^^ OF PmCET^
U'.'
V.Lo
NICHOL'S SERIES OF STANDARD DIVINES.
PURITAN PERIOD.
BY JOHN C. MILLER, D.D.,
LINCOLN college; honoraby canon of Worcester; vicar of Greenwich.
THE
WORKS OF THOMAS BROOKS
VOL. VI.
COUNCIL OF PUBLICATION.
■\V. LIXDSAY ALEXANDER, D.D., Trofcssor of Theology, Congregational Union, Edinljiiii;Ii.
JAMES BEGG, D.D., Minister of Newington Free Church, Edinburgh.
THOMAS J. CRAAVFOED, D.D., S.T.P., Professor of Divinity, University, E(.linl)urgh.
D. T. K. DRUAIMOXD, M.A., Minister of St Thomas's Episcopal Church, Edinburgh.
WILLIAM H. GOOLD, D.D., Professor of Biblical Literature and Church History, Reformed Presbyterian Church, Edinburgh.
ANDREW THOMSON, D.D., Minister of Broughton Place United Presby- terian Church, Edinburgh.
liSencrnt ^JDitor. REV. THOMAS SMITH, D.D., Edinburgh.
THE COMPLETE WORKS
THOMAS BROOKS.
(!;i3itci>, toitfj Hlcmoir,
BY THE EEV. ALEXANDER BALLOCH GROSART, LIVERPOOL.
VOL. YI.
containing:
London's lamentations on the late fiery dispensation — the glokious
DAY OF the saints' APPEARANCE — GOD'S DELIGHT IN THE PROGRESS OP THE UPRIGHT — HYPOCRITES DETECTED — A BELIEVER's LAST DAY IS HIS
BEST DAY — A HEAVENLY CORDIAL THE LEGACY OF A DYING MOTHER
AND MRS bell's EXPERIENCES INDICES, ETC.
EDINBURGH : JAMES NICHOL.
LONDON : JMIES NISBET AND CO, DUBLIN : G. HERBERT.
M.DCCC.LXVII.
EDITORIAL POSTSCRIPT.
FOLLOWING the last of his larger treatises—' London's Lamenta- tions' — there will be found in the present concluding volume certain minor writings of Brooks, of some of which the Editor had despaired securing copies — having searched in vain for most of them in all our great Libraries, and applied with similar result to innumer- able book-lovers and booksellers. He has not anywhere chanced upon another copy besides his own of either the ' Heavenly Cordial ' or of ' The Legacy of a Dying Mother ;' while years since the learned editor of the ' Depositions from the Castle of York, relating to Offences com- mitted in the Northern Counties in the Seventeenth Century,' for the Surtees Society — James Eaine, Esq., — with reference to the Funeral Sermon of Colonel Eainsborough, designated it * a very rare tract,' and congratulated himself that by the kindness of a local Bibliopole he was ' able to give a copy of the title.' i Apart from the intrinsic Avorth of these excessively scarce, if not unique tractates, it is exceed- ingly satisfactory to the Editor that he has been enabled by lucky chances to present the entire writings of Brooks in this — like Sibbes' — first collective edition. As simple matter of fact, the Works given n these six volumes could not be purchased in the market in the original and early editions for as many pounds as the shillings they cost in this form : and it is ventured to indulge a hope that the accuracy of our reprint from a genuine and unmutilated text, the careful verifi- cation of the numerous Bible quotations and references, the annotation of names, &c., and the Glossary and marking of Shakesperean words — these sometimes explaining obscurities — will be accepted as addi- tions to their value. The Editor may be permitted to notice the copious Indices. Ordinarily it is to be feared that labour spent on such work is ill appreciated, too many, as rare Thomas Fuller com- plained, regarding an index as ' the bag and baggage of a book, of
^ Publications of the Surtees Society, vol. xl. p. 17.
Tl EDITORIAL POSTSCRIPT.
more use tlian honour, even to suchyho, seeminojly slighting, secretly use it, if not for need, for speed of what they desire to find.'i But he has so constructed these — incorporating the full 'Tables' of Brooks himself wherever prepared by him— as to render any preliminary essay here unnecessary, inasmuch as, well used, they will guide readily the reader of our Worthy to his wealth of fine thought, of priceless insight into the * mind of the Spirit ' and human nature, as well unrenewed as gracious, of definite doctrinal statement, of rich si)iritual- mindcduess, of tender and yet pungent appeal, of happy allusion, of brilliant, rapid wit, of racily-put, telling anecdote and asides, of recon- dite reading and multifarious lore unexpectedly turned to account, with many a pat, almost sly foot-note, ' You know how to make the application ' — in a way hitherto impossible.
With such a ' Cabinet of Jewels'— to appropriate one of his own titles2 — as these AVorks present, one can read with a smile the depre- ciatory estimate of Brooks as of Bunyan, formed by High Church contemporaries, and later. One of these is so characteristic, and serves as so excellent an illustration of the a[)othcgm, that the eye sees what it brings with it, that it must find a place here, especially as it has not before been published : it was come upon by us in an examination of the MSS. of Walker, of the ' Sufferings,' folio, preserved in the Bodleian. This ' character' of Brooks occurs iu a letter from Luke Milbourno. It is literally as follows — the name, to start with, being misspelled — * Mr Tho. Brook was another of those ' i)leasant preachers' whose sermons would require a man of a very staunch temper to preach them over again Avithout smiling. Abundance of ' fine meta- phors' and ' charming similitudes' a man may meet with in his Works, fit only to debase Divinity, or to dress it up in a ffool's Coat ; and I'm afraid such jingling Preachers turn'd men from Truth to ffables [rather] than from sin to righteousness. Souls are no more to be taken with chaff than old Birds are. His stile is neither prophetical nor Apostolical, nor were any of ye antient fathers guilty of such Trifliu"" ; and indeed it icould he loell if all such Preachas tvere silenced. A sound Christian, though he be no Critic, loves plain Truth delivered in good words, but always hates jesting in a serious matter.' 3 The italicised sentence reveals the animus of these small sarcasms and smaller comparisons with 'antient fathers,' — of whom the writer was evidently as ignorant as he was of the preacher and author
' l'i.sgah-si?ht of Palestine in ' Necessary Directions for use of the Index ' at end.
' Works, vol. iii.
» From Miscellaneous Papers in Quarto. From these Walker MSS.— which lie unresid and uncared, for apparently — we hope to use eflectively elscwlicrc not a few letters, anecdotes, &c., Sec. of the Puritan 'Worthies.'
EDITORIAL POSTSCRIPT. VH
he misjudges. Yet is it almost wholly from such witnesses that too many even now express their opinions on the Writings of the Puritans and Nonconformists ; and perchance it must be admitted that the anti-Puritans and High Churchmen have been too much read at second-hand and controversially. In the present instance, it is ludi- crous to find one so inane and sand-barren as Milbourne sitting in judgment upon a nature so rich and so much larger than his own ; but it is a typical and hence valuable example of how an over-dainty cul- ture may be olfended by superficial faults, so as to be stone-blind to the preciousness of the substance of the works wliich these blemish ; it being granted that occasionally Brooks is homely to excess, in common with the greatest divines of his age.
Calamy's summary of the ' character' of Brooks — inadequate though it be — may filly accompany the preceding : — ' He was a veiy affecting preacher, and useful to many ; and tho' he us"d many homely phrases and sometimes too familiar resemblances, which to nice criticks appear ridiculous ; yet he did more good to souls than many of tho exactest composers ; and let the wits of the age pass what censures they please, ' he that winneth souls is wise.' i
' In characterising Sibbcs generally, we selected the epithet univ(T- sally applied to him, ' heavenJi/ ;' and in like manner, the woixl ' usejnV is the one word which accurately expresses the position of Brooks among his contemporaries. His slightest ' Epistle ' is ' Bread of Life :* his most fugitive ' Sermon' a full cup of ' Living Water ;' the very foliage of his exuberant flmcies ' Leaves' of the Tree of Life : his one dominating aim to make dead hearts warm with the Life of the Gospel of Him who is Life ; his supreme purpose to ' bring near ' the very Truth of God. Hence his directness, his urgency, his yearning, his fervour, his fulness of Bible citation, his wistfulness, his intensity, his emotion, and that fine passion of enthusiasm sprung of compassion, and his iteration and forgetfulness,^ and Pauline accident of choice words or melody of sentence. His desire to be ' useful ' to souls, to achieve the holy success of serving Christ, to win a sparkling crown to lav at His feet, breathes and burns from first to last. Evervthin"- is subordinated to 'usefulness ;' and while he gathered around him the cultured and the titled — who all but worshipped the ' good old man' — it w^as his chief rejoicing that, like his Master, ' the common people' heard and read him 'gladly.' In loving association with Sibbes and Shefiield, Baxter and Bunyan, Brinsley and Samuel
^ Account, vol. ii. p. 27.
^ This forgetfulness reveals itself in the repeated recurrence of the same anecdotes and sayings and names. Perhaps nothing more shews Brooks' one thought to have heen present 'usefulness,' not at all literary fame.
VIU EDITORIAL POSTSCRIPT.
Richardson, his books were well thumbed in the hamlets of his own England, and, in quaint 'Glasgow' editions, among the godly peasantry of fScothuul, and gained wide and long-sustained welcome in Germany and llulland, as Brooks gratefully acknowledges repeatedly. i But more cannot be needed : and so — in the words of the loving biographer of good Bishop Lake — " I Avill detain thee no longer, gentle Reader, at this time, fioni the reading of so useful and precious works — only thus much I will promise thee for thine encouragement before thou begin, that if thou take the pains to go through with attention these .... first, Thou shalt gain thereby an exact knowledge of the mean- ing of the text he handles, and of every particular word and phrase in it ; secondlt/, Thou shalt meet with a great variety of choice obser- vations, both theological and moral, aptly deduced, and methodically laid down, as thou art like to find anywhere in so few leaves again ; lasthj, If thou be endued, as I hoj)e thou art, with the same spirit of grace and regeneration that the author was, thou shalt find thine afi'ections kindled and stirred up thereby to a real practice of piety and good works, more than by a great many more flom-ishing dis- courses than these at first sight seem to be." -
May this complete edition of these inestimable Works be used at this ' later day' to cause him, ' being dead, yet to speak' for that dear Lord Jesus he loved and served so well !
Alexander B. Grosart.
Liverpool.
' Among our ]3rooksiana is a Dutch translation of the ' Apples of Gold,' of which the following is the title-page, ' Gouden' Appeleu Voor longh Mans ende longe-Dochters, Als ook eene Kroone der Heerlykheyt Voor Oude-Mannen ende Oude-Yrowen. Ofte De Geluksaligheyt van by tijts goet te ziyn, ende de Eere van een oudt Discipel te wesen. Klaarlijk en ten vollen outdekt, ende beknooptelijk, ende getrouwelijk tocgcpast. Middisgaders Der longen Tcgenworpingen beautwoordt Ende dcr Oudcn Twijssclingen opgclost. Door Thomas Brooks, Prediker des Euangelium tot Margarets New Fish- street hill binnen London : Uyt hct Enji;elsch Verduytst Door D. Montanus, Dienaar des Goddclijcken Woordts tot Sluys in Vlanderen. Tot Uytrecht. Ey Johannes Ribbius. 1067. 12mo.' Ribbius dedicates it in highly appreciatory words to a great lady, ' Anna Elisabeth van Recde, van Xederhorst,' &c. Appended are two religious poems in Dutch.
^ Prefixed to his ' Sermons and Divine Meditations.' 1629. Folio.
CONTENTS.
London's Lamentations.
Epistle Dedicatory, ..... 3-13
The text explained and divided, .... 14-17
Fire, as a symbol in Scripture, .... 17-22
Ends of God in inflicting judgments, . . . 22-35
Ends of God in inflicting judgments on his own people, . 35-50 Seven sins among the professing people in London, that ought to work them to justify the Lord though he burned them up, ..... 51-58
The several sins that bring the fiery judgment upon cities
and countries, ..... 59-127
Various specialities concerning the judgment of fire on
London, ...... 130-153
Considerations to work to lamentation, . . . 154—166
Thirteen supports to bear up their hearts who have either lost all, or much, or most of what they had in this world, ...... 166-197
Of the fire of hell, . . . . . 198-199
Four arguments to prove that it is very probable that there
is material fire in hell, and objections met, . 199-216
Sixteen duties incumbent upon those who have been
burned up, ..... 216-306
Eight duties incumbent upon those whose habitations are
still standing, . . . . .306-312
II. The Glorious Day of the Saints' Appearancr. Epistle Dedicatory, Sermon, ....
315-317 318-334
III. God's Delight in the Progress of the Upright. Epistle Dedicatory, . . . .
Sermon, . ...
337-338 339-363
IV. Hypocrites Detected. Epistle Dedicatory, Sermon,
367-370 371-386
CONTENTS.
PAOR
V. A Bkliever's Last Day his Best Day.
Epistle Dedicatory, ..... 839-393
Sermon, ...... 394-408
VI. A Heavenly Cordial.
Note, . . . . . . .409
The ' Cordial,' ...... 410-434
VII. The Legacy of a Dying Mother.
Epistle Dedicatory, ..... 437-452
Mrs Bell's Experiences, . . . 453-458
Indices, itc, . . . . • . 459-502
LONDON'S LAMENTATIONS.
VOL. VI.
NOTE.
' London's Lamentations,' as it is the largest, so it is perhaps the most remarkable contemporary memorial of the ' Great Fire.' It seems singular that Defoe does not appear to have known it, else his well known compilation might have been enriched by its vivid and powerful incidental notices of public opinion and feeling during and subsequent to the direful calamity. Reeve's ' Plea for Nineveh' — by Nineveh, London being intended — may be compared with the present work. Iioyalist and Puritan alike give terrible pictures of the licentiousness and general wickedness of the 'great city.' The title-page will be found below.*
* LONDON'S LAMENTATIONS :
OR,
A serious Discourse concerning that late fiery Dispensation that turned our (once renown- ed) City into a ruinous Heap. Also the several Lessons that are incumbent upon those whose ' Houses have escaped the consuming Flames.
By THOMAS BROOKS, late Preacher of the Word at
S. Margarets New- Fish-street, where that Fatal Fire first be- gan that turned London into a ruinous Heap.
Una dies interest inter magnam Civitatem & nullam. There is but the distance of one day between a great City and none, said Seneca when a great City was burnt to Ashes.
Come, behold the Works of the Lord, what Desolations he hath made in the Earth. Psal. 46. 8.
LONDON,
Printed for John Llancoch and Nathaniel Po7ider, and are to be sold at the
first Shop in Pojyes-He.ad- Alley in Cornhil, at the Sign of the Three
Bibles, or at his Shop in Bishojisgate-street, and at the Sign of
the Peacock in Chancery-lane. 1670.
[4to.-G.]
PEIHOETOH
Ml
THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY.
To the Eight Honourable Sir William Tukner, Knight, Lord Mayor of the City of London, i
Eight Honourable, — It is not my design to blazon your worth, or Avrite a panegyric of your praises. Your brighter name stands not in need of such a shadow as men's applause to make it more renowned in the world. Native worth is more respected than adventitious glory. ' Your own works praise you in the gates,' Prov. xxxi. 31. It is London's honour and happiness, tranquillity and prosjoerity, to have such a magistrate, that ' bears not the sword of justice in vain,' Eom. xiii. 4, and that hath not brandished the sword of justice in the defence of the friends of Baal, Balaam, or Bacchus. My Lord, had your sword of justice been a sword of protection to desperate swearers, or to cruel oppressors, or to deceitful dealers, or to roaring drunkards, or to cursing monsters, or to gospel despisers, or to Christ contemners, &c., might not London have lain in her ashes to this very day ? yea, might not God have rained hell out of heaven upon those parts of the city that were standing monuments of God's mercy, as once he did upon Sodom and Gomorrah ? Gen. xix. Woe to that sword that is a devouring sword to the righteous, to the meek, to the upright, and to the peaceable in the land, Ps. xxxv. 19, 20. 0 happy sword ! under which all sorts and ranks of men have worshipped God in peace, and lived in peace, and rested in peace, and traded in peace, and built their habitations in peace, and have grown up in peace. Sir, every man hath sat, under your sword, as under his own vine and fig-tree, in peace. Words are too weak to express how great a mercy this hath been to London, yea, I may say, to England. The ancients set forth all their gods with harps in their hands, the hieroglyphic of peace. The Grecians had the statue of Peace, with Pluto, the god of riches, in her arms. Some of the ancients were wont to paint peace in the form of a woman with a horn of plenty in her hands, viz., all blessings. The orator hit it when he said, Dulce nomen pads, The very name of peace is sweet. No city so happy as that wherein the chief magistrate has been as ' eyes to the
^ Of the Guild of Merchant Tailors : son of fTohn Turner of Kirk-Leedham in Cleve- land, Yorkshire. See Herbert's History of the Companies, ii. 426. This admirable magistrate won the praise of Eichard Baxter : Eeliquise Baxterianje, s. 11. — G.
4 THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY.
blind, legs to the lame, ears to the deaf, a father to the fatherless, a husband to the widow, a tower to the righteous, and a terror to the wicked,' Job xxxi.
Certainly rulers have no better friends than such as make conscience of their ways ; for none can be truly loyal but such as are truly reli- gious. Witness ]\Ioses, Joseph, Daniel, and the three children.'^ Sincere Christians are as lambs amongst lions, as sheep amongst wolves, as lilies amongst thorns. They are exposed more to the rage, wrath, and malice of wicked men, by reason of their holy profession, their gracious principles and practices, than any other men in all the world. Now did not God raise up magistrates, and spirit magistrates, to own them, to stand by them, and to defend them in all honest and just ways, how soon would they be devoured and destroyed ! Certainly the sword of the magistrate is to be di'awn forth for the natural good, and civil good, and moral good, and spiritual good, of all that live soberly and quietly under it. Stoloaeus^ tells us of a Persian law, that after the death of their king every man had five days' liberty to do what he pleased, that by beholding the wickedness and disorder of those few days, they might prize government the better all their days after. Certainly had some hot-headed, and little-witted, and fierce-spirited men had but two or three days' liberty to have done what they pleased in this great city during your lordship's mayoralty, they would have made sad work in the midst of us. When a righteous government fails, then (1.) Order fails; (2.) Keligion fails; (3.) Trade fails; (4.) Justice fails; (5.) Prosperity fails; (6.) Strength and power fails; (7.) Fame and honour fails; (8.) Wealth and riches fails; (9.) Peace and quiet fails ; (10.) All human converse and society fails. To take a righteous government out of the world, is to take the sun out of the firmament, and leave it no more a «ocr/xo9, a beautiful structure, but a Xcifxi, a confused heap. In such towns, cities, and kingdoms where righteous government fails, there every man's hand will be quickly en<>-aged against his brother. Gen. xxvi. 12. Oh the sins, the sorrows, the desolations, and destructions that will unavoidably break in like a flood u]:)on such a i)eople !
Public persons should have public spirits ; their gifts and goodness should diffuse themselves for the good of the whole. It is a base and ignoble spirit to pity Cataline more than to pity Kome, to pity any particular sort of men more than to pity the whole. It is cruelty to the good to justify the bad ; it is wrong to the sheep to animate the wolves ; it is danger, if not death, to the lambs not to restrain or chain up the lions ; but, Sir, from this ignoble spirit God has dehvered you. The ancients were wont to place the statues of their princes by their fountains, intimating that they were, or at least should be, fountains of the public good. Sir, had not you been such a fountain, men would never have been so warm for your continuance. My Lord, the great God hath made you a koivov uyadov, a public good, a public blessing ; and this hath made your name precious, and your govern-
1 The three tilings which God minds most, and loves best below heaven, are his truth, his worship, and his people. *
* Stobaeus, serm. xlii. p. 294. [i.e., his Florilegium or Sermones, otherwise Aydo- \6yiov. — 0.]
THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY, O
ment desirable, and your person honourable in the thoughts, hearts, and eyes of all people. i Many — may I not say most? — of the rulers of this world are, as Pliny speaks of the Koman emperors. Nomine dii, naturd diaboli, Monsters, not men; murderers, not magistrates. Such a monster was Saul, who hunted David as a partridge, slew the inno- cent priests of the Lord, ran to a witch, and who was a man of so narrow a soul that he knew not how to look or live above Iwmself, his own interests and concernments. The great care of every magis- trate should be to promote the public interest more than their own, as you may see by comparing the scriptures in the mai'gin together.^ It was Ceesar's high commendation, that he never had himself after the world had him for a governor ; his mind was so set on the public, that he forgot his own private affairs. The stars have their bright- ness, not for themselves, but for the use of others. The application is easy.
My Lord, several philosophers have made excellent and elegant orations in the praise of justice. They say that all virtues are com- prehended in the distribution of justice.^ Justice, saith Aristotle, is a synopsis and epitome of all virtues. All I shall say is this, the world is a ring, and justice is the diamond in that ring; the world is a body, and justice is the soul of that body. It is well known that the con- stitution of a man's body is best known by his pulse : if it stir not at all, then we know he is dead ; if it stir violently, then we know him to be in a fever ; if it keep an equal stroke, then we know he is sound, well, and whole. So the estate and constitution of a city, kingdom, or commonweal is best known by the manner of executing justice therein; for justice is the pulse of a city, kingdom, or commonweal. If justice be violent, then the city, kingdom, or commonweal is in a fever, in a very bad estate ; if it stir not at all, then the city, kingdom, or com- monwealth is dead ; but if it hath an equal stroke, if it be justly and duly administered, then the city, kingdom, or commonweal is in a good, a safe, and a sound condition. When Vespasian asked Apollonius what was the cause of Nero's ruin, he answered, that Nero could tune the harp well, but in government he did always wind up the strings too high or let them down too low. Extremes in government are the ready way to ruin all. The Komans had their rods for lesser faults, and their axe for capital crimes. Extreme right often proves extreme wrong. He that will always go to the utmost of what the law allows, will too too often do more than the law requires. A rigid severity often mars all. Equity is still to be preferred before extremity. To inflict great penalties and heavy censures for light offences, this
^ There is a great truth in that old maxim, Magistratus virum indicat. In my epistle to my treatise called 'A Cabinet of Choice Jewels,' the ingenious reader may find six arguments to encourage magistrates to be men of public spirits. [Vol. iii. pp. 235, seq. — G.]
2 Exod. xxxii. 10, 11, 32; Neh. v. 6-19; Ps. cxxxvii. 5, 6; Acts xiii. 36.
^ Carneades, Aristotle, Socrates, &c. The Eoman orator hath long since observed, that the force of justice is such, and so great, that even thieves and robbers, both by sea and land, Avho live upon injustice and rapine, yet cannot live upon their trade without some practice of it among themselves. Cleobulus, one of the seven sages, was wont to say that mediocrity was without compare. The very heathen could set so much divine glory in the face of a magistrate, that he styled him f/x^i'xos dKoiv 6eov, The living image of the ever-living God. [Cf. Plato : Tim. 92 C— G.]
6 THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY.
is to kill a fly upon a man's forehead with a beetle.^ The great God hath put his own name upon magistrates: Ps. Ixxxii. G, ' I said that ye are gods/ Yet it must be granted that you are gods in a smaller letter : mortal gods — gods that uuist die like men. All the sons of Ish arc sons of Adam. ]\Iagistrates must do justice im- partially; for as they are called gods, so in this they must be like to God, who is no accepter of persons, Deut. i. 17 ; Lev. xix. 15. He accepts not of the rich man because of his robes, neither doth he reject the poor man because of his rags. The magistrates' eyes are to be always upon causes, and not upon persons. Both the statues of the Theban judges and the statues of the Egyptian judges were made without hands and without eyes, to intimate to us that, as judges should have no hands to receive bribes, so they should have no eyes to see a friend from a foe, or a brother from a stranger, in judgment.2 And it was the oath of the heathen judges, as the orator relates, Audiam accusatorem el reum sine afeclihus, ct jxrsonarum respec- ■ Hone : I will hear the plaintiff and the defendant with an equal mind, without affection and respect of persons. In the twelfth Novel of Jus- tinian you may read of an oath imposed upon judges and justices against inclining or addicting themselves to either party ; yea, they put themselves under a deep and bitter execration and curse in case of partiality, imploring God in such language as this : ' Let me have my part with Judas, and let the leprosy of Gehazi cleave to me, and the trembling of Cain come upon me, and whatsoever else may astonish and dismay a man, if I am partial in the administration of justice.' The i)oet in the Greek epigram taught the silver axe of justice that was carried before the Koman magistrates to proclaim, ' If thou be an offender, let not the silver flatter thee ; if an innocent, let not the axe affright thee.' The Athenian judges judged in the night, when the faces of men could not be seen, that so they might be impartial in judgment. My Lord, your impartiality in the administration of justice in that high orb wherein diWne providence hath placed you, is one of those great things that hath made you high and honourable in the eyes and hearts of all that are true lovers of impartial justice. Some writers say, that some waters in Macedonia, being drunk by black shee]>, change their fleece into white. Nothing but the pure and impartial administration of justice and judgment can transform black-mouthed, black-handed, and black-hearted men into white. There is nothing that sweetens, satisfies, and silences all sorts of men like the adminis- tration of impartial justice. The want of this brought desolation upon Jerusalem and the whole land of Jewry, Isa. i. 23, 24, and upon many other flourishing kingdoms and countries, as all know that have but read anything of Scripture or history. St Austin plainly denies that ever the Eoman polity could be called properly a common- wealth, upon this ground, that Ubi non est justitia, non est repiiblica.
^ Peter Lombard. Cf. Sibbee, vol. i. 101.— G.
' Magistrates are, as Xazianzen expresses it, pictures drawn of God. Every magis- trate, though in never so low a place, bears the image of God. A penny bears the image of the prince as well as a shilling. Magistrates are not immortal deities, neither have they everlasting godheads. Those gods, as tliey had a beginning, so they must have an end. Quicquid oritur, moritur. There is a ' Mene, mene ' on them ; their days are numbered ; their time is computed. Hercules his pillar stands in their way. Non datur ultra.
THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY. 7
He calls'" commonwealths without justice hut magna latrocinia; or in Lipsius his language, congeries, confusio, turha. ^ It is hut an abuse of the word respuhlica — commonwealth — where the public good is not consulted by an impartial justice and equity ; it is but a confused heap, a rout of men ; or if we will call it so at present, it will not be so long without impartial justice, partly because injustice and oppression makes the multitude tumultuous, and fills the people's heads with, dangerous designs, as you may see by comparing the scriptures in the margin together ;2 and partly because it lays a nation open and obnoxious to the wrath and vengeance of God, as might easily be made good by scores of scriptures. Impartial justice is the best establishment of kingdoms and commonwealths. ' The king by judgment establisheth the land,' Prov. xxix. 4 : see Num. xxv. 11 ; 2 Sam. xxi. 14. It is the best security against desolating judgments. ' Kun ye through the streets of Jerusalem, and seek in the broad places thereof, if ye can find a man, if there be any that executeth judgment, and I will pardon it,' Jer, v. 1.
My Lord, as it is the honour of a magistrate to do justice impar- tially, so it is the honour and glory of a magistrate to do justice speedily : Jer. xxviii. 12, ' 0 house of David, thus saith the Lord, Execute judgment in the morning, and deliver him that is spoiled out of the hand of the oppressor, lest my fury go out like fire, and burn that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings.' 3 After examination, execution is to be done with expedition. When men cry out for Justice, Justice, magistrates must not cry out, Cras, Oras — to-morrow, to-morrow. Magistrates must do justice in the morning. Neither noon-justice, nor afternoon-justice, nor evening-justice, nor night-justice is so acceptable to God, or so honourable to magistrates, or so advantageous to the people, as morning-justice is. To delay justice is worse sometimes than to deny justice. It is a very dangerous thing for magistrates to be as long a-bringing forth their verdicts as the elephant her young. Delay of justice makes many more irrecon- cilable ; it makes many men go up and down this world with heavy hearts, empty purses, and threadbare coats, I have read of a famous passage of Theodoric, king of the Romans, who, when a widow came to him with a sad complaint, that she had a suit depending in the court three years, which might have been ended in a few days ; the king demands of her the judges' names: she tells him ; he sends a special command to them to give all the speedy despatch that was pos- sible to the widow's cause, which they did ; and in two days determined it to the widow's liking. This being done, the king calls for the judges, and they, supposing that they should have both applause and reward for their expedition, hastened to him full of joy ; but after the king had propounded several things to them about their former delays, he commanded both their heads to be struck off, because they had spun out that cause to a three years' length, which two days would have ended. Here was royal justice, and speedy justice indeed. Ps. ci. 8,
^ August, de Civitate Dei, lib. x. cap. 21, &c. ; lib. iv. cap. 4. Lipsius de Constan., lib. 11. cap. 13. ^1 Kings xii. ; 1 Sam. viii. 3.
^ God is very speedy and swift in the execution of justice, Joel ill. 4 ; Gen. xix.; Num. xvi. ; Ezra vii. 20. In this as in other things it becomes magistrates to be like to God.
8 THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY.
' I will early destroy all the Avicked of the land ;' sum^no mane, I will do morning-justice. Fesiinanter, so Genebrad, ' I will hastily do it.'^ Justice should be on the wing; delays are very dangerous and in- jurious : Prov. xiii. 12, ' Hope deferred maketh the heart sick.' The Hebrew word Mcniiushshacah, that is here rendered ' deferred,' is from Mashavh, that signifies ' to draw out at lengtli.' Men are short- breathed and short-spirited, and hope's hours aie lull of eternity, and when their hopes are draAvn out at length, this makes their hearts sick ; and, ah ! what a world of such sick souls lies languishing at hope's hospital all the world over. Hope in the text is put for the good things hoped for. Now wdien the good things men hope for, be it justice or a quick despatch, &c., are deferred and delayed, this makes the poor client sick at heart. A lingering ho])e always breeds in the heart a lingering consumption ; the harder travail hope hath, and the more strongly it labours to bring forth, and yet is deferred and delayed, the more deadly sick the client grows. 2 The speedy execution of justice is the very life and soul of justice : Amos v. 24, ' But let judg- ment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.' The Hebrew word Veiiggal, that is here rendered ' run down,' is from Galal, that signifies to ' roll down freely, plentifully, vigorously, con- stantly, speedily,' as the great billows of the sea, or as waves roll speedily over the rocks. Judgment and righteousness, like a mighty stream, should bear down all before it. Fiat justitia, mat orhis — Let justice be done, whatever come of it : Deut. xvi. 20, ' That which is altogether just shaltthou follow,' or rather, as the Hebrew hath it, plii plii, Tsedek, Tsedek, Justice, justice shalt thou follow — that is, all manner of justice thou shalt follow, and nothing but justice shalt thou follow, and thou shalt follow justice sincerely, out of love to justice; and thou shalt follow justice exactly, without turning to the right hand or the left; and thou shalt follow justice resolutely, in spite of the world, the flesh, and the devil; and thou shalt follow justice speedily, without delays or excuses. A magistrate that has the sword of justice in his hand must never plead, ' There is a lion in the way.' My Lord, this will be your honour while you live, and your comfort when you come to die, that whilst the sword was in your hand, you did justice speedily as well as impartially. You did justice in the morning, and justice at noon, and justice in the afternoon, and justice at night. What has been your whole mayoralty but one continued day of justice ? Who can sum up the many thousand causes that you have heard and de- termined, and the many thousand differences that you have sweetly and friendly composed and ended ? If the lawyers please but to speak out, they must ingenuously confess that your Lordship has eased them of a gi-eat deal of work.
My Lord, as it is the honour and glory of a magistrate to do justice speedily, so it is the honour and glory of a magistrate to do justice resolutely, courageously, valiantly. It is observable that
' More accurately Gilbert Genebrardus, whose Commentary on the Psalms (1577) has passed through numerous editions. — G.
* Julius Caesar's quick despatch is noted in three ivords : Veni, vidi, vici—l came, I saw, I overcame.
THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY. 9
as soon as ever Joshua came into the office of magistracy, God charges him no less than three times, in a breath as it were, to be very courageous. Josh. i. 6, 7, 9. A magistrate that is timorous will quickly be treacherous. A magistrate that is fearful can never be faithful. Solomon's throne was supported with lions, to shew that magistrates should be men of mettle and courage. The Athenian judges sat in Mars' street, Acts xvii. 22, to shew that they had mar- tial hearts, and that they were men of courage and mettle. The Grecians placed justice betwixt Leo and Libra, to signify that as there must be indififei-ency in determining, so there ought to be courage in executing. Where there is courage without knowledge, there the eje of- justice is blind; and where there is knowledge without courage, there the sword of justice is blunt. A magistrate's heart, a judge's heart and his robes must be both dyed in grain, else the colour of the one and the courage of the other will quickly fade. Why should not the standard be of steel, and the chief posts of the house be heart of oak ? It hath been long since said of Cato, Fabricius, and Aris- tides, that it was as easy to remove the sun out of the firmament as to remove them from justice and equity ; they were men of such courageous and magnanimous spirits for justice and righteousness. No scarlet robe doth so well become a magistrate as holy courage and stoutness doth. As bodily physicians, so state physicians should have an eagle's eye, a lady's hand, and a lion's heart. Cowardly and timorous magistrates will never set up monuments of their victories over sin and profaneness. It is very sad when we may say of our magistrates, as the heathen did of magistrates in his time, they were very good, si audeant quce sentmnt, if they durst but do what they ought to do.i My Lord, had not the Lord of lords put a great spirit of courage, boldness, and resolution upon you, you had never been able to have managed your government as you have done, counting the various winds that have blown upon you, and the several difficulties and discouragements that have risen up before you, Kev. i. 5, 6, and xvii. 14.
My Lord, once more give me leave to say, that in a magistrate justice and mercy, justice and clemency ought to go hand in hand: Prov. XX. 28, ' Mercy and truth preserve the king, and his throne is upholden by mercy. '2 All justice will not jjreserve the king, nor all mercy will not preserve the king ; there must be a mixture both of justice and mercy to preserve the king, and to uphold his throne ; and to shew that mercy is more requisite than justice, the word mercy is doubled in the text. Justice without mercy turns into rigour, and so becomes hateful. Mercy without justice turns into fond pity, and so becomes contemptible. 3 Look, as the rod of Aaron and the pot of manna were by God's own command laid up in the same ark ; so must mercy and justice be preserved entire in the bosom of the same magistrate. Mercy and justice, mildness and righteousness,
^ Cic. de Mil. ^ Truth in Scripture is frequently put for justice.
^ King John thought to strengthen himself by gathering a great deal of money to- gether; but neglecting the exercise of mercy and justice, clemency and lenity, he lost his people's affections, and so, after many endless turmoils, he came to an unhappy end.
10 THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY.
lenity and fidelity arc a safer and a stronj^er ,e;unrd to princes and people than rich mines, munitions of rock.s, mighty armies, powerful navies, or any warlike jircparations. It is very observable tliat Clirist is called but once the ' Lion of the tribe of Judah' in the book of the Revelation, and that is in chap. v. 5 ; but he is called a Lamb no less than nine-and-twenty times in tliat book. And what is this but to shew us the transcendent mercy, clemency, lenity, mildness, and sweetness that is in Jesus Christ, and to shew that he is infinitely more inclined to the exercise of mercy than he is to the exercise of justice. It is true, magistrates should be lions in the execution of justice, and it is as true that they should be lambs in the exercise of mercy and clemency, mildness and sweetness ; and the more ready and inclinable they are to the exercise of mercy, where mercy is to be shewed, the more like to Christ the Lamb they are. God is slow to anger, he abounds in pity, though he be great in power, Ps. Ixviii. 18, and ciii. 13, 14 ; Hosea xi. 8. Seneca hath long since observed, that the custom of anointing kings was to shew that kings, above all other men, should be men of the greatest sweetness and mildness, their anointing being a sign of that kingly sweetness and mildness that should be in them. Thetxlosius the emperor, by his loveliness and clemency, gained many kingdoms.^ The Goths, after the death of their own king, beholding his temperance, patience, and justice mixed with mercy and clemency, gave them- selves up to his government. When Cicero would claw Ccesar, he tells him that his valour and victories were common with the rest of his soldiers, but his clemency and goodness were wholly his own. Nero's speech hath great praise, who in the beginning of his reign, when he was to subscribe to the death of any condemned person, would say, Utinam nescireni literas, I wish I did not know how to write. I know there are a thousand thousand cases wherein severity is to be used ; but yet I must say that it is much safer to account for mercy than for cruelty ; it is best that the sword of justice should be always furbished with the oil of mercy. My Lord, in the manage- ment of your government you have been so assisted and helped from on high, that stoutness and mildness, justice and mercy, justice and clemency, hath like a silver thread run through all your mayoralty, and by this means you have very signally served the interest of the crown, the interest of the city, the interest of the nation, and that which is more than all the rest, the interest of your own soul. Rigour breeds rebellion. Rehoboam by his severity, by his cruelty, lost ten tribes in one day, 1 Kings xii. 16.
My Lord, your prudence, justice, and nioderation, your burning zeal against the horrid, hideous, heady vices of this day ; your punish- ing of oaths, drunkenness, and the fiilse balance ; your singular sobriety and temperance in the midst of all your high entertainments; your fidelity and activity, your eminent self-denial in respect of your perquisites ; your unwearied endeavours to sec London raised out of its ruins, and to see the top-stone laid ; your great readiness and willingness to spend and be spent for the public good : these are the things that have made your name as a precious ointment, and
^ Vide Aug. de civit. Dei, lib. v. cap. 26. Orosius, lib. vii. cap. 3i.
THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY, 11
that have erected for you a noble living monument in the breasts and hearts of all sober, serious Christians : these are the things that have made you the darling of the people, i Let all succeeding lord mayors but manage their own persons, families, and government as you have done, by divine assistance, and without a peradventure they will have a proportionable interest in the hearts and affections of the people. For, my Lord, it is not barely the having of a sword of justice, a sword of power, but the well management of that sword, that makes most for the interest both of prince and people, and that gives the magistrate a standing interest in the hearts and affections of the people. My Lord, the generality of people never concern themselves about the particular persuasions of this or that magistrate in the matters of religion, their eyes are upon their examples, and upon the manage- ment of their trust and power for public good ; and they that do them most good shall be sure to have most of their hearts and voices, let their private opinions in the matters of religion be what they will.
My Lord, I have not so learned Christ as to give flattering titles to men. Job xxxii. 22. The little that I have written I have written in the plainness and singleness of my heart, and for your lordship's com- fort and encouragement in all well-doing, and to provoke all others that shall succeed in your chair to write after that fair copy that you have set them, which will be their honour, London's happiness, and England's interest. Plutarch said of Demosthenes, that he was ex- cellent at praising the worthy acts of his ancestors, but not so at imitating them. The Lord grant that this may never be made good of any that shall succeed your lordship ! Carus the emperor's motto was, Bonus dux, bonus comes, A good leader makes a good follower. The complaint is ancient in Seneca, that commonly men live not ad rationem, but ad similitudinem} Prcecepta docent, exempla movent. Precepts may instruct, but examples do persuade. Stories speak of some that could not sleep when they thought of the trophies of other worthies that went before them. The highest examples are very quickening and provoking. Oh that by all that shall succeed your lordship in the chair, we may yet behold our city rising more and more out of its ashes in greater splendour and glory than ever yet our eyes have seen it, that all sober citizens may have eminent cause to call them the repairers of the breaches and restorers of our city to dwell in ! 3 Concerning Jerusalem burned and laid waste by the Assyrians, Daniel foretold that the streets and the walls thereof should be re- builded, even in troublesome times, Dan. ix. 25. Though the Assj-r- ians have laid our Jerusalem waste, yet even to a wonder how have the buildings been carried on this last year !
My Lord, the following treatise, which I humbly dedicate to your lordship, has been drawn up some years. The reasons why it has been buried so long in oblivion are not here to be inserted. The dis- course is sober, and of great importance to all that have been burnt
' A self-seeking magistrate is one of the worst of plagues and judgments that can befall a people ; he is a gangrene in the head, which brings both a more speedy and a more certain ruin than if it were in some inferior and less noble part of the body.
^ Seneca de vita beata, cap. 1.
^ Isa. Iviii. 12, and Ixi. 4.; Amos ix. 14; Ezek. xxxvi. 33-36, 38.
12 THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY.
up, and to all whose houses have escaped the furious flames. Whilst the remembrance of London's flames are kept alive in the thoughts and liearts of men, tliis treatise will be of use in tlie world. My Lord, I do not dedicate tlii.s tractate to your lordship as if it stood in need of your honour's patronage ; I judge it to be of age both to plead for itself and to defend itself against all gainsayers. Veritas vincit, Veritas stat in ajycrto cam2)oA Zeno, Socrates, Anaxarchus, &c., sealed the lean and barren truths of philosophy with the expense of their dearest blood, as you may see in the heathen martyrology. Oh, how much more should we be ready to scnl all divine truths with our dearest blood, when God shall call us forth to such a service ! My Lord, I humbly lay this treatise at your lordship's foot, to testify that love and honour that I have in my heart for you, both upon the account of that intrinsecal worth that is in you, and upon the account of the many good things and great things that have been done by you, and publicly to testify my acknowledgment of your lordship's undeserved favours towards me. My Lord, of right this treatise should have been in your hands several months since, and in that it was not it is wholly from others and not from me. If your lordship please but to favour the author so far as to read it once over for his sake, he doubts not but that your lordship will oftener read it over for your own soul's sake, and for eternity's sake, and for London's sake also. My Lord, by reason of my being remote from the city several weeks, I have had the advantage but of reading and correcting two or three sheets, and therefore must beg your lordship's pardon as to all the neglects and escapes of the press. A second impression may set all right and straight.
My Lord, that to your dying day you may be famous in your gene- ration, and that your precious and immortal soul may be richly adorned with all saving gifts and graces, and that you may daily enjoy a clear, close, high, and standing communion with God, and that you may be filled with all the fruits of righteousness and holiness, and that your soul may be bound up in the bundle of life, and crowned with the highest glory in the other world, in the free, full, constant, and uninterrupted enjoyment of that God who is the heaven of heaven and the glory of glory, is, and by divine assistance shall be, the earnest prayers of him who is your honour's in all humble and due observance,
Thomas Brooks.
^ My Lord, some sacrifice their labours to great Jfrccenases, that tliey may be atoned to shield them from potent antagonists ; but these sermons, which here I present to your honour's perusal, being only the blessed truths of God, I hope they need no arm but his to defend them.
THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY. 13
THE FIERY JESUIT'S TEMPER AND BEHAVIOUR.
I fain would be informed by you what ails These foxes to wear firebrands in their tails. What ! did you teach these cubs the world to burn, Or to embottle London in its urn ? Are Huguenots as rank Philistines grown With you, as dwelt in Gath or Askelon ? Bold wretches ! must your fire thus antedate The general doom, and give the world its fate ? Must hell's edict to blend this globe with fire Be done at your grave nods when you require ?
THEOImjGIOAL.
LONDON'S LAMENTATIONS ON THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION.
Who gave Jacob to the spoil, and Israel to the robbers ? did not I the Lord? he against ivhom ive have sinned; for they wotdd not icalk in his ivays, neither were they obedient to his laiu.
Therefore he hath poured uj)on him the fury of his anger, and the strength of battle: and it hath set him on fire round about, yet he kneio not; and it burned Mm, yet he laid it not to Iteart. — IsA. XLII. 24, 25.
The Lord in this chapter, by the prophet Isaiah, doth foretell heavy- things against the people, and, by the way, marks the Lord's dealings. He ever gives warnings before he sends any plagues. He lightens before he thunders, that the i)eople might not say, they did not hear of it, and that the wicked might be the more inexcusable, and that the godly might make an ark to save themselves in. These words contain in them five several things. (L) The author of this destruc- tion or judgment. {'!.) The causes of it. (3.) The judgment itself. (4.) Who they were on whom this judgment was inflicted. (5.) The effects of it. Now by divine permission I will open these words in order to you.
1. For the first, The author of it. Now this is laid down by question and answer : ' Who gave Jacob to the spoil, and Israel to the robbers ?' There is the question. ' Did not I the Lord ?' There is the answer. God is the author of all the plagues and judgments that befall a nation.
2. Secondly, The causes lohy the Lord did this to a people tliat he had chosen to be a sjjccial people unto himself; to a peojile nj^on whom he had set his love ; to a people that lie had owned for his portion, and that he had formerly kept as the apple of his eye, and carried as upon eagles' wings, Deut. vii. 5, 8, and xxxii. 10-12. Now the causes are set down, first, more generally, in these words, ' Because they have sinned against the Lord;' secondly, more particularly, in these words, ' For they would not walk in his ways, neither were they obedient to his law.'
IsA. XLII. 24, 25.] London's lamentations, etc, 15
3. The third thing observable in the words is, the dreadful judg- ments themselves that God inflicted upon his sinful people, his sinning people ; and these you have in ver. 25.
' Therefore he hath poured upon him the fury of his anger : ' not only his anger, but the fury of his anger, to shew the greatness of it, the extremity of it. Mark, he doth not say that God did drop down his anger, but he poured down his anger and indignation. This phrase, ' he poured out,' is an allusion to the clouds pouring down of water violently all at once, in an instant, as they do many times in the Levant seas, in Egypt, at the Indies, and in several other parts of the world ; as they did in the deluge, when the windows of heaven were broke open, Gen. vi. 11. Now, by this similitude, the Lord shews the dreadfulness, the grievousness, the suddenness, and the vehemency of the judgments that were fallen upon them,
' And the strength of battle.' The Lord appears in arms against them in the greatness and fierceness of his wrath ; he sent in a very powerful enemy upon them, that with fire and sword overran them and their country, and destroyed them on every side, as you may see by comparing 2 Kings xxiii. 33, seq., with the 24th and 25th chapters following.
'And hath set him on fire round about.' That is, say some, all the countries, cities, and towns round about Jerusalem were set on fire.
' Yet he knew not.' Though God had burnt them up on every hand, yet they took no notice of it, they regarded it not, they were not at all affected with the fiery dispensations of God.^ Oh the dulness, the insensibleness, the sottishness of the Jews under the most awakening and amazing judgments of God ! ' And it burned him.' This some apply to the city of Jerusalem itself. God did not only fire the cities and towns round about Jerusalem, but he also set Jeru- salem itself into a flame. Jerusalem, which was ' beautiful for situ- ation, the joy of the whole earth,' the paradise and wonder of the world, is turned into ashes. ' Yet he laid it not to heart,' or upon his heart, as the original runs. Oh the monstrous stupidity, insensible- ness, and blockishness of this people ! Though God had brought them low, though their crown was fallen from their head, though their glorious city was turned into ashes, and though they were almost destroyed by many smarting miseries and dreadful calamities, yet they were not affected with the stupendous judgments of God, they were not awakened by all the flames that God had kindled about their ears, they did not lay the judgments of God to heart, nor they would not lay the judgments of God upon their hearts,
4. The fourth thing observable in the words is, the persons, the 'people that ivere spoiled, destroyed, and consumed hy fire; and they were Jacob and Israel. ' Who gave Jacob for a spoil, and Israel to the robbers?' They were a praying people, a professing people, a fasting people, a pecidiar people, a privileged people ; and yet for their
^ Diodorus Siculus writes, that in Ethiopia there is such a sottish insensible people, that if you cut them with a drawn sword, or slay their wives and children before their faces, they are not at all affected with it, nor moved at it. Such brutes were these Jews.
16 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
sins they became a destroyed people, a consumed people, a ruined people, Isa. Iviii. 2 ; Zecli. vii. 5 ; Exod. xix. 5.
5. The fiftli thinf;^ observable in the words is, the little effect the judgments of (rod had iijMn them. Now they were under such mon- strous stupidity that they were not [at] all awakened nor aftected with the judgments of God; they regarded them not, they laid them not to heart. And as stu})id and senseless were they when Titus Ves- pasian had laid their city desolate by fire and sword,i and sold thirty of them for one piece of silver, as Josephus and other historians tell us. 0 sirs, since their crucifying of the Lord of glory, they have never laid their finger upon the right sore ; to this very day they won't acknowledge their sin in crucifying of the Lord of glory. They confess they have sinned more than ever, and therefore it is that God hath more sorely afflicted them than ever ; but their cruelty to Christ, their crucifying of Christ, which ushered in the total ruin of their city and country, they cannot be brought to acknowledge to this very day, though the Lord hath burnt them up on every hand, and hath scat- tered them as dung all over the earth to this very day. A learned writer tells us that they call Christ Bar-chozab, the Bon of a Lie, a Bastard, and his Gospel Aven Gilaion, the Volume of Lies, or the Volume of Iniquity, and us Christians Goiim, that is. Gentiles, Edom- ites. When they salute a Christian, they call him Shed, that is, Devil.2 They hate all Christians, but none so much as those that are converted from Judaism to Christianity, and all this after so great a burning and desolation that the Lord has made in the midst of them. It is trua the length of those heavy judgments under wliich they groan to this very day hath often puzzled the intellectuals of their Eabbis, and hath many times put them to a stand, and sometimes to break out into a kind of confession, that surely their judgments could not last so long, but for crucifying of one that was more than a man. There was one Rabbi Samuel, who, six hundred years since, wrote a tract in form of an epistle to Rabbi Isaac, master of the synagogue of the Jews, wherein he doth excellently discuss the cause of their long captivity and extreme misery. And after that he had proved it was inflicted for some grievous sin, he sheweth that sin to be the same which Amos speaks of, Amos ii. 6, ' For three transgres- sions of Israel, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof, because they sold the righteous for silver.' The selling of Joseph he makes the first sin; the worshipping of the calf in Horeb, the second sin ; the abusing and killing of God's pro2)hets, the third sin; and the selling of Jesus Christ," the fourth sin. For the first they served four hundred years in Egypt, for the second they wan- dered forty years in the wilderness, for the third they were captives seventy years in Babylon, and for the fourth they are held in pitiful captivity even till this day. It is certain that the body of that people are under woeful blindness and hardness to this very day. And thus much for the 0]^)ening of the words.
^ By Titus Vespasian their land became a stage of blood and of all kind of barbarisms, and now their so renowned city, their temple and sanctum sanctorum, so famed all the world over, was turned into ashes and laid level to the ground.
' Buxtorf. Synag. Judaica, cap. .5 and cap 3C.
XSA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 17
The 25th verse is the scripture that I do intend to speak something to, as the Lord shall assist. Now the proposition which I only intend to insist upon is this, viz : —
That God is the author or effipient cause of all tlie great calamities and dreadful judgments that are inflicted upon cities and countries, and in particidar, of thcd of fire.
Now, that God is the author or efficient cause of all the great calamities and dreadful judgments that are inflicted upon cities and countries, will evidently appear to every man's understanding, that will but take the pains to read over the 26th chapter of Leviticus, and the 28th chapter of Deuteronomy, with that 14th of Ezekiel, from ver. 13 to ver. 22.
That Grod is the author or efficient cause of this dreadful judgment of fire that is at any time inflicted upon cities and countries, will sufficiently appear in these following scriptures : Amos iii. 6, ' Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid ? shall there be evil in the city, and the liOrd hath not done it ?' This is to be understood of the evil of punishment, and not of the evil of sin. Amos iv. 11, 'I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a firebrand j^lucked out of the burnings : yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord,' Here ' I ' is emphatical and exclusive, as if he should say, ' I, and I alone.' Amos i. 14, ' But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah,' — that is, in the metropolis or chief city of the Ammonites, — ' and it shall devour the palaces thereof Rabbah, their head city, was a cruel, bloody, covetous, and ambitious city, ver. 13 ; and therefore, rather than it should escape divine vengeance, God will kindle a fire in the wall of it, and burn it with his own hands. Ezek. xx. 47, ' And say to the forest of the south,' — that is, to Jerusalem, that did lie southwards from Chaldasa — ' Hear the word of the Lord ; Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I will kindle a fire in thee, and it shall devour every green tree in thee, and every dry tree : the flaming flames shall not be quenched, and all fuel from the south to the north shall be burnt therein:' ver. 48, ^ 'And all flesh shall see that I the Lord have kindled it : it shall not be quenched.' Men shall see that it was God that kindled the fire, and not man, and therefore it was beyond man's skill or power to quench it, or to overmaster it. Jer. vii. 20, ' Therefore thus saith the Lord God, Behold, mine anger and my fury shall be poured out upon this place, upon man, and upon beast, and upon the trees of the field, and upon the fruit of the ground ; and it shall burn, and shall not be quenched.' The point being thus proved ; for the further opening of it, premise with me these things : —
(1.) First, That great afilictions. dread fid judgments, are likened unto fire in the blessed Scriptures : Ps. Ixvi. 12, ' We went through fire and water :' Jer. iv. 4, ' Circumcise yourselves to the Lord, and take away the foreskins of your heart, ye men of Judah and inhabi- tants of Jerusalem ; lest my fury come forth like fire, and burn that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings :' Jer. xxi. 12, ' 0 house of David, thus saith the Lord, Execute judgment in the morning, and deliver hiin that is spoiled out of the hand of the
^ You will find this scriiiture fully opened in the following discourse. VOL. VI. B
18 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
oppressor, lest my fury go out like fire, and burn that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings :' Lam. ii. 3, 4, ' He hath cut off in his anger all the horn of Israel : he hath drawn back his right hand from before the enemy, and burned against Jacob like a flaming fire, which devoureth round about : he hath bent his bow like an enemy : he stood with his right hand as an adversary, and slew all that was ])leasant to the eye in the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion : he ])oured out his fury like fire : ' Ezek. xv. 7, ' And I will set my face against them ; they shall go out from one fire, and another fire shall devour them : and ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I set my face against them : ' Ezek. xxii. 20-22, ' As they gather silver, and brass, and iron, and lead, and tin, into the midst of the furnace, to blow the fire upon it, to melt it ; so will I gather you in mine anger and in my fury, and I will leave you there, and melt you : yea, I Avill gather you, and blow upon you in the fire of my wrath, and ye shall be melted in the midst thereof : as silver is melted in the midst of the furnace, so shall ye be melted in the midst thereof; and ye shall know that 1 the Lord have poured out my fury upon you.' Thus you see that great afflictions, great judgments, are likened unto fire.
Quest. But in what respects are great afflictions, great judgments, like unto fire ?
Ans. In these eight respects they are like unto fire : —
[1.] First, Fire is very dreadful and terrible to men's thoughts, spirits, and apprehensions. How dreadful was the fire of Sodom, and the fire of London, to all that were near it, or spectators of it ! It is observable that some are set out in the blessed Scriptures as monu- ments of most terrible and dreadful vengeance, whom the kings of Babylon roasted in the fire ; of them, it is said, shall be taken up a curse, Jer. xxix. 21, 22. When any imprecated sore vengeance from the Lord upon any one, it is said, ' The Lord make thee like Ahab and Zedekiah, whom the kings of Babylon roasted in the fire.' It is very dreadful and terrible for a man to have the least member of his body frying in the fire ; but how ten-ible and dreadful must it be for a man's wliole body to be roasted in the fire ! so are the judgments of the Lord very terrible and dreadful to the children of men. ' My flesh trembleth for fear of thee ; and I am afraid of thy judgments,' Ps. cxix. 120. Hab. iii. 16, ' When I heard, my belly trembled ; my lips quivered at the voice: rottenness entered into my bones, and I trembled in myself, that I might rest in the day of trouble.' But,
[2.] Secondly, Fire is very painfid- and tormenting — in w-hich respects hell-torments are compared to fire — so are great afflictions and judgments ; they are very painful and tormenting, they put a land into sore travail. Next to the pangs of conscience, and the pangs of hell, there are none to those pangs that are bred and fed by terrible judgments, Isa. xxvi. 17, 18. But,
[3.] Thirdlj, Fire is of a discovering nature ; it enlightens men's eyes to see those things that they did not see before ; so do the terrible judgments of God enlighten men's minds and understandings tometimes to know the Lord, Rev. xv. 4 ; Ezek. xxi. 3-7. Hence it
ISA. XLII. 24, 25] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 19
is that, after judgments threatened, God doth so often tell them that they shall know the Lord. Sometimes God, by his judgments, enlightens men's minds to see such an evil in sin that they never saw before, and to see such a vanity, mutability, impotency, and uncer- tainty in the creature that they never saw before ; and to see such a need of free-grace, of rich mercy, and of infinite favour and goodness, that they never saw before ; and to see such majesty and terribleness in God that they never saw before, Ps. Ixvi. 3, 5. Job xxxvii. 22, ' With God is terrible majesty.' But,
[4.] Fourthly, Fire is 'probatory and vefitiing, and so are the judg- ments of God ; they will try what metal men are made of ; they will try whether men are sound and sincere, or hypocritical and hollow ; whether men are real Christians or nominal Christians ; whether they are throughout Christians or almost Christians ; whether their graces are true or counterfeit, and whether they have much, or but a little, grace, Isa. i. 25 ; Mai. iii. 1-3 ; Acts xxvi. 28, 29. Isa. xxxi. 9, ' The Lord's fire is in Zion, and his furnace in Jerusalem :/ Zech. xiii. 9, ' And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried :' 1 Pet. iv. 12 ' Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you.' Stars shine brightest in the darkest night. Torches are the better for beating. Grapes come not to the proof till they come to the press. Spices smell sweetest when pounded. Young trees root the faster for shaking. Vines are the better for bleeding. Gold looks the brighter for scouring; and juniper smells sweetest in the fire. The application is easy. But,
[5.] Fifthly, Fire is of a consuming and devouring nature, as we have lately found by woeful experience: Ps. xviii. 8, ' There went out a smoke out of his nostrils, and fire out of his mouth devoured :' Jer, XV. 14, ' A fire is kindled in my anger, which shall burn upon you : ' Ezek. xxii. 31, ' Therefore have I poured out my indignation upon them ; I have consumed them with the fire of my wrath ;' Isa. Ixvi. 15, 16 ; Ps. xxi. 9 ; Jer. xvii. 4 ; Ezek. xxxviii. 19, 20.' Natural fire is a great devourer, but mystical fire, the fire of divine wrath, is infinitely a greater devourer. Men may stand before a natural fire| but no man has ever been able to stand before the devourino- fire of divine wrath. The anger and wrath of God against wicked men is exceeding hot ; it is a burning, fiery, flaming wrath, against which they are never able to stand : Isa.. xxvii. 4, ' Who would set the briers and thorns against me in battle ? I would go through them, I would burn them together.' Briers and thorns are as well able to stand before a devouring fire, as wicked men are able to stand before the smoking wrath of that God which is ' a consuming fire,' Heb. xii. 29.
[6.] Sixthly, Fire breaks out suddenly and unexpectedly ; in an hour, in a moment, when no man thinks of it, when no man looks for it ; as you see by that late dreadful fire, that in a few days turned a glorious city into a ruinous heap. So the judgments of God, they come sud- denly and unexpectedly upon the sons of men. Witness the judgments of God that came upon the old world, Sodom and Gomorrah, Nadab and Abihu, Korah, Dathan, and Abiram : 1 Thes. v. 3, ' For when they shall say, peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon
20 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLTI. 24, 25.
them, as travail upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape.' ►Security is a certain forerunner of desolation and destruction. The apostle, by the similitude he uses, shews that the destruction of the wicked is — (1.) certain, (2.) sudden, (3.) inevitable. Mat. xxiv. 37-39; Gen. xix. But,
[7.] Seventhly, Fire is imjyartial ; it makes no difference between rich and poor, high and low, iionourable and base, bond and free, male and female, <fec. So the judgments of God are impartial, they reach all sorts and ranks of persons. But,
[S.] Eighthly and lastly, Fire is violent and iiTesistihle. We have hail as dreadfid a proof of this in the late dreadful confiagi-ation of London as ever any i)eople have had since the Lord Jesus was on earth. 8o are the judgments of God violent and irresistible. Witness the raging pestilence and the bloody sword that, in 1665 and 1666, has sent many score thousands to their long homes. And thus you see how that metaphorically or typically great and sore judgments do re- semble fire. But,
(2.) Secondly, Premise this with me : Fire is sometimes attributed unto God : Heb. xii. 29, ' Our God is a consuming fire.' Sometimes fire is attributed to Christ : Mai. iii. 2, ' But who may abide the day of his coming ? and Avho shall stand when he appeareth ? for he is like a refiner's fire, and like fuller's soap.' And sometimes fire is attri- buted to the Holy Ghost : Mat. iii. 11, '1 indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear; he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire' — that is, with that fiery Holy Ghost, that spirit of judgment and of burning wherewith the filth of the daughter of Zion is washed away, Isa. iv. 4. But,
(3.) Tliirdly, Premise this with me : The luordjire in Scripture is sometimes used by the Holy Ghost to set forth sin by : Isa. ix. 18, ' For wickedness burnetii as the fire, it shall devour the briers and thorns, and shall kindle in the thickets of the forest, and they shall mount up like the lifting up of smoke.' So the burning lust of unclean- ness : Rom. i. 27, ' They burned in lust one towards another.' So 1 Cor. vii. 9, ' It is better to marry than to burn.' And so Sodom was first in a flame of burning lusts, before it was burned with fire from heaven. But this is not the fire that is here meant in the proposition that we are upon. But,
(4.) Fourthly, Premise this with me: Fire is sometimes taken for the blessed angels : Ps. civ, 4, ' Who maketh his angels spirits, his ministers a flaming fire,' Heb. i. 7. Hence it is that the angels are called serai)hims, which signifies burning or flaming ones, and they are set forth by this name to note their ii-resistible power, Isji. vi. 2 ; for as there is no withstanding of the furious flames, so there is no withstanding of these burning or flaming ones. Jerome, Musculus, and several others, are of opinion that the angel that destroyed of Sen- nacherib's host a hundred and fourscore and five thousand in one night, that he did it by fire, burning their bodies, their garments being un- touched, 2 Kings xix. 35. But the fire in the proposition cannot be understood of the blessed angels, for several reasons not here to be alleged. Bu(,
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 21
(5.) Fifthly, Premise this with me : Fire in Scripture is sometimes taken for loars : 'The fire of thine enemies' — that is, the wars that shall be amongst the nations—' shall devour them.' ' Thou shalt be visited of the Lord with a flame of devouring fire ; but the nations that fight against the altar shall be a dream,' Isa. xxvi. 11, 12, &c., and xxix. 6, 7. Now fire in this sense is not to be excluded out of the proposition. But,
(6.) Sixthly, Premise this with me : Fiy^e sometimes notes the special presence of God in a way of special love and favour to his people. In Exod. iii. 2 you read how ' the Lord appeared unto Moses in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush ; and he looked, and behold the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.' Here was a re- presentation of the church's affliction, that was then in Egypt, a house of bondage, in the midst of a fiery furnace, Deut. iv. 20. But now the Lord was in the bush, while the bush— the dry bush, or the bramble- bush, as the Hebrew word signifies — was in a flaming fire. In that Deut. xxxiil. 16 you read of ' the good- will of him that dwelt in the bush.' God was there in a way of merciful protection and preserva- tion. They were in the fire, but the Lord was with them in the fire ; in all their fiery trials God did bear them company. But,
(7.) Seventhly, Premise this with me: In the blessed Scriptures we read of supernal fire, of fire that came down from above, and that first as a sign of God's anger. So fire came down from heaven on Sodom and Gomorrah, Gen. xix. 24. Also fire came down from heaven on them that offered incense in the conspiracy of Korah, Num. xvi. 35. And so fire came down from heaven on the two captains and their fifties, 2 Kings i. 10-12. Secondly, we read of fire that came down from heaven as a sign and token of God's favour. And so fire came down from heaven on the saciifice of Solomon, and on the sacrifice of Elijah, 2 Chron. vii. 1 ; 2 Kings xviii. 38. God in those times did delight to shew his special love and favour to his precious servants by fire from heaven. But in the proposition we are to understand not supernal, but material fire. But,
(8.) Eighthly and lastly, Premise this with me : Fire is sometimes taken literally for that material fire that consumes houses, towns, cities, and the most stately stimctures. Jer, xxi. 1 0, ' For I have set my face against this city for* evil, and not for good, saith the Lord ; it shall be given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire ;' 2 Chron. xxxv. 13. ' And they roasted the passover with fire ;' Neh. i. 3, ' And they said unto me. The remnant that are left of the captivity there in the province are in great affliction and reproach ; the wall of Jerusalem also is broken down, and the gates thereof are burnt with fire ;' chap. ii. 2, 3, ' Wherefore the king said unto me. Why is thy countenance sad, seeing thou art not sick ? this is nothing but sorrow of heart. Then I was very sore afraid, and said unto the king, Let the king live for ever : why should not my countenance be sad, when the city, the place of my fathers' sepulchres, lieth waste, and the gates thereof are consumed with fire?' See 2 Chron. xxxvi. 19 ; 2 Kings xix. 18, and xxi, 6; Ps. Ixxiv. 7 ; Deut. xiii. 16. Now this ma- terial fire is the fire that is meant in the proposition. 0 sirs ! God is as much the author or efficient cause of this judgment of fire, as he
22 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
is the author or efficient cause of sword, famine, and pestilence. This I have in part ])roved ah-eady ; but shall more abundantly make it good m that which luliow.s.
r>ut you will say, Sir, we know very well that God is the author or efficient cause of this dreadful judgment of tire, as well as he is the author or efficient cause of any other judgment that we have either felt or feared ; but we earnestly desire to know what the ends of God should be in infficting this sore and heavy judgment of fire upon his poor peoj^le, and in turning their glorious city into ashes ? This we are sure of, that whoever kindled the fire, God did blow the coal, and therelbre we shall not now consider what there was of man's treachery concurring with God's severity in that dreadful calamity by fire ; but rather inquire after the grounds, reasons, or ends that God aims at by that fiery dispensation that has lately passed upon us.
Now here give me leave to say, that so far as the late fire was a heavy judgment of God upon the city, yea, upon the whole nation, the ends of God in inflicting that judgment are doubtless such as respect both sinners and saints, the righteous and the wicked, the profane and the holy, the good and the bad. Now such as respect the wicked and ungodly I take to be these that follow : —
[1.] First, That he may evidence his sovereignty, and that they may hnoio that there is a God. The profane atheist saith in his heart, ' There is no God ; ' but God by his terrible judgments startles and awakens the atheist, and makes him unsay what he had said in his heart. i When God appears in flames of fire, devouring and destroying all be- fore him, then the proudest and the stoutest atheists in the world will confess that there is a God — yea, then they will bow and tremble under a sense of the sovereignty of God. Th<} sovereignty of God is that golden sceptre in his hand which he will make all bow to, either by his word or by his works, by his mercies or by his judgments. This sceptre must be kissed and submitted to, or else fire and sword, desolation and destruction, will certainly follow. Jer. xviii. 2-4, 6, ' Arise, and go down to the potter's house ; and there will I cause thee to hear my word. Then I went down to the potter's house ; and, be- hold, he wrought a work on the wheels. And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, that seemed good to the potter to make it. 0 house of Israel, cannot I do with you as the potter? saith the Lord. Behold, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are ye in my hand, 0 house of Israel.' The Jews were so stupid and sottish that verbal teaching without signs would not work u})on them, and therefoi-e the Lord sent Jeremiah to the potter's house, that he might see, by what the potter did, that though he had made them a people, a nation, a church, a state, yet he could as easily unmake them and mar them, as the potter marred the vessel that he had made. Ood would have this people to know that he had as much power over them and all they had as the potter had power over the clay that he works uj)on, and that he had as much both might and right also to dispose of them at his ])lea- sure as the potter had over his clay to dispose of it as he judged
^ Ps. xiv. 1, X. 4, .'), and 1. 21; Eccles. viii. 11; Ps. xxiv. 1; Dan. vi. 25-27; Isa. xlv.9; Ps. ii. 9-12; Hosea ii. 8, 9.
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 23
meet.i Nay, beloved, the potter has not such an absohite power over his pots and clay as the Lord has over the sons of men, to make them and break them at his pleasure ; and that partly because that the clay is none of his creature, and partly because without God give him strength he has no power to make or break one vessel. God by the prophet would have the Jews to know that it was merely by his good pleasure and grace that they came to be so glorious and flourishing a nation as they were at this time ; yea, and further to know that they were not so great, and rich, and flourishing, and settled, and built, but that he could as easily break them and mar tliem as the potter could the vessel that was under his hand, Isa. Ixiv. 8. Ah sirs ! God by that dreadful fire that has destroyed our houses, and burnt up our substance, and banished us from our habitations, and levelled our stately monuments of antiquity and glory even with the ground, has given us a veiy high evidence of his sovereignty both over our persons and all our concernments in this world. Ah London ! London ! were there none within nor without thy walls that did deny the sovereignty of God, that did belie the sovereignty of God, that did slight the sove- reignty of God, that did make head against the sovereignty of God ? Were there none within nor without thy walls that did say, ' We are lords, and we will come no more unto thee ' ? that did say, ' Is not this great Babylon, is not this great London that we have built ? ' that did say, ' The kings of the earth, and all the inhabitants of the world would not have believed that the adversary and the enemy, the flaming and consuming fire, should have entered into the gates of Jerusalem, into the gates of London ' ? that did say, ' Who is the Lord, that we should obey his voice ? ' that did advance a worldly sovereignty above and against the sovereignty of God and Christ ? Jer. ii. 31 ; Dan. iv. 30 ; Lam, iv. 12 ; Exod. v. 2. Ah London ! London ! if there were any such within or without thy walls, then never wonder that God has in a flaming and consuming fire pro- claimed his sovereignty over thee, and that he hath given such atheists to know from woeful experience that both themselves and all their concernments are in the hands of the Lord as the clay is in the hands of the potter, and that the sorest judgments that any city can fall under are but the demonstrations of his sovereign prerogative, Isa. v. 16. Ps. ix. 16, ' The Lord is known by the judgments which he executeth; the power, justice, and sovereignty of God shines most gloriously in the execution of his judgments upon the world.'
[2.] Secondly, God inflicts great and sore judgments upon the sons of men, that the woidd may stand in awe ofhim^ and that they may learn to fear and tremble before him.'^ When he appears as a con- suming fire, he expects that the nation should tremble, and that the inhabitants should fear before him : 1 Sam. xvi. 4, ' And Samuel did that which the Lord spake, and came to Bethlehem : and the elders of the town trembled at his coming, and said, Comest thou peace- ably ? ' Shall the elders of Bethlehem tremble for fear that Samuel came to denounce some grievous judgment against them ; and shall not we tremble when God has executed his terrible judgments upon us ?
^ God hath^ws ad omnia, jus in omnibus, a right to all things, a right in all things. - Consult these scriptures, Exod. xv. 14-16 ; Josh. ii. 10, 11 ; Rev. xv. 4.
24 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII, 24, 25.
Shall Ahab tremble and humble himself, and fast and lie in sackcloth Avhen judgments are but threatened; and sliall not we tremble and fear before the great God, who has actually inflicted upon us his three great judgments, pestilence, sword, and fire? Shall the Ninevites, both })rinces, nobles, and pco])le, tremble and humble themselves in sackcloth and ashes when God doth but threaten to overthrow their great, their rich, their populous city ; and shall not we tremble and lie low before the Lord when we see great London, rich and populous London, laid in ashes before our eyes? 1 Kings xxi. 20-24, 27-29; Jonah iii. 3-10. When the hand of the Lord was stretched out against the Egyptians, ' the dulces of Edom were amazed, and the mighty men of Moab trembled,' Exod. xv. 15, 16 ; 2 Kings vi. 30, and vii. 6, 7, 15 ; Jer. iv. 7-9. Ah, how severely has the hand of the Lord been stretched out against London and all her inhabitants! and therefore what cause have we to be amazed and to tremble before that God who has appeared in flames of fire against us! Lara. ii. 3, 4, ' He hath cut otl' in his fierce anger all the horn of Israel: he hath drawn back his right hand before the enemy, and he burned against Jacob like a flaming fire, which devoureth round about. He bent his bow like an enemy : and poured out his fury like fire.' God burnt down their city, their temple, their gates, their princely habitations, their glorious structures, in the fierceness of his anger and in the greatness of his wrath. 0 sirs ! when God falls upon burning work, when he pours out his fury like fire, when like a flaming fire he de- vours all our pleasant things, and lays all our glory in dust and ashes, we may safely conclude that his anger is fierce and that his wrath is great against us ; and therefore what eminent cause have we to fear and tremble before him ! God is a great and dreadful God : Dan ix. 4, ' A mighty God and terrible ;' Dent. vii. 21, ' A great and terrible God,' Neh. i. 5. He is so in himself, and he has been so in his fiery dispensations towards us, that the world by such remarkable severities may be kept in awe of him. Generally fear doth more in the world than love.i As there is little sincerity, so there is but little ingenuity 2 in the world ; and that is the reason why many very rarely think of God but when they are afraid of him. Many times judgments work where mercies do not win. That famous Thomas-^ Waldo of Lyons, the father of the Waldenses, seeing, among many met together to be merry, one suddenly fall down dead in the street, it struck so to his heart that he went home a penitent, — it wrought to a severe and pious reformation of his life, and he lived and died a precious man. Though Pharaoh was not a pin the better for all the heavy judgments that God inflicted upon him, yet Jethro, taking notice of those dreadful plagues and judgments that fell upon Pharaoh and upon his people, and likewise upon the Amalekites, was thereby converted and became a proselyte ; as Rabbi Solomon noteth u})on that 19th of Prov. 25 : The world is so untractable, that frowns will do more with them than smiles. That God may keep wicked men in awe and in subjection to him, he sees it very needful to bring common, and general, and over-
* Wc arc worthy, saitli Chrysostom, of hell, if for no other cause, yet for fearing hell and the es-il of punishment more than Ciirist. — Chrys. Horn. 5, in Epist. ad Rom. "' Ingenuousness.'— G. ^ Qu. ' Peter'?- -Ed.
IsA. XLTI. 24, 25.] the late fiery dispensation. 25
spreading judgments upon them : Eev. xv. 4, ' Who shall not fear thee, 0 Lord, and glorify thy name ? for thou only art holy : for all nations shall come and worship before thee ; for thy judgments are made manifest.' 0 sirs ! when the judgments of the Lord come to be made manifest, then it highly concerns all ranks and sorts of men to fear the Lord and to glorify his name. How manifest, how visible has the raging pestilence, and the bloody sword, and the devouring flames of London been in the midst of us ! and oh that our fear, and dread, and awe of God were as manifest and as visible as his judg- ments have been and still are ; for his hand to this very hour is stretched out against us ! Isa, ix. 12. But,
[3.] Thirdly, God inflicts great and sore judgments upon the sons of men, and upon cities and countries, to express and make knoivn Ms power, justice, anger, severity, and indignation against sinners and their sinful courses, by lohich he has been provoked : '^ Dent, xxxii. 19 ' And when the Lord saw it, he abhorred them, because of the pro- voking of his sons and of his daughters.' Ver. 21, ' They have pro- voked me to anger with their vanities ; and I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.' Ver. 22, ' For a fire is kindled in my anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the moun- tains.' Ver. 24, ' They shall be burnt with hunger, and devoured with burning heat, or with burning coals, and with bitter destruc- tion.' There is a knowledge of God by his works as well as by his word, and by his judgment as well as by his mercies. In his dreadful judgments every one may run and read his power, his justice, his anger, his severity, and his indignation against sin and sinners. It is irrevocable sins that bring irrevocable judgments upon sinners. Whilst men hold on in committing great iniquities, God will hold on in inflicting answerable severities. When God cannot prevail with men to desist from sinning, men shall not pre- vail with God to desist from destroying of them, their habitations and all their pleasant things : Jer. ii. 1.5, ' The young lions roared upon him, and yelled, and they made his land waste : his cities are burnt without inhabitant.' Ver. 17, ' Hast thou not procured this unto thyself, in that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God, when he led thee by the way?' When Nicephorus Phocas had built a mighty strong wall about his palace for his own security, in the night-time he heard a voice crying unto him, & ^aaikev v-^Itlol'^ TO, T6Lxn, <^c., 0 emperor, though thou bulkiest the wall as high as the clouds; yet if sin be within, it will overthrow all.2 Sin, like those traitors in the Trojan horse, will do cities and countries more hurt in one night than ten thousand open enemies could do in ten years. Cities and countries might flourish, and continue as the days of heaven, and be as the sun before the Almighty, if his wrath be not provoked by their profaneness and wickedness ; so that it is not any divine 3 aspect of the heavens, nor any malignant conjunction of the stars and planets, but the loose manners, the ungracious lives and
1 See Jer. xiv. 15, 16 ; Lam. iv. 11 ; Jer. iv. 15-19.
- Brooks's allusion is to the strong ' tower ' built by Xicephorus II. (Phocas) in his palace. Cf. Oihbon, xlviii. -s. ?i. — G. ^ Q". 'muliiin ' ?-- Ed.
26 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
the enormous sins of men, that lay cities and countries desolate: Jer xiii. 22, ' And if thou say in thine heart, Wherefore come these thin<^s upon me ? wherefore hath the Lord sent plague, sword, famine, and tire to devour and destroy, and to lay all in aslies ?' The answer is, ' For the greatness of thine iniquity.' God will in flames of fire discover his anger and indignation against sin and sinners. The heathen historian [HerodotusJ observes in the ruin of Troy, that the sparkles and ashes of burnt Troy served for a lasting monument of God 8 great anger and displeasure against great sinners. The burn- ing of Tioy served to teach men that God j)unisheth great sinners with great plagues ; and certainly London's being laid in ashes is a high evidence that God knows how to be angry with sinners, and how to punish sin with the sorest of judgments. The gods of the Gentiles were senseless stocks and stones, not able to apprehend, much less to revenge, any injury done unto them. Well therefore might the philosopher be bold with Hercules to put him to his thir- teenth labour in seething of his dinner ; and Martial with Priapus, in threatening him to throw him into the fire if he looked not well to his trees. 1 A child may play at the hole of a dead asp, and a silly woman may strike a dead lion ; but who dare play with a living ser- pent ? who dare take a roaring lion by the beard ? Oh that Chris- tians then would take heed how they provoke the living God, for he is ' a consuming fire,' and with a word of his mouth, yea, with the breath of his mouth, he is able to throw down, and to burn up the whole frame of nature, and to destroy all creatures from the face of the earth. Some heathen philosophers thought anger an unseemly attribute to ascribe to God, and some heretics conceived the God of the New Testament void of all anger. They imagined two Gods : the God of the Old Testament was, in their account, DeiLS Justus, a Deity severe and revengefid : but the God of the New Testament was Deus bonus, the good God, a God made up all of mercy ; they would have no anger in him. But Christians do know that God proclaims this attribute among his titles of honour: Neh. i. 2, ' God is jealous, and the Lord revengeth, and is furious ; he reserveth wrath for his enemies.' It is the highway to atheism and profaneness, to fancy to ourselves a God made up all of mercy, to think that God cannot tell how to be angry and wroth with the sons of men. Surely they that have seen London in flames, or believe that it is now laid in ashes, they will believe that God knows how to be angry, and how to fix the tokens of his wrath upon us. But,
[4.] Fourthly, God inflicts great and sore judgments upon the sons of men, and upon cities and countries, that they may cease from sin, receive instruction, and reform and return to the most High; as you may evidently see by comparing the scriptures in the margin together.2 God's corrections should be our instructions, his lashes should be our lessons, his scourges should be our schoolmasters, his chastisements should be our advertisements : and to note this the
' Epig., lib. viii. ; Ep. xl. — G.
» Isa. xxv'i. 9; Ps. xciv. 12; Prov. iii. 12, 13, and vi. 23; Job xxxvi. 8-10, and xxxiii. 19, 20; Levit. xxvi. ; Deut. xxviii.; 2 Chron. vii. 13, 14; Amos iv. 6-12; Isa. ix. 13 ; Jur. v. 3, and vi. 29, 30; Ezek. xxiii. 25-27.
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 27
Hebrews and the Greeks Loth express chastising and teaching by one and the same word [")D")D, Ilasar, TratSeia], because the latter is the true end of the former, according to that in the proverb, ' Smart makes wit, and vexation gives understanding/ Whence Luther fitly calls affliction, Theologiam Christianorum, The Christian man's divinity : Jer. vi. 8, ' Be thou instructed, 0 Jerusalem, lest my soul depart from thee ; lest 1 make thee desolate, a land not inhabited.' Zeph. iii. 6, 7, ' I have cut off the nations : their towers are desolate ;
1 made their streets waste, that none passed by : their cities are destroyed, so that there is no man, that there is no inhabitant. I said, {Surely thou wilt fear me ; thou wilt receive instruction : so their dwellings should not be cut off, however I punished them : but they rose early, and corrupted all their doings.' By all the desolations that God had made before their eyes he designed their instruction and reformation. From those words, Judges iii. 20, ' I have a message from God unto thee, 0 king,' said Ehud. Lo, his poniard was God's message : from whence one well observes, That not only the vocal admonitions, but the real judgments of God are his errands and in- structions to the world. God delights to win men to himself by favours and mercies ; but it is rare that God this way makes a con- quest upon them: Jer. xxii. 21, ' I spake unto thee in thy prosperity,' saith God ; ' but thou saidst, 1 will not hear : ' and therefore it is that he delivers them over into the hands of severe judgments, as into the hands of so many curst schoolmasters, as Basil speaks, that so they may learn obedience by the things they suffer, as the apostle speaks, Deut. xxxii. 14-17; Jer. v. 7-10; Ps. Ixxiii. 1-10. It is said of Gideon, he took briers and thorns, and with them he taught the men of Succoth, Judges viii. 16. Ah, poor London ! how has God taught thee with briers and thorns, with sword, pestilence, and fire ! and all because thou wouldst not be taught by prosperity and mercy * to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God,' Micah vi. 8 ; Lam. iii. 32, 33 ; Isa. xxviii. 21. God delights in the reformation of a nation ; but he doth not delight in the desolation of any nation. God's greatest severity is to prevent utter ruin and misery, Schola crucis, schola lucis. If God will but make London's destruction Eng- land's instruction, it may save the land from a total desolation. Ah, London ! London ! I would willingly hope that this fiery rod that has been upon thy back has been only to awaken thee, and to instruct thee, and to refine thee, and to reform thee, that after this sore desola- tion God may delight to build thee, and beautify thee, and make thee an eternal excellency, a joy of many generations, Isa. Ix. 15. But,
[5.] Fifthly, God inflicts sore and great judgments upon the sons of men, that he may try them, and make a more full discovery of them- selves to themselves. Wicked men will never believe that their lusts are so strong, and that their hearts are so base, as indeed they are :
2 Kings viii. 12, 13, 'And Hazael said, Why weepeth my lord? and he answered. Because I know the evil that thou wilt do unto the chil- dren of Israel ; their strongholds wilt thou set on fire, and their young men wilt thou slay with the sword, and wilt dash their children, and rip up their women with child. And Hazael said, But what, is thy servant a dog that he should do this great thing ? And Elisha an-
28 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
swered, The Lord hath shewed me that thou shalt be king over Syria.' Hazael could not imagine that he should be as fierce, cruel, murderous, and merciless as a dog, that will tear all in pieces that he can come at. It could never enter into his thoughts that ever he should do such cruel, barbarous, horrid, and inhuman acts as the prophet spoke of ; but he did not know the depth of his own corruption, nor the desperateness, nor deceitfulness of his own heart, Jer. xvii. 9 : Isa. viii. 21, ' And they shall pass through it hardly bestead and hungry ; and it shall come to pass, that wlien they shall be hungry they shall fret them- selves, and curse their king, and their God, and look upward.' When judgments are upon them, then their wickedness appears rampant. Thev shall curse their own king for not defending, protecting, or relieving of them ; they shall look upon him as the cause of all their wants, sorrows, and sufferings; and as men overwhelmed with misery, and full of indignation, they shall fall a-cursing of him. And they shall curse their God as well as their king ; that is, say some, the true God, who deservedly brought these plagues upon them. Their God ; that is, say others, their Melchom, to whom they had sacrificed, and in whom they see now that they vainly trusted. So those desperate Avretches under the beast : Rev. xvi. 8,9,' And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun, and power was given unto him to scorch men with fire. And the men were scorched with great heat, and blas- phemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues; and they repented not, to give him glory ; ' ver. 10, ' And the_ fifth angel poured out his vial upon the scent i of the beast ; and his kingdom was full of darkness, and they gnawed their tongues for pain, and blas- phemed the God of heaven, because of their pains and their sores, and repented not of their deeds.' 2 The top of the judgment that is and shall be upon the wicked is this, that under the sorest and heaviest judgments that shall come upon them, they shall not repent, nor give glory to God. They shall blaspheme the name of God, and they shall blaspheme the God of heaven ; and they shall be scorched with great heat, and they shall gnaw their tongues for pain, but they shall not repent of their deeds, nor give glory to tliat hand that smites them.^ The fierce and fiery dispensations of God upon the followers and wor- shippers of the beast shall draw out their sins ; but they shall nevei- reform their lives, nor better their souls. God kept the Jews forty years in the wilderness, and exercised them with many sore and smart afflictions, that he might prove them, and make a more full discovery of themselves to themselves. And did not the heavy trials that they met with in their wilderness condition make a very great discovery of that pride, that unbelief, that hypocrisy, that imi)atience, that dis- content, that self-love, that murmuring, &c., that was wrapt up close in all their souls ? 0 sirs ! since God has turned our renowned city into ashes, what discoveries has he made of tliat pride, that unbelief, that worldliness, that earthliness, that self-love, that inordinate affec-
' Qu. 'seat'?— Ed.
* Plutarch observes, that it is tlie quality of tigers to grow mad, and tear themselves in pieces, if they hear but drums or tabors to sound about them. — Lib. de Super- utitione.
3 This will be the ca-^p of all the worshippers of tlie brast one dav, Deut. viii. 2, 15, 16.
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 29
tion to relations and to the good things of the world, that discontent, that disquietness, that faint-heartedness, that has been closely wrapped up in the spirits of many thousands whose habitations are now laid in ashes ! We try metals by fire and by knocking, and God has tried many thousands this day by his fiery dispensations and knocking judgments that have been in the midst of us. I believe there are many thousands who have been deep suff'erers by the late dreadful fire, who never did think that there had been so much sin and so little grace, so much of the creature and so little of God, so much earth and so little of heaven in their hearts, as they now find by woeful experience. And how many wretched sinners are there who have more blasphemed God, and dishonoured Christ, and provoked divine justice, and abused their best mercies, and debased and be-beasted themselves since the late fire, than they have done in many years before ! But,
[6.] Sixthly, God inflicts great and sore judgments upon persons, cities, and countries, that others may he ivarned by his severities to break off their sins, and to 7'eturn to the most High. God's judg- ments upon one city, should be advertisements to all other cities to look about them, and to tremble before him who is 'a consuming fire,' Heb. xii. 29. The flaming rod of correction that is laid upon one city, should be a rod of instruction to all other cities. Jer. xxii. 6-9, ' I will make thee a wilderness, and cities which are not inhabited. And many nations shall pass by this city, and they shall say every man to his neighbour. Wherefore hath the Lord done this unto this great city ? Then shall they answer. Because they have forsaken the covenant of the Lord their God, and worshipped other gods, and served then).' God punisheth one city, that all other cities may take warning. There is no judgment of God, be it sword, pestilence, famine, or fire, upon any people, city, nation, or country, but what is speaking and teaching to all others, had they but eyes to see, ears to hear, and hearts to understand, Micah vi. 9. Thus Tyrus shall be devoured with fire, saith the prophet ; Ashkelon shall see it and fear ; Gaza and Ekron shall be very sorrowful, Zecli. ix. 4, 5. When Ashkelon, Gaza, and Ekron shall see the destruction of Tyre by fire, it shall make them afraid of the like judgment. They shall be a little more concerned than some were at the siege of Rhodes, and than others were at the ruin and desolation of Troy by fire. London's suf- ferings should warn others to take heed of London's sins. London's conflagration should warn others to take heed of London's abomina- tions. It should warn others to stand and wonder at the patience, long-suffering, gentleness, and goodness of God towards them who have deserved as hard things from the hand of God, as London have felt in 1665 and 1666, Rom. ii. 4, 5. It should warn others to search their hearts, and try their ways, and break off their sins, and turn to the Lord, lest his anger should break forth in flames of fire against them, and none should be able to deliver them. Lam. iii. 40. It should warn others to fear and tremble before that power, justice, severity, and sovereignty that shines in God's fiery dispensations to- wards us. Ezek. XXX. 7-9, ' And they shall be desolate in the midst of the countries that are desolate, and her cities' — meaning Egypt — 'shall be in the midst of the cities that are wasted. And they 'shall know
30 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLIT. 24, 25.
that I am tlie Lord, when I have set a fire in Egypt. In that day shall niesscn;;"ors go forth from me in ships, to make the careless Ethio])ians afraid, and great i)ain shall come upon them, as in the day of Egypt; for, lo, he cometh,' Exod. xv. 14-16; Isa. xiii. 6-8. God by liis secret instinct and providence would so order the matter, as that the news of the Chaldeans' inroad into Egypt, laying all their cities and towns waste by lire and sword, should be cariied over into Ethiopia; and hereupon the secure Ethiopians should fear and tremble, and be in pain as a woman is that is in travail ; or as the Egyptians were, when they were destroyed at the Red Sea ; or as they were, when the Lord smote their firstborn throughout the land of Egypt. Now shall the Ethiopians, the poor, blind heathens, fear and tremble, and be in pain, when they hear that Egypt is laid waste by fire and sword; and shall not Christians all the workl over fear and tremble, and be in pain, when they shall hear that Ijondon is laid waste, that London is destroyed by fire ? What though papists and atheists have warmed themselves at the flames of London, saying, Aha ! so would Ave have it; yet let all that have the name of God upon them fear and tremble, and take warning, and learn righteousness by his righteous judgments upon desolate London. London's murdering-] )iece should he England's warning-piece to awaken them, and to work them to bethink them- selves, and to turn to him who is able by a flaming fire quickly to turn them out of all, Isa. xxvi. 8, 9. The Jews have a saying, that if war be begun in another country, yet they should fast and mourn because the war is begun, and because they do not know how soon God may bring it to their doors. 0 sirs ! London is burnt, and it highly concerns you to last, and mourn, and pray, and to take the alarm ; for you do not know how soon a fire may be kindled in your own habitations. Now God has made the once famous city of London a flaming beacon before your eyes, he expects and looks that you should all fear before him. Secure your interest in him, walk humbly with him, and no more provoke the eyes of his jealousy and glory. The design of Heaven by this late dreadful fire, is not to be confined to those particular persons upon whom it hath fallen heaviest ; but it is to awaken all, and warn all. When a beacon is fired, it gives warning as much to the whole country as to him who sets it on fire ; or as it does to him on whose ground the beacon stands. We can neither upon the foot of reason or religion, conclude them to be the greatest sinners who have been the greatest sufterers ; for many times we find that the greatest saints have been the greatest sutfei-ers, both from God and men. Job was a non-such in his day for holiness, uprightness, and the fear of the Lord, and yet by the wind and fire from heaven on the one hand, and by the Sabeans and Chaldeans on the other hand, he is stript of all his children and of a fair estate in one day : so that in the morning it might have been said, Who so rich as Job ? and in the evening. Who so poor as Job ? Job was poor even to a proverb, Job i. 1-4. Look, as wicked men are very incompetent judges of divine favouis and mercies, so they are very incompetent judges of divine tiials and severities ; and whatever they may think or say, I dare conclude that they who have drank deepest of this cup of soi'rows, of this cuj) of desolation and fire in London, are not greater
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIEKY DISPENSATION, 31
sinners than all others in England, who yet have not tasted of this bitter cup. But more of this when I come to the application of the point. 0 sirs! I beg upon the knee of my soul, that you will not slight this dreadful warning of God that he has given to the whole nation, in turning London into ashes. To that purpose seriously con- sider. First, Divine warnings slighted and neglected will certainly bring down the greater wrath and vengeance upon you, as you may clearly see by comparing the scriptures in the margin together, i Secondly, Slighting of judgments is the greatest judgment that can befall a people ; it speaks out much pride, atheism, hardness, blind- ness, and desperate security, and contempt of the great God. To be given up to slight divine warnings, is a sj^iritual judgment, and therefore must of all judgments be the greatest judgment. To be given up to sword, famine, fire, pestilence, burning agues, and fevers, is nothing so great a judgment as to be given up to slight divine warnings ; for in the one you are but passive, but in the other you are active. Thirdly, Heathens have trembled, and mended, and reformed, at divine warnings, Jonah iii. ; and therefore for jou to slight them is to act below the heathens, yea, it is to do worse than the heathens, who will certainly one day rise up in judgment against all such who have been slighters of the dreadful warnings of heaven. Fourthly, Slighting of divine warnings lays men open to such anger and wrath, as all the angels in heaven are not able to express, nor all the men on earth able to conceive, Prov. i. 24-32. Fifthly, Slighting and neglecting of divine warnings speaks out the greatest disingenuity, stoutness, and stubbornness that is imaginable. The ingenuous child easily takes warning, and to an ingenuous Christian every divine warning is as the handwriting upon the wall, Dan. v. 5. Sixthly, Slighting of divine warnings provokes God many times to give up men to be their own executioners, their own destroyers. Said had many warnings, but he slighted and neglected them all ; and at last God leaves him to fall on his own sword, 1 Sam. xxxi. 4. Christ cast hell-fire often into Judas his face, ' Thou hast a devil ;' and ' Woe to that man by whom the Son of man shall be betrayed ; it had been good for that man that he had never been born.' But Judas slights all these warnings, and betrays his Lord and Master, and then goes forth and hangs himself, John vi. 70, 71 ; Mat. xxvi. 21-25, and xxvii. 5. It was a strange conceit of the Cerinthians 2' that honoured Judas, the traitor, as some divine and superhuman power, and called his treason a blessed piece of service, and that he, knowing how much the death of Christ would profit mankind, did therefore betray him to death to save the race of mankind, and to do a thing pleasing to God. Judas withstood all divine warnings from within and without, and you know how the tragedy ended ; he died a miserable death, he perished by his own hands, which were the most infamous hands in all the world; 'he went and hanged himself.' 3 And as Luke hath it, * he fell headlong and burst asunder in the midst, and all his bowels
1 Lev. xxvi. 16-18, 21, 23, 24, 27, 28 ; Amos iv. 7-11 ; Jer. xxv. 4-12 ; Isa. xxii. 12-14. ' Ireneeus, &c., Aug. de Htereei.
^ Some report of Judas, that he slew his father, married his mother, and betrayed his Master.
32 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
guslied out.' In every passage of his death we may take notice of divine justice, and accordingly take heed of sh'ghting divine warnings. It was but just that he should hang in the air, who, for his sin, was hated both of heaven and earth, and that he should fall down headlong, who was fallen from such a height of honour as he was fallen from ; and that the halter should strangle that throat through which the voice of treason hail sounded ; and tliat his bowels should be lost who had lost the bowels of all i)ity, piety, and compassion ; and that his ghost should have his passage out of liis midst : ' he burst asunder in the midst,' saith the text, and not out of his lips, because with a kiss of his lips he had betrayed our Lord Jesus. But Seventhly, By slighting divine warnings you will arm both visible and invisible creatures against you. Pharaoh slights divine warnings, and God arms the winds against him to his destruction. Sisera slights divine warnings, and the stars in their course fought agjiinst Sisera. Senna- cherib slights divine warnings, and an angel of the Lord destroyed a hundred fourscore and five thousand of his aimy in one night, 2 Kings vi. 8-11, 16, 17 ; Exod. xiv. ; Judges v. 19, 20 ; Isa. xxxvii. 7-9, 36. Eighthly, By slighting of divine warnings you will tempt Satan to tempt your sovds. He that dares slight divine warnings will stick at nothing that Satan shall tempt him to ; yea, he does to the utmost what lies in him to provoke Satan to follow him with the blackest and sorest temptations. Ninthly, He that slights divine warnings dams up all the springs of mercy, and turns the streams of loving-kindness and favour another way. Tentldy and lastly. Slighting of divine warnings will be the sword that will wound you, and the serpent that will sting you, and the worm that will be still gnawing upon you ; especiall}' (1.) When your consciences are awakening ; (2.) When you shall lie upon a dying bed ; (3.) When you shall stand before a judgment- seat ; (4.) and lastly. When you shall awake with everlasting flames about your ears, Ps. Ixxxi. 11 to the end; Jer. vii. 23-29, 34 ; Isa. xiii. 14-16. Upon all these considerations, take heed of slighting the warnings of God that you are under this day. But,
[7.] Seventhly and lastly, God inflicts great and sore judgments upon persons, cities, and countries, to i^iii the tcorld in mind of the general judgment. Who can think upon the conflagration of our late glorious city, and not call to mind the great and terrible day of the Lord ? Ps. 1. 3, ' Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence : a tire shall devour before him, and it shall be very tempestuous round about him.' As God gave his law in fire, so when he comes to judg- ment, in tire he will reiiuire it, to shew himself a judge and revenger of it, and to bring the world to a strict account for their breaking of it, Eccles. xii. 13, 14. In the pronmlgation of the law a flaming tire was only on mount Sinai, Exod. xx. 18 ; but when Christ shall come to execute vengeance on the transgressors of it, all the world shall become a bonfire, Heb. xii. 18-21. In the ]iromulgation of the law there Avas fire, smoke, thunder, and an earthquake ; but when Christ shall come in flanung tire to revenge the breaches of it, ' the heavens shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat,' so that not only a few cities and kingdoms, but all this lower world shall l)e of a flame ; and therefore if any of the wicked
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 33
should be so weak as to think to secure themselves by creeping behind the Lord, they will but deceive themselves ; for the fire shall not only devour before him, but it shall also devour round about him. When an unquenchable fire shall be kindled above the sinner, and below the sinner, and round about the sinner, how is it possible that he should escape, though he should cry out to the rocks and the mountains to fall upon him, and to cover him from the wrath of the Lamb ? Kev. vi. 15-17 ; Jer. v. 14. Isa. Ixvi. 15, 16, * For, behold, the Lord will come with fire, and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire. For by fire, and by his sword, will the Lord plead with all flesh : and the slain of the Lord shall be many.' . There is nothing more fearful or for- midable either to man or beast than fire. Now when God comes to execute his judgments, and to take vengeance on the wicked in this life, as some carry the words, or in the other life, as others carry the words, he will come in the most terrible and dread- ful manner imaginable, he will come with fire, and he will render his rebuke with flames of fire, or with fiery flames, as some say, or with flaming fire, as others say: 2 Thes. i. 7, 8, 'And to you who are troubled, rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven, with his mighty angels, in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.' Beloved, that Christ will come to judg- ment in flaming fire is no politic invention found out to fright men from their pleasures ; nor no engine of state devised to keep men tame and quiet under the civil powers ; nor no plot of the minister to make men melancholy, or to hurry them into a blind obedience ; but it is the constant voice of God in the blessed Scriptures : 2 Pet. iii. 10-12, ' But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burnt up. Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire, shall be dis- solved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat.' Parens is of opinion i that that fire that shall set all the world in a flame at last will be kindled and cherished by lightning from heaven. The earth being smitten with lightning from heaven, shall be shaken and torn into ten thousand pieces, and by fire utterly consumed ; now the earth shall quake, the sea roar, the air ring, and the world burn. Now you shall look no way but you shall see fire ; you shall see fire above you, and fire below you, and fire round about you. Christ's first coming was attended with a general ])eace, and with carols of angels : he came as rain upon the mown grass, silently, sweetly into the world, Luke ii. 8-15 ; Ps. Ixxi. 6. Then a babe cried in the manger, but now Judah's lion will roar and thunder in the heavens. Then he came riding on an ass's colt, but now on the clouds. Then he was attended with twelve poor despised apostles, but now he shall be waited on with many score millions of angels. At his first coming he freely offered grace, and mercy, and pardon to sinners ; but now he will come in flames of fire to execute wrath and vengeance uijon sinners, 2 Thes. i. 7 ; and it will be no small
^ Parens in Rev. xvi. 18. VOL. VI. C
34 London's lamentations on [isa. XLII. 24, 25.
lionour to Clirist, nor no sm.all comfort to the saints, nor no small tor- ment to the Avicked, for Christ to come in flames of fire when lie comes to judj^mcnt. Sanl was astonished when he heard Jesus of Nazareth but calling unto him out of heaven, Acts xxii, 8. Herod was af- frighted whei» ho thought that John Baptist was risen again, Mat. vi, 16. The Piiiiistines were afraid when they saw David's sword, 1 8am. xxi. 9. The Israelites were startled when they saw Aaron's rod, Num. vii. 10. And Judiih was ashamed when he saw Tiiamar's signet and staff; and 13elshazzar was amazed when he saw the handwriting ui)on the wall, Dan. \^ 5. The Carthaginians were troubled when they saw 8ci])io's sepulchre ; and the Saxons were terrified when tliey saw Cad- wallon's image. 1 Oh, how terrified, amazed, and confounded will wicked men be when they shall see that Christ, whom they have rejected, betrayed, crucifie<,l, scorned, 0])})0sck1, and jx?rsccuted, come in flames of fire to pass an eternal doom upon them ! I have read a story of two soldiers, 2 that coming to the valley of Jehosha})hat in Judea, and one saying to the other, Here in this place shall be the general judgment, wherefore I will now take up my place wdiere I will then sit ; and so lifting up a stone, he sat down ujion it, as taking posse&sion beforehand: but Ijeing sented, and looking up to lieaven, such a quaking and trembling fell upon him, that falling to the earth, he remembered the day of judgment with horror and amazement ever after. The case of this soldier will be the case of every wicked man when. Christ shall apix^ar in flames of fire to pass an eternal sentence of condemnation ui)on all the goats that shall l)e found on the left hand. Mat. xxv. 41-4(). It is strange in this so serious a business of the day of judgment, and of Christ's appearing in flaming fire, • which so nearly concerns the sons of men, how men's wits will busy themselves in many nice inquiries. Ye may meet with many such questions in the schoolmen as — (1.) How long is it to the day of judgment ? (2.) In what place of the world shall the judgment-day be held ? (3.) What kind of fire shall then be burning ? (4.) Whether Christ shall come with a cross carried before him ? As if malefactors in the jail should fall a-reasoning and debating what weather it would be at the day of assizes, or of the judge's habit and retinue, and never bethink themseh^es how to answer their indictment, that they may escape condemnation. London's flames should })ut us in mind of Christ's coming in flames of fire ; and the burning of London should put us in mind of the burning of the world, when Christ shall come to judge the sons of men according to their works ; and the terror and dread of that fire, and men's endeavours to escape it, should put us upon all those holy wa3s and means whereby we may escape the fury of those dreadful flames that shall never be quenched ; and the houses and estates that were consumed by the devouring fire in London streets should put us upon securing * a house not made with hands,' but one ' eternal in the heavens,' and ui^n securing ' durable riches,' and ' an inheritance that fadeth not away,' and ui)on ' laying up for ourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor ru.st, nor thieves,' and let me add, nor flames, ' can break through, corrupt, or steal, or burn,' 2 Cor. v. 1, 2; Prov. vui. 18; 1 Pet. i. 4; Mat. vi. 19-21.
' Holinshcd's Chronicle. - Ilolcot. in lib. Sap. [US;3, folio. — G.]
ISA. XLII. 24, 25. J THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 35
The more general any judgment is, the more it should put us in mind of the general day of judgment. Now the burning of London was a general judgment, a judgment that reaches from one end of the land to another, as I shall more fully evidence before I close up this dis- course ; and therefore it should remind us of the universal conflagra- tion of the whole Avorld and the works thereof. And thus you see the ends that God has in respect of the wicked in inflicting great and sore judgments upon persons, cities, and countries.
Quest. But pray, sir, what are those high and holj^ ends, in respect of the people of God, that God aims at by his inflicting of great and sore judgments upon persons, cities, and countries ? I suppose they are such as follow:
Atis. (1.) First, To hring about those special favours and mercies that God intends them. By the dreadful judgments that God inflicted upon Pharaoh, and upon his people, and upon his country, God brought about the freedom and liberty of his people to worship him according to his own prescriptions. The great difference and contest between God and Pharaoh was, who should have their wills. God would have his people to worship him according to his own mind ; but Pharaoh was resolved to venture his all before they should have their freedom and liberty to serve their God, Upon this God follows him with plague upon plague, and never leaves spending of his plagues upon him till he had overthrown him, and through his ruin brought about the freedom and liberty of his poor j^eople.i The Babylonians were cruel enemies to God's poor Israel, and kept them in bondage, yea, in a fiery furnace, seventy years. At last God stirs up the spirit of Cyrus, for his church's sake, and he, by fire j^and sword, lays Babylon waste, and takes them captive who had held his people in a long captivity, Jer. xi. 4, and Dan. ix. 12. Now he, by breaking the Babylonians in pieces like a potter's vessel, brought about, as an instrument in the hand of God, the freedom and libert}^ of God's poor people, as you may see by comparing that xlvth of Isa. 1-6, with that 1st chapter of Ezra. God stirs up the spirit of Cyrus to put forth a proclamation for liberty for the Jews to go to their own land, and to build the house of the Lord God of Israel ; and then he graciously stirs up the spirits of the people wisely and soberly to improve the liberty he had proclaimed.2 Jer. xlix. 1, 'Concerning the Ammonites, thus saith the Lord, Hath Israel no sons ? hath he no heir? why then doth their king inherit Gad, and his people dwell in his cities ? ' When the ten tribes were carried away captive, the Ammonites Avho dwelt near the tribe of Gad .intruded into it and the cities of it ; but mark what God saith in ver. 2, ' Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will cause an alarm of war to be heard in Eabbah of the Ammonites [that was their chief city] ; and it shall be a desolate heap, and her daughters [that is, lesser towns] shall be burnt Avith fire : then shall Israel be heir unto them that were his heirs, saith the Lord.' 3 God, by fire and sword, would lay desolate the chief city of the Ammonites, and her towns and villages that did
'^ Exod. V. 1, 2, vii. 16, viii. 8, 20, 25, 27, 29, ix. 1, 13, x. 3, 7, 8, 11, 21, xii. 31. ^ Turn to Obadiah, and read from ver. 11 to the end of the chapter. ^ Here was Lex talionis observed ; they that invaded the inheritance of others had their own invaded by them.
36 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLTI. 21, 25.
belong to her : nnd by these dreadful dispensations he would make way for his people, not only to possess their own land, l)ut the Am- monites' also; and I will leave the prudent reader to make the a])pli- cation. We have been under greater and dreadt'uller judgments than ever this poor nation hath groaned under in former times ; and who can tell but that the Lord by these amazing judgments may bring about greater and better mercies and blessings than any yet we do enjoy ? The Kabbins say of civil liberty, that if the heavens were parchment, the sea ink, and every pile of grass a pen, the praises of it could not he comprised nor expressed. ]\Iay we not say more of a holy liberty ? Liberty to serve ami worsliip the Lord according to his own prescriptions and directions laid down in his blessed word, by which all worship and worshipiiers must be tried at last, is a pearl of price that none can sufficiently value. Justinus the second emperor's motto was, Libcrfas res ma'stimahills, Liberty is unvaluable. The Lord give his people holy, wise, prudent, sober, humble, and understanding hearts, that they may know both how to prize and how to improve those liberties and mercies that he has handed to them through terrible dispensations ! But,
(2.) Secondly, God inflicts great trials and sore judgments upon per- sons and places, that he may awaken his own people out of that deep security that oftentimes seizeth upon tliem : Ps. xxx. 5-9 ; Mat. xxv, 5 ; 2 Sam. ii. 7, '15, and xxiv. 15-17; 2 Kings xiv. 25; Mat. xii. 40; Jonah i. 1-3. What deep security had seized upon David, so that God was forced to make use of the bloody sword and of the sweeping pestilence to awaken him ! Jonah was a prophet, he was a servant of the Lord, he was a type of Christ, he was a good man. His name Jonah signifies a dove, though he had but little of the dove in him, being as passionate a man of an honest man as you have lightly i heard of, saith Luther. Now Jonah liaving contracted guilt upon his con- science by acting quite contrary to God's royal call, what a desperate, senseless stupidit}" and security had seized upon liim ! what a spiritual letharg}'' was jioor Jonah in ! not much unlike that of the smith's dog, whom neither the hammers above him, nor the sparks of fire falling round about him, can awake. Jonah was not in a slumber, but in a sound, heavy, deep, and dead sleep ; and Avhat a wonder, what a pro- digy was here, that in all this stir and tunndt and danger, the winds whistling and roaring, the sea working, raging, swelling, frothing, foaming, and boiling like a pot, the waves mounting up to heaven and sinking down again to hell, as the 2>salniist si)eaks, the ship tumbling and tossing like a tennis-ball, the mariners, as stout fellows as they were, surpiised Avith fear, and running up and down like men at their Avits' end, like men that could not look jiale death in the face with blood in their cheeks, that yet Jonah should sleep, and be as secure in that dreadful danger as if he had been in his own house sleeping on a bed of down ! Oh the desperate security that may seize upon the best of saints ! But this security God will cure in his Jonahs by some smart trial, or by some heavy judgment or other. The lethargy is best cured by a burning ague. Absalom sends once or tAvice to Joab to
^ That is, ' likely.'— G.
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 37
come and speak with him ; but when he saw that Joah would not come, he commands his corn-fiekls to be set on fire, and this awakens him, and fetches him with a witness, 2 Sam. xiv. 30. So God, by fiery afflic- tions, and by burning up our comforts round about us, awakens us, and brings us to himself with a witness. When iron grows rusty, we put it into the fire to purify it ; and so when the people of God grow rusty and secure, then the Lord brings them under fiery trials to awaken them, and to purify them. If Nero was so angry w^th Vespasian because he slept at his music, how much more may the Lord be angry with all such as sleep and are secure under the most amazing and awakening judgments ? But my hope and prayer is, that the Lord has, and will more and more graciously and effectually awaken all the wise slumbering virgins upon whom this fiery dispensation has passed. And therefore,
(3.) Thirdly, In respect of his people's sins, God has several siDCcial ends that he aims at by all the fiery trials and smart providences that he exercises them and others with. As,
[1.] First, God by these means designs a further and a /idler dis- covery of their sins. In standing waters you cannot see the mud that lies at the bottom of the pool or pond ; but when once the water is drawn away, then it appears, Deut. viii. 2. In times of prosperity there is a great deal of mud, a great deal of atheism, unbelief, dis- content, murmuring, impatience, passion, pride, &c., that lies at the bot- tom of men's hearts undiscovered. Oh, but when God shall once empty them of their estates, and burn up all their outward comforts, and set them with Job upon the dunghill, then the mud appears, then a whole army of lusts discover themselves, as we see in many this day, whom you shall rarely find without tears in their eyes, sighs in their hearts, and complaints in their mouths. Severe providences are pills made purposely to clear the eyesight : 1 Kings xvii. 18, ' And she said unto Elijah, What have I to do with thee, 0 thou man of God ? art thou come unto me to call my sin to remembrance, and to slay my son ?' If God had not taken away her son, her sin had not been brought to remembrance. 0 sirs ! if God by this late dreadful fire had not taken away your houses, your goods, your estates, your trades, many of your sins had not been brought to your remembrance, though now you have lost most or all. You may say with the psalmist, ' My sins are ever before me,' Ps. li. 3. My pride is ever before me, my unbelief is ever before me, my frowardness is ever before me, my murmuring is ever before me, my discontent is ever before me, and my impatience is ever before me, &c.i Good men never come to know how bad they are, till they come to be exercised with severe providences and smart trials. It was the speech of a holy man in a gi-eat sickness. In this disease I have learned how great God is, and what the evil of sin is ; I never knew to purpose what God was before, nor what sin was before. Afflictions are a Christian's glass, in which they may run and read the greatness of God and the vileness of sin. But,
[2.] Secondly, By severe providences and fiery trials God designs tlie preventing of sin. Paul was one of the holiest men on earth,
' Turn to the scriptures, Gen. xiii. 21 ; Jonah iv. 8, 9 ; Jer. ix. 7, seq.
38 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
called by some an earthly augel, and yet he needed a thorn in the flesh to prevent pride : 2 Cor. xii. 7, ' And lest I sliunld be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buftet me, lest I should be exalted above measure.' Paul was in very great danger of being exalted above measure. Witness the doubling of those words in one verse, ' Lest I should be exalted, lest I should be exalted.' Prudent physicians sometimes give physic to prevent diseases ; and so does the Physician of souls, as you may see by comixiring the scriptures in the margin together, i The burnt child dreads the fire. 8in is but a bitter sweet, it is an evil worse than hell itself. Salt brine preserves from putrefaction, and salt marshes keep the sheep from rotting ; and so sharp trials, severe providences preserve the saints from spiritual putrefying, and from spiritual rotting. The Rabbins, to keep their scholars from sin, were wont to tell them that sin made God's head ache ; and saints under fiery trials do find by experience that sin makes not only their heads, but also their hearts ache ; and by this means God preserves his people from many sins which otherwise they would certainly fall into. Be- loved, God by his fiery dispensations has destroyed many or most of your outward comforts ; but little do you know the horrU)le sins that by this means the Lord has preserved you from. A full estate lays men most open to the greatest sins, the w^orst of snares, and the deadliest temptations. The best of men have fallen foulest under their highest worldly enjoyments. Witness David, Solomon, Heze- kiah, &c. Under your outward fulness, how low was your communion with God ! how languishing were your graces ! how lean were your souls ! and how was your spring of inwartl comforts dried up ! How little had God of your thoughts, your hearts, your time, your strength ! 0 sirs ! how bad would you have been by this time if God had not removed those things that were but fuel to your lusts, and quench-coals to your grace ! Well, often think of this : it is a greater mercy to be preserved from sin, yea, from the least sin, than it is to enjoy the whole world. But,
[3.] Thirdly, By severe providences and by fiery trials God designs the wihittering of sin to his people. When God shall come and burn up mens comforts round about them, then they will cry out. Ah ! what a bitter thing is sin ! That puts God upon burning work ! Then they will speak that language to their own souls that the prophet once spake to the Jews: Jer. ii. 1», ' They made his land waste : his cities are burnt with fire.' Yer. 17, ' Hast thou not pro- cured these things to thyself?' Ver. 19, ' Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee: know therefore and see, that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God, and that my fear is not in thee, saitli the Lord God of hosts.' So chap. iv. 18, ' Thy way and thy doings have procured these things unto thee : this is thy wickedness, because it is bitter, because it reacheth unto thy heart.' Yea, now they will say that sin is bitterness in the abstract, and in the plural number also, accord- ing to that of the prophet Hosea, chap. xii. 14, ' Ephraim provoked
^ Job xxxiii. 19, 17, xxxiv. 31, 32, and xl. 4, 5 ; Ilosca ii. 6, 7.
ISA. XLII. 24, 25,] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 39
liiui to anger most bitterly,' or ' with bitternesses,' as the Hebrew has it. Kelations and friends may tell us that sin is a bitter thing, and conscience may tell us that sin is a bitter thing, and good books may tell us that sin is a bitter thing, and men under terrors and horrors of spirit may tell us that sin is a bitter thing, and the sore and heavy judgments of God upon others may tell us that sin is a bitter thing, and the Spirit by his secret whispers may tell us that sin is a bitter thing, and ministers may tell us that sin is a bitter thing ; they may tell you that it is bitter to God, it being the only thing in all the world that he has revealed his wrath from heaven against, and that is contrary to the nature of God, the law of God, the being of God, the glory of God, and the grand designs of God. They may tell you that it is bitter to Christ. Witness his crying out in the bitterness of his soul, ' My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me ?' and witness the sorrows and heaviness of his soul, and his sweating clods i of blood. When he hung upon the cross they gave him gall and vinegar to drink ; but no gall was so bitter to him as your sins. They may tell you that sin is bitter to the Spirit of God ; for nothing grieves him and provokes him and vexes him but sin, Gen. vi. 3, and Eph, iv. 29. They may tell you that sin is bitter to the good angels. Every sin that you commit is as a dagger at their hearts : there is nothing in all the world so bitter to them as to see their Lord and Master daily, yea, hourly, crucified by sinners' sins. They may tell you that sin is bitter to the evil angels, it being the only thing for which they were banished the court of heaven, and turned down to the lowest hell, where they are kept in chains of darkness to the judgment of the great day, Jude 6. They may tell you that sin is bitter to the worst of men ; witness Adam's hiding of himself, and Judas his hanging of himself, and Cain's ciying out, ' My burden is greater than I am able to bear,' Gen. iii, 10 ; Mat. xxvii.; Gen. iv. 13. They may tell )^ou that it is bitter to the creatures who ' groan under their burdens, and who long to be delivered from that bondage that the sin of man hath subjected them to,' Eom. viii. 20-22 ; and yet for all this we will not feelingly, affectionately, experimentally say that sin is bitter, till God comes and burns us up : Lam. iv. 11, ' And gives us gall and worm- wood to drink/ Chap. iii. 19, 20, ' Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall. My soul hath them still in remembrance, and is humbled in me.' 0 sirs, how bitter should sin be to you, who have seen London all in flames ! Certainly God, by burning up your sweet, pleasant, and delightful things, would teach }'ou to taste a greater bitterness in sin than ever. 0 happy fire, that shall render God and Christ, and heaven, and promises, and ordinances more sweet, and sin more bitter to poor sinners' souls ! Doubtless, one of God's great designs by this late judgment of fire is to imbitter sin to all sorts of men. When judgments imbitter our sins to us, then they work kindly, powerfully, effectually, and then we may conclude that there was a hand of love in those judgments, and then we shall justify the Lord, and say with the church, Lam. i. 18, ' The Lord is righteous ; for I have rebelled against him : ' or as the Hebrew runs, 'because I have imbittered him,' he is righteous in all the sore judg-
1 Query, 'clots'?— G.
40 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
ments that he hath inflicted upon me ; for I have imhittered him against me by my most bitter sins. But,
[4.] Fourthly, By severe providences and fiery trials, God designs ihe morlifyimj and jnirging mcay of his peoples sins : Isa. i. 25, ' And I will turn my hand upon thee,' [to wit, to correct or chastise thee,] ' and purely purge away thy dross,' [or drosses,] ' and take away all thy tin,' or tins in the plui'al number. Some by dross understand gross iniquity ; and by tin, glittering hypocrisy. For as tin is veiy like unto silver, so is hypocrisy very like unto piety. Others by dross under- stand persons that are openly profane ; and by tin, such as are inwardly unsound. The words are a metaphor taken from them that try metals in the fire, purging from precious silver all dross and tin, Isa. xxxi. 9.1 The Jews, who were once silver, were now turned into dross and tin ; but God by fiery trials would burn up their dross and tin, their enor- mities and wickednesses, and make them as shining Christians in grace and holiness as ever they were. So Isa. xxvii. 9, ' By this there- fore shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged ; and this is all the fruit, to take awny his sin.' God by the Babylonish captivity would as by fire purge away the iniquity of Jacob ; and to shew the certainty of it, he instanceth in their darling sin — viz., idolatry. When he maketh all the stones of the altar as chalk-stones that are beaten in sunder, the groves and the images shall not stand up. Idolatry Avas the great sin for which God sent them into captivity. Now how they were purged from this sin after their return out of captivity, appears by their his- tory. Take one instance for all : Pilate being [appointed] by Tiberius to be governor over the Jews, caused in the night-time the statue of Ctesar to be brought into Jerusalem covered, which thing within three days after caused a great tumult among the Jews ; for they who be- held it were astonished and moved as though now the law of their country were profaned, for they hold it not lawful for any picture or image to be brought into the city. At their lamentation who were in the city, there was gathered together a great multitude out of the fields adjoining, and they went presently to Pilate, then at Ca3sarca, beseech- ing him earnestly that the images might be taken away out of Jeru- salem, and that the laws of their country might remain inviolated.2 When Pilate denied their suit, they prostrated themselves before his house, and there remained lying upon their faces for five days and nights, never moving. Afterwards Pilate, sitting in his tribunal-seat, was very careful to call all the Jews together before him, as though there he would have given them an answer, when upon the sudden a company of armed soldiers, for so it was provided, com])nssed the Jevs'S about with a triple rank. The Jews were hereat amazed, seeing that which they expected not. Then Pilate told them, that except they would receive the images of Caesar, he Avould kill them all, and to that end made a sign to the soldiers to draw their swords. The Jews, as though they had agreed thereto, fell all down at once, and offered their necks to the stroke of the sword, crying out that they would rather lose their lives than suff'er their religion to be profaned. Then Pilate,
^ D.in. xi. 35; Mai. iii. 1-3. God's fire is in Zion, ami his furnace in Jerusalem. ' Joscphus, p. G17. The Jews hated and feared idolatry as much as the burnt child dreads the fire. [Josephus, sub voce. — G.]
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 41
admiring the constancy of tlie people in their religion, presently com- manded the statues to be taken out of the city of Jerusalem. All the hurt the fire did the three children, or rather champions, was to burn off their cords, Dan. iii. 23, 24. Our lusts are cords of vanity, but by fiery trials Grod will burn them up : Zech. xiii. 9, ' And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is re- fined, and will try them as gold is tried.' The best of men are but men at the best ; they have much corruption and dross in them, and they need refining ; and therefore God by fiery trials will refine them, but not as dross or chaff which are burnt up in the fire, but as silver and gold which are purified in the fire. He will so refine them as that they shall leave their dregs and dross behind them. Look, what the fire is to the gold, the file to the iron, the fan to the wheat, the soap to the clothes, the salt to the flesh, that shall fiery trials be to- the saints. But what shall be the fruit of their refining? Ans. ' They shall call on my name, and I will hear them. I will say, It is my jjeople, and they shall say. The Lord is my God.' By fiery trials God will purge out our dross and make virtue shine. All the fiery trials that befall the saints shall ])e as a potion to carry away ill humours, and as cold frosts to destroy the vermin, and as a tempestu- ous sea to purge the wine from its lees, and as the north wind that drieth up the vapours, that purges the blood, and that quickens the spirits, and as a sharp corrosive to eat out the dead flesh. The great thing that should be most in every burnt citizen's eye and heart and prayers and desires is, that the fire of London maybe so sanctified as to issue in the burning up of their lusts, and in the purging away of the filth of the daughter of Zion, Isa. iv. 4. Jerome reports of Plato, how he left that famous city of Athens, and chose to live in a little ancient village almost overturned with tempests and earthquakes, that, being often minded therein of his approaching desolation,^ he might get more power over his strong lusts, and learn to live a more virtuous life than ever he had lived before. 2 0 sirs ! if God by this fiery dispensation shall make you more victorious over your strong lusts, and help yo.u to live more virtuous lives, you will have cause to bless him all your days, though he has turned you out of house and home, and burnt up all your comforts round about you. But,
(4.) Fourthly, By severe providences and fiery trials, God designs these four things, in respect of his children's graces :
[1.] First, He designs the reviving, quickening, and recovering of their clecctyed gi^aces. By fiery trials he will inflame that love that was even key-cold, and raise that faith that was fallen asleej), and quicken up those hopes that were languishing, and put life and spirits into those joys and comforts that were withering and dying, Kev. ii. 4 ; James i. 2-12 ; 2 Cor. xii. 10. God, under fiery trials, lets his poor children see how that by their spiritual decays he has been dishonoured, his Spirit grieved, rehgion sliamed, the mouths of the wicked opened, weak saints staggered, strong saints troubled, conscience wounded, and their souls and graces impaired ; and by these discoveries he engages them to the use of all those holy and heavenly helps, whereby
1 Query, ' dissolution '?— Ed. ^ Hieronym. contra Jovinian, lib. ii.
42 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
their decayed graces may be revived and recovered. iMany creatures that have been frozen, and even deail with cold, have been revived and recovered by being brouglit to the fire. God by fiery trials will unfreeze the frozen graces of his people, and put new life and spirits into them. As the air is sometimes clear, and sometimes cloudy ; and as the sea is sometimes ebbing, and sometimes flowing ; and as the trees of the field are sometimes flowering, green, and growing, and sometimes naked, withered, and as it were even dead:' so it is some- times with the graces of the saints ; but the Lord by one fiery trial or another will revive, and recover, and raise their graces again. Epi- phanius makes mention of those that travel by the deserts of Syria, where are nothing but miserable marshes and sands, destitute oT: all commodities, notliing to be had for love or money. Now if it so happen that their fire go out by the way, then they light it again at the heat of the sun, by the means of a burning-glass i : and thus if the tire of zeal, if the sparks of divine grace, by the prevalency of some strong corruption, or by the violence of some dreadful temptation, should be put out, or die as to its lively operations, by a burning-glass, or by one fiery dispensation or another, God will infiame the zeal, and enliven the dying graces of his poor people. I know the saving graces of the Spirit — viz., such as faith, love, hope, &c. — cannot be finally and totally extinguished in the souls, wdien they are once wrought there by the Spirit ; yet their lustre, their radiancy, tlieir activity, their shine and flame may be clouded and covered, whilst the season of temptation lasteth ; as living coals may be so covered with ashes, that neither light, nor smoke, nor heat may appear, and yet when the embers, the ashes, are stirred to the bottom, tlien live coals appear, and by a little blowing a flame breaks forth. -^ There are severa' cases wherein grace in a Christian's breast may seem to be hid, cold, dead, and covered over ; as sap in the winter is hid in the roots of trees, or as flowers and fruits are hid in the seeds, or roots in the earth, or as sparks of fire are hid in the ashes, or as bits of gold are liid in a dust heap, or as pearls nuiy be hid in the mire. Ay, but God by one severe providence or another, by one fiery trial or another, will blow that heavenly grace, that divine tire, into a perfect flame : he will cause their hid graces to revive as the corn, and grow as the vine, and blossom as the lily, and smell as the wine of Lebanon, Hosea xiv. 5-7. 0 sirs 1 how many Christians were there amongst us, who were much decayed and withered in their graces, in tlieir duties, in their converses, in their comforts, in their spiritual enjoyments, in their communions Avith God, and with one anotlier ; and yet were not sensible of their decays, nor humbled under their decays, nor indus- trious to recover themselves out of their withering and dying condition! and therefore no wonder if the Lord, to recover them and raise them, hath brought fiery trials upon them.3 But,
[2.] ^Secondly, God, by severe providences and by fiery trials, designs a further exercise of his children s graces. Sleepy habits bring him no glory, nor do us no good. All the honour he has, and all the
1 Lib. dc Aiichorat. - 1 John iii. 9, 11 ; Hcb. viii ; 1 Pet. i. 5 ; John .\. 28-31.
^ As a njan may take infection, or get some inward bruise, or spring a vein, and yet not know of it.
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 43
advantage we have in this world, is from the active part of grace. Consult the scriptures in the margin. l There is little difference — as to the comfort and sweet of grace — between grace out of exercise, and no grace at all. A man that has millions, but has no heart to use what he has, wherein is he better, as to the comfort and sweetness of his life, than a man that hath but a few mites in the world ? Eccles. vi. 1-4. ' How is it that you have no faith ? ' saitli Christ to his dis- ciples, when they were in a dreadful storm, and in danger of drown- ing, and so stood in most need of their faith, yet they had then their faith to seek. They had faith in the habit but not in the exercise, and therefore Christ looks upon their faith as no faith, Mark iv. 40. How is it that you have no faith ? what is the sheath without the knife ? the scabbard without the sword ? the musket without the match ? the cannon without the bullet ? the granado without powder ? no more are all your graces when not in exercise. The strongest creature, the lion, and the subtlest creature, the serpent, if they are dormant, are as easily surprised and destroyed as the weakest worm ; so the strongest saints, if grace be not in exercise, are as easily surprised and captivated by sin, Satan, and the world, as the weakest saints are. 0 sirs ! if Christians will not stir up the gi-ace of God that is in them, if they will not look to the daily exercise of grace, Grod, by some severe providence or other, by some fiery dispensation or other, will stir up their graces for them, Jonah i. 6, Ah sluggish, slumbering Chris- tians, who are careless as to the exercise of your graces, how sadly, how sorely do you provoke the Lord to let Satan loose to tempt you, and corruptions grow strong to weary you, and the world grow cross to vex you, and friends turn enemies to plague you, and the Spirit withdraw to discomfit you. Lam. i. 16, and fiery trials to break in to awaken you 1 And all this to bring you to live in a daily exercise of grace. God was fain to be a moth, a worm, a lion, yea, a young lion to Ephraim and Judah, before he could bring them up to an exer- cise of grace, Hosea v. 12-14 ; but when he was all this to them, then they fall roundly upon a lively exercise of grace. Hosea vi. 1-3, ' Come, let us return unto the Lord : for he hath torn, and he will heal us ; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up. After two days he will revive us : in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight. Then shall we know, if w^e follow on to know the Lord : his going forth is prepared as the morning ; and he shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth.' Here you see their faith, their repentance, their love^ their hope, all in exer- cise. When a soldiers courage, mettle, and gallantry, lies as it were hid, his captain will put him upon such hardships, hazards, and dangers, as shall rouse up his courage, mettle, and gallantry ; if a scholar has excellent acquired parts and abilities, and will not use them nor improve them, his master will put him upon such tasks as shall draw out all his parts and abilities to the height : so when the Lord has laid into the souls of his people a stock of grace, and they grow idle and careless, and will not improve that stock for his glory and their own good, he will then exercise them with such severe pro-
1 Job XV. 3 ; 2 Chron. xx. 12, 13 ; James i. 4, and v. 11 ; Hab. ii. 3, 4 ; Micah vii. 7-9 ; Rey. xiii. 10 compared with chap. xiv. 12.
44 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
vidences aud fiery trials, as shall put them to a full improvenieut of that blessed stock of grace that he has intrusted them with. The fii-e that came from heaven was to be kept continually burning that it might never go out, Lev, vi. 13. God loves to see the graces of his children in continual exercise. Neglect of our graces is the ground of their decrease and decay. Wells are the sweeter for drawing, and grace is the stronger for acting ; we get nothing by dead and useless habits. Talents hid in a napkin gather rust ; tlie noblest faculties are imbased when not improved in exercise : 2 Tim. i. G, ' Stir up the gift of God which is in thee.' It is an allusion to the fire in the temple, which was always to be kept burning. All the praise that God has from us in this life is from the actings of grace. It was Abraham's acting of taitli that set the crown of glory upon tlie Lord's head. 0 sirs ! look narrowly to it, that you fail not in the activity and lively vigour of your graces. Look to it that your graces be still acted, exercised, and blown up, that so they may be still flaming and shining. The more you exercise grace, the more you strengthen it, the more you increase it. Eepeated acts strengthen habits ; it is so in sin, and it is so in grace also. The more the little child goes, the more strong it grows by going. The more a man plays upon an instrument, the more dexterous he grows. Money is not increased by lying in a chest, but by trading. Mat. xxv. 27. The more any member is used, the stronger it is. As the right hand is most used, so it is commonly strongest. ' The diligent hand makes rich,' Prov. X. 4. A little stock well husbanded will daily increase, when a greater stock neglected shall decay and come to nothing. The exercise of grace will best testify both the truth and the life of your graces. Grace is never more evident than when it is in exercise. When I see a man rise, and walk, and work, and exercise his arms, I know he is a real man, a Uving man. The more the fire is blown up the sooner it is seen to be fire. There are many precious Christians, who are full of fears and doubts that they have no love to God, no faith in God, no hope of glory, &c., but the best way under heaven to put an end to these fears and doubts is to be fervent in exerting acts of love, of faith, of hope, &c. The non-exercise of grace cast Adam out of paradise ; it shut ]\Ioses and Aaron out of Canaan, Num. xx. 12 ; it brought Jacob into fourteen years' hard service and bondage ; for had he exer- cised faith, hope, patience, &c., as he should have done, he would never have got the blessing by indirect means as he did ; it provoked the Lord to strike Zacharias dumb, Luke i. 18-20 ; it sluit tliousands of the Jews out of the land of Canaan, Heb. iii. 17, 18. I dare not be so harsh, so rash, and so uncharitable, as to think that none of those that died in the wilderness had the habits of faith, the seeds of grace in their souls ; but it was their non-acting of faith that kept them out of the Holy Land, as it did Moses and Aaron, according to wliat I hinted but now. Beloved, by these instances, among many others that might be produced, you see lliat God hath dealt very smartly and severely with his choicest servants for their not exercising of their graces as they ought to have done. And thougli I dare not, upon many accounts, say that for the saints' not exercising and improving their graces, God has turned London into a heap of ashes ;
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 4^
yet I dare say that this neglect of theirs may be one thing that added fuel to that fire.i Well, sirs, you had not long since many outward comforts to live upon, but the Lord has now burnt them up, that so he might lead you forth to live in a daily exercise of grace upon himself, upon his power, upon his all-sufficiency, his goodness, his faithfulness, his fulness, his graciousness, his unchangeableness, his promises. And if this fiery dispensation shall be so sanctified to us as to work us to a further activity of grace, and to a further growth and increase of grace, we shall be happy citizens though we are burnt citizens. But,
[3.] Thirdly, By severe providences and by fiery trials God designs the groiuth of his people in grace. Usually the graces of the saints thrive best when they are under a smarting rod, Grace usually is in the greatest flourish when the saints are under the sorest trials, Kom. V. 3, 4 ; 2 Cor, i. 3-6. The snuffiing of the candle makes it burn the brighter. God beats and bruises his links 2 to make them burn the brighter ; he bruises his spices to make them send forth the greater aromatical savour. Fiery trials are like the tazel, which, though it be sharp and scratching, it is to make the cloth more pure and fine. God would not rub so hard, were it not to fetch out the dirt and spots that be in his people. The Jews were always best when they were in their lowest condition. Well-waters arising from deep springs are hotter in the winter than they are in the summer. Stars shine brightest in the darkest nights ; and so do the graces of the saints shine brightest in the darkest nights of afiliction and tribu- lation. God will sometimes more carry on the growth of grace by a cross than by an ordinance ; yea, the Lord will, first or last, more or less, turn all fiery trials into ordinances for the helping on the growth of grace in his people's souls, Heb. xii, 10; James i. 3, 4; 1 Pet. i. 6, 7. Look, as in the lopping of a tree, there seems to be a kind of diminution and destruction ; yet the end and issue of it is better growth : and as the weakening of the body by physic seems to tend to death, yet it produceth better health and more strength : and as the ball by falling downward riseth upward, and as water in pipes descends that it may ascend : so the saints' spiritual growth in grace is carried on by such divine methods and in such ways as might seem to deaden grace, and weaken it, rather than anywise to augment and increase it. We know that winter is as necessary to bring on harvest as the spring ; and so fiery trials are as necessary to bring on the harvest of grace as the spring of mercy is. Though fiery trials are grievous, yet they shall make us more gracious. Though for the present we cannot see but that such and such severe providences and fiery trials as the loss of house, estate, trade, friends, will redound much to our prejudice and damage, yet in the issue we shall find that God will turn them to the internal and eternal advantage of our precious souls, Heb. xii. 11. We may in a pang of passion say, as Jacob, ' Joseph is not, and Simeon is not !' Gen, xlii. 36.^ 'All these are against me' — children are not,
^ Austin writ upon that day wlierein he shewed no acts of grace, Diem perdidi, I have lost a day. Oh how many days have we lost then for which God miffht iustlv visit us '
2 ' Torches.'— G. & J J
3 But yet as old as Jacob was, he lived to see all those things work for his good, which he concluded were asrainst him.
46 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25,
honours are not, riches are not, liahitations are not, credit is not. All these are a.i^ainst us ; but in the close we shall find that promise made good in ])owor upon us, Eom. viii. 28, ' We know that all things shall AYork together for good to them that love God, to them that arc called according to his purpose.' 0 sirs ! all the power of heaven stands engaged to make good this promise to you ; and if you would but Kve in the daily actings of faith upon this blessed promise, you would then be able to bear up bravely luider all the troubles and trials, crosses and losses that you meet with in this world ; and you would then experience the truth of Samson's riddle — ' Out of the eater came meat, and out of the strong sweetnes's,' Judges xiv. 14. What Paul said of his fiery trials, viz., ' I know that this shall turn to my salva- tion,' Phil i. 19, that may you safely say of all your fiery trials : We know that they shall work for our good, we know that they shall turn to our salvation. Though wicked insti'uments might design our de- struction, yet the wise God tliat sits at the helm will turn all into our salvation. Those severe providences which for the present may seem very prejudicial, in the issue shall prove very beneficial. Joseph's brethren threw him into a pit, afterwards they sell him, then he is falsely accused, and as unjustly cast into prison and laid in cold iron, Ps. cv. 17, 18 : yet all this issued in his good ; his abasement made way for his advancement ; for his thirteen years' impiisoument he reigned fourscore years like a king, Gen. 1. 20, and xli. 40. David, you know, had seven years' banishment, yet it ended in a glorious reign of forty years' continuance. Job lost all that ever he had in one day ; he was a man under great calamity, he was a si)ectacle of the highest misery, he abounded only in boils, and sores, and rags ; but all this issued in the trial of his grace, in the discovery of his grace, and in the im})rovement of his grace, and in the close God did compensate his very great losses by giving him twice as much as ever he had before. Job xlii. 10. Dear friends, that by all severe providences and fiery trials God will turn your spark of grace into a flame, your mites into millions, and your droj^s into seas, is, and shall be the hearty desire of my soul. 0 sirs ! if Christ be even ravished with one of his spouse's ej'es, and with one chain of hei* neck, Cant. iv. 9, with the least grains and drachms of true grace, how will he be taken with abundance of grace ! how will he be ravished with the flourishing estate of your souls in grace ! Well, remember tliis, the more under all your fiery trials grace is increased, the more God is honoured, religion adorned, the mouths of the wicked stopped, the hands and hearts of weak saints strengthened and encouraged, the smarting rod sweetened, and threatened judgments prevented. Oh that those two prophecies might be made good in ]iower upon all the burnt citizens of London ! That Isa. xxxii. 15, ' Until the Spirit be poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful iield : ' and that Isa. XXXV. 1,2,' The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them ; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing : the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellenc}' of Carmol and Sharon ; they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISrENSATlUN. 47
of our God.' 1- Thrice happy will the burnt citizens of London be, if under all their crosses and losses they grow into a more deep acquaint- ance with God, the world, and their own hearts ; with God and his holiness, with the world and its vanity, mutability, impotency, and uncertainty ;• and with their own hearts, and the deceitfuluess, vile- ness, baseness, and wretchedness of them. If under fiery dispensations we grow more holy than ever, and more humble than ever, and more heavenly than ever, and more, meek and lowly than ever, and more tender and compassionate than ever, and more faithful and fruitful than ever, and more patient and contented than ever, then we may be confident that the grand design of God in bringing all that evil that he has brought U|X)n us was his glory and our own internal and eternal good, and accordingly we may rejoice in the Lord, though we have nothing else to rejoice in, Hab. iii. 17, 18. But,
[4.] Fourthly and lastly. By severe providences and by fiery trials, God doth design the trial of liis peoples graces, and the discovery of their sincerity and integrity to the world, 1 Pet i. 6, 7 ; Rev. iii. 18. Deut. viii. 2, ' And thou shalt remember all the way Avhich the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no/ God knew them well enough before, Avithout any experimental trial of them ; but that he might the better make a discovery of themselves to themselves and to others, he led them up and down in the wilderness forty years : Ps. Ixvi. 10-12, ' For thou, O God, hast proved us; thou hast tried us, as silver is tried. Thou hast brought us into the net ; thou hast laid affiiction upon our loins. Thou hast caused men to ride over our heads : we went through fire and through water.' God proves his people, not thereby to better his own knowledge of them, but to bring them to a better knowledge both of their own vices and graces. It is not known what corn will yield till it come to the flail, nor what grapes Avill yield till they come to the press. Grace is hid in nature as sweet water in rose leaves ; but fiery trials will fetch it out. Fire and water are merciless elements, and they note variety of sharpest ■ trials. Now through these God led his people, that so he might dis- cover to them and others both the strength of their graces, and the strength of their sins. God many times exercises his dearest children with fiery trials, that he may discover the since)-ity and integrity of his peojDle to the world. The profane atheistical world are apt very boldly and confidently to conclude that the people of God are a pack of hypocrites and dissemblers, and that they serve God for a livery, for loaves, and not for love, John vi. 26 ; and that they are mercenary in all they do, having more in their eye the hedge that he has made about them, and the gold and silver that he has bestowed upon them, than the honour and glory of the great God ; just as the devil objected against Job, chap. i. 9. Now God, to convince these men, these mon- sters, of the integrity and sincerity of his people, he breaks down the hedge that he had made about them, and turns the wheel upon them,
^ Pliny speaks of a golden vine which never withereth, but is ahvays flourishing. Oh that this might be the mercy of all those Christians who have been burnt up !
48 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
and breaks them with breach upon breach ; lie strips them of all, and turns them out of house and home, as he did Job, chap. xx. 21 ; and yet this people, with Job, will still worship the Lord, and bless a tak- ing God, as well as a t;iving God. They will still keep close to the Lord and his Avays, whatever God doth with them or against them. Ps. xliv. 17-19, 'All this is come upon us,' [it is a terrible 'all,' as you may see from the 9th to the 17th verse;] 'yet have we not forgotten thee, neither have we dealt falsely in thy covenant. Our heart is not turned backpneither have our steps declined from thy way; though thou hast sore broken us in the place of dragons, and covered us with the shadow of death.' In spite of all the wrath and rage of Antiochu.s Epiphanes, that cruel and bloody persecutor of the saints, these servants of the Lord shew their sincerity by tlieir constancy in keeping close to the Lord and his ways in the face of the greatest opposition and hottest persecution that they met withal. When the emperor sent to BasiU to subscribe to the Arian heresy, the messenger at first gave him good language, and promised him great preferment, if he would turn Arian; to which Basil rei)lied, x\las, these speeches are fit to catch little chil- dren withal tliat look after such things; but we that are nourished and taught by the Holy Scriptures, are readier to suffer a thousand deaths than to suffer one syllable or tittle of the Scripture to be altered. The same Basil affirms that many of the heathens, seeing the heroic zeal, courage, and constancy of the primitive Christians in the face of all oppositions and persecutions, turned Christians. Justin Martyr con- fesseth that the constancy of the Christians in their sufferings was the chief motive that converted him to Cliristianity ; for I myself, saith he, was once a Platonist, and did gladly hear the Christians reviled ; but when I saw they feared not death, nor any of those miseries which most frighten all other men, I began to consider with myself that it was impossible for such men to be lovers of pleasure more than lovers of piety, and that made mefii'st think of tin-ning Christian.^ Now by these means and methods God convinceth the blind world of the integ- rity and sincerity of his people. When they see those whom they have severely judged for hypocrites shall own the Lord and his ways, and cleave to the Lord and his ways, and continue to follow the Lord and his ways, and hold on in a high honouring of the Lord and his ways, when their hedge is broken down, and God has stripped them as naked as in the day wherein they were born, oh now they begin to change their note, and to conclude, surely these are the servants of the Most High God, Dan. iii. 26, and Acts xvi. 17; these are no hypocrites nor dissemblers, but true Nathanaels in whom there is no guile, John i. 47. How have the people of God in London been judged hyi)ocrites, dissemblers, deceivers, factious, and what not ! Now God, by burning up their substance, and by turning them out of house and home, and destroying all their pleasant things, doth certainly design to give those that have so deeply censured them a i)roof of their integrity and sin- cerity, by letting them see that all the changes that have passed upon them can never work them to change their ]\Iaster Christ, nor to change his ways for the ways of sin, nor to change his worship for the worship of the world, nor to change their religion for the religion of Eome.
' Hist. Tripart., lib. vii. cap. 36. " As before.— G.
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 49
Certainly those that love the Lord, that delight in the Lord, and that highly prize the Lord for those infinite perfections, beauties, glories, and excellencies that are in him, they will own him, and cleave to him, and follow after him when they have little as when they had much, yea, when they have nothing of the world as when they had all the world ; and by so doing, they put a padlock upon the lying lips of sjich, they button up the mouths of such who asperse and calumniate them as a generation that only serve God upon the account of a worldly interest.! There is nothing that doth more amuse,^ amaze, and astonish wicked men, than to see the people of God keep close to him and his ways when they are in a suffering estate, yea, when they have lost all but their God and their integrity. The fire tries the gold as well as the touchstone, and diseases try the skill of the physician, and tem- pests try the skill of the pilot ; and so do fiery trials try both the truth and the strength of a Christian's graces. Paulinus Nolanus, when his city was taken by the barbarians, prayed thus to God: Lord, let me not be troubled at the loss of my gold, silver, honour, city, &c.; for thou art all, and much more than all these to me. Here was a heroic spirit, here was grace in strength, yea, in triumph. The spirits of the men of the world usually sink under their losses. Menippus of Phenicia, having lost his goods, strangled himself.^ Dinarcus Phiton,* at a certain loss, cut his own throat to^ save the charge of a halter. Another, being turned out of his estate, ran out of his wits. And an- other, for the death of his son, threw himself headlong into the sea. Augustus C^sar, in whose time Christ was born, was so troubled and astonished at the relation of a foil and overthrow from Varus, that for certain months together he let the hair of his beard and head grow still, and wore it long ; yea, and otherwhiles he would run his head against the doors, crying out, Quintilius Varus, deliver up my legions again ; Quintilius Varus, deliver up my legions again.^ Henry the Second, who was none of the best of princes, heating that his city Mentz was taken, used this blasphemous speech : I shall never, saith he, love God any more, that suffered a city so dear to me to be taken from me. Now by all these instances you may clearly and plainly see the dif- ferent temper and carriage of wicked men uneler their losses, crosses, trials, and sufferings, from the people of God. When they are under fiery trials, what an evil spirit, what a desperate spirit, what a sullen spirit, what a proud spirit, what a satanical spirit, what a hellish spirit, do they discover ! They tell all the world that they are under the power and dominion of the god of this world ; Phil. ii. 2 and 2 Tim. ii. 26. But when the people of God are under fiery trials, they make conscience of carrying of it so as that they may convince the world that God is in them of a truth, and that they are sincere and upright before the Lord, however they are judged and censured as hypocrites, deceivers, dissemblers, and what not. Oh that all that are sufferers by this fiery dispensation would make it their business, their work, their heaven, so to carry it under their present trials, as to
^ Joshua xiiv. 15 ; Mat. xix. 27 ; Rev. xiv. 4, 5; 1 Peter iii. 16, and ii. 12, 15. <f)ifiovv properly signifies to muzzle, or halter, or tie up, or to button up their mouths, as we say. ^ = Cause to 'muse,' consider. — G. ' Diog. Laertius, ii. 99, 100.— G.
* Qu. ' Phyton of Rhegium ' ? if go, above is a myth. — G. * Suetonius.
VOL. VI. • D
50 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
convince all gainsayers of the sincerity, integrity, and uprightness of their hearts, both towards the Lord, his people, his ways, his ordinances, his interest, and all his concernments in this world ! And tlius much for the gracious ends that God aims at in all those severe providences and fiery trials that of late he has exercised his people with.
The next tiling we have to inquire after is those sins for which the Lord inflicts so heavy a judgment as this of fire upon the sons Qi men. Now for the opening of this, give me leave to propose this question — viz..
Quest. What are those sins that bring the fiery dispensation, that bring the judgment of fire upon cities, nations, and countries ? Now, that I may give a full and fair answer to this necessary and important question, will you please to premise with me these four things : —
[1.] First, We need not question but that some of all sorts, ranks, and degrees of men in and about that once great and glorious city did eminently contribute to the bringing down of that dreadful judg- ment of fire, that has turned that renow^ned city into ashes. Doubt- less superiors and inferiors, ministers and peoj)le, husbands and wives, parents and children, masters and servants, rich and poor, honourable and base, bond and free, have all had a hand in the bringing down that judgment of fire that has turned London into a ruinous heap. But,
[2.] Secondly, Premise this with me — viz., That it is a greater argument of humility, integrity, and holy ingenuity to fear ourselves, and to be jealous of ourselves rather than others, as the disciples of Christ did: Mat. xxyi. 21, 22, ' And as they did eat, he said. Verily I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me. And they were exceeding sorrowful, and began every one of them to say unto him, Lord, is it I?' It is better for every man to do his best to ransack and search his own soul, Lam. iii. 40, and to find out the Achan, Josh, vii., the accursed thing in his own bosom that has brought that dreadful judgment of fire upon us, than for men, without any Scrip- ture warrant, to fix it upon this party and that, this sort of men and that. There is no Christian to him that smites upon his own heart, his own breast, his own thigh, saying, AVhat have I done ? The neglect of this duty the prophet long since has complained of : ' No man repents himself of his wickedness, saying. What have I done?' Jer. viii. 6 — that is, none comparatively. So how rare is it to find a burnt citizen repenting himself of his wickedness, and saying. What have I done ? Most men are ready to blame others more than them- selves, and to judge others rather than themselves to be the persons that have brought down this judgment of fire upon us, Mat. vii. 1-4. It was a good saying of one of the ancients, [Augustine,] Amat Deus seipsos judicantes non judicare, God loves to judge them that judge others rashly, but not those that judge themselves religiously. But,
[3.] Thirdly, Premise this with me, In times of common judg- ments, common calamities, and miseries, other of the saints and ser- vants of God have looked upon their own sins as the procuring causes of the common calamity. Thus David did in that 2 Sam. xxiv. 15, ' So the Lord sent a pestilence upon Israel, from the morning even to
IsA. XLTI. 24, 25.] the late fiery dispensation. 51.
the time appointed : and there died of the people, from Dan even to Beer-sheba, seventy thousand men.' But mark the 17th verse, ' And David spake unto the Lord, when he saw the angel that smote the people, and said, Lo, I have sinned, and I have done wickedly : but these sheep, what have they done ? Let thy hand, I pray thee, be against me, and against my father's house.' And thus did good Nehemiah, chap. i. 3, 6, 7, ' And they said unto me, The remnant that are left of the captivity there in the province are in great afflic- tion and reproach : the wall of Jerusalem also is broken down, and the gates thereof burnt with fire. Both I and my father's house have sinned. We have dealt very corruptly against thee, and have not kept thy commandments, nor the statutes, nor the judgments which thou commandedst thy servant Moses.' Now certainly it is as much our glory as our duty to write after these blessed copies that these worthies have set before us. Alexander had somewhat a wry neck, and his soldiers thought it an honour to be like him. How much more should we count it an honour to be like to David and Nehemiah in such a practice as is honourable to the Lord, and advantageous to ourselves ! But what Plutarch said of Demosthenes, that he was excellent at praising the worthy acts of his ancestors, but not so at imitating them, is applicable to the present case, and to many who have been burnt up in our day. But,
[4.] Fourthly and lastly. Premise this with me, There were many sins amongst them that did profess to fear God in that great city, which may and ought to work them to justify the Lord, and to say that he is righteous in his fiery dispensations. I may well say to the burnt citizens of London what the prophet Oded to them in that 2 Chron. xxviii. 10, ' But are there not with you, even with you, sins against the Lord your God?'
But you will say, What sins were there among the professing people in London that may and ought to work them to justify the Lord, and to say that he is just and righteous, and that he has done them no wrong, though he has burnt them up, and turned them out of all ?
A71S. I answer, That there were these seven sins, among others, to be found amongst many of them, I say not amongst all of them, all which call aloud upon them to lie low at the foot of God, and to sub- scribe to the righteousness of God, though he has turned them out of house and home, and burnt up their substance on every hand.
[1.] First, There was among many prof essors of the gospel in London too great a conformity to the fashions of the looiid. How many pro- fessing men in that great city were dressed up like fantastical antics, and women like Bartholomew-babies,^ to the dishonour of God, the shame of religion, the hardening of the wicked, the grieving of the weak, and the provoking of divine justice ! When Darius changed the fashion of his scabbard from the Persian manner into the mode of the Greeks, the Chaldean astrologers prognosticated that the Persian monarchy should be translated to them whose fashion he counterfeited. Certainly that nation may fear a scourge from that nation or nations whose fashion they follow : Zeph. i. 8, ' And it shall come to pass in the day of the Lord's sacrifice, that I will punish the princes, and the
^ ' Dolls' sold at Bartholomew Fair. Cf. Morley's 'History.' — G.
62 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
king's children, and all such as are clothed with strange apparel.' This is a stino;ing and a flaming check against all fashion-mongers, against all such as seem to have consulted with Frencli, Italian, Per- sian, and all outlandish monsters, to advise them of all their several modes and fashions of vice, and that are so dexterous at following of them, that they are more complete in them than their pattern. Cer- tainly, if ever such wantons he saved, it will be by fire. Strange apparel is part of the old man, that must be put off, if ever men or women intend to go to heaven. What dreadful things are thundered out against those proud, curious dames of Jerusalem, by the prophet Isaiah, who being himself a courtier, inveighs as punctually against the noble vanity of apparel, as if he had even then viewed the ladies' wardrobes, Isa. xxxviii. 16, seq. And those vanities of theirs brought desolating and destroying judgments upon them : Isa. iii. 24-26, ' And it shall come to pass, that instead of sweet smell there shall be a stink ; and instead of a girdle a rent ; and instead of well-set hair baldness ; and instead of a stomacher a girding of sackcloth ; and burning instead of beauty. Thy men shall fall by the sword, and thy mighty in the Avar. And her gates shall lament and mourn ; and she, being desolate, shall sit upon the ground.' As light and slight as many make of vain apparel, yet Cyrian^ and Augustine draw up this conclusion : that superfluous apparel is worse tlian whoredom, because whoredom only corrupts chastity, but this corrupts nature. Seneca complained, that many in his time were more solicitous of their attire than of their good behaviour, and that they had rather that the com- monwealth should be troubled than their locks and set looks. I have read of the Grecians, that when they wished a curse upon their enemies, it was this — that they should please themselves in bad customs. There are many who lift their heads high, who seem to be under this curse this day. Why doth the apostle say, saith one of the ancients, [Austin,] ' Above all things swear not ' ? Is it worse to swear than to steal ? worse to swear than to commit adultery ? worse to swear than to kill a man ? No ; but the apostle would fortify us as much as he could against a pestilent custom, to punish the pestilent customs and fashions that were amongst us, James v. 12. God sent the pestilence in 1665, and the fiery judgment in 1666. And the Lord grant that the bloody sword, in the hands of cruel cut-throats, that are brutish and skilful to destroy, be not sent amongst us some other year to jiunish the same iniquity, Ezek. xxi. 31. 0 sirs! what was more common among many professors in London than to be clothed in strange apparel, a la mode de France? Mark, those that affected the Babylonian habit were sent captives to Babylon, Ezek.. xxiii. 15. They that borrowed the fashions of the Egyptians may get their boils and blotches. Cer- tainly such as fear the Lord should go in no apparel, hut, Jirst, such as they are willing to die in ; second!//, to appear before the Ancient of days in, when his judgments are abroad in the earth, Isa. xxvi. 8-10 ; thirdly, to stand before a judgment-seat. But,
[2.] Secondly, There was among many })rofessor8 of the gospel in London much luheivarmness and coldness in the things of God. The city was full of lukewarm Laodiceans, Rev. iii. 16, 17. The love of
^ Qu. 'L'\ priaii '■/ — G.
ISA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION, 63
many to God, to his people, to hia ways, and to his instituted worship, was cold, very cold, stark cold. Mat. xxiv. 12. God destroyed the old world by water for the heat of their lusts, and God has destroyed the city of London by fire for the coldness of their love that dwelt therein. I have read of Anastasius the emperor, how God shot him to death with a thunderbolt, because of his lukewarmness and for- mality. But,
[3.] Thirdly, There was a great deal of ivorldliness and eartJdy- mindedness^ and covetousness among the professing loeople of London.
0 sirs I the world is all shadow and vanity ; it is filia noctis, like Jonah's gourd. A man may sit under its shadow for a time, but it soon decays and dies. The main reason why many professors dote upon the world is, because they are not acquainted with a greater glory. Men ate acorns till they were acquainted with the use of wheat. The loadstone cannot draw the iron when the diamond is in presence ; and shall earthly vanities draw the soul, when Christ, the pearl of price, is in presence ? Many of the professors of London were great worshippers of the golden calf, and therefore God is just in turn- ing their golden calf into ashes. The world may well be resembled to the fruit that undid us all, which was fair to the sight, smooth in handling, sweet in taste, but deadly in effect and operation. The world in all its bravery is no better than the cities which Solomon gave to Hiram, which he called Cabul, that is, displeasing or dirty,
1 Kings ix. 13. The whole world is circular, the heart of man trian- gular, and we know a circle cannot fill a triangle. If the heart of man be not filled with the three persons in Trinity, it will be filled with the world, the flesh, and the devil, 1 John v. 7. Riches, like bad servants, never stay long with one master. What certainty is there in that which one storm at sea, one treacherous friend, one false oath, one ball of fire, yea, one spark of fire may strip us of? 0 sirs ! if you can gather grapes off thorns, and figs off thistles, then go on, and dote upon the world still. All the things of this world are vain things — they are vanity of vanities, Eccles. i. 2. All in heaven count them vain, and all in hell count them vain : a Jacobus piece is but as a chip to them ; pearls are but as pebbles in their eyes. Lazarus was a preacher, as some conceive, and Dives a lawyer : sure I am, that Lazarus in heaven is now rich enough, and happy enough, and Dives in hell is now poor enough, and miserable enough. He who makes his world his god while he is in the world, what will he do for a god when he goes out of this world ? Well, sirs, remember this inordinate love to the world will expose a man to seven great losses — viz..
First, To the loss of many lyrecious opportunities of grace. Rich Felix had no leisure to hear poor Paul ; and Martha, busied about many things, had no time to hear Christ preach, though never man preached as he preached. Acts xxiv., Luke x., John vii. Men inordi- nately in love with the world have so much to do on earth, that they have no time to look up to heaven.
Secondly, To the loss of all heavenly benefit and profit by the ministry of the word, Ezek. xxxiii. 31-33; Mat. xiii. 22. Nothing will grow where gold grows. Where the love of the world prevails, there the ministry of the word will not prevail. If the love of the world be too
54 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
hard for our hearts, then the ministry of the word will work but little upon our he;nls.
Thirdly, To the loss of the face and favour of God. God doth not love to smile upon those who are still smiling upon the world, and still running after the world, Ps. xxx. 6, and Isa, Ivii. 17. The face and favour of God are pearls of price that God bestows upon none but such whose conversation is in heaven, Phil. iii. 20, and who have the moon — viz., all things that are changeable as the moon — imder their feet, Kev. xii. 1, 2. God never loves to lift up the light of his coun- tenance upon a dunghill-spirited man. God hides his face from none so much and so long as from those who are still longing after more and more of the world. '
Fourthly, To the loss of religion, and the true ivorship and service of God; as you may see by comparing of the scriptures in the margin together.l iMany worldlings deal with religion as masons deal with their ladders when they have work to do, and to climb, &c. Oh then how they hug and embrace the ladder, and carry it on their arms and on their shoulders! but then, when they have done climbing, they hang the ladder on the wall, or throw it into a corner. 0 sirs, there is no loss to the loss of religion. A man were better lose his name, his estate, his limbs, his liberty, his life, his all, than lose his religion.
Fifthly, To the loss of communion with God, and acquaintance loith God, Dent. viii. 10, 11; Jer. ii. 31, and xxii. 21; Ps. cxhv. 15. A man whose soul is conversant with God shall find more pleasure, delight, and content in a desert, in a den, in a dungeon, and in death, than in the palace of a prince. Man's sumnium bonum stands in his communion with God, as Scripture and experience evidences — nay, God and I are good company, said famous Doctor Sibbes. Mace- donius the hermit, retiring into the wilderness that he might with more freedom enjoy God and have his conversation in heaven, upon a time there came a young gentleman into the wilderness to hunt wild beasts, and seeing the hermit, he rode to him, asking him why he came into that solitary place ? he desired he might have leave to ask him the same question, why he came thither ? I came hither to hunt, said the young gallant : and so do I, saith the hermit, Deum venor meum, I hunt after my God ; — they hunt best who hunt most after communion with God. Urbanus Kegius, having one day's con- verse with Luther, said, it was one of the sweetest days that ever he had in all his life.^ But what was one day's, yea, one year's converse with Luther, to one hour's converse with God ? Now an inordinate love of the world will eat out all a man's communion with God. A man cannot look up to heaven and look down upon the earth at the same time. But,
Sixthly, To the loss of A/.s precious and immortal soul. Shimei, by seeking his servant, lost his life,^ and many by an eager seeking after this world, Mat. xvi. 2G, and 1 Tim. vi. 9, lose their precious and immortal souls. Many have so much to do on earth, that they have no time to look up to heaven, to honour their God, to secure their interest in Christ, or to make sure work for their souls. But,
' 2 Tim. iv. 10 ; 1 Tim. vi. 10 ; Jer. v. 7; Dcut. xxxii. 15 ; Hosea iv. 7, and xiii. 6. 2 Adam in vit. l?cgii, p. 78. ^ See 1 Kings ii. 39, scq.—O.
IsA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 55
Seventlihj, To the loss of the world; for by their inordinate love of the world they highly provoke God to strip them of the world. Ah, how rich might many a man have been had he minded heaven more, and the world less ! Wlien men set their hearts so greedily upon the world, it is just with God to blast, and curse, and burn up all their worldly comforts round about them.
[4.] Fourthly, Many in London vf eve fallen under spiritual decays, iDitherings, and languishings, in their graces, in their comforts, in their communions, and in their spiritual strength. They are fallen from their first love, Kev. ii. 4.i The flame of divine love being blown oat, God sends a flaming fire in the midst of them. Many Londoners were fallen into a spiritual consumption, and to recover them out of it, God sent a fire amongst them. Many in London were withered in their very profession. Where was that visible forwardness, that zeal, that diligence in waiting upon the Lord in his ordinances, that once was to be found amongst the citizens of London ? And many citizens were withered in their conversations and converse one with another. There was not that graciousness, that holiness, that spiritualness, that heavenliness, that fruitfulness, that exem- plariness, that seriousness, and that profitableness sparkling and shining in their conversations and converse one with another, as once was to be found amongst them. And many were withered in their affections. Ah, what a flame of love, what a flame of joy, what a flame of desires, what a flame of delight, what a flame of zeal as to the best things, was once to be found amongst the citizens of London ! but how were those mighty flames of affection reduced to a few coals and cinders ! and therefore no wonder if God sent a flaming fire in the midst of them, and many were withered in their very duties and services. How slight, how formal, how cold, how careless, how remiss, how neglective were many in their families, in their closets, and in their church-communions, who heretofore were mighty in praying and wrestling with God, and mighty in lamenting and mourning over sin, and mighty in their groanings and longings after the Lord, and who of old would have taken the kingdom of heaven by violence ! Mat. xi. 12. There were many in that great city that had lost their spiritual taste ; they could not taste that sweetness in promises, in ordinances, in Sabbaths, and in the communion of saints, that once they had tasted and found, 2 Sam. xix. 35. In spiritual things, many citizens could taste no more sweetness than in the white of an e^^, Job vi. 6. Many in that great city had lost their spiritual appetite, they had lost their stomachs, they did not hunger and thirst after God and Christ, and the Spirit and grace, and the light of God's countenance, and pure ordinances, and the fellowship of the people of God, as once they did. Now is there anything more con- trary to the nature of God, the works of God, the word of God, the glory of God, than spiritual decays ? Oh the prayers and the praises that God loses by decayed Christians ! Ah, how do decayed Chris-
^ The nutmeg-tree makes barren all the ground about it; so doth the sj^ice of worldly love make the heart barren of grace. Ursinus observes that the sins and barrenness iinder the gospel in tlie Protestants in King Edward's days brought in the persecution in Queen Mary's days.
66 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25,
tians grieve the strong, and stumble the weak, and strengthen the hands of the wicked, and lay themselves open to divine displeasure ! Many in London did like Mandrobuliis in Lucian, who offered to his god the first year gold, the second year silver, and the third year nothing ; and therefore no wonder if God sent a fire amongst them. But,
[5.] Fifthly, Their non-improvement of the mercies and privileges that they were surrounded icith, and their non-improvement of lesser and greater judgments that God had formerly inflicted on them, and their non-improvement of their estates to that height they should have done for the supply of them whose wants, bonds, necessities, and miseries did call aloud for supplies. Many did something, a few did much, but all should have done more.
[6.] Sixthly, Those unnatural heats, fiery contests, violent passions, and. sore divisions that have been amongst them, may well work them to justify the Lord in his fiery dispensations towards them ; for a wolf to worry a lamb is usual, but for one lamb to worry another is un- natural ; for Christ's lilies to be among thorns is common. Cant. ii. 16, but for these lilies to become thorns, and to tear and rend, and fetch blood of one another, is monstrous and strange. The contest that was between the birds about the rose that was found in the way, was fatal to many of them, and issued in the loss of the rose at last.
[7.] Seventhly and lastly, TJiere were many in London icho were so very secure, and so excessively taken up with their ivorldly com- forts, contentments, and enjoyments, that they did not lay the afiiictions of Joseph (1.) so kindly, (2.) so seriously, (3.) so affectionately, (4.) so readily, (5.) so frequently, (6.) so lamentingly, and (7.) so con- stantly to heart as they ought to have done, Amos vi. 6. Upon all these accounts, how well does it become the citizens of London to cry out. The Lord is righteous, the Lord is righteous in all his fiery dis- pensations towards us !
But to prevent mistakes, and that I may lay no heavier a load upon the people of God that truly feared him, and that had and have a saving interest in him, than is meet, and that I may give no advan- tage to profane persons to fatlier the burning of the city of London wholly, mainly, or only upon the sins of the people of God, give me leave therefoi-e to propound these four queries : —
First, Whether all these seven sins last cited, or most of them, can be justly charged upon the body of those sincere Christians who lived then in London, and whose habitations are now burnt up ?
Secondly, Whether those of the people of God, upon whom any of the forementioned sins are chargeable, have not, before the city was burnt, daily lamented, bewailed, and mourned over those sins that might have been charged upon them either by their own consciences or others ?
Thirdly, Where and how it doth appear by the blessed Scriptures that ever God sent so great a judgment of fire as was poured out upon London upon the account of the sins of those that truly feared him, be it those seven that have been already specified, or any others that can be now clearly and justly proved against them ?
IsA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 57
Fourthly, Whether there are not some other men's sins upon whom in the clear evidence of Scripture Kght this heavy judgment of fire may be more clearly, safely, and fairly fixed, than upon the sins of those who had set up God as the great object of their fear? Now, in answer to this last query, give me leave to say, [1.] First, That sin in the general brings the dreadful judgment of fire upon a people. Mark, personal afflictions and trials may come upon the people of God for trial, and to shew the sovereignty of God, as in the case of Job, whose afflictions were for trial, and not for sin. Job i. The same may be said of the man that was born blind, John ix. But general judgments, such as this fiery dispensation was, never comes upon a people but upon the account of sin. This is evident in my text, Isa. xlii. 24, 25 ; God set Jacob and Israel on fire, and burnt them round about ; but it was because they would not walk in his ways, neither were they obedient unto his law. Jer. iv. 4, ' Cir- cumcise yourselves to the Lord, and take away the foreskin of your heart, ye men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem ; lest my fury come forth like fire, and burn that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings.' So Ps. cvii. 33, 34, ' He turneth rivers into a wilderness, and the water-springs into dry ground; a fruitful land into barrenness, for the wickedness of them that dwell therein.' The very country of Jewry, as travellers report, which flowed once with milk and honey, is now for fifteen miles about Jerusalem like a desert, without grass, tree, or shrub. Ah, what ruins doth sin bring upon the most renowned countries and cities that have been in the world ! Such is the destructive nature of sin, that it will first or last level the richest, the strongest, and the most glorious cities in the world. So the prophet Amos tells us that it is sin that brings God's sorest punishments upon his people : Amos i. 3, ' For three trans- gressions of Damascus,' (by which we are to understand the greatness of their iniquities,) ' and for four,' (by which we are to understand the multitude of their transgressions,) ' I will not turn away the punish- ment thereof The same is said of Gaza, ver. 6, and of Tyrus, ver. 9, and of Edom, ver. 11, and of Amnion, ver. 13, and of Moab, chap, ii. 1, and of Judah, ver. 4, and of Israel, ver. 6. Now it is very observable of every one of these, that when God threatens to punish them for the greatness of their iniquities, and for the multitude of their transgressions, he doth particularly threaten to send a fire among them to consume the houses and the palaces of their cities ; so he doth to Damascus : Amos i. 4, ' But I will send a fire into the house of Hazael, which shall devour the palaces of Ben-hadad.' So he doth to Gaza, ver. 7, ' But I will send a fire on the wall of Gaza, which shall devour the palaces thereof.' So he doth to Tyrus, ver. 10, ' But I will send a fire on the wall of Tyrus, which shall devour the palaces thereof.' So he doth to Edom, ver. 12, ' But I will send a fire upon Teman, which shall devour the palaces of Bozrah.' So he doth to Ammon, ver. 14, ' But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Kabbah, and it shall devour the palaces thereof, with shouting in the day of battle, with a tempest in the day of the whirlwind. So he doth to Moab, chap. ii. ver. 2, ' But I will send a fire upon Moab, and it shall devour the palaces of Kirioth ; and Moab shall die with tumult, with shout-
58 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
ing, and with the sound of a trumpet.' So he doth to Judah, ver. 5, ' But 1 will send a fire upon Judah, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem.' By all these remarkable instances it is evident that God, by his tier}' dispensations, tells all the world that the sins of that peoi)le are great and many, u[)on whom the dreadful judgment of fire is inflicted in its fury, and therefore it is high folly and madness in many men that makes them impute this heavy judgment of fire to anything rather than to their sins. 0 sirs, it is sin