A SERMON Preached before the PEERS IN THE Abby-Church at Weslminster October 10th M. DC LXVI BY SETH Lord Bishop of EXON LONDON Printed by E. C. for James Collins and are to be sold at the Kings-head in Westminster-Hall 1666. A SERMON Preached before the House of Peers AT WEST MINSTER ECCLRS xi 9 But know that for all these things God will bring thee to Judgement Rejoice O young man etc. THE great and general design of the Ministry and preaching of the Gospel is to bring men to Christianity not in the outward profession but in the true spirit and power thereof to the end they may be justified and sanctified and finally saved through Christ for ever The particular design of this Days Observation is to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God in Consideration of his Judgements especially that late one in consuming with Fire the Ancient and noble Metropolis of this Nation and to endeavour to appease the wrath of God gone out against us To compass both these designs whereof the later is subordinate to the former I know no better expedient than to reason a while upon that important argument suggested in the Text. Who can think upon the Conflagration of our late Glorious City and not call to mind the great and terrible day of Judgement Who can think seriously of Judgement and not be compelled to come in driven to Christianity that he may be saved from the wrath to come The great Instructor and Example of Christian Preachers he who saith of himself that Christ sent him to preach and not to baptise found no means so powerful to persuade men to Christianity as to reason upon this argument as first to lay before them the terror of Judgement and then whilst that was warm upon their hearts to make them a tender of the Gospel This is the great Advantage and use the Apostle makes of the Doctrine of the Text. We must all appear saith he before the Judgment-seat of Christ Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord we persuade men Upon these Considerations I shall hope for the pardon of this Noble Auditory if without affectation of Science I shall in a practical and familiar way of reasoning endeavour to imitate our Apostle in this particular If in the mean time it will be irksome and unpleasant to hear of the Judgement to come we shall do well to consider what it will be to undergo it we shall do well to reflect upon our Souls and search out the ground of this averseness Is it because we do not believe a Judgement to come or that we ourselves shall be brought to Judgement Is it because we never consider Who it is before whom we must appear or what things will be charged on our own account Is it because we are so far gone in our arrears that it is to no purpose to call these things into our remembrance What ever it be we may perhaps hear of that which may meet with and remove the prejudice and Imposture that is upon us It is neither our Negligence nor Infidelity that will make void the Truth of God Whether we will hear or Whether we will forbear the Words which I have read remain firm and unalterable and they clearly contain these Propositions 1. There is a Judgement to come 2. Thou shalt be brought to Judgement 3. God will bring thee to Judgement 4. God will bring thee to Judgement for these things the ways of thy heart etc. 5. God will bring thee to Judgement for All these things 6. All this is certain and evident for it is not think or believe But Know that for all these things God will bring thee to Judgement I. First than There is a Judgement to come This is no I. Politic invention found out to fright thee from thy pleasures this is no Engine of State devised to keep you in a subordination to your Brethren this is no vain Thunder or foolish fire to affright you into a blind obedience but it is the Tenor of the Scripture of the voice of God King Agrippa believest thou the Prophets I know that thou believest saith St. Paul Brethren do we believe the Scriptures I hope we do believe them this we do all profess to believe so often as we repeat our Creed and I hope the dissolution of our times has not yet shattered that foundation of our faith the ground work of our hopes even the Salvation of our souls Surely there are rewards for men doubtless there is a God which judgeth the Earth What though the foundations of the world be out of course the pillar of Faith remains unshaken the Rod of the ungodly shall not for ever rest upon the back of the righteous I desire to make a little use of your faith for that which anon will be obtained from your reason There is a Judgement to come it 's as sure as death nay far surer they shall be judged which shall not die they have been judged which could not die the one at the end the other at the beginning of the world There is a Particular and a General Judgement the one at the dissolution of the lesser the other of the greater world the one at the hour of death the other at the day of Judgement A Judgement I say a strict examination an exact account a severe sentence words which make no thundering noise or tragical sound and so they may pass our hardened hearts without any motion wherefore let us judge of the tenor and moment of them by their antecedent signs Before one of them the evil days come The other is called the evil day Before one Solomon tells us that the Sun and the Moon and the Light and the Stars shall be darkened Before the other a greater than Solomon tells us that the Sun shall be turned into Darkness and the Moon into Blood and the Stars shall fall from Heaven Before one the Keepers of the House shall tremble and the Strong men bow themselves Before the other the Mountains shall quake and the Powers of Heaven shall be shaken Before one we shall rise at the voice of the Bird Before the other at the sound of the Trumpet Before one the silver Cord shall be loosed and the golden Bowl broken and the Pitcher broken at the Fountain and the wheel broken at the Cistern Before the other the silver Zone of the ecliptic and the golden Globe of the Sun the Orbs and the Vortices shall be confounded the wheel within a wheel the Heavens shall be riveled as a scroll of Parchment and the Earth and the Elements shall melt away with fervent heat In the one the dust shall return to the earth as it was and the spirit to God that gave it at the other the dust shall return from the earth to be as it was and the spirit from God that gave it Come now and let us reason together Are all these the forerunners and symptoms of approaching Judgement then why art thou so drowsy O my careless soul and why art thou so secure within me What strange Lethargy hath seized on thee Awake thou that sleepest and Christ shall give thee light The time of thy dissolution is a coming and after death the judgement Retire therefore a while into thy self and commune with thy heart Enter thou into thy Closet and shut thy Door upon thee Let us examine ourselves before we come to that strict Examen Let us make a Judgement of our expectation before we come to Judgement Do we believe a Judgement will come Then how are we provided against that Day Are our accounts ready Art thou able to stand in Judgement Shalt thou be clear when thou art judged When Paul reasoned before Felix concerning the Judgement to come Felix trembled and because it was an unpleasant argument he put him off to another time There is no doubt but our treacherous hearts would gladly put off these Considerations and defer them to a more convenient season Nay but there is no time so convenient as the present when we are wrought into some apprehension of Judgement If we stay till our present thoughts are over we shall again be brought to lose the apprehension to forget the import and moment of the Judgement we shall come again to hear the Name thereof and to neglect it as an idle Noise and empty Sound Let us therefore not neglect this opportunity Let us search ourselves to the bottom Let us make a discovery of our final Resolution and secret Reserves in reference to Judgement We profess openly to believe that Christ shall come with Glory to judge both the Quick and Dead What are our inward thoughts in that particular and how are we provided against the Day of Judgement There is a Judgement to come that Judgement terrible the Examination strict the Condemnation insupportable and most of us utterly unprovided yet for all this it 's possible it may be avoided All these things are true in Judgements here below and we see the proof of them at every Assizes yet all Offenders are not brought to Judgement but many Thiefs and Murderers escape it It may be thus in the Judgement to come 't is possible it may be avoidable A miserable hope if this be all for Thou shalt be brought to Judgement That 's the second Proposition II. And it contains the Universality or Particularity of the Judgement which you please thou and every man singuli generum & genera singulorum all sorts of men and every man of every sort from Him that sitteth on the Throne to Her that grindeth in the Mill For we must all appear before the Judgement seat of Christ It is appointed for all men once to die and after death the judgement Death shall deliver up our Souls to the first and Death shall deliver up our Bodies to the second Judgement The Grave shall deliver up her spoils and the bodies of all men devoured of Beasts consumed of Fire swallowed by the Sea scattered to the four Winds in a moment in the twinkling of an eye shall be brought to Judgement And here shall I bewail the infirmity or inviegh against the negligence of us Men that suffer ourselves to be hurried he adlong by the power of our imaginations against the striving of our consciences that suffer our Senses to carry away the crown from our Understanding and give over ourselves to the impetuous stream of our passions That when we have a full information a complete judgement a clear dictate of conscience we will suffer all these to be overborne in us by the Idola Specûs tribûs etc. which are brought into our imaginations That having clear and evident Principles we can yet doubt of their immediate consequences or whilst we profess an universal truth never descend to think of the particulars We know there is a vast difference between the things present and those to come and yet we form our thoughts of those according to the analogy of these deluding ourselves with idle and childish imaginations God keeps silence we think he is such a one as we Vengeanc is not presently executed we set our hearts to do wickedly We profess that all men must die and come to judgement yet ve do not really believe that we ourselves shall die and come to judgement This is the fountain of our misery and the original of our spiritual miscarriages the discovery of the causes and remedy whereof lies deep in the Philosophy concerning Humane Nature but the thing itself is of every days observation we may recount it in these authentical examples David knew full well what belonged to Murder and Àdultery and what himself had done in the matter of Uriah yet he cried not out that he had sinned till Nathan had charged him Thou art the man Abab undoubtedly had read the Law of Moses and knew the guilt of Marder and Oppression yet he goes on triumphantly he kills and also takes possession but when Elijah charges him home In the field of Jezereel shall Dogs lick thy blood even thine than he cries out Hast thou found me O mine enemy 1 King 21 and having applied things to his particular he Rend his  and put on sackcloth he fasted and lay in sackcloth and went softly Once more 'T is likely Belshazzar had a general Judgement and an universal Maxim in his mind That it was unlawful to spoil the House of God to plunder those things which were dedicated to the Lord and to debauch in the bowls of the Temple and probably he had seen the hand writing of the book of God to that purpose yet all this does not restrain him But when the Fingers write upon the Wall Mene Mene etc. thou art weighed etc. then his countenance was changed and his thoughts troubled him the joints of his loins were loosed and his knees smore one against another This then is the Office of this second Proposition it charges us home it lays down the Universal and it brings it down to the Particular Thou shalt be brought to Judgement Thy Judgement is unavoidable O but then thy Evasion is crossed O my stupid Soul Thou art spoiled of thy frivolous ground of hope Thou shalt surely be cited and thou must appear if thou refuse to come thou shalt be brought to Judgement Return then again into thyself and take a review of thy condition what will the issue be of that Judgement to which thou must be brought What hopes are now remaining that thou shalt not be condemned when the Officers have haled thee before the Judge that thou be not delivered to the Executioners If thou art called to Examination Canst thou elude thy Judge by thy wily answers or Canst thou baffle or suborn the witnesses Canst thou work off thy Jury not to find the Verdict or bribe the Judge to favour thee in thy Doom Canst thou withdraw him from the Rigour of Justice by the mediation of thy friends or melt him into compassion by the loudness of thy cries the sadness of thy lamentation Canst thou procure a Reversion or Reprieve of thy sentence or appeal from thy Judge unto another Canst thou make an escape from thine Executioner Or lastly Canst thou stoutly endure the sentence of condemnation These are the hopes of men here brought to Judgement and why may not some of them be mine No thou knowest O treacherous heart all these to be fond impossibilities dreams and suggestions of a childish faney If once this day be over and that time come thy hopes are barely these that Omniscience and Wisdom itself may be deluded by stupidity that Omnipotence and Power itself may be evaded by poor contemptible infirmity that Severity and Justice itself may be perverted by iniquity all this is evident by that which follows For we must all appear before the Judgment-seat of Christ God will bring thee to Judgement III. And here we are concerned to raise our thoughts and employ the utmost of our attention lest by the prejudice which our Idleness hath brought upon us we treasure up wrath to ourselves against that day of Judgement 'T is true we daily he are of God and receive the names of his Attributes into our ears but we pass over his Name as if he were like to us and never bestow so much labour as to attain to a considerable notion of those names O that the God of Heaven would afford us here some Glimpse of himself That he would illustrate us with some beam of his Majesty That he would be pleased to visit every unprovided soul and insinuate into it a full and clear apprehension of this Proposition God will etc. But how shall we endure to see his face No man can see my face and live Exod. 33 if the Israelites durst not hear him proclaim the Law how shall we endure to hear him denounce the Judgement If the Angels veil their faces not able to behold his Excellency how shall we be affected with his terrors If the Cherubins are oppressed with the sight of his glory what shall we be with the sense of his fury If we find ourselves confounded and swallowed up into inextricable Labyrinths when we set ourselves to consider of his immanent Attributes of his eternal duration his unbounded Essence his unconfined Presence With what disposition can we entertain the terror of his Judgement the search of his Omniscience the stroke of his Omnipotence If the best and choicest of the Saints of God have been afraid and trembled at the thoughts of Judgement if they have been surprised with horror and confusion at the mere imagination of that Dreadful voice Arise and come to Judgement What shall the worst and most obdurate sinners when they shall be stripped of this cloud of flesh and error and cited before the great tribunal there to render an account of our Creation Preservation and Redemption What fear what horror what agony will possess thee O sinful soul when thou shalt be brought into a perfect apprehension of thy Judge and of thyself and he shall be gi'en to order out before thee the things which he hath done when the whole Trinity shall begin to unfold its common work and that sacred Person blessed for ever upon whose shoulders the Judgement is laid shall unfold to thee his peculiar and thou must render a severe account of thy returns When the mystery of thy Creation shall be unveiled to thee When thou shalt apprehend throughly what it is to have been fetched out of the dark and barren shade of an eternal privation to be put in a capacity of glory When he shall recount to thee the proceedings of his handy work the method of thy making the several articles and gradations of his Providence in the formation and information of thee How at first he poured thee out like milk and curdled thee like cheese How he spun out thine arteries and veins and whilst thou wert yet in thy blood he said unto thee live How he guarded thee with muscles and strengthened thee with sinews and propped thee with bones and covered thee with skin furnished thee with organs endowed them with senses invested thee with reason crowned thee with freedom enlightened thee with principles of Science and Conscience bounded thee by his Precepts encouraged thee by his Promises restrained thee by his threatenings When he shall runover the benefits of thy daily preservation and rigorously examine what thou hast done for him When God the Son shall display to thee what he hath done and suffered for thee and shall set before thine eyes the great mystery of thy Redemption When he shall bring thee to apprehend the price that he has paid that ransom which thou hast not regarded When it will not be in thy power to pa● over these considerations as now thou dost but they shall be forced into the essential centre of thy Soul When thou shalt have a clear sight of the abasement of a God incarnate When thou shalt know how to be moved at the sight of a despised and an abused Godhead When he shall charge thee with the blewness of those stripes and the ghastliness of those wounds which thou hast made When he shall rehearse to thee the miseries of his life and the circumstances of his death When he shall recount to thee the wound of the taunts and reproaches the smart of the whips the terror of the agony which made him sweat great drops of blood the pricks of the thorns the piercing of the nails the lancing of the spear and the ineffable horror of the dereliction when he cried out in the bitterness of his soul My God my God why hast thou forsaken me And when he shall fiercely call upon thee to answer for the wounds that thou hast made to render him his blood that thou hast spilt to account to him for that life which thou hast made to show him the fruit of all his pains and sufferings to present him thy returns for all these benefits and favours then tell me what thou wilt answer O stupid soul How art thou provided to reply Wilt thou deny that he has done these things for thee or canst thou show as much for him Hast thou returned him that being which he hath given thee and so been even with him in a form of words though that come infinitely short indeed Hast thou sacrificed thyself for his benefit or abased thy selffor his commodity What wilt thou plead when thou art called The time is coming thy Judgement hastening thine account is unavoidable thy Judge inexorable Alas what could I have done for him what profit could I have brought him if I should have pined away in the exercise of Devotion and been eaten up with zeal If I should have spent my substance in Burnt-Offerings or Calves of a year old If I should have presented him with thousands of Rams or ten thousand Rivers of Oil To what purpose then should I endeavour that which I could not have performed Why should I trouble myself with vain attempts and spend my strength about that which I never could accomplish neither if I be righteous is he the better nor if I be wicked is he the worse our goodness extends not to him if thou sinnest what dost thou against him if thou be righteous what receiveth he at thine hand Is this then the evasion I need not stand to unfold the disingenuity the stupor and madness of this evasion However though these things shall be urged upon us they are not all these offer themselves in the consideration of the person of the Judge but are not all the matter of thy Judgement For Thou shall be brought to Judgement for these things IV. there is the matter ofthy Judgement For all these things there is the extent Because this V. latter adds only a Modallity to the former and I desire not to be over tedious we will put these two together And now we are descended from those less familiar Considerations to which we were forced to strain our understandings in the contemplation of our Judge into the compass of our own sphere to the survey of our own operations we are come from the incomprehensible ways of God to the ways of our own hearts Walk in the ways of thy heart etc. and but know etc. In the judgement of this life men are tried by the works of their hands or the words of their mouths for theft or murder for slander or Treason men may be brought to Judgement but thought is free he has lived well that has carried his crimes close the crafty Politician and the concealed Hypocrite escape There the case is quite contrary the Judgement takes in primarily the ways of the heart and the words and actions as they proceed from them Wherefore let us withdraw a space into ourselves and endeavour to meet out the extent of that Proposition For all the ways of the hearts of men God will bring them to Judgement How would it trouble us to recount and bring to memory every thought but of one only day and how many disorders and irregularities should we find in such a reflection How do our thoughts float upon our brains and we know neither whence they come nor what becomes of them when they are broken in upon our minds we cannot hold them and when they are gone from us as it was with Nebuchadnezzar's dream it is not in our power to recover them How many roving fancies present themselves unto us in a moment and how many sudden and imperfect Complacencies and distastes are raised by them Leave but thyself unbound unfixed by hearing or reading or business etc. for an hour and then tell me what suppositions and consequences and resolutions thou hast made And how thou hast felt thyself to strain upon the borders of Lust or Envy of Pride or Anger of Discontent or Melancholy O that you would but reflect a little upon your souls and consider how many wandering thoughts have broken in upon your minds since I began to speak of this important Subject You might save me the labour of further speaking and raise yourselves to that which I endeavour I fear you might find among your sacred thoughts a mixture of others very unsuitable your envious your amibitious your covetous your idle thoughts All these are the matter of our future Judgement and however they slightly pass us here they are noted in the Book of God and when that Book shall be opened they will be charged on our account Thou tellest my wander saith the Psalmist Are not these things noted in thy Book I have already said enough to take up the consideration of the remainder of our time But our hearts being too heavy and our ears too dull of hearing to be moved with generals I must crave leave that I may be permitted to run over the heads of some particulars Thou must give an account of all things committed to thee Inward or Outward Natural or Spiritual thy senses and thy understanding thine Outward and thine Inward faculties If thou hast been at a constant covenant with thine eyes and hast never suffered them to rove in loose disorders If thou hast bowed thine ears to discipline and never let them open to vain entertainments If thy taste hath been moderated by the necessities of nature and the laws of temperance and never let loose according to the lust of Riot If thy hands have been wholly employed in the works of God and never been instruments to the machinations of the Devil If thy speech have never uttered any idle words but ever administered grace to the hearers If thy feet have only traced the ways of God and never stood in the way of sinners What hath been the exercise of thine inward faculties thine Apprehensions and thine Appetite If thy fancy hath ever been employed in administering help to thine understanding and never afforded incentives to thy vile affections If thy memory have been taken up with the things which God hath done and Christ hath suffered for thee and hath afforded no place to Ribaldry and vanity How thou hast ordered thine Anger and Concupiscence What have been the object measure and end and circumstances love hatred desire aversion delight sadness hope despair fear boldness anger envy jealousy and compassion How thou hast managed thine understanding and improved thy contemplative and active principles If thou hast advanced in the discovery of eternal verities or herded with the beasts that perish If thou hast cherished the principles of thy Synteresis and the dictates and reflections of thy conscience and never rebelled against them How thou hast determined the freedom of thy Will in thy volition and intention thine election and consent fruition and use when Good and Evil Life and Death have been set before thee How thou hast behaved thyself in Spirituals in gifts and graces If thou hast accepted that which hath been offered and improved what thou hast accepted or hid it in a Napkin In outward things how thou hast acquired and how thou hast managed thine Estate How thou hast behaved thyself in thy Relations public and private in thy charge and in thy duty But the time would fail me to reckon up a considerable part of the exercises and objects of the ways of the hearts of Men And now all these and many more are but the simple elements and common heads of our account Consider then O Negligent and incogitant soul if thou couldst reckon up the ways of thy heart in any one of these kinds if thou couldst call to mind but every idle word whereof thou must give an account or thy motions upon every thing that thou hast heard and remember in any one of these elements what thou hast done or else omitted Then tell me how wouldst thou find thyself possessed and how wouldst thou be disposed to Judgement Wouldst thou deem it needless or idle to call it betimes to thy remembrance Wouldst thou drive off thy thoughts of it to the time of sickness to the hour of death and rudely throw thyself upon it But then try and examine all these together contemplate a little upon the mixtures and combinations of them these will afford us many millions of millions of ways far exceeding the varieties of the corporeal nature which proceed from the mixture of fewer elements so many as will utterly confound our thoughts to number Who can reckon up the ways of the hearts of the children of Men Who can understand his errors And now that he that hath the World to uphold the Planets and Stars to guide the course of nature to maintain should keep a Register of our impertinencies and bring to Judgement all the ways of Men the traces of a Ship in the Sea of a Serpent upon a Rock Who hath believed our report we are apt to think it cannot be Surely he sees not these things Tush he cares not for them This is indeed the last resort of the treacherous hearts of men the grand imposture which resolves into a species of Atheism and Infidelity O but then if I shall use the language of the Scriptures I must call thee fool and beast to doubt of that which is plain and evident to disbelieve that which may be known This Article concerning the Judgement to come is not a problem of Philosophy to be disputed this way and that way with equal probability neither is it only an Article of faith but it is a principle of natural Theology the Scripture speaks of it under terms of greater evidence St. Paul reasoned with Felix he disputed with the Philosophers concerning it he speaks of the terror of Judgement under terms of certainty and of a kind of Demonstrative evidence Knowing the terror of the Law etc. and here in the Text it is not said Think or believe But know that for all these things God will bring thee to Judgement He is a fool that hath said in his heart there is no God VI and he that thinks he hath no understanding may well be compared to the beasts that perish and so sure as there is a God and that man hath an understanding soul so surely it may be known That for all these things etc. For if there be a God he must be infinitely just and if so he must render to every one according to their actions and if not here then hereafter and if so he must bring them to Judgement But he doth it not here The ways of Providence seem to be promiscuous there is a wicked man to whom it happens according to the way of the righteous and a righteous man to whom it happens according to the way of the wicked Dives receives pleasure Lazarus pain therefore so sure as there is a God there will be a Judgement Again If man have an understanding soul he must have freedom in his actions and if so he deserves either good or evil and if there be deserts there must be rewards and if there be rewards there must be a Judgement So then so sure as thou art an understanding creature so sure there is a Judgement to come Once more Reward is answerable to desert and desert is only in what is free and what is free in man is the ways of his heart wherefore they are to be brought to Judgement and if any than all for no reason can be fancied why some should be brought to Judgement and others not Wherefore if it be sure that God is in Heaven and that Man hath an understanding soul than it is also sure that for all these things God will bring thee to Judgement that God shall bring to judgement every secret thing And now how sure and evident are these things more sure and more plain if we will attend than any other truths in the world for there is not any known truth which doth not evict the truth of these things We know a truth because we plainly and evidently understand the composition or division of the notions in a Proposition or the Deduction of a Proposition from some others therefore if we know any truth we presuppose that we have souls which understand the notions of things and if souls which understand these notions then to be sure they are not bodies no combination os fire and air and earth and water no disposition of insensible atoms can cause the subject to apprehend and judge to reason and discourse and if they be no bodies than they are not subject to corruption It is evident therefore that our souls are understanding and also immortal deserving and capable of future Judgement And as evident it is also that there is a sovereign Power a God that governs and will judge the Earth This is not a Rhetorical undertaking but a just and measured truth there is not any thing in the world from whence these two may not be plainly and evidently evicted viz. a Godhead from the Creature and thine own Immortality from the discovery of a Godhead The world which thou seest had it a beginning or had it not if it had a beginning he is thy God that made it if it had no beginning then there are passed as many myriads of years as minutes of time which is infinitely more absurd to grant than tosay thou hast as many hands as fingers as many wholes as parts If then at any time we find ourselves to doubt of these things it is not because we are the beaux esprits or forts spirits our doubting proceeds from dulness and the want of that strong reason to which we do pretend the things are certain in themselves and evident He is not far from any one of us in whom we live and move and have our being and the Light of Nature discovered our Immortality not only to Philosophers but even to the Heathen Poets to him that sung to us that We are also his offspring So that now thy pretences are all taken off and every imposture of the heart discovered Return then once again into thy bosom and take account Applic. general of thy apprehensions The day of the Lord is coming and stealing upon thee as a thief in the night the day of Judgement the great and terrible day A day of anguish and of gloominess a day of a whirlwind and a tempest a day of anguish and tribulation Where wilt thou hide thyself O that 's impossible Whether shall we go then from his presence shall we call to the Mountains to fall upon us How wilt thou appear O that 's intolerable for our God is a consuming fire What wilt thou do when the day of Judgement comes and this may be the hour this minute thou mayst be smitten and hurried hence to Judgement Thousands have fallen besides us and Ten Thousands at our right hand and why may not we be next The time of our particular Judgement cannot be far away and why may we not reasonably apprehend the approach of the General Judgement either of this World or at leastwise of this sinful Nation Our Lord Christ indeed tells us that of the day and hour of the final Judgement Knoweth no man Yet he hath given us the signs of his coming The Apostles have left us Characters of the last days the Prophets have declared the manner and apparatus of the coming of the Lord to Judgement We read that when the Disciples admired the stones and the building of Herod's Temple at Jerusalem Christ told them That the day was coming when there should not be left one stone upon another upon this the Disciples ask him privately three Questions 1. When shall these things be 2. What shall be the sign of thy second coming And 3. of the end of World As for the precise moment of these things he denies to tell it them Nay he professes that as he was the Son of Man he did not know it But for the other two he cendescends to their curiosity he tells them the signs of his coming and of the end of the World and that they shall be such as these You shall hear saith he Matth. 24. of Wars and rumours of Wars Nation rising against Nation and Kingdom against Kingdom There shall be Traitors and false Prophets Saying Lo here is Christ Behold a new Messias in the Wilderness Lo there is Christ Behold he is at a Conventicle in the secret Chambers He tells us that iniquity shall abound and the love of many shall wax cold that he shall hardly find faith on the earth as it was in the days of No they ate they drank till the flood came and swept them all away so shall the coming of the Son of Man be He tells us Luke 21. there shall be Famines and Earthquakes Pestilence and fearful sights great signs from Heaven in the Earth distress of Nations great perplexities the Sea and Waves roaring men's hearts failing them for fear looking after those things that are coming upon the Earth Concerning the last days St. Paul tells us that there shall be perilous times that on one hand there shall be a sort of men that shall be lovers of themselves Covetous Proud Boasters Ranters and Blasphemers On the other hand there shall be a Race of heady high minded Traitors having a form of godliness creeping into houses leading captive silly women They shall despise Dominion and speak evil of Dignities They shall be Separatists from the Church and false pretenders to the Spirit Th●se saith St. Judas are they that separate themselves sensual having not the Spirit St. Peter tells us that in the last times there should be a loose profane a bold Atheistical Gigantic race of scoffers walking after their own lusts saying Where is this God of Judgement let him make speed and hasten his work that we may see it Where is the promise of his coming since the fathers fell asleep all things continue as they were before And for the manner and Apparatus of his coming Our God shall come saith the Psalmist and shall not keep silence there shall go before him a devouring fire and a mighty Tempest shall be stirred up round about him Behold the Lord will come with fire saith the Prophet and with his Chariots like a Whirlwind to render Esai 66. 15. his anger with fury and his rebukes with flames of fire The streams of Zion shall be turned into Pitch and the dust thereof into Brimstone the Earth thereof shall be burning Pitch the smoke thereof shall ascend day and night and shall not be quenched compare Revel 6. with Esai 34. The Kings of the Earth shall tremble the Captains and the mighty shall be horribly afraid the great men and the rich men shall hide themselves all the bondmen and all the freemen shall fly to the Rocks of the Mountains And soon after all this The Heavens shall be riveled as a s●r●wl the Earth and the Elements shall melt away for God shall arise to judge terribly the Earth Have not all these things come upon us the men of this Generation Is it weakness is it a vain and superstitious scrupulosity to call these things to our remembrance Have we no reason at all to apprehend the approach of a General Judgement either upon the World or upon our sinful Nation Do we not now envy those despised souls which have made their accounts ready We thought it madness to see them pine away with penitential exercises and macerate themselves with mourning We thought it folly which they called Conscience for which they denied themselves the pleasures and enjoyments of the World We fool's counted their life madness and their latter end to be without horror But the time is coming when they shall be comforted and we shall be tormented Because he hath called and we have refused he hath stretched out his hand and we have not regarded He will laugh at our calamity and mock when our fear cometh When our destruction cometh as a Whirlwind when distress and anguish comes upon us May we not therefore give up ourselves to the torments of our hearts and surrender up our souls unto Despair so Israel said there is no hope we will follow every one the devices of his heart after 20 30 or 40 years' continuance in our courses 'tisin vain to think of turning from them Our arrears are so far gone that there is no hope to discharge them and why should we trouble ourselves with the thoughts of our Account Nay that which must come let it come and what is a few days respite to Eternity Let us eat and drink for to morrow we shall die Let us go forth as at other times and shake ourselves and scatter these troublesome apprehensions of future Judgement What if we should drink a little to drive away Melancholy Yes and fall perhaps and spew and rise no more Nay but I beseech you stay a little and consider consider at least in this your day the things which belong to your peace It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God Who among us can dwell with a devouring fire Who among us can dwell with everlasting burnings Such careless and desperate resolutions are the advantages which the Devil aims at that he may sear our Consciences and seal us up in a final obduration But there is another kind of advantage which God and our Lord Christ and the Holy Spirit and the Gospel and the Ministers aim at That advantage which I told you of in the beginning of my Discourse That knowing the terror of the Lord they may persuade men And now what is it that they would persuade us that we will be contented to part with the tormenting fears of Judgement that we will condescend not to be miserable to all Eternity That we will accept of deliverance from the wrath to come that we will not neglect so great salvation nor trample on the blood of the everlasting Covenant Behold God calls upon us Turn you turn you at my reproof why will you die O House of Israel As I live saith the Lord I desire not the death of sinners Our Lord Christ calls upon us Come unto me all ye that are weary and heavy laden and I will ease you In the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles he stood and cried Saying If any man thirst let him come unto me and drink The Spirit says come and who ever will let him come and take of the water of life freely The Gospel assures us That God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have everlasting life Behold I set before you this day life and death blessing and cursing and as an unworthy Ambassador in Christ's stead I pray you be reconciled to God take his yoke upon you his yoke is easy and his burden light embrace now the tender of the Gospel only repent and believe in the Lord Jesus accept him for your Saviour and your Lord Your Prophet to instruct you your King to govern you your Priest to save you and you shall be saved Saved from the fears and horrors of a Guilty Conscience condemned by its own witness Saved from the wrath of God and of the Lamb. You shall meet the Lord with Confidence We shall be able to stand with boldness in the Judgement to lift up our heads with joy because our redemption draweth near This is the way to save our own souls from perishing which is the General design of all our Preaching And this is the way to appease the wrath which is gone out against us and to preserve our Nation from destruction which is the particular and more immediate end of our present Humiliation whereof I am yet to speak THe hand indeed of the Lord hath been heavy upon us Applic particular his wrath hath been kindled it hath waxed hot against the Sheep of his pasture and he hath plagued our Nation very sore His Judgements have been multiplied his strokes have been redoubled and for all this his anger is not turned away but his hand is stretched out still Wars and Pestilences and those other forerunners of Christ's coming to Judgement have been seen and felt amongst us and now when these have not been able to prevail To awaken a drowsy people to rouse up a Lethargic Nation to ferment a people settled upon their Lees. God has made anew thing in the midst of us he hath wrought a work in our days which makes the ears of all that hear it to tingle A work not to be paralleled perhaps in all the circumstances since the Creation of the World How hath the Lord covered the Daughter of our Zion with a cloud in his anger and hath cast down from Heaven to Earth the beauty of Israel and remembered not his footstool in the Day of his Anger he hath swallowed up the habitations of his people he hath taken away his Tabernacles and destroyed his places of Assemblies the Ramparts and the Walls lament and languish her Gates are sunk to the ground her Barrs are destroyed Who can express the terror of this fatal Judgement the unexpected eruption the sudden increase the irresistible force the remorseless rage the insatiable voracity of this fiery Judgement the present sufferings the lasting miseries of private persons are inexpressible the public damage the dangerous consequences it may be unconceivable What thing shall I liken to thee O Daughter of my People Whereunto shall I compare the day of thy Visitation To the destruction of Jerusalem to the great and terrible day of Judgement O the terrors and affrightments the shrieks and lamenations the agonies the confusions of that Day They that were on the house top durst not stay to take any thing out of their houses nor he that was in the field return back to take his clothes they that were in the City betook themselves to the Fields and Mountains where they beheld their flaming habitations where they trembled to behold the abomination of desolation raging in the holy places How were the wise men amazed and the strong men terrified despair seized them counsel and strength fled away from them there was no help in them they presently gave all for lost they stood affrighted at a distance gazing at the dreadful spectacle in vain they thought it to contend it looked so like the coming of the Son of Man The breath of the Lord kindled the fire he road upon Cherub he came flying upon the wings of the wind He made the winds his Messengers and the flames of fire his Ministers He brought the Winds out of his Treasure and to point the flame directly upon the bulk and body of the City through his power he brought in the Southeast wind as a thief in the night as pains upon a woman in travel as the lightning that cometh from the East and passeth to the West so came this flaming Judgement and so shall the coming of the Son of Man be I cannot endure to dilate upon this Argument Sorrow and anguish are in the consideration of it Animus meminisse horret luctuque refugit Great is the Judgement and there is reason for us to fear that it may be portending and symtomatical YEt who can tell but God may have mercy upon us but he may yet save us from destruction though our breach be great as the Sea yet is not in itself irreparable though our wounds be deep and gaping they are not desperate or uncurable hitherto we may say with the Apostle We are chastened but not killed afflicted but not in despair The signs and symptoms of an approaching final Judgement are not so decretory and peremptory that we should despair God's signal Judgements have hitherto been accompanied with signs of mercies and this is a plain case that he is not fond of our destructions and that he had rather that we should live He doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men He stands pausing and hoesitating as he did once before O Ephraim how shall I give thee up O Ephraim O England How shall I give thee up O England What mean else those Alternations and those mixtures and combinations of wonderful Judgements and of wonderful deliverancies and mercies which our ears have heard and our eyes have seen We have heard with our ears and our Fathers have told us what wonderful deliverances he wrought in their time of old We have seen vicissitudes great and prodigious mixtures and combinations marvellous in our eyes horrible destructions and wonderful restitutions succeeding one another raging Plagues at home and signal Victories abroad God hath filled us with bitterness and covered us with ashes But it is his mercy that we are not consumed because his compassions fail not If the arm of his Justice and Severity hath been made bare that it might be seen of all the people He hath not left his mercy without witness If his Judgement hath been great and terrible in that which is consumed his mercy is wonderful and miraculous in that which is preserved Plainly except the Lord had left us a Remnant and visibly interposed to do it we should not have had this place wherein to humble our solves before him We should have been as Sodem and we should have been like unto Gomorrah It was he that in the midst of Judgement remembered mercy when the flaming vengeance was in its height when in the opinion of all men it had arrived at the state of irresistibility and when every man's heart failed him when the hopes of all men were sunk into despair He checked the domineering vengeance he put up the flaming Sword he controlled the streaming waves of sire and said thus far shall ye come and no further In a wonderful manner he preserved the Goods and Persons of the poor Inhabitants of the City He restrained the rage of our enemies that cried concerning our Jerusalem Down with it Down with it Aha! so would we have it He suffered not a foreign Enemy to land nor our domestic loes to make a head in our confusions He was a wall of fire about the persons of our Gracious Sovereign and his Royal Highness and of those valiant Noble Persons which adventured boldly and strenuously and indefatigably laboured the public preservation He hath given signal Preservations and Victories to our Fleets abroad he hath restored our Highborn and Nobles-general and our Fleet in health and safety He hath given us plenty of all things necessary for the life of man In one great word to sum up an aggregation of great and various mercies he hath upheld our Religion and our Government in peace and for an earnest of his further preservation he hath given us this seasonable opportunity with health and safety in this place to attend the Public Service to advise and assist in this arduous Juncture of affairs Arduous and difficult indeed it is to restore our City and defend our Country to restore the Houses of God and Public Buildings to re-edify ten Thousand private habitations to sustain the poor and needy to preserve the rights and properties of men to find such a temper of Justice and equity that there be no decay no just complaining in our Streets To uphold the Traffic of the Nation and to keep it in order and security free from private Robberies and public Insurrections and therefore in order to all those ends to uphold our Religion in the zealous and effectual exercise in the sincerity and uniformity thereof to preserve it from encroachments and undermining tolerations ruinous to Religion destructive to the Government of the Nation And all this while to make provision against our dangerous and cruel Enemies Gebal and Ammon and Amalech the French Dutch and the Dane who have conspired to our destruction These things are arduous but not insuperable difficult but not to be despaired of Concerning Jerusalem burned and laid waist by the Assyrians Daniel foretold that the streets and the walls thereof should be rebuilded even in troubleous times and when the time came that they were re-edified we read in Nehemiah that the labourers in one hand held the trowel and the other held a weapon one half of the people laboured in the work and the other half held the Spears & the Shields the Bows and the Habergeons because of their cruel enemies on every side If God shall be pleased to give us a spirit of Understanding and teach our Senaters Wisdom If he shall pour out a public spirit upon our Counsels a spirit of tenderness and compassion of Justice and Equity Temperance and Frugality Fortitude and Magnanimity If all Orders and Degrees amongst us Civil and Military and Ecclesiastical shall take to themselves the spirits of Christians and of men If our Counsels and endeavours shall be answerable to the care and benignity to the fervour and strenuous industry of our gracious Sovereign and to the alacrity and magnanimity of our courageous and generous Countrymen then speaking humanely and abstracting from our Deservings we need not greatly fear but we may yet subdue the pride and insolence of our barbarous Enemies we may yet behold our City rising out of its ashes in greater splendour than we have seen it heretofore Wherefore arise and gird yourselves O ye Princes ye Nobles ye Rulers of our Israel Consult consider and give sentence Men Brethren and Fathers let us arise and labour let us up and be doing be strong and of good courage and the good hand of our God shall be upon you he shall give you the honour to be the defenders of your Country he shall make you repairers of the breaches restorers of our City to dwell in Yet I cannot I may not forbear to put you in remembrance of this one thing Except the Lord build the City their labour is but lost that build it It is not our wisdom or industry much less our confidence that will do it unless God be for us neither will God be for us unless we turn from the evil of our ways except we repent we have reason to fear that what we have seen hitherto will be no more but the beginning of our sorrows The Prophet Esay tells us That the Lord sent a word unto Esai 9 Jacob and it lighted on Israel and all the people shall know that say in the pride and stoutness of their hearts the Bricks are fallen but we will build with hewn Stones the Sycamores are down but we will change them into Cedars Therefore the Lord will set up their Adversaries and join their Enemies together the Syrians before and the Philistines behind and they shall devour Israel with open mouth Because this people turneth not to him that smiteth them Wherefore turn you turn you every one from the evil of his ways Let us search our hearts and try our ways and turn to him that hath smitten us Turn unto him with all our hearts with fasting and with weeping and mourning he hath smitten us and he will heal us because his compassions fail not Come and let us reason together saith God though your sins were as scarlet they shall be white as snow There is yet a way open to take away the terror of our Particular Judgement and to prevent a final Judgement from falling upon the Nation We are yet in the Land of hope and space is given for Repentance the door of mercy is not yet shut upon us nor the ears of our Judge sealed against us O that men would therefore praise the Lord for his Goodness and declare the wonders that he hath done for the children of men that hath not dealt with us after our sins nor rewarded us according to our Iniquities that hath not cut us off in the midst of our sins nor in the height of our impenitencies snatched us away to Judgement that hath not dealt with us as with the Apostate Angels and with Thousands of our Brethren who were better and more righteous than we Let us once more than return into our selves Let us consider our condition let us view over and balance the grounds of our hopes and the reasons of our fears Let us take an exact account of our whole estate and interest in reference to all our concernments National and Personal Temporal and Eternal Let us deliberate and advise what is to be done and what to be avoided Did I say deliberate Whether we shall save our souls from utter darkness and everlasting burnings Whether we shall save the Nation from final ruin and desolation Nay rather Let us break off our sins by repentance and our Iniquities by showing mercy to the poor Let us make ourselves friends of the Mammon of unrighteousness that-when we fail we may be received into everlasting habitations Let us lend unto the Lord that we may have treasure in Heaven where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt nor theives break through and steal Let us fast the fast that the Lord hath chosen Lose the bands of wickedness feed the hungry cloth the naked he that hath two Coats let him give to him that hath none and he that hath meat let him do likewise Such an occasion scarce happens in many hundreds of years and for motives to charity they are all comprised in that great argument of the Judgement to come When the Son of Man shall come to Judgement and shall sit upon the Thnone of his Glory When all Nations shall be gathered before him and he shall set the Sheep on his right hand and the Goats on his left This shall be the mark of their discrimination He shall say to those on his right hand I was hungry and ye fed me thirsty and ye gave me drink naked and ye clothed me sick and in prison and ye visited me Come ye blessed of my Faiher receive the Kingdom prepared for you And he shall say unto them on the left hand I was hungry and ye fed me not thirsty and ye gave me no drink etc. Wherefore go ye cursod into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels The way is short and compendious to save all our interests What doth the Lord require of us but to do justly to love mercy to walk humbly before the Lord our God Let us be merciful therefore as our heavenly Father is merciful and let us humble our selves under the Almighty hand of God as we pretend to do this day Let us betake ourselves aforehand to our Judge and pour out our complaints before him Let us confess our wickedness and be sorry for our sins Let us lay hold on the feet of our Blessed Redeemer and give him no rest till he hath sealed our pardon Let us bathe with our tears the wounds that we have made Let us cry mightily to the Throne of Grace Let us wrestle and strive with our Redeemer and not les him go until he bless us Until he open our eyes to see the dangers we are in and through his mercy show us a way to escape them Till he quicken us up to resolutions of amendment and carry us strongly through these resolutions Until he heal our back-slidings and make up our breaches Until he save our souls from death and our Nation from destruction To work ourselves to these Resolutions and to fix us in them to make them abide upon us all our days let us remember what hath been spoken and let us frequently meditate upon that Sarcastical Concession of the Text Rejoice O young man in thy youth and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth walk in the ways of thy heart and the sight of thy eyes But know that for all these things God will bring thee to Judgement FINIS