men's persons, but of their ways. For three years this people have
   been eminently sick of the folly of backsliding, and without some
   special cordial are like to perish in it, as far as I know.

   Look upon the estate of this people as they were differenced seven
   years ago, so for some continuance, and as they are now; and you shall
   find in how many things we have returned to others, and not one
   instance to be given of their return to us. That this may be clear,
   take some particulars.

   (1.) In words and expressions; -- those are "index animi." Turn them
   over, and you may find what is in the whole heart. "Out of the
   abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh." Now, is not that language,
   are not those very expressions which filled the mouths of the common
   adversaries only, grown also terms of reproach upon the tongues of men
   that suffered sometimes under them, and counted it their honour so to
   do? Hence that common exprobration, A parliament of saints, an army of
   saints, and such like derisions of God's ways, -- now plentiful with
   them who sat sometimes and took sweet counsel with us. Ah! had it not
   been more for the honour of God that we had kept our station until
   others had come to us, -- so to have exalted the name and profession of
   the gospel, -- than that we should so return to them as to join with
   them in making the paths of Christ a reproach? Had it not been better
   for us, with Judah, to continue "ruling with God, and to be faithful
   with the saints," Hos. xi. 12, than to stand in the congregation of the
   mockers, and to sit in the seat of the scornful? What shall we say,
   when the saints of God "are as signs and wonders [to be spoken against]
   in Israel?" Isa. viii. 18. O that men would remember how they have left
   their first station, when themselves use those reproaches unto others
   which for the same cause themselves formerly bare with comfort! It is
   bitterness to consider how the gospel is scandalized by this woful
   return of ministers and people, by casting scriptural expressions by
   way of scorn on those with whom they were sometimes in the like kind
   companions of contempt. Surely in this we are returned to them, and not
   they to us.

   (2.) In actions, and those, --

   [1.] Of religion. Not only in opinion, but practice also, are we here
   under a vile return. We are become the lions, and the very same
   thoughts [are] entertained by us against others as were exercised
   towards ourselves. Are not others as unworthy to live upon their native
   soil in our judgments, as we ourselves in the judgments of them
   formerly over us? Are not groans for liberty, by the warmth of favour,
   in a few years hatched into attempts for tyranny? And for practice,
   what hold hath former superstition, in observing days and times, laid
   upon the many of the people again! Witness the late solemn
   superstition, and many things of the like nature.

   [2.] For civil things, the closing of so many formerly otherwise
   engaged with the adverse party in the late rebellion, with the lukewarm
   deportment of others at the same time, is a sufficient demonstration of
   it. And may not the Lord justly complain of all this? "What iniquity
   have you seen in me or my ways, that you are gone far from me, and have
   walked after vanity, and are become vain?" Jer. ii. 5. "Why have you
   changed your glory for that which doth not profit," verse 11. "Have I
   been a dry heath or a barren wilderness to you?" Oh, that men should
   find no more sweetness in following the Lamb under wonderful
   protections, but that they should thus turn aside into every
   wilderness! What indignity is this to the ways of God! I could give you
   many reasons of it; but I have done what I intended, -- a little hinted
   that we are a returning people, that so you might be exhorted to help
   for a recovery. And how shall that be?

   2. By your own keeping close to the paths of righteousness. If you
   return not, others will look about again. This breach, this evil is of
   you; within your own walls was the fountain of our backsliding. Would
   you be the repairers of breaches, the restorers of paths for men to
   walk in? -- do these two things:--

   (1.) Turn not to the ways of such as the Lord hath blasted under your
   eyes. And these may be referred to three heads.

   [1.] Oppression; [2.] Self-seeking; [3.] Contrivances for persecution.

   [1.] Oppression. How detestable a crime it is in the eyes of the
   Almighty, -- what effects it hath upon men, "making wise men mad!"
   Eccles. vii. 7, -- how frequently it closeth in the calamitous ruin of
   the oppressors themselves, -- are things known to all. Whether it hath
   not been exercised in this nation, both in general by unnecessary
   impositions, and in particular by unwarrantable pressures, let the
   mournful cries of all sorts of people testify. Should you now return to
   such ways as these, would not the anger of the Lord smoke against you?
   Make it, I beseech you, your design to relieve the whole, by all means
   possible, and to relieve particulars, yea, even of the adverse party
   where too much overborne. O let it be considered by you, that it be not
   considered upon you! I know the things you are necessitated to are not
   to be supported by the air. It is only what is unnecessary as to you,
   or insupportable as to others, that requires your speedy reforming;
   that so it may be said of you as of Neh. v. 14, 15. And for particulars
   (pray pardon my folly and boldness), I heartily desire a committee of
   your honourable House might sit once a-week, to relieve poor men that
   have been oppressed by men sometimes enjoying parliamentary authority.

   [2.] Self-seeking, when men can be content to lay a nation low, that
   they may set up themselves upon the heaps and ruins thereof. Have not
   some sought to advance themselves under that power which, with the
   lives and blood of the people, they have opposed; seeming to be
   troubled at former things, not because they were done, but because they
   were not done by them? But innocent blood will be found a tottering
   foundation for men to build their honours, greatness, and preferments
   upon. O return not in this unto any! If men serve themselves of the
   nation, they must expect that the nation will serve itself upon them.
   The best security you can possibly have that the people will perform
   their duty in obedience, is the witness of your own consciences that
   you have discharged your duty towards them, -- in seeking their good by
   your own trouble, and not your own advantages in their trouble. I doubt
   not but that in this your practice makes the admonition a commendation;
   otherwise the word spoken will certainly witness against you.

   [3.] Contrivances for persecution. How were the hearts of all men
   hardened like the nether millstone, and their thoughts did grind blood
   and revenge against their brethren! What colours, what pretences, had
   men invented to prepare a way for the rolling of their garments in the
   tears, yea, blood of Christians! The Lord so keep your spirits from a
   compliance herein, that withal the bow be not too much bent on the
   other side, -- which is not impossible.

   Be there a backsliding upon your spirit to these, or such-like things
   as these, the Lord will walk contrary to you; and were you "as the
   signet upon his hand," he would pluck you off.

   (2.) Return not to the open enemies of our peace. I could here enlarge
   myself, to support your spirits in the work mentioned, Job xxix. 14,
   15; but I must go on to the following parts of my text. And therefore,
   --

   II. I pass from the direction given to the supportment and assistance
   promised: "I will make thee to this people a brasen and a fenced wall."

   An implied objection, which the prophet might put in, upon his charge
   to keep so close to the rule of righteousness, is here removed. If I
   must thus abide by it, to execute whatsoever the Lord calls me out
   unto, not shrinking nor staggering at the greatest undertakings, what
   will become of me in the issue? will it not be destructive to stand out
   against a confirmed people? No, saith the Lord, it shall not be; "I
   will make thee," etc.

   Observation. God will certainly give prevailing strength and
   unconquerable defence unto persons constantly discharging the duties of
   righteousness, especially when undertaken in times of difficulty and
   opposition.

   The like engagement to this you have made to Ezekiel chap. iii. 8, 9.
   Neither was it so to the prophets alone, but to magistrates also. When
   Joshua undertook the regency of Israel in a difficult time, he takes
   off his fear and diffidence with this very encouragement, Josh. i. 5.
   He saith, he will make them a wall, -- the best defence against
   opposition; and that not a weak, tottering wall, that might easily be
   cast down, but a brazen wall, that must needs be impregnable. What
   engines can possibly prevail against a wall of brass? And to make it
   more secure, this brazen wall shall be fenced with all manner of
   fortifications and ammunition; so that the veriest coward in the world,
   being behind such a wall, may, without dread or terror, apply himself
   to that which he findeth to do. God will so secure the instruments of
   his glory against a backsliding people, in holding up the ways of his
   truth and righteousness, that all attempts against them shall be vain,
   and the most timorous spirit may be secure, provided he go not out of
   the Lord's way; for if they be found beyond the line, the brazen wall,
   they may easily be surprised. And, indeed, who but a fool would run
   from the shelter of a brazen wall, to hide himself in a little stubble?
   And yet so do all who run to their own wisdom, from the most hazardous
   engagement that any of the ways of God can possibly lead them unto. It
   is a sure word, and forever to be rested upon, which the Lord gives in
   to Asa, 2 Chron. xv. 2, "The Lord is with you, while ye be with him."
   An unbiased magistracy shall never want God's continued presence. Very
   Jeroboam himself receives a promise, upon condition of close walking
   with God in righteous administrations, of having a house built him like
   the house of David, 1 Kings xi. 38. What a wall was God to Moses in
   that great undertaking, of being instrumental for the delivery of
   Israel from a bondage and slavery of four hundred years' continuance?
   Pharaoh was against him, whom he had deprived of his sovereignty and
   dominion over the people. And what a provocation the depriving of
   sovereignty is unto potentates needs no demonstration: to the
   corruption of nature which inclines to heights and exaltations, in
   imitation of the fountain whence it flows, they have also the
   corruption of state and condition, which hath always inclined to
   absoluteness and tyranny. All Egypt was against him, as being by him
   visibly destroyed, wasted, spoiled, robbed, and at length smitten in
   the apple of the eye, by the loss of their first-born. And if this be
   not enough, that the king and people whom he opposed were his enemies,
   -- the very people for whose sakes he set himself to oppose the others,
   they also rise up against him, yea, seek to destroy him. One time they
   appeal to God for justice against him, Exod. v. 21, "The Lord look upon
   you, and judge." They appeal to the righteous God to witness that he
   had not fulfilled what he promised them, -- to wit, liberty, safety,
   and freedom from oppression; but that rather by his means their burdens
   were increased: and in this they were so confident (like some amongst
   us), that they appealed unto God for the equity of their complaints.
   Afterward, being reduced to a strait, such as they could not see how
   possibly they should be extricated from, without utter ruin (like our
   present condition in the apprehension of some), they cry out upon him
   for the whole design of bringing them into the wilderness, and affirm
   positively, that though they had perished in their former slavery, it
   had been better for them than to have followed him in this new and
   dangerous engagement, Exod. xiv. 11, 12; -- that generation being, as
   Calvin observes, [215] so inured to bondage, that they were altogether
   unfit to bear with the workings and pangs of their approaching liberty.
   Afterward, do they want drink? -- Moses is the cause. Do they want
   meat? -- this Moses would starve them, Exod. xv. 24, xvi. 7. He could
   not let them alone by the flesh-pots of Egypt; for this they are ready
   to stone him, Exod. xvii. 3. At this day, have we too much rain, or too
   short a harvest? -- it is laid on the shoulders of the present
   government. It was no otherwise of old. At length this people came to
   that height, as, being frightened by the opposition they heard of and
   framed to themselves in that place whither Moses would carry them, they
   presently enter into a conspiracy and revolt, consulting to cast off
   his government, and choose new commanders, and with a violent hand to
   return to their former condition, Num. xiv. 4, -- an attempt as
   frequent as fruitless among ourselves. When this would not do, at
   length, upon the occasion of taking off Korah and his company, they
   assemble themselves together, and lay, not imprisonment, but murder to
   his charge; and that of "the people of the Lord," Num. xvi. 41. Now,
   what was the issue of all those oppositions? what effect had they? how
   did the power of Pharaoh, the revenge of Egypt, the backsliding of
   Israel prevail? Why, God made this one Moses a fenced brazen wall to
   them all; he was never in the least measure prevailed against; -- so
   long as he was with God, God was with him, no matter who was against
   him.

   One thing only would I commend to your consideration, -- viz., that
   this Moses, thus preserved, thus delivered, thus protected, falling
   into one deviation, in one thing, from close following the Lord, was
   taken off from enjoying the closure and fruit of all his labour, Num.
   xx. 12. Otherwise he followed the Lord in a difficult season, and did
   not want unconquerable supportment. Take heed of the smallest turning
   aside from God. Oh! lose not the fruit of all your labour, for self,
   for a lust, or any thing that may turn you aside!

   Now, the Lord will do this, --

   1. Because of his own engagement.

   2. For our encouragement.

   1. Because of his own engagement. And that is twofold.

   (1.) Of truth and fidelity.

   (2.) Of honour and glory.

   (1.) His truth and veracity is engaged in it. "Those that honour him,
   he will honour," 1 Sam. ii. 30. If men honour him with obedience, he
   will honour them with preservation. "He will be with them, while they
   are with him," 2 Chron. xv. 2. While they are with him in constancy of
   duty, he will be with them to keep them in safety. He will never leave
   them, nor forsake them, Josh. i. 5. "No weapon that is formed against
   them shall prosper," Isa. liv. 17. Now, God is never as the waters that
   fail to any that upon his engagements wait for him; he will not shame
   the faces of them that put their trust in him. Why should our
   unbelieving spirits charge that upon the God of truth which we dare not
   impute to a man that is a worm, a liar? Will a man fail in his
   engagement unto him who, upon that engagement, undertakes a difficult
   employment for his sake? The truth is, it is either want of sincerity
   in our working, or want of faith in dependence, that makes us at any
   time come short of the utmost tittle that is in any of the Lord's
   engagements.

   [1.] We want sincerity, and do the Lord's work, but with our own aims
   and ends, like Jehu; -- no wonder if we be left to ourselves for our
   wages and defence.

   [2.] We want faith, also, in the Lord's work, -- turn to our own
   counsels for supportment: no marvel if we come short of assistance. "If
   we will not believe, we shall not be established."

   Look to sincerity in working, and faith in dependence; God's truth and
   fidelity will carry him out to give you unconquerable supportment:--
   deflexion from these will be your destruction. You that are working on
   a new bottom, work also on new principles; put not new wine into old
   bottles, new designs into old hearts.

   (2.) He is engaged in point of honour. If they miscarry in his way,
   what will he do for his great name? Yea, so tender is the Lord herein
   of his glory, that when he hath been exceedingly provoked to remove men
   out of his presence, yet because they have been called by his name, and
   have visibly held forth a following after him, he would not suffer them
   to be trodden down, lest the enemy should exalt themselves, and say,
   Where is now their God? They shall not take from him the honour of
   former deliverances and protections. In such a nation as this, if the
   Lord now, upon manifold provocations, should give up parliament,
   people, army, to calamity and ruin, would not the glory of former
   counsels, successes, deliverances, be utterly lost? would not men say
   it was not the Lord, but chance that happened to them?

   2. For our encouragement. The ways of God are oftentimes attended with
   so many difficulties, so much opposition, that they must be embraced
   merely because his; no other motive in the world can suit them to us. I
   mean, for such as keep them immixed from their own carnal and corrupt
   interests. Now, because the Lord will not take off the hardship and
   difficulty of them, lest he should not have the honour of carrying on
   his work against tumultuating opposition, he secures poor weaklings of
   comfortable assistance and answerable success, lest his work should be
   wholly neglected. It is true, the Lord, as our sovereign master, may
   justly require a close labouring in all his ways without the least
   sweetening endearments put upon them, only as they are his, whose we
   are, who hath a dominion over us. But yet, as a tender father, -- in
   which relation he delights to exercise his will towards his own in
   Christ, -- he pitieth our infirmities, knowing that we are but dust;
   and therefore, to invite us into the dark, into ways laboursome and
   toilsome to flesh and blood, he gives us in this security, -- that we
   shall be as a fenced brazen wall to the opposing sons of men.

   Use 1. To discover the vanity and folly of all opposition to men called
   forth of God to his work, and walking in his ways. Would you not think
   him mad that should strike with his fist, and run with his head against
   a fenced brazen wall, to cast it down? Is he like to have any success,
   but the battering of his flesh, and the beating out of his brains? What
   do the waves obtain by dashing themselves with noise and dread against
   a rock, but their own beating to pieces? What prevails a man by
   shooting his arrows against the sky, but a return upon his own head?
   Nor is the most powerful opposition to the ways of God like to meet
   with better success God looks no otherwise upon opposers than you would
   do upon a man attempting to thrust down a fenced brazen wall with his
   fingers. Therefore it is said, that in their proudest attempts,
   strongest assaults, deepest counsels, combinations, and associations,
   "he laughs them to scorn," derides their folly, contemns their fury,
   lets them sweat in vain, until their day be come, Ps. ii. How birthless
   in our own, as well as other generations, have been their swelling
   conceptions! What, then, is it that prevails upon men to break through
   so many disappointments against the Lord as they do? -- doubtless that
   of Isa. xxiii. 9, "Surely the Lord of hosts hath purposed it, to stain
   the pride of all glory, and to bring into contempt all the honourable
   of the earth." God gives up men unto it, that he may leave no earthly
   glory or honour without pollution or contempt. And therefore hath
   opposition in our days been turned upon so many hands, that God might
   leave no glory without contempt: yet with this difference, that if the
   Lord will own them, he will recover them from their opposition; as has
   happened of late to the ministry of one, and will happen ere long to
   the ministry of another nation. When the Lord hath a little stained the
   pride of their glory, they shall be brought home again by the spirit of
   judgment and burning; but if he own them not, they shall perish under
   the opposition. And when it hath been wheeled about on all sorts of
   men, the end will be.

   Use 2. "Be wise now therefore, O ye [rulers;] be instructed, ye judges
   of the earth; serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling,"
   Ps. ii. 10, 11. See whence your assistance cometh; see where lie the
   hills of your salvation, and say, "Asshur shall not save us; we will
   not ride upon horses; neither will we say any more to the work of our
   hands, Ye are our gods: for in thee the fatherless findeth mercy," Hos.
   xiv. 3. It is God alone who is "a sun and shield: his ways do good to
   the upright in heart." Behold, here is a way to encompass England with
   a brazen wall: let the rulers of it walk in right ways with upright
   hearts. Others have been careful to preserve the people to them, and
   the city to them; oh, be you careful to preserve your God unto you! He
   alone can make you a fenced wall; if he departs, your wall departs,
   your shade departs. Give me leave to insist a little on one particular,
   which I choose out among many others. When God leads out his people to
   any great things, the angel of his presence is still among them. See at
   large, Exod. xxiii. 20-22. The angel of the covenant, in whom is the
   name of God, that hath power of pardoning or retaining transgressions,
   -- Jesus Christ, the angel that redeemeth his out of all their
   troubles, Gen. xlviii. 16, -- he is in the midst of them, and amongst
   them. And God gives this special caution, if we would have his
   assistance, that we should beware of him, and obey him, and provoke him
   not. Would you, then, have God's assistance continued? -- take heed of
   provoking the angel of his presence: provoke him not by slighting of
   his ways; provoke him not by contemning his ordinances: if you leave
   him to deal for himself, he will leave you to shift for yourselves.
   What though his followers are at some difference, [216] (the best
   knowing but in part) about the administration of some things in his
   kingdom; the envious one having also sown some bitter seeds of
   persecution, strife, envy, and contention among them? -- what though
   some poor creatures are captivated by Satan, the prince of pride, to a
   contempt of all his ordinances, -- whose souls I hope the Lord will one
   day free from the snare of the devil; -- yet I pray give me leave (it
   is no time to contest or dispute it) to bear witness in the behalf of
   my Master to this one truth, that if by your own personal practice and
   observance, your protection, countenance, authority, laws, you do not
   assert, maintain, uphold the order of the gospel, and administration of
   the ordinances of Christ, -- notwithstanding the noise and clamours of
   novel fancies, which, like Jonah's gourd, have sprung up in a night,
   and will wither in a day, -- you will be forsaken by the angel of God's
   presence, and you will become an astonishment to all the inhabitants of
   the earth. And herein I do not speak as one hesitating or dubious, but
   positively assert it, as the known mind of God, and whereof he will not
   suffer any long to doubt, Ps. ii. 12.

   Use 3. "Strengthen ye the weak hands, and confirm the feeble knees. Say
   to them that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not: behold, your
   God will come with vengeance, even God with a recompense; he will come
   and save you," Isa. xxxv. 3, 4. Let the most weak and fearful, the
   fainting heart, the trembling spirit, and the doubting mind, know, that
   full and plenary security, perfect peace, attends the upright in the
   ways of God. You that are in God's way, do God's work, and take this
   cordial for all your distempers, -- Return not to former provoking
   ways, and he will make you" a fenced brasen wall."

   And so I come to the third thing which I proposed to consider, --

   III. The opposition which men cleaving to the Lord in all his ways
   shall find, with the issue and success of it: "They shall fight against
   thee; but shall not prevail."

   The words may be considered either as a prediction depending on God's
   prescience of what will be; or a commination from his just judgment of
   what shall be.

   In the first sense the Lord tells the prophet, from the corruption,
   apostasy, stubbornness of that people, what would come to pass; -- in
   the second, what, for their sins and provocations, by his just
   judgment, should come to pass. Time will not allow me to handle the
   words in both acceptations, wherefore I shall take up the latter only,
   -- viz., that it is a commination of what shall be for the farther
   misery of that wretched people; they shall judicially be given up to a
   fighting against him.

   Observation. God oftentimes gives up a sinful people to a fruitless
   contention and fighting with their only supporters and means of
   deliverance..

   Jeremiah had laboured with God for them, and with them for God, that,
   if possible, peace being made, they might be delivered; and, to
   consummate their sins, they are given up to fight against him.

   I cannot now insist upon particular instances; consult the history of
   the church in all ages, -- you shall find it continually upon all
   occasions verified. From the Israelites opposing Moses, to the
   Ephrahnites' contest with Jephthah, the rejecting of Samuel, and so on,
   to the kings of the earth giving their power to the beast to wage war
   with the Lamb, with the inhabitants of the world combining against the
   witnesses of Christ, is this assertion held out. In following story, no
   sooner did any plague or judgment break out against the Roman empire,
   but instantly, "Christianos ad leones;" -- their fury must be spent
   upon them who were the only supporters of it from irrecoverable ruin.

   Now the Lord doth this, --

   1. To seal up a sinful people's destruction. Eli's sons hearkened not,
   "because the Lord would slay them," 1 Sam. ii. 25. When God intends
   ruin to a people, they shall walk in ways that tend thereunto. Now, is
   there a readier way for a man to have a house on his head, than by
   pulling away the pillars whereby it is supported? If by Moses standing
   in the gap the fury of the Lord be turned away, certainly if the people
   contend to remove him, their desolation sleepeth not. When, therefore,
   the Lord intends to lay cities waste without inhabitants, and houses
   without men, to make a land utterly desolate; the way of its
   accomplishment is by making the hearts of the people fat, and their
   ears heavy, and shutting their eyes, that they should not see and
   attend to the means of their recovery, Isa. vi. 10, 11, -- so gathering
   in his peace and mercies from a provoking people, Jer. xvi. 5.

   2. To manifest his own power and sovereignty in maintaining a small
   handful, ofttimes a few single persons, a Moses, a Samuel, two
   witnesses, against the opposing rage of a hardened multitude. If those
   who undertake his work and business in their several generations should
   have withal the concurrent obedience and assistance of others whose
   good is intended, neither would his name be so seen nor his ways so
   honoured as now, when he bears them up against all opposition. Had not
   the people of this land been given up (many of them) to fight against
   the deliverers of the nation, and were it not so with them even at this
   time, how dark would have been the workings of providence which now, by
   wrestling through all opposition, are so conspicuous and clear! When,
   then, a people, or any part of a people, have made themselves unworthy
   of the good things intended to be accomplished by the instruments of
   righteousness and peace, the Lord will blow upon their waves, that with
   rage and fury they shall dash themselves against them; whom he will
   strengthen with the munition of rocks, not to be prevailed against. So
   that God's glory and their own ruin lie at the bottom of this close
   working of providence, in giving up a sinful people to a fruitless
   contending with their own deliverers, if ever they be delivered.

   Obj. But is not a people's contending with the instruments by whom God
   worketh amongst them, and for them, a sin and provocation to the eyes
   of his glory? How, then, can the Lord be said to give them up unto it?

   Ans. Avoiding all scholastical discourses, as unsuited to the work of
   this day, I shall briefly give in unto you how this is a sinful thing,
   yet sinners are given up unto it without the least extenuation of their
   guilt, or colour for charge on the justice and goodness of God.

   (1.) Then, to give up men unto a thing in itself sinful is no more but
   so to dispose and order things, that sinners may exercise and draw out
   their sinful principles in such a way. Of this that the Lord doth the
   Scripture is full of examples, and hath testimonies innumerable. That
   herein the Holy One of Israel is no ways co-partner with the guilt of
   the sons of men, will appear by observing the difference of these
   several agents in these four things:--

   [1.] The principle by which they work.

   [2.] The rule by which they proceed.

   [3.] The means which they use.

   [4.] The end at which they aim.

   [1.] The principle of operation in God is his own sovereign will and
   good pleasure. He doth whatsoever he pleaseth, Ps. cxv. 3. He saith his
   purpose shall stand, and he will do all his pleasure, Isa. xlvi. 10. He
   hath mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth,
   Rom. ix. 18; giving no account of his matters, Job xxxiii. 13. This our
   Saviour rendereth the only principle and reason of his hidden
   operations, "O Father, so it seemed good in thy sight," Matt. xi. 26.
   His sovereignty in doing what he will with his own, as the potter with
   his clay, is the rise of his operations; so that whatever he doth, "who
   will say unto him, What doest thou?" Job ix. 12. "Shall the thing
   formed say unto him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?" Rom.
   ix. 20. And hence two things will follow:--

   1st. That what he doth is just and righteous; for so must all acts of
   supreme and absolute dominion be.

   2dly. That he can be author of nothing but what hath existence and
   being itself; for he works as the fountain of beings. This sin hath
   not. So that though every action, whether good or bad, receives its
   specification from the working of providence, -- and to that is their
   existence in their several kinds to be ascribed, -- yet an evil action,
   in the evilness of it, depends not upon divine concourse and influence;
   for good and evil make not sundry kinds of actions, but only a
   distinction of a subject in respect of its adjuncts and accidents.

   But now the principle of operation in man is nature vitiated and
   corrupted; -- I say nature, not that he worketh naturally, being a free
   agent, but that these faculties, will and understanding, which are the
   principles of operation, are in nature corrupted, and from thence can
   nothing flow but evil. "An evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit." "Men
   do not gather figs from thistles." "A bitter fountain sends not forth
   sweet waters." "Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?" If the
   fountain be poisoned, can the streams be wholesome? What can you expect
   of light and truth from a mind possessed with vanity and darkness? what
   from a will averted from the chiefest good, and fixed upon present
   appearances? what from a heart the figment of whose imagination is only
   evil?

   [2.] Consider the difference in the rule of operation. Every thing that
   works hath a rule to work by; -- this is called a law. In that thing
   which to man is sinful, God worketh as it is a thing only; man, as it
   is a sinful thing. And how so? Why, every one's sin is his aberration
   from his rule of operation or working. Hamartanein, is "aberrare à
   scopo:" to sin is not to collime aright at the end proposed. He
   hamartia estin he anomia is a most exact definition of it. Irregularity
   is its form, if it may be said to have a form; a privation's form is
   deformity. Look, then, in any action wherein an agent exorbitates from
   its rule, -- that is sin. Now, what is God's rule in operation? His own
   infinite, wise will alone. He takes neither motive, rise, nor occasion
   for any internal acts from any thing without himself; he doth whatever
   he pleaseth, Ps. cxv. 3; he "worketh all things according to the
   counsel of his own will," Eph. i. 11; -- that is his own law of
   operation, and the rule of righteousness unto others:-- working them
   agreeably to his own will, which he always must do, he is free from the
   obliquity of any action. What, now, is the rule of the sons of men Why,
   the revealed will of God, "Revealed things belong to us, that we may do
   them," Deut. xxix. 29. God's revealed will is the rule of our walking,
   our working; whatever suits not, answers not this, is evil. "Sin is the
   transgression of the law," 1 John iii. 4. Here, then, comes in the
   deformity, the obliquity, the ataxy, of any thing. God works, and man
   worketh; those agents have several rules. God works according to his
   rule; hence the action is good, as an action; -- man deviates from his
   rule; hence it is sinful, in respect of its qualifications and
   adjuncts. Man writes fair letters upon a wet paper, and they run all
   into one blot; not the skill of the scribe, but the defect in the
   paper, is the cause of the deformity. He that makes a lame horse go, is
   the cause of his going; but the defect in his joints is the cause of
   his going lame. The sun exhales a steam from the dunghill; the sun is
   the cause of the exhalation, but the dunghill of the unwholesome
   savour. The first cause is the proper cause of a thing's being, but the
   second of its being evil.

   [3.] Consider the several operations and actings of God and man; for
   instance, in a rebellious people's fighting against their helpers under
   him.

   Now, the acts of God herein may be referred to six heads.

   1st. A continuance of the creature's being and life; -- "upholding him
   by the word of his power," Heb. i. 3, when he might take him off in a
   moment; -- "enduring them with much long-suffering," Rom. ix. 22, when
   he might cut them off, as he did the opposers of Elijah, with "fire
   from heaven," 2 Kings i. 12.

   2dly. A continuance of power of operation to them, when he could make
   their hands to wither, like Jeroboam's, when they go about to strike, 1
   Kings xiii. 4; or their hearts to die within them, like Nabal's, when
   they intend to be churlish, 1 Sam. xxv. 37. But he raiseth them up, or
   makes them to stand, that they may oppose, Rom. ix. 17.

   3dly. Laying before them a suitable object for the drawing forth their
   corruption unto opposition, giving them such helpers as shall in many
   things cross their lusts, and exasperate them thereunto, -- as Elijah,
   a man of a fiery zeal, for a lukewarm Ahab.

   4thly. Withholding from them that effectual grace by which alone that
   sin might be avoided, -- a not actually keeping them from that sin by
   the might of his Spirit and grace. That alone is effectual grace which
   is actual. "He suffers them to walk in their own ways."

   And this the Lord may do, --

   (1st.) In respect of them judicially, -- they deserve to be forsaken:
   Ahab is left to fill up the measure of his iniquities, -- "Add iniquity
   to iniquity," Ps. lxix. 27.

   (2dly.) In respect of himself, by way of sovereignty, -- doing what he
   will with his own, -- hardening whom he will, Rom. ix. 18.

   5thly. He positively sends upon their understandings that which the
   Scripture sets out under the terms of blindness, darkness, folly,
   delusion, slumber, a spirit of giddiness, and the like: the places are
   too many to rehearse. What secret actings in and upon the minds of men,
   -- what disturbing of their advices, -- what mingling of corrupt
   affections with false, carnal reasonings, -- what givings up to the
   power of darkness, in Satan the prince thereof, -- this judicial act
   doth contain, I cannot insist upon. Let it suffice, God will not help
   them to discern, yea, he will cause that they shall not discern, but
   hide from their eyes the things that concern their peace, and so give
   them up to contend with their only helpers.

   6thly. Suitably upon the will and affections he hath several acts, --
   obfirming the one in corruption, and giving up the other to vileness,
   Rom. i. 24, 26, until the heart become thoroughly hardened, and the
   conscience seared; not forcing the one, but leaving it to follow the
   judgment of practical reason, -- which being a blind, yea, a blinded
   guide, whither can it lead a blind follower, but into the ditch? -- not
   defiling the other with infused sensuality, but provoking them to act
   according to inbred, native corruption, and by suffering frequent vile
   actings to confirm them in ways of vileness.

   Take an instance of the whole: God gives helpers and deliverers to a
   sinful people; because of their provocations, some or all of them shall
   not taste of the deliverance by them to be procured. Wherefore, though
   he sustains their lives in being, whereby they might have opportunity
   to know his mind and their own peace; yet he gives them a power to
   contend with their helpers, causing their helpers to act such things
   as, under consideration of circumstances, shall exceedingly provoke
   these sinners. Being so exasperated and provoked, the Lord, who is free
   in all his dispensations, refuseth to make out to them that healing
   grace whereby they might be kept from a sinful opposition: yea, being
   justly provoked, and resolved that they should not taste of the plenty
   to come, he makes them foolish and giddy in their reasonings and
   counsels, -- blinds them in their understandings, that they shall not
   be able to discern plain and evident things, tending to their own good,
   but in all their ways shall err like a drunken man in his vomit;
   whence, that they may not be recovered, because he will destroy them,
   he gives in hardness and obstinacy upon their hearts and spirits,
   leaving them to suitable affections, to contend for their own ruin.

   Now, what are the ways and methods of sinful man's working in such
   opposition, would be too long for me to declare; what prejudices are
   erected, what lusts pursued, what corrupt interests acted and followed,
   -- how self is honoured, what false pretences coined, how God is
   slighted, -- if I should go about to lay open, I must look into the
   hell of these times, than which nothing can be more loathsome and
   abominable. Let it suffice, that sinful self, sinful lusts, sinful
   prejudices, sinful blindness, sinful carnal fears, sinful corrupt
   interests, sinful fleshly reasonings, sinful passions, and vile
   affections, do all concur in such a work, are all woven up together in
   such a web.

   [4.] See the distance of their aims. God's aim is only the
   manifestation of his own glory -- than which nothing but himself is so
   infinitely good, nothing so righteous that it should be [his aim] --
   and this by the way of goodness and severity, Rom. xi. 22; -- goodness,
   in faithfulness and mercy, preserving his who are opposed, whereby his
   glory is exceedingly advanced; -- severity towards the opposers, that,
   by a sinful, cursed opposition, they may fall up the measure of their
   iniquities, and receive this at the hand of the Lord, that they lie
   down in sorrow, -- wherein also he is glorious.

   God forbid that I should speak this of all that for any time, or under
   any temptation, may be carried to an opposition, in any kind or degree,
   to the instruments of God's glory amongst them. Many for a season may
   do it, and yet belong to God, who shall be recovered in due time. It is
   only of men given up, forsaken, opposing all the appearances of God
   with his saints and people in all his ways, of whom I speak.

   Now, what are the ends of this generation of fighters against this
   brazen wall? and how distant from those of the Lord's! "They consult to
   cast him down from his excellency" whom God will exalt, Ps. lxii. 4.
   They think not as the Lord, neither doth their heart mean so; but it is
   in their heart to destroy and to cut off, Isa. x. 7. To satisfy their
   own corrupt lusts, ambition, avarice, revenge, superstition, contempt
   of God's people because his, hatred of the yoke of the Lord, fleshly
   interests, -- even for these, and such like ends as these, is their
   undertaking.

   Thus, though there be a concurrence of God and man in the same thing,
   yet, considering the distance of their principles, rules, actings, and
   ends, it is apparent that man doth sinfully what the Lord doth
   judicially; which being an answer to the former objection, I return to
   give in some uses to the point.

   Use 1. Let men, constant, sincere, upright in the ways of God,
   especially in difficult times, know what they are to expect from many,
   yea, the most of the generation, whose good they intend, and among whom
   they live; -- opposition and fighting are like to be their lot; -- and
   that not only it will be so because of men's lusts, corruptions,
   prejudices, but also it shall be so from God's righteous judgments
   against a stubborn people. They harden their hearts that it may be so,
   to compass their ends; and God hardens their hearts that it shall be
   so, to bring about his aims. They will do it, to execute their revenge
   upon others; they shall do it, to execute God's vengeance upon
   themselves. This may be for consolation, that in their contending there
   is nothing but the wrath of man against them whom they oppose (which
   God will restrain, or cause it to turn to his praise); but there is the
   wrath of God against themselves, which who can bear? This, then, let
   all expect who engage their hearts to God, and follow the Lamb
   whithersoever he goeth.

   Men walking in the sincerity of their hearts are very apt to conceive
   that all sheaves should bow to theirs, that all men should cry, "Grace,
   grace," to their proceedings. Why should any oppose? "Quid meruere?"
   Alas! the more upright they are, the fitter for the Lord by them to
   break a gainsaying people. Let men keep close to those ways of God
   whereto protection is annexed, and let not their hearts fail them
   because of the people of the land. The storm of their fury will be like
   the plague of hail in Egypt; it smote only the cattle that were in the
   field; -- those who, upon the word of Moses, drove them into the
   houses, preserved them alive. If men wander in the field of their own
   ways, of self-seeking, oppression, ambition, and the like, doubtless
   the storm will carry them away; but for those who keep house, who keep
   close to the Lord, though it may have much noise, terror, and dread
   with it, it shall not come nigh them. And if the Lord, for causes best
   known, known only to his infinite wisdom, should take off any Josiahs
   in the opposition, he will certainly effect two things by it.

   (1.) To give them rest and peace.

   (2.) To further his cause and truth, by drawing out the prayers and
   appeals of the residue; and this living they valued above their lives.

   All you, then, that are the Lord's workmen, be always prepared for a
   storm. Wonder not that men see not the ways of the Lord, nor the
   judgments of our God; -- many are blinded. Admire not that they will so
   endlessly engage themselves into fruitless oppositions; -- they are
   hardened. Be not amazed that evidence of truth and righteousness will
   not affect them; -- they are corrupted. But this do; Come, and enter
   into the chambers of God, and you shall be safe until this whole
   indignation be overpast. I speak of all them, and only them, who follow
   the Lord in all his ways with upright hearts and single minds: if the
   Lord will have you to be a rock and a brazen wall for men to dash
   themselves against, and to break in pieces, though the service be
   grievous to flesh and blood, yet it is his, whose you are. Be prepared,
   the wind blows, -- a storm may come.

   Use 2. Let men set upon opposition make a diligent inquiry, whether
   there be no hand in the business but their own? whether their counsels
   be not leavened with the wrath of God, and their thoughts mixed with a
   spirit of giddiness, and themselves carried on to their own
   destruction? Let me see the opposer of the present ways of God, who,
   upon his opposition is made more humble, more self-denying, more empty
   of self-wisdom, more fervent in supplications and waiting upon God,
   than formerly; and I will certainly blot him out of the roll of men
   judicially hardened. But if therewith men become also proud, selfish,
   carnally wise, revengeful, furious upon earthly interests, full,
   impatient; doubtless God is departed, and an evil spirit from the Lord
   prevaileth on them. O that men would look about them before it be too
   late; see the Lord disturbing them, before the waves return upon them;
   know that they may pull down some antics that make a great show of
   supporting the church, and yet indeed are pargeted posts supported by
   it! The foundation is on a rock that shall not be prevailed against.

   Use 3. See the infinite wisdom and sovereignty of Almighty God, that is
   able to bring light out of darkness, and to compass his own righteous
   judgments by the sinful advisings and undertakings of men. Indeed the
   Lord's sovereignty and dominion over the creature doth not in any thing
   more exalt itself, than in working in all the reasonings, debates,
   consultations of men, to bring about his own counsels through their
   free workings. That men should use, improve their wisdom, freedom,
   choice, yea, lusts, not once thinking of God; yet all that while do his
   work more than their own, -- "this is the Lord's doing, and it is
   marvellous in our eyes."

   Of the last part of my text I shall not speak at all; neither indeed
   did I intend.
     __________________________________________________________________

   [207] Isa. li. 20.

   [208] Exod. x. 17.

   [209] Zech. v. 7, 8.

   [210] "Est quædam æmulatio divinæ rei, et humanæ." -- Ter. Apol.

   [211] See the appendix at the end of this sermon.

   [212] Rev. vi. 9, 10.

   [213] Tertul. Apol.

   [214] Sleid. Com., lib. viii.

   [215] In Num. cap. iv.

   [216] See the appendix about Toleration.
     __________________________________________________________________

Of toleration; and the duty of the magistrate about religion.

   The times are busy, and we must be brief. Prefaces for the most part
   are at all times needless, -- in these, troublesome. Mine shall only
   be, that aneu prooimion kai pathon, "without either preface or
   solemnity," I will fall to the business in hand. The thing about which
   I am to deal is commonly called Toleration in Religion, or toleration
   of several religions. The way wherein I shall proceed is not by
   contest, thereby to give occasion for the reciprocation of a saw of
   debate with any; but by the laying down of such positive observations,
   as being either not apprehended or not rightly improved by the most,
   yet lie at the bottom of the whole difference between men about this
   business, and tend in themselves to give light unto a righteous and
   equitable determination of the main thing contended about.

   And lastly, herein for method I shall first consider the grounds upon
   which that non-toleration whereunto I cannot consent has been, and is
   still, endeavoured to be supported; which I shall be necessitated to
   remove --

   I. By considering the arguments brought from holy writ;

   II. From some other general observations. And then in order;

   III. I shall assert the positive truth, as to the substance of the
   business under contest.

   All in these ensuing observations.

   I. As to the first of these --

   1. Although the expressions of "toleration," and "non-toleration,"
   wherewith the thing in controversy is vested, do seem to cast the
   affirmative upon them who plead for a forbearance in things of religion
   towards dissenting persons, yet the truth is, they are purely upon the
   negation, and the affirmative lies fully on the other part; and so the
   weight of proving, which ofttimes is heavy, lies on their shoulders
   Though non-toleration sound like a negation, yet punishment (which
   terms in this matter are isodunamounta is a deep affirmation. And,
   therefore, it sufficeth not men to say that they have consulted the
   mind of God, and cannot find that he ever spake to any of his saints or
   people to establish a toleration of error; and yet this is the first
   argument to oppose it produced in the late Testimony of the reverend
   and learned Assembly of the Church of Scotland. [217] Affirmative
   precepts must be produced for a non-toleration; that is, the punishing
   of erring persona For actings of such high concernment, men do
   generally desire a better warrant than this -- "There is nothing in the
   word against them." Clear light is needful for men who walk in paths
   which lead directly to houses of blood. God hath not spoken of
   non-toleration, is a certain rule of forbearance; but God hath not
   spoken of toleration, is no rule of acting in opposition thereunto.
   What he hath spoken, one way or other, shall be afterward considered.
   Positive actings must have positive precepts and rules for them, as
   conscience is its own guide. If, then, you will have persons deviating
   in their apprehensions from the truth of the gospel civilly punished,
   you must bring better warrant than this, that God hath not spoken
   against it; or I shall not walk in your ways, but refrain my foot from
   your path.

   2. That undoubtedly there are very many things under the command of the
   Lord, so becoming our duty, and within his promise, so made our
   privilege, which yet, if not performed, or not enjoyed, are not of
   human cognizance -- as faith itself; yet because the knowledge of the
   truth is in that rank of things, this also is urged as of weight, by
   the same learned persons, to the business at hand.

   3. Errors, though never so impious, are yet distinguished from
   peace-disturbing enormities. If opinions in their own nature tend to
   the disturbance of the public peace, either that public tranquility is
   not of God, or God alloweth a penal restraint of those opinions. It is
   a mistake, to affirm that those who plead for toleration do allow of
   punishment for offences against the second table -- not against the
   first. The case is the same both in respect of the one and the other.
   What offences against the second table are punishable? Doubtless not
   all, but only such as, by a disorderly eruption, pervert the course of
   public quiet and society; yea, none but such fall under human
   cognizance. The warrant of exercising vindictive power amongst men is
   from the reference of offences to their common tranquillity. "Delicta
   puniri publicè interest." Where punishment is the debt, "Bonum totius"
   the creditor to exact it. And this is allowed as to the offences
   against the first table. If any of them in their own nature (not some
   men's apprehensions) are disturbances of public peace, they also are
   punishable. Only, let not this be measured by disputable consequences,
   no more than the other are. Let the evidence be in the things
   themselves, and "Actum est," let who will plead for them. Hence --

   Popish religion, warming in its very bowels a fatal engine against all
   magistracy amongst us, cannot upon our concessions plead for
   forbearance; it being a known and received maxim, that the gospel of
   Christ clashes against no righteous ordinance of man.

   And let this be spoken to the third argument of the fore-named reverend
   persons, from the analogy of delinquencies against the first and second
   table.

   4. The plea for the punishment of erring persons from the penal
   constitution under the Old Testament against idolaters (which in the
   next place is urged), seems not very firm and convincing. The vast
   distance that is between idolatry and any errors whatsoever, as merely
   such, however propagated or maintained with obstinacy, much impaireth
   the strength of this argumentation.

   Idolatry is the yielding unto a creature the service and worship due to
   the Creator, Rainold. de Idol., lib. ii. cap. 1, sect. 1. "Idololatria
   est circa omne idolum famulatus et servitus," Tertul. de Pol. -- "The
   attendance and service of any idol." "Idololatræ dicuntur Qui
   similacris eam servitutem exhibent, quæ debertur Deo," August., lib. i.
   de Trinit. cap. 6 -- "They are idolaters who give that service to idols
   which is due unto God." To render glory to the creature as to God is
   idolatry, say the Papists, Bell, de Eccles. Triumph, lib. ii. cap. 24;
   Greg. de Valen. de Idol, lib. i. cap. 1; -- suitable to the description
   of it given by the apostle, Rom. i. 25: plainly, that whereunto the
   sanction under debate was added, as the bond of the law against it
   (which was the bottom of the commendable proceedings of divers kings of
   Judah against such), was a voluntary relinquishment of Jehovah revealed
   unto them, to give the honour due unto him to dunghill idols. Now,
   though error and ignorance ofttimes lie at the bottom of this
   abomination, yet error, properly so called, and which under the name of
   heresy is opposed, is sufficiently differenced therefrom. That common
   definition of heresy -- that it is an error, or errors, in or about the
   fundamentals of religion, maintained with stubbornness and pertinacy
   after conviction (for the main received by most Protestant divines) --
   will be no way suited unto that which was before given of idolatry, and
   is as commonly received, being indeed much more clear; as shall be
   afterward declared. That this latter is proper and suitable to those
   scriptural descriptions which we have of heresy, I dare not assert; but
   being received by them who urge the punishment thereof it may be a
   sufficient ground of affirming that those things whose definitions are
   so extremely different are also very distant and discrepant in
   themselves; and therefore constitutions for the disposal of things
   concerning the one cannot "eo nomine" include the other. Neither is the
   inference any stronger, than that a man may be hanged for coveting,
   because he may be so for murdering.

   The penal constitutions of the Judaical polity (for so they were, which
   yet I urge not) concerning idolaters, must be stretched beyond their
   limits, if you intend to inwrap heretics within their verge. If
   heretics be also idolaters, as the Papists (the poor Indians who
   worship a piece of red cloth, the Egyptians who adored the deities
   which grew in their own gardens, being not more besotted with this
   abomination than they who prostrate their souls unto, and lavish their
   devotion upon, a piece of bread, a little before they prepare it for
   the draught -- so casting the stumbling-block of their iniquities
   before the faces of poor Heathens and Jews, causing Averroes to breathe
   out his soul in this expression of that scandal, "Quoniam Christiani
   manducant Deum quem adorant, sit anima mea cum Philosophis!") then, the
   case seems to me to have received so considerable an alteration, that
   the plea of forbearance is extremely weakened as to my present
   apprehension. However, for the present I remove such from this debate.

   5. The like to this also may be said concerning blasphemy, the law
   whereof is likewise commonly urged in this cause. The establishment for
   the punishment of a blasphemer is in Lev. xxiv. 16. Given it was upon
   the occasion of the blaspheming and cursing of the son of an Egyptian,
   upon his striving and contending with an Israelite. Being probably, in
   his own apprehension, wronged by his adversary, he fell to reviling his
   God. The word here used to express his sin, is nqv?, signifying also to
   pierce, and is twice so rendered -- Isa. xxxvi. 6; Heb. iii. 14.
   Desperate expressions, piercing the honour and glory of the Most High
   willingly and willfully, were doubtless his death-deserving crime. It
   is the same word that Balak used to Balaam, when he would have
   persuaded him to a deliberate cursing and pouring out of imprecations
   on the people of God, Num. xxiii. 13, 14. A resolved piercing of the
   name and glory of God, with cursed reproaches, is the crime here
   sentenced to death. The schoolmen tell us, that to complete blasphemy,
   the perverse affection of the heart, in detestation of the goodness of
   God, joined with the reproaches of his name, is required. [218] Which,
   how remote it is from error of any sort (I mean within the compass of
   them whereof we speak), being a pure misapprehension of the
   understanding, embraced (though falsely) for the honour of God, I
   suppose is easily conceived; and so, consequently, that the argument
   for the death of a person erring, because he came off no easier of old
   who blasphemed, is "à baculo ad angulum.

   If any shall say that blasphemy is of a larger extent and more general
   acceptation in the Scripture, I shall not deny it; but yet that that
   kind of blasphemy which was punishable with violent death, was
   comprehensive of any inferior crime, I suppose cannot be proved.
   However, blasphemy in the Scripture is never taken in any place, that I
   can remember, for a man's maintaining his own error; but for his
   reviling and speaking evil of the truth which he receiveth not: and so
   Paul before his conversion was a blasphemer. [219] Now, if men to whom
   forbearance is indulged in by-paths of their own, shall make it their
   work to cast dirt on the better ways of truth, it is to me very
   questionable whether they do not offend against that prime dictate of
   nature for the preservation of human society, "Quod tibi fieri non vis,
   alteri ne feceris;" and for such I will be no advocate. Neither can,
   indeed, the law of blasphemy be impartially urged by us in any case of
   heresy whatsoever. For --

   (1.) The penal sanctions of the laws of God are not in England esteemed
   of moral equity, and perpetually indispensable; for if so, why do
   adulterers unmolested behold the violent death of stealers?

   (2.) The blasphemer by that law was not allowed his clergy; die he must
   without mercy, no room being left for the intervention of repentance,
   as to the removal of his temporal punishment; when once the witnesses'
   garments were rent, he was anathema. But in case of any heresy,
   repentance, yea, recantation, is a sure antidote (at least for once, so
   it is among the Papists) against all corporeal sufferings.

   6. Neither doth that place in Zech. xiii. 3, concerning the running
   through of the false prophet, more prove or approve of the punishment
   of death to be inflicted for misapprehensions in the matters of
   religion (and if it proves not that, it proverb nothing; for slaying is
   the thing expressed, and certainly if proofs be taken from the letter,
   the letter must be obeyed, or we force the word to serve our
   hypothesis) than that place of John x. 1, "He that entereth not by the
   door is a thief and a robber;" which Bellarmine strongly urgeth to this
   very purpose, because thieves and robbers are so dealt withal
   righteously. [220] If such deductions may be allowed, it will be easy
   to prove "quidlibet ex quolibet," at any time.

   If the letter be urged, and the sense of the letter as it lies (indeed
   [221] the figurative sense of such places is the proper, literal sense
   of them), let that sense alone be kept to. Let parents, then, pass
   sentence, condemn, and execute their children, when they turn seducers;
   and that in any kind whatsoever -- into what seduction soever they
   shall be engaged, be it most pernicious, or in things of less
   concernment. The letter allows of none of our distinctions; be they
   convinced or not convinced, obstinate or not obstinate, all is one --
   so it must be: thrust through and slain by their parents must they fall
   to the ground. Only observe, his father and his mother that begat him
   must be made magistrates -- prophets with unclean spirits be turned
   into heretics:-- only "thrusting through," that must be as it is in the
   letter; yea, though plainly the party of whom it is said, "Thou shalt
   not live," verse 3, is found alive, verse 6. Surely such an Orleans
   gloss [222] is scarce sufficient to secure a conscience in slaying
   heretics. But, when men please, this whole place shall directly point
   at the discipline of the churches, and their spiritual censures under
   the gospel -- curing deceivers, and bringing them home to confession
   and acknowledgment of their folly. See the late Annot. of the Bible.

   7. From the asserting of the authority and description of the duty of
   the magistrate, Rom. xiii., the argument is very easy that is produced
   for the suppressing by external force of erroneous persona The
   paralogism is so foul and notorious in this arguing -- "He is to
   suppress evil deeds; heresy is an evil deed: therefore that also" that
   it needs no confutation. That he is to punish all evil deeds was never
   yet affirmed. Unbelief is a work of the flesh -- so is coveting; one,
   the root-sin, against the first, the other against the second table:
   yet in themselves both exempted from the magistrate's cognizance and
   jurisdiction. The evil-doers, doubtless, for whose terror and
   punishment he is appointed, are such as by their deeds disturb that
   human society the defence and protection whereof is to him committed.
   That among the number of these are errors, the depravations of men's
   understandings, hath not yet been proved.

   8. The case of the seducer, from Deut. xiii., is urged with more show
   of reason than any of the others to the business in hand; but yet the
   extreme discrepancies between the proof and the thing intended to be
   proved make any argumentation from this place, as to the matter in
   hand, very intricate, obscure, and difficult. For --

   (1.) The person here spoken of pretends an immediate revelation from
   heaven: he pretends dreams, and gives signs and wonders, verse 1, and
   so exempts his spirit from any regular trial Heretics, for the most
   part, offer to be tried by the rule that is "in medio," acknowledged of
   all -- a few distempered enthusiasts excepted.

   (2.) His business is to entice from the worship of Jehovah -- not in
   respect of the manner, but the object, verse 5. All heretics pretend
   the fear of that great name.

   (3.) The accepting and owning idol, dunghill gods in his room, is the
   thing persuaded to, verse 2 (and those were only stocks and stones);
   and this in opposition to Jehovah, who had revealed himself by Moses.
   Heretics worship him, own him, and abhor all thoughts of turning away
   from following after him, according to their erroneous apprehensions.
   Manichees, Marcionites, Valentinians, and such like names of infidels,
   I reckon not among heretics; neither will their brain-sick, paganish
   follies be possibly comprehended under that definition of heresy which
   is now generally received. Mohammedans are far more rightly termed
   heretics than they.

   (4.) This seducer was to die without mercy. And Ainsworth observes from
   the rabbins, that this offender alone had traps laid to catch him; and
   were he but once overheard to whisper his seduction, though never so
   secretly, there was no expiation of his transgression without his own
   blood. But now this place is urged for all kind of restraint and
   punishment whatsoever. Now, where God requires blood, is it allowed to
   man to commute at an inferior rate? So, I confess, it is urged. But yet
   what lies at the bottom, in the chambers of their bellies who plead for
   the power of the magistrate to punish erring persons from those, and
   such like places as these, is too apparent. Blood is there: swiftly or
   slowly, they walk to the chambers of death.

   (5.) Obstinacy after conviction, turbulency, etc., which are now laid
   down as the main weights that turn the scale on the side of severity,
   are here not once mentioned, nor by any thing in the least intimated.
   If he have done it, yea, but once, openly or secretly, whether he have
   been convinced of the sinfulness of it or no, be he obstinate or
   otherwise, it is not once inquired -- die he must, as if he had
   committed murder, or the like indispensable death-procuring crime. If
   the punishment, then, of erring persons be urged from this place, all
   consideration of their conviction, obstinacy, pertinacy, must be laid
   aside: the text allows them no more plea in this business than our law
   doth in the case of wilful murder.

   (6.) Repentance and recantation will, in the judgment of all, reprieve
   an erring person from any sentence of any punishment corporeal
   whatsoever; and many reasons may be given why they should so do. Here
   is no such allowance. Repent or not repent, recant or not recant, he
   hath no sacrifice of expiation provided for him -- die he must.

   (7.) The law contains the sanction of the third commandment, as the
   whole was a rule of the Jewish polity in the land of Canaan. This
   amongst us is generally conceived not binding, as such.

   (8.) The formal reason of this law, by some insisted on -- because he
   sought to turn a man from Jehovah, --

   [1.] Is of force only in this case of the object whereunto seduction
   tends -- viz., strange gods -- and no other.

   [2.] Turning from Jehovah respects not any manner of backsliding in
   respect of the way of worship, but a falling away from him as the
   object of worship.

   Now, there being these and many other discrepancies hindering the cases
   proposed from running parallel, I profess, for my part, I cannot see
   how any such evident deductions can possibly be drawn from hence as to
   be made a bottom of practice and acting in things of so high
   concernment. What may be allowed from the equity of those and the like
   constitutions, and deduced by analogy and proportion to the business in
   hand, I shall afterward declare.

   II. The sum of what is usually drawn from holy writ against such
   forbearance as I suppose may be asserted, and for the punishing
   heretics with capital punishments, being briefly discussed, I proceed,
   in the next place, to such other general observations as may serve to
   the farther clearing of the business in hand; and they are these that
   follow:--

   The forbearance of or opposition unto errors, may be considered with
   respect either unto civil or spiritual judicature.

   First, For the latter, it is either personal or ecclesiastical,
   properly so called. Personal forbearance of errors, in a spiritual
   sense, is a moral toleration or approbation of them; so also is
   ecclesiastical. The warrant for procedence against them on that hand is
   plain and evident: certainly this way no error is to be forborne. All
   persons who have any interest and share in truth are obliged, in their
   several ways and stations, to an opposition unto every error -- an
   opposition to be carried on by gospel mediums and spiritual weapons.
   Let them, according as they are called or opportuned, disprove them
   from the word, "contending earnestly for the faith once delivered unto
   the saints." Erring persons are usually "bono animo," says Salvian --
   very zealous to propagate their false conceptions; and shall the
   children of truth be backward in her defence? Precepts unto this as a
   duty, commendations of it, encouragements unto it, are very frequent in
   the gospel. Alike is this duty incumbent on all churches walking to the
   rule. The spiritual sword of discipline may be lawfully sheathed in the
   blood of heresies. No spiritual remedy can be too sharp for a spiritual
   disease. When the cure is suited to the malady, there is no danger of
   the application. And this is not denied by any. He that submits himself
   to any church society, does it "ea lege," -- of being obedient to the
   authority of Christ in that church in all its censures. "Volenti non
   fit injuria." Error is offensive, and must be proceeded against.
   Examples and precepts of this abound in the Scriptures. The blood of
   many erring persons, I doubt not, will one day have a "quo warranto"
   granted them against their (as to the particulars in debate) orthodox
   slayers, who did it to promote the service of God. Let them not fear an
   after-reckoning who use the discipline of Christ according to his
   appointment.

   This being considered, the occasion of a most frequent paralogism is
   removed. If errors must be tolerated, say some, then men may do what
   they please, without control. No means, it seems, must be used to
   reclaim them. But is gospel conviction no means? Hath the sword of
   discipline no edge? Is there no means of instruction in the New
   Testament established, but a prison and a halter? Are the hammer of the
   word and the sword of the Spirit, which in days of old broke the
   stubbornest mountains, and overcame the proudest nations, now quite
   useless? God forbid! Were the churches of Christ established according
   to his appointment, and the professors of the truth so knit up "in the
   unity of the Spirit and bond of peace" as they ought to be, and were in
   the primitive times, I am persuaded those despised instruments would
   quickly make the proudest heretic to tremble. When the churches walked
   in sweet communion, giving each other continual account of their
   affairs, and warning each other of all or any such persons as, either
   in practice or doctrine, walked not with a right foot (as we have
   examples in Clem. Epist. ad Corinth. -- the churches of Vienne and
   Lyons to those of Asia, Euseb.; -- of Ignatius to several persons and
   churches -- of Irenæus to Victor., Euseb.; -- to Stephen, ibid., and
   the like), heretics found such cold entertainment as made them ashamed,
   if not weary, of their chosen wanderings. But this is not my present
   business.

   Secondly, There is an opposition or forbearance in reference to a civil
   judicature and procedence of things which respecteth errors in a. real
   sense, as to the inflicting or not inflicting of punishment on
   religious delinquents. And this is the sole thing under debate, viz. --

   Whether persons enjoying civil authority over others -- being intrusted
   therewithal according to the constitutions of the place and nation
   where the lot of them both, by providence, is fallen -- are invested
   with power from above, and commanded in the word of God, to coerce,
   restrain, punish, confine, imprison, banish, hang, or burn, such of
   those persons under their jurisdiction as shall not embrace, profess,
   believe, and practice, that truth and way of worship which is revealed
   unto them of God? or how far, into what degrees, by what means, in any
   of these ways, may they proceed?

   The general propositions and considerations of the penal laws of God,
   which were before laid down, have, as I suppose, left this business to
   a naked debate from the word of truth, without any such prejudices on
   either part as many take from a misapprehension of the mind of God in
   them; and therefore, by the reader's patience, I shall venture upon the
   whole anew, as if no such arguments had ever been proposed for the
   affirmative of the question in hand, not declining the utmost weight
   that is in any of them, according to equity and due proportion. And
   here, first, I shall give in a few things --

   (1.) To the question itself.

   (2.) To the manner of handling it.

   (1.) To the question itself. For herein I suppose --

   [1.] That the persons enjoying authority do also enjoy the truth; which
   is to the advantage of the affirmative.

   [2.] That their power in civil things is just and unquestionable; which
   also looks favorably on that side.

   [3.] That non-toleration makes out itself in positive infliction of
   punishment; which is so, or is nothing. Casting men out of protection,
   exposing them to vulgar violence, is confessedly unworthy of men
   representing the authority of God, and contrary to the whole end of
   their trust.

   (2.) To the manner of handling this question among persons at variance.
   And here I cannot but observe --

   [1.] That if I have taken my aim aright, there is no one thing under
   debate amongst Christians that is agitated with more confidence and
   mutual animosity of the parties litigant -- each charging other with
   dreadful inferences -- streams of blood, and dishonour to God, flowing
   out from their several persuasions; so that ofttimes, instead of a fair
   dispute, you meet on this subject with a pathetical outcry, as though
   all religion were utterly contaminated and trampled under foot, if both
   these contradictory assertions be not embraced. Now, seeing that in
   itself it is a thing wherein the gospel is exceedingly sparing, if not
   altogether silent, certainly there must be a farther interest than of
   judgment alone, or else that very much prejudicated with corrupt
   affections, or men could not possibly be carried out with so much
   violence upon supposed self-created consequences, wherewith in this
   cause they urge one another.

   [2.] That generally thus much of private interest appears in the
   several contesters, that non-toleration is the opinion of the many, and
   these enjoying the countenance of authority -- toleration, of the
   oppressed, who always go under the name of the faction, or factions --
   the unavoidable livery of the smaller number professing a way of
   worship by themselves, be it right or wrong. I do not desire to lay
   forth the usual deportment of men seeking the suppressing of others
   differing from them, towards those in authority. It is but too clearly
   made out by daily experience. If they close with them, they are
   "custodes utriusque tabulæ," -- the church's nursing-fathers, etc. --
   what they please; but if they draw back, for want of light or truth to
   serve them, logs and storks find not worse entertainment from frogs
   than they from some of them. Such things as these may, nay, ought to
   be, especially heeded by every one that knows what influence corrupt
   affections have upon the judgments of men, and would willingly take the
   pains to wipe his eyes for the discerning of the truth.

   These things premised, I assert that --

   Non-toleration -- in the latitude which is for persons in authority
   enjoying the truth (or supposing they do enjoy it) to punish in an
   arbitrary way, according to what they shall conceive to be condign, men
   who will not forsake their own convictions about any head or heads of
   Christian religion whatsoever, to join with what they hold out, either
   for belief or worship, after the using of such ways of persuasion as
   they shall think fit -- is no way warranted in the gospel; nor can any
   sound proof for such a course be taken from the Old Testament.

   The testimonies out of the law, which I can apprehend to have any
   colour or appearance of strength in them, with the examples approved of
   God that seem to look this way, I considered at our entrance into this
   discourse.

   I speak of punishing in an arbitrary way; for all instances produced to
   the purpose in hand, that speak of any punishment, mention nothing
   under death itself; which yet, at least in the first place, is not
   aimed at by those that use them in our days, as I suppose. Now, some
   divines of no small name maintain, that God hath not left the
   imposition of punishment in any measure to the wills of men.

   Some arguments for the proof of the former assertion as laid down I
   shall in due place make use of; for the present, I desire to commend to
   the serious pondering of all Christians in general, especially of those
   in authority, these ensuing considerations --

   1. That it is no privilege of truth to furnish its assertors with this
   persuasion, that the dissenters from it ought forcibly to be opposed,
   restrained, punished.

   No false religion ever yet in the world did enthrone itself in the
   minds of men enjoying a civil sovereignty over the persons of others,
   but it therewithal commanded them, under pain of neglect and contempt
   of itself, to crush any underling worship that would perk up in
   inferior consciences.

   The old heathens carried their gods into the war (as did the
   Philistines, 1 Chron. xiv. 12, and the Israelites the ark, with
   heathenish superstition, 1 Sam. iv. 3), to whom they ascribed the
   success they obtained; and in requital of their kindness, they forced
   the dunghill deities of the conquered nations to attend the triumph of
   their victorious idols; and unless they adopted them into the number of
   their own gods, all farther worship to them was forbidden. Hence were
   these inventions among the old Romans, by spells and enchantments, to
   entice away a deity from any city they besieged (they being as expert
   at the getting of a devil as Tobias's Raphael, or the present Romanists
   at his fumigation); by which means they shrived into the honour of
   having thirty thousand unconquered idols, [223] and deserved worthily
   that change of their city's epithet from Epitome oikoumenes to Epitome
   deisidaimonias -- which it justly inheriteth to this very day.
   Rabshakeh's provocation to the example of the gods of the nations, 2
   Kings xviii. 33, 34, and the Roman senate's consultation concerning the
   admitting of Christ to a place among their idols, that he might have
   been freely worshipped (their consent being prevented by his almighty
   providence, who will not be enrolled among the vilest works of his most
   corrupted creatures), do both declare this thing.

   Now, not to speak of Cain, who seems to me to have laid the foundation
   of that cruelty which was afterwards inserted into the church's
   orthodoxies by the name of Hæreticidium; we find the four famous
   empires of the world to have drunk in this persuasion to the utmost, of
   suppressing all by force and violence that consented not to them in
   their way of worship.

   Nebuchadnezzar, the "crown of the golden head," set up a furnace with
   an image; and a negative answer to that query, "Do you not serve my
   gods, nor worship my image?" served to cast the servants of the living
   God into the midst of the fire, Dan. iii. 1.

   Daniel's casting into the lions' den, chapter vi., shows that the
   Persian silver breast and arms did not want iron hands to crush or
   break the opposers of, or dissenters from, their religious edicts.

   And though we find not much of the short-lived founder of the Grecian
   dominion, yet what was the practice of the branches of that empire,
   especially in the Syrian and Egyptian sprouts, the books of the
   Maccabees, Josephus, and others, do abundantly manifest.

   For the Romans, though their judgment and practice -- which fully and
   wholly are given over from the dragon to the beast and false prophet --
   be written in the blood of thousands of Christians, and so not to be
   questioned; yet, that it may appear that we are not the only men in
   this generation, that this wisdom of punishing dissenters was not born
   with us, I shall briefly give in what grounds they proceeded on, and
   the motives they had to proceed as they did.

   (1.) First, then, they enacted it as a law, that no religious worship
   should be admitted or practised without the consent, decree, and
   establishment of the senate. Mention is made of a formal law to this
   purpose in Tertullian, Apol., cap. v., though now we find it not. The
   foundation of it was doubtless in that of the twelve tables: "Separatim
   nemo habessit deos, neve novos, sed ne advenas, nisi publicè ascitos,
   privatim colunto;" -- "Let none have gods to himself, neither let any
   privately worship new or strange deities, unless they be publicly owned
   and enrolled." And that it was their practice, and in the counsels of
   the wisest amongst them, appears in that advice given by Mæcenas to
   Augustus, in Dion Cassius: To men zeion pante pantos autos te sebou,
   kata ta patria, kai tous allous timan anankaze; tous de de zenizontas
   ti peri auto, kai misei kai kolaze, me monon ton theon heneka, hon
   kataphronesas oud' allou an tinos protimeseien, all' hoti kaina tina
   daimonia hoi toioutoi anteispherontes pollous anapeithousin
   allotrionomein; kak toutou kai sunomosiai kai sustaseis, etaireiai te
   gignontai, haper hekista monarchia sumpherei -- "Worship," saith he,
   "the divine power thyself according to the constitutions of thy
   country, everywhere and at all times; and compel others so to honour
   it. But hate and punish those who introduce foreign religions; not only
   for the god's sake -- whom he who contemneth will regard nothing else
   -- but because such, introducing new deities, do persuade many to
   transgress (or to change affairs); whence are conjurations, seditions,
   private societies -- things no way conducing to monarchy," Hist. Rom.,
   lib. 52:36.

   Hence, doubtless, was that opposition which Paul met withal in divers
   of the Roman territories. Thus, at Athens (though, as I suppose, they
   enjoyed there their own laws and customs, very suitable, as it should
   seem, to those of the Romans), preaching Jesus, he was accused to be "a
   setter forth of strange gods," Acts xvii. 1. For although, as Strabo
   observeth of the Athenians, that publicly, by the authority of the
   magistrates, polla ton zenikon hieron paredexanto, "they received many
   things of foreign worships;" yet that none might attempt any such
   things of themselves is notorious from the case of Socrates, who, as
   Laertius witnesseth, was condemned as hous men nomizei zeous -- "one
   who thought not those to be gods whom the city thought so to be, but
   brought in certain new deities." Hence, I say, was Paul's opposition,
   and his haling to Mars-hill. Without doubt, also, this was the bottom
   of that stir and trouble he met withal about Philippi. It is true,
   private interest lay in the bottom with the chief opposers; but this
   legal constitution was that which was plausibly pretended. Acts xvi.
   21, "They teach customs which are not lawful for us to receive, neither
   to observe, being Romans:" ouk exesti Rhomaiois, -- "it is not lawful
   for us Romans" to receive the religion they hold out, because statutes
   are made amongst us against all religious worship not allowed by public
   authority. Let Calvin's short annotation on that place be seen.
   Gallio's refusing to judge between Jews (as he thought) in a Jewish
   controversy, is no impeachment of this truth; had it been about any
   Roman establishment, he would quickly have interposed. Now, this law
   amongst them was doubtless "fundi Christiani calamitas."

   This, then, in the first place, was enacted, that no worship should be
   admitted, no religion exercised, but what received establishment and
   approbation from them who supposed themselves to be intrusted with
   authority over men in such things. And this power of the dragon was
   given over to the beast and false prophet. The anti-christian power
   succeeding in the room of the paganish -- the pope and councils, of the
   emperors and senate -- it was quickly confirmed that none should be
   suffered to live in peace who received not his mark and name, Rev.
   xiii. 16, 17. Whereunto, for my part, I cannot but refer very many of
   those following imperial constitutions, which were made at first
   against the opposers of the church's orthodoxism, but were turned
   against the witnesses of Jesus in the close.

   (2.) This being done, they held out the reasons of this establishment.
   I shall touch only one or two of them, which are still common to them
   who walk in the same paths with them.

   [1.] Now, the first was, That toleration of sundry ways of worship, and
   several religions, tends to the disturbance of the commonwealth and
   that civil society which men under the same government do and ought to
   enjoy. So Cicero tells us, lib. ii., De Leg., "Suosque deos, aut novos,
   aut alienigenas coli, confusionem habet," etc.; -- it brings in
   confusion of religion and civil society. The same is clearly held out
   in that counsel of Mæcenas to Augustus before mentioned. "They," saith
   he, "who introduce new deities, draw many into innovations; whence are
   conspiracies, seditions, conventicles, no way profitable for the
   commonwealth."

   [2.] The other main reason was, That hereby the gods, whom they owned
   and worshipped, were dishonoured and provoked to plague them. That this
   was continually in their mouths and clamours, all the acts at the
   slaying of the martyrs, the rescripts of emperors, the apologies of the
   Christians, as Tertullian, Justin Martyr, Arnobius, Minutius Felix, do
   abundantly testify. All trouble was still ascribed to their impiety.
   Upon the first breaking out of any judgment, as though the cause of it
   had been the toleration of Christians, presently the vulgar cry was,
   "Christianos ad leones." Now, that those causes and reasons have been
   traduced to all those who have since acted the same things, especially
   to the emperors' successor at Rome, needs not to be proved. With the
   power of the dragon, the wisdom also is derived. See that great
   champion, Cardinal Bellarmine, fighting with these very weapons, Lib.
   de Laicis, cap. 21. And indeed, however illustrated, improved, adorned,
   supported, flourished, and sweetened, they are the sum of all that to
   this day hath been said in the same case.

   (3.) Having made a law, and supported it with such reasons, as these,
   in proceeding to the execution of the penalty of that law as to
   particular persons (which penalty being, as now, arbitrary, was
   inflicted unto banishment, imprisonment, mine-digging, torturing in
   sundry kinds, maiming, death, according to the pleasure of the judges),
   they always charged upon those persons, not only the denying and
   opposing their own deities, religion, and worship; but also, that that
   which they embraced was foolish, absurd, detestable, pernicious,
   sinful, wicked, ruinous to commonwealths, cities, society, families,
   honesty, order, and the like. If a man should go about to delineate the
   Christian religion by the lines and features drawn thereof in the
   invectives and accusations of their adversaries, he might justly
   suppose that indeed that was their god which was set up at Rome with
   this inscription, "Deus Chistianorum Ononychites;" being an image with
   ass's ears, in a gown, claws or talons upon one foot, with a book in
   his hand. Charged they were that they worshipped an ass's head; which
   impious folly -- first fastened on the Jews by Tacitus, Hist., lib. v.
   cap. 1, in these words, "Effigiem animalis, quo monstrante errorem
   sitimque depulerant, penetrali sacravere" (having before set out a
   feigned direction received by a company of asses), which he had
   borrowed from Apion, a railing Egyptian of Alexandria [224] -- was so
   ingrafted in their minds that no defensative could be allowed. The
   [225] sun, the cross, "sacerdotis genitalia," were either really
   supposed, or impiously imposed on them, as the objects of their
   worship. The blood and flesh of infants, at Thyestean banquets, was
   said to be their food and provision; promiscuous lust, with incest,
   their chiefest refreshment. Such as these it concerned them to have
   them thought to be, being resolved to use them as if they were so
   indeed. Hence I am not sometimes without some suspicion, that many of
   the impure abominations, follies, villainies, which are ascribed unto
   the primitive heretics, yea, the very Gnostics themselves (upon whom
   the filth that lies is beyond all possible belief), [226] might be
   feigned and imposed, as to a great part thereof. For though not the
   very same, yet things as foolish and opposite to the light of nature,
   were at the same time charged on the most orthodox.

   But you will say, They who charged these things upon the Catholics were
   Pagans, enemies of God and Christ; but these, who so charged heretics,
   were Christians themselves. And so say I also, and therefore, for
   reverence of the name (though perhaps I could), I say no more. But yet
   this I say, that story which you have in Minutius Felix (or Arnobius,
   viii. book apologetical), of the meeting of Christians, the drawing
   away of the light by a dog tied to the candlestick, so to make way for
   adulteries and incests, I have heard more than once told with no small
   confidence of Brownists and Puritans. Hath not this very same course
   been taken in latter ages? Consult the writings of Waldensis and the
   rest of his companions, about Wickliffe and his followers, -- see the
   occasion of his falling off from Rome in our own chronicles, in Fabian
   of old, yea, and Daniel of late, to gratify a popish court; -- of
   Eckius, Hosius, Staphylus, Bolsec, Bellarmine, and the rest who have
   undertaken to portray out unto us Luther and Calvin, with their
   followers; -- and you will quickly see that their great design was to
   put on (as they did upon the head of John Huss at the Council of
   Constance, when he was led to the stake) the ugly visard of some
   devilish appearance, that under that form they might fit them for fire
   and fagot. And herein also is the polity of the dragon derived to the
   false prophet, and a colour tempered for persecutors to imbrue their
   hands in the blood of martyrs.

   This was the old Roman way, and I thought it not amiss to cautionate
   those enjoying truth and authority, that, if it be possible, they may
   not walk in their steps and method. The course accounted so sovereign
   for the extirpation of error was, as you see, first invented for the
   extirpation of truth.

   2. I desire it may be observed, that the general issue and tendence of
   unlimited arbitrary persecution, or punishing for conscience' sake
   (because in all ages, hoi pleiones kakoi, and the worst of men have sat
   at the upper end of the world, for the most part more false worshippers
   having hitherto enjoyed authority over others than followers of the
   Lamb), hath been pernicious, fatal, and dreadful to the profession and
   professors of the gospel, -- little or not at all serviceable to the
   truth.

   I have heard it averred by a reverend and learned personage, that more
   blood of heretics hath been shed by wholesome severity, in the
   maintenance of the truth and opposition unto errors, than hath been
   shed of the witnesses of Jesus by the sword of persecution, in the
   hands of heretics and false worshippers; -- an assertion, I conceive,
   under favour, so exceedingly distant from the reality of the thing
   itself, that I dare take upon me, against any man breathing, that in
   sundry Christian provinces, -- almost in every one of the west, -- more
   lives have been sacrificed to the one idol Hæreticidium, of those that
   bear witness to the truth, in the belief for which they suffered, than
   all the heretics, properly so called, that ever were slain in all the
   provinces of the world by men professing the gospel. And I shall give
   that worthy divine, or any other of his persuasion, his option among
   all the chiefest provinces of Europe, to tie me up unto which they
   please. He that shall consider that above sixty thousand persons were,
   in six years or little more, cut off in a judicial way, by Duke D'Alva
   in the Netherlands, in pursuit of the sentence of the inquisition, will
   conclude that there is "causa facilis" in my hand.

   The ancient contest between the Homoousians and the Arians, -- the
   first controversy the churches were agitated withal after they enjoyed
   a Christian magistrate (and may justly be supposed to be carried on to
   the advantage of error beyond all that went before it, because of the
   civil magistrates interesting themselves in the quarrel), -- was not
   carried out to violence and blood before the several persuasions
   lighted on several dominions and state interests: as between the Goths,
   Vandals, and the rest of their companions on one side, who were Arians;
   and the Romans on the other. In all whose bickerings, notwithstanding,
   the honour of severity did still attend the Arians, especially in
   Africk, where they persecuted the Catholics with horrible outrage and
   fury:-- five thousand at one time were barbarously exposed to all
   manner of cruel villainy. Some eruptions of passion had been before
   among emperors themselves; but still with this difference, that they
   who Arianized carried the bell for zeal against dissenters. Witness
   Valens, who gave place in persecution to none of his pagan
   predecessors, killing, burning, slaying, making havoc of all orthodox
   professors; yea, perhaps that which he did -- at least was done by the
   countenance of his authority -- at Alexandria, upon the placing in of
   Lucius an Arian in the room of Athanasius, thrusting Peter beside the
   chair, who was rightly placed according to the custom of those times;
   perhaps, I say, the tumults, rapes, murders, then and there acted, did
   outgo what before had been done by the Pagans. See Theodoret, Eccles.
   Hist., lib. iv., cap. 19. It were tedious to pursue the lying,
   slandering invectives, banishments, deaths, tumults, murders, which
   attend this council all along, after once they began to invoke the help
   of the emperors one against another; yet in this space some
   magistrates, weary with persecuting ways, did not only abstain
   practically from force and violence, -- as most of the orthodox
   emperors did, -- but also enacted laws for the freedom of such as
   dissented from them. Jovianus, a pious man, grants all peace that will
   be peaceable; offended only with them who would offer violence to
   others, Socrates Eccles. Hist., lib. iii. cap. 25. Gratianus makes a
   law, whereby he granted liberty to all sects, but Manichees,
   Photinians, and Eunomians, Sozom. Eccles. Hist., lib. vii. cap. 1. Many
   more the like examples might be produced.

   The next difference about the worship of God, to the Arian and its
   branches, that was controverted in letters of blood, was about images
   and their worship; in which, though some furious princes -- in
   opposition to that growing idolatry which, by popes, bishops, priests,
   and especially monks, was in those days violently urged -- did mingle
   some of their blood with their sacrifices; yet not to the tithe almost
   of what the Iconolastræ, getting uppermost, returned upon them and
   their adherents.

   This, if occasion were, might be easily demonstrated from Paulus
   Diaconus, and others. After this, about the year 850, -- about which
   time the Iconolatræ having ensnared the west by polity (the posterity
   of Charles the Great, who had stoutly opposed the worship of images,
   complying with the popes, the fathers of that worship, for their own
   ends), and wearied the east by cruelty, -- that contest growing towards
   an end, the whole power of punishing for religion became subservient to
   the dictates of the pope, the kings of the earth giving their power to
   the beast; unto which point things had been working all along; -- from
   thence, I say, until the death of Servetus in Geneva, the pursuit of
   Gentilis, Blandrata, and some other madmen in Helvetia, for the space
   well-nigh of seven hundred years, -- the chiefest season of the reign
   of Satan and Antichrist, -- all punishing for religion was managed by
   the authority of Rome, and against the poor witnesses of Jesus,
   prophesying in sackcloth in the several regions of the west. And what
   streams of blood were poured out, what millions of martyrs slain in
   that space, is known to all. Hence Bellarmine boasteth that the
   Albigenses were extinguished by the sword, De Laic. cap. xxii. It is
   true, there were laws enacted of old by Theodosius, Valentinian,
   Martian, -- as C. De. hæreticis, 1; Manichseis, 1; Arianis, 1;
   Unicuique, which last provideth for the death of seducers; but yet,
   truly, though they were made by Catholics, and in the favour of
   Catholics, considering to what end they were used, I can look upon them
   no otherwise but as very bottom-stones of the tower of Babel.

   This, then, in its latitude proving so pernicious to the profession of
   the gospel, -- having for so long driven the woman into the wilderness
   and truth into corners, -- being the main engine whereby the tower of
   Babel was built, and that which at this day they cry grace unto, as the
   foundation-stone of the whole antichristian fabric, [227] -- we had
   need be cautious what use we make (as one terms it well) of the broom
   of Antichrist, to sweep the church of Christ. Whether that we are in
   the truth, and they blinded with error of whom we have spoken, be a
   sufficient plea, we shall see anon. In the meantime we may do well to
   remember what Louis XII. of France said, yea, swore, concerning the
   inhabitants of Mirindol, whom, by the instigation of his prelates, he
   had ordered to be slain, when news was brought him what was their
   conversation and way of life: "Let them be heretics if you please,"
   saith he, "but assuredly they are better than I and my Catholics." Take
   heed lest the punished be better than the punishers.

   Let me add to this observation only this, that the attempt to suppress
   any opinions whatsoever by force hath been for the most part fruitless.
   For either some few particular persons are proceeded against, or else
   greater multitudes; if some particulars only, the ashes of one hath
   always proved the seed of many opinionatists. Examples are innumerable;
   take one, which is boasted of as a pattern of severity, taken from
   antiquity. About the year 390, Priscillianus, a Manichee, and a
   Gnostic, by the procurement of Ithacius and Idacius, two bishops, was
   put to death by Maximus, an usurping emperor, who ruled for a season,
   having slain Gratianus; as that kind of men would always close with any
   authority that might serve their own ends. Now, what was the issue
   thereof? Martinus, a Catholic bishop, renounces their communion who did
   it; the historian that reports it giving this censure of the whole,
   "Sic pessimo exemplo sublati sunt homines luce indignissimi;" -- though
   the men (Priscillianus and his companions) were most unworthy to live,
   yet their sentence of death was most unjust. But no matter for this,
   was not the heresy suppressed thereby? See what the same historian, who
   wrote not long after, and was able to testify the event, says of it:
   [228] "Non solum non repressa est hæresis, sed confirmata, et latius
   propagata est," etc.; -- "The heresy was so far from being suppressed
   hereby, that it was confirmed and propagated." His followers, who
   before honoured him as a saint, now adore him as a martyr. The like in
   all ages hath been the issue of the like endeavours.

   But now, if this course be undertaken against multitudes, what is or
   hath been the usual end of such undertakings? Take some examples of
   late days. Charles V., the most mighty emperor of Germany, undertakes
   by violence to extirpate the Lutherans and Calvinists out of the
   empire. After a tedious war, the death of many thousands, the wasting
   of the nation, in the close of all himself is driven out of Germany,
   and the business left much where it began, Sleid. Com. Philip of Spain,
   will needs force the inquisition upon the Netherlands. What is the
   issue? After the expense of an ocean of blood, and more coin than would
   have purchased the country twice over, his posterity is totally
   deprived of all sovereignty over those parts.

   Patrick Hamilton and George Wishart are put to death in Scotland by the
   procurement of a cardinal; the cardinal is instantly murdered by some
   desperate young men, and a war raised there about religion, which was
   never well quieted until, having hunted their queen out of her native
   kingdom, she had her head chopped off in England. [229] The wars,
   seditions, tumults, murders, massacres, rapes, burnings, etc., that
   followed the same attempt in France, cannot be thought of without
   horror and detestation. Neither knew those things any end, until the
   present forbearance was granted. Instances might be multiplied, but
   these things are known to all. If any shall say, All these evils
   followed the attempting to suppress truth, not error, I shall answer
   him another time, being loath to do it unless compelled. Only for the
   present I shall say, that error hath as much right to a forcible
   defence as truth.

   3. To stir us up yet farther to a serious consideration of the grounds
   and reasons which are laid down for the inflicting of punishment upon
   any for exorbitancies in things of religion (upon what hath been said),
   the perpetual coincidence of the causes by them held forth who pretend
   to plead for just severity, with their pretences who have acted unjust
   persecution, should be well heeded.

   The position is laid down in general on both sides, That erring persons
   are so and so to be dealt withal, -- that such is the power and duty of
   the magistrate in such cases. The definition of heresy is agreed on for
   the main; only the Papists place the church's determination where
   others thrust in the heretic's conviction, -- a thing much more obscure
   to bystanders and judges also. The appellations wherewith truth
   persecuted and error pursued are clothed, still the same. The
   consequences urged on all sides -- of dishonour to God, trouble to the
   state, and the like -- not at all discrepant. The arguments for the one
   and other for the most part the same. Look what reasons one sect gives
   for the punishing of another, -- the names being changed, are retorted.
   He blasphemeth to the heretic, who chargeth blasphemy upon him. We use
   no other arguments, cite no other texts, press no other consequences
   for the punishing of other heretics, than the Papists, the wisest
   heretics breathing, do for the punishment of us.

   No colour, no pretence, but hath been equally used in all hands. None
   can say, This is mine. To Luther's objection, that the Church of Christ
   never burned a heretic, for Huss and Jerome were none; Bellarmine
   answers, they were heretics to them Catholics, which did suffice, De
   Laic. cap. xxi. And indeed this vicissitude of things is very
   pernicious. All Christians almost are heretics to some enjoying
   authority (as Salvian said the case was between the Homoousians and
   Arians in his time); and most of those enjoying authority are persuaded
   it is their duty to suppress them whom they account heretics, and,
   answerably, have more or less acted according to this persuasion,
   until, by blood, wars, and horrid devastations of nations, some of them
   have been wearied. From the first croisade against the Albigenses,
   through the war of the Hussites under Zisca and the Procopii, those
   dreadful massacres before recounted, what a stage of blood hath Europe
   been made on this account! I desire that to this point the declaration
   of the Netherlands, at the beginning of their troubles (whom Bellarmine
   affirms to have petitioned for liberty of conscience, as he was writing
   "De Hæreticidio," the thing being long before granted at Spira, at the
   convention of the states of the empire, in the year 1526), may be
   seriously considered.

   4. For the necessity of courses of extremity against erroneous persons,
   for the upholding "the faith once delivered to the saints," and the
   keeping the churches in peace, it doth not appear to me to be so urgent
   as is pretended.

   For three hundred years the church had no assistance from any
   magistrate against heretics; and yet in all that space there was not
   one long-lived or far-spreading heresy, in comparison of those that
   followed. As the disease is spiritual, so was the remedy which in those
   days was applied; and the Lord Jesus Christ made it effectual The
   Christians also of those days disclaimed all thoughts of such
   proceedings. The expressions of the most ancient, as Polycarpus,
   Ignatius, Irenæus, concerning heretics, are sharp and cutting; their
   avoiding of them, being admonished, precise and severe; their
   confutations of them laborious and diligent; their church censures and
   ejections piercing and sharp; communion amongst the churches close,
   exact, and carefully preserved, so that a stubborn heretic was thrust
   out of Christian society; -- but for corporeal punishment, to be
   inflicted on them, in their writings not a syllable. Until Augustine
   was changed from his first resolution and persuasion, by the madness of
   Donatistical Circumcellions, this doctrine had but poor footing in
   antiquity. And whether his reasons as to this point be convincing, let
   any impartial man read his Epistle 50, and determine. What some say, --
   The Christians would have been of another mind had they enjoyed
   Christian magistrates, -- is so suited to our present frame and temper,
   but so unworthy of them, that I should wrong them by a defensative.
   What was their sense of them, in a spiritual way, is clear. John, they
   say, would not abide in a bath where Cerinthus the heretic, infected
   with Judaism and Paganism, was; saying, "Let us depart, lest the
   building fall on us where Cerinthus is," Iren., lib. iii. cap. 3;
   Euseb. Eccles. Hist., lib. iii. cap. 28. Marcion meeting Polycarpus,
   and asking him whether he knew him, or acknowledged him, his answer
   was, "Yea, to be the first-born of the devil," Euseb., lib. iv. cap.
   14. Ignatius's epistles are full of the like expressions. Irenæus says,
   he would have no words with them, lib. iii. cap. 3. Tertullian's books
   testify for him at large, with what keenness of spirit he pursued the
   heretics of his days, though before the end of them he had the
   unhappiness to be almost one himself. Cyprian cries out, "Nulla cum
   talibus convivia, nulla colloquia, nulla commercia misceantur," Epist.
   iii. ad Cornel; -- "Neither eat, nor talk, nor deal with them."
   Antonius the hermit leaves testimony when he was dying, "that he never
   had peaceable conference with them all his days," Vita Anton. inter
   Oper. Athan. Surely had these men perceived the mind of God for their
   bodily punishment, they would not have failed to signify their minds
   therein; but truly their expressions hold out rather the quite
   contrary. Tous misountas ton Theon, misein chre kai humas, kai epi tois
   echthrois autou ektekesthai; ou men kai tuptein autous e diokein,
   kathos ta ethne ta me eidota ton Kurion kai Theon, all' echthous men
   hegeisthai kai chorizesthai ap' auton, says Ignatius, Epist. ad
   Philad.; -- "Count them enemies, and separate from them who hate God;
   but for beating or persecuting them, that is proper to the heathen who
   know not God, nor our Saviour: do not you so." Tertullian in very many
   places lays down general maxima tending to more liberty than is now
   pleaded for. One or two places may be pointed at: "Videte ne et hoc ad
   irreligiositatis elogium concurrat, adimere libertatem religionis, et
   interdicere optionem divinitatis, ut non liceat mihi colere quem velim,
   sed cogar colere quem nolim. Nemo se ab invito coli vellet, ne homo
   quidem," Apol., cap. xxiv. And again to Scapula the governor of
   Carthage, to dissuade him from the persecution he intended: "Tamen
   humani juris et naturalis potestatis est unicuique quod putaverit
   colere, nec alii obest, aut prodest alterius religio: sed nec
   religionis est cogere religionem, quæ sponte suscipi debeat, non vi;
   cum et hostiæ ab animo libenti expostulentur: ita et si nos
   compuleritis ad sacrificandum, nihil præstabitis diis vestris, ab
   invitis enim sacrificia non desiderabunt." And I desire to know,
   whether that which he maketh to be the plea of Christians may not also
   be used by all erring persons: "Quasi non totum quod in nos potestis,
   nostrum sit arbitrium. Certe si velim, Christianus sum, tunc ergo me
   damnabis, si damnari velim. Cum vero quod in me potes, nisi velim, non
   potes, jam meæ voluntatis est quod potes, non tuæ potestatis," Apol.,
   cap. xlix. Hence was that query of Lactantius, "Quis imponet mihi
   necessitatem aut credendi quod nolim, aut quod velim non credendi?" And
   long after these, Gregory of Rome, lib. ii. Epist. lii., tells us,
   "Nova et inaudita est ista prædicatio, quæ verberibus exigit fidem;" --
   to beat in faith with stripes, was then a new kind of preaching. These
   and the like were their expressions.

   It is true, in the three first centuries many fond, foolish, corrupt
   opinions were broached by sundry brain-sick men; but they laid little
   hold of the churches, kept themselves in the breasts of some few
   disorderly wanderers, and did very little promote the mystery of
   iniquity: but afterward, when the Roman emperors, and the great men of
   the earth, under and with them, began to interpose in the things of
   religion, and were mutually wooed, instigated, and provoked by the
   parties at variance (as indeed it is a shame to consider, upon all
   meetings, assemblies, disputes, councils, what running, what
   flattering, what insinuation at court, were used on all hands), what
   root did divers heresies take! how far were they propagated! Witness
   Arianism, which had almost invaded the whole world.

   Furthermore, by the ways which were invented, oft from the rule, for
   the extirpation of errors, when, by the instigation of prelates, the
   emperors were (to their own ruin) persuaded to them, the man of sin
   walked to his throne. Those very laws, edicts, and declarations, which
   were obtained against erring persons, did the bishops of Rome invert
   and use against all the witnesses of Jesus. The devil durst not be so
   bold as to employ that his grand agent in his apprenticeship against
   the saints; but he first suffers him to exercise his hand against
   heretics, intending to make use of him afterward to another purpose. In
   most of those contests which the Roman pontiffs had with their
   fellow-bishops, by which they insensibly advanced their own supremacy,
   it was the defence of Catholics they undertook; as in the case of
   Athanasius and others.

   Neither did the Christians of old at once step into the persuasion of
   punishing corporeally in case of religion. Constantine makes a decree
   at first, Ten eleutherian zreskeias ouk arnetean einai, "that liberty
   of worship is not to be denied; and therefore the Christians, as
   others, should have liberty to keep the faith of their religion and
   heresy," Euseb., Eccles. Hist., lib. x. cap. 5. And in the same edict
   he saith (how truly I know not, but yet great Constantine said it),
   "That it is most certain, that this is conducing to the peace of the
   empire, that free option and choice of religion be left to all."
   Afterward, when he began a little farther to engage himself in the
   business of religion, being indeed wearied with the petitions of
   bishops and their associates for the persecution of one another, what
   troubles in a few years did he intricate himself withal! Perplexed he
   was in his spirit to see the untoward revengefulness of that sort of
   people; insomuch that he writes expressly to them, being assembled in
   council at Tyre, "That they had neither care of the truth, nor love to
   peace, nor conscience of scandal, nor would by any means be prevailed
   on to lay down their malice and animosities," Socrat. Hist., lib. i.
   cap. 34. At length an Arian priest curries favour with his sister
   Constantia: she gets him into the esteem of her brother: after some
   insinuations of his, new edicts, new synods, new recallings, new
   banishments of other persons, follow one upon the neck of another,
   Rufin. Eccles. Hist., lib. i. cap. 11. And when this knack was once
   found out of promoting a sect by imperial favour, it is admirable to
   consider how those good princes, Constantine and his sons, were abused,
   misled, enraged, engaged into mutual dissensions, by the lies,
   flatteries, equivocations of such as called themselves bishops, Rufin.,
   lib. i. cap. 15, 16, etc. As also, how soon, with the many, the whole
   business of religion was hereupon turned into a matter of external pomp
   and dominion. But it is beside my purpose to rake into that hell of
   confusion which by this means brake in upon the churches in succeeding
   ages. Only for the following imperial edicts and constitutions in the
   behalf of the catholic faith, and for the punishing of erring persons,
   I desire to observe, --

   (1.) That the emperors were stirred up to them by turbulent priests and
   aspiring prelates. Let the pope's letters to them witness this. Leo,
   Epist. lxxv. etc.

   (2.) That they were still bottomed upon such and such councils, that
   were not to be opposed or spoken against, when all of them were spent
   for the most part about things quite beside and beyond the Scripture
   (as feasting, and lastings, and bishops' jurisdictions); and some of
   them were the very ulcers and imposthumations of Christian religion, as
   those of Nice and Ephesus, both the second; and in general all of them
   the sea upon which the whore exalted her seat and throne. And these
   things did those good men, either deceived by the craft of heretics, or
   wearied by the importunity of the orthodox.

   And yet, notwithstanding all this (as I shall afterward declare), I
   cannot close with that counsel which Themistius, a philosopher, gave to
   Valens the emperor, and am most abhorrent from the reason of his
   counsel, -- viz., "That he should let all sects alone, because it was
   for the glory of God to be honoured with diversities of opinions and
   ways of worship." Yet though this reason be false and impious, the
   advice itself was well conducing at that time to the peace of the
   churches, something qualifying the spirit of that heretical emperor,
   who before had cruelly raged against all orthodox professors of the
   Deity of Christ, Socrat., lib. iv. cap 27.

   5. Lastly, add unto all that hath been said, "Vice coronidis," for the
   use of such as, enjoying authority, may have misapprehensions of some
   truths of Christ, -- a sad consideration concerning the end and issue
   which the Lord, in his righteous judgment, hath in all ages given to
   persecutors and persecution.

   Nero (of whom says Tertullian, "Tali dedicatore gaudet sanguis
   Christianus"), who was the first that employed the sword against our
   religion, being condemned by the senate to be punished "more majorum,"
   slew himself, with this exprobration of his own sordid villainy,
   "Turpiter vixi, turpius morior," Sueton. in Ner. Domitian, the
   inheritor of his rage and folly, was murdered in his own house by his
   servants, Idem in Domit. Trajan, by a resolution of his joints,
   numbedness of body, and a choking water, perished miserably, Dio
   Cassius de Traj. This is he whose order not to seek out Christians to
   punishment, but yet to punish them appearing, you have in his epistle
   to Pliny, a provincial governor under him, Plin. Epist. xcvii.; which,
   though commended by Eusebius, Eccles. Hist., lib. iii. cap. 33, yet is
   canvassed by Tertullian as a foolish, impious, wicked constitution,
   Apol cap. ii. Hadrian, perishing with a flux and casting of blood, paid
   some part of the price of the innocent blood which he had shed, Ælius
   Spart. in Had. Severus poisoned himself, to put an end to his
   tormenting pains, Jul. Capitol. Maximinus, with his son yet a child,
   was torn in pieces of the soldiers, all crying out, "that not a whelp
   was to be left of so cursed a stock." Decius, having reigned scarce two
   years, was slain with his children, Euseb., lib. vii. cap. 1. Valerian,
   being taken by Sapores king of Persia, was carried about in a cage, and
   being seventy years old, was at length flayed alive, Euseb., lib. vii.
   cap. 13. Another Valerian, of the same stamp with his brother and
   kindred, was murdered at Milan. Diocletian being smitten with madness,
   had his palace consumed with fire from heaven, and perished miserably.
   The city of Alexandria, in the time of Gallienus, was, for its
   persecution, so wasted with variety of destroying plagues and
   judgments, that the whole number of its inhabitants answered not the
   grey-headed old men that were in it before, Dionys. apud Euseb., lib.
   vii. cap. 21. What was the end of Julian is known to all. Now, truly,
   of many of these we might well say, as one of old did, "Quales
   imperatores." As Trajan, Hadrian, Severus, Julian, what excellent
   emperors had they been, had they not been persecutors! And all this,
   says Tertullian, is come to pass that men might learn me theomachein.
   He that desires to see more of this, let him consult Tertul. Apol. et
   ad Scap.; Euseb. Eccles. Hist., lib. vii. cap. 21; August. de Civit.
   Dei, lib. xviii. cap. 52; Eutrop., lib. viii. It would be tedious to
   descend to examples of latter ages, our own and the neighbour nations
   do so much, too much, abound with them. Let this that hath been spoken
   suffice to cautionate mortal men how they meddle with the vessels of
   the sanctuary.

   But now may some say, What will be the issue of this discourse? Do you,
   then, leave every one at liberty in the things of God? Hath the
   magistrate nothing to do in or about religion? Is he to depose the care
   thereof? Shall men, exasperated in their spirits by different
   persuasions, be suffered to devour one another as they please?

   III. I have only showed the weakness of those grounds which some men
   make the bottom of their testimonies against the toleration of any
   thing but what themselves conceive to be truth; as also, taken away the
   chief of those arguments upon which such a proceeding against erring
   persons is bottomed as tends to blood and death. What positively the
   civil magistrate may, nay, ought to do, in the whole business of
   religion, comes in the next place to be considered, being the third and
   last part of our discourse.

   Now, my thoughts unto this I shall hold out under these three heads.

   1. What is the magistrate's duty as to the truth, and persons
   professing it.

   2. What in reference to the opposers and revilers of it.

   3. What in respect of dissenters from it.

   1. I shall begin with the first, which to me is much of chiefest
   importance.

   His power, or rather his duty herein, I shall hold out in these ensuing
   propositions:--

   (1.) As all men in general, so magistrates, even as such, are bound to
   know the mind and will of God in the things which concern his honour
   and worship. They are bound, I say, to know it. This obligation lies
   upon all creatures capable of knowing the Creator, answerably to that
   light which of him they have, and the means of revelation which they do
   enjoy. He of whom we speak is supposed to have that most sovereign and
   supreme of all outward teachings, the word of God, with such other
   helps as are thereby revealed, and therein appointed; so as he is bound
   to know the will of God in every thing him concerning. Wherein he foals
   and comes short of the truth, it is his sin; -- the defect being not in
   the manner of the revelation, but in the corruption of his darkened
   mind. Now, that he is to make this inquiry in reference to his calling,
   is evident from that of David, 2 Sam. xxiii. 3, "He that ruleth over
   men must be just, ruling in the fear of God." This fear is only taught
   by the word. Without a right knowledge of God and his mind, there can
   be no true fear of him. That command, also, for the Jewish magistrate
   to study it day and night, and to have the book of the law continually
   before him, because it was the rule of that civil polity whereof he
   was, under God, the head and preserver, by analogy comfirmeth this
   truth, Deut. xvii. 18, 19.

   (2.) If he desire this wisdom sincerely, and the Lord intend him "as a
   light of the morning, as a rising sun, a morning without clouds" to his
   people, doubtless he will reveal himself to him, and teach him his
   mind; as he did David and Solomon, and other holy men of old. And as to
   this, I shall only with due reverence cautionate the sons of men that
   are exalted in government over their brethren, that they take heed of a
   lifted-up spirit, -- the greatest closer of the heart against the truth
   of God. He hath promised to teach the humble and the lowly in mind; the
   proud he beholdeth afar off. Is not this the great reason that the
   rulers believe not on him, and the nobles lay not their necks to the
   yoke of the Lord, even because their hearts are lifted up within them,
   and so lie in an unteachable frame before the Lord?

   (3.) The truth being revealed to them, and their own hearts made
   acquainted therewith, after their personal engagements to the practice
   of the power of godliness, according to the "revelation of God in the
   face of Jesus Christ," three things are incumbent on him in reference
   thereunto.

   [1.] That, according to the measure of its revelation unto him, he
   declare, or take care that it be declared, unto others, even all
   committed to his governing charge. The general equity that is in the
   obligation of "strengthening others when we are confirmed," desiring
   them to be like ourselves in all participation of grace from God, --
   the nature of true zeal for the glory and name of the Lord, are a
   sufficient warrant for this, yea, demand the performance of this duty.
   So Jehoshaphat, being instructed in the ways of God, sent princes and
   priests to teach it in all the cities and towns of Judah, 2 Chron.
   xvii. 7-9. As also did Hezekiah, 2 Chron. xxx. 6-9. Let this, then, be
   our first position:--

   i. It belongs to the duty of the supreme magistrate, the governor or
   shepherd of the people, in any nation, being acquainted with the mind
   of God, to take care that the truth of the gospel be preached to all
   the people of that nation, according to the way appointed, either
   ordinary or extraordinary.

   I make no doubt but God will quickly reject them from their power who,
   knowing their Master's will, are negligent herein.

   [2.] As he is to declare it, so he is to protect it from all violence
   whatever. Jesus Christ is the great king of nations, as well as the
   holy king of saints. His gospel hath a right to be preached in every
   nation, and to every creature under heaven. Whoever forbids or hinders
   the free passage of it, is not only sinful and impious towards God, but
   also injurious towards men.

   Certainly the magistrate is to protect every one and every thing in
   their own right, from the violence and injury of unruly men. In the
   preaching and receiving the gospel there is a right acted, superior to
   all earthly privileges whatever. In this, then, the magistrate is to
   protect it, that under him the professors thereof "may lead a quiet and
   peaceable life, in all godliness and honesty." And for this cause they
   to whom the sword is committed may with the sword lawfully defend the
   truth, as the undoubted right and privilege of those who do enjoy it,
   and of which they cannot be deprived without the greatest injury.
   Jephthah laid it down as the ground of the equity of the wars he waged
   against the Ammonites, that they would possess what the Lord their God
   gave them to possess; the defence whereof he pursued to the subversion
   of their (at first) invading enemies, Judges xi. 24, 33. It is no new
   thing to begin in defence, and end in offence. Now, if the truth be
   given us of the Lord our God to possess, certainly it may be contended
   for by those who owe protection thereunto.

   And if this were not so, we may pray, and prevail, for the prosperity
   of those in authority, and yet, when we have done, not have a right to
   a quiet and peaceable life. Let this, then, be the second assertion:--

   ii. The gospel being preached and declared, as of right it ought to be,
   it is the duty of the magistrate, by the power wherewith he is
   intrusted, to protect and defend it against all or any persons that, by
   force or violence, shall seek to hinder the progress or stop the
   passage of it, under what pretence soever.

   And that a neglect of this also will be attended with the anger of the
   Lord, and the kindling of his wrath, shall not long be doubted of any.

   [3.] The protecting, assisting, and supporting of all the professors of
   it in that profession, and in ways of truth's appointment, for the
   practice of that which is embraced, and the furtherance of it towards
   them who as yet embrace it not, is also required. And of this there are
   sundry parts.

   1st. That, seeing Christ Jesus hath appointed his disciples to walk in
   such societies, and requireth of them such kind of worship, as cannot
   be performed without their meeting together homothumadon, "in one
   place;" that he either provide, or grant being provided, the use of
   such places under his protection as may, in all or any kind, be suited
   and fitted for that end and purpose. And the ground of this is, --

   (1st.) From the right which the gospel of Christ hath to be received
   amongst men, according to his own appointment; whether that be the
   appointment of Christ or not, amongst us is no question.

   (2dly.) Because the magistrate hath the sole power of all public
   places, and the protection of them is committed to him alone, by virtue
   of that consent unto government which is among any people. This proved
   as above. 2dly. A protection in the use of those places, and all things
   exercised in them, answerable to that which he doth and is bound to
   grant unto men in their own private dwellings and families. The reason
   why I am protected from all hurt or violence in my family is, because I
   have a right to dispose of all things in my family, being my own; and
   so hath not another. It was asserted before that Christians have a
   right to the ordinances of Christ, and truth a right to be at liberty;
   and therefore, if any shall invade, disturb, or trouble them in their
   rights and liberties, he is bound, "ex officio," to give them a
   protection, "not bearing the sword in vain."

   Now, being in my family, in my private house, the assistance of those
   in authority is due, --

   (1st.) In respect of them without.

   (2dly.) In respect of them within.

   (1st.) For them without, if any one will, against my consent, intrude
   himself upon my family enjoyments, to share with me, or violently come
   to take away that is mine, or disturb me in the quiet possession of it,
   the magistrate takes cognizance of such disturbances, and punisheth
   them according to equity. Suitably, if any person or persons whatsoever
   shall with violence put themselves upon the enjoyment of such
   ordinances as those enjoying the rights of the gospel have obtained to
   themselves, or shall come in their celebration of them to cause
   disturbance, certainly that magistrate protects not every one in his
   undoubted rights, who doth not accommodate the wronged parties with the
   assistance of his power to the punishment of the transgressors.

   (2dly.) For house dwellers, servants, or any others, who may break out
   into such offences and incorrigibleness as the amendment thereof may be
   beyond what I am intrusted to do to any by law of God or man, shall not
   the magistrate here also interpose? is not his assistance here
   abundantly required and always granted?

   From parity of reason, is it not as due for their protection who, in
   the enjoyment of their public religious rights, may receive
   disturbance, and be under force from some incorrigible by any rule
   among themselves? For instance, -- suppose a person justly
   excommunicated and ejected any society of Christians, as to any
   spiritual communion, yet will with outward force and violence put
   himself upon them in their closest acts of communion; doubtless their
   rights are here to be by power preserved.

   3dly. That whereas the preachers of the gospel are now to be maintained
   in an ordinary way, and to expect their supportment in a usual course
   of providence; and seeing that many to whom we have proved that the
   gospel is to be declared by the care of the magistrate, will not or
   cannot make such provisions for them as is needful in these last evil
   days of the world; it is incumbent on those nursing-fathers to provide
   for them, who, because of their continual labours in the work of the
   Lord, are disenabled to make provision for themselves. Where churches
   are settled according to the rule of the gospel, and not too much
   straitened by reason of want, there may be an alteration as to this
   proposal. That this engagement lies first upon the churches, was seen
   of old. Hence that caution or canon of the Council of Chalcedon, cap.
   vi., Medeis cheirotoneistho apolelumenos, "Let none be ordained at
   large." "Ne dicatur, mendicat in palæstra infelix clericus," says the
   scholiast, -- "lest he should be driven to beg for want of
   maintenance."

   This being the sum of what, as to this head, I have to assert, I shall
   give in the proofs of it, and then draw some farther positions.

   Reason 1. The bottom of the whole ariseth from that right which the
   gospel hath to be preached to all nations and people; and that right,
   paramount to all civil sanctions and constitutions, which every soul
   hath to receive it in the profession thereof. And all this flows from
   the donation of the Father unto Jesus Christ, whereby he is made "heir
   of all things," Heb. i. 2, having the "nations given him for his
   inheritance, the uttermost parts of the earth for his possession," Ps.
   ii. 8; -- being also" King of kings, and Lord of lords," acting nothing
   in taking possession of his own but what his sovereignty bears him out
   in.

   Reason 2. All this tends to the apparent good of these committed to his
   charge, that they may lead their lives in godliness and honesty; which
   is the very chief end of magistracy committed unto men. This is
   directly intended; all other things come in by accident, and upon
   suppositions.

   Reason 3. No person living can pretend to the least injury by this, --
   none is deprived, none wronged.

   Reason 4. The precepts given unto them, and the promises made
   concerning them, do abundantly confirm all that hath been asserted. Ps.
   ii. 10, 11, they are commanded as kings and judges to serve the Lord,
   in promoting the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ. And it is promised,
   Isa. xlix. 23, that "they shall be nursing-fathers and nursing-mothers
   to the church" of Christ, even then when she shall "suck the breasts of
   kings" (earthly things are the milk of kingly breasts), "when her
   officers shall be peace, and her exactors righteousness," Isa. ix. 16,
   17. This, at least, reacheth to all we have ascribed to them. All is
   but bowing the knee of magistracy at the name of Jesus.

   Hence are these positions:--

   iii. The providing or granting of places requisite for the performance
   of that worship which in the gospel is instituted, is the duty of the
   Christian magistrate.

   iv. Protection, as to peace and quietness in the use of the ordinances
   of the Lord Jesus Christ, from violent disturbers, either from without
   or within, is also incumbent on him.

   v. Supportment and provision, as to earthly things, where regularly
   failing, is of him required.

   And in the neglect of any of these that takes place, which is
   threatened, Isa. lx. 12, two or three consectaries, added hereunto,
   shall close this part of the magistrate's power, or rather duty, about
   the things of religion. As, --

   Consect. 1. Positive actings, by way of supportment and assistance,
   maintenance, allowance of public places, and the like, in the behalf of
   persons deviating from the truth, in those things wherein they deviate,
   are contrary to the rule of the word, and duty of them in authority.
   For, --

   Error hath neither right nor promise; nor is any precept given in the
   behalf thereof.

   Consect. 2. The defence and protection of erring persons from violence
   and injury, in those things wherein they have a right, is no acting of
   his duty about religious things, but a mere dealing for the
   preservation of human society, by the defence of persons not acting
   against the rules thereof. [230]

   Consect. 3. Every particular minute difference among the professors of
   the truth cannot be proved to come under the cognizance of the
   magistrate, he being to attend the worship which for the main is
   acceptable to God in Christ; neither do any testimonies extend his duty
   any farther. Hence, --

   Corollary 1. The present differences about church society and the
   subject or seat of discipline, which are between those dissenters who
   are known by the names of Presbyterians and Independents, as they are
   in themselves (not heightened by the prejudices, lusts, corruptions,
   and interests of men), hinder not at all, but that the magistrate is
   bound to the performance of the duties before mentioned unto both
   parties. And the reasons of this are, because, --

   Reason 1. The things wherein they are agreed are clearly as broad as
   the magistrate's duty can be stretched to cover them.

   Reason 2. Neither party, I am persuaded, in their retired thoughts dare
   avow the main of the worship by their dissenters embraced, to be, as
   such, rejected of the Lord.

   Reason 3. No example in the world can be produced out of the Old
   Testament, or New, or ecclesiastical history, of a forcible decision of
   such minute differences. See Socrat. Eccles. Hist., lib. vi. cap. 20.

   Corollary 2. All the plea of persons erring in doctrine or worship is
   not from what the magistrate must do, but from what he may not do.

   And this for the first part shall suffice.

   2. There is another part of the magistrate's power, -- the other side
   of his sword, -- to be exercised towards the opposition of that truth
   which he hath embraced.

   And this hath a twofold object:--

   (1.) Things; (2.) Persons.

   (1.) Things are of two sorts:--

   [1.] Ways of worship.

   [2.] Outward appearances, monuments, accommodations, and declarations
   of those ways.

   Of the first I shall speak afterward.

   By the second I mean all the outward attendances of any false or
   erroneous worship, which are either helps to or declarations of the
   superstition, idolatry, error, or falseness of it; as temples for
   idolatrous service, crosses, pictures, and the like abused relics of
   old, unwarranted zeal. Now, concerning these, I affirm, --

   1st, That the magistrate ought not to make provision of any public
   places for the practice of any such worship as he is convinced to be an
   abomination unto the Lord. When I say he ought not to make provision, I
   understand not only a not actual caring that such be, but also a caring
   that such may not be. He should not have a negation of acting as to any
   thing of public concernment. His not opposing here is providing. For
   instance, he must not allow -- that is, it is his duty to oppose -- the
   setting apart of public places under his protection for the service of
   the mass (as of late in Somerset House), or for any kind of worship in
   itself disallowed, because not required, and so not accepted. This were
   to be bound to help forward sin, and that such sin whereof he is
   convinced; -- which is repugnant to the whole revealed will of God. A
   magistrate, I told you before, is not to act according to what he may
   do, but what he must do. Now, it cannot be his duty to further sin.

   2dly. Outward monuments -- ways of declaring and holding out false and
   idolatrous worship -- he is to remove; as the Papists' images, altars,
   pictures, and the like; Turks' mosques; prelates' service-book. Now
   these are of two sorts:--

   (1st.) Such things as, in their whole use and nature, serve only for
   the carrying on of worship in itself wholly false, and merely invented;
   as altars, images, crosses.

   (2dly.) Such as are used for the carrying on of worship true in itself,
   though vilely corrupted; as praying and preaching; -- such are those
   places commonly called churches.

   The first are to be abolished; the latter aright used. I speak as to
   public appearances; for private disquisitions after such things I may
   be otherwise minded. The reason of this difference is evident to all.

   Thus, in days of old, Constantine shut up Pagans' temples, Euseb. de
   Vita Constant., lib. iv. cap. 23, 24; and demolished some of the most
   filthy of them, lib. iii. cap. 52. Theodosius utterly cast them to the
   ground, though not without some blows and bloodshed, Socrat. Eccles.
   Hist., lib. v. cap. 16. The command of God for the abolishing all
   monuments of idolatry, Deut. xii. 1-3, with the commendation of those
   kings of Judah who accordingly performed this duty, 2 Chron. xvii. 6,
   xxx. 14, are enough to confirm it, and to bottom this position:--

   vi. It is the duty of the magistrate not to allow any public places for
   (in his judgment) false and abominable worship; as also, to demolish
   all outward appearances and demonstrations of such superstitious,
   idolatrous, and unacceptable service.

   Let Papists, who are idolaters, and Socinians, who are anthropolatræ,
   plead for themselves.

   (2.) Now, for persons there seems something more of difficulty; yet
   certain clear rules may be proposed concerning them also, to hold out
   when they and their proceedings come under the cognizance of the civil
   magistrate, and are obnoxious to the sword which he beareth. And they
   are these:--

   [1.] Such persons as, having embraced any false principles and
   persuasion in or about things concerning God and his worship, do pursue
   the upholding or propagating of such principles in a disorderly manner,
   to the disturbance of civil society, are doubtless under his
   restraining power, to be acted and put forth in such ways as to other
   persons running out into the same or the like compass of disorder, upon
   other grounds, and from the instigation of other lusts. The pretence of
   disturbance and confusion, upon the bearing with differences in opinion
   about things commanded in religion, we before rejected, as a colour
   fitted chiefly for the wearing of persecution. But actual disturbances,
   indeed, must have actual restraints. For instance, if a man, being
   persuaded that the power of the magistrate is in Christian religion
   groundless, unwarrantable, unlawful, should thereupon stir up the
   people to the abolishing and removal of that power; such stirrings up,
   and such actings upon that instigation, are as opposite to the gospel
   of Christ (which opposeth no lawful regimen among the sons of men), so
   also prejudicial to human society; and therefore to be proceeded
   against by them who bear not the sword in vain. This case we know
   happened once in Germany, and may do so again in other places. If such
   as these suffer, it is "as murderers, or thieves, or evil-doers, or
   busy-bodies in other men's matters;" which is a shameful thing, no way
   commendable or praiseworthy, 1 Pet. iv. 15.

   [2.] If any persons whatsoever, under any pretence whatsoever, shall
   offer violence or disturbance to the professors of the true worship of
   God, so owned, established, and confirmed as above said, in and for the
   profession of that true, so-owned worship, service, and declaration of
   the mind of God; such persons are to fear that power which is the
   minister of God, and a revenger to them that do evil. Let us suppose of
   them what they suppose, and for their own justification and support in
   irregular ways bear out of themselves, -- that they enjoy the truth,
   others walking in paths of their own; yet then this practice is
   contrary to that prime dictate of nature which none can pretend
   ignorance of, viz., "Do not that to another which thou wouldst not have
   done unto thyself." If men that would not think it equitable to be so
   dealt with as they deal with others, supposing themselves in their
   condition, do yet so deal with them, they are autokatakritoi, and do
   pronounce sentence against themselves out of their own mouths. This,
   then, deserveth punishment; and breaking out to the disturbance of
   public order ought to be punished. We before proved the protection of
   public places to belong to the magistrate; so that he not only may,
   but, if he will not be false to Him by whom he is intrusted, he must,
   put forth his authority for the safe-guarding and revenging of them.
   Yea, also, and this rule may pass, when some things in the way publicly
   established are truly offensive. What the ancient Christians thought of
   the zeal of Audas, a Christian bishop, who would needs demolish a Pagan
   temple in Persia, I know not; but I am sure his discretion is not much
   extolled who, by that one fiery act of destroying pureion, -- that is,
   "a temple of fire" (for the Persians looked upon fire as a god, as the
   historian observes), -- occasioned a cruel persecution of thirty years'
   continuance, Theod. Eccles. Hist., lib. v. cap. 38.

   [3.] When any have entertained any singular opinion in matters of great
   weight and importance, -- such as nearly concern the glory of God, and
   the minds of Christians, in reverence of his holy name, are most
   tenderly affected withal, so that without much horror of mind they can
   scarce hear those errors whereby those grand truths are opposed, -- yet
   those persons who have entertained such uncouth opinions shall not be
   content so to have done, and also in all lawful ways (as to civil
   society) endeavoured to propagate the said opinions to others; but, in
   the pursuit of this their design of opposing truth, shall publicly use
   such expressions, or perform such acts, as are fit to pour contempt and
   scorn upon the truth which they do oppose, -- reviling it also, or God
   himself so represented as he is in the truth they abominate, with
   odious and execrable appellations (as, for instance, the calling the
   holy Trinity, "Tricipitem Cerberum"; -- if the question be put, Whether
   in this case the magistrate be not obliged to vindicate the honour of
   God by corporeal restraints, in some degrees at least, upon the persons
   of those men? -- truly, for my part, I incline to the affirmative. And
   the reason hereof is this:-- Though men, through the incurable
   blindness of their minds, falling into error of judgment and
   misinterpretation of the word, may disbelieve the Deity of Christ, and
   the Holy Spirit; yet that any pretence from the word, persuasion of
   conscience, or dictate of religion, should carry them out to reviling,
   opprobrious speeches of that which of God is held out contrary to their
   apprehensions, is false and remote from reason itself. For this cause
   Paul says he was a blasphemer; -- not because, being a Jew, he
   disbelieved the gospel; but because, so disbelieving it, he moreover
   loaded the truths thereof with contumelious reproaches Such
   expressions, indeed, differ not from those piercing words of the holy
   name of God which he censured to death, Lev. xxiv. 15, but only in
   this, that there seemeth in that to be a plain opposition unto light,
   in this not so. The like may be said of a Jew's crucifying a dog.

   [4.] There are a sort of persons termed in Scripture ataktoi, 1 Thess.
   v. 14; agoraioi. Acts xvii. 5; atopoi, 2 Thess. iii. 2; anupotaktoi, 1
   Tim. i. 9, and the like, -- disorderly, vagabond, wandering, irregular
   persons, fixed to no calling, abiding in no place, taking no care of
   their families; that, under a pretence of teaching the truth, without
   mission, without call, without warrant, uncommanded, undesired, do go
   up and down, from place to place, creeping into houses, etc. Now, that
   such ways as these, and persons in these ways, may be judicially
   inquired into, I no way doubt. The story is famous of Sesostris, king
   of Egypt, who made a law, that all the subjects of his kingdom should
   once a year give an account of their way and manner of living, and if
   any one were found to spend his time idly, he was certainly punished;
   and the laws of most nations have provided that their people shall not
   be wanderers, and whosoever hath not a place of abode and employment is
   by them a punishable vagabond. And in this, by much experience of the
   ways, walking, and converse of such persons, I am exceedingly confirmed
   in. I did as yet never observe any other issue upon such undertakings,
   but scandal to religion, and trouble to men in their civil relations.

   [5.] When men, by the practice of any vice or sin, draw others to a
   pretended religion; or, by pretence of religion, draw men to any vice
   or known sin, let them be twice punished, -- for their real vice, and
   pretended religion. The truth is, I have been taught exceedingly to
   disbelieve all the strange imputations of wickedness and uncleanness
   that are imposed upon many, to be either the end or the medium of the
   practice of that communion in religion which they do profess and
   embrace. I remember that, when I was a boy, all those stories were told
   me of Brownists and Puritans which afterward I found to have been long
   before the forgeries of Pagans, and imposed on the primitive
   Christians. I dare boldly say, I have heard stories of them a hundred
   times, holding out that very thing, and those deeds of darkness, which
   Minutius Felix holds out in the tongue of an infidel concerning the
   Christians of those days; but yet, because sundry venerable persons, to
   whom antiquity hath given sanctuary from being arraigned on the point
   of false testimony, have left it upon record of sundry heretics in
   their days, -- as the Gnostics and others, that they were conjoined
   into "societates tesserâ pollutionis," and some assert that the like
   iniquities are not wholly buried, I made the supposition, and hope
   that, if they depose themselves from common sense and reason, the
   magistrate will never exalt them to the privilege and exemption of
   religion.

   In these, and such like cases as these, when men shall break forth into
   disturbance of common order and enormities against the light of nature,
   beyond all positive command of any pretended religion whatsoever, that
   the magistrate ought to set hedges of thorns in their ways, sharpened
   according to their several delinquencies, I suppose no man not abhorred
   of common sense can once hesitate or doubt. And I am the more inclined
   to assert a restraint to all such as these, because it may be
   established to the height without the least prejudice unto the truth,
   though persons erring should enjoy the place of authority.

   3. That which now remaineth in this head to be considered, is
   concerning persons maintaining and upholding any great and pernicious
   errors, but in such ways as are not, by any of the former disorders, to
   be brought under the cognizance of the civil magistrate, but good,
   honest, allowable, and peaceable in themselves; not at all to be
   questioned, but in reference to the things that are carried on in and
   by those ways, -- as communication by discourse and private preaching,
   and the like.

   Now, concerning these, it is generally affirmed, that persons
   maintaining any error in or against any fundamental article of faith or
   religion, and that with obstinacy or pertinacy after conviction, ought
   to be proceeded against by the authority of the civil magistrate,
   whether unto death or banishment, imprisonment or confiscation of
   goods.

   (1.) Now unto this -- supposing what I have written heretofore
   concerning the incompetency of all and the non-constitution of any
   judge in this case, with the answers given at the beginning of this
   treatise to most of the places produced usually for the affirmative --
   I shall briefly give in my thoughts; reserving the consideration of
   pressing conformity to the next head to be handled. And, --

   [1.] That I cannot but observe, that, in the question itself, there are
   sundry things gratis assumed; as, --

   1st. That it is known and confessed what articles in religion are
   fundamental, and this also to the magistrate; when no one thing among
   Christians is more questionable, most accounting them so (be they what
   they will) wherein they differ from others. So that, one way or other,
   all dissenters shall be hooked in, directly or indirectly, to clash
   upon fundamentals. In this Papists are secure, who make the church's
   propositions sufficient to make an article fundamental.

   2dly. That the persons holding the error are convinced, when perhaps
   they have been only confuted; between which two there is a wide
   difference. He that holds the truth may be confuted; but a man cannot
   be convinced but by the truth. That a man should be said to be
   convinced of a truth, and yet that truth not shine in upon his
   understanding to the expelling of the contrary error, to me is strange.
   To be convinced, is to be overpowered by the evidence of that which
   before a man knew not. I myself once knew a scholar invited to a
   dispute with another man about something in controversy in religion. In
   his own, and in the judgment of all the bystanders, the opposing person
   was utterly confuted; and yet the scholar, within a few months, was
   taught of God, and clearly convinced that it was an error which he had
   maintained, and the truth which he opposed: and then, and not till
   then, did he cease to wonder that the other person was not convinced by
   his strong arguments, as before he had thought. May not a Protestant be
   really worsted in a dispute by a Papist? hath it not so ere now fallen
   out? -- if not, the Jesuits are egregious liars. To say a man is
   convinced, when, either for want of skill and ability or the like, he
   cannot maintain his opinion to and against all men, is a mere conceit.
   The truth is, I am so far from this morose severity of looking upon all
   erring persons as convinced that have been confuted, that I rather, in
   charity, incline to believe that no erring person, whilst he continues
   in his error, is convinced. It will not easily enter into my dull
   apprehension, how a man can be convinced of an error that is
   enlightened with a contrary truth, and yet hold that error still. I am
   loath to charge more corrupt and vile affections upon any than do
   openly appear. That of Paul, affirming that some men are
   self-condemned, is quite of another nature. I think a person is said to
   be convinced, not when there is sufficiency in the means of conviction,
   but when there is such an efficacy in them as to lay hold upon his
   understanding.

   3dly. That they are obstinate and pertinacious is also a cheap
   supposal, taken up without the price of a proof. What we call
   obstinacy, they call constancy; and what we condemn them for as
   pertinacy, they embrace as perseverance. As the conviction is imposed,
   not owned, so is this obstinacy. If we may be judges of other men's
   obstinacy, all will be plain; but if ever they get uppermost, they will
   be judges of ours. Besides, I know not what good it will do us, or how
   it will advantage our cause, to suppose men obstinate and convinced
   before we punish them, -- no such qualifications being anywhere in the
   book of God urged in persons deserving punishment:-- if they have
   committed the crime whereunto the penalty is annexed, be they obstinate
   or not, they shall be punished.

   [2.] But now, supposing all this, -- that we are clear in all
   fundamentals, -- that we are convinced that they are convinced, and
   doubt not but that they are obstinate; -- if they keep themselves in
   the former bounds, what is to be done? I say, besides what we spake at
   the entrance of this discourse, I shall, as to any ways of corporeal
   co-action and restraint, oppose some few things.

   1st. The non-constitution of a judge in case of heresy is a thing
   civilly criminal. As to spiritual censures, and an ecclesiastical
   judgment of errors and false doctrines, we find them appointed, and a
   lawful judge as to the determining concerning them divinely instituted;
   so that in such ways they may be warrantably proceeded against, Rev.
   xxii. 15. But now, for any judge that should make disquisition
   concerning them, or proceed against them, as things criminal, to be
   punished with civil censures, I conceive the Scripture is silent. And
   indeed, who should it be? The custom of former ages was, that some
   persons of one sort should determine of it as to right, -- viz., that
   such or such a thing was heresy, and such or such a one a heretic, --
   which was the work of priests and prelates; and persons of another sort
   should "de facto" punish, and determine to be punished, those so
   adjudged by the former, -- and these were, as they called them, the
   secular magistrates, officers of this world. And indeed, had not the
   god of this world blinded their eyes, and the God of the spirits of all
   flesh hardened their hearts, they would not have so given up their
   power to the man of sin as to be made so sordidly instrumental to his
   bloody cruelty. We read, Jer. xxvi. 10, 11, that the priests and
   prophets assemble themselves in judgment, and so pronounce sentence
   upon the prophet Jeremiah that he should die for a false prophet; verse
   12, Jeremiah makes his appeal to the secular magistrate, and all the
   people; who, taking cognizance of the cause, pronounce sentence in the
   behalf of the condemned person against the priests and prophets, and
   deliver him whether they will or not, verse 16. I spare the application
   of the story: but that princes and magistrates should, without
   cognizance of the thing or cause, proceed to punishment or censure of
   it, upon the judgment of the priests condemning such or such a man for
   a heretic or a false prophet, -- blessed be the Lord, we have no
   warrant. Had this proceeding been regular, Jeremiah had died without
   mercy for a false prophet, as thousands since, standing before the Lord
   in his spirit, have done. This course, then, that the civil magistrate
   should proceed to sentence of corporeal punishment upon others judging
   of the fault, is vile, sordid, unwarrantable, and exceedingly unworthy
   of any rational man, much more such as are set over the people of the
   land. That the same persons must determine of the cause and appoint the
   punishment is clear.

   Now, who must these be?

   (1st.) Are they the ministers of the gospel? -- of all others, they are
   the most likely to be the most competent judges in spiritual causes.
   Let it be so; but then, also, they must be the determiners and
   inflicters of the punishment upon default. Now, let them pour out upon
   obstinately erring persons all the vengeance that God hath betrusted
   them withal, "The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty
   through God," etc. By this course, admonition, avoiding, rejection,
   excommunication, will be the utmost that can be inflicted on them;
   which, for my part, I desire may be exercised to the utmost extent of
   the rule.

   (2dly.) Shall the magistrate be made judge of the cause as well as of
   the person? Is he intrusted to determine what is error, what not, --
   what heresy, what not, -- who is an heretic, who not; and so what
   punishment is due to such and such errors, according to the degrees
   wherein they are?

   [1st.] I desire an institution of this ordinance in the church. Where
   is the magistrate intrusted with such a power? where are rules
   prescribed to him in his proceedings?

   [2dly.] Is not a judiciary determination concerning truth and error (I
   mean truths of the gospel) a mere church act? and that church power
   whereby it is effected? Must not, then, the magistrate, "quâ talis," be
   a church officer? Will men of this mind tolerate Erastianism?

   [3dly.] If there be a twofold judicature appointed for the same person,
   for the same crime, is it not because one crime may in divers respects
   fall under several considerations? and must not these considerations be
   preserved immixed, that the formal reason of proceeding in one court
   may not be of any weight in the other? We proved before, and it is
   granted of all, that the church is judge in case of heresy and error,
   as such, to proceed against them, as contrary to the gospel; -- their
   opposition to the faith delivered to the saints is the formal reason
   upon which that proceedeth to censure. If, now, this be afterward
   brought under another sentence, of another judicature, must it not be
   under another consideration? Now, what can this be, but its disturbance
   of civil society; which, when it doth so, -- not in pretence, but
   really and actually, -- none denies it to be the magistrate's duty to
   interpose with his power.

   [4thly.] If the magistrate be judge of spiritual offences, and it be
   left to him to determine and execute judgment, in such proportion as he
   shall think meet, according to the quality and degrees thereof, -- it
   is a very strange and unlimited arbitrariness over the lives and
   estates of men: and surely they ought to produce very clear testimonies
   that they are intrusted from the Lord herewith, or they can have no
   great quiet in acting.

   [5thly.] It seems strange to me, that the Lord Jesus Christ should
   commit this architectonical power in his house unto magistrates,
   foreseeing of what sort the greatest number of them would be, yea,
   determining that they should be such, for the trim and affliction of
   his own. View the times that are past, consult the stories of former
   ages, take a catalogue of the kings and rulers that have been, since
   first magistrates outwardly embraced Christian religion in this and
   other nations where the gospel hath been planted; and ask your own
   consciences whether these be the men to whom this high trust in the
   house of God is committed? The truth is, they no sooner left serving
   the dragon in the persecution of the Pagans, but presently, in a very
   few years, they gave up their power to the beast, to set up another
   state in opposition to the Lord Jesus Christ and his gospel; in the
   supportment whereof the most of them continue labouring till this very
   day. "Hæ manus Trojam exigent?" What may be added in this case, I refer
   to another opportunity.

   2dly. Gospel constitutions in the case of heresy or error seem not to
   favour any course of violence, -- I mean, of civil penalties. Foretold
   it is that heresies must be, 1 Cor. xi. 19; but this for the
   manifesting of those that are approved, not the destroying of those
   that are not; -- I say destroying, I mean with temporal punishment,
   that I may add this by the way; for, -- all the arguments produced for
   the punishment of heretics, holding out capital censures, and these
   being the tendence of all beginnings in this kind, -- I mention only
   the greatest, including all other arbitrary penalties, being but steps
   of walking to the utmost censures. Admonitions, and excommunication
   upon rejection of admonition, are the highest constitutions (I suppose)
   against such persons: "Waiting with all patience upon them that oppose
   themselves, if at any time God will give them repentance to the
   acknowledgment of the truth." Imprisoning, banishing, slaying, is
   scarcely a patient waiting. God doth not so wait upon unbelievers.
   Perhaps those who call for the sword on earth are as unacquainted with
   their own spirits as those that called for fire from heaven, Luke ix.
   54. And perhaps the parable of the tares gives in a positive rule as to
   this whole business: occasion may be given of handling it at large; for
   the present I shall not fear to assert, that the answers unto it,
   borrowed by our divines from Bellarmine, will not endure the trial. We
   hope that spiritual quiet, and inoffensiveness in the whole mountain of
   the Lord, which is wrapped up in the womb of many promises, will at
   length be brought forth to the joy of all the children of Zion.

   3dly. Sundry other arguments, taken from the nature of faith, heresy,
   liberty of conscience, the way of illumination, means of communication
   of truth, nature of spiritual things, pravitious tendence of the
   doctrine opposed, if it should be actually embraced by all enjoying
   authority, and the like, I thought at present to have added; but I am
   gone already beyond my purposed resting place.

   (2.) Come we, in a few words, to the last thing proposed (wherein I
   shall be very brief, the main of what I intended being already set
   down), -- the power of the magistrate to compel others to the embracing
   of that religion and way of worship which he shall establish and set
   up; which, for the greater advantage, we shall suppose to be the very
   same, both for the things proposed to be believed and also practised,
   which God himself hath revealed, and requireth all men everywhere to
   embrace. What is to be done for the settling and establishing of the
   profession of the gospel, and the right apprehension of the mind of God
   therein, contradistinct from all those false and erroneous persuasions
   which, in these or former days, [are] or have been held forth in
   opposition thereunto, was before declared; -- how it is to be
   supported, maintained, protected, defended, safe-guarded from all
   oppositions, disturbances, blasphemings, was then and there set down.

   Now, supposing that sundry persons, living under the power, and owning
   civil obedience to the magistrate, will not consent to sound doctrine,
   nor receive in some things (fewer or more, less or greater) that form
   of wholesome words which he holds forth and owns as the mind of Christ
   in the gospel, nor communicate with him in the worship which, by the
   authority of those words or that truth, he hath as before established,
   it is inquired, What is the duty of the magistrate in reference to the
   bringing of them into that subjection which is due unto, and an
   acknowledgment of, the truth?

   And to this I shall briefly give in my answer in these following
   positions:--

   [1.] In reference unto us in this nation, the greatest difficulty in
   giving a full return to this question ariseth from the great disorder
   of the churches of God amongst us. Were the precious distinguished from
   the vile, churches rightly established, and church discipline [so]
   exercised that Christians were under some orderly view, and men might
   be considered in their several capacities wherein they stand, an easy
   finger would untie the knot of this query. But being in that confusion
   wherein we are, gathering into any order being the great work in hand,
   I suppose, under favour, that the time is scarce come for the proposal
   of this question; but yet something may be given in unto it, though not
   so clear as the former supposal, being effected, would cause it to be.

   [2.] The constant practice of the churches in former ages, in all their
   meetings for advice and counsel, to consent unto some form of wholesome
   words, that might be a discriminating "tessera" [symbol] of their
   communion in doctrine, being used in prime antiquity, -- as is manifest
   in that ancient symbol commonly esteemed apostolical (of the chief
   heads whereof mention in the like summary is made in the very first
   writers among them), -- having also warrant from the word of God, and
   being of singular use to hold out unto all other churches of the world
   our apprehensions of the mind of God in the chief heads of religion,
   may be considered. If this be done by the authority of the magistrate,
   -- I mean, if such a declaration of the truth wherein the churches by
   him owned and protected do consent be held out as the confession of
   that truth which he embraceth, -- it will be of singular use unto, yea,
   indeed, must necessarily precede, any determination of the former
   question. Of the nature and use of confessions, etc., so much hath of
   late been learnedly disputed, that I shall not pour out any of mine own
   conceptions for the present about them in that hasty, tumultuary manner
   wherein I am enforced to expose this essay.

   [3.] Those who dissent from the truth so owned, so established, so
   decreed, do so either in less matters of small consequence, and about
   things generally confessed not fundamental; or in great and more
   weighty heads of doctrine, acts of worship, and the like; -- both
   agreeing in this, that they will not hold communion, either as to all
   or some parts and duties thereof, with those churches and persons who
   do embrace the truth so owned, as before, and act accordingly.

   1st, For the first of these, or such as dissent about things of no
   great concernment, in comparison of those other things wherein they do
   agree with them from whom they do dissent, I am bold positively to
   assert, that, saving and reserving the rules and qualifications set
   down under the second head, the magistrate hath no warrant from the
   word of God, nor command, rule, or precept, to enable him to force such
   persons to submit unto the truth as by him established, in those things
   wherein they express a conscientious dissent, or to molest them with
   any civil penalty in case of refusal or non-submission; nor yet did I
   ever in my life meet with any thing in the shape of reason to prove it,
   although the great present clamour of this nation is punctually as to
   this head:-- whatever be pretended, this is the Helena about which is
   the great contest.

   What, I pray, will warrant him, then, to proceed? Will the laws against
   idolatry and blasphemy, with their sanctions towards the persons of
   blasphemers and idolaters? (For I must ingenuously confess, all that
   which, in my poor judgment, looks with any appearance of pressing
   towards Hæreticidium is the everlasting equity of those judicial laws,
   and the arbitrariness of magistrates from a divine rule in things of
   the greatest concernment to the glory of God, if free from them; and
   that [as] these laws, I doubt, will scarcely be accommodated unto any
   thing under contest now in this age of the world among Christians.) --
   But shall I say a warrant [may be] taken from hence for the compelling
   of men sound in so many fundamentals as, were it not for the contest
   with them, we would acknowledge sufficient for the entertainment of the
   Lord Jesus in their bosoms, to subject [themselves] to, and close with,
   the things contrary to their present light and apprehension (though
   under a promise of being taught of God), or to inflict penalties upon a
   refusal so to do? -- "Credat Apella!"

   Shall the examples of extraordinary judgments upon idolaters, false
   prophets, by sword and fire from heaven, on magicians, apostates, and
   the like, be here produced? Though such arguments as these have made
   thousands weep tears of blood, yet the consequence, in reason, cannot
   but provoke laughter to all men not wholly forsaken of directing
   principles.

   What, then, shall be done? they will say. They have been admonished,
   rebuked, convinced, -- must they now be let alone?

   Something as to this I shall add in the close of this discourse; -- for
   the present, let learned Whitaker answer for me. And first, to the
   first, -- of their being confuted: "Possunt quidem controversiæ ad
   externum forum deferri, et ibi definiri; sed conscientia in eo foro non
   acquiescit, non enim potest conscientia sedari sine Spiritu sancto."
   Let controversies (saith he) be determined how you please, -- until the
   conscience be quieted by the Holy Spirit, there will be little peace.
   Unto which I shall not add any thing, considering what I said before of
   conviction. And to the latter, -- of letting them alone to their own
   ways, "Ecclesiæ quidem optatius est levibus quibusdam dissensionibus ad
   tempus agitari, quam in perfida pace acquiescere; non ergo sufficit
   aliquo modo pacem conservari, nisi illam esse sanctam pacem
   constiterit," Whit., Con. 4 de Rom. Pont. qu. 1, cap. 1, sect. 2.
   Better some trouble, than a perfidious, compelled peace. See him handle
   this more at large, with some excellent conclusions to this purpose,
   Con. 4 de Rom. Pont. qu. 1, cap. 1, sect. 19, pp. 48 et 50.

   For these, then (and under this head I compare all such persons as,
   keeping in practice within the bounds before laid forth, do so far hold
   the foundation, as that, neither by believing what is not, nor
   disbelieving what indeed is, they do take in or keep off any such thing
   as wherewithal being embraced, or without which being rejected, the
   life of Christ cannot in any case possibly consist, nor salvation by
   him be obtained), as the magistrate is not bound by any rule or precept
   to assist and maintain them in the practice of those things wherein
   they dissent from the truth; so he is bound to protect them in peace
   and quietness in the enjoyment of all civil rights and liberties; --
   nor hath he either warrant or allowance to proceed against them, as to
   the least penalty, for their dissent in those things they cannot
   receive. Attempts for uniformity among saints, or such as, for aught we
   can conclude either from their opinions or practices, may be so, by
   external force, are purely antichristian.

   2dly. Now, for those that stand at a greater distance from the publicly
   owned and declared truths, -- such as before we spake of, -- the
   orderly way of dealing with such is, in the first place, to bring them
   off from the error of the way which they have embraced; and until that
   be done, all thoughts of drawing in their assent to that from which at
   such a distance they stand is vain and bootless. Now, what course is to
   be taken for the effecting of this? Spiritual ways of healing are known
   to all, -- let them be used; and in case they prove fruitless, for
   aught that yet I can perceive, the persons of men so erring must be
   left in the state and condition we described under the second head.

   And now, to drive on this business any farther by way of contest, I
   will not. My intention at the beginning was only positively to assert,
   and to give in briefly, the scriptural and rational bottoms and proofs
   of those assertions; wherein I have gone aside, to pull or thrust a
   line of debate, I have transgressed against my own purpose, -- I hope
   it will be pardoned; though I am heartily desirous any thing which
   passeth my pen may be brought to the test, and myself reduced where I
   have gone amiss. Yet my spirit faints within me to think of that way of
   handling things in controversy which some men, by reciprocation of
   answers and replies, have wound themselves into. Bolsec, [231] and
   Staphylus, and Stapleton, seem to live again, and much gall from
   beneath to be poured into men's ink. O the deep wounds the gospel hath
   received by the mutual keen invectives of learned men! I hope the Lord
   will preserve me from being engaged with any man of such a frame of
   spirit. What hath been asserted may easily be cast up in a few
   positions; -- the intelligent reader will quickly discern what is aimed
   at, and what I have stood to avow.

   If what is proposed be not satisfactory, I humbly offer to the
   honourable Parliament, that a certain number of learned men, who are
   differently minded as to this business of toleration, which almost
   every where is spoken against, may be desired and required to a fair
   debate of the matter in difference before their own assembly; that so,
   if it be possible, some light may be given to the determination of this
   thing, of so great concernment in the judgments of all men, both on the
   one side and on the other; that so they may "try all things, and hold
   fast that which is good."

   Corol. 1. That magistrates have nothing to do in matters of religion,
   as some unadvisedly affirm, is exceedingly wide from the truth of the
   thing itself.

   Corol. 2. Corporeal punishments for simple error were found out to help
   to build the tower of Babel.


   Si quid novisti rectius istis,

   Candidus imperti; si non, his utere mecum.
     __________________________________________________________________

   [217] See a "Solemn Testimony against Toleration and the Present
   Proceedings of Sectaries and their Abettors in England, in reference to
   Religion and Government," etc. -- a document sanctioned by the General
   Assembly of the Church of Scotland, Jan. 16, 1649, and published in the
   course of the same year -- Ed.

   [218] Thom. 22æ. g. 13, a. 1, ad 1um.

   [219] Acts xviii. 6, xxvi. 11; 1 Tim. i. 13.

   [220] Bell. Lib. de Laicis., cap. xxi.

   [221] August. de Util. Creden., cap. iii. Thom. pp. q. 1, a. 10. Zanch.
   de SS. q. 12, cap. 2, reg. 10. Tilen. Syntag. Theol. de Interpret. S.
   Thes. 8. Whitak. de SS., qu. 5, cap. 2. Armin. Disput. Pri. Thes. 9, 1.
   Ames. Med. Theol. cap. 34. Thes. 22.

   [222] Orleans gloss, -- a very ancient proverbial saying in France,
   used in ridicule of comments more obscure than the text -- Menage,
   Dict. Etymol., sub. v. Glozè. -- Ed.

   [223] Varro in Augustin. de Civit. Dei.

   [224] Joseph. ad. Ap., lib. i.

   [225] "Moses novos ritus contrariosque cæteris mortalibus indidit.
   Profana illic omnia, quæ apud nos sacra; rursum concessa apud illos,
   quæ nobis incesta. Projectissima ad libidinem gens alienarum concubitum
   abstinent, inter se nihil illicitum." -- Tacitus (de Judæis) Hist.,
   lib. v. "Judæos, impulsore Chresto quotidie tumultuantes Roma expulit,"
   falsely and foolishly. -- Suet. Claud., cap. xxv. "Quæsitissimis poenis
   afficiebat, quos per flagitia invisos vulgus Christianos apellabat."
   Tac. An., lib. xv. "Afflicti suppliciis Christiani, genus hominum
   superstitionis novæ ac maleficæ." -- Sueton. in Nerone, cap. xvi.

   [226] Epiphan. tom. ii. lib. 1, Hær. 26.

   [227] "Becanus de fide hæreticis servanda." -- Bell., De Laicis, etc.

   [228] Sulpitius Severus, lib. ii., Eccles. Hist.

   [229] Hist. of Reformation in Scotland.

   [230] For this cause the emperors of old still allowed the Novatians
   the liberty of worship.

   [231] Bolsec was a bitter opponent of Calvin, and wrote with much
   acrimony against him. -- De J. Calv. Hist. Col. 1580. Staphylus was was
   at one time an evangelical theologian of the Lutheran Church, and
   afterwards became a violent enemy of the Reformation, 1558-1564.
   Stapelton was a celebrated Roman Catholic divine, born in Sussex 1535.
   He left England on the accession of Queen Elizabeth, and was appointed
   Regius Professor of Divinity in the University of Louvain. He died in
   1598. His works were published at Paris in 1620, in four vols. folio.
   -- Ed.
     __________________________________________________________________
     __________________________________________________________________
     __________________________________________________________________

   Sermon IV.

   The steadfastness of the promises,

   and

   the sinfulness of staggering:

   opened in a sermon preached at Margaret's in Westminster, before the
   Parliament, February 28, 1649,

   being a day set apart for solemn humiliation throughout the nation.
     __________________________________________________________________

Prefatory note.

   The following discourse was preached after Owen's return from Ireland.
   The expedition of Cromwell had been eminently successful in
   establishing peace, after the massacres and commotions which had long
   prevailed in that island. Owen, however, had set his heart upon
   securing for it higher blessings than outward peace, enforced by the
   conquering sword of the Protector. It is affecting to note the depth of
   spiritual concern and anxiety he evinces, that Ireland should enjoy the
   gospel of Christ, as the only cure for its manifold and inveterate
   disorders. How humbling, that extensive districts of it should have
   remained to our day substantially under the same wants and necessities
   which bad a voice so clamant in the ear of Owen! It reads as if the
   utterance of yesterday, when we find him declaring his heartfelt wish,
   that "the Irish might enjoy Ireland as long as the moon endureth, so
   that Jesus Christ might possess the Irish."

   Mr Orme holds, apparently on good grounds, that this sermon was really
   delivered before the House of Commons, not in February 1649, as the
   title bears, but in February 1650. The epistle dedicatory to the
   preceding sermon on" Righteous Zeal," etc., has the address and date,
   "Coggeshall, Feb. 28," (undoubtedly 1649), which is the same day on
   which, by the title of the present sermon, he was preaching at London.
   Some allusions in this sermon are thought to indicate that Owen had
   been in Ireland; and though, in all the editions of it, the year is
   said to have been 1649, by the present mode of reckoning it would be
   1650. We may add, that in the old collections of Owen's sermons, this
   one follows the sermon next in the present order, on Heb. xii. 27. On
   the other hand, Asty affirms that it was preached before Owen went to
   Ireland, and speaks of it as giving rise to his acquaintance with
   Cromwell. The allusions to Ireland may not be regarded by some as very
   decisive on the point; and it is singular that the number of the year
   should differ from the mode of reckoning common to the dates of the
   other sermons published by Owen about this time. Since authorities
   differ, we have given the evidence on both sides, and the sermons
   appear in the order in which, by the dates and titles, they are said to
   have been preached. Mr Orme seems to us clearly in the right; and,
   though the matter is not of much importance, we have, under this view,
   some record in this discourse of the impressions left on the mind of
   Owen by his visit to Ireland. On the first occasion on which he ever
   preached before the House of Commons, he entreated that the destitute
   parts of England and Wales might be supplied with the gospel; and now
   on his return from his mission to Dublin, as soon as he has the ear of
   Parliament, he implores, in fervent terms, that the gospel may be sent
   to Ireland. The fact bespeaks his own heartfelt sense of its value, and
   shows how wisely be could turn opportunities to account for the
   advancement of his Master's cause. -- Ed.
     __________________________________________________________________

   Die Veneris, 1 Martii, 1649.

   Ordered by the Parliament, That the thanks of this House be given to Mr
   Owen for his great pains taken in his sermon preached yesterday before
   the Parliament, at Margaret's, Westminster (being a day set apart for
   public humiliation); and that he be desired to print his sermon; and
   that he have the like privilege in printing as others in like cases
   have usually had. Ordered, That Sir William Masham do give the thanks
   of this House to Mr Owen accordingly.

   Hen. Scobell, Cler. Parl.
     __________________________________________________________________

To the Commons of England, in Parliament assembled.

   Sirs,

   That God in whose hands your breath is, and whose are all your ways,
   having caused various seasons to pass over you, and in them all
   manifested that his works are truth and his ways judgment, calls
   earnestly by them for that walking before him which is required from
   them who, with other distinguishing mercies, are interested in the
   speciality of his protecting providence. As, in a view of present
   enjoyments, to sacrifice to your net, and burn incense to your drag, as
   though by them your portion were fat and plenteous, is an exceeding
   provocation to the eyes of his glory; so, to press to the residue of
   your desires and expectations by an arm of flesh, the designings and
   contrivances of carnal reason, with outwardly appearing mediums of
   their accomplishment, is no less an abomination to him. Though there
   may be a present sweetness to them that find the life of the hand, yet
   their latter end will be, to lie down in sorrow. That you might be
   prevailed on to give glory to God, by steadfastness in believing,
   committing all your ways to him, with patience in well-doing, to the
   contempt of the most varnished appearance of carnal policy, was my
   peculiar aim in this ensuing sermon.

   That which added ready willingness to my obedience unto your commands
   for the preaching and publishing hereof, being a serious proposal for
   the advancement and propagation of the gospel in another nation, is
   here again recommended to your thoughts, by

   Your Most Humble Servant

   In Our Common Master,

   J. Owen.

   March 8, 1649.
     __________________________________________________________________

Sermon IV. The steadfastness of the promises, and the sinfulness of staggering.

   "He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief." -- Rom. iv.
   20.

   In the first chapters of this epistle, the apostle, from Scripture and
   the constant practice of all sorts of men of all ages, Jews and
   Gentiles, wise and barbarians, proves all the world, and every
   individual therein, to "have sinned and come short of the glory of
   God;" -- and not only so, but that it was utterly impossible that, by
   their own strength, or by virtue of any assistance communicated, or
   privileges enjoyed, they should ever attain to a righteousness of their
   own that might be acceptable unto God.

   Hereupon he concludes that discourse with these two positive
   assertions:--

   First, That for what is past, "every mouth must be stopped, and all the
   world become guilty before God, chap. iii. 19.

   Secondly, For the future, though they should labour to amend their
   ways, and improve their assistances and privileges to a better
   advantage than formerly, "yet by the deeds of the law shall no flesh be
   justified in the sight of God," verse 20.

   Now, it being the main drift of the apostle, in this epistle, and in
   his whole employment, to manifest that God hath not shut up all the
   sons of men hopeless and remediless under this condition, he
   immediately discovers and opens the rich supply which God, in free
   grace, hath made and provided for the delivery of his own from this
   calamitous estate, even by the righteousness of faith in Christ; which
   he unfoldeth, asserteth, proves, and vindicates from objections, to the
   end of the 3d chapter.

   This being a matter of so great weight, as comprising in itself the sum
   of the gospel wherewith he was intrusted, -- the honour and exaltation
   of Christ, which above all he desired, -- the great design of God to be
   glorious in his saints, -- and, in a word, the chief subject of the
   embassage from Christ to him committed (to wit, that they who neither
   have, nor by any means can attain, a righteousness of their own, by the
   utmost of their workings, may yet have that which is complete and
   unrefusable in Christ, by believing); he therefore strongly confirms it
   in the 4th chapter, by testimony and example of the Scripture, with the
   saints that were of old; -- thereby also declaring, that though the
   manifestation of this mystery were now more fully opened by Christ from
   the bosom of the Father, yet indeed this was the only way for any to
   appear in the presence of God, ever since sin entered the world.

   To make his demonstrations the more evident, he singleth out one for an
   example who was eminently known, and confessed by all to have been the
   friend of God, -- to have been righteous and justified before him, and
   thereon to have held sweet communion with him all his days; to wit,
   Abraham, the father according to the flesh of all those who put in the
   strongest of all men for a share in righteousness, by the privileges
   they did enjoy and the works they did perform.

   Now, concerning him the apostle proves abundantly, in the beginning of
   the 4th chapter, that the justification which he found, and the
   righteousness he attained, was purely that, and no other, which he
   before described; to wit, a righteousness in the forgiveness of sins
   through faith in the blood of Christ. Yea, and that all the privileges
   and exaltations of this Abraham, which made him so signal and eminent
   among the saints of God as to be called "The father of the faithful,"
   were merely from hence, that this righteousness of grace was freely
   discovered and fully established unto him; -- an enjoyment being
   granted him in a peculiar manner by faith of that promise wherein the
   Lord Christ, with the whole spring of the righteousness mentioned, was
   enwrapped. This the apostle pursues, with sundry and various inferences
   and conclusions, to the end of verse 17, chapter 4.

   Having laid down this, in the next place he gives us a description of
   that faith of Abraham whereby he became inheritor of those excellent
   things, from the adjuncts of it; -- that as his justification was
   proposed as an example of God's dealing with us by his grace; so his
   faith might be laid down as a pattern for us in the receiving that
   grace.

   Now, this he doth from, --

   First, The foundation of it, whereon it rested.

   Secondly, The matter of it, what he believed.

   Thirdly, The manner of it, or how he believed.

   First, From the bottom and foundation on which it rested, -- viz., the
   omnipotency or all-sufficiency of God, whereby he was able to fulfil
   whatever he had engaged himself unto by promise, and which he called
   him to believe, verse 17, "He believed God, who quickeneth the dead,
   and calleth those things which be not as though they were."

   Two great testimonies are here of the power of God.

   1. That he "quickeneth the dead:" -- able he is to raise up those that
   are dead to life again.

   2. He "calleth things that are not as though they were:" -- by his very
   call or word gives being to those things which before were not, as when
   he said, "Let there be light, and there was light," Gen. i. 3; by that
   very word "commanding light to shine out of darkness," 2 Cor. iv. 6.

   These demonstrations of God's all-sufficiency he considereth in
   peculiar reference to what he was to believe; to wit, that "he might be
   the father of many nations," verse 11, -- of the Jews, "according to
   the flesh," -- of Jews and Gentiles, according to the faith whereof we
   speak. For the first, "his body being now dead, and Sarah's womb dead,"
   verse 19, he rests on God "as quickening the dead," in believing that
   he "shall be the father of many nations." For the other, that he should
   be a father of the Gentiles by faith, the Holy Ghost witnesseth that
   they "were not a people," Hos. ii. 23. The implanting of them in his
   stock must be by a power "that calleth things that are not, as though
   they were," -- giving a new nature and being unto them, which before
   they had not.

   To bottom ourselves upon the all-sufficiency of God, for the
   accomplishment of such things as are altogether impossible to any thing
   but that all-sufficiency, is faith indeed, and worthy our imitation. It
   is also the wisdom of faith to pitch peculiarly on that in God which is
   accommodated to the difficulties wherewith it is to wrestle. Is Abraham
   to believe that from his dead body must spring a whole nation? -- he
   rests on God, as "him that quickeneth the dead."

   Secondly, His faith is commended from the matter of it, or what he did
   believe; which is said in general to be "the promise of God," verse 20,
   "He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief." And
   particularly, the matter of that promise is pointed at, verses 11, 18,
   -- that he should be "the father of many nations;" that was, his being
   a "father of many nations," of having "all nations blessed in his
   seed:" -- a matter entangled with a world of difficulties, considering
   the natural inability of his body and the body of Sarah to be parents
   of children. But, when God calls for believing, his truth and
   all-sufficiency being engaged, no difficulty nor seeming
   impossibilities that the thing to be believed is or may be attended
   withal, ought to be of any weight with us. He who hath promised is
   able.

   Thirdly, From the manner of his believing, which is expressed four
   ways.

   1. "Against hope, he believed in hope," verse 18. Here is a twofold
   hope mentioned; -- one that was against him, the other that was for
   him.

   (1.) He "believed against hope;" that is, when all arguments that might
   beget hope in him were against him. "Against hope," is against all
   motives unto hope whatever. All reasons of natural hope were against
   him. What hope could arise, in or by reason, that two dead bodies
   should be the source and fountain of many nations? so that against all
   inducements of a natural hope he believed.

   (2.) He "believed in hope;" that is, such hope as arose, as his faith
   did, from the consideration of God's all-sufficiency. This is an
   adjunct of his faith, -- it was such a faith as had hope adjoined with
   it. And this believing in hope, when all reasons of hope were away, is
   the first thing that is set down of the manner of his faith. In a decay
   of all natural helps, the deadness of all means, an appearance of an
   utter impossibility that ever the promise should be accomplished, --
   then to believe with unfeigned hope is a commendable faith.

   2. He was "not weak in faith," verse 19, meiosis, "minimè debilis,"
   Beza. He was by "no means weak;" a negation that, by a figure, me
   asthenesas, doth strongly assert the contrary to that which is dented.
   He was no way weak; that is, he was very strong in faith, as is
   afterwards expressed, verse 20, He "was strong in faith, giving glory
   to God." And the apostle tells you wherein this his not weakness did
   appear: saith he, "He considered not his own body being now dead, when
   he was about a hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah's
   womb," verse 19. It was seen in this, that his faith carried him above
   the consideration of all impediments that might lie in the way to the
   accomplishment of the promise.

   It is mere weakness of faith that makes a man lie poring on the
   difficulties and seeming impossibilities that lie upon the promise. We
   think it our wisdom and our strength to consider, weigh, and look into
   the bottom of oppositions and temptations that arise against the
   promise. Perhaps it may be the strength of our fleshly, carnal reason,
   but certainly it is the weakness of our faith. He that is strong in
   faith will not so much as debate or consider the things that cast the
   greatest seeming improbability, yea, impossibility, on the fulfilling
   of the promise: it will not afford a debate or dispute of the cause,
   nor any consideration. "Being not weak in faith, he considered not."

   3. He was "fully persuaded," verse 21, plerothphoretheis, "persuasionis
   plenus." This is the third thing that is observed in the manner of his
   believing. He fully, quietly, resolvedly cast himself on this, that "he
   who had promised was able to perform it." As a ship at sea (for so the
   word imports), looking about, and seeing storms and winds arising, sets
   up all her sails, and with all speed makes to the harbour; Abraham,
   seeing the storms of doubts and temptations likely to rise against the
   promise made unto him, with full sail breaks through all, to lie down
   quietly in God's all-sufficiency.

   4. The last is, that "he staggered not," verse 20. This is that which I
   have chosen to insist on unto you, as a choice part of the commendation
   of Abraham's faith, which is proposed for our imitation: "He staggered
   not at the promise of God through unbelief."

   The words may be briefly resolved into this doctrinal proposition:--

   Observation. All staggering at the promises of God is from unbelief.

   What is of any difficulty in the text, will be cleared in opening the
   parts of the observation.

   Men are apt to pretend sundry other reasons and causes of their
   staggering: The promises do not belong unto them, -- God intends not
   their souls in them, -- they are not such and such, -- and this makes
   them stagger; when the truth is, it is their unbelief, and that alone,
   that puts them into this staggering condition. As in other things, so
   in this, we are apt to have many fair pretences for foul faults. To lay
   the burden on the right shoulders, I shall demonstrate, by God's
   assistance, that it is not this, or that, but unbelief alone, that
   makes us stagger at the promises.

   To make this the more plain, I must open these two things:--

   I. What is the promise here intended.

   II. What it is to stagger at the promise.

   I. The promise here mentioned is principally that which Abraham
   believing, it was said eminently that "it was accounted to him for
   righteousness." So the apostle tells us, verse 5 of this chapter. When
   this was, you may see Gen. xv. 6; there it is affirmed, that "he
   believed the Lord, and it was accounted to him for righteousness." That
   which God had there spoken to him of, was about "the multiplying of his
   seed as the stars of heaven, whereas he was yet childless."

   The last verse of chapter xiv. leaves Abraham full of earthly glory. He
   had newly conquered five kings with all their host, was honoured by the
   king of Sodom, and blessed by the king of Salem; and yet, in the first
   verse of chapter xv., God, "appearing to him in a vision," in the very
   entrance, bids him "fear not; "-- plainly intimating, that
   notwithstanding all his outward success and glory, he had still many
   perplexities upon his spirit, and had need of great consolation and
   establishment. Abraham was not clear in the accomplishment of former
   promises about the blessed seed; and so, though he have all outward
   advancements, yet he cannot rest in them. Until a child of God be clear
   in the main in the matter of the great promise, -- the business of
   Christ, the greatest outward successes and advantages will be so far
   from quieting and settling his mind, that they rather increase his
   perplexities. They do but occasion him to cry, Here is this and that;
   here is victory and success; here is wealth and peace; -- but here is
   not Christ.

   That this was Abraham's condition appears from verse 2 of that chapter;
   where God having told him that he was his shield, and his exceeding
   great reward, he replies, "Lord God, what wilt thou give me, seeing I
   go childless?" As if he should have said, Lord God, thou toldest me
   when I was in Haran, now nineteen years ago, that in me and "my seed
   all the families of the earth should be blessed," Gen. xii. 3, -- that
   the blessed, blessing seed, should be of me: but now I wax old, all
   appearances grow up against the direct accomplishment of that word; and
   it was that which, above all, in following thee, I aimed at: if I am
   disappointed therein, what shall I do? and what will all these things
   avail me? -- what will it benefit me to have a multitude of earthly
   enjoyments, and leave them in the close to my servant?

   I cannot but observe, that this sighing, mournful complaint of Abraham,
   hath much infirmity, and something of diffidence mixed with it. He
   shakes in the very bottom of his soul, that improbabilities were
   growing up, as he thought, to impossibilities against him in the way of
   promise. Yet hence also mark these two things: First, That he doth not
   repine in himself, and keep up his burning thoughts in his breast, but
   sweetly breathes out the burden of his soul into the bosom of his God.
   "Lord God," saith he, "what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless?"
   It is of sincere faith, to unlade our unbelief in the bosom of our God.
   Secondly, That God takes not his servant at the advantage of his
   complaining and diffidence; but lets that pass, until having renewed
   the promise to him, and settled his faith, then he gives in his
   testimony that he believed God. The Lord overlooks the weakness and
   causeless wailings of his, takes them at the best, and then gives his
   witness to them.

   This, I say, was the promise whereof we spake, -- that he should have a
   seed of his own, "like the stars that cannot be numbered," Gen. xv. 4,
   5. And herein are contained three things.

   1. The purely spiritual part of it, that concerned his own soul in
   Christ. God engaging about his seed, minds him of his own interest in
   that seed which brings the blessing. Jesus Christ, with his whole
   mediation, and his whole work of redemption, is in this promise, with
   the enjoyment of God in covenant, "as a shield, and as an exceeding
   great reward."

   2. The kingdom of Christ, in respect of the propagation and
   establishment of it, with the multitude of his subjects, -- that also
   is in this promise.

   3. The temporal part of it, -- multitudes of children to a childless
   man, and an heir from his own bowels.

   Now this promise, in these three branches, takes up your whole
   interest, comprises all you are to believe for, be you considered
   either as believers or as rulers. As believers:-- so your interest lies
   in these two things: That your own souls have a share and portion in
   the Lord Christ; and that the kingdom of the Lord Jesus be exalted and
   established. As rulers:-- That peace and prosperity may be the
   inheritance of the nation, is in your desires. Look upon this in
   subordination to the kingdom of Christ, and so all these are in this
   promise.

   To make this more plain, these being the three main things that you aim
   at, I shall lay before you three promises, suited to these several
   things, which, or the like, you are to view in all your actings, all
   staggering at them being from unbelief.

   The first thing you are to believe for, is the interest of your own
   souls in the covenant of grace by Christ. As to this, I shall only
   point unto that promise of the covenant, Heb. viii. 12, "I will be
   merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities
   will I remember no more."

   The second is the establishment of the kingdom of Christ, in despite of
   all opposition And for this, amongst innumerable [passages], take that
   of Isa. ix. 11. "Therefore thy gates shall be open continually; they
   shall not be shut day nor night; that men may bring unto thee the
   forces of the Gentiles, and that their kings may be brought: for the
   nation and kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish."

   The quiet and peace of the nation, which ye regard as rulers, as it
   stands in subordination to the kingdom of Christ, comes also under the
   promise; for which take that of Jer. xxx. 20, 21.

   These being your three main aims, let your eye be fixed on these three,
   or the like promises; for in the demonstration and the use of the point
   I shall carry along all three together, desiring that what is instanced
   in any one may be always extended to both the others.

   II. What is it to stagger at the promise? "He staggered not," ou
   diekrithe, "he disputed not." Diakrinomai is, properly, to make use of
   our own judgment and reason in discerning of things, of what sort they
   be. It is sometimes rendered, "to doubt," Matt. xxi. 21, "If ye have
   faith" (kai me diakrithete), "and doubt not:" that is, not use arguings
   and reasonings in yourselves concerning the promise and things
   promised. Sometimes it simply denotes to discern a thing as it is:-- so
   the word is used, 1 Cor. xi. 29, Diakrinon to soma, "Discerning the
   body." In the sense wherein it is here used, as also Matt. xxi. 21, it
   holds out, as I said, a self-consultation and dispute concerning those
   contrary things that are proposed to us. So also Acts x. 20, Peter is
   commanded to obey the vision, meden diakrinomenos, "nothing doubting."
   What is that? Why, a not continuing to do what he is said to have done,
   verse 17, "He doubted in himself what the vision he had seen should
   mean;" he rolled and disputed it in his own thoughts; he staggered at
   it.

   To stagger, then, at the promise, is to take into consideration the
   promise itself, and withal, all the difficulties that lie in the way
   for the accomplishment of it, as to a man's own particular, and then so
   to dispute it in his thoughts, as not fully to cast it off, nor fully
   to close with it. For instance, the soul considers the promise of free
   grace in the blood of Jesus, -- looks upon it, -- weighs as well as it
   is able the truth of God, who makes the promise, with those other
   considerations which might lead the heart to rest firmly upon it; but
   withal, takes into his thoughts his own unworthiness, sinfulness,
   unbelief, hypocrisy, and the like, -- which, as he supposes, powerfully
   stave off the efficacy of the promise from him. Hence he knows not what
   to conclude. If he add a grain of faith, the scale turns on the side of
   the promise; the like quantity of unbelief makes it turn upon him; and
   what to do he knows not; let go the promise he cannot, take fast hold
   he dares not; but here he staggers and wavers to and fro.

   Thus the soul comes to be like Paul, in another case, Phil. i. 23. He
   considered his own advantage on the one side by his dissolution, and
   the profit of the churches by his abiding in the flesh on the other;
   and taking in these various thoughts, he cries out he is in a strait;
   -- he staggered, he was betwixt two, and knew not which to choose: or
   as David, 2 Sam. xxiv. 14, when he had a tender of several corrections
   made to him, says, "I am in a great strait;" -- he sees evil in every
   one, and knows not which to choose.

   A poor creature looking upon the promise sees, as he supposes, in a
   steadfast closing with the promise, that there lies presumption; on the
   other hand, certain destruction if he believes not. And now he
   staggers, -- he is in a great strait: arguments arise on both sides, he
   knows not how to determine them; and so, hanging in suspense, he
   staggereth. Like a man travelling a journey, and meeting with two
   several paths that promise both fairly, and he knows not which is his
   proper way; he guesses, and guesses, and at length cries, Well, I know
   not which of these ways I should go; but this is certain, if I mistake,
   I am undone: I'll go in neither, but here I'll sit down, and not move
   one step in either of them, until some one come that can give me
   direction. The soul very frequently sits down in this hesitation, and
   refuses to step one step forward, till God come mightily and lead out
   the spirit to the promise, or the devil turn it aside to unbelief.

   It is as a thing of small weight in the air: the weight that it hath
   carries it downwards; and the air, with some breath of wind, bears it
   up again, so that it waves to and fro: sometimes it seems as though it
   would fall by its own weight; and sometimes again, as though it would
   mount quite out of sight; but poised between both, it tosseth up and
   down, without any great gaining either way. The promise draws the soul
   upward, and the weight of its unbelief sinks it downward. Sometimes the
   promise attracts so powerfully, you would think the heart quite drawn
   up into it; and sometimes again unbelief presses down, that you would
   think it gone forever; -- but neither prevails utterly, the poor
   creature swags between both. This is to stagger. Like the two disciples
   going to Emmaus, Luke xxiv. 14, "They talked together of the things
   that had happened," -- debated the business; and, verse 21, they gave
   up the result of their thoughts. They "trusted it had been he that
   should have redeemed Israel." They trusted once; but now, seeing him
   slain and crucified, they know not what to say to it. What then? do
   they quite give over all trusting in him? No, they cannot do so, verses
   22-24. Certain women had astonished them, and affirmed that he was
   risen; yea, and others also, going to his grave, found it so. Hereupon
   they have consultation within themselves, and are sad, verse 17; --
   that is, they staggered, they were in a staggering condition; much
   appears for them, something against them, -- they know not what to do.

   A poor soul, that hath been long perplexed in trouble and anxiety of
   mind, finds a sweet promise, -- Christ in a promise suited to all his
   wants, coming with mercy to pardon him, with love to embrace him, with
   blood to purge him, -- and is raised up to roll himself in some measure
   upon this promise. On a sudden, terrors arise, temptations grow strong,
   new corruptions break out, -- Christ in the promise dies to him, Christ
   in the promise is slain, is in the grave as to him; so that he can only
   sigh, and say, I trusted for deliverance by Christ, but now all is gone
   again; I have little or no hope, -- Christ in the promise is slain to
   me. What then? shall he give over? never more inquire after this buried
   Christ, but sit down in darkness and sorrow No, he cannot do so: this
   morning some new arguments of Christ's appearance again upon the soul
   are made out; Christ is not forever lost to him. What does he, then?
   Steadfastly believe he cannot, -- totally give over he will not; he
   staggers, -- he is full of self-consultations, and is sad. This it is
   to stagger at the promise of God.

   I come now to prove, that notwithstanding any pretences whatever, all
   this staggering is from unbelief.

   The two disciples, whom we now mentioned, that staggered and disputed
   between themselves in their journey to Emmaus, thought they had a good
   reason, and a sufficient appearing cause of all their doubtings. "We
   hoped," say they, "that it was he that should have redeemed Israel."
   What do they now stand at? Alas! the "chief priests and rulers have
   condemned him to death, and crucified him," Luke xxiv. 20. And is it
   possible that deliverance should arise from a crucified man? This makes
   them stagger. But when our Saviour himself draws nigh to them, and
   gives them the ground of all this, he tells them it is all from hence,
   they are "foolish, and slow of heart to believe," verse 25. Here is the
   rise of all their doubtings, even their unbelief. Whilst you are slow
   of heart to believe, do not once think of establishment.

   Peter venturing upon the waves at the command of Christ, Matt. xiv. 1,
   seeing "the wind to grow boisterous," verse 30, he also hath a storm
   within, and cries out, "Lord, save me!" What was now the cause of
   Peter's fear and crying out? Why, the wind and sea grew boisterous, and
   he was ready to sink; -- no such thing, but merely unbelief, want of
   faith, verse 31. "O thou of little faith," saith our Saviour,
   "wherefore didst thou doubt?" It was not the great wind, but thy little
   faith that made thee stagger. And in three or four other places, upon
   several occasions, doth our Saviour lay all the wavering and staggering
   of his followers as to any promised mercy upon this score, as Matt. vi.
   30, viii. 26.

   Isa. vii., Ahaz being afraid of the combination of Syria and Ephraim
   against him, received a promise of deliverance by Isaiah, verse 7.
   Whereupon the prophet tells him, and all Judah, that "if they will not
   believe, surely they shall not be established," verse 9. He doth not
   say, If Damascus and Ephraim be not broken, you shall not be
   established; no, he doth not stick there. The fear that you will not be
   established ariseth merely from your unbelief; -- that keeps you off
   from closing with the promise, which would certainly bring you
   establishment.

   And this is the sole reason the apostle gives why the word of promise,
   being preached, becomes unprofitable, even because of unbelief: it was
   not "mixed with faith," Heb. iv. 2.

   But these things will be more clear under the demonstration of the
   points, which are two.

   1. When a man doubts, hesitates, and disputes, any thing in himself,
   his reasonings must have their rise, either from something within
   himself, or from something in the things concerning which he
   staggereth; -- either "certitudo mentis," "the assurance of his mind,"
   or "certitudo entis," the "certainty of the thing itself," is wanting.
   He that doubteth whether his friend in a far country be alive or not,
   his staggering ariseth from the uncertainty of the thing itself; when
   that is made out, he is resolved, as it was with Jacob in the case of
   Joseph. But he that doubteth whether the needle in the compass, being
   touched with the loadstone, will turn northward, all the uncertainty is
   in his own mind.

   When men stagger at the promises, this must arise either from within
   themselves, or some occasion must be administered hereunto from the
   promise. If from within themselves, that can be nothing but unbelief;
   -- an inbred obstacle to closing with and resting on the promise, --
   that is unbelief. If, then, we demonstrate that there is nothing in the
   promise, either as to matter or manner, or any attendancy of it, that
   should occasion any such staggering, we lay the burden and blame on the
   right shoulders, -- the sin of staggering on unbelief.

   Now, that any occasion is not administered, nor cause given, of this
   staggering from the promise, will appear if we consider seriously
   whence any such occasion or cause should arise. All the stability of a
   promise depends upon the qualifications of the promiser to the ends and
   purposes of the promise. If a man make me a promise to do such and such
   things for me, and I question whether ever it will be so or not, it
   must be from a doubt of the want of one of these things in him that
   makes the promise; -- either (1.) of truth; or (2.) of ability to make
   good his word, because of the difficulty of the thing itself; or (3.)
   of sincerity to intend me really what he speaks of; or (4.) of constant
   memory to take the opportunity of doing the thing intended; or (5.) of
   stableness to be still of the same mind. Now, if there be no want of
   any of these in him whose promises we speak of, there is then certainly
   no ground of our staggering, but only from our own unbelief.

   Let us now see whether any of these things be wanting to the promises
   of God; and begin we with the first.

   (1.) Is there truth in these promises? If there be the least occasion
   in the world to suspect the truth of the promises or the veracity of
   the promiser, then may our staggering at them arise from thence, and
   not from our own unbelief. On this ground it is that all human faith,
   that is bottomed merely on the testimony of man, is at best but a
   probable opinion; for every man is a liar, and possibly may lie in that
   very thing he is engaged to us in. Though a good man will not do so to
   save his life, yet it is possible he may be tempted, -- he may do so.
   But now, the author of the promises whereof we speak is truth itself,
   -- the God of truth, who hath taken this as his special attribute, to
   distinguish him from all others. He is the very God of truth; and holds
   out this very attribute in a special manner in this very thing, in
   making of his promise: "He is faithful to forgive us our sins," 1 John
   i. 9. Whence his word is said not only to be true, but "truth," John
   xvii. 17, -- truth itself. All flesh is as grass, but his word abideth
   for ever, Isa. xl. 6, 8.

   But yet farther, that it may be evident that from hence there can be no
   occasion of staggering, this God of truth, whose word is truth, hath,
   in his infinite wisdom, condescended to our weakness, and used all
   possible means to cause us to apprehend the truth of his promises. The
   Lord might have left us in the dark, -- to have gathered out his mind
   and will towards us from obscure expressions; and, knowing of what
   value his kindness is, it might justly be expected that we should do
   so. Men in misery are glad to lay hold of the least word that drops
   from him that can relieve them, and to take courage and advantage upon
   it; -- as the servants of Benhadad watched diligently what would fall
   from the mouth of Ahab concerning their master, then in fear of death,
   and when he had occasionally called him his brother, they presently
   laid hold of it, and cry, "Thy brother Benhadad," 1 Kings xx. 33. God
   might have left us, and yet have manifested much free grace, to have
   gathered up falling crumbs or occasional droppings of mercy and supply,
   that we should have rejoiced to have found out one word looking that
   way. But, to shut up all objections, and to stop for ever the mouth of
   unbelief, he hath not only spoken plainly, but hath condescended to use
   all the ways of confirming the truth of what he says and speaks that
   ever were in use among the sons of men.

   There be four ways whereby men seek to obtain credit to what they speak
   as an undoubted truth, that there may be no occasion of staggering.

   [1.] By often averring and affirming of the same thing. When a man says
   the same thing again and again, it is a sign that he speaks the truth,
   or, at least, that he would be thought so to do; yea, if an honest man
   do clearly, fully, plainly, often engage himself to us in the same
   thing, we count it a vile jealousy not to believe the real truth of his
   intentions. Now, the Lord in his promises often speaks the same things,
   -- he speaks once and twice. There is not any thing that he hath
   promised us but he hath done it again and again. For instance, as if he
   should say, "I will be merciful to your sins;" I pray believe me, for
   "I will pardon your iniquities;" yea, it shall be so, -- "I will blot
   out your transgressions as a cloud."

   There is not any want whereunto we are liable, but thus he hath dealt
   concerning it. As his command is line upon line, so is his promise. And
   this is one way whereby God causeth the truth of his promises to
   appear. To take away all colour of staggering, he speaks once, yea
   twice, if we will hear.

   [2.] The second way of confirming any truth is by an oath. Though we
   fear the truth of some men in their assertions, yet when once they come
   to swear any thing in justice and judgment, there are very few so
   knownly profligate, and past all sense of God, but that their
   asseverations do gain credit and pass for truth. Hence the apostle
   tells us, Heb. vi. 16, that "an oath for confirmation is to men an end
   of all strife." Though the truth be before ambiguous and doubtful, yet
   when any interposes with an oath, there is no more contest amongst men.
   That nothing may be wanting to win our belief to the promises of God,
   he hath taken this course also, -- he hath sworn to their truth, Heb.
   vi. 13, "When God made promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no
   greater, he sware by himself." He confirms his promise by an oath. "O
   felices nos, quorum causâ Deus jurat; O infelices, si nec juranti Deo
   credimus!" When Christ came, "in whom all the promises of God are yea
   and amen," to make sure work of the truth of them, he is confirmed in
   his administration by an oath, Heb. vii. 21. He was made a priest by an
   oath by him that said, "The Lord sware, and will not repent, Thou art a
   priest for ever." Now, I pray, what is the cause of this great
   condescension in the God of heaven, to confirm that word which in
   itself is truth by an oath? The apostle satisfies us as to the end
   aimed at, Heb. vi. 17, 18. This was, saith he, the aim of God herein,
   that his people, seeing him engaged by two such immutable things as his
   promise and his oath, may be assured that there is an utter
   impossibility that any one word of his should come short of its truth;
   or that they firmly resting upon it should be deceived thereby. And
   this is a second way.

   [3.] Another course whereby men confirm the truth of what they speak,
   is by entering into covenant to accomplish what they have spoken. A
   covenant gives strength to the truth of any engagement. When a man hath
   but told you he will do such and such things for you, you are full of
   doubts and fears that he may break with you; but when he hath indented
   in a covenant, and you can show it under his hand and seal, you look
   upon that, consider that, and are very secure. Even this way also hath
   the Lord taken to confirm and establish his truths and promises. That
   all doubtings and staggerings may be excluded, he hath wrapped them all
   up in a covenant, and brought himself into a federal engagement, that
   upon every occasion, and at every temptation, we may draw out his hand
   and seal, and say to Satan and our own false hearts, See here, behold
   God engaged in covenant, to make good the word wherein he hath caused
   me to put my trust; and this is his property, that he is a God keeping
   covenant. So that having his promise redoubled, and that confirmed by
   an oath, all sealed and made sure by an unchangeable covenant, what can
   we require more to assure us of the truth of these things? But yet
   farther:--

   [4.] In things of very great weight and concernment, such as whereon
   lives and the peace of nations do depend, men use to give hostages for
   the securing each other of the faith and truth of all their
   engagements, that they may be mutual pledges of their truth and
   fidelity. Neither hath the Lord left this way unused to confirm his
   promise. He hath given us a hostage to secure us of his truth, -- one
   exceedingly dear to him, one always in his bosom, of whose honour he is
   as careful as of his own. Jesus Christ is the great hostage of his
   Father's truth, the pledge of his fidelity in his promises. God hath
   set him forth, and given him to us for this end. "Behold, the Lord
   himself shall give you a sign" (a sign that he will fulfil his word);
   "a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name
   Immanuel," Isa. vii. 14. That you may be assured of my truth, the
   virgin's son shall be a hostage of it. "In him are all the promises of
   God yea and amen." Thus also to his saints he gives the farther hostage
   of his Spirit, and the first-fruits of glory; that the full
   accomplishment of all his promises may be contracted in a little, and
   presented to their view, as the Israelites had the pleasures of Canaan
   in the clusters of grapes brought from thence.

   Now, from all this it is apparent, not only that there is truth in all
   the promises of God, but also that truth so confirmed, so made out,
   established, that not the least occasion imaginable is thence
   administered to staggering or doubting. He that disputes the promises,
   and knows not how to close with them, must find out another cause of
   his so doing; as to the truth of the promise, there is no doubt at all,
   nor place for any.

   (2.) But secondly, though there be truth in the promise, yet there may
   want ability in the promiser to accomplish the thing promised, because
   of its manifold difficulties. This may be a second cause of staggering,
   if the thing itself engaged for be not compassable by the ability of
   the engager. As if a skilful physician should promise a sick man
   recovery from his disease, though he could rely upon the truth and
   sincerity of his friend, yet he cannot but question his ability as to
   this, knowing that to cure the least distemper is not absolutely in his
   power; but when he promises who is able to perform, then all doubting
   in this kind is removed. See, then, whether it be so in respect of
   these promises whereof we speak. When God comes to Abraham to engage
   himself in that covenant of grace from whence flow all the promises
   whereof we treat, he lays this down as the bottom of all; "I am," saith
   he, "God Almighty," Gen. xvii. 1; or "God all-sufficient," very well
   able to go through with whatever I promise. When difficulties,
   temptations, and troubles arise, remember who it is that hath promised;
   -- not only he that is true and faithful, but he that is God Almighty,
   before whom nothing can stand, when he will accomplish his word. And
   that this was a bottom of great confidence to Abraham, the apostle
   tells you, Rom. iv. 21, "Being fully persuaded that he who had promised
   was able also to perform." When God is engaged by his word, his ability
   is especially to be eyed. The soul is apt to ask, How can this be? It
   is impossible it should be so to me. But, "he is able that hath
   promised." And this, Rom. xi. 23, the same apostle holds out to us to
   fix our faith upon, in reference to that great promise of recalling the
   Jews, and re-implanting them into the vine. "God," saith he, "is able
   to graft them in;" though now they seem as dead bones, yet the Lord
   knows they may live; for he is able to breathe upon them, and make them
   terrible as an army with banners. Yea, so excellent is this
   all-sufficiency, this ability of God to accomplish his whole word, that
   the apostle cautions us that we do not bound it, as though it could go
   so far only, or so far. Nay, saith he, Eph. iii. 20, he "is able to do
   exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think."

   When men come to close with the promise indeed, to make a life upon it,
   they are very ready to question and inquire whether it be possible that
   ever the word of it should be made good to them. He that sees a little
   boat swimming at sea, observes no great difficulty in it, looks upon it
   without any solicitousness of mind at all, -- beholds how it tosses up
   and down, without any fears of its sinking. But now, let this man
   commit his own life to sea in that bottom, what inquiries will he make!
   what a search into the vessel! Is it possible, saith he, this little
   thing should safeguard my life in the ocean? -- It is so with us, in
   our view of the promises: whilst we consider them at large, as they lie
   in the word, alas! they are all true, -- all yea and amen, -- shall be
   all accomplished; but when we go to venture our souls upon a promise,
   in an ocean of wrath and temptations, then every blast we think will
   overturn it; it will not bear us above all these waves. Is it possible
   we should swim safely upon the plank of a pinnace in the midst of the
   ocean.

   Now, here we are apt to deceive ourselves, and mistake the whole thing
   in question; which is the bottom of many corrupted reasonings and
   perplexed thoughts. We inquire whether it can be so to us as the word
   holds out; when the truth is, the question is not about the nature of
   the thing, but about the power of God. Place the doubt aright, and it
   is this: Is God able to accomplish what he hath spoken -- can he heal
   my backslidings? can he pardon my sins? can he save my soul? Now, that
   there may be no occasion or colour of staggering upon this point, you
   see God reveals himself as an all-sufficient God, as one that is able
   to go through with all his engagements. If you will stagger, you may so
   do. This is certain, you have no cause to do so from hence, -- there is
   not any promise that ever God entered into but he is able to perform
   it.

   But you will say, Though God be thus able, thus all-sufficient, yet may
   there not be defects in the means whereby he worketh? -- as a man may
   have a strong arm, able to strike his enemies to the ground, but yet if
   he strike with a feather or a straw, it will not be done; -- not for
   want of strength in his arm, but of fitness and suitableness in the
   instrument whereby he acteth. But, --

   [1.] God using instruments, they do not act according to their own
   virtue, but according to the influence of virtue by him to them
   communicated. Look to what end soever God is pleased to use any means,
   -- his choosing of them fills them with efficacy to that purpose. Let
   the way and means of accomplishing what thou expectest by the promise
   be in themselves never so weak, yet know that, from God's choosing of
   them to that end, they shall be filled with virtue and efficacy to the
   accomplishment of it.

   [2.] It is expressly affirmed of the great mediums of the promise, that
   they also are able, -- that there is no want of power in them for the
   accomplishment of the thing promised.

   1st. There is the means procuring it, and that is Jesus Christ: the
   promises, as to the good things contained in them, are all purchased by
   him. And of him the apostle affirms expressly, that "he is able to save
   them to the uttermost that come to God by him," Heb. vii. 25. No want
   here, no defect; he is able to do it to the uttermost, -- able to save
   them that are tempted, Heb. ii. 18.

   2dly. There is the great means of manifestation, and that is the word
   of God. And of this also it is affirmed, that it is able. It hath an
   all-sufficiency in its kind. Paul tells the elders of Ephesus, that
   "the word of grace is able to build them up, and to give them an
   inheritance among all them that are sanctified," Acts xx. 32.

   3dly. There is the great means of operation, and that is the Spirit of
   grace. He works the mercy of the promise upon the soul. He also is
   able, exceeding powerful, to effect the end appointed. He hath no
   bounds nor measure of operation but only his own will, 1 Cor. xii. 11.

   Hence, then, it is apparent, in the second place, that there is no
   occasion for doubting; yea, that all staggering is excluded, from the
   consideration of the ability of the promiser, and the means whereby he
   worketh. If thou continuest to stagger, thou must get a better plea
   than this, -- It cannot be, it is impossible. I tell thee, nay, but God
   is able to accomplish the whole word of his promise.

   (3.) There may be want of sincerity in promises and engagements; which
   whilst we do but suspect, we cannot choose but stagger at them. If a
   man make a promise to me, and I can suppose that he intends not as he
   says, but hath reserves to himself of another purpose, I must needs
   doubt as to the accomplishment of what he hath spoken. If the soul may
   surmise that the Lord intends not him sincerely in his promise, but
   reserves some other thing in his mind, or that it shall be so to others
   and not to him, he must needs dispute in himself, stagger, and keep off
   from believing. This, then, must be demonstrated, in the third place,
   -- that the promises of God, and God in all his promises, are full of
   sincerity; so that none need fear to cast himself on them: they shall
   be real unto him. Now, concerning this, observe, --

   [1.] That God's promises are not declarative of his secret purposes and
   intentions. When God holds out to any a promise of the pardon of sin,
   this doth not signify to any singular man that it is the purpose of God
   that his sin shall be pardoned. For if so, then either all men must be
   pardoned to whom the word of promise comes, which is not; or else God
   fails of his purposes, and comes short of his intendments, -- which
   would render him either impotent, that he could not, or mutable, that
   he would not, establish them. But "who hath resisted his will?" Rom.
   ix. 19. He is the Lord, and he changeth not, Mal. iii. 6. So that
   though every one to whom the promise is held out hath not the fruit of
   the promise, yet this derogates not at all from the sincerity of God in
   his promises; for he doth not hold them forth to any such end and
   purpose as to declare his intentions concerning particular persons.

   [2.] There are some absolute promises, comprehensive of the covenant of
   grace, which, as to all those that belong to that covenant, do hold out
   thus much of the mind of God, that they shall certainly be accomplished
   in and towards them all. The soul may freely be invited to venture on
   these promises, with assurance of their efficacy towards him.

   [3.] This God principally declares in all his promises of his mind and
   purpose, that every soul to whom they shall come may freely rest on; to
   wit, that faith in the promises, and the accomplishment of the
   promises, are inseparable. He that believeth shall enjoy. This is most
   certain, this God declares of his mind, his heart, towards us, -- that
   as for all the good things he hath spoken of to us, it shall be to us
   according to our faith. This, I say, the promises of God do signify of
   his purpose, that the believer of them shall be the enjoyer of them. In
   them "the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith," Rom.
   i. 17; -- from the faith of God revealing, to the faith of man
   receiving. So that, upon the making out of any promise, you may safely
   conclude that, upon believing, the mercy, the Christ, the deliverance
   of this promise is mine. It is true, if a man stand disputing and
   staggering whether he have any share in a promise, and close not with
   it by faith, he may come short of it; and yet without the least
   impeachment of the truth of the promise or sincerity of the promiser,
   -- for God hath not signified by them that men shall enjoy the good
   things of them whether they believe or not. Thus far the promises of
   grace are general, and carry a truth to all, that there is an
   inviolable connection between believing and the enjoyment of the things
   in them contained. And in this truth is the sincerity of the promiser,
   which can never be questioned without sin and folly. And this wholly
   shuts up the spirit from any occasion of staggering. "O ye of little
   faith! wherefore do ye doubt?" Ah! lest our share be not in this
   promise, -- lest we are not intended in it. -- Poor creatures! there is
   but this one way of keeping you off from it; that is, disputing it in
   yourselves by unbelief. Here lies the sincerity of God towards thee,
   that believing, thou shalt not come short of what thou aimest at. Here,
   then, is no room for staggering. If proclamation be made granting
   pardon to all such rebels as shall come in by such a season, do men use
   to stand questioning whether the state bear them any good-will or not?
   No, saith the poor creature, I will cast myself upon their faith and
   truth, engaged in their proclamation: whatever I have deserved in
   particular, I know they will be faithful in their promises. The gospel
   proclamation is of pardon to all comers in, to all believers: it is not
   for thee, poor staggerer, to question what is the intendment towards
   thee in particular, but roll thyself on this, there is an absolute
   sincerity in the engagement which thou mayest freely rest upon. But, --

   (4.) Though all be present, truth, power, sincerity; yet if he that
   makes the promise should forget, -- this were a ground of staggering.
   Pharaoh's butler, without doubt, made large promises to Joseph; and
   probably spake the truth, according to his present intention.
   Afterward, standing in the presence of Pharaoh, restored to favour, he
   had doubtless power enough to have procured the liberty of a poor
   innocent prisoner. But yet this would not do, -- it did not profit
   Joseph; because, as the text says, he "did not remember Joseph, but
   forgat him," Gen. xl. 23. This forgetting made all other things
   useless. But neither hath this the least colour in divine promises. It
   was Zion's infirmity to say, "The Lord hath forsaken me, and my Lord
   hath forgotten me," Isa. xlix. 14; for saith the Lord, "Can a woman
   forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the
   son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.
   Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are
   continually before me," verses 15, 16.

   The causes of forgetfulness are, --

   [1.] Want of love. The things that men love not, they care not for:--
   the matters of their love are continually in their thoughts. Now, says
   God to Zion, Why sayest thou I have forgotten thee? Is it for want of
   love? Alas! the love of a most tender mother to her sucking child comes
   infinitely short of my love to thee. My love to thee is more fixed than
   so, and how shouldst thou be out of my mind? how shouldst thou be
   forgotten? Infinite love will have infinite thoughtfulness and
   remembrance.

   [2.] Multiplicity of business. This with men is a cause of forgetting.
   I had done, says one, as I promised, but multiplicity of occasions
   thrust it out of my mind; I pray excuse me. -- Alas! though I rule all
   the world, yet thou art graven upon the palms of my hands; and
   therefore thy walls are continually before me. See also Ps. lxxvii. 9.
   Neither, then, is there as to this the least colour given us to stagger
   at the promise of God.

   (5.) But lastly, where all other things concur, yet if the person
   promising be changeable, if he may alter his resolution, a man may
   justly doubt and debate in himself the accomplishment of any promise
   made to him. "It is true," may he say, "he now speaks his heart and
   mind; but who can say he will be of this mind to-morrow? May he not be
   turned? and then what becomes of the golden mountains that I promised
   myself upon his engagement?" Wherefore, in the last place, the Lord
   carefully rejects all sinful surmises concerning the least change or
   alteration in him, or any of his engagements. He is "the Father of
   lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning," James
   i. 17, -- no shadow, no appearance of any such thing. "I am the Lord,"
   saith he, "I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed,"
   Mal. iii. 6. The Lord knows, that if any thing in us might prevail with
   him to alter the word that is gone out of his mouth, we should surely
   perish. We are poor provoking creatures, therefore he lays our not
   being consumed only on this, even his own unchangeableness. This we may
   rest upon, "He is in one mind, and who can turn him?"

   And in these observations have I given you the first demonstration of
   the point: all staggering is from our own unbelief.

   2. The experience which we have of the mighty workings of God for the
   accomplishment of all his promises gives light unto this thing. We have
   found it true, that where he is once engaged, he will certainly go
   through unto the appointed issue, though it stand him in the laying out
   of his power and wisdom to the uttermost, Hab. iii. 9, "Thy bow was
   made quite naked, according to the oaths of the tribes, thy word." If
   God's oath be passed, and his word engaged, he will surely accomplish
   it, though it cost him the making of his bow quite naked, -- the
   manifestation of his power to the utmost.

   It is true, never did any wait upon God for the accomplishment and
   fulfilling of a promise, but he found many difficulties fall out
   between the word and the thing. So was it with Abraham in the business
   of a son: and so with David in the matter of a kingdom. God will have
   his promised mercies to fall as the dews upon the parched, gasping
   earth, or "as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land," Isa. xxxii.
   2, -- very welcome unto the traveller who hath had the sun beat upon
   his head in his travel all the day. Zion is a crown of glory in the
   hand of the Lord, as a royal diadem in the hand of her God, Isa. lxii.
   3. The precious stones of a diadem must be cut and polished, before
   they be set in beauty and glory. God will have ofttimes the precious
   living stones of Zion to have many a sharp cutting, before they come to
   be fully fixed in his diadem; but yet in the close, whatever obstacles
   stand in the way, the promise hath still wrought out its passage; -- as
   a river, all the while it is stopped with a dam, is still working
   higher and higher, still getting more and more strength, until it bear
   down all before it, and obtain a free course to its appointed place.
   Every time opposition lies against the fulfilling of the promise, and
   so seems to impede it for a season, it gets more and more power, until
   the appointed hour be come, and then the promise bears down all before
   it.

   Were there any thing imaginable whereof we had not experience that it
   had been conquered, to open a door for the fulfilling of every word of
   God, we might possibly, as to the apprehension of that thing, stagger
   from some other principle than that of unbelief.

   What is there in heaven or earth, but God and his ministering spirits,
   that hath not, one time or other, stood up to its utmost opposition,
   for the frustrating of the word wherein some or other of the saints of
   God have put their trust? Devils, in their temptations, baits,
   subtleties, accusations, and oppositions; -- men, in their counsels,
   reasonings, contrivances, interests, dominions, combinations, armies,
   multitudes, and the utmost of their endeavours; -- the whole frame of
   nature, in its primitive instituted course, -- fire, water, day, night,
   age, sickness, death, all in their courses have fought against the
   accomplishment of the promises. And what have they obtained by all
   their contendings? All disappointed, frustrated, turned back, changed,
   and served only to make the mercy of the promise more amiable and
   glorious.

   I would willingly illustrate this demonstration with an instance, --
   that the almighty, all-conquering power that is in the promise,
   settling all staggering upon its own basis of unbelief, might be the
   more evident.

   I might here mention Abraham, with all the difficulties and appearing
   impossibilities which the promise unto him did pass through and cast to
   the ground, -- the mercy of it at length arising out of the grave, for
   he received his son from the dead "in a figure," Heb. xi. 19; or I
   might speak of Joseph, Moses, or David; -- but I shall rather choose a
   precedent from among the works of God in the days wherein we live, and
   that in a business concerning which we may set up our Ebenezer, and
   say, Thus far hath God been a helper.

   Look upon the affair of Ireland. The engagement of the great God of
   revenges against murder and treachery, the interest of the Lord Christ
   and his kingdom against the man of sin, furnished the undertakers with
   manifold promises to carry them out to a desired, a blessed issue. Take
   now a brief view of some mountains of opposition that lie in the way
   against any success in that place; and hear the Lord saying to every
   one of them, Who art thou, O great mountain? before my people thou
   shalt be made a plain, Zech. iv. 7.

   Not to mention the strivings and strugglings of two manner of people in
   the womb of this nation, totally obstructing for a long time the
   bringing forth of any deliverance for Ireland; nor yet that mighty
   mountain (which some misnamed a level) that thought at once to have
   locked an everlasting door upon that expedition; I shall propose some
   few, of many that have attended it.

   (1.) The silence that hath been in heaven for half an hour, as to this
   business, -- the great cessation of prayers in the heavens of many
   churches, -- hath been no small mountain in the way of the promise.
   When God will do good for Zion, he requires that his remembrancers give
   him no rest, until he do it, Isa. lxii. 7; and yet sometimes, in the
   close of their supplications, gives them an answer "by terrible
   things," Ps. lxv. 5. He is sometimes silent to the prayers of his
   people," Ps. xxviii. 1. Is not then a grant rare, when his people are
   silent as to prayers? Of how many congregations in this nation may the
   prayers, tears, and supplications for carrying on of the work of God in
   Ireland, be written with the lines of emptiness! What a silence hath
   been in the heaven of many churches for this last half hour! How many
   that began with the Lord in that work, did never sacrifice at the altar
   of Jehovah-nissi, nor consider that the Lord hath sworn to have war
   with such Amalekites as are there "from generation to generation!"
   Exod. xvii. 15, 16. They have forgotten that Ireland was the first of
   the nations that laid wait for the blood of God's people desiring to
   enter into his rest; and therefore "their latter end shall be to perish
   for ever," Num. xxiv. 20. Many are as angry as Jonah, not that Babylon
   is spared, but that it is not spared. Hath not this been held out as a
   mountain? What will you now do, when such or such, these and those men,
   of this or that party, look upon you "as the grass upon the house-tops,
   which withereth afore it groweth up; wherewith the mower filleth not
   his hand, nor he that bindeth sheaves his bosom;" -- that will not so
   much as say, "The blessing of the Lord be upon you; we bless you in the
   name of the Lord?" But now, shall the faithlessness of men make the
   "faith of God of none effect?" Shall the kingdom of Christ suffer
   because some of those that are his -- what through carnal wisdom, what
   through spiritual folly -- refuse to come forth "to his help against
   the mighty?" No, doubtless! "The Lord sees it, and it displeases him;
   he sees that there is no man, and wonders that there is no
   intercessor," -- even marvels that there are no more supplications on
   this behalf. "Therefore his own arm brought salvation to him; and his
   own righteousness, it sustained him. He put on righteousness as a
   breastplate, and an helmet of salvation upon his head; and he put on
   the garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a
   cloak. According to their deeds, accordingly he will repay, fury to his
   adversaries, recompense to his enemies; to the islands he will repay
   recompense," Isa. lix. 15-18. Some men's not praying shall not hinder
   the promises accomplishing. They may sooner discover an idol in
   themselves than disappoint the living God. This was a mountain.

   (2.) Our own advices and counsels have often stood in the way of the
   promises bringing forth. This is not a time nor place for narrations;
   so I shall only say to this in general, -- that if the choicest and
   most rational advices of the army had not been overswayed by the
   providence of God, in all probability your affairs had been more than
   ten degrees backward to the condition wherein they are.

   (3.) The visible opposition of the combined enemy in that nation
   seemed, as to our strength, unconquerable. The wise man tells us, "A
   threefold cord is not easily broken." Ireland had a fivefold cord to
   make strong bands for Zion, twisted together. Never, I think, did such
   different interests bear with one another for the compassing of one
   common end.

   He that met the lion, the fox, and the ass travelling together,
   wondered -- "quo unâ iter facerent" -- whither these ill-matched
   associates did bend their course; neither did his marvelling cease when
   he heard they were going a pilgrimage, in a business of devotion.

   He that should meet Protestants, -- covenanted Protestants, that had
   sworn, in the presence of the great God to extirpate Popery and
   Prelacy, as the Scots in Ulster; -- others, that counted themselves
   under no less sacred bond for the maintenance of prelates,
   service-books, and the like, as the whole party of Ormond's adherents;
   -- joined with a mighty number that had for eight years together sealed
   their vows to the Romish religion with our blood and their own; --
   adding to them those that were profound to revolt up and down as suited
   their own interest, as some in Munster; -- all closing with that party
   which themselves had laboured to render most odious and execrable, as
   most defiled with innocent blood:-- he, I say, that should see all
   these, after seven years' mutual conflicting and imbruing their hands
   in each other's blood, to march all one way together, cannot but marvel
   -- "quo unâ iter facerent" whither they should journey so friendly
   together. Neither, surely, would his admiration be lessened when he
   should hear that the first thing they intended and agreed upon was, to
   cover the innocent blood of forty-one [232] [1641], contrary to that
   promise, "Behold, the Lord cometh out of his place to punish the
   inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity: the earth also shall
   disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain," Isa. xxvi. 21;
   and nextly, to establish Catholic religion, or the kingdom of Babel, in
   the whole nation, in opposition to the engaged truth, and, in our days,
   visibly manifested power of the Lord Jesus; with sundry such like
   things, contrary to their science and conscience, their covenant and
   light, yea, the trust and honesty, of most of the chief leaders of
   them. Now, how can the promise stand in the way of this hydra? what
   says it to this combined opposition?

   [1.] Why, first, saith the Lord, "Though hand join in hand, the wicked
   shall not be unpunished," Prov. xi. 21. Their covering shall be too
   short and narrow to hide the blood which God will have disclosed.

   [2.] And nextly, though they will give their power to the beast, and
   fight against the Lamb, -- consenting in this, who agree in nothing
   else in the world, -- yet they shall be broken in pieces; though they
   associate themselves, they shall be broken in pieces. If Rezin and the
   son of Remaliah, Syria and Ephraim, old adversaries, combine together
   for a new enmity against Judah, -- if covenant and Prelacy, Popery and
   treachery, blood and (as to that) innocency, join hand in hand to stand
   in the way of the promise, -- yet I will not in this join with them,
   says the Lord. Though they were preserved all distinctly in their
   several interests for seven years in their mutual conflicts, that they
   might be scourges to one another, yet if they close to keep off the
   engagement of God in the word of his promise, not much more than the
   fourth part of one year shall consume some of them to nothing, and fill
   the residue with indignation and anguish.

   By what means God hath mightily and effectually wrought, -- by mixing
   folly with their counsels, putting fear, terror, and amazedness upon
   all their undertakings, -- into carry on his own purpose, I could
   easily give considerable instances. That which hath been spoken in
   general may suffice to bottom us on this, that whilst we are in the way
   of God, all staggering at the issue is from unbelief; for he can, he
   will, do more such things as these.

   Use 1. My first use shall be as unto temporals; for they also, as I
   told you, come under the promise, not to be staggered at with the
   limitations before mentioned. Learn hence, then, to live more by faith
   in all your actings; believe, and you shall be established. I have, in
   the days of my pilgrimage, seen this evil under the sun, -- many
   professors of the gospel called out to public actings, have made it
   their great design to manage all their affairs with wisdom and policy,
   like the men of the residue of the nations. Living by faith upon the
   promises hath appeared to them as too low a thing for the condition and
   employment wherein they now are; -- now they must plot, and contrive,
   and design, -- lay down principles of carnal, fleshly wisdom, to be
   pursued to the uttermost. And what, I pray, hath been the issue of such
   undertakings?

   (1.) First, The power of religion hath totally been devoured by that
   lean, hungry, never-to-be-satisfied beast of carnal policy; -- no signs
   left that it was ever in their bosoms. Conformity unto Christ in gospel
   graces is looked on as a mean, contemptible thing. Some of them have
   fallen to downright atheism, -- most of them to wretched formality in
   the things of God. And then, --

   (2.) Secondly, Their plots and undertakings have generally proved
   tympanous and birthless; vexation and disappointment hath been the
   portion of the residue of their days. The ceasing to lean upon the
   Lord, and striving to be wise in our actings, like the men of the
   world, hath made more Rehoboams than any one thing in this generation.

   What now lies at the bottom of all this? Merely staggering at the
   promise through unbelief. What building is that like to be which hath a
   staggering foundation? When God answers not Saul, he goes to the devil.
   When the promise will not support us, we go to carnal policy: neither
   can it otherwise be. Engaged men finding one way to disappoint them,
   presently betake themselves to another. If men begin once to stagger at
   the promise, and to conclude, in their fears, that it will not receive
   accomplishment, that the fountain will be dry, they cannot but think it
   high time to dig cisterns for themselves. When David says, he shall one
   day perish by the hand of Saul, whatever God had said to the contrary,
   his next advice is, Let me go to the Philistines: and what success he
   had in that undertaking you know. Political diversions from pure
   dependence on the promise, do always draw after them a long time of
   entanglements.

   Give me leave to give a word of caution against one or two things which
   men, staggering at the promises through unbelief, do usually in their
   carnal wisdom run into, for the compassing of the thing aimed at, that
   they may not be found in your honourable assembly.

   [1.] Take heed of a various management of religion, of the things of
   God, to the advantage of the present posture and condition of your
   alfalfa The things of Christ should be as Joseph's sheaf, to which all
   others should bow. When they are made to cringe, and bend, and put on a
   flattering countenance, to allure any sort of men into their interest,
   they are no more the things of Christ. I would it had not been too
   evident formerly, that men entangled in their affairs, enjoying
   authority, have, with all industry and diligence, pursued such and such
   an appearance of religion; not that themselves were so passionately
   affected with it, but merely for the satisfaction of some in that,
   whose assistance and compliance they needed for other things. Oh, let
   not the things of, God be immixed any more with carnal reasonings! His
   truths are all eternal and unchangeable. Give them at once the
   sovereignty of your souls, and have not the least thought of making
   them bend to serve your own ends, though good and righteous. Think not
   to get the promise like Jacob, by representing yourselves in the things
   of God for other than you are.

   [2.] Hide no truth of God as to that way of manifestation which to you
   is committed, for fear it should prove prejudicial to your affairs.
   That influence and signature of your power which is due to any truth of
   God, let it not be withheld by carnal reasonings. I might farther draw
   out these, and such like things as these; -- the warning is, to live
   upon the faith of that promise, which shall surely be established,
   without turning aside to needless, crooked paths of your own.

   Use 2. Secondly. Be faithful in doing all the work of God whereunto you
   are engaged, as he is faithful in working all your works whereunto he
   is engaged. Your work, whereunto (whilst you are in his ways) God is
   engaged, is your safety and protection: God's work, whereunto you are
   engaged, is the propagating of the kingdom of Christ, and the setting
   up of the standard of the gospel. So far as you find God going on with
   your work, go you on with his. How is it that Jesus Christ is in
   Ireland only as a lion staining all his garments with the blood of his
   enemies; and none to hold him out as a lamb sprinkled with his own
   blood to his friends? Is it the sovereignty and interest of England
   that is alone to be there transacted? For my part, I see no farther
   into the mystery of these things but that I could heartily rejoice,
   that, innocent blood being expiated, the Irish might enjoy Ireland so
   long as the moon endureth, so that Jesus Christ might possess the
   Irish. But God having suffered those sworn vassals of the man of sin to
   break out into such ways of villany as render them obnoxious unto
   vengeance, upon such rules of government amongst men as he hath
   appointed; is there, therefore, nothing to be done but to give a cup of
   blood into their hands? Doubtless the way whereby God will bring the
   followers after the beast to condign destruction for all their enmity
   to the Lord Jesus, will be by suffering them to run into such practices
   against men as shall righteously expose them to vengeance, according to
   acknowledged principles among the sons of men. But is this all? hath he
   no farther aim? Is not all this to make way for the Lord Jesus to take
   possession of his long since promised inheritance? And shall we stop at
   the first part? Is this to deal fairly with the Lord Jesus? -- call him
   out to the battle, and then keep away his crown? God hath been faithful
   in doing great things for you; be faithful in this one, -- do your
   utmost for the preaching of the gospel in Ireland.

   Give me leave to add a few motives to this duty.

   (1.) They want it. No want like theirs who want the gospel. I would
   there were for the present one gospel preacher for every walled town in
   the English possession in Ireland. The land mourneth, and the people
   perish for want of knowledge. Many run to and fro, but it is upon other
   designs; knowledge is not increased.

   (2.) They are sensible of their wants, and cry out for supply. The
   tears and cries of the inhabitants of Dublin after the manifestations
   of Christ are ever in my view. If they were in the dark, and loved to
   have it so, it might something close a door upon the bowels of our
   compassion; but they cry out of their darkness, and are ready to follow
   every one whosoever, to have a candle. If their being gospelless move
   not our hearts, it is hoped their importunate cries will disquiet our
   rest, and wrest help as a beggar doth an alms.

   (3.) Seducers and blasphemers will not be wanting to sow their tares,
   which those fallowed fields will receive, if there be none to cast in
   the seed of the word. Some are come over thither already without call,
   without employments, to no other end but only to vaunt themselves to be
   God; as they have done in the open streets with detestable pride,
   atheism, and folly. So that as Ireland was heretofore termed by some in
   civil things a frippery of bankrupts, for the great number of persons
   of broken estates that went thither; so, doubtless, in religion it will
   prove a frippery of monstrous, enormous, contradictions opinions, if
   the work of preaching the word of truth and soberness be not carried
   on. And if this be the issue of your present undertakings, will it be
   acceptable, think you, to the Lord Jesus, that you have used his power
   and might to make way for such things as his soul abhors?

   [1.] Will it be for his honour, that the people whom he hath sought to
   himself with so high a hand should, at the very entrance of his taking
   possession, be leavened with those high and heavenly notions which have
   an open and experimented tendency to earthly, fleshly, dunghill
   practices? or, --

   [2.] Will it be for the credit and honour of your profession of the
   gospel, that such a breach should be under your hand? that it should be
   as it were by your means? Will it not be a sword, and an arrow, and a
   maul in the hands of your observers? Who can bear the just scandal that
   would accrue, -- scandal to the magistrates, scandal to the ministers
   of this generation, -- in neglecting such an opportunity of advancing
   the gospel, -- sleeping all the day whilst others sow tares?

   [3.] Where will be the hoped, the expected consolation of this great
   affair, when the testimony and pledge of the peculiar presence of
   Christ amongst us upon such an issue shall be wanting?

   What, then, shall we do? This thing is often spoken of, seldom driven
   to any close!

   1st. Pray. "Pray the Lord of the harvest, that he would send out," that
   he would thrust forth, "labourers into his harvest." The labourers are
   ready to say, There is a lion in the way, difficulties to be contended
   withal. And to some men it is hard seeing a call of God through
   difficulties; when if it would but clothe itself with a few carnal
   advantages, how apparent is it to them! they can see it through a
   little cranny. Be earnest, then, with the Master of these labourers, in
   whose hand is their life and breath, and all their ways, that he would
   powerfully constrain them to be willing to enter into the fields that
   are white for the harvest.

   2dly. Make such provision, that those who will go may be fenced from
   outward straits and fears, so far as the uncertainty of human affairs
   in general and the present tumultuating perturbations will admit. And
   let not, I beseech you, this be the business of an unpursued order.
   But, --

   3dly. Let some be appointed (generals die and sink by themselves) to
   consider this thing, and to hear what sober proposals may be made by
   any whose hearts God shall stir up to so good a work.

   This, I say, is a work wherein God expecteth faithfulness from you:
   stagger not at his promises nor your own duty. However, by all means
   possible, in this business I have striven to deliver my own soul.

   Once more; -- to this of faith, let me stir you up to another work of
   love, and that in the behalf of many poor perishing creatures, that
   want all things needful for the sustentation of life. Poor parentless
   children that lie begging, starving, rotting in the streets, and find
   no relief; yea, persons of quality, that have lost their dearest
   relations in your service, seeking for bread, and finding none; -- oh,
   that some thoughts of this also might be seriously committed to them
   that shall take care for the gospel!

   Use 3. I desire now to make more particular application of the
   doctrine, as to things purely spiritual. Until you know how to believe
   for your own souls, you will scarcely know how to believe for a nation.
   Let this, then, teach us to lay the burden and trouble of our lives
   upon the right shoulder. In our staggerings, our doubtings, our
   disputes, we are apt to assign this and that reason of them; when the
   sole reason, indeed, is our unbelief. Were it not for such a cause, or
   such a cause, I could believe; that is, were there no need of faith.
   That is, faith must remove the mountains that lie in the way, and then
   all will be plain. It is not the greatness of sin, nor continuance in
   sin, nor backsliding into sin, that is the true cause of thy
   staggering, whatever thou pretendest (the removal of all these is from
   that promise whose stability and certainty I before laid forth), but
   solely from thy unbelief, that "root of bitterness" which springs up
   and troubles thee. It is not the distance of the earth from the sun,
   nor the sun's withdrawing itself, that makes a dark and gloomy day; but
   the interposition of clouds and vaporous exhalations. Neither is thy
   soul beyond the reach of the promise, nor doth God withdraw himself;
   but the vapours of thy carnal, unbelieving heart do cloud thee. It is
   said of one place, "Christ could do no great work there." Why so? for
   want of power in him? Not at all; but merely for want of faith in them;
   -- it was "because of their unbelief." The promise can do no great work
   upon thy heart, to humble thee, to pardon, to quiet thee. Is it for
   want of fulness and truth therein? Not at all; but merely for want of
   faith in thee; -- that keeps it off Men complain, that were it not for
   such things, and such things, they could believe; when it is their
   unbelief that casts those rubs in the way. As if a man should cast
   nails and sharp stones in his own way, and say, Verily I could run,
   were it not for those nails and stones; when he continues himself to
   cast them there. You could believe, were it not for these doubts and
   difficulties, these staggering perplexities; when, alas! they are all
   from your unbelief.

   Use 4. See the sinfulness of all those staggering doubts and
   perplexities wherewith many poor souls have almost all their thoughts
   taken up. Such as is the root, such is the fruit. If the tree be evil,
   so will the fruit be also. Men do not gather grapes from brambles. What
   is the root that bears this fruit of staggering? is it not the evil
   root of unbelief? And can any good come from thence? -- are not all the
   streams of the same nature with the fountain? -- if that be bitter, can
   they be sweet? If the body be full of poison, will not the branches
   have their venom also? Surely if the mother -- unbelief -- be the mouth
   of hell, the daughters -- staggerings -- are not the gates of heaven.

   Of the sin of unbelief I shall not now speak at large. It is, in sum,
   the universal opposition of the soul unto God. All other sins arise
   against something or other of his revealed will; only unbelief sets up
   itself in a direct contradiction to all of him that is known. Hence the
   weight of condemnation in the gospel is constantly laid on this sin:
   "He that believeth not, on him the wrath of God abideth; he shall be
   damned." Now, as every drop of sea-water retains the brackishness and
   saltness of the whole; so every staggering doubt that is an issue of
   this unbelief hath in it the unsavouriness and distastefulness unto God
   that is in the whole.

   Farther, to give you a little light into what acceptance our staggering
   thoughts find with the Lord (according to which must be our esteem of
   all that is in us), observe that, --

   (1.) They grieve him.

   (2.) They provoke him.

   (3.) They dishonour him.

   (1.) Such a frame grieves the Lord. Nothing more presses true love than
   to have an appearance of suspicion. Christ comes to Peter, and asks
   him, "Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?" John xxi. 15. Peter seems
   glad of an opportunity to confess him, and his love to him, whom not
   long since he had denied, and answers readily, "Yea, Lord; thou knowest
   that I love thee." But when Christ comes with the same question again
   and again, the Holy Ghost tells us, "Peter was grieved because he said
   unto him the third time, Lovest thou me?" It exceedingly troubled Peter
   that his love should come under so many questionings, which he knew to
   be sincere. The love of Christ to his is infinitely beyond the love of
   his to him. All our doubtings are nothing but so many questionings of
   his love. We cry, Lord Jesus, lovest thou us? and again, Lord Jesus,
   lovest thou us? and that with distrustful hearts and thoughts, that it
   is not, it cannot be. Speaking of the unbelieving Jews, the Holy Ghost
   tells us, Jesus was "grieved for the hardness of their hearts," Mark
   iii. 5. And as it is bitter to him in the root, so also in the fruit.
   Our staggerings and debates, when we have a word of promise, is a grief
   to his Holy Spirit, as the unkindest return we can make unto his love.

   (2.) It provokes him. How can this be, says Zacharias, that I should
   have a son? This shall be, saith the Lord; and thou thyself, for thy
   questioning, shalt be a sign of it, "Thou shalt be dumb, and not
   speak," Luke i. 20. His doubting was a provocation. And our Saviour
   expresses no less, in that bitter reproof to his disciples upon their
   wavering, Matt. xvii. 17, "O faithless and perverse generation, how
   long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you?" -- that is, in
   this unbelieving frame. Poor souls are apt to admire the patience of
   God in other matters, -- that he spared them in such and such sins, at
   such and such times of danger; but his exceeding patience towards them
   in their carnal reasonings and fleshly objections against believing,
   this they admire not. Nay, generally they think it should be so, God
   would not have them one step farther; nay, they could be more steadfast
   in believing, as they suppose, might it stand with the good-will of
   God; -- when all this while this frame of all others is the greatest
   provocation to the Lord; he never exercises more forbearance than about
   this kind of unbelief. When the spies had gone into Canaan, had seen
   the land, and brought of the good fruit of it, -- then to repine, then
   to question whether God would bring them into it or no, this caused the
   Lord "to swear in his wrath, that they should not enter into his rest."
   When God hath brought men to the borders of heaven, discovered to them
   the riches and excellency of his grace, admitted them to enter as spies
   into the kingdom of glory, -- then to fall a staggering whether he
   intends them an entrance or no is that which lies heavy on him. The
   like may be said of all promised mercies and deliverances whatsoever.
   That this is a provocation, the Lord hath abundantly testified,
   inasmuch as for it he hath oftentimes snatched sweet morsels from the
   mouths of men, and turned aside the stream of mercies when it was ready
   to flow in upon them. "If," saith he, "ye will not believe, surely ye
   shall not be established," Isa. vii. 9. The very mercy but now promised
   concerning your deliverance shall be withheld. Oh, stop not success
   from Ireland by unbelief!

   (3.) It dishonours God. In the close of this verse it is said, Abraham
   was "strong in faith" (or staggered not), "giving glory to God." To be
   established in believing, is to give God the greatest glory possible.
   Every staggering thought that ariseth from this root of unbelief robs
   God of his glory.

   [1.] It robs him of the glory of his truth: "He that believeth not,
   hath made him a liar; because he believeth not his record," 1 John v.
   10. Let men pretend what they please (as most [pretend?] an end, we
   give in specious pretences for our unbelief), the bottom of all is, the
   questioning of the truth of God in our false hearts.

   [2.] It robs him of the glory of his fidelity or faithfulness in the
   discharge of his promises: "If we confess our sins, he is faithful to
   forgive us our sins," 1 John i. 9. He hath engaged his faithfulness in
   this business of the forgiveness of iniquities, -- he whose right it
   is; calling that in question, calls the faithfulness of God in
   question.

   [3.] It robs him of the glory of his grace. In a word, if a man should
   choose to set himself in a universal opposition unto God, he can think
   of no more compendious way than this. This, then, is the fruit, this
   the advantage, of all our staggering, -- we rob God of glory, and our
   own souls of mercy.

   Use 5. Be ashamed of, and humbled for, all your staggerings at the
   promises of God, with all your fleshly reasonings and carnal
   contrivances issuing therefrom. For the most part, we live upon
   successes, not promises:-- unless we see and feel the print of
   victories, we will not believe; the engagement of God is almost quite
   forgotten in our affairs. We travel on without Christ, like his mother,
   and suppose him only to be in the crowd; but we must return to seek him
   where we left him, or our journeying on will be to no purpose. When
   Job, after all his complaining, had seen the end of the Lord, he cries
   out, "Now I abhor myself in dust and ashes." You have seen the end of
   the Lord in many of his promises, -- oh, that it might prevail to make
   you abhor yourselves in dust and ashes, for all your carnal fears and
   corrupt reasonings upon your staggerings! When David enjoyed his
   promised mercy, he especially shames himself for every thought of
   unbelief that he had whilst he waited for it. "I said," saith he, "in
   my haste, that all men were liars:" and now he is humbled for it. Is
   this to be thankful, to forget our provoking thoughts of unbelief when
   the mercy is enjoyed? The Lord set it home upon your spirits, and give
   it to receive its due manifestation!

   (1.) If there be any counsels, designs, contrivances, on foot amongst
   us, that are bottomed on our staggering at the promise under which we
   are, oh, let them be instantly cast down to the ground. Let not any be
   so foolish as to suppose that unbelief will be a foundation for quiet
   habitations. You are careful to avoid all ways that might dishonour you
   as the rulers of so great a nation; oh, be much more careful about such
   things as will dishonour you as believers! That is your greatest title,
   -- that is your chiefest privilege. Search your own thoughts; and if
   any contrivance, any compliance, be found springing up, whose seed was
   sown by staggering at the promise, root them up and cast them out
   before it be too late.

   (2.) Engage your hearts against all such ways for the future. Say unto
   God, How faithful art thou in all thy ways! how able to perform all thy
   promises! how hast thou established thy word in heaven and earth! Who
   would not put their trust in thee? We desire to be ashamed that ever we
   should admit in our hearts the least staggering at the stability of thy
   word.

   (3.) Act as men bottomed upon unshaken things, that are not at all
   moved by the greatest appearing oppositions. "He that believeth will
   not make haste:" be not hasty in your resolves in any distress; wait
   for the accomplishment of the vision, for it will come. So long as you
   are in the way of God, and do the work of God, let not so much as your
   desires be too hasty after appearing strengthenings and assistance.
   Whence is it that there is amongst us such bleating after the
   compliance of this or that party of the sons of men, -- perhaps priding
   themselves in our actings upon unbelief, as though we proclaimed, that,
   without such and such, we cannot be protected in the things of God? Let
   us, I beseech you, live above those things that are unworthy of the
   great name that is called upon us.

   Oh, that by these and the like ways we might manifest our
   self-condemnation and abhorrency for all that distrust and staggering
   at the word of God, which arising from unbelief, hath had such
   deplorable issues upon all our counsels and undertakings!
     __________________________________________________________________

   [232] Dr Owen refers to the Irish massacre of 1641, when, by the lowest
   computation, 40,000 Protestants are said to have been slaughtered. --
   Ed.
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     __________________________________________________________________
     __________________________________________________________________

   Sermon V.

   OURANON OURANIA:

   The

   shaking and translating of heaven and earth:

   a sermon preached to the honourable House of Commons in Parliament
   assembled, April 19, 1649,

   a day set apart for extraordinary humiliation.
     __________________________________________________________________

Prefatory note.

   This sermon, from Heb. xii. 27, was preached before Parliament on a day
   set apart for extraordinary humiliation. It was in connection with this
   sermon that Owen for the first time was introduced to Oliver Cromwell;
   who, with other officers, listened to it, and afterwards made
   acquaintance with the preacher, under the circumstances mentioned in
   the "Life," etc., vol. i. p. 42. Cromwell was preparing to go to
   Ireland, and procured the appointment of Owen to accompany him, in
   order that the affairs of Trinity College, Dublin, might be adjusted
   and placed on a proper footing. -- Ed.
     __________________________________________________________________

   Die Veneris, April 20, 1649.

   Ordered, by the Commons assembled in Parliament, That Sir William
   Masham do give hearty thanks from this House to Mr Owen for his great
   pains in his sermon preached before the House yesterday, at Margaret's,
   Westminster; and that he be desired to print his sermon at large, as he
   intended to have delivered it if time had not prevented him; wherein he
   is to have the like liberty of printing thereof as others in like kind
   usually have had.

   Hen. Scobell, Clerc. Parl.
     __________________________________________________________________

To the right honourable, the Commons of England, in Parliament assembled.

   Sirs,

   All that I shall preface to the ensuing discourse is, that seeing the
   nation's welfare and your own actings are therein concerned (the
   welfare of the nation and your own prosperity in your present actings
   being so nearly related, as they are, to the things of the ensuing
   discourse), I should be bold to press you to a serious consideration of
   them as now presented unto you, were I not assured -- by your ready
   attention unto, and favourable acceptation of, their delivery -- that,
   being now published by your command, such a request would be altogether
   needless. The subject-matter of this sermon being of so great weight
   and importance as it is, it had been very desirable that it had fallen
   on an abler hand; as also that more space and leisure had been allotted
   to the preparing of it -- first, for so great, judicious, and
   honourable an audience; and, secondly, for public view -- than possibly
   I could beg from my daily troubles, pressures, and temptations, in the
   midst of a poor, numerous, provoking people. As the Lord hath brought
   it forth, that it may be useful to your Honourable Assembly, and the
   residue of men that wait for the appearance of the Lord Jesus, shall be
   the sincere endeavour at the throne of grace of

   Your most unworthy Servant

   In the work of the Lord,

   J. Owen.

   Coggeshall, May 1, 1649
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Sermon V. The shaking and translating of heaven and earth

   "And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things
   that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which
   cannot be shaken may remain." -- Heb. xii. 27.

   The main design of the apostle in this scripture to the Hebrews, is to
   prevail, with his countrymen, who had undertaken the profession of the
   gospel, to abide constant and faithful therein, without any apostasy
   unto, or mixture with Judaism, which God and themselves had forsaken;
   -- fully manifesting, that in such backsliders the soul of the Lord
   hath no pleasure, chap. x. 38, --

   A task, which whoso undertaketh in any age, shall find exceeding
   weighty and difficult, -- even to persuade professors to hold out and
   continue in the glory of their profession unto the end, that with
   patience doing the will of God they "might receive the promise;" [233]
   -- especially if there be "lions in the way," [234] if opposition or
   persecution do attend them in their professed subjection to the Lord
   Jesus. Of all that deformity and dissimilitude to the divine nature
   which is come upon us by the fall, there is no one part more eminent,
   or rather no one defect more evident, than inconstancy and unstableness
   of mind in embracing that which is spiritually good. Man being turned
   from his unchangeable rest [235] seeks to quiet and satiate his soul
   with restless movings towards changeable things.

   Now, he who worketh all our works for us and in us, Isa. xxvi. 12,
   worketh them also by us; [236] and, therefore, that which he will give,
   he persuades us to have, that at once his bounty and our duty may
   receive a manifestation in the same thing. Of this nature is
   perseverance in the faith of Christ; -- which, as by him it is
   promised, and therefore is a grace; so to us it is prescribed, and
   thereby is a duty. "Petamus ut det, quod ut habeamus jubet," Augustine;
   -- "Let us ask him to bestow what he requires us to enjoy." Yea, "De
   Domine, quod jubes, et jube vis;" -- "Give what thou commandest, and
   command what thou pleasest."

   As a duty it is by the apostle here considered; and therefore pressed
   on them who by nature were capable, and by grace enabled, for the
   performance thereof. Pathetical exhortations, then, unto perseverance
   in the profession of the gospel, bottomed on prevalent scriptural
   arguments and holy reasonings, are the sum of this epistle.

   The arguments the apostle handleth unto the end proposed are of two
   sorts:-- First, Principal; Secondly, Deductive, or emergencies from the
   first.

   First, His principal arguments are drawn from two chief fountains:-- 1.
   The author; and, 2. The nature and end of the gospel.

   1. The author of the gospel is either, --

   (1.) Principal and immediate, which is God the Father, who having at
   sundry times and in divers manners formerly spoken by the prophets,
   herein speaketh by his Son, chap. i. 1.

   (2.) Concurrent and immediate, Jesus Christ, this great salvation,
   being begun to be spoken to us by the Lord, chap. ii. 3. This latter he
   chiefly considereth, as in and by whom the gospel is differenced from
   all other dispensations of the mind of God. Concerning him to the end
   intended he proposeth, --[1.] His person; [2.] His employment.

   [1.] For his person, that thence he may argue to the thing aimed at, he
   holdeth out, --

   1st. The infinite glory of his Deity; being "the brightness of the
   Father's glory, and the express image of his person," chap. i. 3.

   2dly. The infinite condescension of his love, in assuming humanity;
   for, "because the children were partakers of flesh and blood, he also
   himself took part of the same," chap. ii. 14.

   And from the consideration of both these, he presseth the main
   exhortation which he hath in hand, as you may see, chap. ii. 1, 2, iii.
   12, 13, etc.

   [2.] The employment of Christ he describeth in his offices, which he
   handleth, --

   1st. Positively, and very briefly, chapters i., ii., iii.

   2dly. Comparatively, insisting chiefly on his priesthood, -- exalting
   it in sundry weighty particulars above that of Aaron, which yet was the
   glory of the Jewish worship; and this at large, chapters vi., vii.,
   viii., ix., x. And this being variously advanced and asserted, he
   layeth as the main foundation, upon which he placeth the weight and
   stress of the main end pursued, as in the whole epistle is everywhere
   obvious.

   2. The second head of principal arguments he taketh from the gospel
   itself; which considering as a covenant, he holdeth out two ways.

   (1.) Absolutely, in its efficacy in respect of, --

   [1.] Justification. In it God is merciful to unrighteousness, and sins
   and iniquities he remembers no more, chap. viii. 12; -- bringing in
   perfect remission, that there shall need no more offering for sin,
   chap. x. 18.

   [2.] Sanctification. He puts his laws in our hearts, and writes them in
   our minds, chap. x. 16; -- in it purging our consciences by the blood
   of Christ, chap. ix. 14.

   [3.] Perseverance: "I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a
   people," chap. viii. 10.

   All three are also held out in sundry other places.

   (2.) Respectively to the covenant of works; and in this regard assigns
   unto it principal qualifications, with many peculiar eminences them
   attending, -- too many now to be named. Now, these are, --

   [1.] That it is new: "In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made
   the first old," chap. viii. 13.

   [2.] Better. It is a better covenant, and built upon "better promises,"
   chap. vii. 22, viii. 6.

   [3.] Surer, the Priest thereof being ordained, "not after the law of a
   carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless life," chap. vii.
   16.

   [4.] Unalterable. So in all the places before named, and sundry others.

   All which are made eminent in its peculiar mediator, Jesus Christ;
   which is the sum of chap. vii.

   And still, in the holding out of these things, that they might not
   forget the end for which they were now drawn forth, and so exactly
   handled, he interweaves many pathetical entreaties and pressing
   arguments by way of application, for the confirming and establishing
   his countrymen in the faith of this glorious gospel; as you may see
   almost in every chapter.

   Secondly. His arguments less principal, deduced from the former, being
   very many, may be referred to these three heads:--

   1. The benefits by them enjoyed under the gospel.

   2. The example of others, who by faith and patience obtained the
   promises, chap. xi.

   3. From the dangerous and pernicious consequence of backsliding; of
   which only I shall speak. Now this he setteth out three ways.

   (1.) From the nature of that sin. It is a crucifying to themselves the
   Son of God afresh, and putting him to open shame, chap. vi. 6; a
   treading under foot the Son of God, counting the blood of the covenant
   an unholy thing, and doing despite to the Spirit of grace, chap. x. 29.

   (2.) The remediless punishment which attends that sin: "There remaineth
   no more sacrifice for it, but a certain fearful looking for of
   judgment, and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries,"
   chap. x. 26, 27.

   (3.) The person against whom peculiarly it is committed, and that is he
   who is the author, subject, and mediator of the gospel, the Lord Jesus
   Christ; concerning whom, for the aggravation of this sin, he proposeth
   two things.

   [1.] His goodness and love, and that in his great undertaking to be a
   Saviour; being "made like unto his brethren in all things, that he
   might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to
   God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people," chap. ii. 17.
   And of this there is a sweet and choice line running through the whole
   discourse, making the sin of backsliding against so much love and
   condescension appear exceeding sinful.

   [2.] His greatness or power; which he sets out two ways.

   1st. Absolutely, as he is God, to be "blessed for ever," chap. i.; and,
   "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God," chap.
   x. 31.

   2dly. Comparatively, as he is the mediator of the new covenant in
   reference to Moses. And this he setteth forth, as by many and sundry
   reasonings in other places of the epistle, so by a double testimony in
   this 12th chapter, making that inference from them both which you have,
   verse 25, "See that ye refuse not him that speaketh: for if they
   escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, much more shall not we
   escape, if we turn away from him who speaketh from heaven."

   Now, the first testimony of his power is taken from a record of what he
   did heretofore; -- the other from a prediction of what he will do
   hereafter.

   The first you have, verse 26, in the first part of it, "His voice then
   shook the earth;" then, -- that is, when the law was delivered by him,
   as it is described, verses 18-21, foregoing; when the mountain upon
   which it was delivered, the mediator Moses, into whose hand it was
   delivered, and the people for whose use it was delivered, did all shake
   and tremble at the voice, power, and presence of Christ, [237] -- who,
   as it hence appears, is that Jehovah who gave the law, Exod. xx. 2.

   The other, in the same verse, is taken from a prediction out of Hag.
   ii. 6, of what he will do hereafter, -- even demonstrate and make
   evident his power, beyond whatever he before effected: He hath
   promised, saying, "Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also
   heaven."

   And if any one shall ask, wherein this effect of the mighty power of
   the Lord Jesus consisteth, and how from thence professors may be
   prevailed upon to keep close to the obedience of him in his kingdom, --
   the apostle answers, verse 27, "And this word, Yet once more,
   signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things
   that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain."
   And thus am I stepped down upon the words of my text, finding them in
   the close of the arguments drawn from the power of Christ to persuade
   professors to constancy in the paths of the gospel; and having passed
   through their coherence, and held out their aim and tendence, their
   opening and application come now to be considered.

   And herein these three things:-- I. The apostle's assertion: "The
   things that are shaken shall be removed, as things that are made;" II.
   The proof of this assertion: "This word, Yet once more, signifieth no
   less;" III. His inference from this assertion thus proved: "The things
   that cannot be shaken must remain."

   I. In the first I shall consider, -- 1. What are the things that are
   shaken; 2. What is their shaking; 3. What their removal, being shaken.

   1. For the first, there is a great variety of judgment amongst
   interpreters. [238] The foregoing verse tells us it is not only the
   earth, but the heaven also; but now what heaven and earth this should
   be is dubious, -- is not apparent. So many different apprehensions of
   the mind of God in these words as have any likeness of truth I must
   needs recount and remove, that no prejudice may remain from other
   conceptions against that which from them we shall assert.

   (1.) The earth, say some, is the men of the earth, living thereon; and
   the heavens are the angels, their blessed inhabitants: both shaken or
   stricken with amazement upon the nativity of Christ and preaching of
   the gospel. The heavens were shaken, when so great things were
   accomplished as that "the angels themselves desired to look into them,"
   1 Pet. i. 12; and the earth was filled with amazement, when, the Holy
   Ghost being poured out upon the apostles for the preaching of the
   gospel, men of every nation under heaven were amazed and marvelled at
   it, Acts ii. 5-7. Thus Rollocus, Piscator, and sundry other famous
   divines. But, --

   [1.] The shaking here intimated by the apostle was then, when he wrote,
   under the promise, not actually accomplished, as were the things by
   them recounted; for he holds it forth as an issue of that great power
   of Christ which he would one day exercise for the farther establishment
   of his kingdom.

   [2.] This that now is to be done must excel that which formerly was
   done at the giving of the law; as is clearly intimated in the
   inference: "Then he shook the earth, but now the heavens also." It is a
   gradation to a higher demonstration of the power of Christ; which that
   the things of this interpretation are is not apparent.

   [3.] It is marvellous these learned men observed not, that the heavens
   and the earth shaken, verse 26, are the things to be removed, verse 27.
   Now, how are angels and men removed by Christ? are they not rather
   gathered up into one spiritual body and communion? [239] Hence, verse
   27, they interpret the shaken things to be Judaical ceremonies, which,
   verse 26, they had said to be men and angels.

   (2.) Others by heaven and earth understand the material parts of the
   world's fabric, commonly so called; and by their shaking, those
   portentous signs and prodigies, with earthquakes, which appeared in
   them at the birth and death of the Lord Jesus. A new star,
   preternatural darkness, shaking of the earth, opening of graves,
   rending of rocks, and the like, are to them this shaking of heaven and
   earth. [240] So Junius, and after him most of ours. But this
   interpretation is obnoxious to the same exceptions with the former, and
   also others For, --

   [1.] These things being past before, how can they be held out under a
   promise? [241]

   [2.] How are these shaken things removed? which with their shaking they
   must certainly be, as in my text.

   [3.] This shaking of heaven and earth is ascribed to the power of
   Christ as mediator, whereunto these signs and prodigies cannot
   rationally be assigned; but rather to the sovereignty of the Father,
   bearing witness to the nativity and death of his Son; -- so that
   neither can this conception be fastened on the words.

   (3.) The fabric of heaven and earth is by others also intended, -- not
   in respect of the signs and prodigies formerly wrought in them, but of
   that dissolution, or, as they suppose, alteration, which they shall
   receive at the last day. So Pareus, Grotius, and many more. Now, though
   these avoid the rock of holding out as accomplished what is only
   promised, yet this gloss also is a dress disfiguring the mind of God in
   the text. For, --

   [1.] The things here said to be shaken do stand in a plain opposition
   to the things that cannot be shaken nor removed; and therefore they are
   to be removed, that these may be brought in. Now, the things to be
   brought in are the things of the kingdom of the Lord Jesus. What
   opposition, I pray, does the material fabric of heaven and earth stand
   in to the kingdom of the Lord Jesus? Doubtless none at all, being the
   proper seat of that kingdom.

   [2.] There will, on this ground, be no bringing in of the kingdom of
   the Lord Jesus until indeed that kingdom in the sense here insisted on
   is to cease; that is, after the day of judgment, when the kingdom of
   grace shall have place no more.

   Those are the most material and likely mistakes about the words. I
   could easily give out, and pluck in again three or four other warping
   senses; but I hope few in these days of accomplishing will once stumble
   at them.

   (4.) The true mind of the Spirit, by the help of that Spirit of truth,
   comes next to be unfolded. And first, what are the things that are
   shaken?

   [1.] As the apostle here applies a part of the prophecy of Haggai, so
   that prophecy, even in the next words, gives light into the meaning of
   the apostle. Look what heaven and earth the prophet speaks of; -- of
   those, and no other, speaks the apostle. The Spirit of God in the
   Scripture is his own best interpreter. [242] See, then, the order of
   the words as they lie in the prophet, Hag. ii. 6, 7, "I will shake
   heaven and earth: I will shake all nations." God, then, shakes heaven
   and earth when he shakes all nations; that is, he shakes the heaven and
   earth of the nations. "I will shake heaven and earth, and I will shake
   all nations," is a pleonasm for "I will shake the heaven and earth of
   all nations." These are the things shaken in my text.

   The heavens of the nations, what are they? -- even their political
   heights and glory, those forms of government which they have framed for
   themselves and their own interest, with the grandeur and lustre of
   their dominions. The nations' earth is the multitudes of their people,
   their strength and power, whereby their heavens, or political heights,
   are supported. It is, then, neither the material heavens and earth, nor
   yet Mosaical ordinances, but the political heights and splendour, the
   popular multitudes and strength, of the nations of the earth, that are
   thus to be shaken, as shall be proved.

   That the earth, in prophetical descriptions or predictions of things,
   is frequently, yea, almost always, taken for the people and multitudes
   of the earth, needs not much proving. [243] One or two instances shall
   suffice. Rev. xii. 16, "The earth helped the woman" against the flood
   of the dragon; which that it was the multitudes of earthly people none
   doubts. That an earthquake, or shaking of the earth, are popular
   commotions, is no less evident from Rev. xi. 13, where by an earthquake
   great Babylon receives a fatal blow. And for the heavens, whether they
   be the political heights of the nations or the grandeur of potentates,
   let the Scripture be judge; I mean, when used in this sense of shaking,
   or establishment, Isa. li. 15, 16, "I am the Lord thy God, that divided
   the sea, whose waves roared: the Lord of hosts is his name. And I have
   put my words in thy mouth, and I have covered thee in the shadow of
   mine hand, that I may plant the heavens, and lay the foundations of the
   earth, and say unto Zion, Thou art my people." By a repetition of what
   he hath done, he establisheth his people in expectation of what he will
   do. And, --

   1st. He minds them of that wonderful deliverance from an army behind
   them, and an ocean before them, by his miraculous preparing dry paths
   for them in the deep: "I am the Lord, that divided the sea, whose waves
   roared."

   2dly. Of his gracious acquainting them with his mind, his law, and
   ordinances at Horeb. "I have put," saith he, "my words in thy mouth."

   3dly. Of that favourable and singular protection afforded them in the
   wilderness, when they were encompassed with enemies round about: "I
   covered thee in the shadow of mine hand."

   Now, to what end was all this? Why, saith he, "That I might plant the
   heavens, and lay the foundations of the earth." What! of these
   material, visible heavens and earth? Two thousand four hundred and
   sixty years before, at least, were they planted and established. It is
   all but [nothing more than] making of "Zion a people," which before was
   scattered in distinct families. And how is this done? Why, the heavens
   are planted, or a glorious frame of government and polity is erected
   amongst them, and the multitudes of their people are disposed into an
   orderly commonwealth, to be a firm foundation and bottom for the
   government amongst them. This is the heavens and earth of the nations
   which is to be shaken in my text.

   Isa. xxxiv. 4, "All the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the
   heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll: and all their host shall
   fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine." Now, these
   dissolved, rolled heavens are no other but the power and heights of the
   opposing nations, their government and tyranny, especially that of
   Idumea, as both the foregoing and following verses do declare. "The
   indignation of the Lord," saith he, "is upon the nations, and his fury
   upon all their armies; he hath delivered them to the slaughter, their
   slain," etc. Jer. iv. 23-25, "I beheld the earth, and, lo, it was
   without form and void; and the heavens, and they had no light. I beheld
   the mountains, and, lo, they trembled, and all the hills moved
   lightly." Here's heaven and earth shaken, and all in the razing of the
   political state and commonwealth of the Jews by the Babylonians, as is
   at large described in the verses following. Ezek. xxxii. 7, "I will
   cover the heaven, and make the stars thereof dark; I will cover the sun
   with a cloud, and the moon shall not give her light. All the bright
   lights of heaven will I make dark over thee, and set darkness upon thy
   land, saith the Lord God." Behold heaven and earth, sun, moon, and
   stars, all shaken and confounded in the destruction of Egypt, -- the
   thing the prophet treats of, their kingdom and nation being to be
   ruined.

   Not to hold you too long upon what is so plain and evident, you may
   take it for a rule, that, in the denunciations of the judgments of God,
   through all the prophets, heaven, sun, moon, stars, and the like
   appearing beauties and glories of the aspectable heavens, are taken for
   governments, governors, dominions in political states; as Isa. xiv.
   12-15; Jer. xv. 9, li. 25. [244]

   Furthermore, to confirm this exposition, St John, in the Revelation,
   holds constantly to the same manner of expression. Heaven and earth in
   that book are commonly those which we have described. In particular,
   this is eminently apparent, chap. vi. 12-15, "And I beheld when he had
   opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the
   sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;
   and the stars of heaven fell unto the earth: and the heaven departed as
   a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were
   moved out of their places," etc. The destruction and wasting of the
   Pagan-Romish state, the plagues and commotions of her people, the
   dethroning her idol-worship, and destruction of persecuting emperors
   and captains, with the transition of power and sovereignty from one
   sort to another, is here held out under this grandeur of words, [245]
   being part of the shaking of heaven and earth in my text.

   Add lastly hereunto, that the promises of the restoration of God's
   people into a glorious condition after all their sufferings, is
   perpetually, in the Scripture, held out under the same terms, and you
   have a plentiful demonstration of this point. Isa. lxv. 17, 18,
   "Behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not
   be remembered, nor come into mind. But be ye glad and rejoice for ever
   in that which I create," etc. [246] 2 Pet. iii. 13, "Nevertheless we,
   according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein
   dwelleth righteousness." Rev. xxi. 1, "I saw a new heaven and a new
   earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and
   there was no more sea." The heaven and earth are restored, but the sea,
   -- that shall be no more. Those gatherings together of many waters,
   rivers from all places, [247] or pretended clergymen from all nations
   into general councils, which were the sea or many waters on which the
   whore sat, [248] shall have no place at all in the church's restored
   condition.

   I hope it is now fully cleared what is meant by the things that are
   shaken, -- even the political heights, the splendour and strength of
   the nations of the earth: the foundation of the whole is laid, and our
   heap (or building, if your favour will so accept it) will go on apace;
   for to the analogy hereof shall the residue of the words be
   interpreted.

   2. The second thing considerable is, What is the shaking of these
   things?

   To this the answer is now made brief and facile. Such as are the things
   shaken, such must their shaking be: spiritual, if spiritual; natural,
   if natural; civil, if civil. Now, they being declared and proved to be
   civil things, such also is their shaking. [249] Now, what is a civil
   shaking of civil constitutions? how are such things done in the world?
   what are these earthquakes? Truly, the accomplishment hereof is in all
   nations so under our eyes as that I need not speak one word thereunto.

   Neither shall I insist upon the inquiry, when this shaking shall be?

   The text is plain, that it must be previous to the bringing in of those
   things that cannot be moved; that is, the prosperous estate of the
   kingdom of Christ. [250] Only we may observe, that besides other
   shakings in particular nations, of less general concernment and
   importance, this prophecy hath and shall receive a twofold eminent
   accomplishment, with reference unto a twofold eminent opposition which
   the kingdom of Christ hath met withal in the world.

   (1.) From the Pagan-Roman state, which, at the gospel's first entrance,
   held in subjection most of the chief provinces of the then known world.
   [251] What were the bloody endeavours of the heaven and earth of that
   state for the suppression thereof is known to our children. The issue
   of the whole in the accomplishment of this promise, shaking those
   heavens and earth to pieces, I before pointed at from Rev. vi. 12-17,
   beginning in the plagues of the persecuting emperors, and ending in the
   ruin of the empire itself. But, --

   (2.) The immovable things were not yet in their glory to be brought in.
   More seed of blood must be sown, that the end of the gospel's year may
   yield a plentiful harvest. That shaking was only for vengeance upon an
   old, cursed, and not for the bringing in of a new, blessed state. The
   vials of God's wrath having crumbled the heavens and earth of pagan
   Rome into several pieces, [252] and that empire being removed as to its
   old form, by the craft of Satan it became moulded up again into a papal
   sovereignty, to exercise all the power of the first beast in
   persecution of the saints, Rev. xiii. 12. This second pressure, though
   long and sore, must have an end; -- the new-moulded heaven and earth of
   papal, antichristian Rome, running by a mysterious thread through all
   the nations of the west, must be shaken also; which when it is
   accomplished, there shall be no more sea. There is not another beast to
   arise, nor another state to be formed; -- let endeavours be what they
   will, the Lord Jesus shall reign. [253]

   3. What is the removal of heaven and earth, being shaken?

   The word here translated "removal" is metathesis: whence that is come
   to pass I dare not positively say. This, doubtless, is a common fault
   amongst translators, that they will accommodate the words of a text to
   their own apprehension of the sense and matter thereof. [254]
   Understanding, as I suppose, that the things here said to be shaken
   were the Jewish ordinances, they translated their disposition a
   "removal;" as the truth is they were removed. But the word signifies no
   such thing. As its natural import, from its rise and composition, is
   otherwise, so neither in the Scripture nor any profane author doth it
   ever signify properly a "removal." Translation, or changing, is the
   only native, genuine import of it: [255] and why it should in this
   place be haled out of its own sphere, and tortured into a new
   signification, I know not. Removal is of the matter, translation of the
   form only. It is not, then, a destruction and total emotion of the seat
   things of the nations; but a change, translation, and a new-moulding of
   them, that is here intimated. They shall be shuffled together, almost
   into their primitive confusion, and come out new-moulded, for the
   interest of the Lord Jesus. All the present states of the worm are
   cemented together by antichristian lime, as I shall show afterward:--
   unless they be so shaken as to have every cranny searched and brushed,
   they will be no quiet habitation for the Lord Christ and his people.
   This, then, is the metathesis of the "heaven and earth" of the nations.

   Now, this is evident from that full prediction which you have of the
   accomplishment hereof, Rev. xvii. 12, the kingdoms of the west "receive
   power one hour with the beast." Verse 13, in their constitution and
   government at first received, "they give their power to the beast," and
   fight against the Lamb. Verse 14, the Lamb with his faithful and chosen
   ones overcomes them. There their heaven and earth is shaken. Verse 16,
   their power is translated, new-moulded, and becomes a power against the
   beast, in the hand of Jesus Christ.

   This, then, is the shaking and removal in my text, which is said to be,
   "as of things that are made;" that is, by men, through the concurrence
   of divine Providence for a season (which making you have, Rev. xvii.
   12-17); -- not like the kingdom of Christ, which, being of a purely
   divine constitution, shall by no human power receive an end.

   The other parts of the text follow briefly.

   II. The next thing is the apostle's proof of this assertion. And he
   tells you, "This word, Once more," the beginning of this sentence he
   urged from the prophet, "signifies no less."

   The words in the prophet are, vd 'cht mt hy'?, "Yet once it is a
   little." mt hy'?, "It is a little," is left out by the apostle, as not
   conducing to the business in hand. Eti hapax, as he rendereth vd 'cht?,
   are a sufficient demonstration of the assertion. In themselves they
   hold out a commutation of things, and, as they stand in conjunction in
   that place of the prophet, declare that that shaking and commutation
   must be for the bringing in of the kingdom of the Lord Christ. In
   brief, being interpreted by the same Spirit whereby they were indited,
   we know the exposition is true.

   III. The last head remaineth under two particulars:-- 1. What are "the
   things that cannot be shaken?" 2. What is their remaining?

   1. For the first, "the things that cannot be shaken," verse 27, are
   called "a kingdom that cannot be moved," verse 28, -- a kingdom subject
   to none of those shakings and alterations which other dominions have
   been tossed to and fro withal. [256] Daniel calls it, a not giving of
   the kingdom to another people, Dan. ii. 44; -- not that oecumenical
   kingdom which he hath with his Father, as king of nations; but that
   oeconomical kingdom which he hath by dispensation from his Father, as
   king of saints. Now this may be considered two ways.

   (1.) As purely internal and spiritual; which is the rule of his Spirit
   in the hearts of all his saints. [257] This "cometh not with
   observation," it is within us, Luke xvii. 20, 21, -- consisting in
   "righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost," Rom. xiv. 17.

   (2.) As external, and appearing in gospel administrations. [258] So is
   Christ described as a king in the midst of their kingdom, Rev. i.
   14-17, as also chap. iv. and chap. xi. 15. And both these may be again
   considered two ways.

   [1.] In respect of their essence and being; and so they have been, are,
   and shall be continued in all ages. He hath built his church upon a
   rock, "and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it," Matt. xvi.
   18.

   [2.] In reference to their extent in respect of subjects, with their
   visible glorious appearance, which is under innumerable promises to be
   very great in the latter days: "And it shall come to pass in the last
   days, that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established in the
   top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills, and all
   nations shall flow unto it," Isa. ii. 2. [259]

   These, then, are the things which cannot be shaken; which we may reduce
   to three heads.

   1st. The growth of righteousness, peace, and joy in the saints, being
   filled with light and love from the special presence of Christ; with a
   wonderful increase of the number of them, multitudes of the elect being
   to be born in those days, the residue of the Jews and fulness of the
   Gentiles meeting in one fold, and there "dwelleth righteousness," 2
   Pet. iii. 13. [260]

   2dly. The administration of gospel ordinances, in power and purity,
   according to the appointment and unto the acceptation of the Lord
   Jesus. The temple of God and the altar being measured anew, the outward
   court, defiled with Gentile worship, is left out, Rev. xi. 1, 2.

   3dly. The glorious and visible manifestation of those administrations
   in the eyes of all the world, in peace and quietness, -- none making
   afraid or hurting in the whole mountain of the Lord, Isa. lxv. 25.

   For the personal reign of the Lord Jesus on earth, I leave it to them
   with whose discoveries I am not, and curiosities I would not be,
   acquainted, Acts iii. 21.

   But as for such who from hence do, or for sinister ends pretend to
   fancy to themselves a terrene kingly state unto each private particular
   saint, -- so making it a bottom "vivendi ut velis," for every one to do
   that which is good in his own eyes, to the disturbance of all order and
   authority, civil and spiritual, -- as they expressly clash against
   innumerable promises, so they directly introduce such confusion and
   disorder as the soul of the Lord Jesus doth exceedingly abhor.

   It is only the three things named, with their necessary dependencies,
   that I do assert.

   2. And lastly, of these it is said, -- they must remain; that is,
   continue and be firmly established, as the word is often used, Rom. ix.
   11.

   The words of the text being unfolded, and the mind of the Holy Ghost in
   them discovered, I shall from them commend to your Christian
   consideration this following position:--

   Observation. The Lord Jesus Christ, by his mighty power, in these
   latter days, as antichristian tyranny draws to its period, will so far
   shake and translate the political heights, governments, and strength of
   the nations, as shall serve for the full bringing in of his own
   peaceable kingdom; -- the nations so shaken becoming thereby a quiet
   habitation for the people of the Most High.

   Though the doctrine be clear from the text, yet it shall receive
   farther scriptural confirmation, being of great weight and concernment.
   Dan. ii. 44, "And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven
   set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall
   not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume
   all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever." That this is affirmed
   of the kingdom of Christ under the gospel, none ever doubted.

   Three things are here remarkably intimated of it:-- 1. The time wherein
   it shall most eminently be established; and that is, "In the days of
   these kings," of which Daniel was speaking; 2. The efficacy of its
   being set up: "It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms;" 3. Its own
   stability: "It shall never be destroyed."

   1. For the first, there is great debate about the principal season of
   the accomplishing of this prediction; -- much hesitation who those
   kings are in whose days the kingdom of Christ is eminently to be
   established. In the days when the two legs of the Roman empire shall be
   divided into ten kingdoms, and those kingdoms have opposed themselves
   to the power of Christ, -- that is, in the days wherein we live, -- say
   some; yea, most of the ancients took this for the Roman empire, and to
   these the bringing in of the kingdom of Christ is the establishment of
   it in these days. Others understand the Syrian and Egyptian branches of
   the Grecian monarchy, and the bringing in of Christ's kingdom to be in
   his birth, death, and preaching of the gospel; wherein certainly the
   foundations of it were laid. I will not contend with any mortal
   hereabout; only I shall oppose one or two things to this latter
   interpretation. As, --

   (1.) The kingdom of Syria was totally destroyed and reduced into a
   Roman province sixty years before the nativity of Christ; and the
   Egyptian, thirty; -- so that it is impossible that the kingdom of
   Christ by his birth should be set up in their days.

   (2.) It is ascribed to the efficacy of this kingdom, that, being
   established, it shall break in pieces all those kingdoms: which how can
   it be, when, at the first setting of it up, they had neither place nor
   name, nor scarce remembrance?

   So that it must needs be the declining, divided Roman empire, shared
   among sundry nations, that is here intimated: and so, consequently, the
   kingdom of Christ to be established, is that glorious administration
   thereof which in these days he will bring in.

   2. Be it so or otherwise, this from hence cannot be denied, that the
   kingdom of Christ will assuredly shake and translate all opposing
   dominions, until itself be established in and over them all, -- oper
   hedei, -- which is all I intend to prove from this place. The
   ten-partite empire of the west must give place to the stone cut out of
   the mountain without hands.

   Dan. vii. 27, "The kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the
   kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the
   saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and
   all dominions shall serve and obey him." Hitherto is the end of the
   matter. Either Antichrist is described in the close of this chapter, or
   one very like him, St John painting him in the Revelation with all this
   man's colours; plainly intimating, that though, in the first place,
   that mad, raging tyrant, Antiochus the Illustrious, was pointed at, yet
   that another was to rise in his likeness, with his craft and cruelty,
   that, with the assistance of the ten horns, should plague the saints of
   the Christians no less than the others had done those of the Jews. Now,
   what shall be the issue thereof? His dominion with his adherents shall
   be taken away and consumed, verse 26. And then shall it be given to the
   people of the Most High, as before; or, they shall enjoy the kingdom of
   Christ in a peaceable manner, their officers being made peace, and
   their exactors righteousness.

   3. It is clearly evident, from these and other places in that prophecy,
   that He who is the only potentate will sooner or later shake all the
   monarchies of the earth, where he will have his name known, that all
   nations may be suited to the interest of his kingdom; which alone is to
   endure.

   Isa. lx. 1 in many places, indeed throughout, holds out the same. Verse
   12, "The nation and kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish;"
   that is, all the nations of the earth. Not a known nation, but the
   blood of the saints of Christ is found in the skirts thereof. Now, what
   shall be the issue when they are so broken?

   Verses 17, 18, "I will make thy officers peace, and thine exactors
   righteousness. Violence shall no more be heard in thy land, wasting nor
   destruction within thy borders: but thou shalt call thy walls
   Salvation, and thy gates Praise." See at your leisure to this purpose,
   Amos ix. 11-15; Jer. xxxi. 23-25; Isa. xxxiii. 20-24.

   I shall only add that punctual description which you have of this
   "whole matter," as Daniel calls it, in the Revelation, with respect
   unto its accomplishment. Chap. xvii., the Roman harlot having procured
   the ten kings or kingdoms, into which the last head of the Roman empire
   sprouted, about the year 450, by the inundation of the northern
   nations, to join with her, they together make war against the Lamb.
   Verse 12, "The ten horns which thou sawest" upon the last head of the
   great beast, the Roman monarchy, "are ten kings, which have received no
   kingdom as yet," -- to wit, when John saw the vision, -- "but receive
   power as kings one hour with the beast." About four hundred years after
   this, the pope ascended to his sovereignty, and these western nations
   grew into distinct dominions about the same time. Verse 13, "These have
   one mind," -- that is, as to the business in hand, for otherwise they
   did and do vex one another with perpetual broils and wars, -- "and
   shall give their power and strength unto the beast," or swear to defend
   the rights of holy church (which is no other than Babylon), and act
   accordingly. Verse 14, "These shall make war with the Lamb;" -- having
   sworn and undertaken the defence of holy church, or Babylon, they
   persecuted the poor heretics with fire and sword; that is, the
   witnesses of the Lamb, and in them the Lamb himself, striving to keep
   his kingdom out of the world; -- "and the Lamb shall overcome them,"
   shaking and translating them into a new mould and frame; "for he is
   Lord of lords, and King of kings, and they that are with him," whose
   help and endeavours he will use, "are called, and chosen, and
   faithful." Verse 16, "The ten horns which thou sawest upon the beast,"
   being now shaken, changed, and translated in mind, interest, and
   perhaps government, "these shall hate the whore, and shall make her
   desolate" -- are instrumental in the hand of Christ for the ruin of
   that antichristian state which before they served -- "and naked, and
   shall eat her flesh, and burn her with fire."

   Hence, chap. xviii. 2, Babylon, and that whole antichristian state
   which was supported upon their power and greatness, having lost its
   props, comes toppling down to the ground: "Babylon the great is fallen,
   is fallen." And the saints take vengeance on the whore for all her
   former rage and cruelty: "Double unto her double, according to her
   works," verse 6. And verse 9, "And the kings of the earth," -- being
   some of them shaken out of their dominion for refusing to close with
   the Lamb, -- "who have committed fornication, and lived deliciously
   with her," -- learning and practising false worship of her institution,
   -- "shall bewail her, and lament for her," -- as having received
   succour from her, her monasteries and shavelings, in their distress,
   whereunto indeed they were brought for her sake, -- "when they shall
   see the smoke of her burning," -- beholding her darkness, stink, and
   confusion, in her final desolation.

   Now, all this shall be transacted with so much obscurity and darkness,
   Christ not openly appearing unto carnal eyes, that though "many shall
   be purified, and made white, and tried, yet the wicked shall do
   wickedly: and none of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall
   understand," Dan. xii. 10. There shall be no such demonstration of the
   presence of Christ as to open the eyes of hardened men; but at length,
   having suffered the poor, deceived wretches to drink of the cup
   prepared for them, he appears himself gloriously, Rev. xix. 13, in a
   more eminent manner than ever before, to the total destruction of the
   residue of opposers. And that this will be the utmost close of that
   dispensation wherein now he walketh, I no way doubt.

   The assertion being cleared and proved, the reasons of it come next to
   be considered. And, --

   (1.) It shall be done by the way of recompense and vengeance. It is the
   great day of the wrath of the Lamb, Rev. vi. 17. "Their land shall be
   soaked with blood, and their dust made fat with fatness. For it is the
   day of the Lord's vengeance, and the year of recompenses for the
   controversy of Zion," Isa. xxxiv. 7, 8. The day of vengeance is in his
   heart, when the year of his redeemed is come, Isa. lxiii. 4. [261]

   The kings of the earth have given their power to Antichrist,
   endeavouring to the utmost to keep the kingdom of Christ out of the
   world. What, I pray, hath been their main business for seven hundred
   years and upwards, -- even almost ever since the man of sin was
   enthroned? How have they earned the titles, Eldest Son of the Church,
   The Catholic and Most Christian King, Defender of the Faith, and the
   like? Hath it not been by the blood of saints? Are there not, in every
   one of these kingdoms, the slain and the banished ones of Christ to
   answer for? In particular, --

   Hath not the blood of the saints of Jesus [262] (eclipsed by Antichrist
   and his adherents), Wickliffites and Lollards, cried from the ground
   for vengeance upon the English "heaven and earth" for a long season Did
   not their bodies lie in the streets of France, under the names of
   Waldenses, Albigenses, and poor men of Lyons? Hath not Germany and the
   annexed territories her Huss and Hussites, Jerome, and Subutraquians,
   [263] to answer for? Is not Spain's inquisition enough to ruin a world,
   much more a kingdom? Have not all these, and all the kingdoms round
   about, washed their hands and garments in the blood of thousands of
   Protestants? and do not the kings of all these nations as yet stand up
   in the room of their progenitors with the same implacable enmity to the
   power of the gospel? Show me seven kings that ever yet laboured
   sincerely to enhance the kingdom of the Lord Jesus, and I dare boldly
   say, "Octavus quis fuerit, nondum constat." And is there not a cry for
   all this, -- "How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and
   avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?" Rev. vi. 10. Doth
   not Zion cry, "The violence done to me and my flesh be upon Babylon;"
   and, My blood upon those heavens of the nations? And will not the Lord
   avenge his elect, that cry unto him clay and night? will he not do it
   speedily? Will he not call the fowls of heaven to eat the flesh of
   kings, and captains, and great men of the earth? Rev. xix. 18. Will he
   not make these heavens like the wood of the vine, -- not a pin to be
   taken off them to hang a garment on in his whole tabernacle? The time
   shall come wherein the earth shall disclose her slain, and not the
   simplest heretic (as they were counted) shall have his blood
   unrevenged: neither shall any atonement be made for this blood, or
   expiation be allowed, whilst a toe of the image or a bone of the beast
   is left unbroken.

   (2.) A second reason is, That by his own wisdom he may frame such a
   power as may best conduce to the carrying on of his own kingdom among
   the sons of men. [264]

   He hath promised his church that he will give unto it holy priests and
   Levites, Isa. lxvi. 20, 21, which shall serve at the great feast of
   tabernacles, Zech. xiv. 16, -- a sufficient demonstration that he will
   dwell still in his churches by his ordinances, whatsoever some
   conceive; -- so also, that he will "make her civil officers peace, and
   her exactors righteousness," Isa. ix. 17, 18. They shall be so
   established that the nations, as nations, may serve it, and the
   kingdoms of the world shall become the kingdoms of our Lord, Rev. xi.
   15.

   For the present, the government of the nations (as many of them as are
   concerned therein) is purely framed for the interest of Antichrist. No
   kind of government in Europe, or line of governors, so ancient but that
   the beast is as old as they, and had a great influence into their
   constitution or establishment, to provide that it might be for his own
   interest. [265] I believe it will be found a difficult task to name any
   of the kingdoms of Europe (excepting only that remotest northward) in
   the setting up and establishment whereof, either as to persons or
   government, the pope hath not expressly bargained for his own interest,
   and provided that should have the chiefest place in all the oaths and
   bonds that were between princes and people. Bellarmine, to prove that
   the pope had a temporal power indirectly over all kings and nations (if
   he mean by indirectly, gotten by indirect means, it is actually true as
   to too many of them), [266] gives sundry instances, in most of the most
   eminent nations in Europe, how he hath actually exercised such a power
   for his own interest.

   There have been two most famous and remarkable changes of the
   government of these nations; and into both of them what an influence
   the pope had, is easily discernible.

   The first was between the years 400 and 500 after Christ, when the
   Roman empire of the west -- that which withheld the man of sin from
   acting his part to the life [267] -- was shivered to pieces by many
   barbarous nations; [268] who, settling themselves in the fruitful soils
   of Europe, began to plant their heavens, and lay the foundations of
   their earth, growing up into civil states, -- for the most part
   appointing them to be their kings in peace who had been their leaders
   in war. This furious inundation settled the Franks in Gaul, the Saxons
   in England, the West Goths in Spain, the East Goths and Longobards into
   Italy, and set up the Allemanns in Germany; from some whereof though
   for divers years the papal world was exceedingly tormented, and Rome
   itself sacked, yet in the close and making up of their governments,
   their manners and religion, they all submitted to the usurpation of the
   man of sin, so that in all their windings up there was a salve for him
   and his authority. [269]

   The second great alteration took up a long space, and was in action
   about three hundred years, -- reckoning it from the translation of the
   French crown from Childeric IV. [270] unto Pepin and his son Charles by
   papal authority, unto the conquest of England by the Normans; in which
   space the line of Charles in France was again by the same authority and
   the power of Hugh Capet cut off. No state in Europe -- the choice
   patrimony of the beast -- that did not receive a signal alteration in
   this space; nor was there any alteration but that the pope had a hand
   in every one of them; and, either by pretended collations of right, to
   pacify the consciences of blood-thirsty potentates in the undertaking
   and pursuing their unjust conquests, or foolish mitred-confirmations of
   sword-purchases, he got them all framed to his own end and purpose, --
   which was to bring all these nations into subjection to his Babylonish
   usurpations; which their kings finding no way inconsistent with their
   own designs, did willingly promote, labouring to enforce all
   consciences into subjection to the Roman see.

   Hence it is, as I observed before, that such an interposition was made
   of the rights of holy church that is, Babylon, the mother of
   fornications -- in all the ties, oaths, and bonds between princes and
   people. [271] And for the advancement of the righteous judgments of
   God, that the sons of men may learn to fear and tremble before him, it
   may be observed, that that which doth and shall stick upon potentates
   to their ruin, is not so much their own or any other interest, as the
   very dregs of this papal, antichristian interest thrust into their
   oaths and obligations, for no end in the world but to keep the Lord
   Jesus out of his throne. [272]

   This is a second reason why the Lord Jesus, by his mighty power, at the
   bringing in of his immovable kingdom, "will shake the heavens and the
   earth of the nations;" even because in their present constitution they
   are directly framed to the interest of Antichrist, which, by notable
   advantages at their first moulding, and continued insinuations ever
   since, hath so riveted itself into the very fundamentals of them, that
   no digging or mining, but an earthquake, will cast up the
   foundation-stones thereof. [273] The Lord Jesus, then, having promised
   the service of the nations to his church, will so far open their whole
   frame to the roots, as to pluck out all the cursed seeds of the mystery
   of iniquity, which, by the craft of Satan and exigencies of state, or
   methods of advancing the pride and power of some sons of blood, have
   been sown amongst them.

   (3.) A third reason is, because as is their interest, so is their
   acting. The present power of the nations stands in direct opposition to
   the bringing in of the kingdom of Christ. Two things there are which
   confessedly are incumbent on him in this day of his advancement.

   [1.] The bringing home of his ancient people to be one fold with the
   fulness of the Gentiles, raising up the tabernacle of David, and
   building it as in days of old, in the accomplishment of innumerable
   promises, [274] and in answer to millions of prayers put up at the
   throne of grace for this very glory, in all generations. Now, there be
   two main hinderances of this work that must be removed. The first
   whereof is, --

   1st, Real: the great river Euphrates, the strength and fulness of whose
   streams doth yet rage so high that there is no passage for the kings of
   the east to come over. Wherefore this must be dried up, as other waters
   were for their forefathers in the days of old, Rev. xvi. 12. [275]
   Doubtless this is spoken in allusion to Abraham's coming over that
   river into Canaan, when the church of God in his family was there to be
   erected, -- whence he was called the Hebrew (that is, the passenger, to
   wit, over that river, Gen. xiv. 13); -- and then it may well enough
   denote the Turkish power; which, proud as it is at this day, possessing
   in peace all those regions of the east, yet God can quickly make it
   wither and be dried up; -- or the deliverance of the Jews from Babylon,
   when it was taken and destroyed by the drying up of the streams of that
   river, and so the yoke of her tyranny broken from the church's neck;
   [276] -- and so it can be no other but the power of the Romish Babylon,
   supported by the kings of the nations, which must therefore be shaken
   and dried up.

   2dly, Moral, or the idolatry of the Gentile worshippers. [277] The Jews
   stick hard as yet at this, that God should abolish any kind of worship
   which himself had once instituted; but, that he should ever accept any
   false worship, which he had once strictly prohibited, and nowhere to
   this day appointed, -- to this they will never be reconciled. Now, such
   is all the invented idolatrous worship which the kings of the earth
   have sucked in from the cup of fornication held out to them in the hand
   and by the authority of the Roman whore; this still they cleave close
   unto, and will not hearken to the angel preaching the everlasting
   gospel, that men should worship Him who made the heavens, and the
   earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters, Rev. xiv. 6, 7, --
   that is, the God of heaven in Jesus Christ, -- in opposition to all
   their iconolatry, [278] artolatry, hagiolatry, staurolatry, and mass
   abominations. This, then, must also be removed; and because, as you saw
   before, it is so riveted and cemented into and with all the orbs of the
   nations, heaven and earth, they must be shaken, and brought eis
   metathesin, before it can be effected.

   [2.] The second thing he hath to accomplish is the tremendous, total
   destruction of Babylon, ( Ps. cxxxvii. 8, 9; Isa. xlvii. 7-9) the man
   of sin, and all his adherents, that are not obedient to the heavenly
   call, Rev. xviii. 4. [279] Now, as Samson, intending the destruction of
   the princes, lords, and residue of the Philistines, who were gathered
   together in their idol-temple, effected it by pulling away the pillars
   whereby the building was supported, whereupon the whole frame toppled
   to the ground; [280] so the Lord, intending the ruin of that mighty
   power, whose top seems to reach to heaven, will do it by pulling away
   the pillars and supporters of it, after which it cannot stand one
   moment. Now, what are the pillars of that fatal building? Are they not
   the powers of the world, as presently stated and framed? Pull them
   away, and, alas! what is Antichrist? It is the glory of the kings put
   upon her that makes men's eyes so dazzle on the Roman harlot. Otherwise
   she is but like the Egyptian deities, whose silly worshippers through
   many glorious portals and frontispieces were led to adore the image of
   an ugly ape.

   Add hereunto, that in this mighty work the Lord Jesus Christ will make
   use of the power of the nations, the horns of them; that is, their
   strength, Rev. xvii. 16. They must hate the whore, and make her
   desolate and naked, and eat her flesh, and burn her with fire. Now,
   whether this can be accomplished or no in their present posture, is
   easily discernible. Doth not the papal interest lie at the bottom of
   all, or the most ruling lines of Christendom? [281] Can that be ejected
   without unbottoming their own dominion? Do they not use the efficacy of
   the Roman jurisdiction to balance the powers of their adversaries
   abroad, and to awe their subjects at home? Hath not the pope a
   considerable strength in every one of their own bosoms? Are not the
   locusts of their religious orders (all sworn slaves to him) for number
   sufficient to make an army to fight the greatest emperor in the world?
   Are not most potentates tied by oath, or other compact, to maintain
   either the whole or some part of the old power, under the name of rites
   of holy church, prelates, and the like? And can any expect that such as
   these should take up the despised quarrel of the saints against that
   flourishing queen? Doubtless no such fruit will grow on these trees,
   before they are thoroughly shaken.

   (4.) A fourth reason is, that His own people, seeing all earthly things
   shaken and removing, may be raised up to the laying hold of that
   durable kingdom that shall not be removed. [282] All carnal interests
   will doubtless be shaken with that of Babylon. Many of God's people are
   not yet weaned from the things that are seen: [283] -- no sooner is one
   carnal form shaken out, but they are ready to cleave to another, yea,
   to warm themselves in the feathered nests of unclean birds. All fleshly
   dominion within doors, and all civil dominion that opposeth without
   doors, shall be shaken. Now, these things are so glued also to men's
   earthly possessions, the talons of the birds of prey having firmly
   seized on them, that they also must be shaken with them; and therefore
   from them also will he have us to be loosed, 2 Pet. iii. 12, 13.

   And these are some of the reasons of the position laid down, which is
   so bottomed, so proved, as you have heard. Of the speedy accomplishment
   of all this I no way doubt. "I believe, and therefore I have spoken."
   Whether I shall see any farther perfection of this work whilst I am
   here below, I am no way solicitous; being assured that if I fail of it
   here, I shall, through the grace of him who loved us, and gave himself
   for us, meet with the treasures of it otherwhere.

   Come we to the uses.

   Use 1. The rise of our first use I shall take from that of the prophet,
   "Who is wise, and he shall understand these things? prudent, and he
   shall know them? For the ways of the Lord are right, and the just shall
   walk in them: but the transgressors shall fall therein," Hos. xiv. 9.
   Labour for this heavenly wisdom and prudence, that we may know these
   things, and be acquainted with the mind and will of God in the season
   and generation wherein we live. His way is not so in the dark, nor his
   footsteps in the deep, but that we may perceive what he is about.

   Luke xii. 54-56, our Saviour gives it in as a sure testimony of the
   Pharisees' hypocrisy, notwithstanding all their pretences, and
   possession of Moses' chair, that they were wise in earthly things, and
   had drawn out experiences, by long observation, of what was like to
   come to pass as to the weather, by considering the ordinary signs of
   the alterations thereof; but notwithstanding that mighty effectual
   concurrence of signs in heaven and earth, with the accomplishment of
   prophecies, all pointing to the instant establishment of the kingdom of
   God in the coming of the Messiah, not discerning them at all, they come
   and cry, "If thou be the Christ, give us a sign;" when, without
   satisfying their sinful curiosity, heaven and earth were full of signs
   round about them. Men who will not receive God's signs, suppose they
   should be wonderful proficients in credulity might they have signs of
   their own fancying. The rich glutton thought that if his way of
   teaching might have been set up by men rising from the dead, there
   would have been a world of converts, -- more than were made by
   preaching the word of God. [284] Men suppose that if God from heaven
   should give in some discriminating prodigy, oh, how abundantly should
   they be satisfied! The truth is, the same lust and corruption that
   makes them disbelieve God's signs, moves them to look after signs of
   their own. For this very thing, then, were the Pharisees branded as
   hypocrites, that having wisdom in natural things, to calculate and
   prognosticate from necessary signs, yet in the works of the Lord,
   though the signs which in his wisdom he was pleased to give were
   plentiful round about them, they must have some of their own choosing.
   I pray God none such be found in our day.

   1 Chron. xii. 32, it is said of the men of Issachar, that they "had
   understanding of the times, to know what Israel ought to do." [285]
   Israel is in the dark, and knows not what to do, if the times and
   seasons be not discovered to them. If the mind and will of the Lord in
   their generation be not made out unto a people, it will be their ruin.
   Hence it is that the Lord encourageth us to make inquiry after these
   things, to find out the seasons wherein he will do any great work for
   his people, knowing that without this we shall be altogether useless in
   the generation wherein we live, Isa. xlv. 11, "Ask me of things to come
   concerning my sons; and concerning the work of my hands command ye me."
   And what is this that the Lord will have his people to inquire of him
   about? Even the great work of the ruin of Babylon, and restoration of
   his church; which yet was not to be accomplished for two hundred and
   forty years. And this he tells you plainly in the following verses: "I
   have raised him up" (Cyrus) "in righteousness, and I will direct all
   his ways: he shall build my city, and he shall let go my captives, not
   for price nor reward, saith the Lord of hosts," verse 13. The Lord is
   earnest with his people to inquire into the season of the
   accomplishment of his great intendments for the good of his church,
   when as yet they are afar off; how much more when they are nigh at
   hand, even at the doors! "Whoso is wise, and will observe these thing,
   even they shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord," Ps. cvii.
   43. The prophet tells you [286] that this was his great study, and at
   length he understood by books the approach of the time wherein God
   would deliver his church from Babylonish captivity and pollution. Now,
   this discovery hath two or three notable products.

   (1.) It puts him upon earnest supplications for the accomplishment of
   their promised deliverance in the appointed season; -- wide from that
   atheistical frame of spirit which would have a predetermination of
   events and successes to eradicate all care and endeavour to serve that
   Providence which will produce their accomplishment. A discovery of the
   approach of any promised and before-fixed work of God should settle our
   minds to the utmost endeavour of helping the decree to bring forth.

   (2.) He finds great acceptation in this his address to the Lord by
   supplications, for the establishing of that work which he had
   discovered was nigh at hand. For, --

   [1.] An answer is returned him fully to his whole desire in the midst
   of his supplications, verse 21, "Whiles I was praying, the man Gabriel
   came," etc.

   [2.] The work which he had discovered to be approaching was instantly
   hastened and gone in hand withal, verse 23, "At the beginning of thy
   supplications the commandment came forth." Oh, that God would stir up
   his saints, in the spirit of Daniel, to consider and understand by
   books the time that he hath appointed for the deliverance of his
   people, that, fixing their supplications for the speeding thereof, the
   commandment may come forth for its full accomplishment!

   [3.] Having attained this, the Lord gives him fresh discoveries, -- new
   light of the time for the birth of the Messiah, which he thought not
   of, prayed not for: "Seventy weeks are determined," etc., verse 24. So
   delighted is the Lord with his people's diligent inquiry into his ways
   and walkings towards them, that thereupon he appears unto them, in the
   revelation of his mind, beyond all that they did expect or desire.

   Now, all this have I spoken to stir you up unto that whereunto at the
   entrance of this use you were exhorted, -- that you would labour for
   that spiritual wisdom and prudence which may acquaint your hearts, at
   least in some measure, with the mind and will of God concerning his
   work in the generation wherein you live. And farther to provoke you
   hereunto, know that you cannot but wander, as in many other, so
   especially in four sinful things:-- 1st, Sinful cares; 2dly, Sinful
   fears; 3dly, Sinful follies; 4thly, Sinful negligence.

   1st. Sinful cares, -- anxious and dubious thoughts about such things
   as, perhaps, the Lord intends utterly to destroy, or, at least, render
   useless. Had it not been the greatest folly in the world for Noah and
   his sons, when the flood was approaching to sweep away the creatures
   from the face of the earth, to have been solicitous about flocks and
   herds that were speedily to be destroyed? [287] Many men's thoughts at
   this day do even devour them about such things as, if they knew the
   season, would be contemptible unto them. Wouldst thou labour for
   honour, if thou knewest that God at this time were labouring to lay all
   the "honour of the earth in the dust?" [288] Couldst thou set thy heart
   upon the increase of riches, wert thou acquainted that God intends
   instantly to make "silver as stones, and cedars as sycamores," [289] --
   though not for plenty, yet for value? Would men be so exceedingly
   solicitous about this or that form of religion, this or that power to
   suppress such or such a persuasion, if they knew that the Lord would
   suddenly fill the earth with his knowledge, as the waters cover the
   sea? [290] Should our spirits sink for fear of this or that persecutor
   or oppressor, were it discovered unto us that in a short time nothing
   shall hurt or destroy in the whole mountain of the Lord? [291] Should
   we tremble at the force and power of this or that growing monarchy
   giving its power to the beast, had God revealed unto us that he is
   going to shake it until it be translated? Certain it is, that the root
   of all the sinful cares, which sometimes are ready to devour the hearts
   of God's people, is this unacquaintedness with the work and mind of the
   Lord.

   2dly. Sinful fears. Luke xxi. 28, our Saviour having told his disciples
   of wars, tumults, seditions, famines, earthquakes, etc., which were to
   come upon the earth, bids them, when they see these things, to "lift up
   their heads for joy." But how should this be? -- rejoice in the midst
   of so many evils and troubles, in the most whereof they were to have a
   Benjamin's mess, -- a double portion! Yea, saith our Saviour, Rejoice;
   for I have told you before, that then it is that your deliverance and
   redemption draweth nigh. It is for them to shake and tremble who are in
   the dark, -- who know not what the Lord is doing. They may be at their
   wits' end who know no other end of these things; but for you who know
   the mind of the Lord, what he intendeth and will effect by these
   things, cast off all sinful fears, and rejoice in him who cometh.

   Amongst us in these days new troubles arise, -- wars, and rumours of
   wars, appearances of famine, invasions, conspiracies, revolts,
   treacheries, sword, blood. Oh, how do men's faces wax pale, and their
   hearts die within them! Sometimes, with David, they could fly to the
   Philistines, and wind up their interest with them whom God will
   destroy. Every new appearance of danger shuffles them off from all
   their comforts, all their confidence. Hence poor souls are put upon
   doubling and shifting in the ways of God, in such a frame as God
   exceedingly abhors. They know not why any mercy is given, nor to what
   end; and therefore are afraid to own it, lest some sudden alteration
   should follow, and make it too hot for them to hold it; and all this
   because they know not the mind of the Lord, nor the judgment of their
   God. Were they but acquainted with it, so far as it is evidently
   revealed, they would quickly see all things working together to the
   appointed end.

   3dly. Sinful follies. Toil and labour in vain is, of all follies, the
   greatest folly; -- like the Jews under Julian, building of their temple
   in the day, God casting it to the ground in the night. When a man
   labours, toils, wearies and spends himself for the accomplishing of
   that which shall never come to pass, and that which, if he would but
   inquire, he might know shall never come to pass, he cannot well want
   the livery of a brutish man. How many poor creatures that think
   themselves wiser than those of Teman, and Dedan, and all the children
   of the east, do spend and consume their days and time in such ways as
   this, labouring night and day to set up what God will pull down, and
   what he hath said shall fall! "Come on, let us deal wisely," saith
   Pharaoh to his Egyptians, Exod. i. 10, to root out and destroy these
   Israelites. Poor fool! is there any wisdom or counsel against the Most
   High? I could give instances plenty in these days of men labouring in
   the dark, not knowing what they are doing, endeavouring with all their
   strength to accomplish that whereof the Lord hath said, "It shall not
   prosper;" and all because they discern not the season.

   4thly. Sinful negligence. You are no way able to do the work of God in
   your generation. It is the commendation of many saints of God, that
   they were "upright, and served the will of God in their generation."
   Besides the general duties of the covenant, incumbent on all the saints
   at all seasons, there are special works of providence which, in sundry
   generations, the Lord effecteth, concerning which he expects his people
   should know his mind, and serve him in them. Now, can a servant do his
   master's work if he know not his will? The Lord requireth that, in the
   great things which he hath to accomplish in this generation, all his
   should close with him. What is the reason that some stand in the
   market-place idle all the day? Some work for a season, and then give
   over; they know not how to go a step farther, but after a day, a week,
   a month, or year, are at a stand; -- worse than all this, some
   counterwork the Lord with all their strength, -- the most neglect the
   duty which of them is required. What is the reason of all this? They
   know in no measure what the Lord is doing, and what he would have them
   apply themselves unto. The best almost live from hand to mouth,
   following present appearances to the great neglect of the work which
   the Lord would have hastened amongst us. All this comes from the same
   root.

   But now, if all these sad and sinful consequences attend this nescience
   of the mind of God as to the things which he is doing in the days
   wherein we live, so far as he hath revealed himself and requires us to
   observe his walkings; by what ways and means may we come to the
   knowledge thereof, that we be not sinfully bewildered in our own cares,
   fears, and follies, but that we may follow hard after God, and be
   upright in our generation?

   There be four things whereby we may come to have an insight into the
   work which the Lord will do and accomplish in our days. (1st.) The
   light which he gives. (2dly.) The previous works which he doth. (3dly.)
   The expectation of his saints. (4thly.) The fear of his adversaries.

   (1st.) The light which he gives. God doth not use to set his people to
   work in the dark. They are the "children of light," and they are no
   "deeds of darkness" which they have to do. However others are blinded,
   they shall see; yea, he always suits their light to their labour, and
   gives them a clear discerning of what he is about. The Lord God doth
   nothing, but he reveals his secrets to his servants. The light of every
   age is the forerunner of the work of every age.

   When Christ was to come in the flesh, John Baptist comes a little
   before -- a new light, a new preacher. And what doth he discover and
   reveal? Why, he calls them off from resting on legal ceremonies, to the
   doctrine of faith, repentance, and gospel ordinances; -- tells them
   "the kingdom of God is at hand;" -- instructs them in the knowledge of
   Him who was coming. To what end was all this? Only that the minds of
   men being enlightened by his preaching, who was a "burning and a
   shining lamp," they might see what the Lord was doing.

   Every age hath its peculiar work, hath its peculiar light. Now what is
   the light which God manifestly gives in our days? Surely not new
   doctrines, as some pretend -- (indeed old errors, and long since
   exploded fancies). Plainly, the peculiar light of this generation is
   that discovery which the Lord hath made to his people of the mystery of
   civil and ecclesiastical tyranny. The opening, unravelling, and
   revealing the Antichristian interest, interwoven and coupled together,
   in civil and spiritual things, into a state opposite to the kingdom of
   the Lord Jesus, is the great discovery of these days. Who almost is
   there amongst us now who doth not evidently see, that for many
   generations the western nations have been juggled into spiritual and
   civil slavery by the legerdemain of the whore, and the potentates of
   the earth made drunk with the cup of her abominations? -- how the whole
   earth hath been rolled in confusion, and the saints hurried out of the
   world, to give way to their combined interest? Hath not God unveiled
   that harlot, made her naked, and discovered her abominable filthiness?
   Is it not evident to him that hath but half an eye, that the whole
   present constitution of the government of the nations is so cemented
   with antichristian mortar, from the very top to the bottom, that
   without a thorough shaking they cannot be cleansed? This, then, plainly
   discovers that the work which the Lord is doing relates to the
   untwining of this close combination against himself and the kingdom of
   his dear Son; and he will not leave until he have done it. To what
   degree in the several nations this shaking shall proceed, I have
   nothing to determine in particular, the Scripture having not expressed
   it. This only is certain, it shall not stop, nor receive its period,
   before the interest of Antichristianity be wholly separated from the
   power of those nations.

   (2dly.) The previous works he doth. How many of these doth our Saviour
   give as signs of the destruction of Jerusalem, -- and so, consequently,
   of propagating the gospel more and more to the nations! Matt. xxiv. 1;
   Luke xxi. 1. How fearful and dreadful they were in their
   accomplishment, Josephus the Jewish historian relateth; and how by them
   the Christians were forewarned, and did by them understand what the
   Lord was doing, Eusebius and others declare. "When," saith he, "you
   shall see the abomination of desolation" (the Roman eagles and ensigns)
   "standing in the holy place," Matt. xxiv. 15, -- or "Jerusalem
   compassed with armies," as Luke xxi. 20, -- then know by that, that
   "the end thereof is come, and your deliverance at hand."

   The works of God are to be sought out of them that have pleasure in
   them. They are vocal-speaking works; the mind of God is in them. They
   may be heard, read, and understood: the "rod may be heard, and who hath
   appointed it." Now, generally, he begins with lesser works, to point
   out to the sons of men what he is about to accomplish. By these may his
   will be known, that he may be met in righteousness.

   Now, what, I pray, are the works that the Lord is bringing forth upon
   the earth? what is he doing in our own and the neighbouring nations?
   Show me the potentate upon the earth that hath a peaceable molehill to
   build himself a habitation upon. Are not all the controversies, or the
   most of them, that at this day are disputed in letters of blood among
   the nations, somewhat of a distinct constitution from those formerly
   under debate? -- those tending merely to the power and splendour of
   single persons, these to the interest of the many. Is not the hand of
   the Lord in all this? Are not the shaking of these heavens of the
   nations from him? Is not the voice of Christ in the midst of all this
   tumult? And is not the genuine tendence of these things open and
   visible unto all? What speedy issue all this will be driven to, I know
   not; -- so much is to be done as requires a long space. Though a tower
   may be pulled down faster than it was set up, yet that which hath been
   building a thousand years is not like to go down in a thousand days.

   (3dly.) The expectation of the saints is another thing from whence a
   discovery of the will of God and the work of our generation may be
   concluded. The secret ways of God's communicating his mind unto his
   saints, by a fresh favour of accomplishing prophecies and strong
   workings of the Spirit of supplications, I cannot now insist upon. This
   I know, they shall not be "led into temptation," but kept from the hour
   thereof, when it comes upon the whole earth. When God raiseth up the
   expectation of his people to any thing, he is not unto them as waters
   that fail; nay, he will assuredly fulfil the desires of the poor.

   Just about the time that our Saviour Christ was to be born of a woman,
   how were all that waited for salvation in Israel raised up to a high
   expectation of the kingdom of God! -- such as that people never had
   before, and assuredly shall never have again; [292] yea, famous was the
   waiting of that season through the whole Roman empire. And the Lord,
   whom they sought, came to his temple. Eminent was their hope, and
   excellent was the accomplishment.

   Whether this will be made a rule to others or no, I know not: this I am
   assured, that, being bottomed on promises, and built up with
   supplications, it is a ground for them to rest upon. And here I dare
   appeal to all who with any diligence have inquired into the things of
   the kingdom of Christ, -- that have any savour upon their spirits of
   the accomplishment of prophecies and promises in the latter days, --
   who count themselves concerned in the glory of the gospel, -- whether
   this thing of consuming the mystery of iniquity, and vindicating the
   churches of Christ into the liberties purchased for them by the Lord
   Jesus, by the shaking and translating all opposing heights and heavens,
   be not fully in their expectations. Only, the time is in the hand of
   God, and the rule of our actings with him is his revealed will.

   (4thly.) Whether the fears of his adversaries have not their lines
   meeting in the same point, themselves can best determine. The whole
   world was more or less dreaded at the coming of Christ in the flesh.
   When, also, the signs of his vengeance did first appear to the Pagan
   world, in calling to an account for the blood of his saints, the kings
   and captains presently cry out, "The great day of his wrath is come,
   and who shall be able to stand?" Rev. vi. 17.

   I am not of counsel to any of the adherents to the man of sin, or any
   of those who have given their power unto the beast, -- I have not a key
   to the bosoms of the enemies of Christ, -- I am neither their
   interpreter nor do they allow me to speak in their behalf; yet truly,
   upon very many probable grounds, I am fully persuaded that, were the
   thoughts of their hearts disclosed, notwithstanding all their
   glittering shows, dreadful words, threatening expressions, you shall
   see them tremble, and dread this very thing, that the whole world as
   now established will be wrapped up in darkness, at least until that
   cursed interest which is set up against the Lord Jesus be fully and
   wholly shaken out from the heavens and earth of the nations.

   And thus, without leading you about by chronologies and computations
   (which yet have their use, well to count a number being wisdom indeed),
   I have a little discovered unto you some rules whereby you may come to
   be acquainted with the work of God in the days wherein we live, and
   also what that work is; which is our first use. The next shall be for
   direction to guide you what you ought to do, when you know what is the
   work of your generation.

   Use 2. Be exhorted to prepare to meet the Lord, to make his way
   straight: and this I would press distinctly, -- (1.) As to your
   persons; (2.) As to your employments.

   (1.) As to your persons. Give the Lord Jesus a throne in your hearts,
   or it will not at all be to your advantage that he hath a throne and
   kingdom in the world. Perhaps you will see the plenty of it, but not
   taste one morsel. Take first that which comes not by observation, --
   that which is within you, which is "righteousness, and peace, and joy
   in the Holy Ghost." Take it in its power, and you will be the better
   enabled to observe it coming in its glory. "Seek first this kingdom of
   God, and the righteousness thereof, and all these things shall be added
   unto you." Oh, that it were the will of God to put an end to all that
   pretended holiness, hypocritical humiliation, self-interested religion,
   that have been among us, whereby we have flattered God with our lips,
   whilst our hearts have been far from him! Oh, that it might be the
   glory of this assembly, above all the assemblies of the world, that
   every ruler in it might be a sincere subject in the kingdom of the Lord
   Jesus! Oh, that it might suffice that we have had in our parliament,
   and among our ministers, so much of the form and so little of the power
   of godliness; that we have called the world Christ, and lusts Christ,
   and self Christ, working indeed for them, when we pretended all for
   Christ! Oh, that I could nourish this one contention in your honourable
   assembly, that you might strive who should excel in setting up the Lord
   Jesus in your hearts!

   You may be apt to think, that if you can carry on and compass your
   purposes, then all your enemies will be assuredly disappointed. Do but
   embrace the Lord Jesus in his kingly power in your bosoms, and "ipso
   facto" all your enemies are everlastingly disappointed. You are the
   grains which, in the sifting of the nation, have been kept from falling
   to the ground. Are you not the residue of all the chariots of England?
   Oh, that in you might appear the reality of the kingdom of the Lord
   Jesus, which hath been so long pretended by others! -- that sound
   righteousness, not a pharisaical, rigid, supercilious affectation, not
   a careless belief and comportment, the issue of novel fancies, might be
   found upon your spirits! -- that you may be thought meet to rejoice
   with the Lord in his kingdom! Otherwise this day of the Lord which we
   have described, however desired and longed after, will be "darkness to
   you, and not light."

   (2.) In reference to your great employments, whereunto the Lord hath
   called you. And here I shall briefly hold out unto you one or two
   things.

   [1.] That you would seriously consider why it is that the Lord shakes
   the heavens and the earth of the nations, -- to what end this tendeth,
   and what is the cause thereof. Is it not from hence, that he may
   revenge their opposition to the kingdom of his dear Son? -- that he may
   shake out of the midst of them all that antichristian mortar wherewith,
   from their first chaos, they have been cemented, that so the kingdoms
   of the earth may become the kingdoms of the Lord Jesus? Is not the
   controversy of Zion pleaded with them Are not they called to an account
   for the transgression of that charge given to all potentates, "Touch
   not mine anointed?" And what is the aim of the Lord Jesus herein, whose
   mighty voice shakes them? Is it not to frame and form them for the
   interest of his own kingdom? -- that he may fulfil the word he hath
   spoken to Zion, "I will make thy officers peace, and thine exactors
   righteousness?"

   Consider, then, I pray, what you have in hand. Wait upon your King, the
   Lord Christ, to know his mind. If you lay any stone in the whole
   building that advanceth itself against his sceptre, he will shake all
   again. Dig you never so deep, build you never so high, it shall be
   shaken. Nay, that there be no opposition will not suffice:-- he hath
   given light enough to have all things framed for his own advantage. The
   time is come, yea, the full time is come, that it should be so; and he
   expects it from you. Say not, in the first place, this or that suits
   the interest of England; but look what suits the interest of Christ,
   and assure yourselves that the true interest of any nation is wrapped
   up therein. More of this in the treatise annexed to my sermon of
   January 31. [293]

   [2.] Be encouraged under all those perplexities and troubles which you
   are or may be wrapped in. Lift up the hands that hang down, and let the
   feeble knees be strengthened: "It is but yet a little while, and he
   that shall come will come, and will not tarry." The more you are for
   Christ, the more enemies you shall be sure to have; but the Lamb shall
   overcome. He is come to revenge the blood of his slain upon this
   generation, and to free the residue from the jaws of the terrible. He
   is our rock, and his work is perfect. What he hath begun, faster or
   slower, he will surely accomplish. It is a thing of the utmost
   imaginable indifferency whether any of our particular persons behold
   these things here below or not. If otherwise, we shall for the present
   have "rest with him, and stand in our lot at the end of the days;" but
   for the work itself, "the decree is gone forth," and it shall not be
   recalled. Receive strength and refreshment in the Lord.

   Use 3. Wonder not, when the heaven is shaken, if you see the stars fall
   to the ground. We had some who pretended to be church stars, that were
   merely fixed, to all men's view and by their own confession, in the
   political heavens. The first shaking of this nation shook them utterly
   to the ground. If others also tremble like an aspen leaf, and know not
   which wind to yield unto, or sail backwards and forwards by the same
   gale, wonder not at that neither. When men lay any other foundation
   than the immovable corner-stone, at one time or other, sooner or later,
   assuredly they will be shaken.

   Use 4. Let the professing people that are amongst us look well to
   themselves: "The day is coming that will burn like an oven." Dross will
   not endure this day: we have many a hypocrite as yet to be uncased.
   Take heed, you that act high, if a false heart, a defiled heart be
   amongst you, there shall be no place for it in the mountain of the
   Lord's house. "The inhabitants of Zion shall be all righteous," Isa.
   lx. 21. Many that make a great show now upon the stage, shall be turned
   off with shame enough. Try and search your hearts; force not the Lord
   to lay you open to all. The spirit of judgment and burning will try
   you. Tremble, I pray; for you are entering the most purging, trying
   furnace that ever the Lord set up on the earth.

   Use 5. Be loose from all shaken things:-- you see the clouds return
   after the rain, -- one storm in the neck of another. Thus it must be,
   until Christ hath finished his whole work. "Seeing that all these
   things must be dissolved, what manner of persons ought we to be in all
   manner of holy conversation?" Let your eyes be upwards, and your hearts
   be upwards, and your hands be upwards, that you be not moved at the
   passing away of shaken things. I could here encourage you by the
   glorious issue of all these shakings, whose foretaste might be as
   marrow to your bones, though they should be appointed to consumption
   before the accomplishment of it; but I must close.

   Use 6. See the vanity, folly, madness of such as labour to oppose the
   bringing in the kingdom of the Lord Jesus. Canst thou hinder the rain
   from descending upon the earth when it is falling? Canst thou stop the
   sun from rising at its appointed hour? Will the conception for thee
   dwell quietly in the womb beyond its month? Surely thou mayest with far
   more ease turn and stop the current and course of nature than obstruct
   the bringing in of the kingdom of Christ in righteousness and peace.
   Whence comes it to pass that so many nations are wasted, destroyed,
   spoiled, in the days wherein we live? -- that God hath taken quietness
   and peace from the earth? Doubtless from hence, that they will smite
   themselves against the "stone cut out of the mountain without hands."
   Shall not "the decree bring forth?" Is it not in vain to fight against
   the Lord? Some are angry, some troubled, some in the dark, some full of
   revenge; but the truth is, whether they will hear or forbear, Babylon
   shall fall, and all the glory of the earth be stained, and the kingdoms
   become the kingdoms of our Lord Jesus Christ.
     __________________________________________________________________

   [233] Chap. x. 36.

   [234] Prov. xxii. 13, xxvi. 13.

   [235] Ps. lxvi. 7.

   [236] 1 Thess. i. 3; 2 Thess. i. 11; Deut. x. 16, xxx. 6; Ezek. xviii.
   31, xxxvi. 26; Acts xi. 18.

   [237] Exod. xix. 18, 19, xx. 18.

   [238] "Nescio an facilior hic locus fuisset, si nemo eum exposuisset."
   -- Mald. ad Luc., ii. 34.

   [239] Eph. i. 10. Anakephalaiosasthai, that is, mian kephalen
   paraschein angelois kai anthropois ton Christon; apeschismenoi gar esan
   hoi angeloi kai anthropoi. OEcumen. in loc.

   [240] Matt. ii. 2, xxvii. 45; Luke xxiii. 44, 45; Matt. xxvii. 51, 52.

   [241] Ho gar blepei tis, ti kai elpizei, Rom. viii. 24.

   [242] "Nunquam Pauli sensum ingredieris, nisi Pauli Spiritum
   imbiberis." -- Ber. Ser. de Monte. To auto chrisma didaskei humas peri
   panton, 1 John ii. 27. En pneumati hagio nooumenai kai anoigomenai hai
   graphai deiknuousin hemin ton Christon, eikotos zuroros to pneuma to
   hagion. -- Theophylac. in John x.

   [243] Ps. lxviii. 8; Hab. ii. 20; Matt. xxiv. 7; 1 Sam. xiv. 25 --
   [Heb.]

   [244] Isa. xiii. 13; Ps. lxviii. 8; Joel ii. 10; Rev. viii. 12; Matt.
   xxiv. 29; Luke xxi. 25; Isa. lx. 20; Obad. 4; Rev. viii. 13, xi. 12,
   xx. 11.

   [245] Euseb. Eccles. Hist., lib. ix., cap. 8, 10, lib. viii. cap. 17;
   De Vita Constant., lib. i., cap. 50-52.

   [246] Isa. lxvi. 22-24.

   [247] Gen. i. 10.

   [248] Rev. xvii. 1.

   [249] Chronous e kairous, hous ho pater etheto en te idia exousia, Acts
   i. 7.

   [250] Seismoi kata topous, Matt. xxiv. 7.

   [251] Exelthe dogma para Kaisaros Augoustou, apographesthai pasan ten
   oikoumenen, Luke ii. 1.

   [252] To katechon, 2 Thess. ii. 6.

   [253] Rev. xviii. 2; Isa. lx. 13; Ps. ii. 6.

   [254] Heb. xi. 5; Jude 4; Gal. i. 6; Heb. vi. 18, vii. 12.

   [255] "Mutationem," Trem. "Translationem." Erasm. Ar. Mont.

   [256] Ps. ii. 6, cx. 2; Acts ii. 36; Rev. i. 18; 1 Cor. xv. 24-27.

   [257] Luke vi. 20; Mark xii. 34, etc.

   [258] Ps. xlv. 6, xlv. 13; Isa. ix. 7; Obad. 21.

   [259] Isa. xi. 5-10, xix. 18, 19, xxx. 18, 19; Mic. iv. 1.

   [260] Isa. xlix. 18-22, liv. 1-3, etc., lv. 11, 12, lx. 16, 17; Ezek.
   xlviii. 35; Amos ix. 11; Rom. xi. 15, etc.; Isa. xlix. 22, 23, lxvi.
   21; Mal. iii. 3; Ezek. xliii. 9-11; Rev. xxi. 3; Isa. liv. 11-13, etc.;
   Zech. xiv. 9-11.

   [261] Ps. ii. 4, 5, cxxxvii. 8, 9; Isa. xlvii. 1-3, xlix. 26; Jer. l.
   33, 34, li. 24, 25, 34, 35; Zech. xii. 2-4, xiv. 12; Rev. xviii. 6,
   etc.

   [262] Acts; and Mon. Histor. Pap.

   [263] Utraquists? -- another name for the Calixtines, -- adherents of
   Huss and Jacobellus, who in 1421 exhibited their peculiar creed under
   four articles:-- 1. The preaching of the word in the natural tongue; 2.
   The dispensation of the Lord's supper to all Christians, the private
   members of the church as well as the clergy, sub utrâque specie, in
   both kinds, -- and hence the name "Utraquists;" 3. The renunciation of
   secular dignities by the clergy; 4. The introduction of a stricter
   discipline in regard to the clergy. -- Guericke, ii. 439; Gieseler on
   the Period 1409-1517. -- Ed.

   [264] Ps. ii. 9-12; Rev. xvii. 14; Matt. xxviii. 20; 1 Cor. xi. 26;
   Eph. iv. 11-13; 1 Tim. vi. 13, 14; Ps. xlv. 16; Isa. xlix. 7, 23.

   [265] Bell. de Rom. Pon., lib. v. cap. 8.

   [266] Rev. xviii. 3 Hoi basileis tes ges met' autes eporneusan.

   [267] 2 Thess. ii. 6, 7.

   [268] Dan. ii. 41.

   [269] Houtoi mian gnomen echousi, kai ten dunamin kai ten exousian
   eauton to zerio diadidosousin, Rev. xvii. 13.

   [270] Childeric III.?-- the last of the Merovingian race of French
   kings, -- deposed in a.d. 750 by Pepin, to whom the crown of France, by
   the sanction of Pope Zachary, was transferred. The date of the Norman
   Conquest is a.d. 1066. -- Ed.

   [271] Rev. xiii. 15, 16.

   [272] Pempsei autois ho Theos energeian planes, 2 Thess. ii. 11.

   [273]

   "Roma sedes Petri, quæ Pastoralis honoris

   Facta caput mundo, quicquid non possidet armis,

   Relligione tenet."
   Prosp., de Ingrat.

   [274] John x. 16; Isa. xxxvii. 31; Jer. xxx. 9; Ezek. xxxiv. 27,
   xxxvii. 24, 25; Hos. iii. 5; Amos ix. 11.

   [275] Exod. xiv. 21, 22; Josh. iii. 15, 16; Hab. iii. 8.

   [276] Jer. li. 31, 32.

   [277] Rev. xi. 2.

   [278] Worship of images -- bread -- saints -- the cross -- Ed.

   [279] Jer. li. 25, 26; Rev. xvii. 1, 2; Zech. ii. 7; Jer. li. 6.

   [280] Judges xvi. 28, 29.

   [281] Petra dedit Petro, Petrus diadema Rudolfo.

   [282] Heb. xii. 28.

   [283] 2 Cor. iv. 18.

   [284] Echousi Msoea kai tous prophetas. Ouchi pater Abraam; all' ean
   tis apo nekron poreuthe, Luke xvi. 29, 30.

   [285] Esth. i. 13.

   [286] Dan. ix. 2.

   [287] Gen. vi. 13.

   [288] Isa. xxiii. 9.

   [289] 1 Kings x. 27.

   [290] Hab. ii. 14.

   [291] Isa. lxv. 25.

   [292] Luke iii. 15.

   [293] Vide Discourse concerning Toleration, etc.
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   Sermon VI.

   The

   branch of the Lord the beauty of Zion;

   or,

   the glory of the church in its relation unto Christ.

   Opened in two sermons;

   one preached at Berwick, the other at Edinburgh.
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Prefatory note.

   All the information which can be given respecting these sermons on Isa.
   lvi. 7, will be found in the "Life," vol. i. p. 45, and the dedication
   to Cromwell which is prefixed to them. The first sermon was preached at
   Berwick, July 21, 1650. The date of the dedication is November 26,
   1650. There is no record of Owen's proceedings in Scotland. The
   decisive battle of Dunbar, September 3, 1650, placed Edinburgh in the
   hands of Cromwell. The castle for a time held out against him; and as
   the Presbyterian ministers who had retired to it refused to issue from
   it on the Sabbath to fill the pulpits in the town, there is every
   likelihood that Owen found constant employment in preaching the gospel.
   A celebrated correspondence took place between those ministers, as
   represented by Dundas, the commandant of the fortress, and Oliver
   Cromwell. The latter offered them liberty to preach in their respective
   churches. Not much to their credit, they declined to avail themselves
   of this permission, on the ground of "the personal persecution" of
   which they were afraid if they ventured to quit the castle. Cromwell
   replies with insinuations that they wished "worldly power," and made
   "worldly mixtures to accomplish the same," and advises them to "trust
   to the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God;" alleging, at the
   same time, that though they bad not listened to his public appeals,"
   the Lord hath heard us," in the victory of Dunbar. The ministers, in
   their reply, and in allusion to the practices of Cromwell's officers,
   "regret that men of mere civil place and employment should usurp the
   calling and employment of the ministry, particularly in Scotland,
   contrary to the government and discipline therein established, -- to
   the maintenance whereof you are bound by the Solemn League and
   Covenant;" and state that they "have not so learned Christ as to hang
   the equity of their cause upon events." Cromwell, in a long answer,
   with a postscript of four queries, betraying some temper at the smart
   rejoinder of the clergy, complains that they make themselves
   "infallible expositors of the Covenant;" and winds up a reproof to them
   for calling such successes as that achieved at Dunbar "bare events,"
   with the characteristic words, "The Lord pity you." In one of the
   postscript queries he has very manifestly the advantage, when he twits
   the ministers with their inconsistency in "crying down Malignants, and
   yet setting up the head of them,' Charles Stuart." It has been thought
   that the hand of Owen can be traced in the letters of Cromwell; and
   Hume speaks of them "as the best of Cromwell's wretched compositions."
   The improvement in the composition may be ascribed to the greater
   leisure which Cromwell possessed at this time, while waiting the
   reduction of the castle. The letters are deeply impregnated with all
   the strongly-marked peculiarities of Cromwell's style of thought, --
   the perpetual emphasis of a resolute will, expressed in sentences
   "lumbering," indeed, but, like his own sword, sharp as well as heavy.
   Owen, we cannot but think, would have been more successful in reply to
   some of the statements of the ministers, and especially to the charge
   which they preferred against Cromwell, of suspending the equity of his
   cause upon his outward success. Sea Owen's answer to such an accusation
   in the prefatory note to the third sermon in this volume. -- Ed.
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To his excellency, the Lord General Cromwell, etc.

   My Lord,

   It was with thoughts of peace that I embraced my call to this place in
   time of war. As all peace that is from God is precious to my spirit, so
   incomparably that between the Father and his elect, which is
   established and carried on in the blood and grace of Jesus Christ. The
   ministerial dispensation of this peace being through free grace
   committed even unto me also, I desire that in every place my whole may
   be, to declare it to the men of God's good pleasure. That this was my
   chief design, in answer to the call of God upon me, even to pour out a
   savour of the gospel upon the sons of peace in this place, I hope is
   manifest to the consciences of all with whom (since my coming hither)
   in the work of the ministry I have had to do. The enmity between God
   and us began on our part; -- the peace which he hath made begins and
   ends with himself. This is the way of God with sinners: when he might
   justly continue their enemy, and fight against them to their eternal
   ruin, he draws forth love, and beseeches them to be reconciled who have
   done the wrong, and them to accept of peace who cannot abide the
   battle. Certainly the bearing forth of this message, which is so
   "worthy of all acceptation," and ought to be so welcome, cannot but
   have sweetness enough to season all the pressures and temptations
   wherewith it is sometimes attended. This it hath been my desire to
   pursue, and that with the weapons which are not carnal. And though some
   may be so seasoned with the leaven of contention about carnal things,
   or at best the tithing of mint and cummin, as to disrelish the
   weightier things of the gospel, yet the great Owner of the vineyard
   hath not left me without a comfortable assurance that even this labour
   in the Lord hath not been in vain.

   The following sermons, which I desire to present unto your excellency,
   were preached, one at Berwick, upon your first advance into Scotland,
   the other at Edinburgh. My willingness to serve the inheritance of
   Christ here, even in my absence, caused me to close with the desires
   that were held out to this purpose. And I do present them to your
   excellency, not only because the rise of my call to this service, under
   God, was from you; but also, because in the carrying of it on I have
   received from you, in the weaknesses and temptations wherewith I am
   encompassed, that daily spiritual refreshment and support by inquiry
   into, and discovery of, the deep and hidden dispensations of God
   towards his secret ones -- which my spirit is taught to value. The
   carrying on of the interest of the Lord Jesus amongst his saints, in
   all his ways, which are truth and righteousness -- the matter pointed
   at in this discourse -- being the aim of your spirit in your great
   undertakings, it bears another respect unto you. I am not unacquainted
   with its meanness, yea, its coming short, in respect of use and fruit,
   of what the Lord hath since and by others drawn forth; but such as it
   is, having by Providence stepped first into the world, I wholly commend
   it to him for an incense who graciously "supplied the seed to the
   sower;" -- beseeching him that we may have joy unspeakable and glorious
   in the acceptance of that peace which he gives us in the Son of his
   love, whilst the peace whose desire in the midst of war you continually
   bear forth to him and to others, is by them rejected to their hurt.

   Your Excellency's

   Most humble Servant in our dearest Lord,

   J. Owen.

   Edinburgh, Nov. 26, 1650.
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Sermon VI. The branch of the Lord the beauty of Zion: or, the glory of the
church in its relation unto Christ.

   "For mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people."
   Isa. lvi. 7.

   From verse 3 of this chapter to verse 8, you have promises and
   predictions of calling in Gentiles and strangers to the church of God,
   notwithstanding any objections or hindrances laid in their way by
   ceremonial and typical constitutions, -- they being all to be removed
   in the cross of Christ, Eph. ii. 13-16; Col. ii. 14; -- making way for
   the accomplishment of that signal promise which is given in the 2d
   chapter of this prophecy, verses 2, 3, "And it shall come to pass in
   the last days, that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be
   established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the
   hills; and all nations shall flow unto it: and many people shall go and
   say, Come ye, and let us go up," etc.

   The words of verse 7 are a recapitulation of the whole, holding out
   summarily the calling of the Gentiles to the holy mount, or spiritual
   church of Christ; where also you have a description of the services
   performed by them upon their coming: "Their burnt-offerings and
   sacrifices shall be accepted upon mine altar;" -- answerable to that
   eminent prediction of the solemn worship of the called Gentiles, Mal.
   i. 11, "For from the rising of the sun, even unto the going down of the
   same, my name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place
   incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering: for my name
   shall be great among the heathen, saith the Lord of hosts." The
   spiritual services of the saints of the Gentiles are in each place set
   forth by those ceremonial ordinances of incense, altar, and sacrifice,
   as were then most acceptable, from the Lord's own appointment.

   Now, this whole promise is once again strengthened, without loss of
   life or beauty, and comprised in the words of the text. That which
   before he termed "sacrifice and burnt-offerings," here he calleth
   "prayer;" and those who before were "the sons of the stranger," are
   here "all people," -- some, many of all sorts, the whole world, all
   men, without distinction, the partition wall being broken down.

   The thing here spoken of is God's house, described, -- First, By its
   appropriation unto him; it is his peculiar, -- "My house." Secondly, By
   its extent of receipt in respect of others; it is "for all people."
   Thirdly, By the employment of its inhabitants; that is, prayer, -- it
   "shall be called an house of prayer."

   "House" here may be taken two ways.

   1. Properly, as it was in the type for the material temple at
   Jerusalem; whereunto these words are applied by our Saviour, Matt. xxi.
   But that is no farther concerned herein, but as the spiritual holiness
   of the antitype could not be represented without a ceremonial holiness
   of the type.

   2. Spiritually, for the church of Christ to be gathered to him out of
   all nations; the house wherein "juge sacrificium," a continual
   spiritual sacrifice, is to be offered to him: this is peculiarly
   intended.

   So, then, observe, -- I. Christ's church of saints, of believers, is
   God's house. II. The church of Christ under the gospel is to be
   gathered out of all nations. III. There are established ordinances and
   appointed worship for the church of Christ under the gospel. It is the
   first that I shall speak unto.

   Christ's church of saints, of believers, is God's house.

   That his church is of saints and believers will appear in the issue.

   By the church of Christ I understand, primarily, the whole multitude of
   them who antecedently are chosen of his Father, and given unto him;
   consequently, are redeemed, called, and justified in his blood; -- the
   church which he loved, and gave himself for, "that he might sanctify
   and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word; that he might
   present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle,
   or any such thing; but that it should be holy, and without blemish,"
   Eph. v. 26, 27. And, secondarily, also every holy assembly of mount
   Zion, whereunto the Lord Christ is made beauty and glory, -- every
   particular church of his saints, inasmuch as they partake of the nature
   of the whole, being purchased by his blood, Acts xx. 28.

   That this church belongs unto God, I shall only leave evidenced under
   the claim whereby he here appropriates it to himself; he calls it his:
   "My house."

   That it is his house, I shall farther demonstrate. Three things are
   required to the making of a house:-- first, A foundation; secondly,
   Materials for a superstruction; thirdly, An orderly framing of both
   into a useful building; -- and all these concur to the church of
   Christ.

   First. It hath a foundation. "I have laid the foundation," saith Paul,
   1 Cor. iii. 10; and, "Other foundation can no man lay, save that which
   is laid, which is Jesus Christ," verse 11. That which Paul laid
   ministerially, God himself laid primarily and efficiently. "Thus saith
   the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried
   stone, a precious corner-stone, a sure foundation," Isa. xxviii. 16.
   Now, this foundation is no other but the rock upon which the church is
   built, Matt. xvi. 18, which makes it impregnable to the gates of hell,
   communicating strength and permanency continually to every part of the
   building.

   Secondly. A foundation only will not make a house, -- there must also
   be materials for a superstruction. Those you have, 1 Pet. ii. 5. "Ye
   are," saith he, "lively stones." All God's elect are stones, in due
   time to be hewed and fitted for this building.

   Thirdly. Materials themselves will not serve: they must be fitly
   framed, and wisely disposed, or they will be a heap, not a house. This,
   then, is not wanting. Yet "are built upon the foundation of the
   apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief
   cornerstone; in whom all the building, fitly framed together, groweth
   unto an holy temple in the Lord: in whom ye also are builded together
   for an habitation of God through the Spirit," Eph. ii. 20-22. There is
   much spiritual and heavenly architecture in these three verses. I shall
   only touch on some particulars.

   1. The foundation of this house, this temple, is laid; and that is
   Jesus Christ: "Other foundation can no man lay." He is here called "The
   chief corner-stone," and, "The foundation of the apostles and
   prophets." It is not, which they were, but which they laid. It is
   "genitivus efficientis," not "materiæ," that expression holds out, --
   the persons working, not the thing wrought.

   2. The materials of this building, -- elect, believers; said in the
   former verse to be "fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the
   household of God." They alone are built on Christ, and thereby have
   union with him: not one dead, rotten stone in all this building, as
   shall be declared.

   3. The architects or builders are of two sorts.

   (1.) Principal: "The Spirit;" -- we are "framed for an habitation of
   God by the Spirit;" he is the principal workman in this fabric, --
   without him is not one stone laid therein.

   (2.) Secondary and instrumental: "The apostles and prophets." And this
   they were two ways.

   [1.] Personally, in their several generations; -- this was their work,
   their labour, to lay the foundation and carry on the building of this
   house.

   [2.] Doctrinally; so they labour in it to this very day; -- their
   doctrine in the Scripture holds out the only foundation, and the only
   way of building thereon.

   4. The manner of the building: it is "fitly framed together,"
   sunarmologoumene, closely jointed and knit in together, sweetly closed
   together with Christ, "the head, from which all the body by joints and
   bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with
   the increase of God," Col. ii. 19.

   5. What kind of a house it is. It receiveth here a twofold title, "An
   holy temple," and "An habitation," or tabernacle; because of its
   allusion to both those holy places of the worship of God, fulfilling
   the types of them both. Hence it is most evident that this church of
   Christ is a house, and being appropriated unto God, God's house. To
   make this the more evident, I shall do these two things:--

   (1.) Show you what are the chief properties of this house. (2.) Declare
   what is the relation wherein Jesus Christ stands to this house, having
   called it all along the church of Christ. (1.) For the properties, or
   chief qualities of this house, they are three:-- [1.] It is a living
   house; [2.] It is strong; [3.] It is glorious.

   [1.] It is a living house: "To whom coming, as unto a living stone, ye
   also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house," 1 Pet. ii. 4,
   5. Christ, the foundation, is a living stone, and they that are built
   upon him are living stones. Hence they are said to grow together into a
   house. Growth is a sign of life, growing from an inward principle. Such
   as the growth of any thing is, such is its life. The growth of this
   house is spiritual, so therefore also is its life; -- it lives with a
   spiritual life, a life whose fulness is in its foundation. He hath
   "life in himself," John v. 26, and they from him: "I am crucified with
   Christ, nevertheless I live," Gal. ii. 20; yea, it is himself in them,
   -- "yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." It is true, those stones are
   dead in the rock as well as others; "by nature children of wrath as
   well as they," Eph. ii. 3; being "dead in trespasses and sins," verse
   1. He who hews them out gives them life; -- he quickens them when dead
   in trespasses and sins. There is not one rotten, dead stone in all this
   building. However some such may, by the advantage of their outward
   appearance, crowd in, yet they are not of the house itself.

   [2.] It is a strong house: "The gates of hell cannot prevail against
   it," Matt. xvi. 18. Though the rain descend, and the floods come, and
   the winds blow upon this house, yet it will not fall, because it is
   founded on a rock, Matt. vii. 25. We were all once a house built upon
   Adam; and when the wind came, and beat upon us, we fell; and the fall
   of that house was very great. He in his best estate was found to be but
   sand; now we are built upon a rock that will abide all trials:-- the
   waves may make a noise, and dash themselves against him, but it will be
   to their own ruin.

   But you will say, May not weak and inconsistent materials be built upon
   a rock, which yet may have never the more strength for their
   foundation?

   It is not so here, for the whole building is framed together in the
   foundation, Eph. ii. 22; not only on it, but also in it, and so not to
   be prevailed against, unless the rock itself be overthrown. And it is a
   living rock that this house is built on, -- a rock continually
   communicating strength unto every stone in the building, that it may be
   enabled to abide in him. I should proceed too far, should I go to
   declare the mighty defence and fortification of this house; -- what
   hath been spoken from the foundation is enough to demonstrate it to be
   a strong house.

   [3.] It is a glorious house, and that in a threefold respect.

   1st. It is glorious in respect of inward glory, brought unto it of God
   in the face of Jesus Christ, being beautiful through the comeliness
   that he puts upon it. Hence Christ speaking of it says, "How fair art
   thou, O love, for delights!" Cant. vii. 6; and, "Thou art all fair, my
   love; there is no spot in thee," chap. iv. 7. And how, I pray, comes
   that about? Why, Christ washeth it in his own blood, that it might be
   wholly "a glorious church," Eph. v. 26, 27. And farther, he being "The
   branch of the Lord and fruit of the earth," is made beauty and glory,
   excellency and comeliness, thereunto, Isa. iv. 2.

   It hath the beauty and glory of justification, which doth not only take
   away all filthy garments, causing iniquity to pass away, but also gives
   fair "change of raiment," Zech. iii. 4, 5, even the "garments of
   salvation," and the "robe of righteousness," Isa. lxi. 10. And then it
   hath the glory and beauty of sanctification; whence "the King's
   daughter is all glorious within," Ps. xlv. 13. The comeliness and
   beauty that is in a sanctified soul is above all the glory of the
   world. This house is all overlaid with gold within; Christ is unto it
   "a head of gold," Cant. v. 11. His house is not like Nebuchadnezzar's
   image, that the head should be of gold, and the members some of them of
   clay; -- they all partake of his nature, and are very glorious therein.

   2dly. In respect of its outward structure, which it eminently hath in
   all the peculiar assemblies thereof: "O thou afflicted, and tossed with
   tempest, and not comforted! behold, I will lay thy stones with fair
   colours, and thy foundations with sapphires. I will make thy windows of
   agates and carbuncles, and all thy borders of pleasant stones," Isa.
   liv. 11, 12. So, also, where it is called the new Jerusalem, -- a city,
   from its laws and polity, this "city" is said to be of "pure gold," --
   not dross and mire, -- "the building of the wall of jasper, and the
   foundations of the wall garnished with all manner of precious stones,"
   Rev. xxi. 18, 19. This is that which the psalmist calls. "The beauty of
   holiness," Ps. cx. 3. The glory of the ordinances of the gospel is
   their vigour and purity. There is nothing so glorious as our King on
   his throne, Christ in his court, this house reigning in the
   administration of his ordinances:-- the "all his garments smell of
   myrrh, aloes, and cassia, out of the ivory palaces whereby they have
   made him glad. Kings' daughters are among his honourable women: upon
   his right hand doth stand the queen in gold of Ophir," Ps. xlv. 8, 9.
   His goings are seen, the goings of our God and King in the sanctuary,
   Ps. lxviii. 24, 25, etc. The apostle exalteth the glory of gospel
   administrations exceedingly above the old tabernacle and temple
   worship, -- which yet was exceeding pompous and glorious. "If," saith
   he, "the ministration of death, written and engraven in stones, was
   glorious, so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold
   the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance; which glory was to
   be done away: how shall not the ministration of the Spirit be rather
   glorious? For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much more
   doth the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory. For even that
   which was made glorious had no glory in this respect, by reason of the
   glory that excelleth. For if that which was done away was glorious,
   much more that which remaineth is glorious," 2 Cor. iii. 7-11. Let men
   think as meanly as they please of the spiritual service of God amongst
   his people, all glory that ever yet appeared in the world was but a
   bubble to it, -- all that God ever instituted before came exceeding
   short of it. He delights in it who beholds the proud afar off.

   3dly. It is glorious in respect of the exaltation it hath above and the
   triumph over all its opposers. To see a house, a palace, hung round
   about with ensigns, spoils, and banners taken from the enemies that
   have come against it, is a glorious thing:-- thus is this house of God
   decked: "Kings of armies did flee apace, and she that tarried at home
   divided the spoil," Ps. lxviii. 12. "She that tarries at home," the
   mother of the family, the church of God, she "hath all the spoils." The
   Lord hath affirmed, that not only every one that opposeth, but all that
   do not serve this house, shall be utterly destroyed, Isa. lx. 12. There
   you have the spoil of Pharaoh, and all his host, gathered on the shore
   of the Red sea, and dedicated in this house, Exod. xv. There you have
   the robes of Nebuchadnezzar, reserved when himself was turned into a
   beast, Dan. iv. 1. There you have the imperial ornaments of Diocletian
   and his companion, casting aside their dominion for very madness that
   they could not prevail against this house. There is the blood of
   Julian, kept for a monument of vengeance against apostates. There you
   have the rochets of the prelates of this land, hung up of late, with
   other garments of their adherents, rolled in blood. There is a place
   reserved for the remaining spoils of the great whore, when she shall be
   burned, and made naked, and desolate, Rev. xi. Never any rose, or shall
   arise, against this house, and go forth unto final prosperity. Let the
   men of the world take heed how they burden themselves with the
   foundation-stone of this house; -- it will assuredly break them all in
   pieces.

   Thus have I given you a glimpse of this house, with the chief
   properties of it, which as God assumes as his own, so also peculiarly
   it belongs unto the Lord Christ; yea, what relation it stands in unto
   him, or rather he unto it, is the main thing I intend.

   (2.) Jesus Christ stands in a twofold relation unto this house:-- [1.]
   In respect of its fabric and building; [2.] In respect of its state and
   condition.

   [1.] In the first regard, Christ relates to this house in a fourfold
   respect; -- as, 1st. Its foundation; 2dly. Its ark; 3dly. Its altar;
   4thly. Its candlestick.

   I shall pass through these, God assisting, in order, and begin with
   what was first laid down, -- his relation to this house, as, --

   1st. The foundation of it. This was in part declared before. He is the
   stone which the builders rejected, but made of the Lord the head of the
   corner, Ps. cxviii. 22. He is the lowest in the bottom, to bear up the
   weight of the building; and the highest in the corner, to couple the
   whole together. "Other foundation can no man lay but that which is
   laid, which is Jesus Christ," 1 Cor. iii. 11. He is the rock on which
   he builds his church, Matt. xvi. 18.

   Now there are three things required to a foundation, all which are
   eminently seen in the Lord Christ, in reference to this house.

   (1st.) That it be first laid in the building. It were a course
   exceeding preposterous, first to build a house, and then to lay the
   foundation. Jesus Christ is the first that is laid in this holy fabric,
   and that in a fourfold respect.

   [1st.] He is the first in respect of God's eternal purpose. The Lord
   purposed that "he should have the pre-eminence" in this as well as in
   all other things, Col. i. 18. He is in that respect "the first-born
   among many brethren," Rom. viii. 29, the residue of this house being
   predestinated to be made conformable unto him. "He is before all
   things: by him all things" -- that is, all spiritual things, all the
   things of this house -- "consist: he is the head of the body, the
   church." This I mean, God purposed that Christ should be the bottom and
   foundation of this whole building, -- that it should be all laid on
   him. I do not mean that God first intended Christ for a foundation, and
   then his elect for building (the order of intention and execution is,
   as to first and last, inverted by all agents); but this I say, God
   purposing to build his elect into a holy temple, purposed that Jesus
   Christ should be the foundation.

   [2dly.] In respect of outward manifestation. God first manifests and
   declares him, before he laid one stone in this building. Gen. iii. 15,
   The seed, saith he, of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head:-- in
   that was laid the first stone of this building. Then was the "Lamb
   slain," apo katazoles kosmou, Rev. xiii. 8, presently "after the
   foundation of the world:" and thence is grace in him said to be given
   to the elect, pro chronon aionion, Tit. i. 2, "many ages ago."

   [3dly.] Because, in order of nature, Christ must be first laid in the
   heart of every individual stone before they are laid up in this
   building. If Christ be not in men, they are adokimoi, 2 Cor. xiii. 7,
   -- altogether useless for this building. Try them never so often, they
   must at last be rejected and laid aside.

   [4thly.] In respect of every particular assembly and little sanctuary
   of mount Zion. If he be not first laid in the midst of such assemblies,
   they will prove to be pinnacles of Babel, not towers of Zion. This,
   therefore, was the way of the saints of old, first to give up
   themselves to the Lord Christ, and then to one another, by the will of
   God, 2 Cor. viii. 5.

   In these respects Christ the foundation is first laid in this spiritual
   building, -- which is the first property of a foundation.

   (2dly.) A foundation must be hidden and out of sight unto all those
   that outwardly look upon the house. They cannot perceive it, though
   every part of the house doth rest upon it. And this hath occasioned
   many mistakes in the world. An unwise man coming to a great house,
   seeing the antics and pictures [figures?] stand crouching under the
   windows and sides of the house, may haply think that they bear up the
   weight of the house, when indeed they are for the most part pargeted
   posts. They bear not the house, -- the house bears them. By their
   bowing, and outward appearance, the man thinks the burden is on them,
   and supposes that it would be an easy thing, at any time, by taking
   them away, to demolish the house itself. But when he sets himself to
   work, he finds these things of no value; there is a foundation in the
   bottom, which bears up the whole, that he thought not of:-- against
   that he may waste himself, until he be broken in pieces. Men looking
   upon the church, do find that it is a fair fabric indeed, but cannot
   imagine how it should stand. A few supporters it seemeth to have in the
   world, like crouching antics under the windows, that make some show of
   under-propping it:-- here you have a magistrate, there an army, or so.
   Think the men of the world, "Can we but remove these props, the whole
   would quickly topple to the ground." Yea, so foolish have I been
   myself, and so void of understanding before the Lord, as to take a view
   of some goodly appearing props of this building, and to think, How
   shall the house be preserved if these should be removed? -- they looked
   unto me like the mariners in Paul's ship, without whose abode therein
   they could not be saved, -- when, lo! suddenly some have been
   manifested to be pargeted posts, and the very best to be held up by the
   house, and not to hold it up. On this account the men of the world
   think it no great matter to demolish the spiritual church of Christ to
   the ground:-- they encourage one another to the work, never thinking of
   the foundation that lies hidden, against which they dash themselves all
   to pieces. I say, then, Christ, as the foundation of this house, is
   hidden to the men of the world, -- they see it not, they believe it
   not. There is nothing more remote from their apprehension than that
   Christ should be at the bottom of them and their ways, whom they so
   much despise.

   (3dly.) The foundation is that which bears up the whole weight of the
   building. What part of the house soever is not directly poised upon it
   hath no strength at all. Take a goodly stone, hew it, square it, make
   it every way fit for your fabric, so that it may seem to be the best of
   all your materials; yet if you do not lay it upon the foundation,
   answerable to that which may give it a solid basis, and bear up the
   weight and poise thereof, it will be useless, cumbersome, and quickly
   fall to the ground.

   Let a man be hewed and squared by the word and ordinances into outward
   conformity never so exactly, that he seems one of the most beautiful
   saints in the world; yet if he be not laid rightly by faith upon the
   foundation, to derive from thence strength, supportment, and vigour, he
   will quickly fall to the ground. What, then, will become of their
   building who heap up all sorts of rubbish to make a house for the,
   Lord?

   2dly. Christ is the ark of this house. The ark in the tabernacle, and
   afterward in the temple, was the most holy thing in the most holy
   place. There was nothing in it but the two tables of stone written with
   the finger of God; -- before it was Aaron's rod that budded, with a pot
   full of manna; -- over it was the propitiatory, or mercy-seat, being a
   plate of gold as long and as broad as the ark, covering it, being
   shadowed with the cherubims of glory. Now all this glorious fabric did
   signify, that unless the law with its condemning power were hid in the
   ark, and covered with the mercy-seat, no person could stand before the
   Lord. Besides, the law was the old covenant of works, and being renewed
   unto them chiefly to be subservient to the gospel, and partly, with its
   appurtenances mad carnal administration, to be the tenure of the
   Israelites' holding the land of Canaan, and this being in the ark, it
   was said to contain the covenant, and is frequently called "The ark of
   the covenant." Jesus Christ is the ark of this spiritual house. When
   the temple was opened in heaven, there was seen in the temple the ark
   of God's testament, Rev. xi. 19, -- Jesus Christ, made conspicuous to
   all, who lay much hid under the old testament, Rom. iii. 25. God is
   said to set forth Christ to be hilasterion, "a propitiation," or
   mercy-seat; for by that very term is the mercy-seat expressed, Heb. ix.
   5. He is, then, the ark and the mercy-seat covering it. He, then, doth
   these two things:--

   (1st.) In behalf of this house, and every stone thereof, he hides the
   law with its condemning power, that nothing from thence shall be laid
   to their charge. If a man have a suit to be tried in any court, and a
   powerful friend engage himself that the only evidence which is against
   him shall not be produced, will it not give him encouragement to
   proceed? In that great and tremendous trial which is to be above, there
   is but one principal evidence against us, which gives life to all
   others; which if it be removed all the rest must fail:-- this is the
   law. Christ, as the ark and mercy-seat, hides this law; -- it shall not
   (I speak in respect to this house) be produced at the day of trial.
   Will not this be a great encouragement to them to appear at the throne
   of God? Christ hides the law, as being "the end" of it, Rom. x. 4,
   "that the righteousness thereof might be fulfilled in us," Rom. viii.
   4. He hath so far answered all that the law required, that none from
   thence can "lay anything to the charge of God's elect," Rom. viii. 33,
   34. Let not poor sinners fear, it will not be with them as with
   Uzzah:-- he touched the ark and died; touch this ark, and live forever.
   And, --

   (2dly.) He is the ark of this house, as containing in himself the new
   covenant; it is made with him originally, established in him
   irreversibly, -- made out through him in all the grace of it
   faithfully.

   3dly. He is the altar of this house. There were two altars in the old
   tabernacle and temple, -- an altar for sacrifice and an altar for
   incense, Exod. xxvii. 1, xxx. 1. The first was the great brazen altar
   that stood without the holy place, whereon the burnt-offerings and all
   sacrifices of blood for remission were offered. The other less, made of
   shittim-wood, all overlaid with pure gold, and a crown of beaten gold
   upon it, on which they were to burn pure incense unto the Lord always.
   And they were both most holy, sanctifying the gifts with legal
   sanctification that were offered on them, Matt. xxiii. 19. Now, both
   these doth our Saviour supply in this house. He is the great altar of
   sacrifice, the altar of offerings for expiation and atonement: "We have
   an altar, whereof they have no right to eat who serve the tabernacle,"
   Heb. xiii. 10; that is, even He who sanctified the people with his own
   blood, and suffered without the gate, verse 11. The good-will and soul
   of Christ offering up himself, through the eternal Spirit, a pure
   oblation and sacrifice, by one offering to perfect for ever them that
   are sanctified, is all our altar. He is also the golden altar of
   incense. Incense is prayer, Ps. cxli. 2, "Let my prayer come before
   thee as incense." Jesus Christ is the golden altar whereon that incense
   is offered, Rev. viii. 3, 4, even that altar which is always before
   God, Rev. ix. 13. As by being the former he makes our persons accepted,
   so by the latter he makes our duties accepted. And all the living
   stones of this house are priests to offer sacrifice on these altars. By
   him, as priests, they have approximation to the holy place; -- there
   they have a share and participation in all the sacrifices that are
   offered upon or by him.

   4th. He is the candlestick of this house. The making, fashioning, and
   use of the candlestick in the holy place of the tabernacle, you have,
   Exod. xxv. 31, etc. It was one of the most glorious utensils of that
   frame, made of pure and beaten gold, with much variety of works, --
   knops, flowers, and lamps. The use of it was, to bear out light for all
   the worship of God in that most holy place. The tabernacle was made
   close, without any window. It was not to receive light from without; it
   had all its own light from within. It is true, this candlestick, with
   its seven lamps, did secondarily represent the churches of Christ,
   which hold out his light among themselves and unto others, Rev. i. 20,
   "The seven candlesticks thou sawest are the seven churches." Therefore
   Solomon made "ten candlesticks of pure gold," 1 Kings vii. 49, to set
   out yet farther the increase and multiplying of the churches of God.
   Upon this account, also, the two witnesses are said to be "two
   candlesticks," Rev. xi. 4, and "the two anointed ones that stand before
   the God of the whole earth," Zech. iv. 3, whence that in the Revelation
   is taken. There is mention, indeed, of two anointed ones, but of one
   candlestick; -- the Holy Ghost plainly intimating, that though the
   churches and witnesses of Christ are also candlesticks in a second
   sense, yet there is one eminent candlestick, which hath light
   originally in itself, which also it communicates unto all others. And
   this is that which is mentioned in Zech iv., which hath the "two
   olive-trees," or the two anointed churches of Jews and Gentiles,
   standing by it, receiving light from it to communicate to others: they
   empty the golden oil out of themselves which they receive from the
   candlestick. For this candlestick hath "seven lamps," verse 2; which
   lamps, that burn before the throne, are the "seven Spirits of God,"
   Rev. iv. 5, -- seven Spirits, that is, the perfection and completeness
   of the Spirit of God in all his graces and operations. Now, who hath
   these seven Spirits? Even he who received not the Spirit "by measure,"
   John iii. 34, being the "stone" upon which are the "seven eyes," Zech.
   iii. 9. He alone, then, is this candlestick, and all the light which
   this house hath it is from him.

   There are two ways whereby Jesus Christ make., out light to this
   house:-- (1st.) By way of doctrinal revelation; (2dly.) Of real
   communication.

   (1st.) He alone discovers light to all the stones of this building: "No
   man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the
   bosom of the Father, he hath declared him," John i. 18. No saving
   discovery of God, of his nature, his will, his love, but what is by
   Christ. The moon and stars give light; but it is only what they receive
   from the sun. The prophets and apostles held out light; but it was all
   received from him. They spake by the Spirit of Christ that was in them.
   "I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you," 1
   Cor. xi. 23. The same apostle curses every one that shall bring in any
   other light into this house, be they angels or men, Gal. i. 8, 9.
   Christ alone fully knows the mind of God, as being always "in the bosom
   of the Father," John i. 18; yea, he knows it to the uttermost, being
   one with his Father, John x. 30. And he is willing to reveal it; for
   even "for this end came he into the world, that he might bear witness
   to the truth." And he had ability enough to do it, for "in him were hid
   all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge," Col. ii. 3. He alone is the
   author of all light to this his holy habitation. Many attempts have
   been to set up light in this house, and not from Christ. Some would
   kindle their traditions, for the doctrine of this house; some their
   prudentials, for the government of it; some their ceremonials, for the
   worship of it; -- all candles in the sun. Shall men think to compass
   themselves with sparks, and walk in the light of the fire which
   themselves have kindled, in the face of the Sun of righteousness? Shall
   not such men lie down in sorrow? Beloved, take heed of such "ignes
   fatui," -- foolish, misguiding fires.

   (2dly.) By way of real communication. He is" the true Light, which
   lighteth every man," John i. 9. Every one that hath any spiritual light
   really communicated to him hath it from Christ. It is part of his work
   to "recover sight to the blind," Luke iv. 18. And therefore he adviseth
   the church of Laodicea to come to him for eye-salve, that she might
   see, Rev. iii. 18. At his coming, Zion shines forth, Isa. lx. 1;
   because his light ariseth upon her, verse 2. The former doctrinal
   teaching of itself will not suffice: that light may shine in darkness,
   and the darkness not comprehend it, John i. 5. All the light the sun
   can give will not make a blind man see: there must be a visive faculty
   within as well as light without. The stones of this building are by
   nature all blind, -- yea, darkened, -- yea, darkness itself. If the
   Lord Christ do not, by the mighty efficacy of his Spirit, create a
   visive power within them, as well as reveal the will of his Father to
   them, they will never spiritually discern the things of God. The
   natural man discerneth not the things of God, nor indeed can do, 1 Cor.
   ii. 14. It is true, men, by the help of common gifts, with the use of
   the former doctrinal revelation, may attain to such a knowledge of the
   mind of God as may, in a sense, be called illumination, Heb. vi. 4. Far
   may they go, much may they do, by this light:-- they may teach others,
   and be cast away themselves; -- they may dispute for truth, yea, die
   for truth, and all this while have but the first, common anointing, --
   see nothing clearly, but men walking like trees. A spiritual insight
   into the mind of God is not to be obtained without an almighty act of
   the Spirit of Christ, creating a new power of life and light upon the
   soul. Some, indeed, think that they have this seeing power in
   themselves. Do but show them outwardly what is to be seen, and let them
   alone for the discerning of it. Well, then, let them alone; if ever
   they are stones of this living house, I am deceived. Thou that art so,
   know whence is all thy light; and if thou art any thing in the dark,
   draw nigh to the candlestick from whence all light is. Thence must thy
   light come, yea, and thence it shall come; the secrets of the Lord
   shall make their abode with thee.

   And this is the fourfold relation wherein the Lord Christ stands unto
   this house, as it is a spiritual building.

   [2.] In respect of state and condition, Jesus Christ stands in a
   fivefold relation to this house, -- viz., 1st, As the owner; 2dly, The
   builder; 3dly, The watchman or keeper; 4thly, The inhabiter; 5thly, The
   avenger: each of which I shall unfold in order.

   1st. He is the owner of it. He calls it his: "Upon this rock will I
   build my church," Matt. xvi. 18. "Moses verily was faithful in all his
   house, as a servant; but Christ as a Son over his own house, whose
   house are we," Heb. iii. 5, 6. And that you may see that he doth not
   own it as his without good right and title, know that in the great
   economy of grace Jesus Christ hath a threefold right and title to this
   house.

   (1st.) Of inheritance. He is by his Father "appointed heir of all
   things," Heb. i. 3. By inheritance he obtains this excellent name, to
   be Lord of this house. God sends him to the vineyard as the heir, after
   his servants were refused. And he hath an engagement from his Father,
   that he shall enjoy his whole inheritance upon demand, Ps. ii. 8. For
   the Father appointed, "in the fulness of times, to gather together all
   things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth,
   even in him," Eph. i. 10. So that as Christ is "the first-begotten" of
   the Father, Heb. i. 6, and "the first-born of every creature," Col. i.
   15, the right of heirship is his. But this will not do; for, --

   (2dly.) When he should come to take possession of this house, he finds
   that it is mortgaged, and that a great debt lies upon it; which he must
   pay to the uttermost farthing, if he ever intend to have it. To the
   former title there must also be added a right of purchase. He must
   purchase this house, and pay a great price for it. And what is this
   price? what is required of him? No less than his dearest blood, Acts
   xx. 28. Yea, he must make his soul an offering for sin, and charge
   himself with the whole debt; -- all the curse and punishment which this
   house had in part actually contracted upon itself, and wholly deserved.
   He must put his shoulders under the burden due to it, and his back to
   the stripes prepared for it. A hard task! But Jesus Christ being the
   heir, the right of redemption belonged unto him. It was not for his
   honour that it should lie unredeemed. Full well he knew that if he did
   it not, the whole creation was too beggarly to make this purchase. It
   is true, that nature of ours -- which he assumed to pay that by, which
   he never took -- was startled for a while, and would have deprecated
   this grievous price, crying out, "If it be possible, let this cup pass
   from me;" but he recollects himself, and says, "I am content to do thy
   will, O God:" and so, through the eternal Spirit, he offered himself up
   unto God for a ransom. He likes the house, and will have it to dwell
   in, whatever it cost him. "Here," saith he, "shall be my habitation,
   and my dwelling for ever," Ps. cxxxii. 1. "Know ye not," saith the
   apostle, "that ye are the temple of the Spirit of Christ?" Well, and
   how come we so to be? "Ye are bought with a price," 1 Cor. vi. 19. They
   who affirm that he also purchased the unclean sties of the devil, wot
   not what they say.

   (3dly.) Unto purchase he must also add conquest. An unjust usurper had
   taken possession of this house, and kept it in bondage; -- Satan had
   seized on it, and brought it, through the wrath of God, under his
   power. He, then, must be conquered, that the Lord Christ may have
   complete possession of his own house. "For this purpose," then, "was
   the Son of God manifested, that he might destroy the works of the
   devil," 1 John iii. 8. And how doth he do it? He overpowers him and
   destroys him, in that "through death he destroyed him that had the
   power of death; that is, the devil," Heb. ii. 14. And he spoiled him,
   having overcome him. He bound the strong man, and then spoiled his
   goods, Matt. xii. 29. All that darkness, unbelief, sin, and hardness,
   that he had stuffed this house withal, Christ spoils and scatters them
   all away. And to make his conquest complete, he triumphs over his
   enemy, and, like a mighty conqueror, makes an open show of him, to his
   everlasting shame, Col. ii. 15, "Having spoiled principalities and
   powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in his
   cross;" and by this means strengthens his title to his inheritance.

   I might also farther insist on the donation of his Father, and the
   actual possession he takes of it by his Spirit; but these are
   sufficient to prove this house to be Christ's. I shall take some
   observations hence.

   Observation 1. [294] Is this the house of Christ? is he the owner of
   it? -- Let men take heed how they spoil it for themselves. The psalmist
   makes this a great argument in his pleading against opposers, that they
   came into the Lord's "inheritance," Ps. lxxix. 1. The title of Christ's
   purchase was not then so clearly known as that of his inheritance; and
   therefore they of old pleaded chiefly by that title. Now he hath
   proclaimed to all, his other titles also, -- the whole right he has to
   this house, -- to his saint, Who, then, shall meddle with it, and go
   free? Amongst men, every one with all his might will defend his own
   possession; and shall we think that the Lord Christ will suffer his to
   be spoiled at an easy rate? Shall not men pay dear for their
   encroachment? How hath he in our days frustrated all attempts for the
   persecution of his! "Touch not," saith he, "mine anointed." Men may
   upon various pretences claim this privilege to such a land, nation, or
   faction; it will in the end appear to be theirs, and only theirs, who
   are living stones of this house. Dogs may scramble for their bread, but
   shall not enjoy it. It is Christ in this house that will make every
   stone of it a burdensome stone. He hath done it that men may learn me
   zeomachein. Do not think it will excuse thee to say thou wast mistaken.

   Observation 2. Is Christ the owner of this house? -- Let the order and
   disposal of it be left to himself. Men are apt to be tampering with his
   house and household. They will be so kind and careful as to lay out
   their wisdom and prudence about it; -- Thus and thus shall it be; these
   are parts and members of it. Christ is exceeding jealous of his honour
   in this particular. He cannot bear it, that men pretending to his glory
   should think him so wanting in love or wisdom towards his own, as not
   exactly to dispose of all things that concern the regimen thereof. Men
   would not be so dealt withal in their own houses as they deal with
   Christ in his. We have all wisdom enough (as we suppose) to order our
   own houses; -- only the wisdom and love of the Father leaves his to the
   discretion of others, These thoughts are not from above.

   Observation 3. Hath Christ taken his own house to himself upon so many
   titles? -- Let not men put those building on him for his which are not
   so, which he holds not by these titles. Go to a man that dwells in a
   stately palace of his own, show him a hog-sty, tell him, "This is your
   house; here you dwell; this is yours:" -- can you put a greater
   indignity on him? "No," says the man; "that is not mine; I dwell in
   yonder sumptuous palace." And shall we deal thus with the Lord Jesus?
   He hath bought and adorned his own house:-- a glorious house it is. If
   now men shall hold out to him a sty of swine, a den of unclean beasts,
   a ruinous heap, whereof the far greatest part are dead stones, and tell
   him, this is his church, his house, -- will it not exceedingly provoke
   him? will he bear such a reproach? Nay, he will reject such tenders to
   their ruin.

   2dly. Jesus Christ is the builder of this house: "This man was counted
   worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as he who hath builded the
   house hath more honour than the house," Heb. iii. 3. -- "I," saith he,
   "will build my church," Matt. xvi. 18. This is not a fabric for any
   workman but Christ. It is true, there are others employed under him;
   and some so excellent that they may be said to be "wise
   master-builders," 1 Cor. iii. 10; but yet all the efficacy of their
   labour in this building is not from themselves, but merely from him by
   whom they are employed. Except the Lord build this house, they labour
   in vain that go about to build it.

   Now this house receives a twofold building:-- (1st.) Spiritual, of all
   the stones thereof into one mystical house. Of this I chiefly treat.
   (2dly.) Ecclesiastical, of some particular stones into several
   tabernacles, -- which are useful partitions in the great mystical
   house, -- called assemblies and dwelling-places of mount Zion. Both
   these it hath from Christ alone.

   (1st.) For the first; -- if all the most skilful workmen in the world
   should go to the pit of nature, by their own strength to hew out stones
   for this building, they will never, with all their skill and diligence,
   lay one stone upon it. There is life required to those stones, which
   none can give but Christ. The Father hath given into his hand alone to
   give life eternal to whom he will, John xvii. 2. He alone can turn
   stones into children of Abraham. To him is committed all dispensation
   of quickening power. He brings us from the dust of death, and no man
   hath quickened his own soul. With spiritual power, all spiritual life
   is vested in Christ. If dead stones live, it must be by hearing the
   voice of the Son of God. Christ's building of his mystical house is his
   giving life unto dead stones; or rather, being life unto them. Of those
   who will attempt to build themselves, and draw a principle of spiritual
   life from the broken cisterns of nature, I shall speak afterward.

   (2dly.) For the second, or the communion of living stones one with
   another, and all with Christ, in the order and worship appointed by the
   gospel, so becoming assemblies and dwelling-places of mount Zion; --
   this also is of him. This is for his outward solemn worship; and he
   would never allow that the will of any creature should be the measure
   of his honour, lie sets up the candlesticks; and holds the stars in his
   hand. Look to the institution of this building, -- it is from Christ;
   -- look for directions about this building, -- it is wholly from him.
   From him, his word, his Spirit, is the institution, direction, and
   perfection of it. From hence, now, take some observations.

   Observation 1. Is Christ the builder of this house? can he alone fit us
   for this building? can he alone, and that by his almighty power, put
   life into dead stones, that they may grow up to be a holy and living
   habitation unto him? -- What, then, becomes of that famous workman,
   free-will, and a power of believing in ourselves? do not they work
   effectually in this temple? As it was in Solomon's temple, "there was
   neither axe, nor hammer, nor any tool of iron heard in the house while
   it was in building," 1 Kings vi. 7; so in this spiritual house, that
   iron tool of free-will is not once heard; it comes not nigh the work,
   -- Christ doth all alone. He gives life to whom he pleases. Shall a
   dead will be thought to have a quickening, life-giving power in it?
   Shall a spirit of life be spun out of the bowels of nature? Is it the
   will of man, or the will of God, that draws men unto Christ? and is it
   his Spirit, or flesh, that unites us to him? Where, then, is this
   workman employed, that makes all this noise in the world? Even there,
   where men cry, "Go to, let us build us a city, and a tower whose top
   may reach unto heaven," Gen. xi. 4, -- amongst those who would build a
   Babel, a tower of their own to get to heaven by. The Lord comes down
   and scatters all their undertakings. This workman never placed stone in
   the house of Christ. Nay, it is like the foolish woman, that pulls down
   her house with both her hands. What free grace sets up, that free will
   strives to demolish.

   Observation 2. See hence a great mistake of many poor creatures, who
   would fain be stones in this house. What course take they? They hew and
   square themselves, -- strive to cut off this and that rubbish, which
   (as they suppose) alone hinders them from being fitted to this
   building; they pare themselves with vows, promises, resolutions, and
   engagements, -- beautify themselves with duties and services; and then,
   with many perplexing fears, present themselves to the building, never
   knowing whether they are admitted or no. All this while the great
   Master-builder stands by, scarcely dealt withal. What, now, is the
   issue of such attempts? What they build one day, falls down in another.
   When they have oftentimes in their own thoughts brought the building to
   such a pass as that they are ready to think it will be well with them,
   now surely they shall have a share and interest in this living and
   glorious house; all on a sudden they fall again to the ground, their
   hopes wither, and they suppose themselves in the world's rubbish again.
   There is no end of this alternation. Would, now, this poor soul see
   where its great defect lies?. It hath not applied itself aright to the
   only Builder. Wouldst thou be a stone in this fabric? Lay thyself
   before the Lord Jesus; say to him that thou art in thyself altogether
   unfit for the great building he hath in hand; -- that thou hast often
   attempted to put thyself upon it, but all in vain:-- "Now, Lord Jesus,
   do thou take me into thine own hand. If thou castest me away, I cannot
   complain, -- I must justify thee in all thy ways; but thou callest
   things that are not as though they were, -- thou turnest dead stones
   into children of Abraham: oh, turn my dead into a living stone!" Fear
   not; he will in no wise cast thee out.

   The vanity of men, attempting to mix their power and wisdom in the
   heaping up tabernacles for Christ, might be hence discovered; but I
   forbear.

   3dly. Jesus Christ is the great watchman, or keeper of this house.
   There are, indeed, other watchmen, and that of God's own appointment,
   for the use of this house: "Son of man, I have made thee a watchman,"
   Ezek. iii. 17; "I have set watchmen upon thy walls," Isa. lxii. 6, 7;
   which in a special manner are the pastors of the churches. "They
   watch," Heb. xiii. 17, as the priests and Levites heretofore kept the
   watch of the Lord. It cannot be denied but that many who have taken
   upon them to be these watchmen have watched only for their own
   advantage, have been very dogs, -- yea, dumb dogs, the very worst of
   dogs, Isa. lvi. 10, -- yea, they have been, and oftentimes are, under
   various pretences, great "smiters and wounders of the spouse of
   Christ," Cant. v. 7. But yet, were they never so good and true to their
   trusts, they were never able all to watch and keep this house, had it
   not another watchman: "Except the Lord keep the city, these watchmen
   watch in vain," Ps. cxxvii. 1. He that keepeth Israel, who doth neither
   slumber nor sleep, must keep this house, or it will be destroyed.
   Christ, then, is that holy one, and that watcher, that came down from
   heaven, and commanded to cut down the tree and the branches, Dan. iv.
   13, 14, -- Nebuchadnezzar and his great power, -- for meddling with
   this house. Now, Christ watcheth his house for two ends.

   (1st.) To see what it wants. 2 Chron. xvi. 9, "The eyes of the Lord run
   to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show himself strong in its
   behalf." He looks down from heaven to behold them that fear him, Ps.
   xiv. He is that stone upon which are "seven eyes," Zech. iii. 9, -- a
   sufficiency, in perfection of wisdom, inspection, and government, for
   the good of his house. And those seven eyes of his "run to and fro
   through the whole earth" for this very purpose, Zech. iv. 10. He takes
   notice of the state and condition of his people, to eye them in their
   distresses, and to give them timely and suitable deliverance. They may
   call every spring of their refreshment, Beerlahai-roi [The well of Him
   that liveth and seeth me].

   (2dly.) To see that the son of violence draw not nigh unto it; and if
   he do, to require it at his hands; to make him eat his own flesh, and
   drink his own blood, that he may learn to devour no more. Observe,
   then, --

   Observation 1. Whence it is that this house, which seems so often to be
   nigh to destruction, is yet preserved from ruin. Ofttimes it is brought
   into a condition that all that look on say, Now it is gone for ever.
   But still it recovers, and gets up again. The Lord Christ looks on all
   the while: he knows how far things may proceed for trial. When it comes
   to that pass that, if pressures and troubles should continue, the house
   will be overborne indeed, then he puts in, rebukes the winds and waves,
   and makes all things still again. Like a father who looks upon his
   child in a difficult and dangerous business, -- knows that he can
   relieve him when he pleases, but would willingly see him try his
   strength and cunning, -- lets him alone until perhaps the child thinks
   himself quite lost, and wonders his father doth not help him; but when
   the condition comes to be such that, without help, he will be lost
   indeed, instantly the father puts in his hand and saves him. So deals
   the Lord Jesus with his house, -- inlets it oftentimes strive and
   wrestle with great oppositions, to draw out and exercise all the graces
   thereof; but yet all this while he looketh on, and when danger is nigh
   indeed, he is not far off.

   Observation 2. Let all the enemies of the church know, that there is
   one who hath an we over them in all their counsels and undertakings.
   Whilst they are digging deep, he looks on and laughs them to scorn. How
   perplexed was the king of Syria when he found that the prophet was
   acquainted with all his designs, and made them known to the king of
   Israel! It cannot but be a matter of perplexity to the enemies of this
   house, when they shall find that the great Friend and Protector thereof
   is continually present in all their advisoes. Let them not wonder at
   their birthless undertakings; the eye of Christ is still upon them.

   Observation 3. Let the saints see their privilege; -- whoever they are,
   in what condition soever, the eye of Christ is upon them. He watches
   over them for good, and knows their souls in adversity. When no eye
   sees them, he looks on them; they cannot be cast out of his care, nor
   hid from his sight. There are many poor souls who go heavily all the
   day long, -- that mourn in their spirits unknown, unregarded, unpitied;
   -- the eye of Christ is on them for good continually; they cannot be
   thrown out of his watchful care.

   4thly. Christ is the indweller of this house. He hath not built it and
   framed it for no use. It is for a habitation for himself. He hath
   chosen Zion; he hath desired it for his habitation. "This is my rest,"
   saith he; "here will I dwell," Ps. cxxxii. 13, 14. This house is built
   up to be an habitation unto him, Eph. ii. 22. He is the "King of
   saints," and this house is his court. It is true, for his human nature,
   "the heaven must receive him, until the time of the restitution of all
   things," Acts iii. 21; but yet, he dwelleth in this house three ways:--

   (1st.) By his Spirit. Christ dwells in this house, and every stone of
   it, by his Spirit, "Know ye not that Christ is in you, except ye be
   reprobates?" 2 Cor. xiii. 5. -- "Christ in you;" that is, the Spirit of
   Christ, Christ by his Spirit. So the Holy Ghost expounds it, Rom. viii.
   9, "If the Spirit of God dwell in you:" which, verse 10, is, "If Christ
   be in you." Christ and his Spirit, as to indwelling, are all one; for
   he dwells in us by his Spirit. "The love of God is shed abroad in our
   hearts by the Holy Ghost, that is given unto us," Rom. v. 5. There is
   not only the "love of God," a grace of the Spirit, "shed abroad" in us,
   but there is also the "Holy Spirit given unto us." This is fully
   asserted, Rom. viii. 11, "The Spirit of him that raised up Jesus,
   dwells in you;" as also, 2 Tim. i. 14, "Keep the good thing committed
   to thee by the Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us." Hence the saints are
   said to be "temples of the Holy Ghost." Jesus Christ doth not build
   temples merely for graces, created graces; he dwells in them himself,
   -- he dwells in them by his Spirit. And this is a glorious privilege of
   this house, that Jesus Christ in a mystical and wonderful manner should
   dwell in it, and every stone of it. Hereby all believers come to be not
   one personal, but one mystical Christ, 1 Cor. xii. 12. However we are
   distanced in respect of his human nature, yet mystically we are one, --
   one body, one mystical Christ, -- because we have one Spirit dwelling
   in us and him. If a man were never so tall, so that his head should
   reach the stars, and his feet stand upon the ground, yet, having but
   one soul, he is but one man still. Though Christ in his human nature be
   exceedingly distanced from us, yet there being one and the same Spirit
   in him and us, we are one mystical Christ. Yet observe, --

   Observation 1. Though Christ be united unto the persons of the saints
   by the indwelling of the Spirit, yet the saints have not that which is
   called personal union with him, nor with the Spirit. Personal union is
   by a person of the Deity assuming the nature of man into one
   personality with itself, that having of its own no personal
   subsistence. Things are here clean otherwise: Christ doth not assume
   the saints into a personal subsistence with himself, but dwells in
   their persons by his Spirit.

   Observation 2. That the operations of the indwelling Spirit of Christ,
   and all his manifestations, are voluntary. He worketh as he will, and
   revealeth what he will, even where he dwells. He doth not work in us
   naturally, but voluntarily, unto what proportion he pleaseth;
   therefore, though he dwell equally in all saints in respect of truth
   and reality, yet he doth not in respect of working and efficacy.

   (2dly.) By his graces. Christ dwelleth in this house, and in all the
   stones thereof, by his graces. He "dwells in our hearts by faith," Eph.
   iii. 17. He dwells in us by his word "in all wisdom," Col. iii. 16. All
   the graces we are made partakers of, we receive from his fulness, and
   by them he inhabits in us. They are indeed the ornaments of the living
   stones of this house, to make them meet and fit for such an indweller
   as the Lord Christ. Christ will not dwell in a soul whose mind is
   darkness, his will stubbornness, and his affections carnal and sensual.
   He puts light, and life, and love upon the soul, that it may be meet
   for him to dwell in. Christ dwells in all the world by his power and
   presence, but he dwells only in his saints by his Spirit and grace.

   (3dly.) By his ordinances. Where two or three of his are assembled
   together, there is he in the midst of them. The ordinances of Christ
   are the Meat ornaments of his kingly court; by them he is glorious in
   all the assemblies of mount Zion. Some would fain cast out this
   indwelling of Christ from among his saints; -- in due time he will
   thoroughly rebuke them. Some, again, would thrust him out into the
   world; but he will make men know that his ordinances are given unto
   his. It is true, the benefit of some of them extends to the world; but
   the right and enjoyment of them is the privilege of his saints. Thus
   Christ dwells in his house. Hence, observe, --

   Observation 1. The intimacy of the Lord Jesus with his saints, and the
   delight he takes in them. He dwelleth with them, he dwelleth in them,
   -- he takes them to the nearest union with himself possible: he in
   them, they in him, that they may be one. He hath made many an admirable
   change with us. He took our sin, and gives us his righteousness; he
   took our nature, and gives us his Spirit. Neither is it a bare
   indwelling, -- he thereby holds with us all acts of the choicest
   communion. "If," saith he, "any man hear my voice, and open to me, I
   will come in to him." And what then? "I will sup with him, and he with
   me," Rev. iii. 20.

   (1.) "I will sup with him;" -- I will delight and satisfy myself with
   him. Jesus Christ takes abundance of delight and contentment in the
   hearts of his saints. When they are faithful, when they are fruitful,
   he is marvellously refreshed with it. Hence is that prayer of the
   spouse, "Awake, O north wind; and come, thou south; blow upon my
   garden, that the spices thereof may flow out. Let my Beloved come into
   his garden, and eat his pleasant fruits," Cant. iv. 16. She would have
   the spices, the graces she hath received, breathed on by a fresh gale
   of the Spirit, that they might yield a sweet savour. And why so? That
   her Beloved may have something for his entertainment, -- that he may
   come and sup, and eat of his pleasant fruits. A poor soul, that hath
   received Christ, hath not any desire so fervent as that it may have
   something for the entertainment of him; that he who filled it when it
   was hungry may not (as it were) be sent away empty. And the Lord Jesus
   is exceedingly taken with those refreshments. "The King is held in the
   galleries," Cant. vii. 5. He is detained, yea, bound with delight; --
   he knows not how to pass away. Therefore "he rests in his love," Zeph.
   iii. 17. He is exceedingly satiated in the delight he takes in his
   mints. Neither is this all, that when Christ comes he will sup with us,
   (though this be a great deal; for what are we, that we should entertain
   our Lord?) but also, --

   (2.) The saints sup with him: he provides choice refreshments for them
   also. When Christ comes in unto us, he will entertain a soul
   bounteously. He provides love for us. When the Spirit of Christ is
   bestowed on us, he sheds abroad the love of God in our hearts, Rom. v.
   5. He sheds it abroad, -- pours it out abundantly. Friends, love is a
   choice dainty:-- he that knows it not is a stranger to all spiritual
   banquets:-- it is a choice dish in the feast of fat things that Christ
   prepareth. He provides "righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy
   Ghost," for us That [is] his kingdom, Rom. xiv. 17; and this kingdom of
   his is within us. Of such precious things as these doth Christ provide
   a supper for them with whom he dwells. If Christ be in you, more or
   less, you shall not want this entertainment. We are, indeed, sometimes
   like mad guests, that when meat is set on the table, cast it all down,
   without tasting a morsel. When Christ hath prepared sweet and precious
   dainties for us, we cast them on the ground; we throw away our peace,
   our joy, by folly and unbelief: but this makes not the truth of God of
   none effect.

   Observation 2. Doth Christ dwell in us by his Spirit? -- should we not
   be careful lest we grieve that Spirit of his? The Spirit of Christ is
   very tender. Did the saints continually consider this, that Christ
   dwells in them, -- that he is grieved and troubled at all their
   unbelief, unruly passions, worldly desires, foolish imaginations, --
   surely they could not but be much more watchful over themselves than
   generally they are. He is refreshed when we walk with him, and hold
   fellowship with him. To turn aside from him, to hold fellowship with
   the world or flesh, -- this grieves him and burdens him. Oh, "grieve
   not the Spirit of God, whereby you are sealed to the day of
   redemption." And let me tell you, if you do, though he will not utterly
   depart from you, nor take his kindness away for evermore, yet he will
   do that which shall make your heart ache, your joints tremble, and
   break all your bones in pieces. For, --

   (1.) He will depart from you as to all sense of his presence, that you
   shall have neither joy, nor comfort, nor peace. He will hide his face,
   and make you believe (as we say) that he is gone utterly from you. And
   this he will do, not for a day, or a night, or so, but for a great
   while together. You shall go to seek him, and you shall not find him;
   yea, beg and cry, and have no answer. Now all the world for one smile
   from Christ, for one impression of his presence upon my heart, -- and
   all in vain. When the Spirit of Christ was thus departed from David,
   upon his miscarriage, as to the sense and joy of it, how cloth he cry
   out, "Make me to hear the voice of joy and gladness, that the bones
   which thou hast broken may rejoice!" Ps. li. 8. If thou valuest the
   presence of Christ at no greater rate but to jeopard it upon every
   occasion, thou mayest haply go without the comfort of it all thy days.
   Examine yourselves, -- is it not so with some of you? Have you not lost
   the sense of the presence of Christ by your folly and uneven walking?
   Perhaps you value it not much, but go on as Samson with his hair cut,
   and think to do as at other times; but if the Philistines set upon
   thee, it will be sorrow and trouble; in every assault thou wilt find
   thyself a lost man; -- sooner or later it will be bitterness to thee.

   (2.) He will depart as to the efficacy of his working in thee, and
   leave thee so weak that thou shalt not be able to walk with God. His
   Spirit is "a Spirit of grace and supplications." He will so withdraw it
   that thou shalt find thy heart in a poor condition, as to those things.
   To be cold in prayer, dead in hearing, estranged from meditation,
   slight in all duties, -- this shall be thy portion; -- a frame that a
   tender soul would tremble to think of. Ah, how many poor creatures are
   come to this state in these days, by their neglect and contempt of
   Christ dwelling in them! They have lost their first love, their first
   life; their graces are ready to die, and their whole soul is asleep, in
   a heartless, lifeless, zealless frame. They shall be saved, but "yet as
   through fire."

   (3.) He will depart as to assurance of what is to come, as well as to a
   sense of what is present. It is the indwelling Spirit of Christ that
   gives assurance: hereby are we "sealed to the day of redemption." He
   "beareth witness with our spirits that we are the children of God."
   Upon our grieving him, he will withdraw as to this also. We shall be
   bewildered, and in the dark, not knowing what will become of our souls
   to eternity. For if Christ by his Spirit do not speak peace, who shall?

   Observation 3. Doth he dwell in us by his grace?

   (1.) Let us first know whence all graces are, that in a want or
   weakness of them we may know whither to go for a supply. "Of his
   fulness we receive, and grace for grace." All supplies of graces are
   from Christ. "Lord, increase our faith," say the apostles. Not only
   faith originally is from him, but all increases of it also. "I believe;
   help thou my unbelief," says the poor man. We wrestle and struggle with
   a little grace, a little faith, a little love, a little joy; and are
   contented if we can keep our heads above water, that we be not quite
   sunk and lost. How sweet would it be with us, if, upon a serious
   consideration from whence all these graces flow, we would apply
   ourselves to draw out farther degrees and heightenings of them, whereby
   he might dwell more plentifully in us, and we might always converse
   with him in his gracious train of attendants! How this may be done in
   particular, is not my business now to show.

   (2.) Learn to tender [make much of] the graces of Christ, as those
   which hold out his presence to us. Let us tender them in our own
   hearts, and prize them in whomsoever they are. They are pledges of the
   indwelling of Christ. Certainly, if men valued Christ, they would more
   value his graces. Many pretend to love him, to honour him, yea, with
   Peter, to be ready to die with him, or for him; but what evil surmises
   have they of the graces of Christ appearing in others! how do they call
   them hypocrisy, humour, folly, pride, singularity, with other terms of
   a later invention! I cannot so easily believe that any one can love the
   Lord Jesus and hate the appearances of him in others. Where is any
   thing of Christ, there is also Christ.

   5thly. Jesus Christ is the great avenger of this house, and of all the
   injuries or wrongs that are done unto it. "All," saith he, "that devour
   Israel shall offend," Jer. ii. 3. He will not hold him guiltless that
   rises up against it. See Isa. lix. 15-18. He takes upon him the
   avenging of his house, as his own proper work: "Shall he not avenge his
   elect? He will do it speedily." See also Isa. lxiii. 2-6. How dreadful
   is he in the execution of his revenging judgments against the enemies
   thereof! So also is he described, Rev. xix. 13-15. He hath promised to
   make the stones of this house heavy stones; they shall burden all that
   touch them, Zech. xii. 3. He comes forth of "the myrtle-trees in the
   bottom" (his lowly people in a low condition) with the "red horse"
   following him, Zech. i. 8. Upon this account he fearfully broke the old
   Roman-pagan empire, Rev. vi. 12-17; and will as fearfully destroy the
   antichristian Roman power, with all its adherents, Rev. xvii. to xix.
   Sooner or later he will call to an account every instrument of
   persecution in the world. Hence he is said to be a lion in the behalf
   of this house, that treads down all before him, Mic. v. 8. Jacob says
   of him in Judah, "He is a lion, as an old lion; who shall rouse him
   up?" Gen. xlix. 9. Suppose any do rouse him up: how then? "He will not
   lie down until he eat of the prey, and drink the blood of the slain,"
   Num. xxiii. 24. Many poor creatures have, by their opposition to his
   house, roused up this lion: and what hath been the issue? What attempts
   have been to cause him to lie down again! -- All in vain. If he be once
   roused up, he will not couch down until he eat and drink the blood of
   the slain. But suppose great opposition be made unto him, -- will he
   not give over? Not at all. He will be as a lion that cometh upon his
   prey, if a multitude of shepherds be called forth against him, he will
   not be afraid at their voice, nor abase himself at their noise, Isa.
   xxxi. 4. In brief, sooner or later, temporally or eternally, he will
   avenge all the injuries and destroy all the enemies of his holy
   dwelling, 2 Thess. i. 6-10.

   And these are some of the relations wherein the Lord Christ stands unto
   this house of God, being made thereby unto it beauty and glory,
   comeliness and excellency. The carrying on of this building, by the
   union of all the stones thereof to the foundation, and their cementing
   one to another by faith, love, and order, I shall not now treat of, nor
   of the following points of the text.

   The general uses of what hath been said are three; the heads whereof I
   shall name.

   Use 1. See the eminent privilege of them which are indeed stones of
   this house, which is living, strong, and glorious, -- which is so
   nearly related to the Lord Christ. There is more of duty, dignity, and
   safety, in this thing, than can easily be expressed. To do service unto
   Christ as his, to have the honour of being his, and to be safeguarded
   as his, are great privileges. Let them who have any sense of these
   things farther draw out these particulars, from what hath been spoken.

   Use 2. Learn hence the vanity of resting upon outward church
   privileges, if we are not withal interested in this spiritual estate.
   Where men are living stones indeed, they lie in beauty and order in the
   assemblies; -- where they are otherwise, where assemblies are made up
   of dead rubbish, and yet cry, "The house of the Lord, the house of the
   Lord," -- the Lord Jesus abhors those assemblies; he stands not in
   these relations unto them.

   Use 3. See hence the ruin of persecution that hath appeared in the
   world in various forms. It hath put on all manner of colours and
   pretences, and prevailed with all sorts of persons at one time or other
   to close with it. What hath been the issue? what is like to be? The
   house, indeed, hath been battered sometimes; but they who have come
   against it have been broken all to pieces. Shall the residue of men
   who, under new pretences or old ones new painted, drive on the same
   design, -- shall they prosper? Thou, O Lord Jesus, in thine anger wilt
   cut them off. The Lord open the eyes of the sons of men, that they may
   not hope any more to separate between Christ and his saints, between
   whom there are so many everlasting relations!

   Mono sopho Theo, dia Iesou Christou, ho he doxa eis tous aionas. Amen.
     __________________________________________________________________

   [294] The second of the two sermons under the present text, and
   latterly printed as one, began at this point, according to a statement
   in an old edition. -- Ed.
     __________________________________________________________________
     __________________________________________________________________
     __________________________________________________________________

   Sermon VII.

   The

   advantage of the kingdom of Christ

   in the

   shaking of the kingdoms of the world;

   or,

   providential alterations in their subserviency to Christ's exaltation.
     __________________________________________________________________

Prefatory note.

   The battle of Worcester, "the crowning mercy," as Cromwell termed it,
   which effectually reduced Britain under his control, was fought on the
   3d of September 1651, the anniversary of his victory at Dunbar. On the
   24th of October following, a day of thanksgiving was observed for this
   success, and "sundry other mercies." On this occasion Owen, by this
   time Dean of Christ Church College, Oxford, preached before the House
   of Commons the following sermon. "It contains," says Mr Orme, "many
   free and eloquent passages, especially on the danger of human
   governments interfering with the principles and rights of the kingdom
   of Christ; and on the abomination and extent of the antichristian
   apostasy." He refers, in illustration, to the passage which occurs on
   page 322. -- Ed.
     __________________________________________________________________

   Tuesday, October 28, 1651.

   Ordered by the Parliament, That the thanks of this House be given to Mr
   Owen, Dean of Christ Church in Oxford, for his great pains taken in his
   sermon preached before the Parliament, at Margaret's, Westminster, on
   Friday the 24th of October (being a day set apart for public
   thanksgiving); and that he be desired to print his sermon; and that he
   have the like privilege in printing the same as others in like case
   have usually had; and that the Lord-General do give him the thanks of
   this House, and desire him to print his sermon accordingly.

   Hen. Scobell, Cler. Parl.
     __________________________________________________________________

To the supreme authority of the nation, the Commons assembled in Parliament.

   Right Honourable,

   Of all the times which the Holy One of Israel hath caused to pass over
   the nations of the world, there hath not any from the days of old been
   so filled with eminent discoveries of his presence, power, and
   providence, in disposing of all affairs here below according to the
   counsel of his own will, as the season wherein he hath made you a
   spectacle unto men and angels, being the instrument in his hand to
   perform all his pleasure. Neither in this season hath he, upon any
   opportunity, so gloriously laid hold upon his own strength and
   goodness, to manifest the firedness of his eye on those who are as the
   apple of it, as in that mighty deliverance the high praises whereof,
   according to his good hand upon you, you lately tendered unto him.

   The more beauty and desirableness any design against the Lord Christ is
   clothed withal, the more power and subtlety it is supported with, the
   greater is the brightness of his coming for its wasting and desolation.
   With what deceivableness of unrighteousness and lies in hypocrisy the
   late grand attempt of those in Scotland, with their adherents (which
   also was of the former, and is gone into destruction), was carried on,
   is in some measure now made naked, to the loathing of its abominations.
   In digging deep to lay a foundation for blood and revenge, -- in
   covering private and sordid ends with a pretence of things public and
   glorious, -- in limning a face of religion upon a worldly stock, -- in
   concealing distant aims and bloody animosities to compass one common
   end, that a theatre might be provided to act several parts upon, -- in
   pleading a necessity from an oath of God unto most desperate
   undertakings against God, and such like things as these, perhaps it
   gives not place to any which former ages have been acquainted withal.
   Now, to reject all the claims of the authors and abettors thereof to
   any commission from above, to divest them of all pretences to religion
   and zeal thereof, to disappoint them in their expected associations,
   and to make all their strength to become as tow that hath smelt the
   fire, hath been His work alone who takes to himself his great power to
   carry on the interest of his kingdom against all opposers. Under the
   shadow of this mercy -- composed of as many branches of wisdom, power,
   goodness, and faithfulness, as any outward dispensation hath brought
   forth since the name of Christian was known -- do you now sit in
   council, and the residue of the nation in peace. What obligations from
   the Lord, what cords of love are upon us! The returnal and improvement
   of all his dealings with us, which he requireth and expecteth from us,
   I have pointed you unto in the following sermon. For the present I
   shall only add, that as whatever there hath been of beauty, glory, or
   advantage unto the people of God, in the late transactions, hath been
   eminently of undeserved grace; so the dreadful vengeance which the Lord
   hath executed against the men of his enmity and warfare hath been most
   righteously procured, by their clothing cursed designs of revenge,
   persecution, bondage in soul and body, spoil and rapine, with the most
   glorious pretences of zeal, covenant, reformation, and such like
   things, -- which never came into their hearts. Therefore, that the God
   of all our mercies and deliverances would for ever keep alive in your
   hearts a faithful acknowledgment of his grace, and a practical
   detestation of those ways which are such a provocation to the eyes of
   his glory, shall be the constant prayer of

   Your most humble Servant

   In our dearest Lord,

   J. Owen.

   From my Study, Ch. Ch., Oxon.,

   Nov. 7.
     __________________________________________________________________

Sermon VII. The advantage of the kingdom of Christ in the shaking of the
kingdoms of the world.

   "And all the trees of the field shall know that I the Lord have brought
   down the high tree, have exalted the low tree, have dried up the green
   tree, and have made the dry tree to flourish: I the Lord have spoken,
   and have done Ezek. xvii. 24.

   Although all the works of God's providence -- which are great, and
   sought out of all that have pleasure in them, Ps. cxi. 2 -- have such a
   stamp and impress of his own image on them, his wisdom, goodness,
   power, love, that they declare their author, and reveal from heaven his
   kindness and wrath towards the children of men; [295] yet such are the
   prejudices, lusts, inordinacy of affections, and interest of many, that
   it hath always been a long and difficult task to convince them of his
   presence in them, when it hath been most uncontrollably evident. The
   Egyptians will wrestle with many a plague, by thinking the "magicians"
   can do so; [296] and the Philistines will try to the utmost whether it
   be his hand, or a chance that happened to them. [297] "Lord," saith the
   prophet, "when thy hand is lifted up, they will not see," Isa. xxvi.
   11. Yea, oftentimes (especially when judicial blindness is gone forth
   upon them), [298] though they cannot but see his arm awaked as of old,
   and made bare, they will not rest in his sovereign disposal of things,
   but rise up against the works of his revenge and holiness; like wild
   beasts that are pursued, when all ways of escape and turning are shut
   up, they fly in the face of him that follows them. They repent not of
   their evil deeds, but bite their tongues for anger, and blaspheme the
   God of heaven, Rev. xvi. 10, 11. Yea, such is the power of deceivable
   lusts, that many will admire at the blindness of others in former
   generations who considered not the works of God (as the Jews in the
   wilderness), when themselves are under actual contempt of no less
   glorious dispensations; like the Pharisees, who bewailed the folly of
   their fathers in persecuting the prophets, when themselves were
   endeavouring to kill the Son of God, Matt. xxiii. 29, 30. To bring,
   then, upon the spirits of men a conviction of the works of God, and his
   righteousness therein, so as to prevail with them to rest in his
   determination of things, is a task meet only for him who knows all
   their hearts within them, and can carry on the issues of his providence
   until to a man they shall say, "Verily there is a reward for the
   righteous: verily he is a God who judgeth in the earth," Ps. lviii. 11.
   And this is that which the Lord here undertakes to accomplish, "And,"
   saith he, "all the trees," etc.

   In the preaching and prophesying of Ezekiel, this one thing among
   others is eminent, that he was "artifex parabolarum," -- a wonderful
   "framer of similitudes and parables;" [299] a way of teaching attended
   with much evidence, clearness, and power.

   In particular, he frequently compares the world to a field, or a
   forest, and the inhabitants of it to the trees therein; -- an allusion
   exceedingly proper, considering the great variety and difference of
   condition both of the one and the other. The trees of the field are
   some high, some low; some green, some dry; some strong, some weak; some
   lofty, some contemptible; some fruitful, some barren; some useful, some
   altogether useless: so that you have all sorts of persons, high and
   low, of what condition, relation, or interest soever, clearly
   represented by the trees of the field; and these are the trees in my
   text.

   This chapter, unto verse 22, is taken up in a riddle, a parable, with
   the exposition of it. [300] The time being come that God would destroy
   the outward, visible monarchy of the Jews, for their false worship,
   tyranny, persecution, and oppression, he employs the king of Babylon in
   that work, [301] who subdues the nation, takes away two kings, one
   after another, and appoints Zedekiah a titulary governor under him.
   [302] But the wrath of God being to come upon them to the uttermost, he
   also closes with Egypt, rebels against him [303] by whose appointment
   alone he had any right to be a ruler, verse 16; so way is made, by his
   ruin, to put an end to the kingly reign of the house of David in
   Jerusalem, Jer. xxix. 16, 17. The Lord had of old erected a kingly
   government in the house of David, 1 Sam. xvi. 1; 2 Sam. xii. 7; -- not
   for any eminency in the government itself, or for the civil advantage
   of that people, -- for he had long before chosen and established
   another, consisting of "seventy elders of the people," Num. xi. 24, to
   whom he added prophets and judges, extraordinarily raised up in several
   generations, according to his promise, Deut. xviii. 18, (which when the
   people rejected, he said they rejected him, or his institution, 1 Sam.
   viii. 7), -- but that it might be a type of the spiritual dominion of
   their Messiah; [304] and so was a part of their pedagogy and bondage,
   as were the residue of their types, every one of them; -- yea, the most
   glorious enjoyments whatsoever which were granted them (which did yet
   represent something that was afterward to be brought in), was part of
   that servile estate wherein God kept that people, that without us they
   should not be made perfect. But now this carnal people, beholding the
   outward beauty, lustre, and glory of the type, began to rest in it, to
   the neglect of the spiritual kingdom of Christ represented thereby.
   [305] And thus did they with the rest of their types, until the Lord
   destroyed all their outward pomp and glory, Isa. i. 11, 12; Jer. vii.
   4, 14, 15. So, in particular, dealt he with their kingly government,
   when once they began to account their bondage their glory, and to
   embrace the shadow instead of the substance. And this did he, to recall
   them to a serious consideration of the tendency of all typical
   institutions, and the design he was carrying on concerning the kingdom
   of Christ.

   Hence, verse 22 of this chapter, he calls them from their
   thoughtfulness about the destructions, desolations, and contentions
   that were amongst them in reference to their civil rule, to the
   consideration of that design which he was secretly and silently
   carrying on under all these dispensations. "I will also take of the
   highest branch of the high cedar, and will set it; I will crop off from
   the top of his young twigs a tender one, and will plant it upon an high
   mountain and eminent: in the mountain of the height of Israel will I
   plant it; and it shall bring forth boughs, and bear fruit, and be a
   goodly cedar: and under it shall dwell all fowl of every wing; in the
   shadow of the branches thereof shall they dwell." As if the Lord should
   say, There is a great noise in the world about setting up and plucking
   down of kings, in this their carnal rule; and many of you see nothing
   else, -- you will look no farther: but I also have my work in hand; my
   design is not bounded within these limits and outward appearances; I am
   setting up a King that shall have another manner of dominion and rule
   than these worms of the earth. He shall stand; -- as Mic. v. 4.

   The setting up, then, of this kingdom of Christ, who is "the highest
   branch of the high cedar," and planting it in the church, the "mountain
   of Israel," with the prosperity thereof, and safety of him that shall
   dwell therein, is the subject of verses 22, 23. This being that to the
   consideration whereof God here calls his people at such a season, I
   shall name one or two observations from this connection of the words.

   Observation 1. In the midst of all the tumults and embroilments of the
   nations, that which the Lord takes peculiarly as his own design, into
   his own management, is the carrying on of the kingdom of the Lord
   Jesus.

   You are about your work, saith the Lord, -- I also am about mine; you
   have your branches and cedars, -- I also have one to plant, that shall
   flourish. Dan. ii. 44, "In the days of these kings shall the God of
   heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed," etc. Were not
   those kings and kingdoms also of his setting up, that it is said, In
   their days he shall set up one of his own? Yea, doubtless; "He changeth
   the times and the seasons; he removeth kings, and setteth up kings,"
   chap. ii. 21. He "ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to
   whomsoever he will," chap. iv. 25. There is not a persecuting Pharaoh,
   but he raises him up for his own purpose, Exod. ix. 16. But yet, in
   respect of the kingdom of his Son, he speaks of them as if he had
   nothing to do with them: In their days I will do my own work, --
   advance the kingdom of the Lord Christ.

   There are great and mighty works in hand in this nation; tyrants are
   punished, -- the jaws of oppressors are broken, -- bloody, revengeful
   persecutors disappointed, -- and, we hope, governors set up that may be
   "just, ruling in the fear of God, that they may be as the light of the
   morning," etc., 2 Sam. xxiii. 3, 4. The hand of the Lord hath been
   wonderfully exalted in all these things; but yet, should we rest in
   them, -- should they not be brought into an immediate subserviency to
   the kingdom of the Lord Jesus, -- the Lord will quickly distinguish
   between them and his own peculiar design, and say, In the days of these
   changes I will do so and so; -- speak of them as if he had nothing to
   do with them. The carrying on of the interest of Christ is his peculiar
   aim; he, of his goodness, make it ours also!

   Observation 2. Among all the designs that are on foot in the world,
   there is none that hath either stability, fixedness, or final success,
   but only the design of God concerning the kingdom of Christ.

   Other branches may be set, but the branch of the Lord only prospers.
   [306] The likeliest appearances of other undertakings are but as the
   glorious rising of the sun in the morning, -- quickly clouded. The
   interest of Christ is like Joseph, Gen. xlix. 23, 24. Ofttimes the
   archers shoot at it, and grieve it; but in the close the bow thereof
   abides in strength; and therefore this is the issue of all these
   dispensations, that the kingdoms and nations are at length to be
   possessed by the Lord Christ, [307] his sheaf standing up, and all
   others bowing thereunto.

   And unto the consideration of these things, in the midst of all the
   tumults in the world, doth God effectually recall his people, and
   withal tells them how he will carry it on, in the words of my text,
   "And all the trees," etc.

   In the words three things are to be observed, -- First, The work that
   God ascribes to himself. And that he sets down under a twofold
   similitude: of pulling down the "high tree," and setting up the "low
   tree;" and of drying up the "green tree," and making the "dry tree" to
   flourish; and both these similitudes are coincident, serving only in
   this redoubling for the clearer illustration of that which they shadow
   out. Secondly, There is the issue that God will carry this out unto in
   respect of others: "All the trees of the field shall know." Thirdly, A
   particular assurance that the Lord gives for the accomplishment of all
   this, from the engagement of his name: "I the Lord," etc.

   First, For the first, the expression of the work of the Lord may be
   taken two ways: 1. Strictly and properly; 2. Largely, and by the way of
   analogy and proportion.

   1. In the first way you may consider, --

   (1.) The tree that is to be cast down and withered, and that is the
   "high tree," and the "green tree," -- a tree that in their eyes had
   both beauty and vigour, high and green; this was the Judaical kingdom,
   admired and delighted in by the Jews. This, says God, I will reject; as
   also he will many a tall Eliab, that even some Samuels may think to be
   his anointed.

   (2.) The tree that is to be exalted and made to flourish, and that is
   the "low tree," the "dry tree," contemptible for growth; -- it is low,
   useless for fruit, it is dry. And this is the spiritual kingdom of the
   Messiah, contemned, despised. This, says God, I will exalt, carry on,
   and make glorious; for though the interest of Christ and the gospel may
   seem low and dry for a season, in comparison of the glory of other
   flourishing interests, yet, in the issue, it shall be exalted above
   them all.

   2. As taken more largely, and by the way of analogy; and so, --

   (1.) The high and the green tree are the things of the most glorious
   appearance in the world, -- persons and states that seem to be
   exceedingly suited for the work that God hath to do, that are in the
   greatest probability to be eminently instrumental in his hand: but,
   alas! says God, These will I pull down, and cause to wither. Perhaps
   you will think it strange, that a mighty monarchy, a triumphing
   prelacy, a thriving conformity, should all be brought down; but so it
   shall be, "Every mountain shall be made a plain."

   (2.) The "low tree," and the "dry tree," are things, persons,
   assemblies, outwardly weak and contemptible, -- such as wise men do
   verily believe that God will never use; they will not understand that
   such Moseses shall be deliverers, but cry, Who made them judges and
   rulers? [308] But even these will God exalt and cause to flourish:
   "Every valley shall be exalted."

   Two observations flow from hence, which I shall insist upon:--

   I. In the carrying on of the interest of Christ and the gospel, God
   will work wonderful providential alterations.

   II. The actings of God's providence in carrying on the interest of
   Christ, shall be exceedingly unsuited to the reasonings and
   expectations of the most of the sons of men.

   Some trees must be plucked down, and some raised up; yea, high trees
   thrown down, and the low caused to flourish. There is the issue of
   God's thus dealing in respect of others, "All the trees of the field,"
   etc. By the "trees of the field" are meant men of all sorts that are
   concerned in these transactions.

   And herein you may observe two things:-- something intimated; and that
   is, an unwillingness in men to own these dispensations of God; hence
   the Lord undertakes himself to set on a conviction upon them, as a
   thing of great difficulty; -- and something expressed; which is the
   conviction itself that shall in the issue fall upon them,
   notwithstanding all their reluctancy. Hence also are these two
   observations:--

   Observation 1. Men are exceeding unwilling to see and own the hand of
   God in those works of his providence which answer not their reasonings,
   interests, and expectations.

   Observation 2. The Lord will not cease walking contrary to the carnal
   reasonings of men, in his mighty works for the carrying on the interest
   of the Lord Jesus, until his hand be seen, owned, and confessed.

   For what remains concerning the assurance of the accomplishment of all
   this from the engagement of his name, I shall only add, that the power
   and faithfulness of God are engaged in the carrying on the things of
   the kingdom of Christ, to the conviction of the most stubborn opposers.

   I begin with the first, --

   I. In the carrying on the interest of Christ and the gospel, God will
   work wonderful providential alterations, -- alterations among the trees
   of the field, nations, states, and men on earth.

   When the beginning of the saints' departure from under the dominion of
   Antichrist was followed with wars, tumults, and destructions, it was
   objected to Luther, that that doctrine could not be of God which was
   attended with such desolations: he replied, according to the vigour of
   his spirit, "Ego nisi tumultus istos viderem, Christum in mundo esse
   non crederem;" -- "Did he not see those tumults, he would not believe
   that Christ was come forth into the world." The Lord tells you how he
   will bring on his kingdom, Hag. ii. 6, 7, "I will shake the heavens,
   and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land; and I will shake all
   nations, and the Desire of all nations shall come," etc. The "Desire of
   the nations," is to be brought in by the "shaking of the nations." They
   are to be civilly moved, that they may be spiritually established.
   Neither are they only to be shaken, but also to undergo great
   alterations in their shakings, Heb. xii. 27, "This word, Yet once more,
   signifies the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things
   that are made, that those things that cannot be shaken may remain."
   They must have a removal as well as a shaking; -- metathesin, "a
   change," a translation. Most nations in their civil constitution lie
   out of order for the bringing in of the interest of Christ; -- they
   must be shaken up and new disposed of, that all obstacles may be taken
   away. The day of the gospel is not only terrible in its discovering
   light, and as it is a trying furnace, Mal. iii. 2, but also in its
   devouring fury, as it is a consuming oven, chap. iv. 1.

   There are three principal seasons of the Lord's eminent appearance to
   carry on the kingdom of Christ and the gospel, and all attended with
   dreadful providential alterations: and unto one of these heads may all
   particular actings be reduced.

   1. The first is, the promulgation of the gospel among the Jews by the
   Lord Christ himself and his apostles. What this was attended withal is
   graphically described, Matt. xxiv. 6, 7, "And ye shall hear of wars,
   and rumours of wars; for nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom
   against kingdom, and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and
   earthquakes in divers places." And the close of it you have, verse 29,
   "Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be
   darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall
   fall from heaven, and the powers of heaven shall be shaken." The
   Judaical state, in all the height and glory of it, was utterly
   consumed; so that all flesh, all the Jews, were in danger of utter
   destruction, verse 22; their own historian, himself a Jew, affirming,
   that from the foundation of the world never was there such destruction
   and desolation brought upon any nation: Which words of his are a
   comment on that prediction of our Saviour, Matt. xxiv. 21. And the
   reason of this eminent desolation you have, Isa. ix. 5, 6.

   2. The second is, in the farther carrying on of the gospel, after the
   destruction of Jerusalem, throughout the world of the Gentiles, subject
   then in a great proportion to the Roman empire. And what is the issue
   hereof? The opening of the six seals immediately follows thereon, Rev.
   vi.; which, after manifold and various alterations, end in that
   dreadful dissolution of the Pagan empire which you have described from
   verse 14 to the end.

   3. The most signal is the coming of the Lord Christ to recover his
   people from antichristian idolatry and oppression: which, of all
   others, is, and shall be, attended with the most astonishing
   alterations and desolations, -- pulling down of high trees, and
   exalting them that are low. Thence is that war described Rev. xvii. 14,
   and that mighty vengeance poured out by the Lord Christ on the nations,
   their kings and captains, chap. xix. 11 to the end; which the Holy
   Ghost describes by a collection of all the most dreadful expressions
   which are any where used to set out great devastations in the Old
   Testament.

   And this is the head whereunto the present actings of Providence in
   this nation are to be referred; they all tend to the accomplishment of
   his main design therein. He that thinks Babylon is confined to Rome and
   its open idolatry, knows nothing of Babylon, nor of the new Jerusalem.
   The depth of subtle mystery doth not lie in gross, visible folly. It
   hath been insinuating itself into all the nations for sixteen hundred
   years, and to most of them is now become as the marrow in their bones.
   Before it be wholly shaken out, these heavens must be dissolved, and
   the earth shaken; their tall trees hewed down, and set a howling, Rev.
   xviii., and the residue of them transplanted from one end of the earth
   to another. This, I say, then, is the work that the Lord hath now in
   hand; and this is a day of thankfulness in reference to what he hath
   done for us in this nation. I know no better way of praising God for
   any work, than the finding out of his design therein, and closing with
   him in it. God hath gone with you, I hope, now to the end of your work;
   leave him not until he comes to the end of his. He hath compelled you
   "to go with him one mile" for your own good, -- go with him two for his
   glory. The two tribes and a half sat not down in their own possessions
   until the whole work of the Lord was done. I speak not with respect to
   any engagements of war with foreign nations; -- what have I to do with
   things that are above me? You will find work enough for your zeal to
   the kingdom of Christ at home; and this is the work of thankfulness
   which you are called unto.

   Now, the reasons of this are, --

   (1.) Because amongst all men, where the kingdom of Christ is to be set
   up, there is something or other possessed that he alone must and will
   have; and, therefore, the Lord giving Jesus Christ but his own
   inheritance, it must needs be attended with great alterations. I dare
   say, until of late (whatever now is) there was not any state or nation
   in the world, where the name of Christ is known, but that there was an
   intrenchment upon that which is the pure portion and inheritance of the
   Lord Christ, and that detained with falsehood and force. Yea, such is
   the folly and blindness of the most of men, that they think their
   greatest interest lies in holding that fast which Christ will take from
   them; -- Pharaoh-like, that thought it the great advantage of his
   kingdom not to let the people go, when it proved the ruin of him and
   his land. This, I dare say, will, in the issue, be the ruin of all or
   most of the tall trees of Europe; they have grasped much of the power
   of Christ, and endeavour to impose on the consciences of his in the
   worship of God, or otherwise oppress them in what he hath purchased for
   them: and, by a dreadful mistake, they suppose their own interest lies
   therein; which makes them hold fast until Christ hath shaken them all
   to pieces, and taken away even that also which was their own. The late
   king had learned a saying from his predecessor, "No bishop, no king."
   Hence he supposes his main interest to lie in holding fast Prelacy;
   whatever he seems to part withal, that he will not let go, -- that is
   his main interest. And what is this Prelacy? A mere antichristian
   encroachment upon the inheritance of Christ, Christ coming to take his
   own, shakes the other to pieces. Those who would have been our
   oppressors in Scotland, but that God hath crushed the cockatrice in the
   shell, and filled the pit with their dead bodies which they had digged
   for us, -- they also had prepared a Procrustes' bed, a heavy yoke, a
   beast that, had it grown to perfection, would have had horns and hoofs;
   and in maintaining this they think their great interest to lie. And in
   holding this fast, are they, after all their associations, broken in
   pieces. And this is one cause.

   (2.) The works that God hath to do in such a season require it. God
   hath three great works to do, in the day of his carrying on the
   interest of Christ and the gospel:-- [1.] He hath great revenges to
   take; [2.] He hath great deliverances to work; [3.] He hath great
   discoveries to make. I shall but touch on each.

   [1.] He hath great revenges to take, and that on three sorts of
   persons.

   1st. On oppressing Babylonians, -- false worshippers and persecutors.
   Whilst the bride is preparing for the Lord Christ, he goes forth, with
   the armies of heaven following him, to take vengeance on these his
   enemies, Rev. xix. 11. These are the Absaloms, the usurpers of his
   throne, -- the Hamans, the forcers of his spouse, the chiefest
   adversaries of his kingdom? [309] "He shall fill the places with dead
   bodies" of these; and upon this account "wound the heads over many
   countries," Ps. cx. 6. The axe is laid to the root of many a tall tree
   on this score, even in this nation, where he is reckoning for blood and
   imposition of yokes; and he hath found out men inheriting this spirit
   from one generation to another.

   2dly. Scoffing Edomites. -- There is a twofold quarrel that God hath
   with that generation of men; their rejoicing at Zion's distress, and
   desiring its increase, Ps. cxxxvii. 7; and their endeavour to destroy
   the residue, when at any time straitened, Obad. 14. How many in the
   late trial rejoiced in the straits of Zion, that sat expecting our
   destruction, that they might have risen to stand in the cross ways to
   have cut off them that escaped! Wherewith should they have reconciled
   themselves to their master, but with the heads of the servants of
   Christ? God hath vengeance in such a day as this for Edom also.

   3dly. Lukewarm Laodiceans, -- neutralists, that "drink wine in bowls,"
   and are no way moved at the "suffering of Joseph," -- Gallios, that
   care for none of these things. There is not a generation in the world
   with whom the Lord is more provoked than with this Meroz generation.
   When God is jealous for Zion, he is displeased with them that are at
   ease, Zech. i. 14, 15. Now, consider how many persons of all these
   sorts are fixed in the nation, and you will see that vengeance cannot
   be taken on them without great alterations.

   [2.] He hath deliverances to work. It is the time of "visiting the
   prisoners of hope:" the prey must be taken out of the jaws of the
   terrible, -- every "staff of the oppressor broken in pieces;" yea, he
   delivers his saints, not only from all that they have suffered, but
   from all that was in the contrivance of their enemies to bring upon
   them, -- which is greater than they can execute; and this will cost
   something, before the Pharaohs of the nation will let his people go.

   [3.] He hath great trials to make; -- 1st. Of his own, that they may be
   purged; 2dly. Of hypocrites, that they way be discovered.

   1st. The day of carrying on the interest of Christ is a day of
   purifying and purging, Dan. xii. 10, "Many shall be purified, and made
   white, and tried;" that is, a day like a furnace, Mal. iii. 3, that
   will consume dross and tin. The remainder of the people must be brought
   through the fire, Zech. xiii. 9. Joshua's garments are defiled by
   dwelling in Babylon; [310] many of Christ's own have contracted rust
   and soil, have got carnal interests and engagements, that must be
   scoured from them.

   2dly. Of the discovery of hypocrites. It is emphatically said of the
   saints, that they "follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth." [311] All
   sorts of professors will follow him in some paths; in such as are
   consistent with their power, dominion, and advantages, they are even
   ready to run before him: but he hath some paths that are unpleasing to
   flesh and blood, -- paths that he gives no loaves in; here men that say
   they are Jews, and are not, but lie, give quite out from him. Now, upon
   all these several accounts, must that day of the gospel of necessity be
   attended with great providential alteration.

   Use 1. To discover where dwells that spirit that actuates all the great
   alterations that have been in these nations. Such things have been
   brought to pass as have filled the world with amazement; -- a monarchy
   of some hundred years' continuance, always affecting and at length
   wholly degenerated into tyranny, destroyed, pulled down, swallowed up;
   -- a great and mighty potentate, that had caused "terror in the land of
   the living," and laid his sword under his head, brought to punishment
   for blood; -- hypocrites and selfish men abundantly discovered, wise
   men made fools, and the strong as water; -- a nation (that of Scotland)
   engaging for and against the same cause, backward and forward twice or
   thrice, always seeking where to find their own gain and interest in it,
   at length totally broken, in opposition to that cause wherewith at
   first they closed; -- multitudes of professors, one year praying,
   fasting, mightily rejoicing upon the least success, bearing it out as a
   sign of the presence of God; another year, whilst the same work is
   carried on, cursing, repining, slighting the marvellous appearance of
   God in answer unto prayers and most solemn appeals, being very angry at
   the deliverances of Zion:-- on the other side, all the mighty successes
   that God hath followed poor despised ones withal, being with them as
   with those in days of old, Heb. xi. 33, "Who through faith subdued
   kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths
   of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword,
   out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to
   flight the armies of the aliens." He, I say, that shall consider all
   this, may well inquire after that principle which, being regularly
   carried on, yet meeting with the corruption and lusts of men, should so
   wheel them about, and work so many mighty alterations. Now, what is
   this but the most effectual design of the Lord to carry on the interest
   of Christ and the gospel, whatever stands in the way? This bears down
   all before it, -- wraps up some in blood, some in hardness, and is most
   eminently straight and holy in all these transactions. Isa. xiv. 32,
   "What shall one then answer the messengers of the nation? That the Lord
   hath founded Zion, and the poor of his people shall trust in it."

   Use 2. To magnify the goodness of God, who unto us hath sweetened and
   seasoned all his dreadful dispensations, and all the alterations in
   those nations, with this his gracious design running through them all:
   this is that which puts all their beauty and lustre on them, being
   outwardly dreadful and horrible. The carrying on of this (which is
   hidden from the men of the world, who have therefore no joy) is the
   only thing we have to rejoice at in this day; our victories have no
   glory but what they receive from hence, Isa. iv. 2. That blood which is
   an acceptable sacrifice to the Lord is the blood of the enemies of this
   design of his; the vengeance that is to be delighted in is the
   vengeance of the temple; heaven, and all that is in it, is called to
   rejoice, when Babylon "is destroyed with violence and fury," Rev.
   xviii. 21, -- when those who would not have the King of saints reign
   are brought forth and slain before his face: and in this God makes
   distinguishing work, and calls to rejoicing, Isa. lxv. 13, 14,
   "Therefore thus saith the Lord God, Behold, my servants shall eat, but
   ye shall be hungry: behold, my servants shall drink, but ye shall be
   thirsty: behold, my servants shall rejoice, but ye shall be ashamed:
   behold, my servants shall sing for joy of heart, but ye shall cry for
   sorrow of heart, and shall howl for vexation of spirit."

   Thus the saints are called to sing "the song of Moses the servant of
   God, and the song of the Lamb," Rev. xv. 3. The deliverance by Moses
   was a temporal deliverance from outward yokes and bondage; -- the
   deliverance of the Lamb was a spiritual deliverance from spiritual
   bondage: the deliverance that God will give his saints from this
   oppression shall be mixed; as their bondage partakes of both, so shall
   their deliverance be; and therefore they shall sing the song of Moses
   and the Lamb. If ever any persons in the world had cause to sing the
   song of Moses and the Lamb, we have this day. The bondage prepared for
   us was both in spirituals and temporals; -- about a tyrant full of
   revenge, and a discipline full of persecution, hath been our contest:
   whether the yoke of the one and the other should by the sword and
   violence be put upon our necks and consciences, is our controversy.
   There was both Egypt and Babel in the bondage prepared, -- and both
   these enraged. Pharaoh doubled the task of the Israelites when they did
   speak of liberty; what would he have done had he recovered them under
   his hand after they were escaped? What would the thoughts of that man
   of blood have been, and his ways, had he prevailed, after so many
   provocations? "Cræde ac sanguine, quisquis ab exilio." And what would
   their ways have been who thought to sit on his right hand and his left
   in his kingdom? But of this afterward. Now, God having broken both the
   one snare and the other, surely we have cause to sing the song of Moses
   and of the Lamb this day, when others are in the condition mentioned
   Isa. viii. 21, 22.

   It is true, all things are not clear to all perhaps that serve the
   Lord. Some cannot rejoice in the works of our God; but they are not the
   first on whom that sin hath been charged. Nothing more frequent in the
   Scripture than the laying this sin at the door of professors, that they
   set not their hearts to the work of the Lord. If they are of the armies
   in heaven, they will at length learn to follow the Lamb; and for the
   present, music with some discords may make melody for the Lord. The
   song of Deborah is full of complaint, [312] -- divisions of Reuben, --
   Gilead, Dan, and Asher, slow in their helps, -- Meroz wholly neutral:--
   though we have of all these sorts, yet may we make a song to the Lord,
   that in Jesus Christ may be acceptable this day. And the Lord, I hope,
   will open the eyes of them amongst us, and give them to cry for mercy
   when his righteous judgments have driven them from all their holds.
   When the mighty army was destroyed in the north about three years ago,
   many would see nothing in it, but that they had not the blessing of the
   church. Hence they began to think of it as Balak did of Balaam; --
   "whom he blessed, they were blessed; and whom he cursed, they were
   cursed." [313] God could not bear the robbing him of his glory, and
   giving it unto selfish men. They shall bless, and bless again, and be
   no more heard than the Baalists' cry:-- even to the Lord shall they
   cry, but he will not regard them: the Lord, I say, will drive them from
   such holds as these, that they may acknowledge his hand. Let, then, the
   great work of the Lord be owned, be rejoiced in, for it will certainly
   bear down all that stand in the way of it: neither is there the least
   true consolation in any of these alterations, but what arises from a
   closing with it.

   Come we to the second observation.

   II. The actings of God's providence, in carrying on the interest of
   Christ, are and shall be exceedingly unsuited to the reasonings and
   expectations of the most of men.

   He hath a glorious work here to be accomplished. Of whom should he now
   make use? Surely the "high tree," the "green tree" will be employed. If
   one be to be anointed in the family of Jesse, will it not be goodly
   Eliab? if the king will honour any, who should it be but I, says Haman?
   But all on the contrary, the low, dry tree is taken; -- David from the
   flock, and Mordecai from the gate. The thoughts of God are not as our
   thoughts, neither doth he look on outward appearances.

   To give some instances in his most signal actings in this kind.

   The Jews knew that God had a great work to do in giving of a Messiah,
   the Saviour of the world. They are raised up to expectation of it; upon
   every considerable appearance, they cry, Is this he? And what withal
   did they expect? -- Outward glory, beauty, deliverance, carnal power
   and dominion. God at length comes to do his work, and bringeth forth a
   poor man, that had not where to lay his head, followed by a few
   fishermen and simple women, that had "neither form nor comeliness that
   he should be desired;" persecuted, despised, crucified from the
   beginning to the end; -- quite another thing than what they looked for.
   [314] Thus lays he the foundation of the gospel in the person of his
   Son, by frustrating the expectations of the most of men: "The stone
   which the builders refused," etc. Again, seeing salvation is of the
   Jews, the rod of Christ's strength being to be sent out of Zion, and
   that living waters were to flow forth from Jerusalem, -- the gospel
   being from thence to be published through the world, -- whom should the
   Lord choose to do it? Surely the great, the wise, the learned of that
   nation; the high priests, learned scribes, devout Pharisees, that might
   have won their message some repute and credit in the world. [315] But,
   contrary to all the wisdom of the flesh, he takes a few ignorant, weak,
   unlearned fishermen, despised upon all accounts, and commits this great
   work unto them; and accordingly out they go, friendless, helpless,
   harbourless, unto their great employment. The like instruments, for the
   most part, did he employ to make an entrance upon the great work of
   casting down false worship and idolatry. Moreover, in that great work
   for the Lord Christ which is to be accomplished in the ruin and
   destruction of Babel, when it must be done with might, power, and
   strength, with armies and blood, will not now the Lord use the "high
   and green tree?" Many kings and potentates having in profession
   embraced the doctrine of the gospel, nobles and great ones having given
   up their names in appearance unto Christ, -- who but they shall now be
   used in this work of the Lord? But yet plainly the Lord tells them the
   contrary, Rev. xviii. 9; -- all these persons bewail the judgments of
   God that are executed on Babel, which shall be done by low, dry trees.

   To give one instance in the mighty works which God hath lately wrought
   in these nations:-- A work of reformation and carrying on the interest
   of Christ is here undertaken. What, upon this, are the thoughts of the
   most of men? whither were their eyes turned? Tall trees, green trees
   are pitched on. This and that great lord, popular with the multitude,
   Eliabs in their eyes, they must do it; -- the Scots shall certainly
   effect it; -- the king shall be taken from his evil counsel, he shall
   be active in it. A church government shall be set up, and no man
   suffered to live in the nation that will not submit unto it. Some, like
   the sons of Zebedee, shall sit on the right and left hand of Christ, in
   the kingdom they were setting up for him; -- these and those, sound
   good men, shall be next the king: then all will be great and glorious
   indeed. What now, I pray? Do all things indeed suit and answer these
   expectations and reasonings of men? doth God accomplish the thoughts of
   their hearts? Alas! the high trees rested on proved, for the most part,
   broken reeds, that ran into our hands, and let out our blood in
   abundance to no purpose; -- the top bough, hoped for, fallen as an
   abominable branch; -- the Scots shaken and broken with unparalleled
   destruction, in the maintenance of the interest and cause which at
   first they prosperously opposed; -- the iron yoke, pretended to be that
   of Christ (though it be fleshly, carnal, and cruel, suited to the
   wisdom of a man, and his rule be spiritual, meek, and gentle), cast off
   and thrown away:-- low trees, dry trees, despised ones, contemned ones,
   without form or comeliness, exalted, used, employed, and the hand of
   the Lord evidently lifted up in all these transactions.

   Some reasons of this may be given, and, --

   1. The first is taken from the corruptions of the hearts of men
   squaring the works of God to their fleshly reasonings, corrupt
   interests and principles. They are bold with the wisdom of God, and
   conclude thus and thus things ought to be, -- ordering their thoughts
   for the most part according to their corrupt and carnal advantages. I
   shall instance both as to carnal advantages and principles.

   (1.) Carnal power and glory seem excellent to the Jews: hence think
   they, When God gives us our Messiah, all this must be accomplished.
   Their affections are disordered by corrupt lusts and desires, and that
   enslaves their minds to strange apprehensions:-- God comes in his own
   way, and how cross do things run to their expectations. What was the
   corrupt design of many in Scotland? That they might set up a son of
   Tabeal in England, and themselves be great under him; that they and
   their partakers might impose on the residue of the nation, especially
   in the things of God. Their great desire that things should be thus,
   corrupts their minds to think that it ought to be so, and shall be so.
   Hence ambition to rule and to have all under their power, even in
   conscience, is quickly mistaken for zeal to the kingdom of Christ, --
   re-enthroning of tyranny is loyalty; and all according to covenant. As
   if men had sworn to be good to themselves, and to be true to their own
   interests all their days; which surely few need to be sworn to. Thus
   men's minds and judgments are distempered by their lusts and interests,
   which makes them frame a way for God to proceed in; which, when he doth
   not, how are they surprised!

   (2.) For principles. Men take up principles that they will adhere
   unto:-- wise principles, forsooth, yea, and very righteous too! All
   things whatever that fall out must be squared unto their principles.
   They expect that nothing must be done but what suits unto them; and if
   any thing contrary be wrought, even of God himself, how deceived, how
   disappointed are they! The most tremendous judgment of God in this
   world is the hardening of the hearts of men; -- this seals them up for
   the most part to destruction:-- a thing it is often mentioned in the
   Scripture, and many subtle disputes there are, how it should come forth
   from Him who is most holy, seeing it is the greatest sin of the
   creature.

   I shall give you my thoughts, in a most eminent instance or two, as to
   one particular of it. Look on Pharaoh, of whom it is most signally
   spoken, that God "hardened his heart." How did the Lord accomplish
   this? Pharaoh settles himself upon as righteous principles as ever any
   of the sons of men could do: one is, "That it belongs to the chief
   ruler of a nation to see to the profit and glory of the nation." What
   more righteous principle is there in the world? You that talk of your
   principles, give me one more righteous than this. Hence he concludes,
   that if it be incumbent on him to see that the realm receive no
   detriment, he must not let the people go by whom they received so many
   great advantages. God confirms his heart in these principles, which are
   good in themselves, but abominable when taken up against the mind and
   providence of God. Hence he and his perished in their principles,
   acting against the appearance of God. It is also said of Sihon, the
   king of the Amorites, that "his heart was hardened that he would not
   let the people go through his land." How, I pray? Even by adhering to
   that wise principle, "That it is not meet to let a potent enemy into
   the bowels of a people." And this made way for his ruin.

   Thus is it with many; they fix on principles, good in general, and in
   their season. Old bounds must not be broken up; -- order must not be
   disturbed:-- let God appear never so eminently, so mightily, they will
   keep to their principles. What is this but judicial hardness? And this,
   I say, is one reason why the actings of God in such a day as this are
   so unsuited to the expectations of men; -- they square his work to the
   interests and principles which it will not answer.

   2. God chooseth thus to do things above and beside the expectations of
   men, that his presence and the presence of the Lord Christ may be the
   more conspicuous in the world. Did the Lord always walk in paths that
   men had rationally -- that is, foolishly (for such is our wisdom in the
   ways of God) allotted to him, the appearances of his glory would be
   exceedingly eclipsed. It is hard for men to have a clear and naked view
   of the power of God [316] in effecting any thing, when there is great
   help of means to do it; but it is much harder to discern the wisdom of
   God in an affair, when men's own wisdom and designing is all
   accomplished. But now, when the way of God is "like the way of an eagle
   in the air," -- when "his paths are in the deep, and his footsteps are
   not known," -- then is he glorious in his goings. Men think all things
   would be very glorious, if they might be done according to their mind:
   perhaps, indeed, they would; -- but with their glory, not the glory of
   God.

   3. God will do it for the hardening of many false, empty professors and
   others in the world, that the judgments appointed may come upon them to
   the uttermost. [317] The hardening of men to their destruction, being a
   close and inward work, is one of the most eminent acts of the
   providence of God in governing the world:-- by this he accomplisheth
   most of the judgments that he hath threatened. Now, there is not any
   dispensation of God towards man but he can, and doth sometimes, cause
   it to be so managed and ordered, that it shall be a way and means of
   hardening such as he hath appointed thereunto:-- some are hardened by
   the word, some by mercies, some by judgments. Amongst other ways that
   he useth for this purpose, this is one, -- the disposal of the works of
   his providence contrary to the reasonings of men, -- doing things
   unlikely and unfitly in the eyes of flesh and blood, that so they may
   despise those ways of his, and be broken in opposition unto them. Take
   an instance in Pharaoh's last hardening for destruction: When he
   brought the people out of Egypt, he did not lead them the direct way to
   Canaan, but carries them into the wilderness, and shuts them up between
   the mountains and the sea. Pharaoh justly concludes that they are
   entangled beyond escape, and that he shall surely overtake them and
   destroy them. This draws him out to his ruin. Had God led them in the
   straight path, probably he had not pursued after them; but the Lord
   lays this as a plot for his destruction. God will harden Jeroboam, and
   therefore a lion shall slay the prophet that preached against his
   idolatry. So was it with the Jews. They expect all glory to attend the
   coming of the Messiah; and after the coming of him indeed, God follows
   them with judgments to a total desolation; which being so unsuited unto
   the dispensation they expected, hardness thereby is come upon them to
   the uttermost. Tertullian says, he dares say that "the Scriptures were
   on purpose framed in many thing to give occasion to proud and curious
   unhumbled wits to stumble and fall." And I dare say that the Lord doth
   order many of his works in the world in "ways past finding out," on
   purpose to give occasion to many to stumble and fall. God fulfilleth
   many mighty works, that could not otherwise be brought about, by
   hardening the hearts of men. The hardening of the late king's heart was
   an engine whereby he wrought mighty thing and alterations. Had not God
   laid obdurateness and stubbornness upon his spirit, we had long since,
   in all probability, been ruined. To accomplish this end, then, God will
   so order the works of his providence, that men shall reason themselves
   into unreasonable and brutish hardness and stupidity. Thus God hath
   done in the days wherein we live. His mighty acts that he hath wrought,
   both for the matter of the things done and the manner of their doing,
   have been so contrary to men's principles, interest, expectations, and
   reasons, that they have slighted them to such a degree of hardening
   that they seem to have no reason left at all; -- and when it comes to
   that, God will fall judicially upon the very faculties of their souls;
   he will blind their eyes, deprive them of their judgment and insight
   into things, that they shall be as incapable of [understanding] God's
   mind as fools; and give them up to vile affections, to do the things
   that are not seemly; -- as it hath fallen out with too many amongst us.

   Let us now make some use of this point.

   Use. It serves, then, to discover the vanity of those men who, because
   the works of God have not been carried on in ways suitable to their
   reasonings and expectations, do utterly reject them, disown them, and
   oppose him in them. Can these men give any one instance of any one
   eminent work of God that he hath brought about by such ways and means
   as men would rationally allot thereunto, especially in things that are
   in immediate subserviency to the kingdom of the Lord Christ? Can they
   instance that they have been so managed? nay, hath not this been a
   means to harden multitudes to their destruction that have limited the
   Holy One, and chalked out paths for him to walk in? I cannot but fear
   that it was a great provocation of the eyes of God's glory, that at the
   beginning, and in the carrying on of the great alterations that have
   been wrought by his providence among us, we did speak of confirming and
   continuing, under any condition whatsoever, any things or persons which
   it was in his design to evert:-- we must be promising to keep up the
   high tree, and to keep down the low tree; which was not at all in his
   thoughts, neither ever came it into his heart. I hope he hath taught us
   (though with thorns) to follow him sometimes, like Abraham, not knowing
   whither we go. Now, the Lord convince them who are yet under this
   darkness; -- that think the ways of God not equal, because not measured
   by their line; -- that bring their crooked rules unto that which is
   really straight, and cast it away as abominable. The children of Israel
   had got a proverb against the ways of God; [318] it was so taken for
   granted that the ways of his providence were not right and straight,
   that it was grown into a common by-word. A little discovery of the
   pride and hypocrisy of their own hearts undeceived them at last.

   I shall not say to our brethren that they have showed this day, that if
   Absalom had lived, and all we had been slain, it would have been
   well-pleasing to them; but this I shall say, that it is a sad sign that
   our ways please not God, when his ways please not us at all.

   There being not space for handling the two remaining propositions
   contained in the text, I shall go forth to one general use, and so
   conclude.

   Use. Now, this I shall take from that of the prophet Amos iv. 12; --
   the generality of the people being exercised with various judgments,
   the residue of them are said to be saved "as a firebrand out of the
   burning;" that is, powerfully, effectually, from a very terrible and a
   very near destruction. After all the Lord's great dispensation of
   providence, in carrying on his own design, this being the condition of
   the people of this nation, many being destroyed by foregoing judgments,
   and the residue now saved like a firebrand out of the burning, God
   having given us this issue of his mighty works in pulling down the high
   tree, and exalting the low tree, it cannot but be our wisdom to close
   with the counsel which God gives in such a condition; and that you
   have, I say, Amos iv. 12, "Because I will do this unto thee, prepare to
   meet thy God, O Israel." Seeing that all this is done, prepare to meet
   thy God, O England: prepare to meet thy God, O parliament: prepare to
   meet thy God, O army.

   To lead you a little towards the performance of this duty, it being
   that, and that alone, which is incumbent on you, I shall show you these
   two things:-- 1. What it is wherein we are to meet our God. 2. How we
   must meet him therein.

   1. For the first, there are three ways wherein we must meet the Lord,
   if we desire to answer his mind in any of these dispensations:-- (1.)
   In the way of his providence; (2.) In the way of his worship; (3.) In
   the way of his holiness.

   (1.) The eminent ways of the providence of God in these days may be
   referred unto three heads.

   [1.] His general design, to pull down all those high oppositions to the
   kingdom of his Son which I have mentioned.

   [2.] His peculiar aim, to stain the glory of all flesh, to pull down
   high trees, that no flesh may glory.

   [3.] His shaking of all endearments and enjoyments here below, that the
   hearts of his may be fixed only on the things that cannot be shaken.

   And these, upon all accounts and considerations whatever, appear to be
   the main tendencies of the actings of providence in these our days.

   (2.) There is the way of his worship; wherein also he will be met. It
   is most remote from my thoughts to enter into contests concerning that
   peculiar way of gospel worship which Christ hath appointed. It
   sufficeth me, that seeing God hath promised that in these days he will
   have his tabernacle with men, and that barrenness and drought shall be
   on every soul that comes not up to his feast of tabernacles, it is
   bottom sufficient to press men to meet him in that way, according as he
   shall graciously make out light unto them.

   (3.) There is the way of his holiness. As he is holy, so are all his
   ways holy, -- so he will be met and walked with in all ways of holiness
   and obedience to Jesus Christ. And these are the ways wherein God will
   be met by his remnant, his delivered remnant.

   2. What, then, is it to meet the Lord in any of these ways? what is it
   to meet him in the way of his providence, his worship, his holiness? To
   meet one in any thing, is to close with him in that thing:-- we say,
   Herein I meet you, when we are of one mind. To meet the Lord in these
   things, is to close with the will and mind of God in them. This is that
   which I would exhort you unto, yea, lay the charge of God upon you this
   day, even on you and your companions, who are as a brand snatched out
   of the burning, --

   (1.) To meet God in the way of his providence.

   [1.] Meet him in his general design of casting down all combined
   opposition to the kingdom of his Son; that God in his appointed time
   will bring forth the kingdom of the Lord Christ unto more glory and
   power than in former days, I presume you are persuaded. Whatever will
   be more, these six things are clearly promised:--

   1st. Fulness of peace unto the gospel and the professors thereof, Isa.
   xi. 6, 7, liv. 13, xxxiii. 20, 21; Rev. xxi. 25.

   2dly. Purity and beauty of ordinances and gospel worship, Rev. xi. 2,
   xxi. 3. The tabernacle was wholly made by appointment, Mal. iii. 3, 4;
   Zech. xiv. 16; Rev. xxi. 27; Zech. xiv. 20; Isa. xxxv. 8.

   3dly. Multitudes of converts, many persons, yea, nations, Isa. ix. 7,
   8, lxvi. 8, xlix. 18-22; Rev. vii. 9.

   4thly. The full casting out and rejecting of all will-worship, and
   their attendant abominations, Rev. xi. 2.

   5thly. Professed subjection of the nations throughout the whole world
   unto the Lord Christ, Dan. ii. 44, vii. 26, 27; Isa. lx. 6-9; -- the
   kingdoms become the kingdoms of our Lord and his Christ, [Rev. xi. 15,]
   amongst whom his appearance shall be so glorious, that David himself
   shall be said to reign.

   6thly. A most glorious and dreadful breaking of all that rise in
   opposition unto him, Isa. lx. 12, -- never such desolations, Rev. xvi.
   17-19.

   Now, in order to the bringing in of this his rule and kingdom, with its
   attendances, the Lord Christ goes forth, in the first place, to cast
   down the things that stand in his way, dashing his enemies "in pieces
   like a potter's vessel." This is a part of the design of Providence,
   wherein we are to meet him in these days.

   I shall speak a word, -- (1st.) Unto them who are enabled to look
   through the clouds and darkness whereby his paths are encompassed;
   (2dly.) Unto them who cannot.

   (1st.) For the former, be you persuaded to meet the Lord in this his
   design, -- yet to continue steadfast in helping him against the mighty.
   I speak not only to you who are in authority, nor unto you to whom the
   sword is girded, but unto all that wish well to Zion. We have every one
   our mite that we may cast into this treasury: we may be all princes in
   this case, all Israels, -- prevailers with God and men. There be three
   things whereby even you, who are but as the number, the common soldiers
   of Christ, may meet the Lord in this design.

   [1st.] By faith. Believe the promises, close with them, act faith upon
   them, and you will believe the beast unto destruction, antichrist into
   the pit, and Magog to ruin. Believe that ( Ps. cx. 1, 4, ii. 7, 8; Mic.
   v. 3, 4; Isa. lx. 12) the enemies of Christ shall be made his
   footstool, that the nations shall be his inheritance, that he shall
   reign gloriously in beauty, that he shall smite in pieces the heads
   over divers nations; -- live in the faith of these things, and as it
   will give you the sweetness of them before they come, so it will hasten
   their coming beyond the endeavours of thousands, yea, millions of armed
   men.

   [2dly.] Meet him with your supplications. Cry unto him, as Ps. xlv.
   3-5, "Gird thy sword upon thy thigh, O most Mighty, with thy glory and
   thy majesty. And in thy majesty ride prosperously, because of truth,
   and meekness, and righteousness; and thy right hand shall teach thee
   terrible things. Thine arrows are sharp in the heart of the King's
   enemies; whereby the people fall under thee." This will make you be the
   armies of heaven, that follow him in his great undertakings, Rev. xix.
   14. It is his praying people that are his conquering armies that follow
   him. Now you find it coming, leave not pulling with all your strength,
   lest it roll back again. Shoot not two or three arrows, and so give
   over; but never leave shooting until the enemies of the Lord be all
   destroyed. Seeing it is his gospel whose advancement the Lord Jesus
   aimeth at in all these dispensations, and whose quarrel alone he
   revengeth (whatever men may do), help on to the advancement of that
   gospel of his; which, as formerly it was oppressed by the height and
   tyranny of the tower of Babel, so for the present is exceedingly
   defiled and cumbered by the rubbish of it being in some measure cast
   down.

   [3dly.] Whereas in these dispensations it is most eminently and
   frequently, in the praise of Christ, said that he is just and righteous
   in all his ways, -- as you may see in all the acclamations of the
   saints upon the execution of his judgments on his enemies ("Just and
   righteous art thou"); which is signally done on this account, because
   the ways whereby he doth it are counted most unrighteous in the world,
   -- in this, then, also is he to be met, even in the administration of
   justice and judgment: you will otherwise certainly be found in a cross
   path unto him, and be borne down before him. This is that wisdom which
   he calls for among the judges of the earth, when he is set to reign on
   his holy hill, Ps. ii. 10, 11.

   (2dly.) I shall add one word or two unto them who, either from the
   darkness of the things themselves, or from the prejudices and
   temptations of their own spirits, are not able to discern the
   righteousness of the ways of God, but rather lift up themselves against
   him.

   First, then, Consider the constant appearing of God against every party
   that, under any colour or pretence whatever, have lifted up themselves
   for the reinforcement of things as in former days:-- what colour or
   pretence soever they have put on, or which way soever they have turned
   themselves, God hath still appeared against them. Can you not discern
   his leavening their counsels with folly and madness, weakening their
   hearts and hands, -- making the strong become as tow, and the
   successful a reproach? Though they have gone from mountain to mountain
   to seek for divination, and changed their pretences as olden as Laban
   did Jacob's wages, yet they find neither fraud nor enchantment that
   will prevail: and doth not this proclaim that the design which God had
   in hand is as yet marvellously above you?

   Secondly, Consider the constant answer of prayers which those which
   have waited on God in these dispensations, to their unspeakable
   consolation, have received, -- finding God to be nigh unto them in all
   that they call upon him for. If in this thing they regarded iniquity in
   their hearts, surely God would not have heard them. Others also cry,
   even to the Lord do they cry; but he will not bear witness to the
   abomination of their hearts. Oh, that upon these and the like
   considerations you would at last take the counsel of the psalmist, Ps.
   xlvi. 10, Be still, and know that he is God. Be silent before him, for
   he is risen out of his holy habitation. Say, God hath done great things
   for these; who hath hardened himself against him and prospered? And
   this is the first particular.

   [2.] The second design of Providence in these dispensations, is
   evidently to stain the glory of all flesh; so Isa. xxiii. 9. Never did
   the Lord any work more eminently. What sort of men is there amongst us
   whose glory God hath not stained? I had rather leave this unto a silent
   thought, than give you particular instances of it; otherwise, it were
   very easy to make it as clear as the sun, that God hath left neither
   self-honour nor glory to any of the sons of men. Meet him, then, in
   this also:--

   1st, Cease putting confidence in man; say, He is a worm, and the son of
   man is but a worm; his breath is in his nostrils, and wherein is he to
   be accounted of? This use doth the church make of mercies, Ps. xx. 6,
   7, "Some trust in horses, and some in chariots; but we will remember
   the name of the Lord:" we will not trust in parliaments or armies. "All
   flesh is grass," Isa. xl. 1; let it have its withering time, and away.
   See no wisdom, but the wisdom of God, -- no strength, but the strength
   of God, -- no glory but his.

   2dly, Have any of us any glory, any crowns, any gifts, any graces, any
   wisdom or valour, any useful endowments? let us cast them all down at
   the feet of Jesus Christ. If we look on them, if we keep them as our
   own, God withers all their beauty and their glory. Thus do the elders
   who worship the Lamb forever, Rev. iv. 10, 11, say to him, Lord Jesus,
   thine is the glory, -- thine are all the mighty works which have been
   wrought in our days; -- thine are all the means whereby they have been
   accomplished:-- we are nothing, we can do nothing; thou art all, and in
   all. And this is the second.

   [3.] He aims at the shaking of all these things here below. He is
   taking down the rate and price of all things here below; on that which
   was worth a thousand pounds, he takes his bill and writes down scarce
   the thousandth part. He hath laid his hand upon the nests of the
   nation, and hath fitted wings unto all their treasures, and so
   eminently written vanity and uncertainty on them all as must needs
   lessen their esteem, were not men blinded by the god of this world. In
   this also are we to meet the Lord, --

   1st. By getting a low esteem of the things that God is thus shaking,
   and that upon this account, that he shakes them for this very end and
   purpose, that we should find neither rest nor peace in them. Perhaps
   thou hast had a desire to be somebody in the world; -- thou seest
   thyself come short of what thou aimest at; say now, with Mephibosheth
   upon the return of David, Not only half, but let all go, seeing that
   the Lord Jesus shall reign with glory. A man may sometimes beat a
   servant for the instruction of his son; God hath shaken the enjoyments
   of his enemies to lead his friends to disesteem them. God forbid the
   quite contrary should be found upon any of us.

   2dly. By labouring to find all riches and treasures in the Lord Christ.
   The earth staggers like a drunken man; -- the princes of it are reduced
   to a morsel of bread; -- all that is seen is of no value: doth not God
   direct us to the hidden paths, -- to the treasures that cannot be
   destroyed? Many say, "Who will show us any good? Lord, lift thou up the
   light of thy countenance upon us."

   (2.) We are to meet the Lord in the way of his ordinances, -- in the
   way of gospel worship. The exalting of the Lord Christ herein is the
   issue of all the mighty works of God: this is given in as the end of
   all, Rev. xxi. 3, "The tabernacle of God," etc. After great shakings,
   the promise still is of a new heaven and earth, Isa. lxv. 17; Rev. xxi.
   1; and this is that the people of God put themselves upon in the days
   wherein Babylon is to be destroyed, Jer. i. 4-8; that is the work they
   then take in hand. The end of all is the building of the temple, Ezek.
   xlvii. 1.; and this is the conclusion that the people of God do make,
   Isa. ii. 3, 4; and if this be neglected, the Lord will say of us, as
   David of Nabal, "Surely in vain have I kept these men, and all that
   they have." To meet the Lord in this also, --

   [1.] Inquire diligently into his mind and will, that you may know his
   paths, and be acquainted with his statutes. I dare say, no temptation
   in the world presses with more colour and violence upon men under
   mercies, than that [temptation] to a neglect of walking and holding
   communion with God in his ordinances. The devil thinks thus to revenge
   himself of the Lord Jesus; -- his own yoke being broken, he thinks to
   prevail to the casting away of his. Christ hath a yoke, though it be
   gentle and easy.

   [2.] You that do enjoy holy ordinances, labour to have holy hearts
   answerable thereunto. You have heavenly institutions, labour to have
   heavenly conversations. If we be like the world in our walking, it is
   no great matter if we be like the world in our worship. It is sad,
   walking contrary to God in his own paths. Show out the power and
   efficacy of all gospel institutions in a frame of spirit, course of
   life, and equability of spiritual temper, all your days.

   [3.] Keep up the power of private worship, both personal and family. I
   have seen many good laws for the Sabbath, and hope I shall see some
   good examples! Look what the roots are in the family; such will the
   fruit be in the church and commonwealth. If your spirits are not well
   manured there, you will be utterly barren elsewhere. That is done most
   clearly to God which is done within doors.

   (3.) Meet him in the way of his holiness. In the cry of the saints unto
   the Lord for the execution of his judgments and vengeance, they in an
   especial manner invocate his holiness, Rev. vi. 10, "How long, O Lord,
   holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that
   dwell on the earth?" And in their rendering praises to him, they still
   make mention of his holiness and righteousness in all his ways. Though
   the ways of God are commonly traduced as unequal and unholy ways, yet
   in the close there is no property of his that he will more vindicate in
   all his works than that of his holiness; in this, then, we are also to
   meet the Lord in this day of our deliverance, -- the day wherein he
   hath wrought such great and wonderful alterations.

   This use the Holy Ghost maketh upon such like dispensations, 2 Pet.
   iii. 11, "Seeing that all these things," etc.; and so also, Heb. xii.
   27, 28, "And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those
   things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things
   which cannot be shaken may remain. Wherefore, we receiving a kingdom
   which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God
   acceptably with reverence and godly fear." All things opposing removed,
   a freedom established, -- therefore let us have grace. God is the
   thrice holy one, -- holy in his nature, holy in his word, and holy in
   all his works; and he requires that his people be a holy people. To
   this he still urged his ancient people, from the argument of his
   presence amongst them. Oh, that the Spirit of the Lord would bring
   forth this one fruit of all his dealing with us, that we might be a
   holy people! If we put God's pure and dean mercies into impure and
   unclean vessels, they will to us be defiled. Let us take heed of
   prostituting the mighty works of God to the service of our lusts.
   Should we now make such conclusions to ourselves as the rich fool in
   the gospel, and say, Well, we have now peace and prosperity laid up for
   some years; -- soul, take try ease, eat, drink, and be merry; grow rich
   and great; follow after vanity, pride, folly, uncleanness; enjoy with
   delight the things which we have, and heap up thereto:-- why, as this
   is to labour to draw the Lord God into a partnership with our
   abominations, mad to enforce his mighty works to bear witness to our
   lusts, so certainly it is such a frame as he will surely and speedily
   revenge. The end why God delivers us from all our enemies is, not that
   we may serve our lusts and ourselves without fear; but that we may
   serve him without fear, in righteousness and holiness, all the days of
   our lives. Let, then, this be the issue upon our hearts of all the
   victories, and successes, and returns of prayers that we have received,
   that we give up ourselves to the Lord in all manner of holiness: this
   is that which the Lord's voice calls us unto. Let not now him that is
   filthy be filthy still; let not him that is worldly be worldly still;
   let not him that is loose, and hath east off the yoke of Christ, be so
   still; let not him that hath sought himself do so still; let not him
   who hath contemned the institutions of Christ do so still; let not him
   that hath been lifted up above his brethren be so still; -- but let
   every one forsake his evil way, and the iniquity that is in his hand,
   that we who were not a people at all may be a people to the praise of
   the God of all; that you who rule over men may be just, ruling in the
   fear of the Lord, that you may be as the light of the morning when the
   sun is risen, even as a morning without clouds, as the tender grass
   springing out of the earth by clear shining after rain; -- that we who
   are under rule may sit under our vines and fig-trees, speaking well of
   the name of God, and labouring to carry on the kingdom of the Prince of
   Peace, even every one as we are called, and abiding therein with God;
   -- that as, when you sought this mercy of God which we rejoice in, in
   solemn humbling of yourselves before the Lord, I made it appear unto
   you that it was the remnant of Jacob, God's secret and holy ones, lying
   in the bowels of the nation, that must be the rise of all our
   deliverances, so we would now every one strive to be of that number, --
   for they alone enjoy the sweetness of this and every mercy.
     __________________________________________________________________

   [295] Ps. xix. 1, 2; Rom. i. 20; Acts xiv. 16, 17.

   [296] Exod. vii. 11, 12.

   [297] 1 Sam. vi. 9.

   [298] Isa. vi. 9, 10.

   [299] Ezek. xx. 49.

   [300] xvii. 2.

   [301] 2 Chron. xxxvi. 17.

   [302] 2 Kings xxiv. 1-3.

   [303] Jer. xxxvii. 1; 2 Kings xxiv. 17; 2 Chron. xxxvi. 10.

   [304] Ps. xlv. 6; Hos. iii. 5; Isa. ix. 7, xvi. 5, xxii. 22; Jer.
   xxviii. 5; Amos ix. 11; Ezek. xxxiv. 23, 24, xxxvii. 24, 25.

   [305] 1 Cor. x. 11; Acts xv. 10; Gal. iii. 4.

   [306] Hag. ii. 6, 7; Heb. xii. 26, 27; Isa. viii. 9, 10, ix. 7, xlvi.
   10, liii. 10; Ps. xxxiii. 11; Prov. xix. 21, xxi. 30; Job xxiii. 13.

   [307] Isa. ix. 12, 13; Rev. xi. 15.

   [308] Exod. ii. 14; Acts vii. 27.

   [309] Isa. xliii. 14; Jer. xxv. 12, li. 35; Rev. xvi. 19.

   [310] Zech. iii. 3.

   [311] Rev. xiv. 4; John vi. 26.

   [312] Isa. xliii. 18; Ps. lxxviii. 42-44; Judges v. 15, 17, 23.

   [313] Num. xii. 6; 1 Kings xviii. 26.

   [314] Luke iii. 15; John i. 19, 20; Acts i. 6; Matt. xx. 21, 22, xiii.
   55, viii. 19; John iv. 28, 29; Isa. liii. 2, 3; Phil. ii. 7, 8, etc.

   [315] John iv. 22; Ps. cx. 2; Ezek. xlvii. 1; Zech. xiv. 8; Acts iv.
   13; 1 Cor. i. 20, 26-28.

   [316] Judges vii. 4.

   [317] Rom. ix. 18; Deut. ii. 30; Ps. lxxxi. 12, lxix. 22; Josh. xi. 20;
   Isa. vi. 9-12; John xii. 40-43; Deut. xxxii. 15.

   [318] Ezek. xviii. 2.
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   Sermon VIII.

   The labouring saint's dismission to rest:

   a sermon preached at

   the funeral of the Right Hon. Henry Ireton,

   Lord-deputy of Ireland,
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Prefatory note.

   This sermon on the death of Ireton, though printed, as we are told in
   the dedication, from the first notes which the author took, contains
   some beautiful and interesting thoughts, and is pervaded by a strain of
   peculiar tenderness and solemnity. Henry Ireton was the eldest son of
   German Ireton of Attenton, Nottinghamshire. He was born in 1610;
   entered Trinity College, Oxford, in 1626; and having graduated as
   bachelor of arts, devoted himself' to the study of law at the Middle
   Temple. He entered the parliamentary army when the civil war commenced,
   and gave proof of singular courage and capacity. In 1646 he married
   Bridget, the eldest daughter of Cromwell; and by the powerful interest
   which he thus secured, as well as his own abilities, he obtained rapid
   promotion in the army. At the battle of Naseby he commanded the left
   wing of the parliamentary army, and was defeated by the impetuous
   charge of Prince Rupert. Led in the ardour of the struggle beyond his
   own rank, he was himself wounded and taken prisoner, but contrived soon
   afterwards to make his escape. It was at his suggestion that the secret
   council of officers was held, to consider what course should be taken
   in disposing of the king's person. He was one of the judges on the
   king's trial, and signed the warrant for his execution. In 1649 he was
   second in command to Cromwell in Ireland, was made president of
   Munster, and afterwards was left as lord deputy when Cromwell returned
   to England. In the midst of a successful career, he was seized, after
   having taken Limerick, with an inflammatory fever, on the 16th of
   November, and died on the 26th, 1651. His memory was honoured by a
   public funeral, and his remains were interred in Henry the Seventh's
   Chapel in Westminster Abbey. His widow and his children, consisting of
   one son (Henry) and four daughters, had a grant of £2000 settled on
   them by Parliament out of the confiscated estates of the Duke of
   Buckingham. After the Restoration, his body was disinterred, gibbeted
   along with that of Cromwell, and buried at Tyburn.

   Various testimonies might be adduced in proof of the high esteem in
   which he was held by his party. Burner affirms, that "he had the
   principles and temper of a Cassius;" -- Hume, that "he was a memorable
   personage, much celebrated for his vigilance and capacity;" -- Noble
   ("Memoir of the Cromwell Family," vol. ii. p. 298), that "he was the
   most artful, dark, deliberate man of all the Republicans, by whom he
   was much beloved;" -- Heath ("Flagellum," p. 124), that "he was
   absolutely the best prayer-maker and preacher in the army; for which he
   may thank his education at Oxford;" -- Ludlow ("Memoir," vol. i. p.
   33), that "he erected for himself a more glorious monument in the
   hearts of good men, by his affection to his country, his abilities of
   mind, his impartial justice, his diligence in the public service, and
   his other virtues; which were a far greater honour to his memory than a
   dormitory among the ashes of kings;" -- and Carlyle ("Cromwell's
   Letters and Speeches," vol. i. p. 167) thus closes a reference to his
   death, -- "One brave and subtle-working brain has ended; to the regret
   of all the brave. A man, able with his pen and his sword; very stiff in
   his ways." -- Ed.
     __________________________________________________________________

To the honourable and my very worthy friend, Colonel Henry Cromwell.

   Sir,

   The ensuing sermon was preached upon as sad an occasion as on any
   particular account hath been given to this nation in this our
   generation. It is now published, as at the desire of very many who love
   the savour of that perfume which is diffused with the memory of the
   noble person peculiarly mentioned therein, so also upon the requests of
   such others as enables me justly to entitle the doing of it, obedience.
   Being come abroad, it was in my thoughts to have directed it
   immediately, in the first place, to her who, of any individual person,
   was most nearly concerned in him. But having observed how near she hath
   been to be swallowed up of sorrow, and what slow progress He who took
   care to seal up instruction to her soul by all dispensations, hath
   given her hitherto towards a conquest thereof, I was not willing to
   offer directly a new occasion unto the multitude of her perplexed
   thoughts about this thing. No doubt, her loss being as great as it
   could be, upon the account of one subject to the law of mortality, as
   many grains of grief and sorrow are to be allowed her in the balance of
   the sanctuary as God doth permit to be laid out and dispended about any
   of the sons of men. He who is able to make sweet the bitterest waters,
   and to give a gracious issue to the most grievous trial, will
   certainly, in due time, eminently bring forth that good upon her spirit
   which he is causing all these things to work together for. In the
   meantime, sir, these lines are to you: your near relation to that rare
   example of righteousness, faith, holiness, zeal, courage, self-denial,
   love to his country, wisdom, and industry, mentioned in the ensuing
   sermon; -- the mutual tender affection between you whilst he was
   living; -- your presence with him in his last trial and conflict; --
   the deserved regard you bear to his worth and memory; -- your design of
   looking into and following after his steps and purpose in the work of
   God in his generation, as such an accomplished pattern as few ages have
   produced the like, -- with many other reasons of the like nature, did
   easily induce me hereunto. That which is here printed is but the notes
   which I first took, not having had leisure since to give them a serious
   perusal; and upon that account must beg a candid interpretation unto
   any thing that may appear not so well digested therein as might be
   expected. I have not any thing to express concerning yourself, but only
   my desire that your heart may be fixed to the Lord God of your fathers;
   and that, in the midst of all your temptations and oppositions
   wherewith your pilgrimage will be attended, you may be carried on and
   established in your inward subjection unto, and outward contending for,
   the kingdom of the Dearly Beloved of our souls, not fainting or waxing
   weary until you receive your dismission to rest for your lot in the end
   of the days.

   Sir,

   Your most humble and affectionate Servant,

   J. Owen.

   Oxon, Chr. Ch., April 2.
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Sermon VIII. The labouring saint's dismission to rest.

   "But go thou thy way till the end be: for thou shalt rest, and stand in
   thy lot at the end of the days." -- Dan. xii. 13.

   The words of my text having no dependence (as to their sense and
   meaning, but only as to the occasion of them) on the verses foregoing,
   I shall not at all look backward into the chapter, but fall immediately
   upon them, that I be not hindered from my principal intendment; --
   being unwilling to detain you long, though willing to speak a word from
   the Lord to such a congregation, gathered together by such an eminent
   act of the providence of God.

   The words are the Lord's dismission given to a most eminent servant,
   from a most eminent employment, wherein these four things are
   observable:--

   First, The dismission itself in the first words: "Go thou thy ways."

   Secondly, The term allotted for his continuance under that dismission:
   "Until the end be."

   Thirdly, His state and condition under that dismission: "For thou shalt
   rest."

   Fourthly, The utmost issue of all this dispensation, both as to his
   foregoing labour, his dismission, and rest following: "Stand in thy lot
   at the end of the days."

   I. In the first I shall consider two things:-- 1. The person dismissed:
   "Thou;" 2. The dismission itself: "Go thou thy ways."

   1. The person dismissed is Daniel, the writer of this prophecy, who
   received all the great visions of God mentioned therein; and I desire
   to observe concerning him, as to our purpose in hand, two things:--
   (1.) His qualifications; (2.) His employment.

   (1.) For the first, I shall only name some of them that were most
   eminent in him, and they are three:-- [1.] Wisdom; [2.] Love to his
   people; [3.] Uprightness and righteousness in the discharge of that
   high place whereunto he was advanced.

   [1.] For the first, the Holy Ghost beareth ample testimony thereunto,
   Dan. i. 17, 20, "As for these four children, God gave them knowledge
   and skill in all learning and wisdom: and Daniel had understanding in
   all visions and dreams. And in all matters of wisdom and understanding,
   that the king inquired of them, he found them ten times better than all
   the magicians and astrologers that were in all his realm." In all
   matters of wisdom and understanding, none in the whole Babylonian
   empire, full of wise men and artists, were to be compared unto Daniel
   and his companions; and Ezekiel chap. xxviii. 3, rebuking the pride and
   arrogancy of Tyrus, with a bitter scorn he says, "Behold, thou art
   wiser than Daniel," or thou thinkest thyself so, -- intimating that
   none in wisdom was to be compared unto him.

   [2.] Love to his people. On this account was his most diligent inquiry
   into the time of their deliverance, and his earnest contending with
   God, upon the discovery of the season when it was to be accomplished,
   chap. ix. 1-4. Hence he is reckoned amongst them who in their
   generation stood in the gap in the behalf of others, -- "Noah, Daniel,
   and Job." Hence God calls the people of the Jews, his people, chap. ix.
   24, "Seventy weeks are determined on thy people;" -- the people of thy
   affections and desires, the people of whom thou art, and who are so
   dear unto thee.

   [3.] For his righteousness in discharging of his trust and office, you
   have the joint testimony of God and man:-- his high place and
   preferment you have, chap. vi. 2. He was the first of the three
   presidents who were set over the hundred and twenty other princes of
   the provinces; and the Holy Ghost tells you, that, in the discharge of
   this high trust and great employment, he was faithful to the utmost,
   verse 4, "Then the presidents and princes sought to find occasion
   against Daniel concerning the kingdom; but they could find none
   occasion nor fault; forasmuch as he was faithful, neither was there any
   error or fault found in him." Which also his enemies confessed, verse
   5, "Then said these men, We shall not find any occasion against this
   Daniel, except we find it against him concerning the law of his God."

   These qualifications, I say, amongst others, were most eminent in this
   person who here received his dismission from his employment.

   (2.) There is his employment itself, from which he is dismissed; and
   herein I shall observe these two things:-- [1.] The nature of the
   employment itself; [2.] Some considerable circumstances of it.

   [1.] For the first, it consisted in receiving from God, and holding out
   to others, clear and express visions concerning God's wonderful
   providential alterations in kingdoms and nations, which were to be
   accomplished from the days wherein he lived to the end of the world.
   All the prophets together had not so many clear discoveries as this one
   Daniel concerning these things.

   [2.] For the latter, this is observable, that all his visions still
   close with some eminent exaltation of the kingdom of Christ; -- that is
   the centre where all the lines of his visions do meet, as is to be seen
   in the close almost of every chapter; and this was the great intendment
   of the Spirit in all those glorious revelations unto Daniel, to
   manifest the subserviency of all civil revolutions unto the interest of
   the kingdom of the Lord Christ.

   This, then, is the person concerning whom these words were used, and
   this was his employment.

   2. There is his dismission itself: "Go thou thy ways." Now this may be
   considered two ways:-- (1.) Singly, relating to his employment only;
   (2.) In reference to his life also.

   (1.) In the first sense, the Lord dischargeth Daniel from his farther
   attendance on him, in this way of receiving visions and revelations
   concerning things that were shortly to come to pass, although haply his
   portion might yet be continued in the land of the living: as if the
   Lord should say, Thou art an inquiring man; thou art still seeking for
   farther acquaintance with my mind in these things; -- but content
   thyself, thou shalt receive no more visions; I will now employ Haggai,
   Zechariah, and others; thou shalt receive no more. But I cannot close
   with this sense, for, --

   [1.] This is not the manner of God, to lay aside those whom he hath
   found faithful in his service. Men, indeed, do so; but God changeth
   not: whom he hath begun to honour with any employment, he continueth
   them in it whilst they are faithful to him.

   [2.] Daniel was now above a hundred years old, as may be easily
   demonstrated by comparing the time of his captivity, which was in the
   third year of the reign of Jehoiakim chap. i. 1, with the time of his
   writing this prophecy, which is expressly said to be in the reign of
   Cyrus, the king of Persia, chap. x. 1; and, therefore, probably his end
   was very nigh. And after this you hear of him no more; who, had he
   lived many days, it had been his sin not to have gone up to Jerusalem,
   the decree of Cyrus, giving liberty for a return, being passed.

   (2.) It is not, then, God's laying him aside from his office simply,
   but also his intimation that he must shortly lay down his mortality,
   and so come, into the condition wherein he was to "rest" until the end.
   This, then, is his dismission. He died in his work; -- life and
   employment go together. "Go thou thy ways."

   Observation I. There is an appointed season, wherein, the saints of the
   most eminent abilities, in the most useful employments, must receive
   their dismission:-- be their work of never so great importance, be
   their abilities never so choice and eminent, they must in their season
   receive their dismission.

   Before I handle this proposition, or proceed to open the following
   words, I shall crave leave to bring the work of God and the word of God
   a little close together, and lay the parallel between the persons
   dismissed, -- the one in our text, the other in a present providence,
   which is very near, only that the one lived not out half the days of
   the other.

   1. Three personal qualifications we observed in Daniel, all which were
   very eminent in the person of our desires.

   (1.) Wisdom. There is a manifold wisdom which God imparteth to the sons
   of men. There is spiritual wisdom, that, by the way of eminency, is
   said to be "from above," James iii. 17; which is nothing but the
   gracious acquaintance of the soul with the hidden wisdom of God in
   Christ, 1 Cor. ii. 7. And there is a civil wisdom, or a sound ability
   of mind for the management of the affairs of men, in subordination to
   the providence and righteousness of God. Though both these were in
   Daniel, yet it is in respect of the latter that his wisdom is so
   peculiarly extolled. And though I am very far from assuming to myself
   the skill of judging of the abilities of men, and would be far from
   holding forth things of mere common report; yet, upon assured grounds,
   I suppose this gift of God, -- ability of mind, and dexterous industry
   for the management of human affairs, -- may be ascribed to our departed
   friend.

   There are sundry things that distinguish this wisdom from that policy
   which God abhors; which is "carnal, sensual, and devilish," James iii.
   15, though it be the great darling of the men of the world. I shall
   name one or two of them.

   [1.] A gracious discerning of the mind of God, according to his
   appearance in the affairs wherein men are employed, Mic. vi. 9, "The
   Lord's voice crieth unto the city, and the man of wisdom shall see try
   name: hear ye the rod, and who hath appointed it." It is the wisdom of
   a man, to see the name of God, to be acquainted with his will, his
   mind, his aim in things, when his providential voice crieth to the
   city. All the works of God have their voice, -- have their instruction;
   -- those of signal providences speak aloud; they cry to the city, Here
   is the wisdom of a man: he is a man of substance, [319] a substantial
   man, that can see his name in such dispensations. This carnal policy
   inquires not into, but is wholly swallowed up in the concatenation of
   things among themselves; applying secondary causes unto events, without
   once looking to the name of God, -- like swine following acorns under
   the tree, not at all looking up to the tree from whence they fall.

   [2.] Such acquaintance with the seasons of providence as to know the
   duty of the people of God in them, 1 Chron. xii. 32, "The children of
   Issachar, men that had understanding of the times, to know what Israel
   ought to do." This it is indeed to be a man of understanding, -- to
   know in any season the duty of Israel, that they may walk up to
   acceptation with God in the performance thereof; -- a thing which is
   neither prescribed in the rules nor followed in the practice of men
   wise only with that cursed policy which God abhors. To have a mind
   suited unto all seasons and tempers, so as to compass their own selfish
   ends, is the utmost of their aim.

   Now, in both these did this gift of God shine in this deceased saint.

   1st, He ever counted it his wisdom to look after the name of God, and
   the testification of his will, in every dispensation of providence
   wherein he was called to serve. For this were his wakings, watchings,
   inquires. When that was made out, he counted not his business half
   done, but even accomplished, and that the issue was ready at the door:
   not, What saith this man? or, What saith that man? -- rebut, What saith
   the Lord? that being evident. He consulted not with flesh and blood,
   and the wisdom of it; whereof, perhaps, would he have leaned to it, he
   was as little destitute as any in his generation, -- I mean, the whole
   wisdom of a man. The name of God was as land in every storm; -- in the
   discovery whereof he had as happy all eye, at the greatest seeming
   distance, when the clouds were blackest and the waves highest, as any.

   2d, Neither did he rest here. "What Israel ought to do" in every
   season, was also his inquiry. Some men have a wisdom to know things,
   but not seasons, in any measure. Surely a thing in season is no less
   beautiful than a word in season; -- "as apples of gold in pictures of
   silver." There are few things that belong to civil affairs but are
   alterable upon the incomprehensible variety of circumstances. These
   alter and change the very nature of them, and make them good or bad;
   that is, useful or destructive. He that will have the garment that was
   made for him one year serve and fit him the next, must be sure that he
   neither increase nor wane. Importune insisting on the most useful
   things, without respect to alterations of seasons, is a sad sign of a
   narrow heart. He of whom we speak was wise to "discern the seasons,"
   and performed things when both themselves and the ways of carrying them
   on were excellently suited unto all coincidences of their season And,
   indeed, what is most wisely proposed in one season may be most
   foolishly pursued in another. It had been wisdom in Joshua not to have
   made any compact, but to have slain all the Gibeonites; but it was a
   folly sorely revenged in Saul, who attempted to do the same. He who
   thinks the most righteous and suitable proposals or principles that
   ever were in the world (setting aside general rules of unchangeable
   righteousness and equity, compassing all times, places, ways, and forms
   of government), must be performed, as desirable, because once they were
   so, is certainly a stranger to the affairs of human kind.

   Some things are universally unchangeable and indispensable amongst men,
   supposing them to live answerable to the general principles of their
   kind:-- as, that a government must be; without which every one is the
   enemy of every one, and all tend to mutual destruction, which are
   appointed of God for mutual preservation; -- that in government some do
   rule, and some be in subjection; -- that all rule be for the good of
   them that are ruled; and the like principles, that flow necessarily
   from the very nature of political society.

   Some things, again, are alterable and dispensable merely upon the
   account of preserving the former principles, or the like. If any of
   them are out of course, it is a vacuum in nature politic, for which all
   particular elements instantly dislodge and transpose themselves to
   supply. And such are all forms of governments amongst men; which, if
   either they so degenerate of themselves that they become directly
   opposite, or are so shattered by providential revolutions as to become
   useless, to their proper end, may and ought to be changed, and not upon
   other accounts. But now for other things in government, -- as the
   particular way whereby persons shall be designed unto it, -- the
   continuance of the same persons in it for a less or greater proportion
   of time, -- the exercise of more or less power by some sorts, or the
   whole body of them that are ruled, -- the uniting of men for some
   particular end by bonds and engagements, and the like occasional
   emergencies, -- the universal disposal of them is rolled on prudence to
   act according to present circumstances.

   (2.) Love to his people. This was the second qualification wherein
   Daniel was so eminent. And our deceased friend -- not to enter into
   comparison with them that went before -- had clearly such a proportion
   as we may heartily desire that those who follow after may drink but
   equal draughts of the same cup. That his pains, labour, travail,
   jeopards of his life and all that was dear to him, relinquishment of
   relations and contentments, had sweetness and life from this motive,
   even intenseness of affection to his people, the people of whom he was,
   and whose prosperity he did desire, needs no farther demonstration than
   the great neglect of self and all self-concernments which dwelt upon
   him in all his tremendous undertakings. "Vicit amor patriæ," or
   certainly he who had upon his breast and all his undertakings
   self-contempt so eminently engraven, could not have persisted wrestling
   with so many difficulties to the end of his days. It was Jerusalem and
   the prosperity thereof which was preferred to his chief joy. Neither,
   --

   (3.) Did he come short in righteousness in the administration of that
   high place whereto he was called; nay, than this there was not a more
   eminent stone in that diadem which he had on the earth. If he lay not
   at the bottom, yet at least he had a signal concurrence in such acts of
   justice as antiquity hath not known, and posterity will admire. Neither
   was it this or that particular act that did in this bespeak his praise,
   but a constant will and purpose of rendering to every one his due.

   I shall not insist upon particulars: in these and sundry other personal
   qualifications, between the persons mentioned a parallel may lie.

   2. As to employment, that of Daniel was mentioned before: it was the
   receiving and holding out from God visions of providential alterations,
   disposing and transposing of states, nations, kingdoms, and dominions.
   What he had in speculation was this man's part to follow in action. He
   was an eminent instrument in the hand of God in as tremendous
   providential alterations as such a spot of the world hath at any time
   received, since Daniel foresaw in general them all: and this, not as
   many have been, carried along with the stream, or led by outward
   motives and considerations far above their own principles and desires,
   but seemingly and knowingly he closed with the mind of God, with full
   purpose of heart to serve the will of the Lord in his generation. And
   on this account did he see every mountain made a plain beforehand by
   the Spirit of the Lord, and "staggered not at the greatest difficulties
   through unbelief; but being steadfast in faith, he gave glory to God."
   And to complete the parallel, -- as Daniel's visions were still
   terminated in the kingdom of Christ, so all his actions had the same
   aim and intendment. This was that which gave life and sweetness to all
   the most dismal and black engagements that at any time he was called
   out unto. All made way to the coming in of the promised glory. It was
   all the "vengeance of the Lord and his temple," -- a Davidical
   preparation of his paths in blood, that He might for ever reign in
   righteousness and peace. But be he so or so, the truth of our
   proposition is confirmed towards him, That there is as appointed
   season, when the saints of the most eminent abilities, in the most
   useful employments, shall receive their dismission, etc.

   I shall briefly open the rest of the words, and so take up the
   proposition again which was first laid down.

   II. Then, there is the term allotted to him in this state of his
   dismission: "Until the end be."

   Three things may be here intended in this word, "end."

   1. The end of his life: "Go thou thy ways to the end of thy life and
   days." But this we before disallowed, not consenting that Daniel
   received a dismission from his employment before the end of his life
   and pilgrimage.

   2. The end of the world: "Go thy ways to the end of the world: till
   then thou shalt rest in thy grave." But neither yet doth this seem to
   be particularly intended in these words. The words in the close of the
   text do expressly mention that, calling it "the end of days;" and in so
   few words, the same thing is not needlessly repeated: besides, had this
   expression held out the whole time of his abode in the state of rest
   here signified, it must have been, "Go thou thy ways, for thou shalt
   rest until the end be." So that, --

   3. The "end" here is to be accommodated unto the things whereof the
   Holy Ghost is peculiarly dealing with Daniel; and that is, the
   accomplishment of the great visions which he had received, in breaking
   the kingdoms of the world, and setting up the kingdom of the Holy One
   of God. Daniel is dismissed from farther attendance in this service; he
   shall not see the actual accomplishment of the things mentioned, but is
   dismissed, and laid aside unto the end of them. The word "until," in
   the Scripture, is not such a limitation of time as to assert the
   contrary to what is excepted, upon its accomplishment "Until the end,"
   doth not signify that he should not rest after the end of the things
   intimated; no more than it is affirmed that Michal had children after
   her death, because it is said that until her death she had none, 2 Sam.
   vi. 23. This, then, is that end that he is dismissed unto, -- The
   appointed season for the accomplishment of those glorious things which
   he had foreshown.

   Observation II. God oftentimes suffers not his choicest servants to see
   the issue and accomplishment of those glorious things wherein
   themselves have been most eminently engaged.

   III. The third thing (that we may make haste) is his state and
   condition during the time which he lies under this dismission, in these
   words, "For thou shalt rest."

   There is nothing of difficulty in these words, but what will naturally
   fall under consideration in the opening of the proposition which they
   hold out: which is, --

   Observation III. The condition of a dismissed saint is a condition of
   rest: "Thou shalt rest until the end be."

   What this rest is, and from what, with wherein it consists, shall be
   afterward explained.

   IV. The last thing in the text is the utmost issue of all these
   dispensations, both as to his foregoing labour and his present
   dismission, and following rest: "Thou shalt stand in thy lot," etc.

   Here are two things considerable in these words.

   1. The season of the accomplishment of what is here foretold and
   promised unto Daniel; and that is, "in the end of the days;" that is,
   when time shall be no more, when a period shall be put to the days of
   the world:-- called "the last day, the great day, the day of judgment;"
   that is, the season of the accomplishment of this promise, "The day
   wherein God will judge the world by the man whom he hath ordained."

   Observation IV. There is an appointed, determinate season, wherein all
   things and persons, according to the will of God, will run into their
   utmost issue and everlasting condition.

   2. The thing foretold and promised; that is, that he should "stand in
   his lot."

   Observation V. There is an appointed lot for every one to stand in, and
   measured portion, which in the end they shall receive.

   Observation VI. There is an eminent lot hereafter, for men of eminent
   employment for God here.

   I shall not be able to handle all these several truths which lie in the
   words; those only which are of most importance, and most suitable, may
   briefly be handled unto you. And the first is, --

   Observation I. There is an appointed season wherein the saints of the
   most eminent abilities, in the most useful employments, must receive
   their dismission.

   Zech. i. 5, "Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they
   live for ever?" Fathers and prophets have but their season, and they
   are not: they have their dismission. So old Simeon professeth, "Nunc
   Dimittis," Luke ii. 29; -- Now, thou givest me a dismission. They are
   placed of God in their station, as a sentinel in his watch-tower; and
   they have their appointed season, and are then dismissed from their
   watch. The great Captain of their salvation comes, and saith, Go thou
   thy ways: thou hast faithfully discharged thy duty; go now unto thy
   rest. Some have harder service, -- some have harder duty than others.
   Some keep guard in the winter, -- a time of storms and temptations,
   trials and great pressures; others in the sunshine, the summer of a
   more flourishing estate and condition. Yet duty they all do; -- all
   attend in the service, -- all endure some hardship, and have their
   appointed season for their dismission: and be they never so excellent
   at the discharging of their duty, they shall not abide one moment
   beyond the bounds which he hath set them, who saith to all his
   creatures, Thus far shall you go, and no farther. Oftentimes this
   dismission is in the midst of their work for which they seem to be most
   eminently qualified.

   The three most eminent works of God, in and about his children, in the
   days of old, were his giving his people the law, and settling them in
   the land of Canaan; -- his recovering them from the Babylonish
   captivity; -- and his promulgation of the gospel unto them. In these
   three works he employed three most eminent persons; -- Moses in the
   first, Daniel in the second, and John Baptist in the third; and none of
   them saw the work accomplished wherein they were so eminently employed.
   Moses died the year before the people entered Canaan: Daniel, some few
   years before the foundation of the temple; and John Baptist in the
   first year of the baptism of our Saviour, when the gospel which he
   began to preach was to be published in its beauty and glory. They had
   all but their appointed seasons. Though their abilities were eminent,
   -- who like unto them! and their employment excellent, -- what like it
   in the earth! yet, at their seasons, they must go their ways to rest,
   and lie down, till they stand in their lot at the end of the days. The
   reasons of which are, --

   1. The general condition of their mortality doth require that it should
   be so: "It is appointed to all men once to die," Heb. ix. 27. There is
   a stable law fixed concerning the sons of men, that is not upon the
   account of any usefulness here to be dispensed withal. The number of
   our months is with God; he hath fixed our bounds, which we shall not
   pass. Our days are as the days of an hireling, that have a certain,
   prefixed, and determinate end. Their strength is not the strength of
   stones, neither is their flesh of brass, that they should endure for
   ever. See Job xiv. 10-12. This, I say, requires that there should be an
   appointed season for their employment, for it is so for their lives.
   And yet there is more in it than this; for in the course of five
   thousand years, God hath exempted two persons by his sovereignty from
   the condition of mortality, who walked with him in their generations:
   so that the bounds fixed to them were not upon the account of their
   lives, but merely of the work they had in hand.

   2. God doth it, that he may be the more eminently seen in the carrying
   on his own works, which in their season he commits to them. Should he
   leave his work always on one hand, it would seem at length to be the
   work of the instrument only. Though the people opposed Moses at the
   first, yet it is thought they would have worshipped him at the last:
   and therefore God buried him where his body could not be found. Yet,
   indeed, he had but the lot of most who faithfully serve God in their
   generations; -- despised whilst they are present, -- idolized when they
   are gone. I do not know of any great work that the Lord carried out the
   same persons to be the beginners and enders of. He gave them all their
   seasons, that his power and wisdom might the more evidently appear in
   carrying it from one hand to another.

   3. God makes room, as it were, in his vineyard for the budding,
   flourishing, and fruit-bearing of other plants which he hath planted.
   Great employments call for great exercise of graces. Even in
   employments in and about providential things, there is the exercise of
   spiritual grace; -- as much faith and prayer, as much communion with
   God, walking before him, and wrestling with him, may be used in casting
   down of armies, as in setting up of churches. God exerciseth all the
   graces of his in the work he calleth them out unto. He principles them
   by faith and fellowship with himself for their employment; and
   therefore he gives each individual but his appointed season, that
   others, in whose hearts he hath lodged the same spirit wherewith they
   are endued, may come forth and show the fruits thereof. Daniel lieth
   down in the dust in rest and peace. And why so? The spirit of prophecy
   is poured out on Haggai and Zechariah, etc.; they must also carry on
   this work, and bear my name before my people. Consider the use of this.

   Use 1. Of exhortation unto all that are employed in the work of God,
   especially such as with eminent abilities are engaged in eminent
   employments. You have but your allotted season for your work; -- your
   day hath its close, its evening; your night cometh, wherein none can
   work. The grave cannot praise the Lord; death cannot celebrate him: it
   is the living, the living that are fitted for that work, Isa. xxxviii.
   18, 19. It is true, men may allot you your season, and all in vain; but
   your times are in the hand of God, -- that which he hath appointed out
   unto you shall stand. Be you never so excellent, never so useful, yet
   the days of your service "are as the days of an hireling," that will
   expire at the appointed season. Be wise, then, to improve the time that
   is in your hands. This is the praise of a man, the only praise whereof
   in this world he is partaker, that he doth the will of God before he
   fall asleep; that he faithfully serves his generation, until he be no
   more. For a dying man to wrestle with the rebukes of God and the
   complaints of his own conscience, for meeting with the end of his days
   before he hath attained the midst of his duty, is a sad condition. You
   have your season, and you have but your season; neither can you lie
   down in peace, until you have some persuasion that your work as well as
   your life is at an end. Whatever, then, you find to do, do it with all
   your strength; for there is neither wisdom nor power in the grave,
   whither you are going, Eccles. ix. 10.

   Some particular rules may direct you herein.

   (1.) Compare yourselves with the saints of God, who were faithful in
   their generations, and are now fallen asleep. What a deal of work did
   Josiah do in a short season! what a light did John set up in a few
   years! with what unwearied pains and industry did our deceased friend
   serve his generation! It is said of Cæsar, that he was ashamed of his
   own sloth, when he found that Alexander had conquered the eastern world
   at the age wherein he had done nothing. Behold here one receiving his
   dismission about the age of forty years; and what a world of work for
   God and the interest of the Lord Christ did he in that season! and how
   well, in the close, hath he parted with a temporal life for Him who, by
   his death, procured for him an eternal life! And now rest is sweet unto
   this labouring man. Provoke one another by examples.

   (2.) Be diligent to pass through your work, and let it not too long
   hang upon your hands; your appointed season may come before you bring
   it to the close; -- yea, search out work for God. You that are
   intrusted in power, trifle not away your season. Is there no oppressed
   person that with diligence you might relieve? is there no poor
   distressed widow or orphan whose righteous requests you might expedite
   and despatch? -- are there no stout offenders against God and man that
   might be chastised? -- are there no slack and slow counties and cities
   in the execution of justice, that might be quickened by your example?
   -- no places destitute of the gospel that might be furnished and
   supplied by your industry and wisdom? Can you not find out something of
   this or the like nature to be despatched with vigour and diligence?
   nay, do not innumerable particulars in each kind lie upon your hands?
   and is not your non-performance of them such a sacrifice as wherewith
   God is not well pleased? Your time is limited and appointed; you know
   not how soon you may be overtaken with it; and would it not be
   desirable unto you, that you had done these things? will it be
   bitterness in the end, that you so laid out your endeavours?

   Use 2. All men have but their seasons in any work; only God abideth in
   it for ever: in every undertaking let your eye still be on him, with
   whom is the fulness and the residue of the Spirit. Jeremiah's great
   bewailing of Josiah's death was doubtless made upon the account of his
   discerning that none would come after him to carry on the work which he
   had begun, but the wickedness of that people was to come to its height;
   -- else God can raise up yet more Josiahs. Let him be eyed as the
   principal and only abiding agent in any great undertaking.

   In the residue of the observations I shall be very brief. The next is,
   --

   Observation II. God oftentimes suffers not the choicest of his servants
   to see the accomplishment of those glorious things wherein themselves
   have been most eminently engaged.

   The case of Moses is most eminently known. He had a large share in
   suffering the persecutions Which were allotted to the people:-- forty
   years' banishment he endured in the wilderness, under the reproach of
   Christ; -- forty years more spent in wrestling with innumerable
   difficulties, dangerous perils, mutinies, wars, and contentions. At the
   close, when he comes to look upon the land, -- when the end of all that
   dispensation was to be wound up, and the rest and reward of all his
   toil and labour to be had, which formerly he had undergone for twice
   forty years, -- "Go thou thy ways," saith the Lord; "thou shalt rest;"
   -- take thy dismission; thou shalt not enter into the good land; lie
   down here in the wilderness in peace.

   John Baptist goes and preaches the drawing nigh of the kingdom of God,
   but lived only to point out Christ with his finger; cries, "Behold the
   Lamb of God; I must decrease," -- and is cut off. David makes the great
   preparation for the temple; but he shall not see so much as the
   foundation laid. Men must take their appointed lot. God will send by
   the hand of him whom he will send. Daniel must rest until the end be.
   It is said of some, they began to deliver Israel. The case of
   Zerubbabel was very rare, who saw the foundation and also the top-stone
   of the temple laid; and yet the work of Jerusalem was not half finished
   in his days, as you may see, Zech. i. And this because, --

   1. God oftentimes receives secret provocations from the choicest of his
   servants, which move him to take them short of their desires. Those of
   his own whom he employs in great works, have great and close communion
   with him. God usually exercises their spirits in near acts of
   fellowship with himself: they receive much from him, and are
   constrained to unburden themselves frequently upon him. Now, when men
   are brought into an intimacy with God, and have received great
   engagements from him, the Lord takes notice of every working and acting
   of their souls in an especial manner, and is oftentimes grieved and
   provoked with that in them which others can take no notice of. Let a
   man read the story of that action of Moses upon which the Lord told him
   directly he should not see the finishing of the work he had in hand,
   nor enter into Canaan, Num. xx. 7, 8, 11. It will be a hard matter to
   find out wherein the failing was. He smote the rock with the rod, with
   some words of impatience, when he should only have spoken to it, -- and
   this with some secret unbelief as to the thing he had in hand. God
   deals with others visibly, according to their outward actions; but in
   his own he takes notice of all their unbelief, fears, withdrawings, as
   proceeding from a frame in no measure answering those gracious
   discoveries of himself which he hath made unto them; and on this
   account it is that some are taken off in the midst of their work.

   2. To manifest that he hath better things in store for his saints than
   the best and utmost of what they can desire or aim at here below, he
   had a heaven for Moses; and therefore might in love and mercy deny him
   Canaan. He employeth some eminently; -- their work is great, -- their
   end glorious: at the very last step almost of their journey he takes
   off one and another, -- lets them not see the things aimed at. This may
   be thought hard measure, strict severity, exact justice, -- yea, as Job
   complains, "taking advantages against them;" but see what he calls them
   to, in calling them off from their greatest glories and excellencies on
   the earth, and all this will appear to be love, tenderness, and favour
   in the highest. Whilst you are labouring for a handful of first-fruits,
   he gives you the full harvest; whilst you are labouring for the figure
   here below, he gives you the substance above. Should you see the
   greatest work wherein any of you were ever engaged brought to
   perfection, yet all were but a few drops, compared with that fulness
   which he hath prepared for you. The Lord, then, doth it to witness to
   the children of men that the things which are seen -- the best of them
   -- are not to be compared with the things that are not seen, yea, the
   least of them; inasmuch as he takes them whom he will honour from the
   very door of the one, to bear them into the other. The meanest
   enjoyment in heaven is to be preferred before the richest on earth,
   even then when the kingdom of Christ shall come in most beauty and
   glory.

   Use 1. You that are engaged in the work of God, seek for a reward of
   your service in the service itself. Few of you may live to see that
   beauty and glory which perhaps you aim at as the end of all your great
   undertakings for God whereunto you have been engaged. God will proceed
   at his own pace, and calls on us to go along with him; and in the
   meantime, until the determinate end come, to wait in faith, and not
   make haste. Those whose minds are so fixed on, and swallowed up with,
   some end (though good) which they have proposed to themselves, do
   seldom see good days and serene in their own souls. They have
   bitterness, wrath, and trouble all their days, -- are still pressing to
   the end proposed, and commonly are dismissed from their station before
   it be attained. There is a sweetness, there is wages to be found in the
   work of God itself. Men who have learned to hold communion with God in
   every work he calls them out unto, though they never see the main
   harvest they aim at in general, yet such will rest satisfied, and
   submit to the Lord's limitation of their time:-- they bear their own
   sheaves in their bosoms. Seeing God oftentimes dismisses his choicest
   servants before they see or taste of the main fruits of their
   endeavours, I see not upon what account consolation can be had in
   following the Lord in difficult dispensations, but only in that reward
   which every duty bringeth along with it, by communion with God in its
   performance. Make, then, this your aim, that in sincerity of heart you
   do the work of God in your generation. Find his presence with you, his
   Spirit guiding you, his love accepting you in the Lord Christ; and,
   whenever you receive your dismission, it will be rest and peace, -- in
   the meantime, you will not make haste.

   Use 2. See a bottom and ground of consolation when such eminent
   instruments as this departed worthy are called off from their station,
   when ready to enter upon the harvest of all their labours, watchings,
   toilings, and expense of blood. God hath better things for them in
   store, abiding things, that they shall not enjoy for a day or two, --
   which is the best of what they could hope for here, had they lived to
   see all their desires accomplished, but such as in the fulness whereof
   they may lie down in peace to eternity. Why do we complain? -- for our
   own loss? is not the residue and fulness of the Spirit with Him who
   gave him his dismission? -- for his loss? he lived not to see Ireland
   in peace, but enjoys the glory of that eternal kingdom that was
   prepared for him before the foundation of the world; which is the
   condition held out in the third observation.

   Observation III. The condition of a dismissed saint is a condition of
   rest: "Go thy way until the end be; for thou shalt rest."

   The apostle gives it in as the issue of a discourse from a passage in
   the Psalms, "There remaineth therefore a rest for the people of God,"
   Heb. iv. 9; -- it remains and is reserved for them; this the Lord hath
   solemnly proclaimed from heaven, Rev. xiv. 13, "Blessed are the dead
   which die in the Lord from henceforth: yea, saith the Spirit, that they
   may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them." They go
   into a blessed condition of rest. There is not any notion under which
   the state of a dismissed saint is so frequently described as this of
   "rest," -- which, indeed, is the proper end and tendency of all things.
   Their happiness is their rest; their rest is all the happiness they can
   be partakers of: "Fecisti nos ad te, Domine, et inquietum est cor
   nostrum, donec veniat ad te." [320]

   Now, "rest" holds out two things unto us:-- A freedom from what is
   opposite thereunto, wherein those that are at rest have been exercised,
   in reference whereunto they are said to be at rest; and something which
   suits them and satisfies their nature in the condition wherein they
   are; and, therefore, they are at rest: which they could not be were it
   not so with them; for nothing can rest but in the full fruition and
   enjoyment of that which satiates the whole nature of it in all its
   extent and capacity. We must briefly inquire, -- 1. What it is that the
   saints are at rest from; and, 2. What it is that they are at rest in.
   Which I shall do very speedily.

   1. The many particulars which they are at rest from may be referred
   unto two general heads:-- (1.) Sin; (2.) Labour and travail.

   (1.) Sin. This, on all considerations whatever, is the main
   disquietness of the soul. Temptations to it, actings in it, troubles
   for it, -- they are the very Egypt of the soul, its house and place of
   bondage and vexation; -- either the power of it indwelling, or the
   guilt of it pressing, are here still disquieting the soul. For the
   first, how doth Paul complain, lament, yea, cry out concerning it, Rom.
   vii. 24, "O wretched man that I am!" and what a sad, restless, and
   tumultuating condition upon this account doth he describe in the verses
   foregoing! The best, the wisest, the holiest of the saints on this
   account are in a restless condition. Suppose a man a conqueror in every
   battle, in every combat that he is engaged in; yet whilst he hath any
   fighting, though he be never foiled, he hath not peace. Though the
   saints should have success in every engagement against sin, yet because
   it will still be rebelling, still be fighting, it will disturb their
   peace. So also doth the guilt of it; -- our Saviour testifieth, that a
   sense of it will make a man to be "weary and heavy laden," Matt. xi.
   28. This oftentimes makes the inhabitants of Zion say they are sick;
   for though an end be made of sin, as to the guilt of it, in the blood
   of Christ, yet, by reason of our darkness, folly, and unbelief, and the
   hiding of the countenance of God, the conscience is oftentimes pressed
   with it, no less than if it lay indeed under the whole weight and
   burden of it.

   I shall not instance in more particulars concerning this cause of want
   of rest and disquietness; -- the perplexity of temptations, buffetings
   and winnowings of Satan, allurements and affrightments of the world,
   darkness and sorrows of unbelief, and the like, do all set in against
   us upon this account.

   This, in general, is the first thing that the dismissed saints are at
   rest from: They sin no more, they wound the Lord Jesus no more, they
   trouble their own souls no more, they grieve the Spirit no more, they
   dishonour the gospel no more, -- they are troubled no more with Satan's
   temptations without, no more with their own corruption within; but lie
   down in a constant enjoyment of one everlasting victory over sin, with
   all its attendants: saith the Spirit, "They rest from their labours,"
   Rev. xiv. 1, -- those labours which make them faint and weary, their
   contending with sin to the uttermost. They are no more cold in
   communion; they have not one thought that wanders off from God to
   eternity. They lose him no more, but always lie down in his bosom,
   without the least possibility of disturbance. Even the very remembrance
   of sin is sweet unto them, when they see God infinitely exalted and
   admired in the pardon thereof. They are free from trouble, and that
   both as to doing and suffering. Few of the saints but are called out,
   in one kind or another, to both these. Every one is either doing for
   God or suffering for God; -- some both do and suffer great things for
   him. In either of them there is pain, weariness, travail, labour,
   trouble, sorrow, and anxiety of spirit; neither is there any eminent
   doing or working for God but is carried on with much suffering to the
   outward man.

   What a life of labour and trouble did our deceased friend lead for many
   years in the flesh! how were his days consumed in travail! God calling
   him to his foot, and exercising him to understand the sweetness of that
   promise, that they that die in him shall have rest. Many spend their
   days deliciously, -- with so much contentment to the flesh that it is
   impossible they should have any foretaste and sweet relish of their
   rest that is to come.

   The apostle tells us that "there remaineth a rest for the people of
   God;" and yet withal, that they who believe are entered into that rest;
   -- those who in their labours, in their travails, do take in the
   sweetness of that promise of rest, do even in their labour make an
   entrance thereinto.

   (2.) They rest from all trouble and anxiety that attend them in their
   pilgrimage, either in doing or suffering for God, Heb. iv. 10. They
   enter into rest, and cease from their works. God wipes all tears from
   their eyes. There is no more watching, no more fasting, no more
   wrestling, no more fighting, no more blood, no more sorrow; the
   ransomed of the Lord do return with everlasting joy on their heads, and
   sorrow and sighing flee away. There, tyrants pretend no more title to
   their kingdom; rebels lie not in wait for their blood; they are no more
   awakened by the sound of the trumpet, nor the noise of the instruments
   of death:-- they fear not for their relations, they weep not for their
   friends; the Lamb is their temple, and God is all in all unto them.
   Yet, --

   2. This will not complete their rest; something farther is required
   thereto, -- even something to satisfy, everlastingly content, and fill
   them in the state and condition wherein they are. Free them in your
   thoughts from what you please, without this they are not at rest. This,
   then, you have in the second place, God is the rest of their souls, Ps.
   cxvi. 1, "Return to thy rest, O my soul." Dismissed saints rest in the
   bosom of God, because in the fruition and enjoyment of him they are
   everlastingly satisfied, as having attained the utmost end whereto they
   were created, all the blessedness whereof they are capable. I could
   almost beg for liberty a little to expatiate in this meditation of the
   sweet, gracious, glorious, satisfied condition of a dismissed saint.
   But the time is spent, and therefore, -- without holding out one drop
   of water to quench the feigned fire of purgatory; or drawing forth
   anything to discover the vanity of their assertion who affirm the soul
   to sleep, or to be nothing until the resurrection; or theirs who,
   assigning to them a state of subsistence and perception, do yet exclude
   them from the fruition of God, without which there is no rest, until
   the end of all; with such other by-persuasions as would disquiet the
   condition or abridge the glory of those blessed souls; which yet were a
   facile undertaking, -- I shall draw towards a close.

   There are three points yet remaining. I shall speak only to the first
   of them, and that as an use of the doctrine last proposed, and I have
   done.

   Observation IV. There is an appointed determinate season, wherein all
   things and persons, according to the will of God, wall run into their
   utmost issue and everlasting condition.

   Thou art going, whoever thou art, into an abiding condition and there
   is a lot appointed for thee, wherein lies an estate everlastingly
   unchangeable. It is the utmost end whereunto thou art designed, and
   when once thou art entered into that lot, thou art everlastingly
   engaged: no more change, no more alteration; if it be well with thee,
   it will abide; if otherwise, expect not any relief. In our few days we
   live for eternity; in our mutable estate we deal for an unchangeable
   condition. It is not thus only in respect of particulars, but God hath
   "appointed a day, wherein he will judge all the world by the man whom
   he hath ordained." An end is coming unto all that whole dispensation
   under which we are; -- to you who, by the riches of free grace, have
   obtained union and communion with the Lord Jesus, rest and peace, when
   God shall everlastingly rain snares, fire and brimstone, upon the
   workers of iniquity. Some mock, indeed, and say, "Where is the promise
   of his coming?" But we know "the Lord is not slack, as some men count
   slackness," but exerciseth patience until the appointed season for the
   bringing about of his own glorious ends, which he hath determined
   concerning his creatures. Why should we, then, complain, when any one,
   perhaps before our expectation, but yet according to God's
   determination, makes an entrance into the end of all? All things work
   to that season. This state of things is not for continuance. That which
   is incumbent is in this uncertain space of time allotted to us, to give
   all diligence to make our calling and election sure, as also to serve
   the Lord faithfully in our generations, wherein we cannot be surprised.
   We have an example in him who is gone before. It is true, the Lord
   Jesus is our primitive pattern and example; but those also who have
   followed him, wherein they have followed him, are to be eyed and marked
   as provocations to the same labour of faith and love wherein they were
   exercised. And, that this use may be made by this assembly, I shall add
   one word concerning him from whom is the occasion thereof.

   Every man stands in a threefold capacity, -- natural, civil, religious.
   And there are distinct qualifications that are suited unto these
   several capacities.

   1. To the first, as the ornaments and perfections of nature, are suited
   some seeds of those heroical virtues, as courage, permanency in
   business, etc.; which being in themselves morally indifferent, have
   their foundations eminently laid in the natures of some persons, which
   yet hinders not but that their good improvement is of grace.

   2. To the second, or man's civil capacity, there are many eminencies
   relating as peculiar endowments, which may be referred unto the three
   heads of ability, faithfulness, and industry; that through them neither
   by weakness, treachery, nor sloth, the works and employments incumbent
   on men in their civil state and condition may suffer.

   3. Men's peculiar ornament and improvement, in their religious
   capacity, lies in those fruits of the Spirit which we call Christian
   graces. Of these, in respect of usefulness, there are three most
   eminent, viz., faith, love, and self-denial. I speak of them upon
   another account than the apostle doth, where he placeth hope amongst
   the first three of Christian graces. Now, all these, in their several
   kinds, were as eminent in the person deceased, in his several
   capacities, perhaps is usually found in any one in a generation. My
   business is not to make a funeral oration, only I suppose that without
   offence I may desire, that in courage and permanency in business (which
   I name in opposition to that unsettled, pragmatical, shuffling
   disposition which is in some men), -- in ability for wisdom and
   counsel, -- in faithfulness to his trust and in his trust, -- in
   indefatigable industry in the pursuit of the work committed to him, --
   in faith on the promises of God, and acquaintance with his mind in his
   mighty works of providence, -- in love to the Lord Jesus and all his
   saints, in a tender regard to their interest, delight in their society,
   contempt of himself and all his for the gospel's sake, with eminent
   self-denial in all his concernments, -- in impartiality and sincerity
   in the execution of justice, that in these and the like things we may
   have many raised up in the power and spirit wherein he walked before
   the Lord and the inhabitants of this nation. This (I say) I hope I may
   speak without offence here upon such an occasion as this. My business
   being occasionally to preach the word, not to carry on a part of a
   funeral ceremony, I shall add no more, but commit you to Him who is
   able to prepare you for your eternal condition.
     __________________________________________________________________

   [319] The Hebrew word translated "wisdom" stands alone in the text,
   without "man;" tvsyh?, derived from ysh? or ys?; Sanscrit, as; Pers.,
   ess; Latin, esse, essentia, opes, -- substance. See Fürst's
   Concordance. -- Ed.

   [320] [August. Confes., lib. i. c. 1.]
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     __________________________________________________________________
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   Sermon IX.

   Christ's kingdom

   and the

   magistrate's power.
     __________________________________________________________________

Prefatory note.

   The complete title of the earlier editions of the following sermon
   indicates the design of the author, -- "Concerning the Kingdom of
   Christ, and the Power of the Civil Magistrate about the things of the
   Worship of God." It was preached to the Parliament on October 13, 1652,
   "a day of solemn humiliation." It was the time of the naval war with
   the Dutch. The bill for a New Representative, or, in other words, the
   question whether the Long Parliament should now be dissolved, was
   keenly agitated. The weightier question, as to the settlement of the
   Constitution, burdened and perplexed the nation. During the month in
   which the sermon was preached, numerous private conferences on the
   former point took place between the leaders of the Parliament and the
   officers of the Army. These circumstances may account for the
   appointment of a day of humiliation. What determined Owen to make
   choice of the delicate and important subject of which he treats in this
   sermon, might be the prevalence of a desire in many quarters for a
   proper adjustment of ecclesiastical affairs. A petition from the Army
   (see "Whitelocke's Memorials," p. 516) had been presented to the
   Parliament on the 13th of August 1652, "reciting that they had often
   sought the Lord, and desire these particulars to be considered." Then
   follows a list of twelve "particulars;" the first of which is, "That
   speedy and effectual means be used for promoting the gospel, profane
   and scandalous ministers be ousted, good preachers encouraged,
   maintenance for them provided, and tithes taken away."

   The sermon breathes a spirit weary of the lengthened confusion which
   had distracted the land. The principles contained in it raise questions
   as important in themselves, and as fresh in interest now, as in the
   days when Owen lived and preached. Whatever may be thought of his views
   on the relation of the magistrate to the church, this sermon, in which
   his judgment is declared on this topic of paramount and engrossing
   moment, has evidently been prepared with unusual care. -- Ed.
     __________________________________________________________________

Sermon IX. Christ's kingdom and the magistrate's power.

   "I Daniel was grieved in my spirit in the midst of my body, and the
   visions of my head troubled me. I came near unto one of them that stood
   by, and asked him the truth of all this. So he told me, and made me
   know the interpretation of the things." -- Dan. vii. 15, 16.

   What there is of concernment for the right understanding of these words
   in that part of the chapter which goes before, may be considered in the
   opening of the words themselves; and therefore I shall immediately
   attend thereunto.

   There are in them four things considerable:-- I. The state and
   condition which Daniel, the penman of this prophecy, expresseth himself
   to be in, wherein he hath companions in the days wherein we live: "He
   was grieved in his spirit in the midst of his body." II. The cause and
   means whereby he was brought into this perplexed frame of spirit: "The
   visions of his head troubled him." III. The remedy he used for his
   delivery from that entangled condition of spirit wherein he was: "He
   went nigh to one of them that stood by, and asked him the truth of all
   this." IV. The issue of that application he made to that one that stood
   by for redress: "He told him, and made him know the interpretation of
   the things." -- All these I shall briefly open unto you, that I may lay
   a foundation for the truth which the Lord hath furnished me with to
   hold out unto you this day.

   I. In the first, the person spoken of is Daniel himself: "I Daniel." He
   bears this testimony concerning himself, and his condition was, -- "He
   was grieved in his spirit."

   The person himself was a man highly favoured of God above all in his
   generation; so richly furnished with gifts and graces that he is once
   and again brought forth as an example, and instanced in by God himself
   upon the account of eminence in wisdom and piety. Yet all this
   preserves him not from falling into this perplexed condition, Dan. i.
   17-20; Ezek. xiv. 14, xxviii. 3. Now, as the principal work of all the
   holy prophets, which have been since the world began, Luke i. 70; 1
   Pet. i. 10-12, was to preach, set forth, and declare the Lord Jesus
   Christ, the Messiah who was for to come; so some especial concernments
   of his person, righteousness, and kingdom, were in especial manner
   committed unto them respectively; -- his passion and righteousness to
   Isaiah; the covenant of grace in him to Jeremiah; and to this Daniel,
   most eminently, the great works of the providence of God in the shaking
   and overturning of kingdoms and nations in a subserviency to his
   kingdom. With the revelation hereof, for the consolation of the church
   in all ages, did the Lord honour him of whom we speak.

   For the present he describes himself in a somewhat perplexed condition.
   His spirit (mind and soul) was grieved, sick, troubled, or disquieted
   in the midst of his body; that is, deeply, nearly, closely:-- it sets
   out the greatness of his trouble, the anxiety of his thoughts within
   him. Like David, when he expostulated with his soul about it, -- "Why
   art thou so sad, my soul? and why art thou so disquieted within me?"
   Ps. xliii. 5, -- he knew not what to say, what to do, nor wherewith to
   relieve himself. He was filled with sad thoughts, sad apprehensions of
   what was to come to pass, and what might be the issue of the things
   that had been discovered unto him. This, I say, is the frame and temper
   he describes himself to be in, -- a man under sad apprehensions of the
   issues and events of things and the dispensations of God (as many are
   at this day); and upon that account closely and nearly perplexed.

   II. The cause of this perturbation of mind and spirit was from the
   visions of his head: "The visions of his head troubled him."

   He calls them "visions of the head," because that is the seat of the
   internal senses and fantasy, whereby visions are received. So he calls
   them "a dream," verse 1, "and visions of his head upon his bed." Yet
   such visions, such a dream it was, as, being immediately from God, and
   containing a no less certain discovery of his will and mind than if the
   things mentioned in them had been spoken face to face, he writes them
   by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, verse 2, for the use of the
   church.

   I shall not take the advantage of going forth unto any discourse of
   dreams, visions, oracles, and those other divers ways and manners (Heb.
   i. 1) of revealing his mind and will, which God was pleased to use with
   his prophets of old, Num. xii. 6-8. My aim lies another way:-- it
   sufficeth only to take notice, that God gave him in his sleep a
   representation of the things here expressed, which he was to give over
   for the use of the church in following ages. The matter of these
   visions, which did so much trouble him, falls more directly under our
   consideration. Now, --

   1. The subject of these perplexing visions is a representation of the
   four great empires of the world, which had, and were to have, dominion
   in and over the places of the church's greatest concernments, and were
   all to receive their period and destruction by the Lord Christ and his
   revenging hand.

   And these three things he mentions of them therein:-- (1.) Their rise;
   (2.) Nature; (3.) Destruction.

   (1.) In verse 2 he describes their rise and original: it was "from the
   strivings of the four winds of the heavens upon the great sea;" he
   compares them to the most violent, uncontrollable, and tumultuating
   things in the whole creation. Winds and seas! -- what waves, what
   horrible storms, what mixing of heaven and earth, what confusion and
   destruction must needs ensue the fierce contest of all contrary winds
   upon the great sea! Such are the springs of empires and governments for
   the most part amongst men, -- such their entrances and advancements. In
   particular, such were the beginnings of the four empires here spoken
   of. Wars, tumults, confusions, blood, destruction, desolation, were the
   seeds of their greatness: "Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem adpellant,"
   Galgac. apud Tacit. [Agr., 30.] Seas and great waters do, in the
   Scripture, represent people and nations, Rev. xvii. 15, "The waters
   which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and
   multitudes, and nations, and tongues." As "waters," they are unstable,
   fierce, restless, tumultuating; and when God mingleth his judgments
   amongst them, they are as "a sea of glass mingled with fire," --
   brittle, uncertain, devouring, and implacable. It is a demonstration of
   the sovereignty of God, that he is above them, Ps. xciii. 3, 4, "The
   floods have lifted up, O Lord, the floods have lifted up their voice;
   the floods lift up their waves. The Lord on high is mightier than the
   noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty waves of the sea." Now, from
   these, tossed with the winds of commotions, seditions, oppressions,
   passions, do flow the governments of the world, the Spirit of God
   moving upon the face of those waters, to bring forth those forms and
   frames of rule which he will make use of.

   (2.) Unto verse 9 he describes them in order as to their nature and
   kind; -- one of them being then ready to be destroyed, and the other to
   succeed, until the utter desolation of them all, and all power rising
   in their spirit and principle.

   I shall not pass through their particular description, nor stay to
   prove that the fourth beast, without name or special form, is the Roman
   empire; which I have elsewhere [321] demonstrated, and it is something
   else which at this time I aim at. This is that which troubles and
   grieves the spirit of Daniel in the midst of his body. He saw what
   worldly powers should arise, -- by what horrible tumults, shakings,
   confusions, and violence they should spring up, -- with what
   fierceness, cruelty, and persecution, they should rule in the world,
   and stamp all under their feet.

   (3.) Their end and destruction is revealed unto him, from verse 10 unto
   verses 12, 13; and this by the appearance of "the Ancient of days" (the
   eternal God) in judgment against them; which he sets out with that
   solemnity and glory, as if it were the great judgment of the last day;
   -- God, indeed, thereby giving a pledge unto the world of that
   universal judgment he will one day exercise towards all, "by the man
   whom he hath ordained," Acts xvii. 31. And this increaseth the terror
   of the vision, to have such a representation of the glory of God as no
   creature is able to bear. God also manifests hereby his immediate
   actings in the setting up and pulling down the powers of this world;
   which he doth as fully and effectually as if he sat upon a throne of
   judgment, calling them all by name to appear in his presence, and, upon
   the evidence of their ways, cruelties, and oppression, pronouncing
   sentence against them. "Be wise, therefore, O ye kings; be instructed,
   ye judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with
   trembling," Ps. ii. 11, 12. "He changeth the times and seasons," Dan.
   ii. 21. "He ruleth in the kingdom of men, and setteth over it whom he
   pleaseth," chap. v. 21.

   And this is the first thing in this vision at which the prophet was
   perplexed.

   2. There is the approach of the Lord Christ unto the Father, with his
   entrance into his kingdom and dominion, which is everlasting, and
   passeth not away, verse 14.

   This being the end of the vision, I must a little insist upon it; not
   that I intend purposely to handle the kingdom of Christ as mediator,
   but only a little to consider it as it lies here in the vision, and is
   needful for the right bottoming of the truth in our intendment.

   Various have been the thoughts of men about the kingdom of Christ in
   all ages. That the Messiah was to be a King, a Prince, a Ruler, -- that
   he was to have a kingdom, and that the government was to be on his
   shoulder, -- is evident from the Old Testament; that all this was and
   is accomplished in Jesus of Nazareth, whom God exalted, made a Prince
   and a Saviour, is no less evident in the New; -- but about the nature
   of this kingdom, its rise and manner of government, have been, and are,
   the contests of men.

   The Jews to this very day expect it as a thing carnal and temporal,
   visible, outwardly glorious, wherein, in all manner of pleasure, they
   shall bear rule over the nations at their will; -- such another thing,
   of all the world, as the popedom, which the Gentile or idolatrous
   worshippers of Christ set up for his kingdom: and of some such thing it
   may be supposed the apostles themselves were not without thoughts,
   until they had conversed with the Lord after the resurrection, Luke ix.
   46; Acts i. 6. Neither are all amongst us free from them at this day.

   Those who with any simplicity profess the name of Christ, do generally
   agree that there are three parts of it.

   (1.) First, and principally, in that which is internal and spiritual,
   in and over the souls of men, over spirits both good and bad, in
   reference unto the ends which he hath to accomplish upon them. Of that
   which is direct and immediate upon the hearts and souls of men, there
   are two parts.

   [1.] That which he exerciseth towards his elect, who are given unto him
   of his Father, converting, ruling, preserving them, under and through
   great variety of dispensations, internal and external, until he brings
   them unto himself: "He stands and feeds them in the strength of the
   Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God," Mic. v. 4; --
   even he who is the "Ruler in Israel," verse 2. He is exalted and made
   "a Prince and a Saviour, to give repentance to Israel, and the
   forgiveness of sins," Acts v. 31. He makes his people "a willing people
   in the day of his power," Ps. cx. 3, -- sending out his Holy Spirit to
   lead them into all truth, and making his word and ordinances "mighty
   through God to the pulling down of strongholds" in their hearts,
   "casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalts itself
   against the knowledge of God; and bringing into captivity every thought
   to the obedience of himself," 2 Cor. x. 4, 5. He takes possession of
   their hearts by his power, dwelling in them by his Spirit, making them
   kings in his kingdom, and bringing them infallibly into glory. Oh, that
   this rule, this kingdom of his, might be carried on in our hearts! We
   busy ourselves about many things; we shall find at length this one
   thing necessary. This is that part of the kingdom of Christ which we
   are principally to aim at in the preaching of the gospel: "We preach
   Christ Jesus the Lord," 2 Cor. iv. 5, -- him to be Lord and King,
   though others have had dominion over us. They are the grains of Israel
   which the Lord seeks for in his sifting the nations by his word, as
   well as by his providence: and we are, in the work of the gospel, to
   "endure all things for the elect's sakes," 2 Tim. ii. 10.

   [2.] In the power which he exerciseth towards others, to whom the word
   of the gospel doth come, calling, convincing, enlightening, hardening
   many, whom yet, being not his sheep, nor of his fold, he will never
   take to himself; but leaves to themselves, under aggravations of
   condemnation, which they pull upon themselves by the contempt of the
   gospel, 2 Cor. ii. 16; Heb. x. 29. He sends his Spirit to convince even
   the perishing "world of sin, righteousness, and judgment," John xvi. 8.
   He sendeth sharp arrows into the very hearts of his enemies, Ps. xlv.
   5, -- making them stoop, bow, and fall under him; so bounding their
   rage, overbearing their lusts, leaving them without excuse in
   themselves, and his people oftentimes not without profit from them:--
   with some dealing even in this life more severely; causing the
   witnesses of the gospel to torment them by the preaching of the word,
   Rev. xi. 10, yet giving them up to "strong delusions, that they may
   believe lies, and be damned," 2 Thess. ii. 11, 12, etc.

   [3.] In carrying on of this work towards the one and the other, he puts
   forth the power, rule, and dominion, which he hath of his Father over
   spirits, both good and bad.

   1st. Being made head of principalities and powers, and exalted far
   above every name in heaven or earth, being made the "first-born of
   every creature," and all the angels of God being commanded to worship
   him, Heb. i. 6, and put in subjection under his feet; -- he sends them
   forth, and uses them as ministering spirits for them who shall be heirs
   of salvation, verse 14, -- appointing them to behold the face of his
   Father, ready for his commands on their behalf, Matt. xviii. 10, --
   attending in their assemblies, 1 Cor. xi. 10, and to give them their
   assistance in the time of danger and trouble, Acts xii. 9, destroying
   their adversaries, verse 23, with innumerable other advantageous
   administrations, which he hath not thought good to acquaint us withal
   in particular, that our dependence might be on our King himself, and
   not on any of our fellow-servants, though never so glorious and
   excellent, Rev. xxii. 9.

   2dly. For Satan, as he came to bind the strong man armed, and to spoil
   his goods, Matt. xii. 29, -- to destroy him that had the power of
   death, Heb. ii. 14; and being made manifest to this end, that he might
   destroy his works (1 John iii. 8) in the souls of men in this world, 2
   Cor. x. 4, 5; so, having in his own person conquered these
   principalities and powers of darkness, making an open show of them in
   his cross, and triumphing over them, Col. ii. 15, he continues
   overruling and judging him and them, in their opposition to his church,
   and will do so until he bring them to a full conquest and subjection,
   that they shall be judged and sentenced by the poor creatures whom in
   this world they continually pursue with all manner of enmity, 1 Cor.
   vi. 3.

   And this looketh to the inward substance of the kingdom of Christ,
   which is given him of his Father, and is not of this world, though he
   exercise it in the world to the last day; -- a kingdom which can never
   be shaken nor removed. "The government of it is upon his shoulder, and
   of the increase of it there shall be no end."

   (2.) That rule or government which in his word he hath appointed and
   ordained for all his saints and chosen ones to walk in, to testify
   their inward subjection to him, and to be fitted for usefulness one to
   another. Now, of this part the administration is wrapped up in the
   laws, ordinances, institutions, and appointments of the gospel, -- and
   it is frequently called "The kingdom of God." That Jesus Christ doth
   not rule in these things, and is not to be obeyed as a king in them, is
   but a late darkness, which, though it should spread as a cloud over the
   face of the heavens, and pour forth some showers and tempests, yet it
   would be as a cloud still, which will speedily scatter and vanish into
   nothing.

   And this is that whose propagation, as the means of carrying on the
   former spiritual ends of Christ, you desire strength and direction