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to bring home the prodigal; and by him our Saviour reprefents to us the temper of moft finners. For till we have spent that stock of mercies which God hath given us; till we come to be pinched with want, and are ready to perish, we are not apt to entertain thoughts. of returning to our Father.

It may be there are some finners who are more tract. able, and eafy to be reduced to goodness, that are not fo headstrong and obftinate in their way, but that they may be reclaimed by milder and fofter means. But there are likewife a great many fenfelefs and outrageous finners, who are madly and furiously bent upon their own ruin. Now, to treat these fairly, with the allurements of kindness, and the gentle arts of perfuafion, would be to no purpose: the only way that is left of dealing with them, is, rigour and feverity. When finners are thus befides themfelves, fomething that looks like cruelty is perhaps the greatest mercy that can be fhown to them; nothing fo proper for fuch perfons as a dark room, and a spare diet, and fevere ufage: A rod for the back of fools, as the wife man speaks.

Thus I have done with the first thing I propounded to speak to, namely, the merciful defign and intention of God in fending judgements upon a people; which is, to bring them to repentance, and by repentance to prevent their ruin. I proceed to the

II. The reafon of the continuance of God's judgements; because the people were not reclaimed by them: Therefore his anger is not turned away, but his hand is Stretched out fill; because the people turneth not to him that fmiteth them, neither do they feek the Lord of hofts.

And how can it be expected it fhould be otherwife, when incorrigiblenefs under the judgements of God is a provocation of fo high a nature, a fign of a moft depraved and incorrigible temper, and an argument of the greateft obftinacy in evil? Upon this account we find, that the Holy Spirit of God in fcripture brands Ahaz as a fingular and remarkable fort of finner, 2 Chron. xxviii. 22. becaufe in the time of his diftrefs he finned yet more against the Lord. The longer Pharaoh and the Egyptians refifted the judgements of God, the more still they were hardened, and the more they were plagued. Lev.

xxvi. 22.-28. after God had there threatened his peo. ple with feveral fore judgements for their fins, he tells them, that if they will not be reformed by all these things. he will punish them feven times more, and after that feven times more, for their fins. And if in fuch a cafe the juft God will punish seven times more, we may fafely con clude, that fins after judgements are feven times greater.

So likewife, Deut. xxviii. after a long and dreadful catalogue of curfes there denounced against the people of Ifrael in case of their disobedience, God at laft threatens them with a foreign enemy that fhould diStress them in their gates; and if they would not be reclaimed by all this, he tells them, that he hath still more and greater judgements for them in ftore: v. 58. and 59. If thou wilt not obferve to do all the words of this law, that thou mayeft fear this great and glorious name, THE LORD THY GOD; then the Lord will make thy plagues wonderful. If we be of so strange and monftrous a difpofition as to grow worfe under judgements, God will deal with us after an unusual and prodigious manner; he will make our plagues wonderful.

This incorrigible temper the Prophets of old every where make the great aggravation of the fin of Ifrael: If. i. 4. 5. Ah! finful nation, a people laden with iniquity. And, after a great many other expreffions to fet forth what heinous finners they were, he fums up all in this, that they were fo far from being reformed by the feveral judgements of God which had been inflicted upon them, that they were the worfe for correction: Why Should they be stricken any more? they will revolt more and more. So likewife, Hof. vii. 9, 10. Ephraim, though brought very low, is represented as of the fame refractory temper: Strangers have devoured his ftrength, &c. but they do not return to the Lord, nor feek him for all this. I will mention but one text more, and methinks it bears but too near a refemblance with our own condition, both in refpect of the judgements which have been upon us, and our carriage under them, Amos iv. where God upbraids his people feveral times with this, as the great aggravation of their fins, that they continued impenitent under all thofe terrible judgements of God which had been upon them: I have Sent among you (fays he) famine, and then peftilence, VOL. I.

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and then the word, and laft of all a terrible fire, which had almost utterly confumed them: v. 11. I have overthrown fome of you, as I overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning: yet have ye not returned unto me. And because all these judgements had not been effectual to reclaim them, he tells them, that he was refolved to go on in punishing'; and therefore he bids them to expect it, and prepare themselves for it: v. 12. Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Ifrael and because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Ifrael. When God hath begun to punish a people, and they are not amended by it, the honour of his juftice is concerned to proceed, and not to give over. By every fin that we commit, we offend God; but if he finite us, and we ftand out against him, then do we contend with him, and frive for mastery. And when the finner is upon these ftubborn and infolent terms, then prepare to meet thy God: A bitter farcafm; as if man could be a match for God, and a poor weak creature in any ways able to encounter him to whom power belongs. There is a fevere expreffion concerning God's dealing with fuch perverfe and obftinate finners, Pfal. xviii. 26. With the froward thou wilt fhew thyfelf froward; or, as the words may more properly and conveniently be rendered, With the froward thou wilt wrestle. God will not be outbraved by the fins of men; and therefore, if we continue impenitent, we have all the reason in the world to expect that God will go on to punish.

But to come nearer to ourselves, and to confider our own cafe, which is in truth fo very bad, that we may almost be afraid to confider it. The wife and good God, like a prudent and indulgent father, hath ufed all the arts of his providence towards this nation to reclaim us. He hath invited us to him by many bleffings, but we would not come. So (to borrow an apt illuftration from * a great divine of our own) we have forced him to deal with us as Abfalom did with Joab: he fent one civil meffage to him after another, but he would not come; at laft he fets on fire his corn-field, to try whether that would bring him. This courfe God hath taken with us. We would not be perfuaded by meffages of kindness,

Bishop Sanderfon,

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by his many bleffings and favours, to return to him; and therefore hath he fent amongst us the terrible mef fengers of his wrath. First we were engaged in a foreign war; and though God was pleafed to give us fome confiderable fuccefs in it, yet it feems our provo cations were fo great, that he was refolved to punith us. He was loath to let us fall into the hands of men, and therefore he took the work into his own hand, and punished us himself, by fending a peftilence amongst us, the foreft and most deftructive that hath befallen this nation for many ages. But we did not upon this return to him; and therefore his fierce anger kindled a fearful fire amongst us, which hath laid the honour of our nation, one of the greatest and richest cities in the world, in the duft; and that by fo fudden and irresistible, fo difmal and amazing a devaftation, as in all the circumstances of it is fcarce to be parallelled in any history.

I doubt not but most of us were mightily affected with this judgement whilst it was upon us. So aftonishing a calamity could not but make us open our eyes a little, and awaken us to confideration. Even the rich man in the gofpel, though he had all his lifetime been immerfed in fenfuality, yet could not but lift up his eyes when he was in flames.

And furely God expects that fuch judgements as thefe fhould not only rouse us a little for the prefent, but that they fhould have a permanent operation and effect upon us, and work a thorough and lasting reformation amongst us; but yet I am afraid that this dreadful fire hath had no other influence upon us, but what it uses to have upon metals, which are only melted by it for the prefent, but when the fire is removed, they suddenly cool, and return to their former hardness.

One would have thought, that the fenfe of fuch a calamity as this fhould have remained longer upon us. Methinks God feemed to fay to us after this judgement, as he did once to Jerufalem, Zeph. iii. 7. Surely thou wilt fear me; thou wilt receive inftruction. But we, like them, have been but the more forward to provoke him: They rofe early, and corrupted their doings: we have, after all this, hardened our hearts from his fear,, and refufed to return. And therefore God is now come to one of his laft judgements: Our enemy diftreffeth us

in our gates. God hath begun to let us fall into the hands of men; and, by giving our enemies a fudden and fatal advantage upon us, hath fmitten us with a breach great as the fea.

Thefe were terrible calamities indeed, to come fo thick and fo fwiftly upon us, like defolation, and as a whirlwind. Such a quick fucceffion of judgements, treading almoft upon one another's heels, does but too plainly declare that God is highly incenfed against us. For furely thefe are not the wounds of a friend, but the terrible affaults of an enemy: they do not look like the difpleasure of a father, but the severity of a judge; not like vifitation, but like vengeance.

And, befides thefe more vifible judgements upon the nation, we are by a fecret curfe of God infenfibly decayed in our riches and ftrength; we are, I know not how, ftrangely impoverished in the midft of plenty, and almost undone by victories: and, which adds to our mifery, few among us feem to be fufficiently fenfible of it, or to take any notice by what filent fteps and imperceptible degrees, like gray hairs, and the infirmities of old age, poverty and weakness are stealing in upon us. So that we may fitly apply to ourfelves what the Prophet fays of Ephraim, Hof. vii. 9. Strangers have devoured his ftrength, and he knoweth it not: yea, gray hairs are here and there upon him, and yet he knoweth it not,

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And our condition, as we are a church, is not much better. How is this famous Proteftant church of ours, which was once the admiration of her friends, and the envy of her enemies, funk and declined in her glory, and reduced into a very narrow compafs? fo that she is left like the daughter of Zion, If. i. 8. as a cottage in a vineyard, as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, as a befieged city; ftraitened and hemmed in on all parts, by the impudence of Atheism, the infolencies of Popery, and the turbulency of faction; all which do every day vifibly and apace gain ground upon her, and diftrefs her on every fide: juft as the condition of the Jewish church is described before my text, The Syrians before, and the Philistines behind, both ready to devour Ifrael with open mouth.

And furely it is not for nothing that God hath brought us thus low, that he hath fent all thefe judgements upon

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