The People's Happiness. A SERMON PREACHED IN St. MARIES IN CAMBRIDGE, Upon Sunday the 27 of March, being the day of His MAJESTY'S happy Inauguration: By RI. HOLDSWORTH D. D. Master of Emanuel College in Cambridge, Vicechancellor of the University, and one of His MAJESTY'S Chaplains. Printed by Roger Daniel, Printer to the University of Cambridge, Anno Dom. 1642. TO THE KING'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY CHARLES, By the Grace of God, King of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland, etc. Most Gracious Sovereign, I Had not adventured to bring these unpolished meditations into the public light, much less to have set them before the Sun, but that Your Majesty was pleased to because them to Yourself, and to draw them as by Your own beams, so under Your own shade into Your Royal Presence, that being first animated with the gentleness of Your beams, they might not be dazzled with the splendour. Neither is this the least of Your Princely excellencies, that You please as Christ in the Gospel, to come down from the Mount, Matth. 8.1. for the more free access of Your people; and know, with Moses, to put the vail of Goodness over the shinings of Majesty, so that the meanest of Your subjects may be refreshed with the light of Your countenance notwithstanding the lustre, and draw livelihood from the splendour, through the serenity, finding the medium of their happiness as well as the object to be, under God, in Yourself. It is not to be expected at this present, that the irradiations of this light should be so vigorous in a cloudy Region: we now see to our grief what a misery it is to have the Royal influence intercepted as of late it hath been, and still is, by those disastrous obstructions, which at first had only the appearance of Elia's cloud, 1. Kings 18.44. like the hand of a man; but are since grown to that vastness, as they threaten to the whole Kingdom such ruin as our sins call for: Yet in the midst of these sad distractions, it is Your Majesty's comfort, that as their occasions are from below, so their disposal is from above, both for the exercise of Your Princely clemency and patience, and for the trial of the sincerest loyalty of Your subjects; yea, and religious hearts, through all these clouds, can discern, and do with thankfulness acknowledge the saying of Solomon to be most true, Prov. 16.15. In the light of the King's countenance there is life: the life of the whole State, that it may happily rise to the former glory, wherein it so long flourished: the life of the Church, that it may recover out of this sad languishing condition into which it is brought: the life of the Universities, that they may fruitfully spread forth their numerous branches to all parts of the Land: Lastly, the life of this small inconsiderable Tractate in as many degrees, as Nature hath bestowed it upon man; in that Your Majesty vouchsafed, first to require a copy in writing, then to command it to the Press, then to afford it Your Patronage, whilst it presenteth to the world some little portion of that great happiness, which this eighteen years we have enjoyed, under your blessed government. I wish the Argument had had a better workman, but what is defective in the Sermon, shall be supplied by my prayers, That the happiness hereafter spoken of, howsoever it be now eclipsed, may again shine forth in full strength, through Your Majesty's great prudence; whose Royal beams as they are powerful for the fostering of piety, so I hope they shall be powerful also for the dispelling of all foggy vapours, that may hazard either to prejudice the welfare of Your people, or to pervert their allegiance. Which as it hath been hitherto untainted, to the envy of other Nations and honour of our own: So, that it may be always inviolably preserved, is the daily prayer of Your Majesty's humblest subject and servant, Ri. Holdsworth. A Prayer. O Lord hear our prayer, and let our cry come unto thee. We are here met together to call upon thy holy name, and to be made partakers of thy holy word, revealed in Jesus Christ. In whose name we are bold to begin these our weak prayers, and supplications. In our own names we are unworthy, by reason of our sins, that are so inbred in our natures, so strengthened by impenitency, and so multiplied by custom; that as we dare not conceal them from thee, so now when we would confess them, we are not able to number them. O Lord if thou shouldest plead with us, there is nothing that we can say for ourselves, but that which would make more against us; we are a sinful Generation, and even now when in thy Courts where we should bring holy affections, we are above measure sinful. Our original is wholly sinful, and our lives have answered, and exceeded our original: and besides that we are born in sin, we confess we have so lived, O Lord, as if we had been born to no other end, but to sin against thee, and to grieve thy holy spirit. Our first misery is, that sin hath conceived us; our second, that we have conceived it, and brought it forth, and made it our daily work, and fulfilled it with greediness. Our whole lives are nothing else but a course of sin; we have run through sins of all sorts, sins of Ignorance and of knowledge, sins of infirmity, and of wilfulness, sins of a hard heart, and of a stiffneck; we have committed them after a most presumptuous manner, and continued in them after an impenitent manner; against heaven, and against earth, and before thee; therefore against them because against thee; Against thy righteous law which pointeth out unto us a better way of piety; against thy manifold mercies which should be pledges, and engagements of better obedience; against the glory of thy name, the motions of thy spirit, the covenant of grace, the promises of salvation; the hope of heaven, the light and peace of our own consciences; against our many solemn vows and protestations of reformation. That now if thou shouldest enter into judgement with us, and call us to a strict account for all, or any of these; in the least of them thy severity might find sufficient cause to deprive us of thy mercies, to overwhelm us with thy judgements, to leave us to ourselves in this life, and after this life to give us our portion with hypocrites in that lake which burneth with fire and brimstone, where is nothing but weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth. But we know that thou art a merciful God, that thou mayest be called upon in a time accepted, and thy mercy is a sweet, and a safe Sanctuary; it is thyself as well as thy justice: therefore in the confidence of thy mercy we are emboldened to appeal from thee, to thee; from the bar of thy justice, to the bowels of thy tender compassions: beseeching thee that thou wilt be pleased not to look upon us as we are in ourselves, but to behold us in the face and mediation of Jesus Christ. In ourselves we are vile, and unlovely: but in the beholding of him alone there is abundant to make us amiable in thine eyes. Abundant in the purity of his incarnation; abundant in his death, and passion; abundant in his victorious resurrection, and ascension. Through these we entreat thee to look upon us; through the veil of our nature which he took, through the merits of that precious blood which he shed, through the sweet odor of the satisfaction of obedience which he performed, through the atonement which he purchased, the reconciliation which he wrought, and the intercession which he makes at thy right hand. And having thus looked upon him, look upon us, & give us grace to look upon ourselves, to examine our own ways, to try, and to search our own hearts, to leave no sin unrepented of; open our eyes that we may see them, open our hearts that we may mourn for them, strengthen our endeavours to strive against them. Make us truly to consider with ourselves, and to understand what we have done, what adventurous courses we have taken, how holy a name it is we have profaned, how righteous a law that we have broken, how happy a state that we have lost, how blessed a recovery that we have neglected, how good a spirit that we have grieved, how righteous a father that we have provoked. And by these considerations, weary us, and shame us out of our sins into the true trade of piety, and love of thy holy name, that loving thee we may seek thee, and seeking thee find thee, and in finding thee hold thee, and in holding thee, we may apply ourselves to walk in those ways that are approvable in thy sight. For the time passed of our lives it may suffice: for it is enough, O Lord, it is enough, and too too much that we have spent the prime of our years, and the first fruits of our time in the vanities of this world, and the lusts of the flesh hitherto: O give us grace so to order our steps, that we may consecrate whatsoever of our future age remains wholly unto thy service hereafter: that we growing on forward from grace to grace, from virtue to virtue, from one degree of righteousness to another, in the end of our days, we may enjoy likewise the end of our hopes, the salvation of our sinful souls in Jesus Christ. In whose name we are bold to continue these our weak prayers unto thee, not only for ourselves, but for the estate of thy holy Catholic Church wheresoever dispersed over the face of the whole earth: that thine eyes may be always open towards thine inheritance, to enlarge her borders, to water her growth, to gather her dispersions together, to make up her breaches, to fulfil her months of travel, to establish her station, that howsoever the winds blow, and the rain fall, and the floods lift up their voice, the house which is built upon thyself may stand, and the gates of hell may not prevail against it. In this universality, we humbly beseech thee to pour down thy blessings upon that part of thy fold in this land: O let the light of thy countenance still shine upon us, in the pardoning our many backslidings, in the continuing our peace and plenty and all other benefits we do enjoy by thy Gospel; that as thou hast fixed more eminent tokens of thy love among us, then among other nations, so thou wouldst give us grace also to bring forth fruit proportionable to so plentiful means, even worthy amendment of life; that thou mayest continue to be unto us, a good, and a gracious God, and we may continue to be also unto thee a chosen Generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people, even thine own pleasant plant. Bless all estates, and conditions herein from the highest to the lowest; and more particularly we entreat thee for our gracious sovereign Lord, the King's Majesty, Charles by thy grace King of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, Defender of the true ancient Catholic and Apostolic faith, and over all persons, and in all Causes, as well Ecclesiastical as Temporal, within these his Majesty's Realms, and Dominions, next and immediately under Christ, supreme Lord & Governor; Bless him in his Royal Person, establish his Throne in Righteousness unto himself, set him as a seal upon thy heart, and as a signet upon thine arm, that as thou hast made him unto us, precious as the light of our eyes, so let him be tender unto thee, as the apple of thine, that he may prove an incomparable instrument of thy glory here, and a vessel of glory hereafter. Bless him, as in his Royal Person so, in the comfort of his beloved Consort, the fruitful Vine, the most excellent Lady our Gracious Queen Mary; and in the hopeful growth of his Royal Posterity, the precious Pledges of thy love unto this Land, the Noble Prince Charles, the Duke of York, and the Lady Mary. And in the happy reestablishment of those other illustrious Branches, of the same Royal Stock beyond the seas, the most renounced Lady, the Lady Elizabeth, and her Princely Issue. For the better effecting whereof be pleased to be assistant to all their allies and confederates, to prosper their designs, to fight their battles, to go in, and out before their armies, to crown thy servants with new victories, that yet at length thy poor distressed people may return with joy to their ancient habitations, that peace may be planted upon earth for the further propagating of thy Gospel, the advancement of thy truth, and the consummation of thy Kingdom. Be pleased likewise to be gracious to all the people of this land, from the Cedar of Lebanon to the Hyssop upon the wall let thy several graces distil down upon their heads for the discharge of those particular places wherein thou hast set them: The spirit of knowledge and piety upon the head of Aaron, the Prelacy of the Church, the most reverend Archbishops and Bishops; and from thence to the skirts of his clothing, the inferior ministers: The spirit of wisdom, and understanding, upon the Lords of His Majesty's most Honourable Privy Council, and all the true hearted Nobility: The spirit of Justice and integrity upon the Judges, and Magistrates of this land: The spirit of increase, and fructification upon all Schools of learning, especially upon those two famous Universities, Cambridge, and Oxford; and in Cambridge upon the good estate of S. John's College: The spirit of obedience, and fear of the Lord upon all the commonalty; in particular upon the condition of this great, and populous City: The spirit of patience and consolation upon all thy poor afflicted members, especially those commended to thee in our prayers at this time: be pleased to compass them about with thy blessings, to establish thy mercies, to replenish them with the graces of thy holy spirit, to make the light of thy countenance to shine in their hearts, to fill them full of heavenly comfort, to support them in all their conflicts, to supply them with all those graces needful to their sick and weak estate: Mitigate their pains, assuage their grievances, make those bones which thou hast broken to rejoice, Work in them true remorse of conscience for their sins, and seal unto them the pardon of them in Jesus Christ, that from thence may arise that peace of conscience, and that joy in the Holy Ghost, which is so unspeakable and glorious: If it be thy blessed will, thou canst restore them to their former health, that they may praise thy name among much people; if otherwise thou hast disposed of any of them, prepare, and preserve them to thy heavenly Kingdom, that they may have a peaceable passage out of these earthly tabernacles, into those heavenly mansions, which thou hast prepared for those that love thy appearing. And give us grace, all of us that are here present before thee this day, to be warned by the many examples of our mortality that thou daily settest before our eyes, to prepare for the day of ourvisitation, whensoever thou shalt send it, sooner or later, that we may have oil in our lamps, and our lamps always burning, and the door of our hearts always open, to let thee the King of glory in whensoever thou shalt knock. Last of all, let thine illuminating, and sanctifying spirit, descend down upon all congregations, assembled as this day in thy fear; in particular upon this congregation here present, that thy word that is to be sown among them by me thy unworthy servant, though in great weakness, by thine enabling Grace, may prove thy strong arm of power to salvation, to the enlightening of their understandings, the sanctifying of their affections, the amendment of their lives, the comfort of their souls in this world, and the salvation of them in the day of the Lord. Anoint our eyes with the blessed eye salve of thy Holy Spirit, that the scales, and mists of ignorance being removed, we may clearly see the wonders of thy law: prepare our hearts for the receiving of it, set an edge upon our affections, that we may hunger and thirst after this heavenly Manna, and be always gathering, some an Omer, some an Ephah, every one some; and that for his sake who is the Manna that came down from Heaven, the eternal Word with thee from the beginning, thy Christ, our Jesus, in whose holy Name we pray unto thee further as he himself hath taught us, saying: Our Father, etc. FINIS. PSALM 144.15. Happy is that people that is in such a case yea, happy is that people whose God is the LORD. THe Genius of this Scripture, as it is very graceful and pleasing in itself, so it is also very suitable to the respects of this day, on which we are met together. It presents unto us what we all partake of, if we be so well disposed as to see it, Felicity or Happiness. And if a single happiness be too little, behold it is conveyed in two streams; the silver stream, and the golden. It is reached forth, as it were, in both the hands of Providence. There is the happiness of the left hand, which is Civil, in the first clause of the words; and the happiness of the right, which is Divine and Religious, in the second. Answerable to these are the two welcome aspects of this day: the Civil aspect or reference, which ariseth from the annual revolution, as it is Dies Principis, a day of solemnity for the honour of the King: and the Religious aspect from the weekly revolution, as it is Dies Dominica, a day of devotion for the worship of God. In these there is so evident a correspondence, that I cannot but congratulate, both the day to the text, and the text to the day, in regard of their mutual complications. For we have, on the one side, both clauses of the text in the day: and on the other, both references of the day in the text. Happiness is the language of all: and, that which adds to the contentment, it is Happiness with an Echo, or ingemination; Happy and Happy. From this ingemination arise the parts of the text; the same which are the parts both of the greater world and the less. As the heaven and earth in the one, and the body and the soul in the other: so are the passages of this Scripture in the two veins of Happiness. We may range them as Isaac doth the two parts of his blessing, Gen. 27. The vein of civil happiness, Gen. 27.28 in the fatness of the earth: and the vein of Divine happiness, in the dew of heaven. Or (if you will have it out of the Gospel) here's Marthaes' portion in the many things of the body: Luke 10.41, 42. and Mary's better part in the Vnum necessarium of the soul. To give it yet more concisely, here's the path of Prosperity in Outward comforts; Happy is the people that is in such a case: and the path of Piety in comforts Spiritual; Yea, happy is that people which have the LORD for their God. In the handling of the first, without any further subdivision, I will only show what it is the Psalmist treats of: and that shall be, by way of Gradation, in these three particulars. It is De FELICITATE; De Felicitate POPULI; De HAC felicitate populi: Of happiness; Of the people's happiness; Of the people's happiness, as in such a case. Happiness is the general, and the first: a noble argument, and worthy of an inspired pen, especially the Psalmists. Of all other there can be none better to speak of popular happiness, than such a King: nor of celestial, than such a Prophet. Yet I mean not to discourse of it in the full latitude, but only as it hath a peculiar positure in this Psalm, very various and different from the order of other psalms. In this Psalm it is reserved to the end, as the close of the foregoing meditations: In other Psalms it is set in the front, or first place of all; as in the 32, in the 112, in the 119, and in the 128. Again, in this the Psalmist ends with our blessedness, and gins with God's; BLESSED BE THE LORD MY STRENGTH. In the 41 Psalm, contrary, he makes his exordium from man's; BLESSED IS HE THAT CONSIDERETH THE POOR: his conclusion with God's; BLESSED BE THE LORD GOD OF ISRAEL. I therefore observe these variations, because they are helpful to the understanding both of the essence, and splendour of true happiness. To the knowledge of the essence they help, because they demonstrate how our own happiness is enfolded in the glory of God, and subordinate unto it. As we cannot begin with Beatus, unless we end with Benedictus: so we must begin with Benedictus, that we may end with Beatus. The reason is this, Because the glory of God it is as well the consummation, as the introduction to a Christians happiness. Therefore as in the other Psalm he gins below, and ends upwards: so in this, having begun from above with that which is principal, Blessed be the Lord; he fixeth his second thoughts upon the subordinate, Blessed, or happy are the people. He could not proceed in a better order: he first looks up to God's kingdom, then reflects upon his own; as not meaning to take blessedness before he had given it. There is no man can think, but this is the best method. It is the method of Saints, as we see 1. Sam. 25.32, 33. and 2. Chron. 31.8. First, Blessed be the God of Israel; then, Blessed be the people of Israel. Nay, it is the method of Angels: Luke 2.14. they first sing, Glory to God; then, Good will towards men. It must also be the method of every Christian, whensoever we are about the wishing of blessedness, either to ourselves or others, to begin from heaven, and ascribe it first to the LORD. That we may receive, we must give: give what we have, and give what we mean to have. To give is the way to get: both to get the thing, and to get the greater degree. It is an undeniable consequence, If beatitude be the ultimate end of man, and the glory of God the ultimate end of our very beatification; than it follows necessarily, That by giving more glory to God we gain more of beatitude to ourselves, because more of the supreme and beatifical end. So that he who will attain to the Psalmist's comfort, must observe also the Psalmist's order: that he may end assuredly with BEATUS, he must learn to begin with BENEDICTUS. That's the first considerable thing in the order as touching the essence of true happiness. The other is concerning the splendour, which flows from the other part of the variation: in that the Psalmist doth end this psalm, as he gins divers of the rest, with Happy or Blessed; to represent, as it were, unto us utramquesplendor is paginam, the two great excellencies of blessedness by the double situation of it. Happiness is both the bonum Primum, and the bonum Vltimum, of a Christian: the spring of all good things, and the crown: the spire, and the basis: the first and the last of things to be desired; the first for eminence, the last for fruition. In the descents of Christianity the first, because we move from it to inferior ends: happiness giveth law to all our actions; we move from it, that we may in time come to the possession of it. In the order of ascent it is the last: for having climbed once thither, we go no further, but set up our rest. It hath this resemblance with God himself, who is the Donour of it, That it is both the beginning and the end, before which nothing should be loved, and after which nothing can be desired. Answerable to these two respects are the positures of happiness in the Psalms. As in military affairs, it is the custom of Emperors to promise the Donative to their soldiers when they go forth to war, that they may encourage them; but not to give it till the war be ended, that they may reward them for their service: In like manner (saith S. Ambrose) doth the Psalmist: velut praeco magni Imperatoris, he disposeth of beatitude both ways: he prefixeth it to the beginning of some Psalms, that thereby we might be invited to piety; he annexeth it to the end of others, to teach us not to look for it before our work be done. So even by this we may learn how to order and dispose of ourselves to happiness. Since it hath the double reference, it must have also the double honour, and the double esteem, yea and our double endeavours for the attaining of it. Then we give it the double, when we set it in both places, make it both our first and our last, the prime of our life, and the perseverance. We must look through all things upon happiness, and through happiness upon all: through all upon it, as not resting in any thing else; and through it upon all, as seasoning every act of our life with the thought of happiness. Otherwise, if we think to give it our last respects without our first, pretend what we will, there is no hope to overtake it. Thus fare even worldly men will go: they are willing enough to hear that they must make it their last work, and they fulfil it in a sort to the letter, but not to the meaning. The love, the hope, the care of their own happiness, they put them off all to the last: A very preposterous course for a man to begin where and when he should have ended, and to defer his first of motion to his last of rest. It is too late for the foolish Virgins to cry, Matth. 25.10, 11. Lord open when the door is shut and a vain thing to expect happiness as our end, unless we make it our beginning, and give it the same place in our hearts and actions, which holy David affords it in his meditations: the first place in other Psalms, as the best introduction to all other discourses; the last in this, as a delightful farewell to be always fresh in remembrance. That shall serve for the first step of the Gradation, the general part of the argument handled: It is De FELICITATE. The second is more special: it is defelicitate Populi; HAPPY, or, BLESSED ARE THE PEOPLE. In the former part of the Psalm he speaks of such things as concern his own happiness; Blessed be the Lord MY strength, vers. 1. Send down from above, and save ME out of the great waters, vers. 7. Rid ME and deliver ME from the hand of strange children, vers. 11. And he might as easily have continued the same strain in the clauses following, That MY sons may grow up as the young plants, MY daughters may be as the polished corners of the temple, MY sheep fruitful, MY oxen strong, MY garners full and plenteous: and accordingly he might have concluded it also, Happy shall I be, if I be in such a case. This, I say, he might have done, nay, this he would have done, if his desires had reflected only upon himself. But being of a diffusive heart, and knowing what belonged to the neighbourhoods of piety, as loath to enjoy this happiness alone, he altars his style, and (being in the height of well-wishes to himself) he turns the singular into a plural, Our sheep, Our oxen, Our garners, Our sons and daughters; that he might compendiate all in this, Happy are the people. Here's a true testimony both of a religious and generous mind, who knew in his most retired thoughts to look out of himself, and to be mindful of the public welfare in his privatest meditations. S. Ambrose observes it as a clear character of a noble spirit, to do what tends to the public good, though to his own disadvantage: And Salvian, in his first Deprovidentia, doth recon this as the principal thing which made the Fabii and the Fabricii, and other Roman Worthies so renowned in their times, That they were content to expose themselves to want and danger for the prosperity and safety of the public. But (alas!) there are few such spirits in our time: It is a rate thing to find a private man, who cordially devoteth himself to the good of the Community. It was the complaint of Plato in his time, That every man was impetuously carried 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and of Thucydides the Historian in his, Vnusquisque rem suam urget: and of Tacitus in his, Brivatacuique stimulatio, & vile decus publicum. S. Paul himself was driven to this complaint, Phil. 2.21. All seek their own. Where he left we may take it up: Our own settling, our own security, our own wealth, our own advancement, is all we generally look after. There is hardly any man to be found, whose bent is not towards himself: Whereas the public is the private infinitely multiplied; and so much the more of nearer concernment, as it is of larger extension: whereas again man is only a world in a figurative sense of speaking, and that but a microcosm or little world, that is in effect, a small part of the great; yet, as in some other things, so in this also it falls out, The Allegory devours the letter, the private eats up the public, the part the whole, the overweening respect to the little world doth every where almost overturn the greater. I know there are many which make fair shows, goodly pretences, great ostentation of the contrary: You shall have them often crying out, The Public, the Public; and as fast as the Jews did, The Temple, the Temple: but it is with the like insincerity; for their aim is wholly for themselves. So we show ourselves hypocrites even in things civil, as well as in religion. Each godly man is of another temper. His word is that of S. Ambrose, Mihi parcior, foris totus: or that of the Orator in Sallust, Adsum en Caius Cotta, voveo, dedóque me pro Republica. It was a brave resolution in a Heathen: but it concerns us Christians more. For he was only a part of one Community: we, each of us have a share in two; being members of the Church, as well as the State. So there is a double tie upon us: and that we should daily remember it, it is insinuated in the Lord's prayer: in which as there is one express petition for the public; so there is a respect had to it in all. There is nothing singular, not an I, nor a Me, nor a Mine; but all plural, We, Us, Our: noting that it is every man's duty, even in his prayers, to be zealous for the Community. But the text will not allow me that scope, to speak of this zeal to the public as 'tis the duty of private men, but as it is an excellency of Kings and Princes. It's true, I might call it a duty even in them also; God requires it of them as a duty: but it becomes us to repute it an excellency, both because the benefit is ours which redounds from thence, and likewise because it is more eminent and illustrious in them, then in other men. In others it's limited and ministerial, in a Prince supreme and universal. He is the influxive head, who both governs the whole body, and every member which is any way serviceable to the body: The glorious Sun that gives light both to the world, and to the stars themselves, which in their several stations are useful to the world. Here's enough to define it an excellency, to have the care and trust of the whole in himself. Yea but further, to tender it as himself, and to set the weal of the public in equipage with his own happiness, and to fold them up together, his own in the public and the public in his own; is so high an ascent of goodness, that it were a great wrong to such virtue, to style it by any less name than an excellency. In this particular I might easily be large: but it requires not so much proofs, as acknowledgements and retributions. Therefore I will briefly proceed both ways: and first give you a few examples for proofs; and then, I am sure, there is no man so unworthy, but will think himself obliged to retributions. The first example shall be taken from Moses: whom Philo reckons among Kings; and so doth the Scripture, Deut. 33.5. For howsoever he had not the name, he had the power and authority: yet even in that power he was not more Regal, then in his tenderness over the people. At one time his tenderness was so great toward them, that because he could not do them so much good as he desired, he besought the Lord to take away his life; Numb. 11.15. At another time he was so perplexed with the fear of their destruction, that he requested of God, either to keep them still in the land of the living, or to blot him out of the book of life; Exod 32.32. hereby showing himself not only the miracle of Nature, as Philo calls him, but of Grace too, in pledging for them that which was more worth than his life, his very salvation. It was a rare ex ample of Castor and Pollux, so highly magnified by Authors, That being twins, and (as the Poets feigned) one born mortal, the other immortal, Pollux (to show his love to his brother) yielded so fare, as to take to himself a part of his brother's mortality, and to lend him as much of his own immortality: being better pleased to enjoy a half immortality with the good of his brother, than a whole one alone by himself. It is known by all to be a fiction: yet if it were true, it is fare short of this proffer of Moses. He knew full well what belonged to immortality, and to the favour of God: yet in effect he beseecheth God, either to take them into his favour, or to put him out of it; as content to hazard not half his immortality, but all, out of his love to the Israelites, notwithstanding they were a people ungrateful both towards him and towards God. After this of Moses I know no example so transcending as that of the Prophet David: who (besides that he urgeth it almost in every Psalm, The peace of Jerusalem, The salvation of Israel, The felicity of Gods chosen, The blessing of the people) in one place he argues for it even to his own destruction▪ You have it, 1. Chron. 21.16, 17. It is there recorded, that seeing the angel of the Lord with his sword drawn over Jerusalem to destroy it, he thus reasons with God for the safeguard of the public: Me, me; adsum qui feci; IT IS I, EVEN I IT IS THAT HAVE SINNED: In me convertito ferrum; LET THY HAND BE AGAINST ME, AND AGAINST MY FATHER'S HOUSE, NOT ON THY PEOPLE: FOR THESE SHEEP WHAT HAVE THEY DONE? He that considers these words will hardly be able to tell what most to wonder at; the condescending of his love, or the overflowing. He declared here, saith S. chrysostom, a depth of love 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, an affection more spacious for love, than the sea for water; and for tenderness softer not only then water, but then oil. To lay down, as it were, his own royal neck under the sword of the Angel, when he saw it hanging over him by a less third, then that of Damocles: To open his own religious breast, to receive the blow, that he might ward it from the people: To value the people's safety so fare above his own, as to interpose himself betwixt the sword and the slaughter: O how fare doth he here renounce himself, and recede, not only from royalty, but from life itself! It is much which is mentioned in the text, that he should name the people first to the happiness: more, that he should offer himself first to the punishment: very much, that he should put the people betwixt himself and the blessing: fare more, that he should place himself betwixt the people and the curse. He made himself in this SPECULUM PRINCIPUM, the mirror of Princes: a mirror, into which (as we may well presume) our Gracious Sovereign King CHARLES hath made frequent and useful inspections: for it is manifest by many passages of his reign and happy government, that the tenderness of his love towards his people, if it doth not fully reach, yet it comes close up to the recessions of David. It is the more remarkable, for that he hath this virtue as it were in proper and by himself, he is almost the sole possessor of it. The most of ordinary men, as living more by will then reason, are all for holding: so stiff and inflexible, so tenacious and unyielding, even in matters of small moment; that they will not stir a hairbreadth. Entreat them, persuade them, convince them; still they keep to this principle (and 'tis none of the best) Obtain all, Yield nothing. It is a nobler spirit that resides in the breast of our Sovereign, as appears by his manifold yield and recessions. Of such recessions we have many instances in the course of his Majesty's government. I might go as fare back as his first coming to the Crown: when he receded from his own profit, in taking upon him the payment of his Father's debts, which were great, and but small supplies to be expected from an empty Exchequer: yet the love of justice and his peoples emolument overswayed him, and armed him with Epaminondas his resolution, Totius orbis divitias despicere, prae patriae charitate. Having but glanced at that, I might draw a little nearer to the third of his reign: when, in that Parliament of Tertio, he was pleased to sign the, so much desired, Petition of Right: a Title which, I confess, takes me much: both because it speaks the d●●ifulnesse of the subject, in petitioning, although for right; and the great goodness of a Gracious Prince, who knows how to recede from power, and in some case even from prerogative, when besought by prayers; and rejoiceth, not to sell his favours, but to give them. For I have heard some wise men say, That that single grant was equivalent to twenty subsidies. But the time will not give me leave to dwell, as I should, upon particulars: therefore I will call you nearer to the transient remembrance (and but the transient, for it is no pleasure to revive it,) of the commotions in the North. The eyes of the whole world were upon that action, and they all are witnesses what pains and travel were taken, what clemency and indulgence was used, what yield and condescensions, both in point of hononr and power, to purchase, as it were, by a price paid out of himself, the peace and tranquillity of both kingdoms. Whereby he made all men understand, how much more pleasing it was to his Princely disposition, with Cyrus in Xenophon, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and to conquer, not by might, but by clemency. By clemency, I say, the word which I named before, and I cannot name it too often. It is the virtue God most delights in, to exercise himself; and 'tis the copy also which he sets us to write after: It is the virtue which draws both eyes and hearts unto it; in that it maketh Royalty itself, which is so fare above, to become beneficial and sovereign: It corrects the brightness of Majesty, calms the strictness of Justice, lightens the weight of Power, attemperates whatsoever might cause terror to our mind and liking. If we never had known it before, yet the only time of this Parliament would teach us sufficiently how much we owe to the King's clemency. The laws and statutes which have been made this last year, are lasting and speaking monuments of these royal recessions, as well to posterity, as to ourselves. Surely if the true picture and resemblance of a Prince be in his laws; it cannot be denied, that in the acts, for triennial Parliaments, for the continuation of the Parliament now being, for the regulating of impositions, pressing of soldiers, courts of Judicature, and others not a few of the like nature, are the lineaments, and expressions to the life, of the perfect portraiture of a Benign and Gracious Prince, who seems resolved of a new way, and hitherto unheard of, by wholesome laws to enlarge his subjects, and to confine himself. Yet it may be said, It is not his only hand which is in these laws: the proposal of them is from others, although the ratification be in him. Be it so: But the ratification is tenfold to the proposal; nay, it is the life and essence of a law. So we owe the laws themselves to his goodness. Nay, and if it be granted, that the proposal of such laws comes from others; let us then look to the many gracious messages, which occasionally have been sent, at several times, to that great Assembly. In these he speaks only by himself; and in so gracious a manner, that to read some passages, would ravish a loyal heart, as well as endear it. In some of them we may see, how he puts the happiness of his people into the same proximity with his own: in others, how he neglects his own for our accommodation. In that of January the 20, you have these golden words: That he will rather lay by any particular respect of his Own dignity, then lose time for the Public good: That, out of his Fatherly care of his people, he will be ready, both to equal, and to exceed the greatest examples of the most Indulgent Princes, in their Acts of Grace and Favour to their people. Again, in that of the 28 of January there is yet more tenderness. He calls God to witness (and with him the attestation of that sacred name is very religious) that the preservation of the public peace, the law and the liberty of the subject, is and shall always be as much his care and industry, as the safety of his own life, or the lives of his dearest children. Lastly, in the other of the 15 of March there is more than yield and concessions; a gracious prevention of our desires: for he is pleased to excite and call upon that Great Council, even the second time, to prepare with all speed such Acts, as shall be for the establishment of their privileges, the free and quiet enjoying their estates and fortunes, the liberties of their persons, the security of the true Religion now professed in the Church of England. What now shall we say to these things? Is not that of Solomon made good unto us (Prov. 16.10.) A Divine sentence is in the lips of the King? Have we not good cause to take up Ezra's benediction (Ezr. 7.27.) Blessed be the Lord which hath put such things as these into the King's heart? Such things as these we were not so ambitious as to hope for: I trust we shall not be so unworthy as to forget. For myself, I could wish that, according to the duty of this day, I could set them forth as they deserve. But they need no varnish of Oratory: neither was it my intendment to use them further, then for the proof of the proposition in hand; to show you how this highest excellency of Princes, in the care of their people's happiness, is radiant in our Gracious Sovereign. Yet you may remember also that I told you, The point needs not so much proofs, as retributions. It calls aloud upon us for all dutiful returns, of honour, love, obedience, loyalty, and thankful acknowledgements, into that Royal bosom, the first mover and original under God of our happiness. In the sphere of Nature there is none of us ignorant, how willing the members are to make return to the head, for the government and influence they receive from thence: they will undergo hardship, expose themselves to danger, recede from things convenient, nay necessary; they will not grudge at any plenty or honour which is bestowed upon the head; knowing by instinct that from the head the benefit of all redounds to them. It is likewise obvious in the Regiment of families, which are as States epitomised; that both honour and duty belong to the Paterfamiliâs, not only for the right he hath in the house, but for the provision and support and comfort which all receive from him. Now Kings, by way of excellency, are Fathers, who look upon all their subjects as so many children, and (with that noble Emperor) account equally as daughters Rempublicam & Juliam. The very Heathen, which saw only the outside or Civil part, reputed them as Fathers: but the Prophet Isaiah, when he speaks of the Church, goes further, and calls them Nursing Fathers: Isai. 49.23. a word which in propriety of speech might seem incoagruous; because they have no more of the nurse, than the bosom; nothing at all of the breasts, if what is wanting in the sex were not supplied by their tenderness. Benignity, and clemency, and sweetness of disposition, and facility of access, and compassion toward the distressed, these are their breasts, more breasts than two; the same both their breasts and their bowels, which day by day they open to thousands severally, and to all at once, for the suckling and fostering of the public. Therefore it behoves us to think of returns. By this word Christ read us the lesson, Matth. 22.21. Render, or Return unto Cesar the things which are Caesar's, or the things which are from Cesar. The protection of lives, and fortunes, and worldly comforts; let him have these back again in the honour, love, fear, obedience, supplies which belong to the Sovereign Head and Parent of a beloved people: that his throne may be established by your loyalty, his reign still prosperous by your prayers & blessings, his life lenghthened by years taken forth of your own: that so he may long rejoice to say with David, Happy are the people. So I have done with the second step of the Gradation, the special part of the argument here handled; It is De felicitate Populi. The third is yet more special: It is not only De felicitate Populi, but De felicitate Populari, that is, De Hac felicitate Populi, or De hoc Genere felicitatis: Beatus cui SIC, Happy they who are in SUCH A CASE, or CONDITION. What that condition is, you may see in the former words; in which there are several blessings mentioned, and all of them temporal. Plenty is one, in those words, That our garners may be filled with all manner of store; our oxen strong to labour; our sheep bring forth thousands. Peace is another, in these words, That there be no leading into captivity, no complaining in our streets. Multitude of people, especially such as are virtuous, a third, in those, That our sons may grow up as the young plants, our daughters may be as the polished corners of the temple. The safety and prosperity of David their King, a fourth (or rather a first, for it is first mentioned) He giveth salvation, or victory to Kings, and delivereth David his servant from the peril of the sword. Of all these civil threads the Psalmist twists this wreath of Happiness; Happy they who are in such a case. Now hence ariseth the scruple; Why David, a man of so heavenly a temper, and of so good a judgement in things which concern salvation, that he is said to be A man after Gods own heart, 1 Sam. 13.14. should place felicity in these temporals. Devout S. Paul, who of all others came nearest to David's spirit, had these outward things in no better esteem, then as dross, Phil. 3.8. or dung: and our blessed Saviour, in his first Sermon, Matth. 5. thought good to begin the chain of happiness from poverty, and to second it from hunger, and to continue it from suffering persecution. Non dixit, BEATI DIVITES, sed, BEATI PAUPERES, as S. Ambrose observeth. In this, I say, is the scruple, That Christ should begin blessedness from poverty, and David place it in abundance: that things earthly should be as dross to Paul, and as happiness to David. This scruple wrought so fare with some Interpreters, that they conceived it to be a defective or imperfect sentence, and that the Psalmist uttered it in the person of a worldly man: like that of Solomon, Eccles. 2.24. There is nothing better for a man, then to eat and drink, etc. Therefore, to take off the suspicion of a paradox, they interpose Dixerunt: BEATUM [dixerunt] POPULUM CUI HAEC SUNT, Men usually say, HAPPY ARE THE PEOPLE IN SUCH A CASE. But we need not flee to this refuge: It is neither a defective nor a paradox; but a full and true proposition, agreeable both to the tenor of other Scriptures, and also to the analogy of faith. For first, the Psalmist speaks not here, as in other places, of the happiness of a man, but of the happiness of a people: it is not Beatus homo, but, Beatus populus. In some other places, where he treats of the happiness of a man, he circumscribes it always with things spiritual: a Psal. 32.2. Blessed is the man unto whom the LORD imputeth no sin, and in whose spirit there is no guile: b Psal. 1 12.1. Blessed is the man that feareth the LORD: c Psal 40.4. Blessed is that man that maketh the Lord his trust: and the d Psal. 65.4. & 84.5. & 128.1. like. Here otherwise, seeing he speaks of the happiness of a people, he might use more liberty to take in these outwardaccomplishments, as having a nearer relation to the happiness of a Nation or Kingdom, then abstractively of a Christian. Howsoever Aristotle affirms, in the 7th of his Politics, that there is the same happiness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, of a single man and of awhole city: Yet there is a great deal of difference, which he, being not instructed in Christianity, could not observe. Look as on the one side, the being of a State or Nation, as a collective body, is not so ordered to immortality, nor by consequence to happiness, as the being of a man: so on the other, the concurrence of temporal good things is in no wise so essential or requisite to the happiness of a man, as to the being and well-being, and so to the happiness of a State or people. Experience tells us that a man may be happy without children; a State cannot be so without people: a private man may keep his hold of happiness, though poor and afflicted in the world; a State is only then happy, when 'tis flourishing and prosperous, abounding with peace, plenty, people, and other civil accessions. Men are the walls for strength, women the nurseries for increase, children the pledges of perpetuity, money as the vital breath peace as the natural heat, plenty as the radical moisture, religious and just government as the form or soul of a body politic. Upon this ground the Psalmist well knowing how conducing these outward things are to popular happiness, he casts them all into the definition; his present argument being the happiness of a people. In the second place, admit he had spoke here of the happiness of a man, or a Christian: yet he mentions not these temporals, either as the all, or the only, or the chief of happiness; but as the concomitants and accessories. They have not an essential influx or ingredience into it: but a secondary and accidental respect they have in these two considerations. First they are ornamenta, as garnishings, which give a gloss and lustre to virtue, and make it more splendid. The Moralists say well, that they are as shadows to a picture, or garments to a comely personage. Now as in these, the shadowing makes not the colour of a picture truly better, but only seem better, and appear more fresh and orient; and as garments do indeed adorn the body now in the state of corruption, whereas, if man had stood in his integrity, they had been useless for ornament, as well as for necessity: So likewise these outward things, although in themselves they have nothing of true happiness, yet because they render it more beauteous and graceful, as the state of virtue now stands in respect of our converse with men, we may well reckon them without prejudice to virtue inter ornamenta. Then secondly, they are adminicula also, helps and adjuments, as handmaids to piety, without which virtue is impotent. Were a man all soul, virtue alone were sufficient; it is enough by itself for the happiness of the mind: but being partly body, and enjoying corporal society with others, he stands in need of things corporal, to keep virtue in exercise. Want clips the wings of virtue, that a man cannot feed the hungry, or clothe the naked, or enlarge himself to the good of others: on the other side, this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, as the Philosophers term it, sets virtue at liberty, and gives it scope to be operative. As fire, the more air & fuel you give it, the more it diffuseth itself: so the more health, peace, plenty, friends, or authority we have; the more power, freedom and advantage we have to do virtuously. Put now all these together, & the reason is evident, why the Prophet David here placeth this happiness in the things which are worse; because they are serviceable to the things which are better. Howsoever he reserves the mention of the better till afterwards; Yet he would give us to understand, that even these inferior things are the good blenssigs of God, and such blessings, as being put together, make up one part of the happiness of a people. It is true of popular happiness, as well as personal, It is not one single good, but the aggregation or affluence of many. In the twenty eighth of Deuteronomie, where Moses describes the blessedness promised to the Israelites, he reckons up all sorts of outward blessings: and agreeable to those is the conflux of these in this Psalm: The blessing of the house, and of the city; That there be no leading into captivity, and no complaining in the streets: The blessings of the basket, and of the store; That the garners may be filled with plenty: The blessings of the fruit of the body; That the children may be as young plants: The blessings of the field, That the sheep may bring forth thousands, and the oxen be strong to labour: The blessings of going ou● and coming in; That they may be delivered from the hand of strange children, and saved out of great waters. Here is briefly the compound of the many simples which make up this case or condition of a people's happiness. And surely if by these particulars it be defined, we may boldly say, The condition is our own, and men may pronounce of us, as truly as of any Nation, that we have been for a long time a happy people. Our deliverances from strange children have been great and miraculous, and our land it hath been a Goshen, a lightsome land; whereas the darkness of discomfort hath rested upon other Nations. The blessings of the city and field, of the basket and of the store have grown upon us in such abundance, that many men have surfeited of plenty: Our land hath been as an Eden and garden of the Lord for fruitfulness, as a Salem for peace; whereas other kingdoms do yet groan under the pressures of sword and famine. Besides these, if there be any blessing which the Scripture mentions in other places, Peace in the walls, Plenty in the palaces, Traffic in the ports, or Salvation in the gates; if any part of happiness which it speaks of in this Psalm, for plantings, or buildings, or reaping, or storing, or peoplings; we have had them all in as much fullness as any part of the world, and in more than most: only there is one particular may be questioned, or rather can not be denied. That amidst the very throng of all these blessings there are some murmur and complain in our streets. But it need not seem strange to us, because it is not new in the world. In the stories of all ages we meet with it. That men used to complain of their times to be evil, when indeed themselves made them so. I may be bold to say, There was cause in respect of sin then, as well as now, especially with godly men, who are so good themselves, that it is no marvel, if they thought times a little evil to be extremely bad: as always sin swells to the eye of grace. But if we speak of outward pressures and calamities, I am certain there is not cause now as then: for the riches of the Kingdom were never so great, the peace of the Kingdom never so constant, the state of it for all things never so prosperous. Only we must give leave to the world to be like itself: As long as ambition or covetousness are in the world, men of such spirits will cry out, The times are bad, even when they are best; because they (in their own bad sense) still desire to be better. As nothing is enough, so nothing is pleasing to a restless mind. An insatiable appetite is always impatient; and, because impatient, querulous. Yet this is not the sole reason: for besides this humour of appetite, the very corruption of our nature leads us hereunto, To be weary of the present. It is the joint observation both of Divines and Moralists (as of Salvian, Quintilian, Tacitus, and others, who agree as near almost in words as in opinion) Quòdusitatum est mentis humanae vitium, illamagìs semper velle quae desunt; &, vetera quidem in laude, praesentia in fastidio ponere. Our own experience will tell us as much, if we will take pains to observe it, How, through the pravity of our own dispositions, whatsoever is present proves burdensome, whether it be good or bad. Salvian, in his third De Gubernation, sets forth this humour to the life: That men of all times were displeased with all times: Si aestus est, (saith he) de ariditate causamur; si fluvia, de inundatione conquerimur: si infoecundior annus est, accusamus sterilitatem; si foecundior, vilitatem. So winter and summer are both alike distasteful to impatient men: In scarcity things are too dear, in plenty too cheap: poverty pincheth, and abundance nauseates. If there be a little too much drought, they cry out of a famine; if a shower or two extraordinary, they are afraid of a deluge. You shall hear in good times, Quid nobis cum Davide? and in bad, Antigonum effodio: as we read of the Israelites, That even when God himself was pleased to order their civil affairs, they were not contented; but still repined, as well when they had manna, as when they wanted it. The reason is (as the Greek Historian notes) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. But I hope we Christians are of a better temper. It beseems not us of all others to be so injurious to God, who hath singled us out to be a happy people: It beseems us not to be so unthankful to our Sovereign, under whom we enjoy these blessings. Howsoever it ought to be in the first place acknowledged, that the original of all our happiness is from heaven: yet it must be confessed withal, that the crystal pipe through which blessings are conveyed unto us, is his government: Our peace is from his wisdom's; our plenty from our peace; our prosperity from our plenty; our safety, our very life, our whatsoever good of this nature, it is by God's providence wrapped up in his welfare, whose precious life (as the Orator speaks) is Vita quaedam publica, the very breath of our nostrils perfumed with multitude of comforts. L●…a. 4.20. What then remains, but that our thankfulness should result from all, to make our happiness complete? that so both receiving what we desire, and retributing what we owe, we may give cause unto all Kingdoms to lengthen this acclamation, and to say, Happy both Prince and people which are in such a case. So I have done with the first general part of the text, the path of Prosperity, answerable to the civil respect of the day. I now proceed to the second, the path of Piety, answerable to the Religious respect; Yea, happy. It's the best wine to the last, though all men be not of this opinion. You shall hardly bring a worldly man to think so. The world is willing enough to misconstrue the order of the words, and to give the priority to Civil happiness, as if it were first in dignity, because 'tis first named: they like it better to hear of the Cui sic, than the Cui Dominus. To prevent this folly, the Psalmist interposeth a caution in this corrective particle, Yea, Happy. It hath the force of a revocation, whereby he seems to retract what went before, not simply and absolutely, but in a certain degree, lest worldly men should wrest it to a misinterpretation. It is not an absolute revocation, but a comparative; it doth not simply deny that there is some part of popular happiness in these outward things, but it prefers the spirituals before them: Yea, that is, Yea more, or, Yea rather: like that of Christ in the Gospel, When one in the company blessed the womb that bore him, Luk. 11.28. he presently replies, Yea, rather blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it. In like manner the Prophet David, having first premised the inferior part and outside of an happy condition; fearing lest any should of purpose mistake his meaning, and hearing the first proposition, should either there set up their rest, and not at all take in the second; or if take it in, yet do it preposterously, and give it the precedence before the second, according to the world's order, virtus post nummos: In this respect he puts in the clause of revocation; whereby he shows, that these outward things, though named first, yet they are not to be reputed first. The particle Yea removes them to the second place: it tacitly transposeth the order; and the path of piety, which was locally after, it placeth virtually before. 'Tis as if he had said, Did I call them happy, who are in such a case? Nay, miserable are they, if they be only in such a case: The temporal part cannot make them so without the spiritual. Admit the windows of the visible heaven were opened, and all outward blessings poured down upon us; admit we did perfectly enjoy whatsoever the vastness of the earth contains in it: tell me, What will it profit to gain all, and to lose God? If the earth be bestowed upon us, and not heaven; or the material heaven be opened, and not the beatifical; or the whole world made ours, and God not ours: we do not arrive at happiness. All that is in the first proposition is nothing, unless this be added, Yea, happy are the people which have the LORD for their God. You see in this part there is aliquid quod eminet, something which is transcendent: Therefore I will inquire into two particulars; see both what it is that transcends, and what is the manner of propounding of it. The manner of propounding it, is, as I said, corrective, or by way of revocation: the sum whereof is thus much, That temporals without spirituals, in what abundance soever we possess them, cannot make us truly happy. They cannot make happy, because they cannot make good. They may denominate a man to be rich, or great, or honourable; but not to be virtuous. Nay, Seneca carrieth it a little further, Non modò non faciunt bonum, sed nec divitem; They are so fare from making a man good, that they make him not truly rich; because they increase desire, and riches consist in contentation. Not he that hath little, but he that desires more is poor: nor he that hath much, but he that wants nothing is rich. Yea, and we may go further than Seneca; They are so fare from making good, that they often make evil, if they be not sanctified: they possess the heart with vile affections, fill it full of carnal and sinful desires. Whereas there are four good mothers which bring forth ill daughters, prosperity is one. Truth begets hatred, security danger, familiarity contempt, prosperity pride and forgetfulness of God. In this I might well make a stop; but there is one degree more: They are so fare from making good, that they do not bring good, but many evils and inconveniences. They bring not the good of contentment, but infinite distractions: they are aureae compedes, as S. Bernard speaks, fetters or manacles which entangle the soul, that it cannot attend upon better things: Nor the good of freedom: they do enthrall the soul to that which is worse than itself; and it cannot be apprehended how a thing worse than ourselves can make us happy. Lastly, not the good of safety: for they oftentimes expose us to dangers, Mulios sua felicitas stravit, as Gregory speaks. Many men their lives had been longer, if their riches had been less: their happiness made them miserable; & consolationes factae sunt desolationes, as S. Bernard again. Upon these grounds the Psalmist had very good reason to sequester them from true happiness, and, by this corrective particle, to reduce them to the second place, though he set them in the first. He knew very well that they are burdens, snares, impediments to piety, as often as furtherances. He knew them to be vain and transitory things, Prov. 23.5. that we cannot hold. They make themselves wings, as Solomon speaks. They are only the moveables of happiness, Bractealis felicitas, as Seneca; 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, as Nazianzen. What's that? S. Austin seems to translate it, felicitas fallax, a fabulous and personate felicity: Nay, not only fallax, but falsa, fictitious, spurious, deceitful, which leaves the soul empty when it most fills it: that being most true which the same Father adds, felicitas fallax, major infelicitas; & falsa felicitas, vera miseria. Therefore, that I may shut up this point, let this be the use of it. We must learn from hence to regulate our judgements according to the wisdom of the Spirit revealed in the word: And that we may do, if we keep to God's method, and set every thing in the due place, where God hath seated it. Now the Scripture constantly doth give the inferior place to these temporal things. If to come after, be inferior; it sets them there: Seek first the kingdom of God, etc. Matth. 6.33. If to be below be inferior, it placeth them there: Set your affection on things above, etc. Coloss. 3.2. Even gold and silver, the best of these things, they are seated under the feet of men, and the whole world under the feet of a Christian, Rev. 12.1. to teach us to despise it. Lastly, if to be on the left hand, be inferior; the Scripture reckons them there too: they are called the blessings of the lest hand, to teach us to give them the same place in our affections. In one sense, we may put them on the right, by using them to God's glory: but in love and esteem they must be on the left. S. Hierome illustrates it by this similitude: As flax when it is on the distaff, it is on the left hand; but when it is spun into yarn, and put on the spindle, it is on the right: so temporal things in themselves, when first we receive them, they are as flax on the distaff, all this while on the left hand; but spin them forth, and use them to God's glory, they are as yarn on the spindle, transposed to the right. Thus we must learn to order them: to the right hand only for use, to the left for valuation. Otherwise, if we pervert God's order, and put them on the right; it is to be feared they will set us on the left at the day of judgement: if we elevate them above, they will keep us below; and make us come after, if we set them before. The highest place they can have, is to be seconds to piety: there holy David placeth them though he mentions piety last, yet he giveth it the precedence in this word of revocation, Yea, happy; that is, Yea first, yea more, yea more truly happy. That shall serve for the first particular, the manner of propounding this truth unto us. The second is the thing itself which transcends, in these words, whose God is the LORD, or, who have the LORD for their God. In the general it is an ordinary, as well as transcendent. An ordinary, because all partake of this privilege. Whereupon S. Austin asks the question, Cujus non est Deus? But S. Hierome resolves it; Naturâ Deus omnium, voluntate paucorum: In a community the God of all, even to the sparrow on the house top, and grass of the field; but the God of the righteous after a peculiar manner. To come to the meaning; we must let go the general, this ordo communis providentiae, as he is Dominus omnium, the Lord of all creatures: this brings not happiness along with it: God's ordinary and general providence entitles not to that supreme blessedness, which is in himself. The special references are only intended: and those we may reduce to these two heads. The first is ordo specialis influxûs, on God's part, the respect of his being gracious to us. Then the Lord is our God, when he shows himself benign and propitious, when he manifests his mercy and goodness in the ways of grace and means of salvation. It is so expounded Psalm 65.4. Blessed is the man whom thou choosest: and Psalm 33.12. Blessed is the nation, whose God is the LORD, and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance. Being thus taken, it affords us this meditation, That there is no true happiness, but in the favour of God, and light of his countenance; that is, in God himself: both because happiness is only from him, he is the only author of it: Non facit beatum hominem, nisi qui secit hominem;— Qui dedit ut homines simus, solus dat ut beati simus; He only makes Saints who makes men: 'tis S. Austin's elegant expression. Then again, as it is only from God, so it is only in God. As the soul, saith Austin is vita carnis; so God is the beata vita hominis, so fully, that a man cannot be happy either way, nec absque Deo, nec extra Deum: not without God, because he is the Donor; not out of God, because he is the thing itself, and all which belongs to it. As S. Ambrose of the four beatitudes in S. Luke compared with the eight in S. Matthew; In istis octo illae quatuor sunt, & in ist is quatuor illae octo: and as King Porus, when Alexander asked him how he would be used, answered in one word, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, that is, like a King. Alexander again replying, Do you desire nothing else? No, saith he: all things are in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, So in this which we are now about it holds much more: both the four, and the eight, and all beatitudes, they are in God; so that he who hath God, must needs have all things, because God is all things. There is no notion under which we can couch beatitude, but we may find it in God by way of eminency: if as a state of joy, or glory, or wealth, or tranquillity, or security, God is all these: if as a state of perfection, salvation, retribution; God is all these: not only the giver of the reward, but the reward itself; both our bonum, and our summum. A Christian is never truly happy; till he can find himself and all things in God. The fruition of God, it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 (as Pelusiota speaks) the very top of the spire or pinnacle of beatitude both here and in heaven. In hoc uno summitas beatitudinis eliquatur, to use Tertullia's words. Were a man in paradise, were he in heaven itself, and had not God; he could not be happy. Were he on Job's dunghill, in daniel's den, in the belly of hell with Jonah, nay in the infernal hell with Dives, and yet had God; he could not be miserable: for heaven is wheresoever God is, because his influxive presence maketh heaven. That's the Ordo influxûs I mentioned, for which he is said to be our God. Besides this, there is ordo Divini cultûs, on our part, The respect of our being serviceable to him: when we love him, and fear him, and honour him, and adhere unto him as we ought. To all these there is blessedness pronounced in several Psalms: to those that fear him, Psal. 128.1. to those that keep his testimonies, Psal. 119.2. to those that trust in him, Psal. 84.12. If we take it thus, the point is this in sum, There is no true happiness, but in the worship and service of God: Felice's sunt qui Deo vivunt, that's S. Bernard's: Servire Deo est regnare, that's S. Ambrose his expression: As much as this, The godly man is only the true happy man. Yet we must understand it aright: It is not to serve him only in outward profession, which either makes us his, or him ours. There are many who pretend to serve him, who cannot challenge this interest: for they serve him but with their lips; in act, themselves and their own pleasures: in this both hypocrites and idolaters, that under the show of one God set up many to themselves. The Epicure he makes his belly his God, the lascivious man his lust, the voluptuous man his pleasure, the factious man his humour, the covetous man his mammon. I name this last. It is the observation of S. Austin, in his 7 book De Civitate Dei, and of Lactantius in his second De Origine Erroris, That avarice gives laws to religion, whilst generally sub obtentu Numinis cupiditas colitur. Yea, and S. Paul expresseth it more punctually, That covetousness is idolatry, Col. 3.5. And the covetous man an idolater, Ephes. 5.5. For he doth the same to his gold, that the heathen did to their idols: he makes his gold his God; his God, because his joy, and his care, and his confidence: Those pictures he worships, though otherwise he abhors idols; to these he offers his service, he gives them his heart, he extols them, ascribes unto them the glory of his happiness: These are thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt: this money got thee such a preferment, procured such a deliverance, prevailed in such a suit. It's the secret idolatry which runs through the world. But such men as these, they are as fare from God as from his service, and as fare from happiness as from God. Whosoever will make sure of the Lord to be his God, he must put the idols out of his heart, he must go out of himself, he must not willingly harbour any sin. Sin separates from God, excludes from happiness, cuts off both privileges, of God's being ours, and our being God's. Yet there is one thing more; with which I will conclude: Since it is so, that happiness is seated in these mutual intercurrences, of calling the Lord our God, and ourselves his people; and seeing religion is the Vinculum unionis, which makes these mutual interests intercurrent, and couples them together; it follows as the upshot of all, That the chief and choicest part of Nationall happiness consists in the purity of God's worship, in the enjoying of God's ordinances, in the free passage of the Gospel; that is, in the truth and integrity of religion. In this alone there are all sweets, all beauties, all blisses, all glories. It is as the ark of God to Israel, and as the golden candlestick to the Churches, the elevating principle which advanceth a Christian Nation above the heathen, and the reformed Churches above other Christian Nations, and this Island in which we live (I may say without arrogancy) above all. There is no Nation in the world, which hath had the condition of religion so pure and prosperous, as we, for almost these hundred years. It's true, if God calls us to account, we cannot say that we have answered our opportunities: we find not wherein to boast of our righteousness; for we are a sinful people, whose lives (for the most part of us) are as much worse, as our means and professions better than in other places. It is true also, that of later years the love of religion in most hath grown cold, and the purity by some hath been stained and corrupted: and I will not now discuss where the fault hath been; the rather, because it is every man's endeavour to remove it from himself. Only I will add thus much, That wheresoever the fault is, there is no man hath showed himself more forward to reform it then the King himself. But Princes cannot always attain their ends according to their liking, because they see with other eyes, and execute with other hands than their own. And if we should cast the faults of men upon authority, we should do wrong (I fear) to those who do not deserve it: for even this very year, notwithstanding the reformation of corruptions hath been with so much zeal and diligence endeavoured, yet the end is not attained: Nay, in some respects, it is so fare set back that, to my understanding, the state of religion hath never been worse since the first reformation, than this present year: in respect, first, of the greatness of our distractions, which have divided us all one from another: then, of the multitude of sects and sectaries which cry indeed, as the Jews before them, Templum Domini; but with a worse addition, ut Templum Domini diruatur. Lastly, in respect of the many dishonours done to the service of God, with so much scorn and scandal to religion, that in foreign parts they question, whether all this time we had any. No doubt all this is come upon us for our sins: let us remove them, and then God will bless our study of reformation. But yet in the mean time let us remember that message, which the good Bishop sent to Epiphanius, Domine, sol ad oscasum descendit. Our sunshine is but yet declining; it may come to set, if we now begin to disgust this greatest blessing of religion, which God hath bestowed upon us. Let us learn to regard it more, to love it better, to bless God for it, and for his government who upholds it: a Prince so devout and religious in his own person, that if all were like him, we should have a Kingdom of Saints. In this respect, we may use Velleius his words of his Majesty, Cùm sit imperio Maximus, exemplo Major est: The lustre of his piety surpasseth the lustre of his empire. If therefore that of Synesius be true, That men generally affect to write after the copies which are set by their Princes; it behoves us all, both to take out the lesson, and to bless God for the copy. And moreover, as this day puts us in mind, let us all send up our most affectionate prayers, that his Throne may be established by Righteousness, his Crown exalted with Honour, his Sceptre be for power like Moses rod, for flourishing like Aaron's; that his happy reign may in himself outlive us all, and in his posterity be perpetuated to all generations; that succeeding ages may confess, Surely God hath been favourable unto this land, and hath not dealt so with any Nation. O how happy are the people that are in such a case! Yea, how happy are the people which have the Lord for their God FINIS.