ANOTHER SERMON Preached to the Honourable House of Commons now assembled in PARLIAMENT, November the fifth, 1641.  
By CORNELIUS BURGES. D. D.  
Wherein, among other things, are showed A List of some of the Popish Traitors in England.  
That their Treasons were not occasioned by our Laws, but from Principles of their own Religion.  
That their Priests are bound to infuse suc● Principles into them.  
The courses taken by their Priests and jesuites to animate them unto Treasons.  
An Experimental Prognostication.  
Published by Order of the House of Commons.  
LONDON, Printed by R. B. for P. Stephens and C. Meridith, at the Gilded Lion, and at the Craine in S. Paul's Churchyard, 1641.   

To the Honourable House of Commons now assembled in PARLIAMENT.  
WHen first I understood that You had designed only myself to preach unto You at that Great and happy Solemnity upon the Fifth of November last, I enlarged my Provision, because there was no other to second me in that Service.  
But when I came to set before You what the Lord had brought to my hand, 
The Tumults in Ireland.  I found You so over laid with business of such high importance as would hardly permit You to hear any sermon at all. This constrained me to contract the two first Parts of my Sermon, and wholly to suppress the third; except the last branch of the last Use, which I found means to affix to my second Point.  
It was far from my thoughts, and above my hopes, that such a mangled Peice should gain such Acceptance with You, as to be held worthy of Your Thanks, or of Public View.  
But seeing Your pleasure is, to Order the Publishing it, I obey. Only I have now added the remainder of that Provision, with which I could not at first present You, by reason of those Indispensable Occasions then pressing on You.  
The Lord of Heaven direct all Your ways, make them plain before You, prosper You in them, and hold all Your hearts firm to Himself and in Unity among Yourselves; set You more effectually upon, and carry You more strongly through that most necessary (and of all other most Important) Work, even the Perfecting of the Reformation of this Church (by the assistance of a free Nationall Synod, if Your wisdoms should so think meet) for the further securing of our Religion from Corruption in Doctrine, from Pollution in Worship, from superstition in Ceremonies, from Exorbitancy and Tyranny in Ecclesiastical Government and Discipline, and from Anarchy and Confusion (under a false guise of Christian Liberty) which is fare worse than Tyranny.  
He also make You all more zealous to settle a Ministry worthy of the Glorious Gospel of Christ in every Congregation, and a sufficient maintenance for all faithful Labourers therein. He raise You higher and higher in honour with God and Man, and carry You still in his Bosom till he hath brought You to Glory. All of which, is, and shall be the incessant prayer of  
Your most humble servant C. BURGES.   
PSAL. 76.10. 
Surely the rage of man shall praise thee, the rest of the rage shalt thou restrain.  
THis Text and this day do well agree. 
Introduction showing. I. The fitness.  Never did day more exactly demonstrate the truth of this Text. Never did Text more fully set forth the Works of this Day, whether we regard the rage of man, or the Power of God in overruling thereof to his own Praise and our preservation.  
This is that day wherein the most prodigious rage of man, that ever the Sun beheld, or that Hell itself boiled up to an height justly execrable to all the world, was ready to break forth out of the nethermost Pit, against our Late King, Queen, the Royal Seed, the Parliament, Church, Kingdom, this Place, ourselves, and all ours, all at once. And this is that day wherein our God came riding to us in his Chariot of Triumph, and made himself fearful in praises, by doing wonders, and leaving us no more to do, but to praise his Name, and lengthening out our happiness joyfully to celebrate this Public anniversary of that stupendious Deliverance.  
So that, 
II. The occasion.  while Interpreters contend and sweat about the special occasion of this Gratulatory Song, whether penned as a Lasting Trophy of the many Victories achieved by David over the Philistines, Moabites, Syrians, and others (2 Sam. 8.) or of the discomfiture of that formidable Army of the Ethiopians, in the days of Asa (2 Chr. 20.) Or of the selfe-destroying of that huge Host of the children of Ammon, Moab, and mount Seir, in the reign of Jehoshaphat. 2 Ch. 20. Or rather, (which is more probable) as a Pillar of Gratitude in the time of Hezekiah, for the wonderful defeat of those numberless Forces of blasphemous Sennacherib, nigh to jerusalem, where an Angel went forth, and in one night, and slew 185000. men, in the camp of the Assyrians, King. 19 Sure we are, 
Introduction.  that none of all those Great Acts of the Lord, ever administered greater occasion to advance a Public Thanksgiving, beyond the faint and dull strain of Prose, to the spriteful courage of a Verse, by the grateful violence of a Poetic Rapture, truly divine, than that admirable, and even ineffable over powering of the matchless fury of those Romish Pioners, employed in that Masterpiece of Hellish Invention, the Gunpowder Treason, affords unto us, and all Posterity, of greatest exilience, and of utmost industry to make His Praise glorious, who justly inhabiteth the praises of Israel, and is (in himself) exalted above all blessing and Praise.  
For, on this Day if ever, and even here also, if any where, broke He the arrows of the bow, the shield, the sword, and battle, whereby he is become more glorious and excellent than the mountains of prey.  
Here, the stouthearted are spoiled, they have stepped their sleep, and none of the men of might 
* In that great slaughter in the host of Sennacherib, the Leaders, Captains, and mighty men of Valour, were all cut off 2 Chron. 32.21.  have found their hands. At thy rebuke, O God of Jacob, both the Chariot, and the horse are cast into a dead sleep.— Thou didst cause judgement to be heard from heaven; the earth feared, and was still, when God arose to judgement, to save all the meek of the earth. Therefore we, even we also will for ever say, and sing to thy Name, as thy people of old,  
Surely, the rage of man shall praise thee, the rest of the rage shalt thou restrain.  

III. The Sum.  Which words (Janus like) have a double Aspect. For, they look not only backwards, as a Thankful Remembrance of what God hath already done; but also forwards, as a Prophetic Resolution, and well grounded Conclusion of Faith, touching the constant ordering and curbing the rage of all his and our enemies, so as to get himself glory out of all, to the end of the world.  

iv The Parts of the Text.  If we make a Distribution of the Text, there will be found in it an Asseveration, and an Assertion.  

1. An Asseveration, in the first word, surely.  
2. An Assertion, consisting of two simple Propositions, diversified by the various consideration of the subject of them both, the rage of man; which if we consider, 

1. As the permission of it, by his wise and powerful ordering, may conduce to his honour; So, the rage of man shall praise thee.  
2. As the breaking out of it further might prove inconsistent with his Glory; So, the rest of the rage shalt thou restrain.     
The time allotted me will not be sufficient for a distinct prosecution of every Observation which these several branches afford. And your weighty Affairs press for all expedition. I shall therefore fix only upon the principal points in the shortest way, after a brief explication of the words of the Text.  
Surely. 
Explication. Surely, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. ] So I find the Original [Chi] rendered by our English Translators, Old & New, and by some of the Latin, correspondent thereunto. I acknowledge the Hebrew word to be most frequently used as a Causal particle [For, or Because.] Howbeit it is, not seldom, put for a vehement Asseveration, or Attestation, and translated, Surely, or Verily. Thus, jacob to Laban; 
a Gen 31.42.  Surely, thou hadst sent me away empty. So Judah to Jacob; 
b Gen. 43.10.  Except we had lingered, surely we had returned a second time. And, surely there is no enchantment against Jacob, said wretched Balaam of blessed Israel. In all which places, and many more, the Original word is the same that is in this Text.  
This may be sufficient warrant for our Translation, which is both pertinent, and emphatical. Pertinent, because, had the word been otherwise rendered, the sense had been obscured; for that it is not a Reason of the Premises, but rather a Conclusion deduced from them. Emphatical also, because it lively expresseth the assurance of Faith in God's Wisdom, Power, and Goodness for the happy disposing of that Rage, which he shall at any time please to permit, and for the mastering and suppressing of the residue, which he shall find cause to restrain. You see the Asseveration. I proceed to the Assertion.  

The rage, from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ●al●re 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ex a descere.  The rage.] So I translate [Chamath.] not anger; as some; not yet wrath, as others. Anger is too mild, wrath, too short to express it by. I know anger, wrath, and rage, (or fury) be sometimes promiscuously put one for another. But withal, I find them sometimes 
* Anger is cruel, and wrath is raging. So the old Translation. Prov. 27.4.  distinguished, and in strictness some difference may be found between them.  
Anger is the boiling of the blood about the heart, causing a commotion of the spirits that are near. Wrath is the manifestation of that inward distemper by looks, gestures, or actions tending to revenge. But Rage is the extremity of both the former, causing the heart to study destruction 
d Prov. 24.2. , to meditate and contrive the utmost of mischief and villainy; and, the outward man to watch, and lay hold upon all opportunities and occasions of putting it in execution, out of the depth of malice, and in the height of fury. Besides, it is of longer continuance than anger, strictly so called. It is such an inveterate anger as 
* Eccles. 7.9.  resteth in the bosom of fools, keeps house, and constant residence there; being deeply rooted, and wrought up unto a settled habit, which (though it doth not always actually break forth, yet) is continually desirous of vent, like fire impatient of restraint.  
That all this is comprised under the word here used, is manifest both by the judgement of the Learned, who have expounded it, and by the use of it in Sacred Writ. Therefore some express it by Fervour: Tremellius by Aestus, or a burning heat like to that of an Oven, or Furnace, which sets the whole man in a flame, that cannot, without extraordinary means, be quenched, or allayed. And the Scriptures inform us both of a rage within Psal. 2.1. Why do the heathen rage, which is immediately expounded by an internal act, the imagining (or meditating) of a vain thing: and, of a rage without too, namely, the rage of the tongue. Hosea 7 16. and the rage of the hand. Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce, and their wrath (or rage) for it was cruel, said dying Jacob, touching the bloody butchery committed by his two Sons, Simeon and Levi, upon the newly circumcised Sechemites, in cold blood. Genes. 49.7. Which also shows the settled permanency, and predominancy of such a Disposition in a wicked man.  
This rage is amplified by the subject wherein it is, Man. 
Of man. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉  For it is called, the rage of m●n. The Text names no individual, whether Sennacherib (of whose rage God himself took notice, 
e 2 Kings 19.27. ) or any other blastering Tyrant, or boisterous Ajax; but indefinitely terms it [Chamath Adam] the rage of man, a Livery that fits the shoulders of any wicked man in the world.  
And this indefinite expression is used partly for discovery, and partly out of contempt of the man that is here demonstrated.  
1. By way of Discovery, to point out the vicious quality, and corrupt estate of the man, in whom this rage reigneth. It is the rage of Adam, of the old man, of every man that hath not put off the first Adam, and is not ingraffed into the second. Therefore is it called the rage of man; because, of every man yet remaining upon the old Stock, or the first man, which is of the earth, earthly 
f 1 Cor. 15. . Hence is he called, a man of the earth. Psalm. 10.18 the violent man. Psalm. 18.48. the bloody and deceitful man. Psal. 55.23. and by such like Epithets.  
2. By way of contempt, to show that, be the rage what it will, it is yet but the rage of a weak silly man, that is of base original, and of too small a strength to grapple with Omnipotency. Thus, in Psalm 9.19. Arise, O Lord, let not Man prevail. Where the Strong GOD is opposed to impotent Man. So the next words. Put them in fe●re, O Lord, that the Nations may know themselves to be but men: that is, poor weak grasshoppers, 
g Job. 4.19.  whose houses are clay, whose foundation is in the dust, that are crushed before the moth: so that neither 
h Ezek. 22.14.  can their hearts endure, nor their hands be strong in the days that God shall deal with them Wilt thou yet say before him that slayeth thee, I am God? But thou shalt be a man, and no God, in the hand of him that slayeth thee. Ezek 28.9. This is the man; and this, the account which God makes of him in whom this rage is found. But against whom is it bend? If we consult the story, we shall find God complaining that it went very high, for it reached even unto Himself. 
Explication.  I know thy abode,— and thy rage against me, saith the Lord. 2 King. 19, 27. that is, first more immediately, by blasphemous speaking against the God of Jerusalem, as against the Gods of the people of the earth, which were, 
2 King. 19.21, 22.  the work of the hands of man. 2 Chron. 32.19. Secondly, mediately, through the Loins of Hezekiah, and such of his people as trusted in the Lord.  
Now, what of all this rage of man against God and his servants? The Text tells you what is predicated of it.  

Shall praise thee. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉  It shall praise thee.] Or, as the old Translation hath it, it shall turn to thy praise. Praise is nothing else but the exaltation of Excellency, whereby it may be had in reverence and honour. This is that which redounds unto God from the rage of man: not intentionally on man's part, as if he in his rage aimed at it: for so, God is not in all his thoughts. Psal. 10.4. But occasionally on man's part, and efficaciously on Gods, who brings light out of darkness, and good out of evil. His Power and Providence so ordereth and disposeth all the malicious machinations, and bloody designs of the most desperate men, that they go away with the shame, his people with joy, and himself with the honour. And this he doth not only by mastering them in their greatest rage, and compelling them to acknowledge his power, but also by giving such issue thereunto, as shall produce effects quite contrary to those which they intended. Thus, the rage of joseph's brethren, in selling him to the Ishmaelites turned to God's praise, As for you, saith joseph, Ye thought evil against me, but God meant it unto good. Genes. 50.20.  
Nor is this spoken only in reference to what was already done and passed, as some would seem to insinuate, who render the Verb [Totheka] in the Present tense (doth praise thee:) but as a Declaration of what God will ever do, in all time to come, so often as the rage of man shall issue forth. Therefore the best Interpreters render it by the future, the rage of man shall praise thee, making it to be not only a voice of Thanksgiving, but a conclusion of faith, as before I touched. So have you the first Proposition explained. The Second followeth,  
The rest of the rage] This is the Subject of the later proposition, which, for substance, is the same with the former, 
Explication. The rest of the rage.  to wit, the rage of man: Only it is differenced by two Circumstances, which I must alike open.  
One of the Circumstances is, the changing of the number in the Original.  
Before it was [Chameth] rage, in the singular number: 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉  now it is [Chemoth] rages, in the Plural; which plainly supposeth the greatness, and the variety of it. The rage of the wicked is not small, nor terminated in one plot, or practice, nor of one kind: but it is exceeding great, ever working, and multiplying by continuance, so as there can be no wicked design so barbarous, no plot so bloody and Devilish, but the rage of God's enemies makes them ready for it, and mad upon it. If they once miscarry, yea if they be often disappointed, they are not discouraged, but they will to work again and again, never giving over. If one Plot fail, they are ready with another, and another, of other sorts. The Devil and their own hearts make them fertile and big with all the inventions of Hell. Justly then, doth the Psalmist call them rages, in the Plural. For, they are as Gad, a Troop; yea, you may call their name Legion, they be so many.  
The other circumstance is, in the word [Sheerith] translated, the rest, the remnant, the remainder. 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉  And this gives notice of the abundance of it. Let never so much of it break forth, yet there is still move behind, that throngs after that which got out before And, as it is with foul stomaches, the best that comes up into the Basin, is but filthy stuff, but that which is behind, and comes last, is fare more loathsome and bitter, through the abundance of choler and gall: so is it with the rage of wicked men; the best is abominable, but that which tarries behind, and would come up in the Rear, is most intolerable; that, is the bottom of the stomach, the dregs, the most venomous and malignant part of the rage, the letting out hereof would be the destruction of God's people, or some way or other dishonourable to our God. This remnant it is, of which the Psalmist, speaking unto God, saith,  

Thou shalt restrain. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉  Thou shalt restrain] This, in the Hebrew, is expressed in one word [Tackgor.] which imports the begirting, or binding of it in on every side, that it shall by no means break out, but shall be kept in, as a Dog in a chain, as a Lion in his Den, how violent soever. The Greek Septuagint, in their Translation, have wittily expressed themselves thus; the rest of the rage shall keep holy day unto thee 
* 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. . Their meaning is, that as men, who are to keep an holy day to the Lord, cease from labour, doing no manner of work therein, further than may directly tend to the honour and service of God: so the rage of man, further than God may get some honour out of it, shall keep holy day too, that is, cease from working or acting: it shall rest from labour in regard of breaking out, how restless so ever it be within, because it cannot get out.  
But this is not all. Tremellius, in his Revised Translation, supplies one word, which makes the sense more complete and comfortable. For, thus He; residuo aestuum accingis (tuos) Thou dost begirt thy people with the remainder of the rages. That is, thou dost not only keep in the rage of thine enemies that it do no hurt, but thou makest that very rage, which was intended for their destruction, to become even as the walls of a City, for their defence and protection. The upshot of all is this; That wicked men shall be so fare from attaining those ends, which in their rage they drive at, that they shall be sure to meet with a stop, where they made themselves most sure of going on, and be occasions of promoting the good of God's party, which they meant to destroy. 
1 Observation   
Thus fare the Explication. The Observations which I shall now recommend unto you from the whole, be these Three.  
1. 
The observations.  The rage of the wicked against God and his people is bottomless and endless.  
2. Let the rage of wicked men be what it will, it shall only raise that Glory to God, and benefit to his people, which the wicked never intended, and, ever fall short of that issue, which they chief projected.  
3. The experience of God's overruling, and mastering the rage of man in times past, is an undoubted assurance of the like, for all time to come.  
I begin with the first.  
The rage of the wicked against God and his people is bottomless, and endless. 
The rage of the wicked appea●es. — This is (as you have seen) the subject of both Propositions contained in this Text; and that, whereof the the Godly have had sad experience, ever since there was a world, and wicked men in it. It were an unthristy waste of Time (now, 
1 In particular instances.  so precious) to insist upon the rage of Cain against Abel; of Esau, against Jacob; of the Egyptians against Israel; of Saul and his party, against David; of Absolom, against his own Father; of Haman, against Mordecay; of the Nobles of Babylon, against Daniel; or of Herod, Pilate, and the Jews, against 
b Psal. 2.1, 2. Act 4.27, 28.  Christ himself. What should I tell you of David's moan, 
c Psal. 57.4.  My soul is among Lions, and I lie even among them that are set on fire; Or, of his Prayer to be 
d Psal. 59.2, 3.  saved from bloody men, that lay in wait for his soul; Or, of his complaint of 
e Psal. 22.11.  many strong Bulls of Bashan, that had beset him round?  
Let the Occasion of this Text and Psalm, speak to this Point. The rage of Sennacherib, was first bend against Hoshea, King of Israel, whom, together with those Ten Tribes, after three year's war, he took, and carried away Captive. But, 
2 Kings 18.  eight years after (in the Fourteenth of Hezekiah) his wrath broke out against good Hezekiah, and the Lord himself: for, up he came, and seized into his hands all the frontier Cities of judah; whereof Lachish was one. To appease this rage, thither did Hezekiah dispatch Ambassadors, and craved peace; Sennacherib propounded the Conditions and Articles; Hezeki●h accepts, and performs them. But, no sooner was this done, but Sennacherib sends Tartan, Rabsaris, and Rabshakeh from Lachish to Hezekiah with a great host against Jerusalem, and with words of blasphemy against God himself: insomuch as nothing was so eminent and notable in that expedition, as 
f 2 King. 19.27.  his rage against the Lord. And is it not Saint Paul's own confession of his rage against Christians, before his Conversion; 
g Act. 25 11.  I punished them oft in ever City, and compelled them to blaspheme; and being exceedingly mad against them, I persecuted them even unto strange Cities?  

2 In the universality of this disposition.  Nor is this the Disposition of some few only, but even of all the wicked. You see the Text is indefinite; it takes all before it. This is common to them all; 
h Psal. 37.12.  the wicked plotteth against the just, and gnasheth upon him with his teeth: not in a sudden passion only, but in a constant premeditated course. 
i Vers. 32.  The wicked watcheth the righteous, and seeketh to slay him: and that, 
k Psal. 17.12. Psal. 10.8, 9  Like a Lion that is greedy of prey, and as a young Lion, lurking in secret places.  

3 Against all the Godly.  Neither is this the hard hap of some few godly men, who through indiscretion do administer oil to the flame of wicked men's wrath; but even 
l Isay. 59.15.  every one that departeth from iniquity, maketh himself a prey. Yea, 
m 2 Tim 3.12.  and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution. And, that not only from strangers, but 
* Mic. 7.6.  a man's enemies shall be those even of his own house. So was it with David; witness Achiiophel, a Privy Counsellor, and Absalon that 
n 2 Sam. 16.11  came forth of his own bowels. And so fared it with Christ himself; witness the Traitor judas, who was 
o Joh. 6.7 1.  one of the Twelve.  

4 For godliness sake.  Nor is this, or any of this, for any real injuries done them by the godly; but even gratis, and without a cause, 
p Joh. 15.25.  except their Godliness. 
q Psal. 59.3, 4.  The mighty are gathered together against me (saith David) not for my transgression, nor for my sin, O Lord: They run, and prepare themselves without my fault. A thing so palpable in Paul's case also, that he durst appeal to his very enemies, in the midst of all their rage against him, be fore Felix, his Judge. 
r Act. 24.10.5. When they rage's not outwardly, they rage's the more within.  Let these same here say, if they have found any evil doing in me.  
Indeed they do not always discover, and openly prosecute their inward rancour, because all Times are not for it. And when the times would permit it, yet opportunities to such and such men may be wanting. In which Case, malicious Haman, 
s Esth. 5.9, 10.  though fall of indignation against Mordecay, can refrain himself, while he saw Mordecay countenanced by the Queen, whom he durst not then to displease. But yet, even than their hearts are full of deadly poison; 
t Psal. 64.6.  both the inward thought of every one of them, and the heart is deep. Then, whatsoever craft or subtlety, Counsel or conspiracy can possibly lurk in the most fathomless hearts of men, acted by Him who was a murderer from the beginning, do all meet, and concentrate in them more than at other times, even when the outward face of things extort from them a plausible behaviour towards the Godly. 
u Prov. 26.24.  He that hateth, will (at such a time) dissemble with his lips, and lay up deceit within him.  
And as their rage is bottomless, so is it endless, 
6 All this, without end, or measure.  and still on the increasing hand. Bray a fool in a mortar, yet will not his folly departed from him. How often soever wicked men have been in plots and conspiracies, and smarted for them; they wax not weary, nor give over their rage, which is like the Hare, that after once conceiving, admits of another conception, before she be delivered of her former burden. The older, and more frequent they grow in villainy, the more fruitful their hearts in Devilish Designs and Inventions, till 
x Psal. 5.9.  their inward parts become nothing else, but very wickedness, or wickednesses, as the Psalmist speaketh; and, the whole frame of their spirits be 
y Isay. 57.20.  like the raging Sea, when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt. If any of them seem calmer than the rest, it is not because he is better, but because more subtle; not because he hath no mind to do mischief, but because he is better able to conceal a mischievous intention, till a better opportunity. Whence that Counsel; 
z Pro. 26.25.  When he speaketh fair, believe him not, for there are seven abominations in his heart.  
Reasons. This cannot be otherwise, for divers Reasons.  
1. It is the natural bent and frame of wicked men's hearts to be mischievous. It is their very life. 
z Pro 4.16.  They sleep not except they have done mischief, and, their sleep is taken away, except they cause some to fall. 
1 It is the nature of wicked men to do mischief.  And in this, friends and foes are all alike to them. Sin having turned them out of course, they turn out of kind; and like a mad Ox, gore all they meet. If Herod be in his rage, 
a Macr●h. li. 2. Saturnal.  as good be his swine, as his son.  

2 The old enmity eggs them on.  2. The old enmity put between the two Seeds, makes the serpentine party to adventure a breaking, 
b Gen. 3.15.  yea a crushing of their own heads to pieces, rather than let alone the heel of the woman's seed, which, with all their rage, they can no more but bruise. Therefore wicked men, as once the 
c Ezek. 25.16.  Philistims, take all opportunities to take vengeance with a despiteful heart, because of the old hatred. And this enmity is so hereditary, that never any Northern High-landers more inherited the malice of their Ancestors Feides, than the whole Posterity of collapsed Adam, do, the wrath and rage of their corrupt Progenitors against all the Godly.  

3 Contrary conversation augments it.  3. Contrariety of Conversation augments the hatred. 
d 1 Joh. 3.12.  Wherefore did Cain slay his brother, but because his own works were evil, and his brothers righteous? The wicked 
e Isay. 59.15. sacit ut insanus habeatur. Tremel.  account him mad, that departs from iniquity. Therefore say they, 
f Wisd. 2.12. & ve●. ● 5.  Let us lie in wait for him, because he is not for our turn, but is clean contrary to our do.— He is grievous to us to behold, for his life is not like other men's, his ways are of another fashion.  
4. The honour and happiness that God confers upon his people, 
4 Their envic a●●●h happiness of the go●ly.  is the wicked man's envy, and adds fuel to his rage. If he must be miserable, it mads him at heart to see them happy. 
g 〈◊〉. 11●. 10.  The wicked shall see it, and be grieved, he shall gnash his teeth, and melt away. And this is not the least part of the Devils own quarrel. 
h 〈◊〉. 1●. ●3.  For when the Dragon saw that he was cast (out of heaven) unto the earth, he persecuted the woman, casting water after her, out of his mouth, like a flood, and making war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the Commandments of God, and have the testimony of jesus Christ.  

5 The w●ked hate God himself. 1 Psal. 73 9  5. Their rage spareth not God himself. Nor was it one Sennacherib, or Pharaoh, but it is the property of all the wicked to set their mouths against heaven, and to be 
k Rom. 1. 3●.  haters of God. Yea, they first hate him, before their hatred falls upon them that be his. If the world hate you, saith our Saviour, 
l joh. 15 18.  Ye know that it hated me, before it hated you. And if it hate him first, his followers are sure to fall under it next, and to pay for all: 
m Vers. 20.  If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you. As good men bestow all their 
n Psal. 16.1, 2.  goodness upon the Saints, because they cannot extend it unto God himself: so wicked men wreak all their teen upon the godly, the image of God (as the Panther, upon the image of a man, when he cannot come at the man himself) because their rage cannot reach the Almighty.  
Uses. You have now the Point. Many fruitful Uses might be made of it: but I will confine myself unto two or three, most pertinent to the present Occasion.  
And first, Behold this Truth, abundantly fulfilled, this day, 
1 Behold this in the Gunpowder Treason. Nou. 5. 1605.  in your ears, through the implacable rage of the Popish faction, inventing, contriving, and bringing to the very birth, this day 36. years, the most barbarous, execrable, hellish Treason that ever came within the hopes of the most savage and unnatural Assassinates, to bring forth, or conceive. 
He wished that Rome had but one neck, and that he might cut it off at one blow.  Caligula indeed wished, but never hoped for such a blow: and his wish was, a blow with the sword, not by springing a mine from Hell. A cruelty, that he never dreamt of. Yet such a Cruelty should have been executed here within a few hours, had not God wonderfully restrained the rest of their rage, when nothing was now wanting but giving fire (which also was ready) by the cursed hand of a second 
* Faux.  Mutius Scaevola, who (after his apprehension) avowed the fact, repenting of nothing but of not executing the Design, whereof (as he blasphemously said) not God, but the Devil was the discoverer.  
Indeed I find one Moody, a bloody Villain, solicited by L Ausbespine, A French Ambassador, of the Guisian faction, 
* The plot was to deliver the Q. of Scots then condemned. See the Annals of the year, 1587.  to kill our late glorious Deborah, Q. Elizabeth, (An. 1587.) to have propounded the doing of it, by laying Gunpowder under her Chamber, and secretly firing it: And this, not above 18. 
1 Use.  years, before the Gunpowder Treason. But (though that were too bloody, and perhaps the Embryo of this cursed Monster) that deserved not to be named (for bloodiness) the same day with this.  
For there, only one Person of the Queen was aimed at; here, King, Queen, Prince, all the Nobles, Judges, Knights, Citizens & Burgesses of Parliament, had all gone up at one fatal blow. There, only Twenty pound weight of Powder, in a bag or sack, should have been (but was not) provided, which perhaps might have miscarried; but here, no less than 36. Barrels were actually laid in, and covered close with 1000 Billets, and 500 Faggots, not only for hiding the Powder, if search should be made; but, for more effectual operation thereof, when it should have been fired. There, the traitorous Instruments of D Ausbespine (he disdaining the baseness of the invention) disliked the plot, wishing rather it might be effected by a man of more courage (in a more generous way) like that of the Prince of Orange, by the Burgundian. But here, Garnet, and Tesmond, Garrard, and Oldcorne (or Hall) the Jesuits could approve of the Plot, when propounded by Catesby; and for his encouragement in that work of Darkness, 
See Stat. of 3. Jac. ●.  they join in the Conspiracy as deep as any: as appears by the Report of Roger Widdrington 
* Append. ad supplic. §. 12. , a strong Papist, to Pope Paul the Fifth, beside other testimony.  
This therefore was every way Transcendent, beyond all the most horrid Attempts wherewith any age, or Nation was ever stained. A fact that speaks the Actors, and Accessories, not men, but Tigers; not Beasts, but Devils. The Huns, the Heruli, the Turcilingi (all branded for inhuman Caiteifs in the height) were mild and temperate creatures, in comparison of these. Not the sablest Stories, or Tragedies ever presented such a desperate Scene. No high flown Poet could ever reach such a Plot in a fiction. In a word, joels 
n joel 2.30.  Day of blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke, was unable to match it. Such havoc of Royal and Noble Blood, such heaps of dashed brains, such mountains of mangled bodies, such piles of torn members, such numbers of ghastly preys offered up to Death in a moment, could never have been thought of, much less effected.  
This had been, beyond all precedent, inhuman and terrible; but, the dismal effects that must have sprung from such an Act, had been much more dreadful. The destruction (or forcing the residue) of the Royal Stock, the subversion of the Laws, the ruin of the Kingdom, the utter extinguishing of the Light and Glory of all, the true Religion, and Profession of the Gospel established among us, and the retroducing of Egyptian darkness, Babylonish fornication, and Romish Idolatry, like a flood, to the destruction of souls, as well as bodies, had all followed at the heels of that Infernal Thunderclap.  
Cursed therefore, and for ever cursed be their anger, for it was fierce, and their wrath, for it was cruel. And blessed be that God, who hath scattered first, and divided them into pieces afterwards in this our Israel, making them an astonishment, and an hissing, not in Europe alone, and among Christians; but, even in Africa (that womb of Monsters) where very Turks and Moors, and all sorts of Barbarians, that heard of this monstrous Attempt, sat down amazed, their hearts melting and failing within them at the report.  
Indeed, if Jesuits be consulted, they roundly resolve it, not only lawful, but meritorious; So did Garnet, and the rest before mentioned. What all the world justly condemns as an unjust rage, that they cry up as a commendable Zeal Of which more 
* See the later end of the next Use.  anon. But this is so fare from excusing the fact, that it doth exceedingly aggravate the offence: for it draws in Heaven, to father their bats of Hell. Let them but once proclaim us Heretics and Schismatics, and they may afterwards do any thing else.  
For ourselves, though they brand as Heretical, those Divine Truths professed amongst us, 
n Act. 24.14.  we confess (and justly glory in it) that according to that way which they call Heresy, so worship we the God of our Fathers, believing all things which are written in the Law, the Prophets, and the Gospel too. And indeed, with them, this is our fault. And whereas they pronounce us schismatical, we have often made good before the world, that we never separated from the Catholic Church, but only from the abominations of Babylon, 
o Revel. 18.4.  that we might no longer partake of her sins, nor receive of her plagues.  
But let them account of themselves as highly as they please, and rang us among the rankest heretics that ever were, they be yet to seek of a sufficient warrant for such a Prodigy: seeing we have the peremptory judgement of Christ himself to the contrary, for the everlasting confutation of all such damnable doctrine, and the eternal confusion of all the broachers, and abettors of it.  
In the Ninth of Luke, 
p Vers. 51.52.  we find Christ, in a journey from Galily to Jerusalem, to keep his last Passover, and to offer up himself there a Sacrifice for our sins; and being on the way, he sends before to a village of Samaria, to take up some lodging. The Samaritans, for difference from the Jews in Religion, but chief about the Place of worship (than which, at that time, a greater Controversy could not happen) refused to entertain him, especially now, that he was going up to that feast. And this heightened their offence of inhumanity toward a stranger, to an act of impiety against Religion; refusing upon this ground, that he steadfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem, 
Vers. 53.  and they knew part of his business there.  
His two Disciples James and John (who perhaps had been sent on that errand) in zeal for their Master, took fire at this, and presently put it to the Question; 
Ver. 54.  Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did? They not only make the Proposition, but avouch a Precedent of great authority. Elias 
q 2 King. 1.  did so upon the old Samaritans; therefore why not we much more upon these? That wrong was but to a servant; this to the Son of God himself: And we desire no other revenge upon these, than he took upon those. But what is Resolved upon the Question, by Christ their Master? Surely he gives judgement against his own Disciples, although himself were most concerned in the Cause. He will not have it so much as attempted, no not upon such impious Samaritans. For he both sharply rebuked the propounders of such a fiery Motion, saying, 
Vers. 55.  Ye know not of what spirit ye are; and refuted them too, by the end of his coming, which would not consist with that Act of Elias; for the Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, 
Ver. 56.  but to save them.  
Now then, if the Question be at any time put, Whether a Papist may lawfully blow up a Protestant, or otherwise destroy him, for difference in Religion, and upon pretence of Heresy, without Legal Trial? We can not better resolve it according to the mind of Christ, than by that Resolution, which Himself gave to a Question of his own Disciples, to this effect, Whether it be lawful for a believing Jew, yea for Apostles, upon wrong done to Christ himself for difference in Religion, to set fire on a Samaritan? We see, Christ is clearly and resolutely for the Negative: which is enough to secure all Cities and Villages from such a Desolation, and our Persons from such a Massacre, by any who truly follow Christ, while the World standeth.  
Let it now be supposed by Papists, that our Religious King, Queen, Parliament, and all Protestants, were all out as bad as those wretched Samaritans; and, themselves as Catholic, as Apostles, or as Christ himself: yet, by Christ's Resolution, Protestants ought to have been no worse used by Papists, than the Samaritans by Christ.  
Would Christ not endure that a contemptible Village of Miscreants should be destroyed, upon such a quarrel; and yet, authorize these, to destroy a whole Kingdom (yea Three Kingdoms upon the matter) with one puff, upon a fare less occasion? If he would not permit such a punishment from Heaven, upon only Delinquents; would he approve the blowing up of many others, who, in the judgement of the Conspirators themselves were esteemed Innocent? God would not so deal with Sodom itself, when the cry of their sins called for fire from heaven.  
But, if now we invert the scale, as justly we may; The Instance will conclude more strongly. If Christ would not give way to the good, to bring fire on the evil; not to Apostles, to destroy heretics and Idolaters; 
2 Use.  nay, not so much as to pray for fire, even from heaven, althought the Prayer were to be put up by James and John, against Samaritans; would he warrant not only a Prayer for, but an execution by fire; not from heaven, but from hell; not by Apostles, but by Apostats; not upon Heretics, but upon sound Professors of his Truth; not by james and John, whom he dearly loved, but upon Samaritans, whom all God's people had cause to hate; but, by Samaritans, Priests and Jesuits, Traitors and Rebels (abhorred of God and man) upon james & john, very Pillars of the Church, upon the Lords Anointed, & upon the Assembly of all the Estates of the Kingdom? Sober & Modern Papists themselves are ashamed of this, in behalf of those furious Ones, of their own Party, who cannot blush. Nay, I appeal from Garnet, to Garnet: from Garnet sleeping, to Garnet waking: from his sleeping Conscience, consulted to approve it, to his Conscience awakened, when he was upon the Scaffold, to be executed for it. When the Question was first put to him by Catesby, Whether it were lawful in some Case, to destroy the innocent with the guilty? This Good 
a Widdrington ubi supra.  Father, so soon as he apprehended the Conspirator to be in earnest, peremptorily resolved, that, no doubt, it was; if the good coming by it, might make compensation for the loss of their lives. So that with him, 
b Rom. 3.8.  Let us do evil, that good may come thereof, was good Doctrine, though S. Paul disclaimed it.  
But, when he came to die, Conscience compelled him to change his note. Then, he confessed to a Noble 
c E. of Manch: to whom Garnet confessed, M●rtis sententiam justissimè in cum fuissè pronunciatam, etc.  Lord, yet living, that, for concealing this Treason, the sentence of death was just upon him. And being led to the side of the scaffold, to satisfy the people, he (as 
* Me in Regem peccasse confiteor, quod mihi est de●ori, quoad mali conscius fui, scil. in reticendo Et hoc nomine, veniam a Regia. Majestate supplex pe●o. Machinatio contra Regem & regnum sanguinolenta erat, quamque si pe●acta fuisset, ego ipse in imis sensibus & toto animo de●esta●u●●s erum. Dole● sane maxim & peracerbe fe●o, Catholicos tam atrox & immanc facinus suscepisse. Ibid.  Widdrington reports him) freely said, I confess I have offended against the King, which is now my grief, in that I was guilty of this Treason, in concealing of it, for which I humbly crave pardon of his Majesty. The Conspiracy against the King and Kingdom, was bloody; and had it been executed, I myself should have abhorred it from the secrets of my heart, and with all my soul. And verily, it is my greatest grief, and with much bitterness I feel it, that Catholics undertook such a cruel and outrageous Villainy. And, upon th' Gallows, 
* Eosque adhorto: ne ejusmodi proditionibus & rebellionibus contra Regē se ●mmesceant, ibid. inf●a.  he exhorted all Catholics, that they would never more have hand in such Treasons and Rebellions against their Sovereign. Thus fare our first Use: the next is this.  
Learn hence what to expect, as from all wicked men in general, so from all the brood that be Agents and Factors for Rome in particular; whether Lay, or Ecclesiastic, 
r Never expect better from them.  Regular or Secular, to the end of the world. Surely, no better than from the raging Sea, when it cannot rest. Nothing but rage and wrath, Conspiracy and cruelty, Treason and Rebellion, so often as power and opportunity meet. Whether 
q Prov. 29.9.  they rage, or laugh, there is no rest. 
s Mic. 7.2.3. etc.  They all lie in wait for blood, they hunt every man his brother with a net, that they may do evil with both hands earnestly, the Prince 
* Witnesseth Pope, and other his Adherents.  asketh, and the judge judgeth for reward, and the Great man uttereth his mischievous desires: so they wrap it up. The best of them is a briar, the most upright is sharper than a thorny hedge, etc. Therefore trust ye not in a friend, put ye no confidence in a guide, keep the doors of thy mouth from her that lieth in thy bosom, if this way addicted.  
What then should you listen to any of their Siren's songs, for abrogation, or mitigation of the Laws made against them, for toleration of their Religion, or for trusting of them, as some would persuade? They are no Changelings. Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the Leopard his spots? 
t Jer. 13.23.  then may they also do good, that are accustomed to do evil. I urge this the rather at this time, not only because the very Deliverance, which we this day celebrate, rings loud in your cares, neither to trust nor tolerate them any longer, and strongly moves for a Ne admittas, against them; but, because also, even during this very Parliament, you find the old spirit of rage and treachery, walking too openly, and boldly among them, and too often pressing too near upon you. Let it not move you, that now they are in a Petitioning vein, and seem to Petition for some indulgence, professing all Loyalty: For just so they gave out, while they were preparing their materials for the Gunpowder Treason: then they would Petition for a Toleration of Religion.  
Coming they are to manage their Cause, and means they have more than ordinary to advance their Party: the more reason, you should have a more vigilant eye, and a more active hand over them, to secure the King, and the Royal Seed, Religion, yourselves, and the Kingdoms, against all their machinations. The better to quicken this Care in you, I shall humbly leave with you these Four Remembrancers. First, That they have never been quiet, but continually contriving of Treasons, ever since the Reformation of Religion. Secondly, That this practice is not from the Laws made against them, 
* See Discourse of the Powder-Treason in K. james his Works.  but their very Religion itself leads them unto it. Thirdly, That their Priests are bound to infuse these principles of their Religion into them, and to press the use of them upon all occasions. Fourthly, That to induce their Disciples to swallow those Principles, and accordingly to act them when occasion serveth, they propound great rewards and glory to such as shall attempt them, and defend and magnify those who have formerly miscarried in them. Each of these I shall now make good unto you in order, with some enlargement.  

I. They have never rested from plotting of Treason since the Reformation.  1. They have never been quiet, but always hammering and contriving or soliciting and driving on desperate Plots and conspiracies, to destroy their Sovereign, to abolish Religion, to subvert the Laws, and to expose the Kingdoms to a prey of any foreign Enemy that would lend them either aid, or countenance, ever since the happy Reformation of Religion in the glorious Reign of Queen Elizabeth, unto this very day.  
It is not my purpose, nor will it suit with the short limits of a Sermon, to make a relation of the Treasons themselves, but only to give a short Catalogue of the Chief Actors in them, leaving the rest to Historians, who have reported them to the World.  
I know it goes for current, that the Papists of England were quiet enough for the first 11. years of Queen Elizabeth, before any Laws were made against them. And indeed, in comparison of after times, this may be in part admitted to be true. Howbeit, in those first years, many of them went over Sea, and there laid the foundation of future mischiefs here. There were others at home, that held strict intelligence with those abroad, doing that more secretly, which afterwards was more openly pursued, and avowed.  
It is true, that while Paul the Fourth, and Pius the Fourth sat Popes, their unwillingness to make disturbance here, held our Papists in more quiet. Yet when Pius 4. dispatched a Nuncio to Queen Elizabeth, 
Paul 4. was Pope when Q. El●z came to the Crown. Pius 4. succeeded next, and sat t●ll the Seventh of her Reign. Continuat. of Martin's history, at the year 1561. out of Cambden their friend.  with a kind message (as he took it;) his Nuncio could not be admitted to enter England, because so many, bred up to the Popish Religion, laboured to make troubles both at home and abroad. And this happened about the Fourth of her Reign.  
And if you do but remember, from Whom, the Guises than procured the French King to claim the English Diadem, and solicited the Pope to excommunicate the Queen; as did the Count of Foria, at Rome, in behalf of his Master, the Catholic King, about the same time; and, that divers English Papists had applied themselves to those Princes; to assist in reducing the Romish Religion here; You will find they had no great cause to boast of their loyalty. Especially, if you consider that Arthur Pole, and his Brethren had no small party among the Papists here at home, to assist in that horrible Treason against his Sovereign, for which he and others were after arraigned, and condemned.  
But when Pius the Fifth, the next Pope, mounted the Chair, our Romanists began to be more active and bold. For when once his turbulent disposition was known, the Popish Party, by the help of Cardinal Alan, first obtained a College for English Seminary Priests at Douai, Anno. 1568. which indeed proved the seminary of all the Treasons and Rebellions which after followed. That College was after multiplied into two; one, at Rheims, set up by the Guises, the other at Rome, erected by Gregory 13. Anno 1580. after Requesenius, Governor of the Low Countries under the King of Spain, had thrust them out of their first Nest at Douai. And from these places were they upon all occasions sent hither, to poison the Subjects with Principles of Treason, which every year produced much trouble and danger.  
No sooner were they warm in their first Cells at Douai, but Pius 5. Excommunicated Q. Elizab. at Rome, absolving all her subjects, and cursing all that should longer obey her. An 1569. After which exploit, he sent over his Bull Declaratory thereof, by Morton, an English fugitive, who bringing it to Ridolf a Florentine, divers Copies of it were first secretly scattered among our Papists, and then the Breve itself fixed on the Gate of London-House.  
By which time, the Priests, and other active Factors for Babylon, had wrought fare upon sundry Nobles and Gentlemen of great place, whom they either found, or could make discontented with the present Religion, Government, or State of things, or whom they discerned to be ambitiously affected, or most apt for intelligence with foreign Princes, that either maligned our Religion, envied our Prosperity, or cunningly endeavoured to possess themselves of this Crown; which have been the destruction of many a Noble Spirit, and the ruin of many Ancient Families of this Kingdom.  
Among the many Examples of this kind, may be reckoned up the Rebellion of the unhappy Earls of Northumberland and Westmoreland, and sundry other their Complices, as the first poisoned fruit of the Pope's Bull, in the same year wherein it was here scattered among the Papists. And from the said cursed fountain, issued all those bitter streams of Treasons of Stukely in Ireland, at the same time, of the Stanley's in Darbyshire, of john Trogmorton, and Brook, of  and Bristol, of the norton's, Barn, and Mather, of Doctor Story, the persecuting Civilian, of Shirwin, Parsons, Campian and Kirby, and many other Priests and Jesuits, to the number of above 120. of Somervile and his adherents, of Main, Nelson, Tompson, and the rest of that Crew, of pain, and his 50. Resolutes, hired by the Pope to murder the Queen, of Francis Throgmorton, Paget and Englefeild, of bloody Parry, of some inveigled Nobles, of Babbington, Tichborne, and the rest of that pack, of the same Babington, Charnock and Savage, in a second Devilish Design, of Lopez, of Stanley, of Cullen, of York and Williams, of Creswell (who in his Philopater) and of Parsons (that in his Doleman) fomented that Treason of Stanley and the rest, of Squire, of Garnet, Winter, 
See Stat of 3 Jac. 2.  Caresby, Tresham, and others, who in the last year of Queen Elizabeth, travailed with the King of Spain, to join with the Papists in England, to depose the Queen, and to extirpate Religion, beside many more that never came to light.  
Nor did their rage die with that Lady, but so soon as King James came among us, Watson and Clerk found a way to instill Treason into sundry Nobles and Gentlemen, against the King and Prince, before the Coronation. And for a Coronis of all, the Salt-Peter men in the Gunpowder Treason (of which I have spoken before) can not be forgotten. I spare to speak of their continual Treasons and Rebellions in Ireland, or of that memorable Design in 88 which however it was attempted by Spain, yet all men know the fast tie between our Papists and the Spaniard, their continual correspondencies and combinations with him, and the thundering Bull of Pope Sixtus Quintus, then sent abroad, for confirmation of the several Bulls made by his Predecessors, Pius 5. and Gregory 
* He held consultation with Spain, to invade England and Ireland both together, An. 1576. His aim was to make his base Son, James Boncampagno, (Marquis of Vineola) King of Ireland. Excellent zeal in a Pope! not to gain souls to Christ, but a Kingdom for his own Bastard.  13. against Queen Elizabeth, to the end our Papists might more cheerfully assist in that bloody Enterprise, and none dare to adhere to her against a foreign Enemy.  
Nay, let me add, that even now, while this very Parliament is sitting, and Papists Petitioning 
* See their printed Petit. in the Dial. between a Parliament man, and a Catholic.  for indulgence and liberty, and for taking away the Laws made against them, neither England, Scotland, nor Ireland, have been free from desperate Conspiracies and Treasons, wherein sundry of their Party have been principal Actors. What should I tell you of the Designs upon the Armies in the North, of the Damnable Attempts of our Treacherous Fugitives now abroad, and of the open Rebellion in Ireland: God grant we hear of no more near-hand. But yet, these may instruct you, that if you would have Peace with Rome, Rome will have no peace with you: and that, to pluck up the hedge of your Laws, is to lay all waste; for they will never be quiet, till either by your Care and Wisdom, you have secured them from doing more mischief (which will never be, while their Idolatry is permitted, although but in secret 
* Your Highness may assure yourself, that the Adversaries will not change their Disposition, unless either we were reduced to their blindness, or they drawn to embrace the Truth with us. Bishop Carelton, Epist. Dedic. to Prince (now King) Charles, before his Book of Thankful Rememb. ) or till they have brought us all under the line of confusion.  
If it be said, that the only Reason of their often Conspiracies at home and abroad, hath been the strictness of the Laws made against them for the faults of a few, whom they condemn as much as we: and that if those Laws (now that the occasions of them cease) were but repealed, they could, and would be as Loyal as any, notwithstanding their Religion.  
I answer, that for the Laws made against them, they may thank only themselves, that have so much abused Royal Clemency and Goodness. But what ever the Laws be, none have been put to death, save only for Treason. And even among those that have come within this compass, many have escaped with banishment. And when the turbulency of some have enforced the State to execute them, yet others too guilty, have been spared. For, Queen Elizabeth, shortly after the proceed against Campian, and some of his fellows, 
Bishop Carelton.  sent away 70. Priests in a very short time out of England; some of which had received, and the rest had deserved sentence of death for Treason.  
Neither have our Laws been so rigid, nor so rigidly executed against Papists here, as theirs have been against Protestants. Nor have Papists been exposed to such Butchery, as is too too frequent where Papists domineer. Witness the Spanish Inquisition, wherinto, if any Lutheran be secretly conveyed, they put him not to a legal trial, but give him their Marshal Law. For, as Hoffeus' the Jesuit was wont to brag, they hold it a good piece of Piety, instantly to commend him to the fire, ut anima ejus in curru igneo ad inferos trahatur, that so his soul might be forthwith carried to hell in a fiery Chariot; as one 
* Hassen Muller. Hist jesuit. cap. 6.  bred among them, reporteth of him.  
Nay, sundry degrees of Dignity and honour, have been (in later times, especially) heaped upon divers of them; yea they have been admitted very near to his Majesty's Sacred Person, and trusted with Offices of greatest honour and trust in the State. And yet nevertheless, neither any, nor all of these favours together, either do, or can secure us of them: and that, for the Reason contained in the second Remembrancer, which in the next place followeth.  
2. It is not our Laws, 
2 Remembrancer; Their it very Religion teacheth Rebellion, and so they drink in Principles of Treason with the Principles of Popery.  but sundry Principles of their very Religion, that makes them disloyal, and carries them still on upon Treasons, and Rebellion, and would do so, although the Laws made against them, were all repealed. So that in this sense, our Public Prayer, appointed for this day, as it was first penned and published; viz. that their faith is Faction, their Religion is Rebellion, etc. was no slander, but a just Character of their Antichristian Profession; and is unjustly altered, what ever hath been boldly said, and published, to justify the alteration.  
To make this good, I shall not need to ravel into all their Doctrine; but only to give you a list of such Principles of theirs, as are obvious in all their writings, and notoriously known to all the world.  
And first, 
Read but any of the Pope's Bulls, and you need search no further for proofs hereof.  who knows not that with them all Protestants are condemned for Heretics, Princes themselves not exempted. 2. That no faith is to be held with Heretics, because Heretics themselves are fallen from the Faith; and so do forfeit all Privileges, wherein keeping of Faith with them, might oblige others, or steed them. 3. That Heretical Princes excommunicated by the Pope, are forthwith deprived, and deposed of all Princely dignity and Sovereignty, their subjects are discharged from all allegiance, and are accursed, if they further obey them. Witness the Bulls sent out against Queen Elizabeth, by Pius 5. Gregory 13. and Sixtus 5. and the writings of not only Bellarmine and Suarez, and other Foreigners, but of Alan, Saunders, Parsons, Creswell, and sundry other of our Apostate English, who have defended these Bulls and Positions, even unto death, 4. Our English Papists do all profess to adhere to the Pope, as supreme in all spirituals and ecclesiasticals (their own King having nothing to do herein, but only in temporals;) and, to obey the Pope, before all the world, in things of this nature. 5. They know that the Pope doth profess and publish, both by doctrine and practice, that he hath power to excommunicate the greatest Potentates, if heretical; to command all Catholics in all things, in ordine ad spiritualia, that have any reference to the Catholic Cause; that all Catholics are bound 
* Bulla Pij 5. An. 1569. The Copy of which Bull you may find in any of the Annals, or Chronicles of that time.  to obey him (if he command it) under pain of damnation, in opposing their Sovereign, without disputing his commands; and that he hath power to dissolve all bonds, covenants, leagues and oaths, as he shall find conducing to the advancement of the Catholic Faith; So that, if he list, no bands, humane or Divine, no oaths, never so solemnly taken shall bind Papists; for when occasion serves, the Pope can, and will release them from all obligations of God or Conscience, of Nature and Nations: And they must submit unto him without regret. Nor is here any place left for tergiversation. For first, if they shall plead, that these have been the private opinions of some Jesuits, and hot-spurres, to bring their Religion under hatred and obloquy; they must remember, that they may not put the Definitions of Trent, nor the Pope's Definitive sentences e Cathedra, among private Opinions; if they will acknowledge any thing to be Public, and their Pope infallible, when he decrees from his Chair, which they dare not deny, without renouncing their Religion, and incurring the crime of heresy.  
If they allege, secondly, as some do, that how ever some Treacherous spirits have been too blame, and too many Jesuits have been Incendiaries, as well in their writings as in their practices; yet, the more moderate Catholics have ever condemned those facts and writings; and that not only by word, but also by Books published to the world: witness widdrington's Apology for the Oath of Allegiance, his Defence of his Apology, his Supplication to Pope Paul the Fifth, his Appendix to that Supplication, etc. Witness also watson's Quodlilets, the Jesuits Catechism, and many more: and lastly, witness their Petition to the present Parliament, and their Protestation annexed, wherein they profess all ready and cheerful obedience to the King, in all Civil and Temporal affairs; to take the Oath of Allegiance, So they be not bound to swear opinions; to disclaim all foreign Power, Papal or Princely, that should pretend authority to assoil them of that Oath, etc.  
I must briefly answer, that albeit they have in words professed a dislike of Jesuitical Practices, yet still they hold of the Pope, for the whole frame of their Religion, and vow obedience to all his public Definitions: and, what these be, you have before heard in part. Next, it is true, that Widdrington hath written modestly, yet was he feign to purge for it to the Pope; and after all, to go off with disgrace. And who knows not, that shortly after some Seminaries had admired, and extolled to the heavens, the Bull of Pius 5. against Queen Elizabeth, and blasphemously persuaded the world that it was indicted by the Holy Ghost, they set out a Book (on purpose to lull the Queen and the State asleep) to admonish the Papists of England not to practise any mischief upon the Queen, for that Catholics might use no other Arms, but tears, prayers, watch and fastings, against their Adversaries? Yet who is ignorant of the daily conspiracies that the Papists in those times, and during all the rest of Queen Elizabeth's reign, did desperately involve themselves into, to their own destruction?  
And what though Watson and other Secular Priests (rather out of emulation and envy, than true Loyalty) wrote some volumes against the jesuites, when they began to over-beare the Secular Priests here in England: yet this was not so great an argument of their fidelity, as of their spite and subtlety: for we know that even that very Watson and Clerk (another of his Confederates) was afterwards the desperate propounder and ringleader of that foul Treason against King james, and Prince Henry; for which he and Clerk deservedly suffered the reward of Traitors, in the first year of King James.  
And albeit there be lately cast among you a Pamphlet, or Dialogue between a Parliament man and a Roman Catholic; what credit can be given to that which no man avows, no man ever presented to you? It is, I confess, a cunning piece; but, shamefully blending what cannot be answered. And it is cunningly published, perhaps for a dangerous end. If the Parliament thrive, and carry on their business, as is desired; then, this Book shall be vouched as a fair proffer of the Catholics, rejected without consideration. If any disaster happen, and that Romanists do chance to get a Day; then, if this Petition and Protestation be pressed upon them, they will boldly ask you, What Catholic did ever avow, or own it? It is but a Pasquil, they will not be tied by it.  
And again, Suppose they take the Oath, and Protestation, mentioned in that Pamphlet; what are we the nearer to safety, when they still must hold that the Pope can dispense with any Oath; and therefore with this, even when they have taken it? For, do we not see them take liberty to do so, with the Popes own Bulls? Did not Parsons and Campian in the year, 1580. (notwithstanding their strict Oath, to obey the Pope in all things) procure a Dispensation to free all Catholics from obeying the Popes own Declaratory Bull of Excommunication against Queen Elizabeth, till a better opportunity; when as yet in the mean time, all others should be under the Curse of it, who did not presently obey it? Quo teneam nodo? what Oath or Protestation then, will hold a Romish Catholic in obedience to a Prince, by them accounted heretical; when, no Decree of the Pope himself shall hold them, if they find it not seasonable? When there is no remedy, they will yield to any thing: but when they see their time, they will do any thing.  

Bishop Andrews on Nou. 5. 1616. on ●s●y. 37.3.  I shall therefore close up this, with a passage or two out of two Grave Authors, one a great Bishop, in a Sermon to King James. Where speaking of the prodigious Doctrine of Bellarmine, in reference to the Primitive Christians, and our modern Papists, and of the reason the Cardinal gives, why the Christians of old did not rise up against persecuting Emperors, Id fuit quia deerant vires; the Bishop makes this collection, As much as to say, if they now in these days be so as they were, carry themselves quietly, it is quia non sunt vires: and to hold no longer, than Donec erunt: and then you are like to hear of them, to have them go again with such another birth. You shall have them as mild, as Gregory the First, when they have no strength; but as fierce as Gregory the Seventh, when they have. And afterwards thus.  
See ye not, next under God, whereto to ascribe our safety? Even to non erant vires: there is a point hangs on that For, while that lasts, while ye keep them there, ye shall have the Primitive Church of them; have them lie as quiet, as still, as ever did the barrels in the vault, till vires, like fire come to them; and then, off go they: then nothing but depose Kings, dispose of Kingdoms, assoil Subjects, arm them against their Sovereigns: then, do they care not what. But, if the Powder take not fire, thou shall you strait have Books tending to mitigation; then, all quiet again. Certainly, thus standing, it were best to hold them in defectu virium, to provide ut ne sint: to keep them at non sunt vires; till time they be better minded in this point, and we have good assurance of it. For, minded as they are, they want no will, no virus: they tell us, what the matter is; strength they want; they writ it, they print it, and si adessent vires, they would act it in earnest. Thus He.  
The other of my Authors having reckoned up a Catalogue of the damnable Doctrines of Popery; 
Dr. Prideaux, on Nou. 5 on Psal. 9 19 Num. 8.  professeth to have done it to make it appear to those that would willingly be better persuaded of their Doctrine, that the Doctrine itself directly warranteth Treason, let the Traitors be what they will, and that none can be an absolute Papist, but (if he throughly understand himself, and live under a Christian Prince, 
3 Remembrancer. Popish Priests are bound by them, Oath, to inculcate those Principles of Treason.  that hath renounced the Pope's Authority) must needs, being put unto it, be an absolute Traitor. And so I have done with my second Remembrancer.  
Thirdly; My Third is this, that you would please to Remember that the Education and Profession of all Priests and Jesuits that come over hither under pretence of administering Popish Service and Sacraments to Romish Catholics, do bind them to infuse other principles of Treason into their Proselytes, and to stir them up upon allocations to act it. I shall not need to trouble you with a List of the Loyalists Rules, nor of the Testimony of Pope Vrbane 8. in his Bull of Canonization of Ignatius Loyola, touching that Society, that beyond all other Fraternities, they are the Chief, and most strenuous Propugners of the Pope's Authority, or rather boundless Tyranny. nor will I stay you with a repertory of the Jesuits Vows; and how fare that of blindfold obedience, is to be extended. The Secular Priests have done this at large, 
See Wa●sons Quodlibets, & jesuites Catechism, translated by the Seculars here.  whereby they have concluded the jesuites to be Traitors both for Tenets and practice here in England. I shall only acquaint you with what even the Seminary Priests themselves (who are not jesuites) are bound unto by the Pope himself, in his Constitutions for the ordering of the English College at Rome, whereof we gave a touch before. And I shall give it you out of Mart. Aspilcueta, Doctor Navarrus, an Author without exception, l. 3. Consil. & Resp. Council. 1. de Regular. Romae in Collegio Anglorum est Statutum, & Constitutio Papalis, ut quicunque illud ingredi voluerit, teneatur jurare se, post tot annos, pro defensione fidei Catholica in Angliam profecturum, illamque ibi publicè & privatè praedicaturum. At Rome, in the College of the English, it is a Statute, and Papal Constitution, that whoever will be admitted into that College, he be tied to swear, that after so many years, he will travel into England, for defence of the Catholic Faith, and there preach it both in public and private. Now what that Faith is, you have heard in part, in the former Remembrance; and, how they have defended and preached it here, Tyburn, and such other Pulpits can bear them witness; 
* Dia. between a Parliament man, and a Catholic. pag. 13.  And Priests they say, they must have, while there be any Catholics in England. Nor can it be unknown unto you what influence they have into the Papal sect, of both sexes here, what power they exercise over their Consciences, what esteem and honour they have among them, upon this very reason (among other) that these Priests are in daily hazard of their lives, to do them service, which makes them more apt to drink down any poisonous Positions that these Seminaries can administer to ignorant Disciples: and so, under pretext of Religion, they can, and do at their pleasure, wrap them up in desperate Treasons, ere they be ware. And whither can they not lead them by advancing the Pope's Authority over all, in ordine ad spiritualia, and by continually inculcating in their ears, that all Protestants are but a pack of Heretics, which the Catholics are so to look upon, and prosecute, as the Pope shall command, and direct.  
To say, 
Dial. between Parl. man, and a Cathol. p. 9  that no Excommunication can deprive any man of his temporal estate and goods, at least in Countries where Protestant's either are the greater part, or permitted in great numbers; is but only to cast a mist before weak eyes: for, first they know, that where the Pope excommunicates a Prince, he commands the subjects to rise against him, as before appeareth; Next, the exception here, of Protestant Countries, or numbers, doth clearly discover the Fox in the Lambskin: for this plainly tells us, that the Pope's Censures cannot take place where Protestants be too strong for Papists; and so, by this you may discover what they will be at, when their Party shall so much increase, as to be able to master the Protestants in England; as they begin already to do in Ireland; which I hope will not be forgotten.  
4. My last Remembrancer is this, 
4 Remembrancer. Corrupting men's Consciences and affections with baits of reward, and glory, to attempt those Treasons which their Principles do egg men on unto.  That Priests and Jesuits do ever corrupt the Judgements of their Followers, and Instruments of Assassination and Treason, with poisonous positions, touching the nature of such Facts; and bribe their consciences with strong baits of Reward, and Glory to all that will undertake the acting of Treasons and Rebellions, at their instigation: which is one of the strongest and most dangerous Incentives to any new villainy, that can be invented. For men that either are sensible of Religion, or desirous of glory, cannot be kept back from any Attempt, which is pronounced not only lawful, but noble and meritorious for advancement of their Religion. Difficulty and danger being then a whetstone rather than a Dissuasive to generous minds, thirsting after honour by public service.  
It hath ever been their manner to animate, not single Assassinates alone (as Hall did Somervile, the Pope and the Cardinal de Como did Parry, Ballard did Babington, Creswell did Stanley, Holt did York and Williams, and Walpoole did Squire;) but even all whom they can draw into any desperate design of Treason, by maintaining that the Act, being against Heretics, is not only justifiable, but commendable and glorious. Now what rewards have been promised to Traitors, if they do the deed, and what glory of Martyrdom they purchase in heaven, in case they miscarry, all our Chronicles do amply speak.  
Thus it fell out in the Gunpowder Treason. Catesby, and some others at first had, or at least pretended scruples of the Lawfulness of it. Garnet and other their Ghostly Fathers being consulted, pronounce it lawful, and full of merit, and encourage them in it. Catesby had likewise grounded himself upon the Doctrine of Father Creswell, 
b. In Philopater. §. 2.  that a Prince manifestly heretical, falleth from all Princely Power and authority, even before any Legal Sentence passed by the supreme Pastor against him, to both which he added the infallible judgement of Clement. 8. who in two several Breves, one directed to the Catholic Nobility, and Gentry of England, the other to Father Garnet, enjoined them not to permit any but a Catholic Prince to succeed Queen Elizabeth: Hence he concluded; He, who then might lawfully be kept out, may now as lawfully be thrust out. Pope Clement enjoined the former, Ergo we may do the later. And thus, armed with poisoned Divinity, He and his fellows resolved (and indeed, who, so Principled, would have scrupled) most desperately to go on with that wickedness, impatient of all lets and delays.  
Thus other Traitors have found Popish Doctors forward to warrant their most desperate Rebellions. So had Oneile first, and Tyroen afterwards, the public Approbation of the University of Salamancha in Spain, before they displayed their Rebellious Banners. Yea so careful are the Popish Priests and Jesuits, not to suffer their seduced party to cool in their resolute intentions of holding on any Rebellious course when opportunity serveth, that they are ready to defend and justify the vilest attempts that have miscarried, lest any of their faction should be discouraged by the terrible executions done upon Traitors who have perished in and for their Catholic Treasons.  
Hence it is that so many great Pens have been employed to justify the Gun Powder Treason, and so much honour conferred upon the Arch-Traitor Garnet, after his execution; and so much grace done at Rome to Tesmond, and Gerrard that escaped the hand of Justice here. As for Garnet, 
Vbi supra.  even Widdrington complains to Pope Paul the fifth, that (to the great scandal of Religion) His Holiness had permitted Garnet to be put in the Catalogue of Martyrs, his picture to be worn in Medals, his image to be set upon the very Altars in Churches, and his bones worshipped as holy Relics, etc. and much ado made about a supposed stramineous Miracle of Garnets' face found in a straw, which Widdrington confutes and derides. And well he might, when Garnets' own Confession at the Gallows, proclaimed him to be far wide of a Martyr, as before hath been showed. He likewise complaineth that Gerrard, another bird of that Nest, had been seen taking of Confessions publicly in St. Peter's Church in Rome under the Pope's Nose; and that Tesmond (another of the Conspirators) was made Public Penitentiary at Rome, and Confessor to the Pope himself: and all this, after this barbarous Treason was discovered, and echoed over all the world.  
Now, what, I say, can the meaning of all this be, but still, by impudent bolstering up of such unnatural Traitors, to animate and encourage all Assassinate's and bloody Conspirators to hold on in this Devilish Trade of Treason, when so ever any good sons of his Holiness shall be called upon to do him any further Service in the like kind.  
Nor is it at all to be heeded that the Papists here do condemn it: for, openly they dare do no other, for fear of their necks: but, that in secret they cannot abhor it, is manifest by this, that the Pope hath given not only countenance to it, but laid the foundation of it by those Bulls of Clement the eighth, last mentioned. They must not condemn that, which their Infallible supreme Pastor hath pronounced (not as a private fact, but even) ex Cathedra, out of his judiciary Tribunal to be warrantable and necessary, namely, to keep any man out of the Throne, be his Title what it will, till he take an Oath to advance their pretended Catholic Faith. For, thence Catesby, as you have heard, concluded a Warrant for that detestable Treason. And from thence all Papists in the Kingdom, who attribute any validity to the Pope's Bulls, may draw the like encouragement for any Conspiracy 
* So did Saunders make use of the Bull of Pius 5. to justify a Treason of Stanley and York in the Low Countries, in delivering up of Daventry (a strong Town pertaining to the United States) to the king of Spain; because he kept it in the name of Q. Eliz. who had it now as a Cautionary town from the States, and she (as he pretended) was deprived by the Pope of all Sovereignty, and Dominions, and therefore Stanley did well, and others might do the like with any of the rest.  and Rebellion in any time to come, against any Successor of Queen Elizabeth, that doth or shall renounce the Pope and Popery, if the Conspirators find themselves strong enough, or subtle enough, by stabbing, poisoning, blowing up, or any thing, to dis-throne their Sovereign, and to destroy all that take part with him, and endeavour to support him. And so I have done with my Remembrancers, which I desired to leave with you. And all that hath been hitherto spoken in the large prosecution of this second Use, is but to arm you with Resolution never to give way to any Toleration of Popery, or trusting of Papists. But this is not all: for, I must briefly add,  
A Third Use, to exhort you all, not only not to tolerate Popery, or to trust the pertinacious imbracers of it, 
3. Use.  but also to improve all your wisdom and power to destroy Popery, and to reduce (if possible) those many thousands of poor seduced souls, that, having not known the depths of Satan, are miserably hoodwinked by Antichrist to withstand the light and their own salvation. For, till then, they will never be at an end of their Rage against us. And whosoever withstands their Idolatry, if they have power, they will be sure to ruin him; because Popery, like Pharaohs lean kine, seeks to devour all true Religion that doth oppose it, and all that embrace the the true Religion opposite unto it. They may dissemble, but can never put off their wrath and enmity against those whom they behold as Heretics, and as men appointed to make fuel for hell; as, by their malicious, Idolatrous, Traitorous Priests and blind Guides, they are taught to judge of us.  
It becomes not me to prescribe You the way how to proceed herein, as You are a civil Body now trusted by the King and Kingdom, with all we have, but our souls, and our God. I know there be many excellent Laws for this purpose already made; and oh! that your Wisdoms could find out a way to their effectual execution! But if any thing may be added, for the taking away of their children, and training them up (at the parent's cost, if they have wherewithal) in the nurture and fear of the Lord, that so there may not still be new generations of Papists; I presume it would be a Noble and Pious Service, for which the souls of many thousands would for ever bless you, by whose means they should be delivered out of the power of that Egyptian darkness, and translated into the kingdom of Jesus Christ.  
But, for ourselves, as we are Christians, let me exhort you still to look upon all wicked men as having great wrath and rage within them conceived against us, and that we look upon ourselves as not free from their malice and fury for the future, how often soever they have attempted against us, and been disappointed by God in all their wicked attempts. And not only so, but that we carefully exercise ourselves in these particulars.  
1. Be prudently vigilant over our enemies, watching over them 
a Mat. 10.17.  with all circumspection and prudence; but, no way diffident of our 
b Isa. 7.4. & 9  God.  
2. Pray that either 
c Psal. 7.9.  the wickedness of the wicked may come to an end, or that God would 
d Psal. 10.15.  break the arm of the wicked and the evil man, and that he would 
e Psal. 58.6.  break their teeth in their mouth. And if this will not do; then, that he would destroy them, and make them still to fall by their own counsels.  
3. But above all, labour to make our peace with God, and to walk humbly with him. For if the wicked be still out with us, have we not the more cause to keep in with God? Beware of going on in any course of wickedness, as you love your lives (to say nothing of your souls,) lest God let lose the strong Bulls of Basan, and the young Lions that are greedy of prey, upon you. Yea, beware lest man's rage and God's wrath do meet, and both fall upon you at once. Oh how dreadful must that needs be! If Israel be once a people of God's wrath 
f Isa. 10.6. , every base, proud idolatrous Assyrian shall tread them down like the mire in the street. Even Samson shall fall by the uncircumcised Philistines, whom before he slaughtered by heaps. Thus Israel found it in Joshua's time. When they had once sinned in taking of the accursed thing, even the accursed men of Ai shall be too good for them, 
g Josh. 7.4.5.  three thousand Israelites shall not be able to stand against 36. of the enemies, but fly and be smitten before them. But on the other side, if we labour to maintain peace with God, if 
h Psal. 3.6.  ten thousands of people beset us round about, we shall not be afraid: no, 
i Psal. 46 2.3.  though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; though the waters thereof roar, and be troubled, and the mountains shake with the swell thereof. We can never miscarry by all the rage of all the enemies in the world, so long as we betray not our own selves into their hands. For, there is a God that sets and orders all, as we shall see in the next point, to which I now come. 
2. Observation.   
2. Let the rage of wicked men be what it will, it shall only raise that glory to God, and benefit to his people, which the wicked never intended; and ever fall short of that issue which they chief projected.  
This point hath two branches, which we must distinctly prosecute.  
Branch. 1 The first is this, that be the rage (which is permitted to break forth) what it will, 
The rage that breaks out turns to God's praise.  it shall only raise that glory to God, and benefit to his people, which was never intended by the wicked.  
As for the wicked it is as far from their hearts to intent God's glory, in their rage, as heaven from hell. If God make them 
a Isa. 10.4.  the rod of his anger against a people of his wrath, to do Gods work (not their own,) you shall be sure to find them like that Assyrian King, who being sent by God in such an errand, 
b Vers. 7.  He meant not so, neither did his heart think so; but it was in his heart to destroy, and to cut off Nations not a few. Howbeit the most wise and omnipotent God who is always zealous of his own glory and his people's good, intends himself praise from every spark of fury, and extracts honour out of the least atom of each man's rage, when, or which way so ever it break out. And this he doth,  
1. By diverting their power, 
1. By diverting it.  and driving it one way when they meant it another. Thus Sennacheribs power was employed against 
c 2 King. 19  Tirhakah, when all his rage was first bend against Hezekiah, And what greater praise, than thus to have 
d Prov. 21.1.  the heart and the power of so great a King in his hand, as the rivers of water, to turn it whither soever he will?  
2. 
2. By letting it go on till his hand may be clearly seen in quelling it.  By permitting man's rage sometimes to proceed so far, as all may see a necessity of a Divine Power to give it a stop, and behold an immediate arm of the Almighty in defeating of it. Therefore God permitted Pharaoh to pursue Israel, not only to the banks, but even into the midst of the Red sea, that by destroying him there, 
e exod. 15.6.  the right hand of the Lord might become more glorious in power.  
3. By extorting from his enemies an acknowledgement of his power and conquest, in the midst of their rage. 
3. By making his enemies confess he is against them.  So he did, from that Dragon and his host which he slew in the Sea, when they cried out, 
f Exod. 14.24.  Let us flee from the face of Israel, for the Lord fighteth for them against the Egyptians. And so, from that Atheistical Don Pedro, who seeing the terrible dissipation of that Invincible Armado, in 88 professed that now he perceived God was turned Lutheran.  

4. By more praise from his own people,  4. But more especially doth God receive honour and praise from his own, whom he delivers from the rage of man. Thus did he, from Israel, when they 
g Exod. 14.30.  saw the Egyptians dead upon the shore. 
h Psal. 106.12.  Then believed they his words, and sang his praises. Yea then, they proclaimed him 
i Exod. 15.11.  fearful in praises doing wonders.  

5. By producing effects contrary to the intentions of wicked men.  5. In producing effects of man's rage, quite contrary to those which men intended and expected. If joseph's brethren will sell him, his bondage shall procure his advancement; yea, and (though they deserve it not) their preservation. 
k Gen. 50.20.  As for you (saith he to them) ye thought evil against me, but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass as it is this day, to save much people alive. If Moses must be cast out into the mud to satisfy Pharaohs cruelty, even Pharaohs daughter shall preserve him 
l Exod. 4, 16.  to be unto Pharaoh in stead of a God, to plague Pharaoh while he lived, and then to be an instrument of his destruction, by that very element by which Moses should have perished. When the bloody plot of Haman for the destruction of all the Jews, drew near to execution, not only himself and his ten sons handselled that very gallows which he had prepared for Mordecai; but even all 
m Esth. 9.1.  the enemies of the Jews who hoped to have power over them, found all turned to the contrary, and that the Jews had rule over them that hated them. If the rod of the wicked light on the back of the righteous for some sin against God, this also shall turn much to his praise: for 
n Isa. 27.9.  by this shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged (to prevent destruction intended by the wicked;) and this is all the fruit, to take away sin, which man's rage never meant. Yea, if the rage prevail so far as to be the death of the righteous; yet even this also shall turn to his praise, by causing the death of one righteous man for righteousness sake, to be the seed of many moe righteous that shall rise up in his room. Never such an increase of shining Christians, as when Christianity is under sharpest persecutions, And, as for such as lose their lives for Christ's sake, they are sure 
o Luk. 9.24.  to save them; that is, for ever to live in glory: so that, for them 
p Phil. 1.21.  to die is gain; and, 
q Rom. 8.37.  in all these things they are more than Conquerors through him that loved them.  
Thus every way, the rage of man brings honour to God, and good to his people; and that upon these grounds.  
Reason. 1 1. God never put power into the hands of wicked men, but for his own holy ends. Therefore, 
Wicked men's power is only for God's ends.  if they use that power to rage against his servants, he must and will carry on his own work, let them intent what they list. Now, God's end in raising such men is, 
r Exod. 9.16.  to show in them his power, and that his Name may be declared in all the earth. How, but by his 
s Exod. 14.17.  getting honour upon them in the strongest pursuit of their rage against the godly, as he did upon Pharaoh and all his host, when they would have devoured Israel?  
Reason. 2 2. God cares not a rush for the greatest and proudest Sennacheribs in the world that rage against his people, 
God will break the wicked rather than they should hurt the godly.  in comparison of any one poor servant of his own oppressed by them: 
* Psal. 105.14.  he will suffer no man to do them wrong, but will rebuke even Kings for their sakes that rage against them; yea, 
s Psal. 2.9.  break them to pieces like a potter's vessel, 
* Psal. 69.14.  and scatter them like hay in a whirlwind, or ships in a tempest, rather than not make his people gainers by their rage. So he dealt with Pharaoh, Sennacherib, and many more. This being his peremptory resolution, that 
t Rom. 8.28.  all things shall work together for good to them that love him; and therefore, the rage of the wicked, how much soever they hate them. 
God outshoots them in their own bow.   
Reason. 3 3. God delights to out-shoot the wicked in their own Bow. If 
u Psal 37.14.  they bend their bow, to slay such as be of upright conversation, he will shoot that arrow of their wrath further than ever they intended it, and stick it fast in their own bosoms. 
* Psal. 45.5.  If Pharaoh shoot at Israel God's firstborn, the arrow shall fall short; but then, God takes it up, and he shoots it into the very heart of Pharaohs 
w Exod. 4.22, 23.  firstborn, and he is sure to die for it. Thus, if the devil will still animate the rage of Herod, and the people of the Jews to kill Christ, that very arrow which gave Christ his death's wound, shall be the 
x Hos. 13.14.  death of death itself, and the destruction of the grave, and give the greatest blow to the devil and his kingdom that ever he received. Little thought Satan when in his rage he prosecuted Christ to death, that the death of Christ should be the saving of a world, the rescuing of many millions of souls out of his power, and the destruction of the kingdom of darkness. But so home did God shoot this shaft, out of the bow of his Cross, that 
y Heb 2.14, 15.  by death, he destroyed him who had the power of death, that is, the devil; and delivered them who, through fear of death, were all their life time subject unto bondage.  
I have now given you the first branch of the Point, the other follows, which in effect is this,  
Branch. 2 The rage of the wicked shall never extend so far as to do the work they intended, 
God makes man's rage fall short of their aim.  but shall ever fall short of that which they chief projected.  
It is true that their rage sometimes goes very far, and doth much mischief; but never beyond what may stand with the honour, truth, and goodness of God, and with his Covenant made to his people. When the enemy gins to make himself sure of his will upon the godly, and to say, 
z Exod. 15.9.  I will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil; my lust shall be satisfied upon them, I will draw my sword, mine hand shall destroy them. Then God steps in, and sets their bounds far shorter than wicked men promised to themselves, saying to them, as to the raging sea, 
a Job 38.11.  Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further: and here shall thy proud waves be stayed. And this he doth many ways.  
1. Sometimes by filing off the edge of that roughness and malice that is in them, and constraining them to mildness and gentleness, contrary to their very natures, 
1. By filing off their roughness and malice.  and settled resolutions long before taken up. Thus he restrained the rage of 
b Gen. 31.22.  Laban against jacob, 
c Gen. 32.28.  who shortly after also, as a Prince prevailed with God, to prevail with Esau, that had long vowed his death; so that at their meeting, the rage and malice of Esau was tied up, and 
d Gen. 33.10.  jacob saw his face as if he had seen the face of God, so well was Esau pleased with him.  
2. Sometimes, 
2. By giving them work elsewhere.  by giving them so much work elsewhere, that they have neither leisure not power to pursue the godly any further. We saw it 
e 2 King. 19.8.  before in Sennacherib: and we may see it in 
f 1 King. 22.27, 28.  Ahab at Ramoth-Gilead, when he intended a further persecution of Michaiah; as likewise in julian, 
* Greg. Naz. Orat. 4. in julian.  who resolving to destroy all the Christians, found a necessity to go first against the Persians, by whom he was overthrown; and so, disabled from satisfying his rage upon the others. Thus God often gives Tyrannical Prince's business enough abroad, when he finds them studious to destroy their best Subjects at home.  
3. 
3. By spoiling them of the instruments of revenge.  Sometimes by dispoiling them of the Instruments whereon they rely, as 
g Exod. 14.25.  he took off the chariot wheels of the Egyptians in their pursuit of Israel: either by rending from them a great part of their Dominions; as, from 
h 1. King 12.  Rehoboam, when he resolved to go on in his oppression of his petitioning Subjects; or by weakening that strength which remains with them, as he did that of the Assyrian when he thought none could stand before him, 
i Isa. 10.16.  sending among his fat ones leanness, and under his glory kindling a fire: or by infatuating their counsels making 
k Isa. 19.11.  the Princes of Zoan fools, and the wise Counsellors of a persecuting Pharaoh to become brutish, and causing them to fall by their own counsels, as 
l Theodor. hist. li. 3. ca 20.  julian before the Persians, when, in a bravado, he would needs burn his ships, to put the more necessity of valour into his Soldiers; or by infatuating themselves, that they cannot understand good counsel when it is before them (as in Rehoboam case 
* 1. Kin. 12. ) but rather follow that which is directly given for their destruction, and to countermine their own plots; as, when 
m 2 Sam. 17.7, 8.  Absalon followed the advice of Hushai against that of Achitophel, which would have carried his design that Hushai by his counsel prevented. And indeed this is one of the greatest misfortunes of a Prince (as a grave 
n Phil. de Co. min. ll, 5. c. ult.  Author speaketh) and a sad symptom of his approaching ruin, when God smites him in his wits, as he did Rehoboam, to follow the counsels of those who were brought up with him, and knew how to fit his humour, and to reject the counsels of graver men, who advised nothing but for his prosperity, and honour.  

4. By arming his creatures against them.  4. By arming his creatures against them to suppress their rage; as, he did the 
o judg. 15.20.  stars, against Sisera; the waters, frogs, lice, flies, hail, locusts, and other things against Pharaoh: and, even an Angel, against the host of Sennacherib. Thus God raised a mighty wind from heaven against 
p Aug. de Civit. Dei. li. 5. ca 26.  Eugenius the Tyrant, that beat his Soldier's weapons out of their hands, when they were to fight against the Christians under Theodosius.  

5. By panic fears.  5. By panic fears and strange apprehensions without any ground: as, a mere casual dream 
q judg. 7.13.  of a Midianite frighted an innumerable army, and rendered them unable to stand before 300 unarmed men. So the Moabites were overthrown by occasion of 
r 2. King. 3.22, 23.  a colour of blood upon the waters caused by the Sun, rising very red in the morning, and shining on the waters between the Sun and them.  

6. By making them fall one upon another.  6. By setting the enemies of his people one against another. Thus, in that great host of Midian and Amaleck, that came out against Israel, 
s judg. 7.22.  the Lord set every man's sword against his fellow throughout all the host. And the like we have read in Iehoshaphats time, when 
t 2. Chron. 20.22, 23.  the children of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Scir destroyed each other.  

7. By setting them against themselves.  7. By turning their own swords upon their own breasts. Thus Achitophel, Judas, Pilate, Nero, and others have done. 
u 2. Sam. 17.  Achitophel hanged himself when his counsel for the destruction of David was rejected. 
v Mat. 27.5. Tertul. Apolo. cap. 5. Euseb. li. 2. ca 7.8.  judas did the like, when he had betrayed his Master. Pilate the condemner of Christ, and Nero the persecuter of Christians, did both fall by their own hands, without effecting what either the one or the other had mainly intended.  
8. By discovering their closest plots and counsels before they take effect: and a Treason discovered is lost. Thus did he discover the plot of 
x Esth. 4.1.  Haman against the jews; of the 
y Act. 23.  jews against Paul; And so God did strangely open that plot of the Earls in the North, combining with the Pope and Spain against Queen Elizabeth, by a stranger without the Kingdom; in so much as the Pope openly said, 
z Hieron. Catenae, ubi supra.  That never any Conspiracy was more advisedly begun, nor concealed with more constancy and consent of minds, being not at all opened by any of the conspirators. Thus doth God provide, that rather than the rage of man shall take place, to his dishonour, 
* Eccle. 10.20.  a bird of the air shall carry the voice, and that which hath wings shall tell the matter.  
You may take the Reasons, in a word.  
Reasons. 
1. Because God's power will carry on his own counsels.  1. The power of God is such, that whatsoever 
a Pro. 19.21.  devices be found in the hearts of men, yet the counsel of the Lord that shall stand. Let their rage be what it will; yet, not theirs, but Gods will must be done. 
b Pro. 21.30.  There is no wisdom, nor understanding, nor counsel against the Lord.  
2. All wicked men, and devils are in God's hand: 
2. All men & devils are in God's hand.  and how furiously soever they rage, yet they can run but to the end of their chain. They may rage's, but 
c Psal. 2.4.  God laughs them to scorn. The devil himself may lay about him, but God holds him in his hand: sometimes 
d Rom. 16.20.  bruising him, sometimes 
e Rvel. 20.2.  binding him: but always mastering and overpowering him, that 
f Mat. 16.18.  the gates of hell shall not prevail against his Church and people.  
3. God is engaged by promise to his people that keep his ways, 
3. God's promise is to beat down all weapons.  that 
g Isa. 54.17.  no weapon that is form against them shall prosper, and every tongue that shall rise up against them shall they condemn; and, he pronounceth this to be the heritage of the servants of the Lord. Therefore God is bound to restrain all that wrath, 
1. Use of the second Point.  which would enervate the faith of his people in such a promise, and disappoint them of performance.  
Thus, having given you both branches of the second point, I descend to the Uses. 
The Uses.   

1. Behold all this fulfilled to ourselves.  And first, Behold, all this fulfilled this day, not in our cares only (as the Treason was) but in our eyes too. What the Rage of man upon this day, was, you have already heard. Now see how this rage so far as it was permitted, did turn to God's praise, and how powerfully he restrained the rest.  

Their rage turned to his praise.  How strongly was their plot laid! how secretly, carried! how near, the execution! how probable, the success! how confident the Instruments, of their expected issue! How boldly did they vaunt, that they had gotten God himself into the Conspiracy! God and man had conspired to punish the wickedness of that time, said the Author of that Letter which occasioned the miscarriage of all, mistaking the Devil, for God. Yet even then, we see how admirably God turned all this rage to his praise, by preserving of those that were appointed to die, and by giving them up as a prey to death who had destinated so great a sacrifice to Death of so many at once. Insomuch as the greatness of the danger did not more smite the world with a just amazement, than the extraordinariness of the deliverance took all men with high admiration.  
God permitted it so far that all might see his hand as clearly in the rescue, as in the deliverance of Daniel, in the Lion's den; and his judgement on the Traitors, as in the destruction of daniel's enemies by the same creatures that touched not him. One spark of fire flying out of the Chimney where they were drying powder to make resistance, first brought divers of the principal Conspirators (by the wounds received from the powder kindled by that spark) to acknowledge the justice and vengeance of God upon them by powder, 
At Holbeach in Worcestershire.  wherewith they intended the destruction of so many. And afterwards, Catesby and Piercy, the principals in that wickedness, were shot to death by one shot of a Musket, and thereby found Gods own hand taking revenge by powder, before the justice of man could seize upon them. And not only so, but even Faux the appointed Executioner, and Garnet (the Arch-Devil to bless their plot) confessed to the praise of God as well as the rest at their execution, the outrageous wickedness and odiousness of that hellish design.  
Nay further, God raised up an everlasting 
* An Act for keeping of this Day, for ever.  Pillar of Thanksgiving, from that very Parliament which should have been blown up; and produced effects quite contrary to those which the Traitors intended, in preserving not only the Persons, but the Laws, which they meant to destroy, and in causing more Laws to be made against them who so wickedly provoked the Clemency of the Prince, and abused the lenity and mercy they formerly enjoyed; but, in providing more carefully, ever since, for our preservation.  
I need not tell you that, the rest of the rage is happily restrained. Your eyes behold it, and we all sit under the blessing of it unto this day. Only take notice, that God did it, not by ordinary means.  
Not by abating th●ir rage: for Faux, 
God restrained the rest, not in an ordinary,  after his apprehension, repent nothing more than his not giving the blow; yea the whole crew afterwards broke forth into open Rebellion, till some of them were slain, and the rest taken, in the height of their rage. Not by diverting them; for they received not the least interruption, till all was ready for execution. Not by taking off any of their Instruments; for, not a man of them was touched by death, sickness, or arrest, till after the very trains were laid to the powder, and all prepared for the firing of it. Not by arming the creatures against them: for no creature once troubled them, till they were found out (almost too late) to be Troublers of Israel. Not by smiting them with Panic fears: for they were never so high floan (before the discovery) with confidence of success, nor more desperately fearless, after they knew that all was discovered. Nor yet, by setting them one against another: for (like Simeon and Levi) they held too fast together, 
2. Use of the second Point.  even unto death.  

but in an extraordinary manner.  But the Lord did it himself, causing one of them (who had taken three Oaths to conceal it, and kept touch with his tongue) by a writing to reveile it; verifying that of the Wisest King, that, 
a Eccl. 10.20.  that which hath wings shall tell the matter; and, affecting the King with a spirit of jealousy, (who ordinarily offended rather on the other hand) and leading him to an interpretation of the Letter, quite contrary to the common sense. And not only so, but by sharpening the edge of all men's spirits against the Traitors, 
See the Discourse of the Powder Treason in King James his Works.  in the Countries where they wandered, to kill some of them, and to apprehend the rest, even before any Proclamation could overtake them, and before the people who seized on them, knew any thing of this particular Treason. Thus, He that sitteth in the Heavens, laughed them, their rage, and Counsels, to scorn; compelling them, at length, to acknowledge the finger of God in their Discovery, and his arm in their most deserved Destruction. O wonderful Providence! O admirable Justice upon them, and Goodness to his People!  

2. Use of the second Point. Incitation to thankfulness.  2. How should this put all our hearts into a flame of the highest Thanksgiving to Him who hath done for us such wonderful things! When their Rage had concluded that We and all Posterity should for ever wallow in ashes, 
b Nah. 2.7.  taber upon our breasts, and howl like Dragons for that irreparable Desolation; the God of our Mercies hath prevented them, broken the snare, given us an escape, and hurled them out of the Land of the Living, as out of the midst of a Sling. Therefore, rejoice in the Lord, and again I say rejoice: Rouse up your spirits, call up your hearts, and let all that is within you bless his holy Name. I hope I shall not need to set before you the Institution of a thankful man; nor, to spend time in directing how to give thanks; 
On Septem. 7. 1641.  that Work being excellently performed at your late Public Thanksgiving. Rather let me bestow a few words to incite you to the Duty, because I find every where more and more backwardness to it, and coldness in it.  
For, however, at first, the melt of most men's spirits were extraordinary (their affections being soon upon the wing, 
The necessity of such an Incitation.  when the first news of the Deliverance outran the report of the Danger.) Yet, by Degrees men have so fare cooled, that not only too many of the ordinary sort do wholly neglect this Day; but, not none of the Clergy also, who have sometimes (for their hire) declaimed vehemently against that Treason, in the Pulpit, begin in ordinary discourse to jeer this solemnity of such a Deliverance; and, in derision, to name it, Saint Gunpowders Day. Papists persuade their Novices that there was never any such thing. Yea, some (once ours) have arrived at so much giddiness, as to pronounce the keeping of this Day to be Will-worship; and, the religious enjoining of it, even by Parliament, to be a trenching on the Liberty left us by Christ; as if the binding of ourselves (as God's people of old, in their feast of 
c Esth. 9.27.  Purim, did) to give public thanks for an extraordinary Mercy, were a violation of true Christian Liberty. O shameful Ingratitude! O Impudent Ignorance! And how careless the greater part of the better sort are become in observing this Day, is a subject more fit for my tears than my tongue, even in this Honourable Assembly.  
Wherefore, the better to quicken You, to restore this Day to its former splendour, 
Motives to the Duty.  that the Great Work of the Lord done herein, may be for ever more honourable, and glorious, Let Me present You with a few Incentives.  
1. Remember that, 
1. None but God could do it.  none but the Almighty himself could possibly have wrought such a Deliverance for us. 
d Psal. 124.3, 4.  If it had not been the Lord who was on our side when men risen up against us, they had swallowed us up quick, when their wrath was kindled against us. Let this first settle upon our spirits, that 
e Psal. 118.23, 24.  this was the Lords doing, and then it will soon be marvellous in our eyes, so as We cannot but rejoice, and be glad in it.  
2. Think seriously what manner of persons we were, 
2. He did it for people altogether unworthy of any mercy.  for whom he did all this. Are we not a sinful, unthankful, stubborn People, as ever tasted of mercy? a seed of evil Doers, that call God 
t jer. 3.4.5.  Father, and yet do as evil things as we can? And yet for all this, God hath opened his hand wider, than ever we opened our mouths, and crowned all our years and days with such loving kindness and mercy, as never any Nation under Heaven received greater, or enjoyed longer. If therefore David, upon the bare promise of a mercy, could not but sit down before the Lord, as one in an Ecstasy, crying out, Who am I O Lord, and what is my Father's House, that thou hast brought me hitherto? How much more would our spirits be lifted up beyond all expression, to glorify his Great Name for so great a mercy actually conferred, when we consider who and what we are that do receive it!  

3. The deliverance is extraordinary.  3. Look upon the Deliverance itself as extraordinary. All the 
g Psal. 111.2.  Works of the Lord are great: yet, some greater than others; But this is no less than the raising up of a whole Kingdom from the dead. For, as 
h Heb. 11.17.  Abraham is said to have received his Isaac from death in a figure, when Isaac had been bound on the wood, and the hand of his own Father stretched out to kill him; so we, in this Deliverance, received our King, Queen, and Prince that then were, our King that now is, our Parliament, Laws, Liberties, Lives, and Religion itself from the dead in a figure, when all these were so near to destruction that there was scarce a step between them and death, and such a step as had been easily made, had not the Lord to whom belong the issues from death, stepped in to prevent it.  

4. And altogether unexpected.  4. Take this with you too, that this great Deliverance was a mercy altogether unexpected. (For, who apprehended any danger?) The work was so strange, as we could hardly credit when we saw it done. It was with us, as with Zion, 
* Psal. 126.1.  When the Lord turned her Captivity by Cyrus the Persian; We were like men that dream: we could scarce trust our own eyes to behold it, or our tongues to proclaim it. Men gazed on each other as people amazed. And when the thing was found to be so indeed, oh how our hearts glowed! our affections fired! our hair stood upright! our eyes sparkled! our joints trembled! our spirits even failed with us to behold the wonder! And then, oh what might not God, at that time, have had from us! Let him therefore not go away now with less; seeing his Mercy, even that Mercy endures for ever, to our benefit and comfort.  
5. Behold the Love of God in it, 
5. And all this as a fruit of his Love.  makes all to be yet more precious to a thankful spirit. 
i Isay. 43.4.  I have Loved thee, therefore will I give men for thee, and people for thy life, saith the Lord. If men, yea, if a whole Nation conspire against thy life, he will redeem thee from that danger with the price of all theirs. Hence it is, even from his Love, that he no sooner espies any enemies out against us, but he arms presently as against enemies to himself; and, not only Lays them at his own feet, but even at 
k 2 Sam 22.41. Rom. 16.20.  ours, and gives us to wash our feet in the blood of the wicked.  
6. Consider, God hath gotten him honour, 
6. God hath gotten him praise from the wicked that sought our destruction.  and raised himself a praise out of the very rage of those who sought our destruction, and shall he not have it from those who enjoy this miraculous Preservation? Shall he have it from his enemies, and go without it from his Servants and Friends? The Lord forbidden.  
But oh! fare, and for ever fare be such neglect from every of You, who being the Chariots of Israel and the Horsemen thereof, aught of all others to triumph in his praise for these works of his hands. It was a foul Blot to the Elders of Judah, that, after David was freed of the Rebellion of Absolom they, who were 
* 2 Sam. 19.11, 12.  his brethren, his bones and his flesh, should be last in bringing back the King to his House. But much greater would the stain and the sin be in You the Elders of our Jsrael, unto whom the Lord himself (upon the same grounds that he hath elsewhere said, 
l Psal. 82.6.  Ye are Gods,) now saith, Ye are my brethren, ye are my bones and my flesh, should have cause to add, Wherefore then are ye the Last to bring the King back? Why are You so backward to restore unto Him all that honour that so many Absoloms and sons of Rebellion have taken from Him? Well, If you be not first, nay if You outstrip not all others in the Duty of Praise for so great a Deliverance from the rage of man, 
3. Observation.  You must expect no less Wrath to break out from the Lord upon yourselves and the Kingdom, than befell Hezekiah and all Judah, for 
m 2 Chro. 32.25.  not rendering to the Lord according to a fare less benefit done unto him.  
There be divers other excellent Uses of this comfortable Doctrine, but I must lay them all by, for haste to the Last Point, which is this;  

The third Observation.  The Experience of God's overruling and mastering the rage of man in times past, is an undoubted assurance of the like for all to come.  
This Point, so clearly grounded on the Text which speaks of future Deliverances built upon former mercies, and so strongly bound down with a confident asseveration in the front, that surely it shall be even so, I shall pass over with a light foot.  
Nothing more common in Scripture than to conclude what God will ever do, from what once he hath done. David, even in his youth, could be confident of this, 
n 1 Sam. 17.37.  The Lord that delivered me out of the paw of the Lion, and out of the paw of the Bear, he will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine. And afterwards, when that unnatural Rebellion of Absolom broke out so violently as made Jerusalem too hot for David, 
2 Sam. 15.  causing him to flee whither he could by the way of the Wilderness; yet even then, after God upon his prayer had spoken comfort to him from experience of former deliverances, David grows so secure, that he that before durst not stay in his own house for danger, professeth now to 
o Psal. 3.4.  lie down and sleep where he hath not an house wherein to put his head; and he that durst not tarry in Jerusalem with all the power he could raise against his son, now professeth in a wild howling desolate Wilderness, 
p Vers. 5.  I will not be afraid of ten thousands of people that have set themselves against me round about. Thus, let God do but any thing for him, and let him alone to live upon that while he lives. If God once lead him through green pastures; 
q Psal. 23.1.  his resolution mounts high; 
r Vers. 4.  Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; and, he soon arrives at this Conclusion, 
s Vers. 6.  Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life. Every mercy is an assurance of more. Nor was Paul behind David in this divine Art of argumentation. If God raise him out of his bed from the dangerous arrest of a desperate sickness, he raiseth his faith higher than God raised his body; first, setting down the mercy received, 
t 2 Cor. 1.10.  Who hath delivered us from so great a death, and doth deliver; then inferring hence, in whom we trust that he will yet deliver. And at another time reporting a gracious rescue from the rage of Nero, 
u 2 Tim. 4.17, 18.  I was delivered from the mouth of the Lion; he concludes thus, And the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work; that is, of evil men conspiring against him before he should have finished his course.  
A truth so conspicuous in the eyes of the faithful, that they have pleaded this unto God himself. Moses, when he saw God in such a rage, as to threaten the cutting off of all Israel at once, falls to prayer, and pleads with God for a Pardon of course, because he had given them many before. 
w Num. 14.19.  Pardon, I beseech thee the iniquity of this people, according to the greatness of thy mercy, and as thou hast forgiven them from Egypt even until now. Never were the people nearer a dreadful destruction, and yet this one Plea turned God quite about, and draws from him this answer, 
x Vers. 20.  Lo I have pardoned them according to thy word. So David, in a great danger, when the Philistines took him in Gath, useth the same Plea for deliverance; 
y Psal. 56.13.  Thou hast delivered my soul from death, wilt not thou deliver my feet from falling? Which manner of speaking plainly concludes, that it cannot be otherwise.  
Nay more. Not only deliverances given to ourselves, but to any others from the beginning of the world, is an undoubted argument to assure all the people of God of the like issue in all their straits and distresses. When Isaac was so strangely delivered, beyond all expectation, the godly presently made this use of it, and it grew to a Proverb, in all exigents; 
z Gen. 22.14.  God will be seen in the Mount. When all things are so desperate, that no help can be expected, yet the very delivering of Isaac on the Mount of Moriah shall then assure them of a gracious deliverance. And it is Gods own plea to encourage joshua to go on where Moses left: 
a Iosh. 1.5.  As I was with Moses, so will I be with thee; I will never fail thee nor forsake thee. Which very Text the Apostle citeth as a Legacy bequeathed unto all Christians, though not in being till many hundred years after joshua was dead; to dehort them from covetousness, and to persuade to contentation of mind by a firm reliance upon God. 
b Heb. 13.5.6.  Let your conversation be without covetousness, and be content with such things as ye have: for God hath said, I will never fail thee nor forsake thee; so that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, I will not fear what man shall do unto m●. What was once, and but once spoken to one joshua, an extraordinary person, called to an extraordinary service, wherein he was to encounter extraordinary difficulties, is made by the Apostle as a concluding Argument for all God's people cast upon any straight, to claim the like to the end of the world.  
Reasons. Nor will you strange at it, if you consider the grounds of it. For,  

1 From the nature of God.  1. God is constant and unchangeable in all his proceed, because he is so in his nature. If his people altar not too much, he still keeps one tenor. 
c Mal. 3.6.  I am Jehovah, I change not, therefore ye sons of jacob are not consumed. His meaning is, that therefore they still partake of his ancient mercies formerly showed to jacob their father, because God is so unchangeable.  

2. From their constant interest in the Covenant.  2. His people once in Covenant have always the same interest in his wisdom, power, providence, and goodness, and so may ever plead that whereof they or any others have been at any time partakers. Hence the Church, long after David was gathered to his Fathers, thus expostulates with God; 
d Psal. 89.49.  Lord, where are thy former loving kindnesses which thou swarest unto David in truth. As if they should say, be they not all ours by being in Covenant with thee, as David was?  
3. God never gins a work, but he goes through with it. When he gins he will also make an end, in perfecting mercies, as well as in filling up plagues. 
3. From God's perfecting what he gins.  It is a note of infamy upon a weak man to have it said of him, This man began to build, and was not able to make an end. Therefore Moses knew what he did, when he pleaded for further mercy to Israel on this ground, that it would be said by the enemy, 
e Deut 9.28.  The Lord was not able to bring him into the land which he promised them. Therefore Paul was so confident in this very thing, that he that hath begun a good work in his people, will also finish it unto the day of jesus Christ.  
Thus than we see clear grounds why one deliverance assures many more. Yet take this truth with this caution. 
Yet observe a Caution.  Although God deliver his people all alike, effectiuè, yet he doth not always bind himself to give unto all his servants the same deliverance in speciè, and in kind. But when he doth it not in kind, he doth it,  
First, in equivalence: either the same, 
1. Deliverance may be in equivalence.  or another as good in itself, and better for thee. 
f 2. Pet. 2.9.  The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly, for manner, and kind; as well as for the means. If life be best, he will preserve thee alive. If death be better, even death shall be thy deliverance, and thy greater gain.  
2. When God delivers not in kind, 
2. If not in kind, yet such as satisfieth.  yet that deliverance which he doth bestow, gives full satisfaction and perfect content: so as other deliverance would not be accepted if it were tendered. Those Primitive Saints that were exposed to Martyrdom, 
g Heb. 11.35.  would not accept of deliverance (that is, of an escape with their lives) that they might obtain a better resurrection.  
These things observed, it ever holds good that, The experience of Gods ordering and overruling the rage of man in times past, is an undoubted assurance of the like for all time to come.  
And this being so, I shall, in the Use, observe my former method, beginning with a Parallel of this Truth and these Times: no truth being sweeter than that whereof we have largest taste and experience; nor Use more seasonable, 
1. Use of the last Point.  than that which comes most home to our present condition.  
That great Deliverance we now celebrate, was not as a dead bush to stop a present Gap only, 
1. Behold the experience of this upon ourselves.  nor a mercy expiring with that hour and occasion; but, intended for a living, lasting, breeding Mercy that hath been very fertile ever since. It was an inlet to further favours, and an earnest of many more blessings: for which, I appeal to Your own Experience who have duly observed Gods dealing with you. Many of You who have now the honour to sit Members of the High Court of Parliament were unborn, when the Powder Treason should have been acted. Yet you cannot say, you were born out of due time: for that very Deliverance hath, since that, set down many a rich mercy at all your doors. This very Parliament speaks out this truth to all the world.  
The very Calling of it, and the sitting of it, speaks it. The many Conspiracies that have been detected, the many Popish Designs that have been defeated, the many snares that have been broken, the many Mountains that have been levelled, the mighty Nimrods' that have been plucked down, the unsupportable yokes of which our necks have been freed, those whips of Scorpions the back-breaking heart-sinking Courts which are now broken and dissolved; the devouring sword of war brandished in the heart of this Kingdom, that is now put up; those Rights and Liberties which had been led away captive past hope of rescue, that are now restored; that Religious, necessary, noble Vow and Covenant for conservation of Religion, and Protestation against Popery and Superstition, into which both Houses have worthily entered; that frequency of Parliaments for preventing future inundations of misery and bondage, that is now happily settled; this blessed opportunity of sitting in Parliament, at this time, for the more effectual and timely quelling of that unhappy Rebellion of some Papists in Ireland; and the providing for the continuance of this present Assembly, till all our grievances be heard and relieved, till those that are complained of as instruments of our destruction be brought forth to trial, 
2. Use of the last Point.  till the Church be purged, Reformation perfected, and our Laws, estates, Liberties, and Religion be all settled and secured. These, I say, and many more do all speak and proclaim the manifold, wonderful, and invaluable mercies that have flowed in upon this unworthy and unthankful Nation from that admirable defeat of the Gunpowder Treason.  
Wherefore 
a Psal. 107, 2.  let the redeemed of the Lord, whom he hath redeemed from the hand of the enemy, say, that his mercy endureth for ever. Yea, let all that fear him, say, 
b Psal. 68.19.  Blessed be the Lord who daily loadeth us with his benefits, even the God of our salvation; and let them put a Selah to it, 
c Psal. 102.18.  for the generation to come, that the people which are yet unborn may praise the Lord.  
Use. 2 2. But, what terror and torment speaks this to all wicked men, whether Papists, or Atheists, that speak, 
Terror to the wicked.  and do so exceeding proudly from day to day, as if all were theirs, and that nothing could hinder the satisfying of their lust upon the Gospel! What stone have they left unturned? what plot unattempted? And yet, what Treason of the many which they have contrived, hath taken effect? Will they not see that, in all their rage and conspiracies, they do 
d Psal. 2.1.  imagine but a vain thing? that they are sure of a hard bargain of it (like that of a naked body) 
e Act. 9  to kick against the pricks? that it is a desperate service they daily go upon? Have they not miscarried, and gone by the worse all along? and may they not, out of their miscarriages past, as out of an Experimental Prognostication, read their destiny for all time to come?  
Do they not know that God hath engaged himself to his people, that 
f Isa. 54.17.  no weapon that is form against them shall prosper? Even Hamans' wife (though a heathen) could tell her husband enraged against Mordecai, 
g Esth. 6.13.  If Mordecai be of the seed of the Jews, before whom thou hast begun to fall, thou shalt not prevail against him, but shalt surely fall before him.  
I know God sometimes in anger, gives his people into the hands of their enemies, to chastise and humble them. But, mark the issue: the tail of the storm ever lights upon the rods of his anger. For, the Lord hath said it, 
h Isa. 10.25.  Yet a little while, and the indignation (against the godly) shall cease: and mine anger, in their destruction: that is, of those whom he employed to correct them. Yea, which is a deeper cut to a malicious heart, God doth, at last, usually bring his enemies to confusion even by those poor, despised, oppressed outcasts of Israel, whom the wicked in their rage had resolved to devour. 
i Zach. 12.2.3.  Behold, saith the Lord, I will make jerusalem a cup of trembling, (or of poison) unto all people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against judah and jerusalem. And in that day will I make Ierusal●m a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it: that is, labour to take it up and throw it out, shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it.  
O that wicked men would yet desist from their conspiracies against the godly, before the Lords wrath be kindled, and they perish for ever! But, if they will not be instructed, I must leave with them that which the Lord denounced to the uncureable enemies of his Church heretofore; 
k Isa. 8.9, 10  Gird yourselves, and ye shall be broken in pieces; yea, gird yourselves and ye shall be broken in pieces. Take counsel together and it shall come to nought, speak the word and it shall not stand, for God is with us.  
Use. 3 3. But O the fathomless consolation and steeling encouragement that this Truth administereth to all the godly; 
Comfort to the godly.  but more especially to You who are now employed by God and the King in the great service of the Kingdom! Is it so that your souls be among Lions, and that you lie among those that are set on fire, to plot Treasons against You continually, and boldly to breathe out bloody threaten, so that when you go forth in the morning, you can scarce hope to return in the evening in peace? Do but cast up your accounts and experiments of Gods former Mercies in protecting, directing, preserving, and delivering of You hitherto, and you need no other Prognostication to foretell what will befall you; 
3. Use of the last Point.  nor better assurance that God will go on and preserve and cover you, to direct and prosper You (while you depend on him, and walk with him) maugre all the rage, and power, malice, and subtlety of all men and devils all together against you.  
Nay could it be imagined that you never had experiment of God's power and goodness in any extraordinary preservations and deliverances of yourselves at all: yet, if you do but look abroad upon the many mercies conferred on others, in any age of the world; yea, if you look but upon this very Deliverance given to your Predecessors, this will be enough to assure you of like protection and preservation for ever. For every one of God's servants are entitled to all the mercies and glorious works that ever the Lord wrought for any of his people from the beginning of the world. If you doubt hereof, remember what you have already heard from the Apostle, who hath put it out of question, in the place before cited, where he voucheth that particular encouragement given to Joshua, as an undubitable promise to all the godly; 
l Heb. 13.5.6.  I will never fail thee nor forsake thee: so that we may boldly say, the Lord is my help, I will not fear what man shall do unto me.  
4. Be therefore exhorted hence, 1. 
The last Use. Exhortation.  to make this use of all former mercies. 2. To labour to be capable of this experiment.  
1. Make this use of all former mercies. 
1. Make this Use of former mercies.  Look on what we find acted, or written of God's goodness to his people, not as bare histories of things done, but as Prognostics and assurances of the like again; as upon Book-cases adjudged, that may be vouched unto God as Precedents in this time of trouble and danger. It is the great fault of too many, when they read in Scripture of wonderful protections and deliverances, they behold them only to admire the acts done, but not to roll themselves, by virtue thereof, upon God, for the like. Howbeit, the Apostle tells us, 
m Rom 15.4.  Whatsoever was written afore-time, was written for our learning, 
The last Use.  that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope: of what, but of this; that, as others before us have been graciously born upon wings of mercy; even so we also shall, with no less power and tenderness, be carried through all storms and dangers that may set upon us in any service or suffering for God, beyond all humane helps or hopes of deliverance.  

2. Labour to be capable of like mercies.  2. Labour to be capable of further mercies by virtue of those already conferred. Although God be graciously indulgent, yet is he not inconsiderately prodigal of mercies to all that scrape acquaintance with him in their troubles. There are some to whom God, after many deliverances, saith peremptorily, 
n Judg. 10.13  I will deliver you no more: It concerns all, therefore, to make this sure that they be such who may expect further deliverances from the God of their salvation. To this purpose, three things must be done: You must believe in him, walk with him, and stand for him.  

1. Believe in him.  1. Believe in him. When jehoshaphat and his people, fearing to be swallowed up of an huge host that came out against them, were by a Prophet assured of victory without striking a blow, jehoshaphat presently inculcates this upon his subjects, 
o 2. Chron. 20.20.  Believe in the Lord your God, so shall ye be established, believe his Prophets, so shall ye prosper.  
Faith makes a man even omnipotent. 
p Mar. 9.23.  All things are possible to him that believeth. It 
q Deut. 9.13.  binds Gods hands when he would destroy. It commands his help when his people are in distress; 
r Isa. 45.11.  Concerning the work of my hands command ye me. On the other hand, Infidelity doth weaken Omnipotency itself, in regard of the effects that otherwise would be produced. It makes him 
s jer. 14.8.  as a strong man that cannot save. When Christ did so many mighty works in the days of his flesh, no man felt the effect, but such as believed. 
t Mat. 9.29.  According to your faith be it unto you, said he to the blind men that came to be healed. So it fell out to those of his own country; 
u Mar. 6.5.6.  he could there do no mighty work, save that he laid his hands upon a few sick folks and healed them: the reason is couched in the next words, he marvelled at their unbelief. Which shows plainly, that let God's power be what it will, our necessities as great as can be, and his promises never so firm and punctual for you, yet, 
w Isa. 7.9.  if you will not believe, surely ye shall not be established. Therefore believe.  
2. Walk with God. 
2. Walk with God.  This was required of Abraham the father of the faithful, when God promised to do so much for him and his seed, 
x Gen. 17.1.  Walk before me and be upright. When 
y 2. Chron. 17.3, 4.  jehoshaphat walked in the first ways of his father David, the Lord was with him, and strengthened the kingdom in his hand. And 
z Ver. 10.  the fear of the Lord fell upon all the kingdoms round about judah, so that they made no war against jehoshaphat. Yea, the most inveterate enemies of Judah, the Philistines, brought him gifts and presents. Thus God makes his servants that walk with him so sure of protection, that they become a terror to those that would be a terror to them.  
He that walks with God is sure to far as God himself doth. Fellow travellers use to communicate each to other such things as they have, if any of the company fall into distress: so the Lord communicates all his power, wisdom, and goodness to all that walk with him, as they stand in need of any, or of all of these. 
* Psal. 84.11.  The Lord God is a sun and a shield, and no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly. Yea, 
a 2. Chron. 16.9.  his eyes run too and fro, throughout the whole earth, to show himself strong in behalf of them whose heart is perfect towards him.  
3. Stand for him, and he will stand for you. 
3. Stand for God.  Be zealous for God, and he will put on zeal as a cloak for you. If you will help the Lord against the mighty, especially against those proud enemies that tread down his ordinances, or embase them with alloyes of their own, you shall soon find him speaking to you in your straits and difficulties, as Jehoshaphat to Ahab, 
b 2. Chro. 18.3.  I am as thou art, and my people as thy people, and we will be with thee in the war.  
Give me leave, I beseech You, to speak freely to You; I will do it humbly too. At Your first sitting down, You expressed many brave and noble resolutions, of giving God's business the precedency of all other Your Affairs: and Your beginnings promised much. Howbeit, I know not how it comes to pass, but so it is, that God's Work lies yet undone. Matters of Religion lie a bleeding; all Government and Discipline of the Church is laid in her Grave, and all putredinous vermin of bold Schismatics and frantic Sectaries glory in her ashes; making her fall their own rising to mount our Pulpits, to offer strange fire, to expel the gravest, ablest, and most eminent Ministers in the Kingdom, (if not out of their Pulpits, yet) out of the hearts of their people as a company of weak men, formalists, time-servers, no Ministers of Christ, but Limbs of Antichrist, having no calling except from the Devil; and to forsake our Assemblies as Babylonish and Antichristian, so as in short time they will not leave us the face of a Church. And yet, no course is taken to suppress their fury, and to reduce them to order, which (as things now stand) will never be, till You put your hands to the Cure. I know your businesses and diversions have been extraordinary: yet in the midst of them all, You have found opportunity to vindicate and settle your own Rights and Liberties. Therefore I hope You will find both time and hearts to consider what is to be done for that God who hath done so much for You beyond all expectation.  
Fare be it from any among You to say, it is not yet a time. Remember how unkindly God took the neglect of his House by the Jews whom he had restored from Captivity, albeit they forgot not the daily Sacrifice in the due place, and were opposed by many potent enemies, (the King's Great Officers in Judeah) who procured from Artaxerxes Longimanus a 
c Ezra 4.21.  Decree to stay the building of the Lords House; which caused a cessation of forty-one years, even 
d Vers. 23.  until the second of Darius Nothus. In this case, much might have been said for laying aside the Work; yet because the chief of the people did not constantly solicit the Persian Monarches to reverse that Decree, that the building might go on; but, followed their own business close, built their own houses and seiled them sumptuously, sowed their fields, and omitted nothing for their own Estates and Liberties, God did continually blow upon all, and cursed every blessing.  
When they marvailed at the matter, He bad Haggai the Prophet to tell them the reason, and to persuade them to reflect upon their own ways, as the only cause thereof. 
e Hag. 1.2.  This people say, the time is not come, the time that the Lords House should be built. To this the Lord makes answer; 
f Vers. 4.  Is it time for You, O ye, to dwell in your seiled houses, and this House lie waste? Can you find time for yourselves, and none for Me? Should I bless you in pursuit of your own affairs whiles you neglect mine? Nay, Consider your ways. See what you have gotten, in the issue, by all the Labour you have taken for yourselves, while you have done nothing to set forward the House of your God. Ye have sown much and bring in little, ye eat but you have not enough, ye drink but ye are not filled, etc. Thus it was with them, although an Edict was still in force against building of the Temple; because they did not cordially do their utmost, to obtain the repeal of that Ordinance, but rather made use of it to pursue their own business with more zeal and industry.  
And hath not the same God begun the same course against us, at this very time? Consider your ways. When they who solicited the Cause of God, humbly prayed that the matters of Religion might be put to some issue; the disbanding of the Armies, was thought more necessary, to put an end to that charge. When that was done, what followed? Was any thing done for God? Surely, You can best tell. And what have we gotten? In stead of the former Armies, God hath now laid upon You a business of more difficulty, and likely to prove more costly and bloody, by kindling a fire in Ireland, to the unspeakable persecutions, and butcheries of the poor Protestant Party there; and, when those flames will be quenched, or how far they may extend, is known only to Him whose Cause (I fear) is not sufficiently taken to heart? But this be sure of, it will never be better; but, more and more occasion of exhausting your Estates (which You have spent so much time to secure) will be still administered, so long as You shall defer the building of the Lords House, I mean, the settling and securing of Religion and Discipline. This is that unum necessarium which (what ever some think) will undoubtedly save all: and, without which, all will be lost at home, as well as abroad.  
O therefore let me be bold in the Name of the Lord (whose Servant I am, and whose Cause I now plead,) to give You the same Counsel that God by his servant Haggai, gave to the Jews who seemed to approve the Work, but pretended many Lions to be in the way. 
g Hag. 1.8.  Go up to the Mountain, and bring wood, and build the House, and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith the Lord. What ever your own thoughts be, lay them aside to consider seriously what God exspects from You. Try that Course, and see what a blessing will follow; how soon, how strangely God will turn all things about, remove all difficulties, and work wonderfully for You and our poor Brethren in Ireland.  
This is no Empirical Dosis, but a Probatum est. For mark the issue of taking this Counsel, in the Jews Case. Such as believed the Prophet, and feared the Lord, laid aside the hot pursuit of their own affairs, and did as they were commanded. They set upon the building of the Lords House. And the next news was; 
h Hag. 1.13.  Then spoke Haggai the Lord's Messenger, the Lords message unto the people; I am with you, saith the Lord. That is, now they should find him with them to purpose: first, in carrying up the building, which (beside the several pauses and interruptions of the Work) had been forty-two years, 
That House was forty-six years in building, joh. 2.20.  at several times, laboured in, and yet not finished; and had then lain forty-one years together, without so much as a stone laid in it. Now, it should go up so fast, that one four years more should perfect the work. For, they 
i Ezra 6.15.  finished it in the sixth year of Darius Nothus, having set upon it in 
* Hag. 1.15.  the second of his Reign, as before is showed.  
Nor did God thus prosper them in his own Work only but blessed them in all things else they took in hand for themselves. And whereas before, there was nothing but sidings and factions; some 
* Neh. 6.10. etc. and vers. 17, 18,  complying with the Great Officers of the Persian and Medish Emperors that then ruled over them, others opposing, and all thwarting one another, and thriving in nothing; afterwards, God did on the sudden turn the stream, knit them together 
k Neh. 9  in a Covenant with God, and thereby 
* Neh. 10.28, 29.  unitd them also one to another; so as, not only a new face, but a new state of things presently appeared; and God was as good as his word, not only in taking pleasure in his house, but in those that built it; For, so himself tells them; 
* Hag. 2.19.  From this day will I bless you.  
This is a memorable Instance; and I would to God You would precedent yourselves, by it, which till You do, I shall never expect good of any of your Labours, or Laws already made for yourselves: Nor shall You satisfy the expectations of those that sent You hither, and put so great a Trust into your hands. Even men who at other times care no more than Gallio for matters of Religion; now that they see all men's spirits to be up for Religion, they also are (in their ways) zealous to have somewhat done in it, and for it, as well as others.  
I beseech You therefore in the Name of that Great God, whom You serve, and who hath hitherto blest You, and for the peace and prosperity of this Church and Kingdom, to resume and pursue your first thoughts of setting up God and his Ordinances, as becomes You in a Regular way, which I have ever taken to be, by calling to your assistance a free Synod of Grave Ministers of this Nation. Not that I take upon me to prescribe any thing, but humbly to offer it to consideration only, that so among the several ways and means propounded, Your Wisdoms may select and prosecute what You shall find to be the surest and most honourable way to cure the Ulcers of the Time, that daily fester more and more: That our Church and the Government thereof may be no longer laid waste, and exposed to Confusion, under the plausible pretence of not forcing men's Consciences. To put all men into a course of Order and Uniformity, in God's way, is not to force the Conscience; but, to set up God in his due place, and to bring all his people into the paths of righteousness and life.  
You see how God hath unexpectedly put you into further necessity of more supplies from the people, for suppressing the Rebellion in Ireland, and all that foment or countenance such a prodigious Conspiracy. And you cannot be ignorant of the general discontent at this, that there is yet no more done for Religion, by reforming what is amiss, and by settling what should be so reform. Would you therefore once go roundly to work in this Great Enterprise, and make the people to see and be assured of what I know you intent, namely, the further Reformation of the many things out of order in our Church and Discipline, and the perfecting of that which hath so many years lain unpolished, You might soon command the hearts, and purses, and lives of all good Christians in the public service of the King and kingdom, without regreet, or gainsaying; and be able to do more in a short time, than otherwise you shall ever effect while you live.  
Look upon David. When this was once seriously and sincerely settled in his heart, to build God an House, God took it so kindly, that though he resolved to reserve that Work for Solomon, 
2. Sam. 7.  yet he sent a message to David, that he would build him an house, and establish both his house and kingdom upon him. And not only so; but, when so ever David had need of extraordinary help, God never failed to go out with him whither soever he went. And it is very remarkable, that most of the Great Victories which David achieved, fell to him after his resolution of building the Temple. For the Text saith it expressly, that, 
l 2 Sam. 8.1.  After these things, David smote the Philistines; and after that, the Moabites; then, Hadadazer; and then, the Syrians, and others, none being able to stand before him.  
And thus would it be with you, when, in zeal for God, you follow his steps. What ever the difficulties and discouragements be, when Zorobabel falls close to work, what mountain, so great and high, that shall not become a plain? No plots, no power of hell should prevail against you. Do you carry on God's work, he will be sure to carry on yours, and make you the honour and strength of the King and Kingdom in all the Kings Noble designs for the good of his Subjects. Those unnatural Rebels that now rage so desperately, should be but bread for you; and all your enemies should be compelled to lick the dust of your feet. I shall therefore close all with that of the same David to Solomon his son, touching the building of the Temple, 
m 1 Chro. 22.16.  Arise, and be doing, and the Lord be with you.  
FINIS.   

Faults escaped in some Copies, correct thus. The first number shows the page; the second, the line.  
PAge 1. li. 20. deal and. li. 29. r. (2 Chro. 14.) 2. 2. deal the second and. 4. 9 r. not. 6. 2. r. of clay. 7. 15. r. a little. li. 18. r. Chamath. and in marg. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 17. 17. r. our Cities. 20. 2. r. Cunning. 21. 14. r. for. 24. in marg. r. Hassenmuller. 34. 23. deal the 36. 19 deal not. 49. 1. r. within. and li. 6. r. which makes. pag. 53. 8. r. them. 55. 20. r. Godly.