ΛΟ'ΓΟΙ ' ΩΡΑ▪ ΙΟΙ.  
THREE SEASONABLE SERMONS The First Preached at St. MARY'S IN Cambridge, May 31. 1642.  
The Others designed for public Auditories, but prevented.  
By Tho. Stephens, M. A.  
LONDON, Printed by J.C. for John Crook at the Ship in St. Paul's Churchyard.   

A PREFACE to the READER.  
Christian Reader,  
WHatsoever Title this book carries in the Front of it, thou mayst well censure me, for having been instant out of Season, in obtruding more Sermons upon the World; at this time especially, when the Pulpit hath almost justled the desk out of the Church, and all Religion seems locked up in the Preachers lips: When every Young Stripling is ready (with Ahimaaz) to run before he be sent: yea, and to outrun the Cushis too, which have true tidings in their mouths; and knows nothing, only tells you of tumults, such perhaps as he has raised by the beating of the pulpit-drum.  — Et quorum pars magna fult— 
Such (like the fish Sepia) cast their black infusions upon the waters in which they Swim, and by staining them, do hope not only to secure themselves from being taken, but to poison others too, which delight in clearer streams. Mistake me not in this: I admire, I adore this Ordinance of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this power of God unto salvation: But it is then only, when it is God's ordinance: when it doth not resist another ordinance of God: when the throne is not pulled down to make room for the Doctor's chair; and the word of God made a vizor to cover the deformities of Satan's Ministers. When Corah and his confederates (notwithstanding their pretended Holiness) shall contend with Aaron for a share in holy Administrations; true Israelites will separate from their Congregations. Neither can I admire Saul (any mad frantic Enthusiast) although among the Prophets. The condition of that patiented is very deplorable, to whom poison is administered by an unskilful empiric, instead of Cordials and Restoratives; and the state of that people is no less desperate, when a lying Spirit in the Mouths of the pretended Prophets, shall persuade them to go up to fight to their own destruction. 'tis true that Faith cometh by hearing. But it is by hearing the word of God, not commented upon by the Devil: for as preaching at first begat faith, in our days it has ushered in heresies, profaneness, Libertinism, I had almost said Infidelity.  
The snuffing of these new lights is the design of these following sheets: Which were intended for the public long ago; even then when these Calves of Bethel bleated loudest: and so they may secure the Author from the sinister end of time serving. But alas 〈◊〉 may remember the days (and oh that we could not remember them) when the mouth of the Ox was muzzled: even that Ox that trod out the corn, might neither low nor eat: Never did Nation run more in parallel to Israel, 2 Chron. 15.3. which for a long time had been without a true God, and without a teaching Priest, and without a Law. 'tis true, God's cause was cried up, but God's Vicegerent pulled down; teachers we had many, but teaching priests but a few, saul's footmen had turned against them, because their hands had been with David. And a Law we had still, Veruntamen inclusum in tabulis, tanquam gladium in vagina reconditum A law clasped up in our Bibles; but pulled down in our Churches: when the bear reading of the ten Commandments (the fifth especially) was cause enough of a sequestration.  
But blessed be God, who out of mercy to his Church (than visibly ruined) did still preserve a remnant in Israel, many thousands that never bowed their knee to Baal; though some of them were hid in caves and fed by stealth: blessed be God that suffered not our lamp to be quite extinguished, although it burned in the Socket, but kept it light, till there was fresh Oil and better times to trim it in. Blessed be God that although the eyes of our Elyes be waxed dim, yet before the lamp of God be quite gone out in the Temple of the Lord, they have time still to call some samuel's to the ministration: Ancient men [I know) that have seen the first house (as in Ezra's days) may weep with a loud voice, to find our Church go less, less both in power at home and reputation abroad; yet that noise of weeping may be drowned with shouting aloud for joy, that God has left us a remnant to escape, and given us a nail in his holy place, and lightened our eyes, and given us a reviving in our bondage. Ezra 9.8. So that although Jachin our establishment be shaken, yet Boaz our strength stands upon its basis still.  
'Tis fabled of the old Arcadians (who fancied themselves to be born before the moon) that,  — Occiduum long Titana secuti Desperare diem— 
— They followed the setting Sun to their utmost borders, and there they bade good Night to light, despairing of a second day. But we need no Poetical illustrations to set a gloss upon our true fears; Many a bleeding heart and weeping eye attended upon England's funeral when our Sun was set, and we could expect nothing but an eternal night of horror and confusion; when the bloody and barbarous Regicides, could not believe the King was sure enough, till they had murdered the Kingdom too, and in the place of it had foisted in a misshapen monster called by them a Commonwealth: but an almighty power hath called light out of darkness; he hath said to dead bones, live, and whereas in other acts of providence we may see his finger, here with his own right hand and holy arm he hath gotten himself the victory. Far be it from me, to rake in the Ashes where the coals of division lie buried up, and for want of Air will soon be extinguished; the wound is closed, and I hope so perfectly cured that it will never fester at the bottom to need a second opening. Christ's coat was seamless; I dare not rend it. Tros Tyriusve— True Trojan or false. Carthaginian shall never more be terms of difference: And since his Sacred Majesty in his most Gracious Declaration has desired and ordained that hence forward all Notes of discord separation and difference of parties be utterly abolished, I will not be so uncharitable a Christian, or so disloyal a subject to disobey such just commands. Especially remembering the Prophetical judgement of that blessed Saint and glorious Martyr King CHARLES I. That none will be more loyal & faithful to his Majesty, than those Subjects who sensible of their errors and his injuries will feel in their own souls most vehement motives to repentance, and earnest desires to make some reparations for their former defects. Those hands which have been deepest died in blood if they prove eminent supporters of the throne will be washed from their former guilt:  
Scire piget post tale decus quid fecerat ante,  
Hanc vidi, satis est hanc mihi nosse manum.  
Now that God, that baptised us all into one body whether Jews or gentiles, whether bond or free, unite all interests into the grand concernment of peace and righteousness.  
Having therefore this charity for others I cannot have a distrust of theirs to me, by a suspicion that this Paraenesis to Loyalty will seem unseasonable to any, although it was prepared for the most disloyal times: For the first of these Sermons was preached in the University immediately after his Majesty of blessed memory had retired into the North to avoid the rude and unseemly deportment of the tumultuous rabble so to escape the raging of the waters and the madness of the People: Where the acceptance which it found arose not from any intrinsic worth it had (I dare not flater myself with so vain a conceit) but from the suitableness of the subject to the affections of that learned and religious Auditory; For the good King having lately passed that way, had left so deep an impression upon the hearts of the Loyal Students that any man was welcome to them who was a memoria (his shall I say? Or) their Remembrancer of him: And here it had died with that Generation that soon after passed away, had it not come to the knowledge of some of our Countrey-Committee-men, four years after (some men have long ears) for whom I have reason to bless God, who raised them up as instruments to make me be thought worthy to suffer any thing for that righteous cause. 
Doctor Holdsworth,  Yet the Reverend and pious Vicechancellor obliged me then to another course; to supply which, the Second Sermon was prepared, (upon a Text which had been blasphemed in that Pulpit not long before) which happened soon after the Signal battle of Edghill. But alas! when I came to suck the breasts of my dear Mother I found them rubbed over with gall and wormwood; The Scene was changed Athens was turned to a Mars' hill. The Music of Apollo's harp could not he heard for the noise of trumpets: For on the night before, that MAN OF BLOOD came down with a troop of horse, which was then his only command (the Cockatrice at that time was but an egg) and had blocked up the Pulpit with his Janissaries; so that prudence bade me retire, unless I would mingle my blood with my sacrifice.  
The third Sermon was composed for a Visitation, at what Time I (the unworthiest of those that wait upon God's Altars) by the favour of a Reverend Prelate, was nominated to an Ecclesiastical dignity. But those places fell in the day of God's Visitation, and the Sermon proved abortive. If any thing contained in them may conduce to the settlement of Church and State, or inflame thee to a conscionable discharge of thy duty in reference to both, I have my end. Give God the glory; and let him have the benefit of thy prayers who is,  
Thine in all Christian Offices T. Stephens. Bury St. Edm. June 6. 1660.   
Judges 21. 25. In those days there was no King in Israel; every man did that which was right in their own eyes. 
THen those days have been, and they have been in Israel too; we have Scripture for it, says our Fanatic, and why may they not be again? This place I confess is plain enough, and as well urged on this occasion, as his, who maintained his heterodox opinions from St. Paul's position, Cor. 1.11. Of necessity heresies must be amongst you— But woe be to that man by whom these things come to pass. When Every man must be his own Carver, and sits Judge upon his own actions, there is no King indeed, but whole legions of Tyrants; each domineering affection, every lusting thought, all Bastards-off-spring, the unreasonable appetites of our reasonable souls, will Lord it over us: Take away this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must needs follow: Kings we may have still, but no Subjects to obey; every man will be his own Ruler, yet every man as unruly as he was before.  
Where there is so much confusion in the text, you can expert no curious method in the prosecution of it. An Anarchy and the effects of it do divide it. Israel had no King, there is the Fountain: but the rivulets streaming from it, they are divers: there is division enough in the effects: as many parts as men, every man has his share, they are all in action, and actions speciously good too, they are every man doing right, if themselves may be both judge and parties. Their eyes are the Lesbian rules which measure the works of their hands: Physiologers tell us a crooked object is received into the eye by straight beams: Crooked things may seem straight; that may be right in our eyes, which is wrong in God's eyes, that notwithstanding we walk in the ways of our own heart, and in the sight of our own eyes, Eccl. 9 9 Yet for all these things God will bring us into Judgement.  
My Text will bear no long Doctrinal discourse, neither know I whether I may more properly call it a history of those times or a prophecy of these: for I am sure (mutato nomine) we are as deeply concerned in it, as the Jews themselves. I shall briefly, but more plainly acquaint you with the story, then in the Analogy make application to ourselves.  
When the pleasure of God had called the People of Israel, to be his own peculiar inheritance, he did not presently and at the first, establish one perpetual form of Government, or set the imperial Crown upon the head of his Anointed, but ushers in the Royalty of a King (which Abraham enjoyed long before in a Prototype by way of promise, Gen. 17.) with some inferior subordination of power: from Captains he gave them Judges, next to them his Prophets, than Judges back again: as if Almighty God contrived a way, how best, and upon the best experience, he might be a safeguard to his own people. But when these undertitles could not prevail against the daring outrages and bold presumptions of the tribes, he than exalts his throne, creates his Viceroy; the old Scoene disappears, and he discovers his King upon his holy hill of Zion. And here he stops; no change from hence: St. Austin proves it for this cause the best because it was the last, no supersedeas, no removal from it. Thus as the Epigrammatist congratulates diseases and honours them with the title of the first inventors of Physic, we may bless the sores of the Common wealth which did produce so Sovereign a salve, or rather bless God which did prepare an Antidote for, yet out of such abominable Villainies.  
For in this interregnum of judiciary power, when the sins of the people had devoured their Judges (as the Prophet speaks, Hosea 7.7.) when Owle-eyed iniquity durst see the Sun (Da Phaebe veniam si quid illicitum tui videre vultus!) and the high hand of sin disdained the coercive power of their petty Magistrates; God raises up a new succession of Princes, a race of Kings, which might suppress such insolences. Which were so notorious in this evening of the Judges, when their authority was now a setting, that the holy Spirit records three stories unparallelled by any place of Scripture. And lest the cause of all might be mistaken, four times in these four Chapters, the same words are again repeated, In those days, when those were acted, there was no King in Israel:  
First Micah) from a converted thief turns a superstitious innovator. He made an Idol of the Silver before, or else he would never have stolen it; but now emptying his soul of one Devil, he gives another free entertainment. Should our true service of God Almighty be half so dear, I fear his Temples would not be so well customed. But what he got lightly, he spends as liberally: Out go the eleven hundred shekels, quantum nummorum servat in arca, tantum habet & fidei; his religion was as high prized as his money could purchase; God's house was not enough for him, he must have an house of Gods, an Ephod and a Teraphim, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pretty new found Deities, which must preserve their maker, give a well-being to him who but just now gave them their being.  
The Old Woman his mother (a sex well skilled in such new-fangled religions) she likes very well of this new stamped devotion, and gives a blessing to him who brought a curse upon her and all her family.  
But what shall we do for a Priest to officiate to his golden vanity. Oh! Micahs very good at creating: His reverence cannot only consecrate a God but ordain his Minister too: Holy orders are very cheap, where religion itself is at a loss; A God of gold cannot easily want servants, there will be some Chryses, some Calchis left. Rather than fail his Son shall be consecrated; the Hebrew word (if you look in your margins to the 5th. verse of the 17. Chap, of this b●ok) is (he filled the hand of his Son) engagement enough to this following service; once fill the hand and you have heart and all: We would not care so much for consecration, if the golden breastplate did not accompany it.  
Yet lest his new born piety may want some specious pretence, a poor Journeyman Levite is heard of, such one as God curses. 1 Sam. 2.36. That he shall come and crouch and say, put me into the Priest's office that I may eat a morsel of bread: Such a Titivillitius I say upon high way of acquaintance shall be content for 10. shekels of Silver, a suit of  and victuals besides, to covenant to serve this Idol-God: thus is our Familist confirmed in his new moulded Frame of devotion, his independent congregation, and all this while, there was no King in Israel.  
Next come your Danites, and there is a Tribe, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, there is danger in a multitude, they have hands as well to practise as heads to plot their mischiefs: A private thief may abound with spoils, but when a whole army turns pillagers that Country must needs be desolate. Well! what fair mask did their vice borrow to cover this insolence? Their Country forsooth was too little for them, their climate was too cold. Five Brethren must be sent out for spies to discover the fatness of the land, that they might come and taste of the cup which flowed with milk and honey: These as they pass by Micah's house, hear the Levites voice which sojourned there; sure he had good lungs, that his tongue could so easily take acquaintance with the highway travellers: Ten pound a year will be soon talked out, if he speak so loud: but hearing him, they must needs hear something from him; An exhortation from him will crown the work which they are in hand with: an act of blood if the pulpit bless it, must needs carry the Lord with it? He bids them go in peace, encouragement enough for them to prepare for waar.  
Laish is their next stage, a quiet, careless, secure people, qui damna nec metuunt nec parant, as free from fearing danger as intending of it. With these glad tidings they return and enrich the Danites ears: They now most truly make up jacob's their Father's prophecy Gen. 49.17. they turn Serpents by the way and Adders in the path. Albertus tells us, the Nature of the Creature is to fly from a clothed man, but to set upon him if they find him naked: The Maacathites and Geshurites which live amongst them, are armed men, let them alone 'tis dangerous meddling with them; but secure Laish had neither strength nor men to aid it, the Zidonians were at a far distance, six hundred fight men well appointed might do good service there: The land is very good, why sit you still, arise, make haste, enter and possess it.  
But Micahs house afforded them so good entertainment in their first journal, hat they'll not balk it now in their second progress. We have found idolatry upon Mount Ephraim, say the spies; an Ephod and a Teraphim, a graven Image and a molten Image, fine golden Idols, all of Micah's making, let us invite them on this journey with us: And there is a Levite too, no doubt but he will be content, to follow his golden Gods, and then assuredly we shall go and prosper.  
Well! however they loved their Idols well, (or else they would never have built high places to them afterward) sure I am they loved the gold better: Micah's house is rifled, his Oratory spoiled; his guardian Gods could not now defend themselves: Sacrilege and Burglary are met together; and that false hireling Levite whom he took for his Priest, and Father proves his betrayer. He stands to make good the passage amongst the armed men in the gate, En filii tunicam: his linen Ephod is turned into a coat of Male, and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, his place he changed, but not his office: He thought it safer offending with a multitude; a Tribe in Israel, or two factious Towns of that one Tribe, Zorah, & Eshtaol, may well secure an Idol Priest who goes triumphing in the midst of the Cutthroats.  
If his Mr. Micah come crying after for restitution, he may be answered in the wolves language to the Crane, who plucked the sheepsbone out of his throat. Away thou fool thank me thou hast thy head, which I might have so easily snapped off when I had thy long bill in my mouth: Speak softly Micah, these are angry fellows, and if thou talk much of thy Gods, thou mayst lose thy Life, and all: Our next work is to plunder Laish to put all the inhabitants to the sword, and fire the City. And all this while, there was no King in Israel.  
Lastly, that no society, neither of Families, Tribes, or Cities might be clear, whilst the Danites are bathing themselves in innocent blood, the Citizens of Gibeah are acting a wickedness, far more horrid, much more barbarous: A poor Levite of Mount Ephraim, whom love and charity had reconciled to his offending Concubine, takes a weary journey after her to Bethlem Juda, and overtaking her he was so far from putting her to the shame which the public Law required against adultery, that he makes honourable provision for her more easy and speedy return; there is a couple of Asses with bread, and wine, and provender, himself, and a servant to attender her. After some complemental interchanges of courtesy with his Father-in-law, he gins his journey homeward: Whilst the Sun shaming to behold the barbarous act of the Gibeonites sets upon him: Well, Gibeah he enters, when the courtesy of the inhabitants afforded him the high way for his lodging place, where the Earth might be his bed, and the Heavens his Canopy; for what should a Man of God do in a house of one of these Sons of Belial? And this is the portion of honest Levites. The young Fellow in the last story that mouthed it so well that his voice might be known at distance, found better entertainment at Micah's hand. Once sell your Conscience and you may soon buy Respect. You need not be a Priest to Idols as he was: the People will make an Idol of you, fall down and worship you.  
It happens that a poor old labouring man, a sojourner there among them, a stranger, it seems, to them, but more to their incivility, as he returned home from the field, spied these new guests of their city: He hails to them friendly, invites them to his homely cottage, and courteously embraces them: When after provision of such simple delicates, as his not curious palate had provided for himself, they cheer themselves in the freest expressions of loving souls. But their mirth is soon blasted: The noise of violence is a Voider to the Feast. The house is beset by Incubuses, those hot Devils will not be cooled unless the Stranger be given out to satiate their lusts. We may wonder no longer why they were no freer to entertain him in their houses, since we find by experience, that they exposed him in the streets, that they might the more easily expose him to their injuries.  
Well, to avoid this nefandum, this unheard of wickedness, a less mischief is embraced: his Concubine is offered up as a Sacrifice to those Devils; whom they ravish, nay ravish her to death; These were the acts which were so good in their own eyes: Idolatry in Families, Burglary in Counties, Rapes in Cities, and all these because there was no King in Israel.  
And good reason for it. For first a King amongst them would, Secondly none but a King, could curb such licentious practices; he would I say, for he is the Minister of God which beareth not the sword in vain. Rom. 13. He is God's avenger and executes his wrath on evil doers; It is the cowardly nature of sin that it flies away from the Magistrate though it be gathered into a Troop, like a heard of deer from a bearded Lion: Like the Lacedaemonian Servants, who durst not adventure themselves, after they had made a rebellious head, into their Master's presence, although they came armed with nothing but switches in their hands: and this, whether their inward guilt affright them, or Gods mark on his Anointed charm them to obedience. 'Twas quivering Orestas' reply in Euripides (before his fault was published) to that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉; what  shakes thee? ' oh 'twas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉; 'twas a cold fit of conscience which would end in a burning fit of hell. And I am persuaded that it was something more than our Saviour Christ's Divinity which amazed that band Soldiers with their cursed Captain Judas, when they came to take him John 18. that they went backward and fell to the ground: Something more I say: For should he have called his Divine Power to assist him, he might have commanded ten thousand of Legions of Angels to have rescued him; nor would he the second time so freely have offered himself into their hands.  
Then for the other, God hath bestowed upon all Magistrates an especial Character, to secure them from any dangerous conspiracies: Touch not mine anointed, (says David,) Chro. 1.16. my Messiah saith the Original; as if the brow of Majesty were the nearest draught, the liveliest representation of Almighty God: from hence they were honoured in the purest times by the best Christians with such appellations as did befit their greatness; their words, divalis jussio the audible voice of God, their presence, sacravestigia, the clearest footsteps of the Deity.  
But than secondly, no other Estate or order could, at least could so well suppress such daring impieties; de facto we find they did not, not that they wanted an established form of Government, for we cannot believe that God would leave his People destitute: An interregnum of Judges here we find, from Sampsons' death to Samuel: But High-Priests still contiuned. Yet what power had they, when Corahs' infection (like Pliny's seeds kept many ages in the ground before they sprout,) began now to grow again, and every Micah durst dispense his holy Orders, and consecrate a Priest of his own, good enough for a Religion of his own inventing? And for their Judges (had they at that time enjoyed them) whether Evil Success under them, or Cruel Oppression by them, had so alienated the people's minds, that in the very next generation, Sam. 1.8. finding Samuel sons turning aside after lucre, and taking bribes, and perverting judgement, they with one mouth cry out for a King, for a King in Israel, which might appoint every man to do that which is right, not in their own eyes, but in the eyes of God.  
Let us now make Israel our looking glass, and compare both our Estates and Actions together, that thus laying these two crooked lines together, we may between them draw a right one, a right one, not as we ourselves, but as our Overseers, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, those which watch over us, shall determine.  
First where have we any City, nay any Street, nay almost any Family, where Micah and his Mother, private Spirits, have not set up their Idols, their new stamped divinity? which Proteus-like changes shapes so oft, that two days old 'tis grown out of knowledge: Error I have heard ere now compared to Hydra that monster with a hundred heads, but still the crown of truth was constancy: the Eldest Daughter of Almighty God, and so took place from her Father's titles, and she was always one and the same: But sure in these days she hath either degenerated into error or borrowed so much of the nature of it, as that she's as various as the minds of those which are the assertors of her: and as Micahs Idols are here raised out of that stock which he first stole from his Mother's coffers, the mint of our Religions most commonly are some old wife's traditions, which new molten and new moulded work so deep an impression in our credulous souls, that they justle out the most solemn, devout, essential, divine parts of our service of God: Blasphemous wretches! (I tremble to speak what these ears have heard) who durst accuse our Saviour of indiscretion, and his Apostles of presumption, for leaving two such Legacies, a Prayer and a Creed to the succeeding Church: Nay the very Canon of holy Scripture must wait for approbation in their corner Synodals, or else be no longer Canonical: Blessed Saviour! thou didst once extort a Confession together with the blood of the Apostate Julian that his wounds opened their mouths with a Vicisti Gallilaee, now Christ thou hast the upper hand: Arise O God, plead thine Own cause, remember how the foolish man reproacheth thee daily: forget not the voice of thine enemies, the presumption of them that hate thee increaseth ever more and more.  
For Micahs dispencing holy Orders to his Son, alas we can spare that Labour, there is a rank smell of Popery breathed out of the very name of Orders: Orders do suppose distinctions. We can be every man his own Priest: witness our Anabaptists the new sprung sect of Sebaptists and our other Familists; we can pray for ourselves, instruct ourselves, Baptise ourselves, bless ourselves, curse ourselves, and what you will: Dii talem terris avertite pestem!  
And yet perhaps if some young Levite with a lusty voice will take ten shekels and a suit of , he may be put into employment. Pudeat dicere Academici! ex nobis nostra est perditio; the Vipers which have eaten through the bowels of the Church are our own offsprings: These creep into the Pulpit, God knows from whence, as some customary birds at the time of the year into hollow trees, where out of zealous ignorance they dare declaim against all Authority as Antichristian, all antiquity as heretical, all moral-learning as in itself damnable, which I confess is the best plea for their own ignorance.  
The old Egyptians in their Hieroglyphical Characters made the Hyaena a Symbol of Heresy, which beast (if we believe Aristotle) had the power to blind the Shepherds and make the Dogs dumb, then counterfeiting the Pastor's voice, the simple Sheep came at their call and so were devoured by them: whether Nature's Storehouse have furnished the World with such a traitorous brood of creatures I will not here determine. But I am sure Religion has found too many of them. They creep into Congregations and blind the eyes of the Lawful Pastors, and perhaps have insinuated so far into the hearts of the Assembly that they make him dumb too, he may not be heard to speak: his Bells are cracked, his Pomegranates have lost their Savour: These are the only Spokesmen, and that so loud, that the spies that travel by, may hear them, but the poor sheep, which dance attendance to their deceitful voice, escape well if they lose nothing but their fleeces: Our Saviour Christ in 23 Math. 14. gives us intimation of such as upon a pretence of long prayers devour Widows houses; I doubt, the woe comes down to these times: I'm sure the Levite here with Micahs Religion had packed away Micahs Estate too, if we look narrower to it: for that's the poor Man's complaint in the 24. Verse of the 18. Chapter, that he had no more left; and how many sad stories teach us when Souls and bodies, Goods and Goodness, Estates, and Religions, have been shipwrecked altogether. Well: Micahs story that's made up and in all this we have done that which it right in our own eyes.  
Next come the Danites; where I shall not apply the circumstances, there is too much envy would wait upon them: But I am sure we have Zorahs' and Eshtaols enough, factious Towns and Cities, which can furnish us with a tumultuous brood of discontented Brethren, which think their borders are too strait, they must let out their appetites, and make more room for their active souls. And if Micah have a solitary house upon mount Ephraim in the way, let him take heed of pillaging: the suspicion of an Idol within his doors, will be enough co confiscate all his goods and gold too, to this Exchequer; And truly if their Insolency be not kerbed, I believe they will discover many unknown Idolaters: Scarce a Goldsmith's shop shall be passed by, but some graven Image shall be found in it to make it a lawful booty.  
But if the severity of the Law do restrain such private Burglaries, yet God's house is sure to go to it. There be Idols in the Temple: that's watchword enough for a riotous Assembly: force open the Doors, break down the Windows, let the spies enter and the armed men keep the passage: but once in, 'tis not the Altar and Rails will serve them, no the Vestry & the Library, yes the poor man's box shall be suspected to have a golden Image in it: Nay there is no place secure, there is an Idol in the Desk: away with the book of Common-prayer, tear it to pieces: There is an Idol in the Pulpit too, or rather the Priest of Idols; hale him, pull him out, tear off the sacred Vestments from his superstitious shoulders: The Ephod and the Teraphim will not suffice; the Surplice and the Hood: Cherubims and Seraphins must all away, nay the very stones of the pavement shall be torn up, because men kneel upon them; Thus, O God, do they break down the carved works of thy house with axes and Hammars.  
The Prophet David in that Psalm of Lamentations (where he drops as many tears from his eyes as letters from his pen, for the Desolation of the Sanctuary) Psal. 94. complains of the havoc those unruly bands had made in the midst of the Congregations: And the Septuagint Copies, (whether upon a Mistake in the first transcribing, or of set purpose I know not) render that word, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, instead of burning his Synagogue, they say they will forbid his Festivals: And sure between those two there is a most near relation. No readier gap laid open for the neglect of God's Sabbaths, than the profanations of his Holy Temples: If the Beauty of holiness once be lost, there will be very few that will continue Saitors to it: Set a cheap price upon Religion, and it will find but few Customers.  
Yet who shall be the Ringleader to this furious rout, but the young Levite who had covenanted to be Micah's servant? His voice at first called in the Spies to search the house, and now is the joyfullest man to be in the midst of the Assembly. How many cursed Cham's hath our Church found, quae tanquam sorex suo periit indicio, such who are the readiest to discover their Parent's nakedness; such who being Hirelings and not true Shepherds, as our Saviour calls them, John 10. enter not by the door, but climb in some other way, the same are thiefs and robbers.  
Nor yet will this Levite forsake his Golden Gods, he hoped I believe, ere long to have some limb or other of his Idol stamped into lesser pieces and jingle in his pocket. His Mr. Micah was but a private man, and ten shekels but a poor reward for the hazarding of his Soul: but if a Tribe of Israel will entertain him, choose their Religion he'll be their Minister, he'll serve them in it. Although we for ought find, when they were settled where they would be, they cashiered him & Jonathan was consecrated in his stead: 'Tis so with us; Religion is a good cloak though many time's Covetousness and Sacrilege are hid under it. Dionysius plucks off Aesculapius his golden beard in Apollo's Temple, not out of fear of Idolatry lest the people should fall down and worship it, but that he alone might adore it, when it was locked up safe in his own Coffers: Thus all the holiness of some of our Reformers has ere now proved but sacra fames auri: a religious itch their fingers have had to be telling the Gold of the Sanctuary, which hath constantly proved an Achans wedge, corrupted and consumed the heap to which 'twas laid.  
Thus the Danites story that's made up too, and in all this we have done that which is right in our own eyes.  
The Last is the rape in Gibeah: but in sins of that nature we scorn to have patterns set us; we'll out do all examples; that which once was said of Rome, is now more true of England, illic impune peccare licet: we dare sin without control; else what mean those scandalous, adulterous, incestuous copulations, acted as if it were in despite (quam ingeniosa est haec nequitia) under the nose of those Courts which formerly have punished them?  
But closer yet, this Ephraimite was a Levite which travailed thus patiently after his offending Concubines; but returning among the Benjamites, he finds them so far estranged from civil hospitality, that pro disco damnum, lust backed with violence is their most friendly salutations: None here I hope will deny but the Ministers in the Gospel are espoused to their several Congregations: God Almighty is the Father which gives them in this mystical Marriage. Where after much pains and patience, long suffering and meekness they have travailed to reclaim their errors, and call them back to their first Loves: if they pass by the Benjamites (those ravenous wolves which love to devour the prey, and divide the spoil, Gen. 49.27.) 'tis well if they find highway respect, and not be cudgeled out of that too. The Lion's courtesy goes a great way now, (I assure you,) when he did no injury: More likely the young Children of the Bethlemites will meet them in the streets and cry go up thou bald head, go up thou bald head; but for their Concubines the benefices, every man must be better acquainted with them: They will lie with them, that is, Know them, one after another, make their several impropriation of them, and that all night, so long till they have made a custom of it: So that in the morning when this poor Concubine returns to her Lord the Levite, she shall neither have life or heat to comfort him.  
If a poor old Sojourner, one that hath enough to do to secure his own head from violence amongst them, shall take these traveilers under his roof to protect them from the fury of the Citizens, he runs the same danger with them, and well if the prostituting of his own Daughter can quit him from their hands: God's mercy to his Church is such, that he hath always raised up some to vindicate the reputation of it: yet sometimes they are so far overborne that good Obediah, that Patron of the Prophets is every hour in danger of his own destruction 1 Kings 18. And whotsoever shall be so religious as to undertake their Patronage, although he plead not for Bigamy, plurality of Concubines (the old Ephraimite here did not so) but only that they may quietly enjoy the freedom of the place with what the Law of God and nature gives them, yet this very plea may endanger the prostitution of his own Daughter, the publication of his own Estate.  
Thus the Gibeonites story, that's made up too, and in all this we have done that which is right in our own eyes:  
You see the effects are come home to us within our doors, but the cause you will tell me fails: For in these days we have a King in this our Israel: And God be blessed that in these days we have a King: may the days of this King, in himself and his Royal race endure for ever: Yet let me tell you there is no great difference between having no King, and a King no whit obeyed: Or if any be, the latter is the most extreme, if malum culpae exceed that of poenae; for so we altar it from a punishment of God to a sin of our own.  
When every churlish Nabal shall refuse to let distressed David enter commons with his own day-labourers, and partake of such provision as he had made for his sheep-sherers, denying the least portion of his Estate, to David's use, when the security of all his Estate consist, in David's protection: And if Ahimelech the Priest (which has scarce bread enough to put in his own belly) shall feed him with some few loaves of the Sanctuary, and so refresh and strengthen him with a little Consecrated bread (although in the mean time he fast himself for it) it shall be cause enough for some treacherous Doeg to inform against him; and the next news will be saul's command to his foot men, his Militia, to turn and slay the Priests of the Lord, because their hands are with David. When every reviling Shimei as he passes by the highway may freely and without control curse the Lords Anointed; Nay more throw stones and dirt upon him; bespatter his unblemished name, and poison his reputation with malicious and false slandours, disscourses, of most dangerous Consequences: When Achitophel his own bosom Friend and choicest Counsellor shall provoke all Israel against him, and put down Joab the Captain of the King's Host, and set set up Amasa in his room: When Sheba the Benjamite [neither Priest nor Prophet] shall dare to blow the Trumpet in the high way, renounce David and send every man of Israel to their tents: When the King and all his Servants shall be forced from Jerusalem that Royal City, and receive no entertainment as he passes by Bahurim, till he come to Mahanaim far off, where old Barzillay remembers his Duty, and performs his allegiance better. If these scattered drops do fore-token a black storm a coming; if these thick mists which fall so fast, may easily convince us that our Suns a setting, we need not go far to seek a cause for those forenamed Insolences. I am amazed, Sirs, when I behold the purest times of our Religious Forefathers, and see those blessed Martyrs, even when they were dressed up in flames, and accompanied Eliah to heaven in a chariot of fire, when they were grinding between the teeth of Lions, when they were driven to the tops of Mountains like so many sheep to the slaughter; when their ingenuous Torturers were overcome at their own art, and could invent no punishment answerable to their patience: Then, at their hour of suffering, to hear them pray for their Persecutors, to hear them pour out their Souls in their most pious devotions, for a blessing on the heads of those Tyrants under whom they suffered: fight against them indeed, but cum precibus & lachrimis, with those melting swords of prayers and tears: And we, which enjoy all those blessings which a peaceable government can enrich a Land with, we which fit every man under our own Vines, and our own figtrees partaking of the fatness of the Land; we which are with as much severity kept off from idolatry, as the Old Christians were enforced to it, we which now hear the bells toll quietly to bring us together to the public service of God, which (were it not for this government) we might expect would be jangling in a more dismal tune, ringing a funeral peal to the Town or City; that we Christians, We Protestants should conceive a mischief against the King in our private bedchambers; nay more, should unbridle our tongues so far as to express those thoughts, nay more yet; should put those thoughts and words in Action, and lift up the finger against the Lords Anointed.  
I bring not in a Zisca's drum, a ratteling of the elements to terrify Children with fantastic fears; I would to God the times were such that I might give myself the lie. But alas ye all know 'tis true; it is, and hath been acted: We have a mind to Micahs Idols, to Dan's robbery, to Gibeas rape, and therefore we are for no King to Israel.  
The confusion of my Text is so great, that I have lost all Method, I will not seek now to recover it: but shut up all with one Paraenesis. You see the evil, 'tis general, it extends to every man: and there is but one Salve too, which we can properly call, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, a King amongst us: A precious ointment 'tis, and as preciously to be laid up, laid up by prayers for him, by hands with him, by purses to him of all good subjects. The breath of our nostrils, the life of our liberties, the strength of our hopes the pillar of our Religion: his Commission is signed from Heaven, Pro. 8.15. By me Kings reign. His Authority is conferred by Heaven, Chron. 1.16. He is the Anointed of the Lord: His power descends from Heaven, Psal. 21.1. The King shall rejoice in thy strength, O Lord: Obedience to him is required from Heaven, 1 Pet. 2. It is the will of God that you submit yourselves to the government of your Kings. I have heard the Prophet David suspected by some as partial in his own cause; just like the Northern Borderers, who conceived the eighth Commandment (Thou shalt not steal) to be none of Gods making, but foisted in by Henry the Eight, to shackle their thievish fingers: I am sorry that ever the Truth of Scripture should depend upon the arbitrary opinion of men: but if S. Paul have gained a better credit with them, I dare oppose the 13. Chapter of his Epistle to the Romans, against the power of Men or Devils which would trample upon the neck of Kings: Let every soul he subject; mark the stile: There's a Statute Law enacted in the high Parliament of Heaven, which no man that owns a soul may break without high Treason against man, and higher impiety against God. But if our doughty valour have got so much confidence as to fight against the Spirit of God, the apprehension of our own advantage might be a powerful argument, me thinks, to establish this doctrine: Since in vindicating the right of Princes we assert our own: By setting up a King in Ifrael, we pull down Micah's Idols, we stop the Danites forces, we quell the lust of Gibeah. 'Tis Our battles he fights, 'tis our Laws he enacts, 'tis Our Liberties he defends, 'tis our Life he protects: he watches for us, he is exposed to personal hazards for us, he writes for us, he draws the Sword for us.  
Ye know the old story of all the members mutenying against the lazy Belly: The accusation was, that it consumed all, but got nothing: but they denying their usual contribution, you'll soon find who went to the worst of it. The hands were, feeble, the mouth pale, the feet weak, and the whole Commonwealth of the body was out of frame. If Moses do not stand in the top of the Mount, with the Rod of God in his hand, Exod. 17. and hold up his hand too; Amalek will soon overcome the camp of Israel.  
God hath blest this Land to the Admiration of our Neighbours round about, with a Prince in whom Righteousness and Peace have kissed each other, and carsed for ever be the bramdles of Jotham, which would overshadow the Cedars of our Libanon: But were he as detestable for his vices as he is now honourable for his virtues, this were no fair plea for our disobedience: A wicked King may be an effect of God's wrath against a Nation; but the removal, the taking away this wicked King, that's hotter, that's plain fury, Hos. 13. 11. Suppose him very wicked, he has the more need of thy prayers to make him better. Suppose him to be a Tyrant, he will give the fairer occasions to exercise thy virtue of Patience. Suppose him to be a Persecutor, he'll do thee a courtesy, he will send thee to Heaven by violence. It is not oleum gratiae, but Dominii, that Kings are anointed with: Saul was touched with this Oil long before the Spirit of God came upon him, and this Oil was not wiped off, it swum uppermost still, it had the pre-eminence long after, when that evil spirit did possess him.  
If we took to the story of the 26 of the first Book of Samuel, when saul's guilty conscience gave him leave to sleep in the trenches of Hachilah, with his men of war round about him, we shall find as many arguments to arm David's hand against him, as ever met to depose a Sovereign Title: First on saul's part, he was an unnatural Tyrant against his own son Jonathan, he was a bloody Persecutor of the Priests of God; he was a sacrilegious Usuper of their holy Offices, he was a deamoniacal furious man possessed with a Devil: Next on David's part, his life was sought for, and by sparing Saul he should undo himself: he had all the opportunity that night and security could administer to him: he was saul's adopted son by michal's marriage, he was successor to the Kingdom by the Prophet's unction; and yet for all this, as if he had been a Champion to maintain the right of Princes, he stops Abisha with a quis unqum? Who can lift up the hand against the Lords anointed? And he that did it afterward, though upon saul's own entreaty (if himself may be believed found him as stout a revenger, as he was a bold challenger: He brings News of saul's Death, but is sent after him the grave. I am amazed, Sirs, when I hear mention of the Loyalty of some old Heathen, some of them exposing their bodies to the deadly stroke of the enemies, to secure the person of their Emperors. Others leaping alive into their Funeral piles, as if they could do them no later, no greater service. But I will name no more, lest their dust fly in our eyes, so blind and eclipse the glory of Christians: For let me seriously put the question: Are we Christions? Do we know the virtue of in Oath? What think we then of that solemn Oath of our Allegiance? An Oath which can receive no dispensation, no absolution from what power soever: Are we Protestants? Nay one step farther yet; are we Protesters? What think we then of that branch of the late Protestation, that I will maintain the established doctrine of the Church, as it stands in opposition to Popery and Popish Innovations: I conceive this mainly material to the work in hand, therefore give me leave a while to insist upon it.  
What is the doctrine of the School of Jesuits, Bellarmine's position will fully tell us, non licere Christianis tolerare regem haereticum, etc. Prince's falling into Apostasy from the faith or heresy in the faith, lose all dominion over their Subjects: and our own Countryman, Parsons goes a little farther, that the People if they can gather strength sufficient aught to depose such an unworthy Governor: and like apt Scholars they will learn their lesson quickly; for thus a Jacobine with an Assassination shall soon make good in practice what their School hath taught them. Thus without much straining they make good the Text: Those there work their pleasure because there was no King in Israel, these here will have no King because they might the more freely work their pleasure.  
Contrary to this is established doctrine of the Church of England in the 37th. Article: The King's Majesty his the chief power in this Realm of England, and his other Dominions: and is not, nor aught to be subject to any Jurisdiction whatsoever, but may and must restrain with the sword the Stubborn and Evil doers: Farr different (it seems) from that he is tobe restrained by Stubborn and Evil-doers, upon a pretence of his evil doing: To which purpose are those six parts of the homily against Rebellion so full and apposite that we must either disclaim them from being the interpreters of the Doctrine of our Church, or sit down convinced in the manifest truth of this assertion.  
To these I shall and the Testimony of some unquestioned Divines amongst us, purposely avoiding the authority of such who are amongst some men (perhaps, unworthily) suspected, lest their names prove a blemish to the Calendar: Bishop Cranmer (in his Necessary Erudition for Christian Men) (A work composed by him and other Divines of Henry the Eight, and printed long since by the same King) upon the fifth Commandment, declares that, by it we are bound not to withdraw our Fealty Truth's Love and Obedience from our Princes, for what cause soever it be, nor yet for any cause may we conspire against his Person, nor do any thing towards the hindrance or hurt thereof or of his, Estate. Not long after, Bishop Hooper, upon the same commandment determines, that if he be naught, that rules the place he is in, it is the Order and work of God: so if thou put a difference between the Office itself which is good, and the Officer which is evil, it shall keep thee in a religious fear that thou reverence a good and godly Government in a bad Governor. Bishop Latimer a Companion of them both (in a Sermon upon Twelfday) tells us, that we may for nothing in the World (observe the Universality) rebel against the Ordinance of God, that is the Magistrate. All these three glorious Saints did in their Actions consirme their Doctrine, and in the days of Queen Mary received the triumphant crown of Martyrdom, obeying her in suffering for that, which their consciences would not give them leave actually to perform. Next them comes that painful and Reverend Bishop Jewel, who disputing the Case with Harding draws issue in the story Chilperick of France: whom the Nobles deposed; the people were contented with it, and then Pope confirmed it, (rebellion as well strengthened as we could wish) yet did his Successor Pepin scarce ever with quiet enjoy the Kingdom; and of the nine Generations (which were all that of that race succeeeded) hardly one was found which went down into the grave in peace. Dr. Humpheryes Sermons upon Abisha's story 1 Sam. 26. are so full to our cause in hand, that I should do him wrong to cite any part of him, and not spin it put to a just Treatise: I refer ye to the book itself; as also to Bishop bancroft's English-Scottzing; Bishop King in his 35. Lecture on Ionas makes it the very case of the Brownist, who in his reformation would tread Conscience, Obedience, Religion and Duty both to God and Man under foot. Whereupon the Reverend Bishop Davenant in his twelfth determined Question tells us, induant quam venlint pietatis larvan● isti Magistratuum (mark that Magistratuum not Religionum) reformatores, Albiniani tamen Nigriani out Cassiani rectius audient, quam Christiani; Let them mask under what cloak they will, Religion may be their plea, but Rebellion is their practice. I shall forbear the envy of naming such as are still alive amongst us, of whom Bishop Morton is not the least; But one passage of the Reverend Primate of Armagh in a speech in the Castle Chamber may not be forborn, because of the Universality of the position: There is nothing so contrary to the nature of Sovereignty (which I hope we still allow our Kings, if not how fell they from it?) as to have any Superior power to overrule them: Qui Rex est, Regem (Maxim) non habeat: I forbear Seravia, because although one of our Church, yet a stranger born; and the Learned Erwin of Scotland: their works will testify sufficiently: Yet if you desire to know the consentient opinion of the Protestant Divines, take Calvin in his 25. Sect. of his 4. book of Institutions; Beza in his exposition on the 13. to to the Rom. and the Harmony of them all, in the confession of the Helvetian Divines in the 19 Sect. Article 25. They have prepared against Sophistications in their Anathema: there is put in both the palam and the Art too, whosoever openly by offence, as well as cunningly pretending defence shall do it, there is a damnamus past upon him, there is sentence given by the Church against him, acquit him who will.  
These are men whose names will tell you never were yet suspected for a Malignant Party: Should we blot out these from the Catalogue of the Churchy, I fear we had but a poor Charter for our Religion; if we esteem them as they are, Protestants, I wonder how we can make so brave a flourish with this late taken Protestation in our hats, and banish the genuine interpretation from our hearts.  
If then there be any here with whom that sacred name of Majesty, like a high Mountain at a great distance, has seemed to vanish into the Air and prove a little nothing, suffer yourselves to be undeceived; search the Scriptures, and if ye be of David's faith put on David's conscience, who after he had cut off the skirt of Saul's robe privily, his heart smote him, and his tears washed out his fall: 1 Samuel 24.6, The Lord forbidden that I should do this thing, unto my Master the Lords Anointed, to stretch forth my hand against him, seeing he is the anointed of the Lord: He did but cut off a lap, and shall we lay our Lords anointed naked? Naked, not to relieve his wants; naked, to discover (if any were) his shames. If we be Christians, it makes good our title to him he is Christus Domini, The Lords Christ: if we be Protesants (I speak it again) such as disclaiming the names of Papists, would not degenerate into their Religion, we must confess that damnation is the portion of him that resists this ordinance of God.  
Shall Isaiah call Cyrus the Lords anointed? Baruch and Jeremiah bid us pray for Nebuchodonoser? Peter and Paul command submission to Tiberius, Nero and Caligula, all heathenish persecuting Emperors? and we neglect our Constantine, our Theodesius, the dew of Heaven which is fallen upon, this fleece of England, when all the World is wet with blood besides? If we shall abuse his patience into fury, can we expect any less judgement then to be forced under that fury to practise Patience? If any then neglecting the Urim and the Prophets, the established ordinance of God, as fanatic Saul did 1 Sam. 28. and recur to Wizards, (wise women, as you call them) and inquire of them the event of such a battle, as this would prove; they may perhaps bring you to samuel's Ghost, some Devil in a Prophet's likeness, but look for no better success, than he fourd there, the death of yourselves and your Sons, The stars in their course from Heaven will fight against Sisera, & conjurati venient in classca venti, the wind and the hailstones will muster up their forces against Adonizedek and his confederates. But for you which despise Micah and his private new fangled devotion, which resist Dan, and his riotous, tumultuous assemblies, which would cool Benjamin, and his goatish ravenous lust, make it your care to continue a Rex in Israel. Suffer no Baanahs and Rechabs that dare murder Kings there beds, no Bightans and Tharezes' that dare entertain the motion in their hearts, to live amongst you: Oils by experience we know will mix, although powered into a vessel, much water be put betwixt them: You which have found the Oil of the holy Spirit in your hearts, let it join your hearts and commix your souls to the Oil upon the head of Gods anointed: That thus the religion of your hearts may burst our of joyful lips with prayers, That God would visit him as he did Moses in the bush, Joshua in the Battle, Gideon in the field, David in the Temple: that the dew of his abundant mercies may fall upon his head, and that he would give unto him the blessings of David and Solomon: That he would he his helmet of Salvation against the face of all his enemies and a strong Tower of defence in the time of adversity: That his reign may be prosperous, and his days many; That peace and love, holiness, and Justice, and Truth, all Christain Virtues may flourish in his time: That his people may serve him with Honour and Obedience, and that he may so duly serve God here on Earth that he may hereafter everlastingly reign with God in Heaven. Amen. Amen.   

The Second SERMON.  JUDGES 4.23. Curse ye Meroz (said the Angel of the Lord) yea, curse ye bitterly the Inhabitants thereof: because they came not to the help of the Lord against the mighty. 
A Text no doubt in season; we have an age to Curse in, I to curse bitterly too tanquam venena Aspidum, the poison of Asps is under our lips. And these lips we think are touched by the Angel of God too: A coal from the Altar at least has fired our tongues: Nay we are grown valiant of late, we dare go out to fight now and make the people believe, it is to the help of the Lord: And that no title be left out, 'tis to the help the Lord against the mighty too: Our pulpits by their Almighty power can create new forces, and in one night's space proclaim them mighty whom our Saterdays night Pamphlets told us where to be pitied for their weakness: Thus can we wrest the Scripture to our own destruction, and gain this credit when we are once unmasked, that we have been plausible deceivers.  
'Tis no new rule, that corruptio optima fit pessima, That the most Sovereign antidote when the Spirits are decayed, or that itself by some unskilful Empiric mis-applyed proves oftentimes the rankest poison; And I know indigefting stomaches may corrupt the most nourishing meats, and the sweetest flowers may stink of his breath that smells them: Thus that pure, that sacred fountain of Holy Scripture, whence the waters of life are drawn in their own Crystal integrity, when it is royld with our inventions proves aqua mortis, the poisoned waters of Sodom: The standing lake which neither, flows to other Country's nor nourishes in their own: tuus esse incipit. This book of God, so abused does God as little or less service, than the Turkish Alcoran or the old Romane-Tables. I know this place was never meant for controversy: The intent of Sermons was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, for conclusions to edification, not for disputation; they should not rob the chair. But yet when Sheba shall dare to blow the Trumpet in the highway and renounce his inheritance in David, 'tis time for Joab to cast a bank about his City and besiege him: If any unprejudicate and well-affected Christians, have drank in poison at their ears, which now 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, inflames their souls, sets them a fire on mischief; I shall desire (which I do on my knees to heaven) by a plain lesson on Deboras harp to disenchant them, and by a true though homely relation of this story here, a relation in which neither language nor method shall be concise, to undeceive them.  
The people of Israel, God's own inheritance was at this time under the government of their Judges, which had then the supreme authority. Which authority, whether it were the same with what their Kings did after enjoy, or only a praeparative to it, an Usher to the royal dignity, I will not here determine. Yet this I am sure of, it came from Heaven, and God himself was Author of it; for when the common people, (queis semper mutare potentes principium est,) whose brains are always turning round upon their changes, did in the following story desire a King (which might seem an honourable and fair exchange, whether ye regard their higher credit with other nations, or their greater security against foreign powers, or the praedetermination of Almighty God, who had promised this dignity long ago to the seed of Abraham Gen. 17.) God takes the affront as put upon himself 1 Sam. 18. They have not refused thee, but they have refused me that I should not reign over them: So constant is Almighty God to his own principles, that although in things intended by himself, he will not be prevented by the fantastic desires of men.  
Well! Israel thus founded had many enemies: furnaces at  to cleanse them from their dross: Intestina pericula, pills left in the bowels of their possessions to purge out their corruption: Five Lords of the Philistines, and the Zidonians and the Hivites and the Jebusites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, who would claim title of inheritance to this land of promise. Amongst these, Jabin a Mighty Man (that had nine hundred Chariots of Iron, and a powerful host, whose Captain was Sisera, that lived in Harosheth,) like a near neighbour, he lies heavy on them; he oppresseth, the Sons of Israel. Those which would show their skill in fetching proper names from their originnall, (and indeed your old Geneva Bibles do it) tell me that Sisera signifies a foreseer of Horses, and Harosheth a wooden place of strength; once get a place of strength, and then pretend some fears and jealousies of I know not what impossible conceits, that naked Israel (which had not a spear among forty thousand in the beginning of this Chapter) is preparing strength of Horses, or I know not what, 'tis provocation enough for Sisera to go up against them.  
Their judge Deborah (a Woman of most masculine Spirit) was under a Palm tree, in the highway to Mount Ephraim: Whether excluded her City or not, I cannot tell, but the text says there she dwelled: And truly why may we not think excluded? 'Twas David's lot afterward, who had more Majesty and title too, in and to the Royal City, which himself had raised; yet forced from thence, Bahurim and the other places as he passed by, proves as ungrateful as Jerusalem herself. She with her Copartner Barak, at the Lords appointment do prepare for Battle: But alas nisi Dominus— unless the Lord had been on their side, all the forces they could gather had not been enough for Siseras' host to breath themselves upon. Reuben they find divided, Gilead would not pass his borders: Asher had possessed himself of the Sea Coasts and the strong holds, he thought himself securer there: Dan was employed about the ships, he will make the coasts sure, whatsoever becomes of the Country within: Yes, naviget Antyceras, a little Hellebore would purge his brain better and make him wiser. Only the two Northern Tribes Zebulon and Napthali, with ten thousand men which offer themselves willingly will undertake this quarrel. Yet let me not bespatter all the rest: Ephraim, and Benjamin, and Machir the son of Manasses, and Issachar too, all Southern Counties sent out some Nobles, which were so bold as to be honest, and associated themselves in this holy war. And I know not how there crept in some that handle the pen of the writer too, which might make God's battles famous, and record to after ages those stories which the sword here had wrote in blood. Those Judges which escaped the noise of the Archers came down upon their white Asses: and although the Laws are mute where the Drum speaks, they durst then tell them what the Law was, they durst sit in Judgement, and speak the righteous acts of God. As for the rest, they chose them new Gods, (novum cultum saith the Paraphraser) new forms of devotion, new moulds of the old Religion, if you will; every one made an Idol of himself and worshipped his own inventions.  
Well, their Army thus confederate prepare their march: But where is their Ammunition? No armour but that of faith: not one shield or spear amongst forty thousand men in Israel: and as little hopes of supplies was there in other places: Asher had stopped the coasts, Dan had seized the Ships, the high ways were beset, and the travellers glad to walk thorough by paths. But Deborah arose, Deborah that mother in Israel: She knew that God's hand was not shortened that he could not redeem, nor his power diminished that he could not deliver: Joshua had tried it before with trumpets of rams-hornes, Ehud with his two edged sword, Shamgar with his ox-goad: He which before had slain five Kings with hailstones, could not he muster up an army of stars to fight in their courses against the army of Sisera? Timere metuit: 'tis the Lord's appointment, she dares not fear it, but marches on courageously, whilst her general Barak leads on the forces, to Mount Tabor the rendezvous. A little distance from the Mountain was the village Meroz, whose neighbouring Situation might well have succoured them, if not with a greater strength of men for a reserve at need, yet with a necessary shelter in the day of Battle: But this, whether affrighted with the chariots, or trusting to the horses of the enemy's troops, shut in themselves and shut out the Israelites they will not come to hely the Lord.  
And indeed what need of help has he, in whose name all help consists? The battle joins; the Charets are discomfited, Sisera leaves his Coach and flies away on foot: and Deborah returns back a triumphant Conqueror. Yet lest She should forget that God that taught her hands to fight, and her arms to break those bows of steel. She sings a Paean, a song which a Choir of Angels would Echo too, a song of triumph to the Lord of hosts: In the midst of which, as it were a sharp, a relish to all the rest, she brands this ingratitude of Meroz in the Text. Curse ye Meroz (says the Angel) curse ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof, because they came not to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against the mighty.  
I shall be very brief in the Theory of my Text. Discourses of this nature require more practice: In the words behold an Anathema, a sentence of excommunication (if you will) pronounced: And accordingly to make it legal, here are all the parts of it: 1. There is the hand and seal, the authority confirming it, The Angel says it, 2. There is the form of the sentence, curse ye; yea curse ye bitterly: 3. There is the Excommunicate person, Meroz and her inhabitants: 4. There is the crime of which she stands convict, a negative fault, a sin of omission, for not helping the Lord, not helping the Lord against the mighty: Oppositions seem here at the first view abundantly to meet: The ark of God and Dagon you would think were content with the same roof: here is the Angel of God, that messenger of glad tidings, with curses in his mouth: heres God the Lord Almighty has need of help against the mighty: here is the first Chaos moulded up together, yet with your patience, out of this darkness God may enable us to produce some light.  
First the Angel speaks it; and well there is so good authority. If this blazing star from Heaven, had not pointed out this judgement, holy Deborah would have blessed her enemies, and prayed for them that used her thus despitefully. I will not trouble you here with the Schoolmens quarrels what this Angel's name was, or of what Order in the Heavens, whether he defended visibly, or motu Angelico, insensibly: pretty cobwebs these are to catch flies in. Or whether this Angel were her confederate. Barak, inspired by Heaven with a Prophetic soul, which Peter Martyr thinks a probable conjecture: be it one or other in idem res rediit, this we know, that in times passed there was a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 divers ways and manners, how God spoke to our forefathers by the Prophets: Saul (it seems) 1 Sam. 28, Made trial of them all, he sought God by dreams and visions, by Urim and the Prophets, but finding Heaven inflexible, Acheronta movet, a witch at Endor must do the feat, and raise up the Devil in samuel's mantle to inform him: which Necromantic Religion I would to God it descended not down to these our days; Too many I fear me, finding their dreams grown ridiculous, and their visions blinded, and disdaining the Urim, the precious stones of the high Priests breastplate, and the Prophets, have but one refuge left, some old woman which can raise up samuel's Ghost, a Devil in a Prophet's likeness, which without the wages of Balaak, or the expectation of an Angel of God, can make every Cupboards side or tables-end the top of Pisgah, and the top of Peor, from whence they spit out their poison upon the host of Israel: Nos autem Christum non sic didicimus, if any Man amongst us be thus contentious we have no such custom nor the Church of Christ: Deborah was a Prophetess yet durst not she strain her authority thus far: but signatim dicit, lest this curse should pretend to a morality and prove a leading case to all succeeding ages, she shows her patent and produces her authority, The Angel of the Lord says it. And let us give God's Angel this honour to afford him, 1. A Credendum 2. A Tremendum, 3. A Cavendum:  
Credendum 1. God's Angel is but his messenger, and shall God speak it and the thing not come to pass? 'tis confirmation enough to me that Meroz fell under this bitter curse, because neither sacred Scripture, nor humane writer that (I can find) did ever since make mention of it: And indeed Sirs, let's take heed; there are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, Angels upon the Earth still: The Church has Angels says St. John, and the Woman of Tekoah thought the King of Israel was at least 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Angel of the Lord: Thus when the Angel of the Church curses shall our souls be so irreligiously incredulous as to call it brutum fulmen, a squib in the air, or if the Angel of the state curses, to call it fulmen br●ti, Hannibals faggots on his bulls horns to make them roar the louder? Experience will be a sharp a Mistress, when we shall one day feel the Burden of that which we would not believe.  
But, 2. Tremendum. Manoahs' Wife thought the face of the Angel very terrible, and at that time when he comes to comfort her Judges, 13. and shall not Meroz tremble when he comes to curse her? This is most truly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, the Eclipsing of the Sun, the blacking over the face of Heaven. Vaenobis (says St. Bernard) si quando provocati sancti Angeli peccatis & negligentiis, indignos nos judicaverint praesentia & vifitatione sua. Unhappy Sodom when her daring sins put Lot and his Angels to flight; but infinitely more unhappy, when they came armed with fire and brimstone to destroy it. Our good God created them Ministering Spirits, partly for the use of Men, o'er whom he gave them charge; though all that time he never lessens their joys of Heaven, there is exterius Ministerium, says Gregory, but still there is interior contemplatio: But when our guardidians prove our executioners, when the Shepherds which should quarrel with the wolves, devour the flock: when the Cherub that defends the garden of Eden, brandishes a flaming sword to drive out Adam, let us fear and tremble.  
Lastly, Cavendum: if we fear that curse, beware that sin which caused it: when Jonathan shoots an arrow o'er David's head, 'tis enough to make David fly the place, to beware his Father's wrath: Here is one arrow shot over us, and it lights on Meroz, but the bow is bend still, and armed with as great a curse, a curse for cursing, if not for not going out to help the Lord, I am sure for going to fight against the Lord: this was particular here and occasional, the other is general and eternal. God speaks that, the Angel of God speaks this: Curse ye Meroz (says the Angel of the Lord) yea curse ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof.  
We are now come to the sentence: Curse ye, yea curse ye bitterly, that is, curse ye with a cursing, in the original: in which I will not so far interest myself, as to think to teach you, that it is a Hebraisme: yet thus far give me leave to note, that these ingeminations are either used ass ●erando, as a note of confirmation, as that in Genesis 2. in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die, moriendo morieris; or intendendo, as a screw to set it higher, as this here, execrationibus execramini, curse ye bitterly. What a curse is I shall satisfy myself, and you too I hope, in a plain Narration from Aquihas: Idem est maledicere (says he) & malum dicere, in his 76. Question 2.2. cursing is the same, with speaking or wishing evil: And so a man may curse as many ways as he speaks: which is either Enuntiative, declaring what is done: Thus Deborah in this song may be said to curse Sisera, in that Rhetorical Catastrophe which Jael brought upon his life, At her feet he bowed, he fell, he lay down; at her feet, he bowed, he fell, where he bowed there he fell down dead: or 2ly Imperative by commanding what should be done, which none, can challenge but they which have sovereignty, as God or his Messengers, like the Angel here; or 3ly Optative, by wishing what might be done, as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 most execrations are. The first is in itself indifferent, neither good nor evil, unless detraction accompany it; The two last are always evil unless some occasion of a greater good do invite them: And this good is double, 1. Either that of justice; thus God may curse immundum mundum, the unclean World: Elisha may curse the reviling brats; and the Church may curse the bastard of spring of Sectaries, which like the Mices birthday, fill the mountain with abundant squeaking in the bringing forth, but then nascuntur ridiculi, you may know they are empty vessels because they sound so much; or secondly the good of profit, that affliction may reduce them: As David Psal. 9 wished a terror upon the Nations that they might know themselves to be but men. From hence then we shall receive a speedy satisfaction, to those three questions, which are only material, 1. penes quos est, in whose power this power of cursing lies, 2. ad quos attinet, on whose shoulders it will fall; 3. in quantum praevalet, with what burden it presses: there is infinite distance between all these: here is abyssus abyssum invocans, one deep calling upon another; only a powerful hand from heaven can throw down vengeance, only a sinner's neck can bear it, and if this thunderbolt be not stopped only the pit of hell can bond it. From heaven it comes, whether immediately from God himself, or from his Delegates: The first can make that serpent lick the dust of the earth, which but just now aspired to the Sceptre of Heaven: he can make Cain a runagate in his own land, and fear the stroke of death from man, when he and his father summed up [for aught we know] the total number of mankind. The other have it by Commission and that Commission, they had need take care should be well signed, or else their arrows will recoil upon their own bosoms, and they will provoke God to bless by their malicious curses. Some good expositors are of opinion, that all the curses denounced in the old Law shall rather be interpreted for propheticae praedictiones, then imprecationes maledicae: But what ever power they had, I am sure 'tis now limited; there is an Evangelical temper if we believe Christ that speaks it; when James and John would have been a flashing in the clouds, and followed Elias in the Law, for fire from Heaven on the Village of the Samaritans: Christ cools their furious zeal with another Spirit, Luke 9 he rebukes them saying, ye know not what manner of Spirits ye are of: Forbear such legal threats, if you follow me your Master, I came to save the World not to destroy it. For Ananias and Saphira's judgement, 'tis true it came from heaven; but unless you interline the Text and read it with spectacles to make it bigger, it will no way appear to be caused by Peter's Curse. So that if we compare St. Paul's precept, Rom. 12. bless and curse not, with his anathematising Text, 1 Cor. 16. we shall soon find the Church has no keys left to shut up Heaven but those which Christ left, as a Legacy in that sacred ordination of his Apostles.  
But secondly this curse is only due for sin, that being the adequate object of the wrath of God: Hence does St. Paul think 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doing good, will be an undoubted shield against the power: So that Bellarmine's, Uteunque ferit, will prove but a blunt push, his excommunication undeserved is but a bull without horns, crackers tied upon a line; flash they may, but wound they cannot. Lastly to Hell it goes if not prevented: The Royal prophet in the 37. Psalm says that, they that be cursed of God shall be cut off: Cut off from the Earth first, as Pharaoh and his crew of persecutors, (after they had blunted the arrows of God with often wounding, though they could never yet pierce their hardened hearts:) his final destruction is threatened, Exod 9.15. he will cut them off from the face of the Earth: But 2. cut them down or a passage for them down to hell too; witness Corah and his rebellious Conspirators, quibus dum non essent digni vivere [says Optatus] nec mori concessum est: not deserving to live, they were not vouchsafed to die: sepulti sunt priusquam mortui: they which had made a separation from their Fathers, may not be suffered to be gathered to their Fathers, but go down quick to Hell. This is the effect of a curse, a curse arising from a just cause, proceeding from a just Judge: If this be the cause of Meroz, let her beware, and sure it is, for her judge is just that speaks it, the Angel says, Curse ye Meroz and her inhabitants.  
We are come to the Persons upon whom the censure falls, Meroz and her inhabitants: Where I will not make you sport to tell you what pains Rupert takes (although he cite St. Hierom for it) to make Meroz the president Angel of the Canaanites, and the inhabitants to be the people under his protection. Gerrae germanae, it is not worth confuting: Here is no Labyrinth that needs a clue, or if there did, expositors with one mouth assure me, that this village Meroz was a place adjoining to the field of battle, which must now be made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, a piaculum, a sacrifice to Gods curse to expiate the degenerate backwardness of the neutral tribes. Well may the gates of the Temple be made of Cedar trees; Cedars so fat, so joyful, all Hieroglyphics of God's mercy; when as the gates of Heaven (for aught we find here) were open to an offending multitude, and only shut against this handful of the people: Thus God is pleased sometimes to decimate his malefactors, in paucos vindicta transit, in plures monitio, he sets up Lot's Wife as a pillar 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, says the Scholiast, a Trophy to turn the hearts of the backsliding generations: for as he is a fire to burn the chaff, so he is a fan to separate it from the purer wheat. When fawning Absolom had seduced the people to a great rebellion, promising a freer course of justice if he might reign, 'tis true a slaughter of the Israelites was made in the wood of Ephraim, but still the surviving rebels were suffered to return with David, whilst the justice of God contented itself with the head of Absolom, hanging now as his counsels formerly had done, between Heaven and Hell. But still as Meroz was but one place, yet a place it was, and a place very considerable: With great disadvantage must Deborah fight, when the villages about her were confaederate with her enemies: Put case that God had defeated her before her enemy (as indeed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, etc. A just cause does not always inherit victory) what place was left to retreat to from the bloody Mountain? what refreshment could be given to the fainting Soldiers? What disheartening found the remoter tribes, when the place they marched to, for fresh supplies upon occasion, proved the quarters of their enemies? As God gives to Men, so he accepts from Men their opportunities: Rehekah was known to be a fit wife for Isaac by her ready letting down her pitcher; and that soul that would be espoused to Christ, must discover itself by a seasonable and willing service. Yet mark, one step farther yet, together with the inhabitants, Meroz herself, the very fabric bears a burden in the curse. The eagle's nest is brought down from the Stars that the young ones may be destroyed: Oba. 4. Thus when by God's permission the Israelites (accursed for one man's pillaging) found a repulse at the great City Aye, at the second assault Joshua contents not himself with the head of the ruler, or the throats of the Citizens, but makes the place itself a desolation. And this judgement God sends down sometimes upon the inanimate Creature, either because it hath been the instrument to occasion man's folly, or rather that his folly may be punished by that judgement; that man may learn to groan for sin, by the Creatures example, which groans under that punishment which is due to the sin of man: Well may the young Eagles cry when the one's sacrilege has fired the nest she builds in: 'tis the people's sins begets the City's curse: That's the last part, the cause of this excommunication denounced, Curse ye Meroz (says the Angel) and her inhabitants, because they went not out, to help the Lord, to help the Lord against the mighty.  
And indeed when God himself is gone up with a shout, and the Lord with the sound of the trumpet, he may curse himself that stays behind: If it be true that God does pursue those whom he doth not accompany, it is more true that he comes back upon those that do not accompany him. God's cause is ours, in which if we will not bear a share, we shall surely bear the burden. When the Reubenites and the Gadites, (whether tired out with their tedious march, or alured with the fatness of the plains of the Gileadites, or affrighted with their brethren's reports of the enemy's strength from the valley of Eschol) were now grown lazy and neglected the portion of the other tribes, desiring, as they thought to sleep in a whole skin, and not to endanger themselves by passing over Jordan: See what a contestation Moses himself undertakes: Numb. 32. What a strife beget they in meekness! He which chid his own passions before, now fell to reviling them: They were nigri Jovis incrementum, an increase of sinful men, the fomentors of God's anger: And accordingly was their reward: The first and greatest Giant Og, must be their task to tame; and the Gileadites once cleared, unless they will go armed before the Lord to war and help their Brethren, entrench themselves as sure as they can, they shall never shut out a bosom enemy: there sins will find them out.  
But stay; can God want help? will he, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, sufficient of himself for Heaven and Earth, fly to man for succour, in whom there is no help? What new Typheous have we upon the Earth, which drives the Heavenly powers to the banks of Nile for refuge! Is not God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Almighty? Whose Lips are the fountains of power, at the breath of whose nostrils the infernal spirits tremble? and shall he want assistance against the mighty? 'tis true; and yet he so disposes his affairs on Earth, That man may sometimes seem to get the upper hand: God works not all things by a miraculous power but lets out some part of his vineyard to the tillage and husbandry of man; in which sometimes, depopulatur aper, the wild boars have their lurking holes, and the little foxes have their boroughs: force or cunning have broken down their hedges. He sometimes permits a reviling Shimei in the face of David's Army: a sacrelegious rout to deface his Sanctuary, and not bury them in the ruins which they make: a Jewish confederacy, which Turkism would stand amazed at to recrucify our Saviour in imagine, and hitherto not pays them home with Judas his portion, to go hang themselves.  
And these the all seeing eye of providence dispenses, whether the more surely to prove his friends, or the more fully to confound enemies. For the first, God hath a storehouse, from whence he could fill the hands of all his members yet leaves he some hungry, some thirsty, some naked, to see who would refresh them: Non quod te indiget, sed quod te ●o indigere cupit, he has no need of thee, but he desires that thou shouldest have need of him: What needed 32000 men of Israel gathered under gideon's standard, when 300 did the feat? But to try who would stand up for the Lord, and who will bow their knees to drink of the waters: who would adore the flowing Transitory pleasures here. 'Tis true in temporal as well as eternal salvation, qui te sine te fecit, te sine te non salvabit, he which created thee alone, requires thy own concurrence to thy preservation: nay by this means God pulls off the vizard from the face of hypocrites, unguilds their garnished frontlers, and leaves them as black as the sin they flatter with, If it had not been for Absoloms' rebellion, who could prove Achitophel David's privy Counsellor had been a traitor? Who would have thought Amasa, honoured by David with the name of Cousin, one of his bone and of his flesh, would have accepted of the generalship without David's Commission? Who could believe that Jerusalem that Royal City, honoured with David's Throne, not subsisting (as it seems) two Months without his presence, would have gone up after Absalon? This is the Divine Eye of Wisdom which can produce sound fruit from such rotten stocks.  
In the second there is the supreme hand of power; when wicked designs prosper so happily that they are gathered into a head, till with one stroke God cuts them off: as Jehu serves the Priests of Baal 2 Kings 10: Pretends a solemn sacrifice, invites them with a full ceremony, cloaths them with the richest vestments, makes a holy day feast for Baal's worshippers: The day was theirs, and the Prophets of God were looked upon as poor inferior humble Creatures; but in the midst of their triumph, fourscore men made it end in a bloody sacrifice, they are all cut off, not one escapes. The Servants of the household could have weeded out the tares, Mat. 13. But it was the Master's policy to let them grow ripe before he burned them: They would make the greater blaze: God Almighty, I know, could have routed out the tares of heresy, the tares of sedition, which in these days of sin have almost overtopped the standing wheat: but (I persuade myself) out of mercy to his Church, he has let them grow to these licentious times, when every Son of Belial, dares openly discover his untutored spirit, when we find more sects, than some years since we thought our Church had nourished Sectaries, that the sword of justice now knowing them, may make the surer & sharper stroke against them: Babel's confusion had not been so remarkable, but that the tower was raised so high as that it stood a pillar to after ages: The weakness of Deborahs' forces and Jabins strength enlarge God's honour: he gets a name by pulling down the mighty from their seat; but still he is sensible of the false hearted cowardice of the backsliding troops: He curses Merox and her inhabitants because they came not forth to help the Lord, to help the Lord against the mighty.  
I have made haste, you see with, the plainsong of my text, that I may spend some time in the descant, in which every one of us must bear a part: And I cannot but begin with a just indignation against those who have abused the words and made them speak their own crazy humours, and frantic dreams. Like Men troubled with an Hydrophobia, bitten with a mad dog, and now raging, they think all things before them look like water, like the froth of their own brains: Indeed Scripture shall be no longer Scripture, if it do not please them: Being in this like the old Tyrians, who were wont to whip their Gods if they crossed them with a misfortune, till they made them better: Thus came they armed to the Pulpit with as brave a resolution as Hannibal to the Alps, aut viam invenient aut facient? Where they find no track before them they will adventure first; and are grown so daringly presumptuous as to slight these texts which, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do in plain rerms cross their traitorous position, and tell you it was doctrine fit for those times the Apostles lived in, (I myself have heard it) were they upon the Earth now, when Christians knew their own strength, they would write in another strain. Blasphemous wretches! is the blessed Spirit of God a servant or the times; Is that eternal goodness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, unchangeably constant, and for ever more the same, become the Idol fortune, and dances he upon a wheel? Never Musselman thought thus of his lawgiver Mahomet, never Heathen of the rule of Nature. Yet that they may show some commixture of madness and wit, sometimes they will prove ingeniously wicked, and like a conjurer cast a mist before your eyes, till you think you see the face of these times presented you in the glass of prophecy: which (once persuaded) what ever language came from the top of Ebal, is a Charientismus, a message of peace compared with theirs: Thus Deborah the Church shall fall a cursing Meroz the friends to the crown because they came not out to help the Lord against Siseras' host the royal Army. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉: Here let's join hands: Good sirs instruct me: whose person bore distressed Deborah? was it not the supreme? and are there, or can there be 2. supreams? She was a Mother, a Judge, a Captain in Israel: And can any order that is a primo primus derived from the first be equal to it? Had Jabin been a King to Deborah I am sure she had too religious a soul to have cursed him: For what was Sisera? Was he not a stranger? One of another line, another claim, another religion, another God? one commanded by God long since to be expelled the Land, and his inheritance divided amongst the Tribes? Make you yourselves an Analogy between the stories, and see what an apt proportion they have left. But one nice distinction will stop this gap: We can cut an hair between the King and his forces. The King is a good King, a well meaning King (and so he is in spite of their bold faced detractions) but his Siseras, his Generals, his Commanders, they are none of ours: No, and yet within these three years, the reverend Fathers of our Church were quarreled at by these very Men for leaving their names out of our divine service book. But are we grown such experienced artificers to divide between the squirrel and the tail that hides the back? The fable makes a pretty dialogue between the wolf and the dog: The wolf bids him go home and sleep quietly, why should he expose himself to the winter's frosts, and the summer's heat, to watch his flock? There was no enmity between them: true (says the dog) but when thou hast worried my sheep and art grown fat and lusty with their flesh, thou mayst seize upon my throat next.  
But closer yet: for I would feign follow my text, however they leave it: Neither has the Angel said it to them, nor have they power to curse, nor have they cutsed Meroz, nor curse they for not helping of the Lord: nor (in their sense) does the Lord need any help against the mighty.  
First an Angel has not said it: whatever visions they pretend: or if he should, though an Angel from Heaven deliver any other doctrine then what the Scripture has preached let him be accursed: I Gal. I. the Divine revelations and Angelical descensions which the Anabaptists glory of, are things grown too naked to delude us any longer: They sound like the story of Mahomet's dove. Since Christ's ascension into Heaven he left the holy Spirit as a Legacy to his Church; that Spirit which shall guide it into all truth; and so it will, notwithstanding all these impostures: When their writings are ad thus & scombros alligata, made as they are, wastpaper: St. Peter and St. Paul will be true and sound divinity: And yet I know 'tis no new thing for Satan to transform himself into an Angel of light, and become a lying Spirit in the mouths of such as would be accounted Prophets: We know when he persuaded a Nation to go to war to its own destruction: May our good God defend us from the like mischief.  
But 2ly. they have no power to curse, no commission for their execrations: a Christians office is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 12.10. speak friendly to their persecutors: Mark the phrase, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, well to them, and well of them too, not pump hell for language and arm the tongue with such Rhetoric that it cutteth like a razor. The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Septuagint uses here for cursing, signifies pray ye barkward: (if ye will:) for so the Scholiast tells me that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the theme in Homer's time signified humble prayers; but being abused in the succeeding ages who turned their prayers, into curses, the interpretation of the word changed too and it signifide an execration: and indeed in this art of praying backward we are too good proficients: If that be to pray we can learn our lessons quickly: By the abuse of time it comes that we have changed the genuine meaning of the word. For in the days of old, before Religion was adulterated, the reverend Fathers in the primitive times were wont to bless the patience of Christian Soldiers: bless them for their loyalty, bless them for their service performed to their most cruel bloodsucking persecutors: When they behaved themselves like the stoutest Champions in the causes of the Emperors, they were encouraged with an Euge sic decet Christianos you show now that ye serve the Lord of Heaven, by obeying his vice-roys upon earth. But alas the ditty is changed in our days: if any true hearted piety dare be so bold as to stand in the just defence of that Sovereignty, which the law of God, the laws of Nations our oaths and protestations binds us to, there is an Ito maledicta passed upon it, it is cursed and cursed bitterly. But though they curse yet God will bless: It is not the name malignant can exclude us out of the Church triumphant, if in a true cause we are here militant.  
Thirdly it is not Meroz, any poor little Villages they curse: tales aquilae muscas non capiunt: but Tabor and Hermon the Mounts of God, the hills of Learning: God knows our Meroz's our Country parishes are infatuated with a bayard blindness, they will neither see nor yet believe they are blind: Chirurgeons tell us no such sure sign of death as a senseless Apathy, when we feel not the smarting of our wounds: Thus where our State is wounded, in the head, the seat of judgement, wounded in the heart, the seat of life, wounded in the hands, the execution of justice, wounded in the feet, the interpretation of those laws, on whose bottom the Kingdom stands, we as if we were bitten with a Tarantula, shall laugh ourselves to death in the midst of these distractions, and only be grieved at yesterday ache, and take physic for that disease which had seized and left us three years ago. And this was the very case of the Israelites in the great defection from Rhehoboam, the complaint was oppression by his Father Solomon, whose days indeed was golden days, the very stones of the street which the people trampled on, were outvyed (in their number almost) by others far more precious: But crafty Rhehaboam galling their minds first and then finding when it pinched, he scarrifies first, Remonstrates to the people the grievous Yoke the King had thrown upon them, and then applies an itching plaster: he would ease them of the trouble to go up to worship at the Mother Church at Jerusalem, he knew if the doors of the Sanctuary were open, the law of God read there, would keep the people in subjection, 1 Kings 12.17. Therefore he will lock them up if he can, and pretend the people's ease: it is too much for them to go up thither, especially since they have made Calves at their own homes: what need a Church when the highways of Dan and Bethel will serve the turn? Thus when he had cheated them into a civil war, they run madly to their own confusion, continually weakening the powers of one another till the foreign Assyrian enemy seized on both. Under which captivity, ten revolting tribes lost both their names and beings: If in the mean time a Prophet come with a message from the Lord to reduce these wand'ring sheep, and bring them home to their forsaken folds, Jeroboam presently stretches out his hand against him; and if a miraculous power from heaven do not whither it, that hand will lay him fast. 'Tis reported of Julian that Enemy of Christianity, that although he himself was an able Clerk, yet he hated and forbade all learning in others, left they should detect his cunning fallacies: The comparison I know is very odious, and yet I fear me we shall find in our days more barbarism: Meroz, cursing Tabor: When the people have broken off their golden earings for their calf, Aaron himself shall be threatened, if he will not dance about it. Nay further yet; foolish, ignorant, lying Zedekiah shall have leave to smite Micaiah on the face if he presume to be so honest to dissuade his Countrymen from a war, and prevail so far with those that are in power as to clap him up in prison: God quit England from Jerusalem's sins of stoning those which are sent unto her.  
But fourthly, their curses come not for not helping the Lord. Unless they could persuade us there are two Gods in Heaven, as they would make two faiths and more than two baptisms upon the Earth: For was ever the cause of God set up by lying? Lying, so palpable, so notorious that Bellarmine's piae fraud's were religious, if compared with it: every week being a Cretian Mart where the Devil sends us in impressions by the whole sale, which may teach the next Generation how voluminously wicked their Fathers were; Was ever God's cause set up by oppression? Cruel, inhuman, barbarous oppression, where one subject shall be armed with power to kill another. Whilst the mouth of the Laws are stopped and they outroad by Ordinances: Where every discontented Country boor shall challenge an Equal share in his Neighbour's goods, and fall a plundering by the liberty of the Subject: Liberty! Licence let us rather call it, licence qua deteriores sumus, an abuse of licence which makes us worse. Was ever God's cause set up by Blasphemy? Most execrable deep mouthed blasphemy, which a sober Christian would be afraid to hear, lest the Devil should be in presence: Some daring in the Pulpits (which I myself have heard) tell Almighty God, that if he deserted this cause he would lose his honour, none would ever call upon his name again. Others professing in that sacred place, if this cause failed they should turn Atheists, as I think they are already: I will not tell all, you hear too much already. Oh Sirs, we are cheated of our Religion: The modester Papists have robbed us of some of the choicest of our Refined Doctrine whilst we are degenerated into the dregs of Jesuitism: Shall they make proffers of their service to hazerd their lives and fortunes in the just defence of a good Prince, which notwithstanding hates their Religion although he cherishes their subjection? and shall we unchristianly imagine that we help the Lord by destroying the Lords Anointed? The Giants may as well say they raised those mountains for bulwarks to defend the heavens from whence they meant to scale them: Judas may as well say he had given his Master a kiss of courtesy when he brought out men with swords and staves to secure him. Horror and amazement keeps in the rest.  
Lastly in their sense (I say) God has needed no help against the mighty. For compare Deborahs' Estate to Siseras, and make an equal reference in all to our own Nation and see who might properly be called the mighty: Deborah was under a palm tree in the high way, whilst Sisera dwelled in Harosheth. You may all remember the time when his sacred Majesty was first driven to these parts, when (except his goodness) there was nothing about him like a Prince, whether you look upon his retinue, or his provision or the homage of his vicegerents as he passed: all so much inferior to his Estate, that had those beheld it, which could have wished it meaner, I persuade myself, they would have pitied it: under the burden of which humility he must needs have fallen, if his heart had not proved like Deborahs' palm tree: grown higher with depressing. Sisera at this time abounding with all provision, Deborah seeks out for succour to encounter him: but those as you heard come in very slowly and unarmed: her enemy had made a party in those Tribes she trusted to. When the necessity of a war was made (which God knows was most unwelcome news to the religious heart of our pious Sovereign) (witness those several condescensions to almost unequal terms of peace, as would make a marble heart thaw to tears, that reads them) think but with what difficulty he raised up any forces, remember what opposition he found in preparing a guard for his royal person, (indeed he needed none he had a guard of Angels,) that being quarreled at for him in an open Country, which his Courts of Justice thought necessary for themselves in the greatest place of security: I should distrust your judgements to remember you of Dans ships or Ashers' coast Towns, Reubens divisions or Gileads confaederacy: What ever the wit of man could invent, to stop supplies by sea or land, of monies, or men, or ammunition, what ever disheartening could be thrown upon his well affected subjects; what ever opposition could be made by an association, entered between gebal and Ammon and Ameleck the philistines, and those that dwell at Tire, all these and more than these he encountered with: But non est consilium contra altissimum: In the day of battle Deborah wins the field: wonder not if the power of Heaven prevail Against the arm of flesh: Though his excellency reach unto the Heavens and his head mount up to the clouds yet he shall perish for ever like his own dung, Job. 20.6. Mount Tabor can tell you, and so can rebellious Meroz too, how successful those Northern troops have been, which God raised up as a pledge of his providence over his anointed, which all that look upon impartially, must needs conclude with an hic Dei digitus: This is the hand of Heaven which has defended the Lord of the earth Against the mihgty.  
But I have cut out these so large a share in my text that I have kept for ourselves but a very small division: What ever remains two words shall dispatch, 1. Imprecemur, 2. Deprecemur: let us curse, and let us pray: Curse those that have deserved it, pray that we may not deserve it. Imprecemur first: Curse if not with Deborah, Meroz there for not helping the Lord yet with St. Paul Meroz here for fight against the Lord: In denouncing which sentence I clash not with the doctrine I have delivered. There is an Evangelicall curse for all such coined to my hands, and that the deepest of all other, no less than damnation. Whosoever resists shall receive to himself damnation Rom. 13. Had we the art of opening our bibles, and reading there, as well as wearing them under our arms, which we love so well, we had been taught this divinity from as many plain texts as there are found to confirm any Article of the Creed: But a seeming devotion is no new vizor. Horace tells us of the light wenches in his days, that Libellos stoicos jacere inter sericos pulvillos amant: they would not go to bed, but their grave treatises of chastity must be their pillows: profession I know is very good, but it is when the hearts and lips are friends: But if we walk not honestly toward them which are without, we teach Turks and Mahometans to blaspheme our God, and whereas their religion is their shame, we prove a shame to our religion. For consider I beseech you, and consider seriously against whom ye would take up arms? Is it not against the power, against the ordinance of God? Contra animatam Dei Imaginem, against the walking picture of Heaven? In Kings, says Lactantius, there is a double appearance: they are Men before God but they are Gods before Men: Such (says Optatus) as acknowledge no power to control them, but him alone which instated them in such power: And who that is Tertullian will tell you elegantly: Ind Imperator, unde & homo antequam Imperator, inde potestas illi & spiritus: St. Paul's words shall interpret him, there is no power but what is ordained of God. Which struck good St. Bernard to so brave are resolution, that maugre the confederacy of the world, he would prove himself a Christian to God by a loyal subjection to his Sovereign: his words deserve letters of Gold in his 170. Epistle. Si totus orbis (says he) adversumme conjuraret, ut quippiam molirer adversus regiam Majestatem ego tamen Deum timerem, & ordinatum adeo Regem offendere temere non auderem. And he gives his reason: Nec enim ignoro ubi legerim qui potestati resistit, Dei ordinationi resistit. See how vast a difference here is between our Spirits: Religious soul! the whole earth combining could not make him willingly offend his King: and shall the fear of a threatened plundering make us oppose our King? Alas Sirs, those that we fear for the thorns to wound us, should be the spurs to incite us: Do their worst it is the best for us: they can but rob us of our entanglings, as Theophilact glosses upon 2 Tim. 2. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Some Serpents that embrace us, and hinder us from pleasing him who has called us to be Soldiers: shall we embrace a little nick named favour here, before the Eternal love of God? shall the common rout persuade me to go to Hell for company? If the name of Christian be not worn out with some newborn title for which we have exchanged it, think what our Captain hath done before us: He curses Peter's sword, which was drawn in defence of him his Lord and Master, and when the judge of Heaven & earth stood before the bar of Caesar, to be adjudged, he confesses himself to the author of that power which spoke his own condemnation. 'Tis truly said that Kings have long arms, they can reach to heaven for vengeance, they can crowed down to hell for torments: And this is true of all Kings, Christians, or Heathen good or bad: not only of the Vespasians the sweet governor's, but of Domitian the cruel Tyrant, of Nero, of Tiberius, that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, (as his Master Gadareus called him) that heap of mortar tempered with blood. The Oil upon saul's head saved his throat (says Optatus.) He was a wicked King, it is true, and deserved to die, but David was a good man, and durst not be his executioner, dum timuit olenm servavit inimicum; the oil with which he was anointed, David well knew would never sink, but in despite of violence would swim uppermost. 'Tis true that God sometimes refines his Church in the furnace of perfection, neither then does he leave it naked and disarm it. But what are the Church's weapons? St. Anselm had his dolere potero, potero flere, his sighs and groans against the Gottish Soldiers: St. Bernard fought to death against Lewes of France, non scutis & gladiis, sed precibus & fletibus, prayers and tears were his sword and buckler, Nazianzen overcame Julian but it was Christianorum lachrymis ubertim effusis, by softening his Adamantine heart with salt drops from their eyes: Thence flows the only sea which can overthrow Pharoahs' host. But alas! this is not our case: We prepare other arms against a Prince of another temper: One, whom if the first Christians had known they would have made him more than the delight of Men, they would receive him as an Angel of God. A Prince of so gracious a disposition, that the gratest fear his good subjects have to lose him, is because he is too good for Earth. One which lingers for peace in the greatest success of war: One which has hoped to win by losing, and has willingly made himself less a King, if by that means he might make us more subjects: One which calls out for mercy in the field of blood: ye stones hear this and melt! forbidding the slaughter of those which they can take prisoners, notwithstanding they came out to be his executioners. Groaning for our wants, our infringed Liberties, our decayed religion, which now lay expiring, but that the soul of it has found a warm seat in his royal breast. A true Cedar of Mount Lebanon that hath afforded a secure shelter to the humble valleys: and never, O never may he be cut down, till he be removed to the building of the Heavenly Sanctuary: As for those trees that would have the bramble reign, let them be consumed by the brambles curse, and be burnt up with the fire which the bramble kindles. But I have forgot myself:  
2. Deprecemur, The great God of Heaven remove this curse from us, for let us no longer flatter ourselves, Brethren, with a superficial Allegiance: have we been as zealous for God and the King as our duty binds us? have our Eliahs cried as loud, have they rend and cut themselves as much as Baal's lying Prophets? Has not the fear of daniel's den, the place where the King's Lions were kept, and Jeremiahs' dungeon stopped the mouths of our Men of God? Did not Deborah here find better aid from Zebulon, of those that handle the writer's pen? whereas, after the groaning of the press with seditious Pamphlets, our gracious Sovereign makes a just complaint that all pens are silent in his righteous cause: If he do gladio protegere, shall not we calamo defendere? If his sword rights our cause, shall not our quills writ his? He that fights for Heaven and us, shall not our prayers fight with Heaven and wrestle with Almighty God for him? Shall a little of Demosthenes his gold, send the sqinzy in our throats? Shall a politic silence stop our Mouths? For, good Sirs, what should you fear; the loss of your Estates? Alas, if you let fall this cause, who can challenge a propriety? 'Twill be in vain to preach a non concupisces, thou shalt not wish, when a vote turns you out of all nerutis caesis receptis? Do you fear the loss of Liberty? Was it ever more infringed? Do you fear the loss of Religion? I, here indeed it pinches: We have betrayed the cause Amyclaeo filentio, whilst we durst not tell you, the enemy was a coming: They have taken away the Lord, and we know not where they have laid him: Nay they have not left so much as the white  in the place where he lay before: They have defaced the Sanctuary, and yet we the Nehemiahs, the Eliashibs, the Priests and Labourers, have taken neither a sword in one hand to defend it, nor a trowel in the other to repair it. God be merciful unto our sin, for it is great, we have not helped the Lord Against the might.  
But the King shall rejoice in thy Strength, O Lord; exceeding glad shall he be in thy Salvation. Thou shalt give him his hearts desire; and wilt not deny him the request of his lips. For thou shalt prevent him with the blessings of goodness; and shalt set a crown of pure gold upon his head. His honour shall be great in thy Salvation; glory and great worship shalt thou lay upon him. For thou shalt give him everlasting felicity; and make him glad with the joy of thy countenance. And why, because the King putteth his trust in the Lord; and in the mercy of the most Highest he shall not miscarry. All thine enemies shall feel thy hand; thy right hand shall find out them that hate thee. Thou shalt make them like a fiery oven in the time of thy wrath; the Lord shall destroy them in his displeasure, and the fire shall consume them. Their fruit shalt thou root out of the Earth, and their seed from among the Children of men. For they intended mischief against thee, and imagined such a device as they shall not be able to perform. Therefore shalt thou put them to flight; and the strings of thy bow shalt thou make ready against the face of them. Be thou exalted Lord in thine own strength, so will we sing and praise thy power.  
Amen, Amen.   

The Third SERMON.  NUMBERS 17.8. And it came to pass that on the morrow Moses went into the Tabernacle of Witness, and behold, the rod of Aaron for the house of Levi, was budded, and brought forth buds, and bloomed blossoms, and yielded Almonds. 
THen it appears that time was when Aaron had a rod; and that rod budded too, yes and it budded in the Tabernacle, and was laid up in the Ark of the Covenant to be kept for a token against the Rebels in the latter days, verse 10. And may not we fear that those latter days are fallen upon us, when Aaron's rod is now broken, and he himself scarce suffered to enter into the Tabernacle? Whilst an Antichristian brood, sit in the Temple of God which exalt themselves above all that is called God. The Author to the Hebrews, chap. 9 tells us of three sacra deposita, holy Utensils laid up in the Ark together, the pot of Manna, the Tables of the Covenant, and this budding rod: and there they kept company so long, that now they will not be parted. Let one be banished and all the rest (we may fear) will follow: Once break the Crosier, this pastoral rod, and the Tables of the Covenant, the ten Commendements are not long lived after it: They shall be banished out of the Church by sacrilegious deformers, & out of the heart by impious Antinomians; and the pot of Manna, the heavenly bread of holy doctrine, shall be poisoned with the Coloquintida of errors mixed amongst it: there will be mors in olla, till some Elisha pour in meal, better ground, better sifted principles, there is death in the pot. Doctrine and Discipline like Hypocrates twins will always either laugh or cry together.  
The words read may be called God's lottery; the lots are rods, the bag they are put in is the Tabernacle, the hand that drew them out is the hand of Moses, the house they fall on is the house of Levi. Or more plainly, it is Gods miraculous preferring the house of Levi and Aaron most eminently of all that Tribe; before the mutinying Congregation: They depend upon the foregoing History, and I should handle them very partially; if I did not preface them with it.  
When the Levite Cora● thought himself undervalved, that he was only separated from the Congregation to do the service of the Tabernacle and to Minister to the people; esteeming it but a small thing that the Lord had thus brought him near unto himself (indeed his ambitious heart, kept him at far distance) when the Priesthood was entailed on Aaron and his Successors: he joins himself to Dathan and Abiram, two ruling Elders of the Tribe of Reuben with two hundred and fifty Princes of the Assembly, and there gins to preach parity, a doctrine easily digested by ambitious minds to this Independent Congregation. A pretence of holiness cloaked their wickedness: For being gathered into a riot and daring do all acts of violence which their strength could secure them in, they exclaim against their governor's, you take too much upon you, say they, seeing all the Congregation are holy and the Lord is amongst them: Wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above the Congregation of the Lord? A strange presumption which the mad World will never leave, to entitle God to the Devil's cause, to bring the Lord of Order to countenance their disorders: but these unhappy days hath left the story at our own doors; where a specious outside guilds many rotten Hypocrites: sampson's two foxes cannot be coupled with a firebrand of Sedition between them, but they be reported abroad to draw the yoke of Jes●s Christ: under a pretence of Every one is holy, a parity in righteousness, every one strives for a primacy, a supremacy in wickedness. And it were well if these thrusts were made against Aaron the high priests breast plate only, Moses his rod is beaten down too. The Mitre cannot fall but the Crown shakes; they that made Religion their qnarrel just before, presently after make political grieveances the burden of the song. Moses like a good Prince had taken off the envy from his Highpriest Aaron, and pointed their arrows at an higher mark: you are gathered against the Lord, says he, (and indeed Sirs God is in all his ordinances) but what is Aaron that ye murmur against him? Yet let his next work be, to secure himself: Is it a small thing (say they) that thou hast brought us out of a Land that floweth with milk and honey to kill us in the wilderness, except thou make thyself a Prince altogether over us? This strong complaint of Tyranny was the most forcible cord that could unite the hands of the many-headed-monster-multitude. But the next verse tells us it was their own particular interests which engaged the Rebels, it was because they had not Fields and Vineyards to their hearts desire. Absolom may flatter the people in the gate, and pity their case that justice is delayed them, but let his heart comment upon his words, and he pities most his own case, that he is not in place to do it. But Moses can easily wash his hands of Tyranny: I have not taken ass from them, neither have I hurt one of them, says he. The complaint of Rebels most commonly is as far removed from truth as their quarrel is from goodness: Yet unless God from Heaven will attest his integrity, his own righteousness will scarce defend him against two hundred and fifty assembly men. Moses and Aaron fall upon their faces, but the Lord holds them up; and at their command the Congregation separates from the tents of Corah and his Confederates, who would have made them Separatists from the Congregation: Whilst those mutinying Traitors which did not deserve to live, are not suffered to die, but are buried before their death, and they which would have made a division from their Fathers may not be gathered to their Fathers in peace: But the earth opened her mouth and swallowed them up, they and all that appertained to them went down alive into the pit, and the earth closed upon them, and they perished from amongst the Congregation. As for the other 250 with censers in their ●●nds which would be flashing of strange fire before the Lord, God sends down a true fire from Heaven which eats them up: Two parallel judgements: A Schism of the Earth punisheth a Schism of the People; a fire from Heaven consumes their ignis fatuus, their false fire upon the Earth; so surely does God overtake those which do not carry him along with them in their designs.  
By this time we would think that an awful reverence of Moses & Aaron was wrought upon the hearts of the Congregation by the finger of heaven: but seditious minds are restless: Like Sisyphus his stone, if it be fallen to the bottom, it must be rolled to the top of the hill again: The People fly from the gaping of the Earth, and are afraid of the fire from Heaven, but having digested their Panic fears, next morning (like men hardened to their destruction) they dare challenge God to renew his judgements, by charging his Magistrates with the blood of those which perished in their own rebellion; as if Moses his rod which before had devoured the Egyptian mock-Serpents, had now feasted upon the Rulers of the assembly, and Aaron's blue, and purple, and scarlet, were now altogether died in blood; ye have killed (say they) the people of the Lord.  
But unless those whom they accuse for their Murderers prove their deliverers they are all but dead men for there is wrath gone out against them: Aaron at Moses his command runs into midst of the Congregation, takes the censer, puts fire upon the censer, puts on incense, and stands between the living and the dead, and makes atonement for the People: The mercy of a good Governor resembles God from whom he has his Commission: he is ready to spare and protect them that conspire his destruction: knowing that his Saviour died for them which crucified him; yet lest the death of fourteen thousand and seven hundred should in the next Generation be worn out and forgotten, God will perpetuate this story with a lasting miracle, and that the mouths of murmerers may for ever be stopped he makes choice of Aaron symbolically: the twelve Princes of the twelve Tribes cast in their twelve rods, as Moses appointed, with their names wrote every man upon his rod: and on the morrow Moses went into the Sanctuary of the Witness, and behold the rod of Aaron for the house of Levi budded and bloomed blossoms and brought forth Almonds.  
In prosecuting these words, Aquinas his rule shall be our guide: In omni Scripturae narratione historica (says he) profundamento tenenda est veritas historiae, & de super spirituales rationes sunt fabricondae: in any histocal narrative part of Scripture, the first principle which we must ground upon is the truth of the history, and that foundation once laid we make our mystical, spiritual interpretations, a super-structure. Give me leave hear then to make Aaron another coat and to imbroyder over the fine linen, the groundwork of the history, with the Blue, and Purple, and Scarlet, and Gold, the several colours of the mystery. Observe we then in this miraculous Election of Almighty God, the subject on which the miracle was wrought, which falls under our notice, 1. In the simple, it was a rod, 2. The composit it, was Aaron's rod, 3. The decomposit, it was Aaron's rod for the house of Levi, Secondly, the miracle itself, branched out in 3, decrees: This rod at Aaron for the house of Levi, 1. Brought forth buds, 2. Bloomed bosom, 3. Yielded almonds: Thirdly the circumstances of time and place, like two Servants to attend upon it. It was on the morrow, In the Sanctuary: These are the stages through which we shall drive in this hours discourse, which will hardly afford us time to bait in them, but only with a running eye to overlook them.  
The subject of this miracle first was a rod, and this was chosen of God before any other, as the most proper the most significant: Indeed if we look upon things with a superficial eye, there was nothing belonging to the high Priest which did not promise more, and might not better prove Aaron's pre-eminence. His very garments which God prescribed Exod. 28. to be made glorious and beautiful like joseph's embroidered coat, might have taught his Brtherens that he was his Father's darling: Or the Urim and the Thummim, and the stones of his breastplate which afterwards delivered those divinations to the people, might have proved their own Oracles, and witnessed their praeferment. Or the golden bells upon the verge of his garment might have challenged that honour which is promised to the bells of the Horses, Zach. 14.20. to be superscribed, Holiness to the Lord. But ratio divina in medulla est non in superficie: It is not the glorious outside which God regards: That Almighty power which chooses the weak things of the World to confound the mighty, and says unto the dead bones, live, takes here a sapless sere stick, without either root or branch for a Sceptre at the exaltation of his anointed; and that which before was the instrument of working many miracles is now become the subject matter upon which a miracle is wrought. And this was most apposite to God's intent and purpose in four respects: 1. as it is symbolum potestatis a rod to rule and govern them: 2. As it is symbolum correctionis, a rod to correct and scourge them, 3. As it is symbolum instructionis a rod to guide and instruct them, 4. As it is symbolum sustentationis, a rod to support and comfort them: Power, Correction, Instruction, Sustentation, are the four pinnacles of Aaron's Tower, which make him lift up his head above his fellows.  
1. As a Rod of power. For of old the Priesthood was not fettered nor Aaron's hands bound behind him: If we look to his first election. Exod. 4.16. We shall find he was made Lord Chancellor to Moses amongst the Israelites: He shall be thy spokesman unto the people saith the Lord: Afterwards he and his sons were oftentimes the Lords high Stewards, which executed judgement upon the offenders. And when Moses was called up to Mount Sinai to talk with God, Aaron and Hur were made the Lords high Constables to govern the people in his absence. I deny not but that there was a Subordination of Power: the Crosier gave place to the Sceptre: Aaron's rod submitted to Moses. For in the forequoted place. Exod. 4. Where the Priest was made the Prince's mouth, the Prince was made the Priests God. He shall be as thy mouth and thou shall be to him as God. As for that high Priest now a days which proves himself the Man of sin by exalting himself above all that is called God, he had need build upon a firmer foundation than the Sandy Clementines, or their false Glosses: otherwise their honour will fall into the dust: Because the vision bids Peter, arise, kill and eat, therefore the Pope may depose Princes: because Malchus, which being interpreted a King, was servant to the High Priest, therefore Kings were the Pope's servants. You may well question whither these arguments had their riseth from the Brains or the Guts of the Friars. And truly we need not wonder to see those Mountains are brought low and levelled, if we do but consider that the pride of the Clergy hath been caution enough to Prince and People to look about them: that that Crosier has not been used as a Pastoral staff to catch the Sheep but to hook away the Crown, and Aaron's Rod is turned to a Sceptre of iron, to crush the Kings of the Earth in pieces. Yet a lawful subordinate power they have delegated from God himself: yes, and that in Temporals too, however the policy of our State of late hath thought it otherwise convenient. For to omit the story of Judas Maccabeus, who in the time of the Captivity of their Kings governed the people; we shall find Phineas the Grandson of Aaron in the next generation executing this Authority, who as a Priest the son of Eleazar, and as a Prince of the Congregation did judgement upon Zimri and Cozbi, the idolatrous adulterers; And it is worth your observing how the Psalmist recording this story, Psalm 106. makes choice of a word of double signification, to imply his double capacity; the word is Palal, which signifies either to pray or to execute judgement, verse 30. Phineas stood up and prayed, or Phineas stood up & executed judgement: denoting not only the connaturality of these two, that executing judgement is a kind of prayer or sacrifice to God, but likewise their competibility to the same subject, that executing judgement is as proper an office of the Priest as prayer itself: And thus is Aaron's a rod of power.  
But 2. as of power so of correction too and indeed the first patronises the second: his power enables him for correction. By correction, I mean not a corporal scourging or whipping of the people, as the disciplining Friars use upon themselves and others upon their pennancedayes; Aaron's rod had no whipcord at the end of it: but a more piercing lash circa potiorem partem, such arrows which David speaks of which enter into the soul: It is a tradatur Satanae, a shutting them out of the Congregation, and a banishing them from the camp of Israel. To this purpose, Levit. 13. God gives the Priest's marks & tokens to discover the leprous party, & to make a difference between the clean & unclean, and those marks once found out, it is not Nobility of blood or greatness of power can secure the Leper or keep him within the pale: The crown on Uzzias head cannot hid the Leprosy on his brow, but Azariah the Priest will cast him out. 2 Chro. 26. Indeed if there be Livor in oculis Pontificis, malice in the Priest's eye, which discolours all he looks upon, and makes the most clear object seem full of leprous spots, their casting out proves but brutum fulmen, potguns which make a crack but cannot wound: As the blind man newly recovered to his sight by our Saviour in the Gospel, because he saw more than the high Priest, was ejected: Indeed they threw him out of the Church that he might be nearer God. But when it is done, clavae non errante, with an unerring judgement: pronounced on those marks which God has set: he is polluted, he is unclean, let him dwell alone, without the camp shall his habitation be: and were it not to prevent the application which is to come anon, I should tell you, that in Gospel there is a retenta sunt si retinueritis, whose sins (the Leprosy of the Soul) the Priest retains by excommunication, they are retained, the severest correction of all other.  
But 3. As a rod of power & correction so is the Priest's rod a rod of guidance & instruction too: It is the guiding statue, the Vibilia set up in the crosspaths of sin to guide the people in the way of God's Commandments: Hereupon the Prophet Malachi makes the Priest's lips the Cabinet of knowledge, and sends the People to seek the Law at his mouth, 2 Mal. 7. From those Conduit-pipes flow those streams which make glad the City of God: You know the stopping of the pipes deprives the tankard bearers of water as much as if the fountain head were dried up. As good no law as none divulged: And this was the misery of the Israelites under King Asa. 2 Chron. 15.9. For a long season they had been without the true God, and without a Priest to teach, and without the law: Observe the connexion, no Priest to teach the Law for a while, and presently the law itself is quite forgotten. And this made Aaron, have golden bells as well as Pomgranats, the soundness of the fruit of the one is nothing without the tinkling of the other: Moses made two silver trumpets as well as two stone tables, that the law might be registered in the one and proclaimed with the other: God admits nothing dumb, nothing barren in his service. The very Cattle which draw the ark must be milch kine, such as give down their milk; and they must have calves shut up at home, that they may low after them as they go: And this befalls not under the law alone, but under the gospel too, whose very name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 implies as much; A good message it is, but no message before it be delivered; which imprints upon every Minister's heart, S. Paul's vae mihi 1 Cor. 9.16. Woe is me if I preach not the gospel.  
Lastly as to govern, correct, and guide, so to support the people too Aaron has his rod; and a heavy load is laid upon it, if we look to the first institution: 28 Exo. 38. He is to bear the iniquity of the offerings of the People: Pliny tells us of a poisoned fountain of Arabia, where the shepherds pay the price of the sheep that drink and perish. Let Ezechiel interpret this, Chap. 3.17, 18, 19, 20, 21 Verses, the sum of all is this, the blood of the wicked soul which dies in his iniquity, if he be not forewarmed and admonished God will require at the watchman's hands. Nay not only the inquity of the People's offerings but the offerings themselves lie upon the Priest's shoulders. Heb. 5.1. He is ordained for Men in things appertaining to God that he may offer both gifts and sacrifiees for sins. Have the People offended? The Priest shall make an atonement for them before the Lord. Has Abimelech a curse upon his family? send to Abraham he is a Prophet he shall pray for him and restore him. Is Hezekiah discomforted by Rabshaketh? send to Esayah he is a Prophet, he shall lift up his prayer for the remnant that is left. Is any man sick? Let him send for the Ministers, not the lay-Elders (as some falsely interpret Saint James) and let them pray over him, and their prayer shall work for the health of his body and Salvation of his soul: Thus is the Priest the staff which the people lean on: and in these respects amongst many other a rod was the most proper subject for the miracle.  
2. It was Aaron's rod, Aaron, who was summus Pontifex, a Mountain (as his name imports) which overtops the rest. God which is the God of Order would in no age ever leave his Church to the mischiefs of disorder and confusion. Which Order, God observed as soon as there was a Church, and a Church there was so soon as their was a Congregation, and Men upon the Earth to make it. And first the most honourable, the first born of the families were virtually called to this dignity, to pray, instruct, and sacrifice for the rest: Neither can I hear omit St. Austin's observation, that at the Creation where God brought forth all other Creatures in abundance, storing all the Earth with many individuums and particulars of the same Species, as many beasts, many birds, and the like, he made but one Man, and devised all the rest should flow from his loins, and so acknowledge him their chief and principle; and so from him a lineal descent should be derived by primogeniture, in whose hands should rest the government of all the rest; so that Monarchick Government is (tantum non) natural.  
But when God, as I may say, had embodied his Church and form them into a camp, he then immediately from himself without any suffrage of the People elects his Governors, and dignifies them with the rods of their authority. Moses in the temporals, Aaron in the spirituals. From God I say, immediately they were chosen; not by themselves, not by the People. Not from themselves first, for what power had a poor hireling Shepherd, Revels Son in law to engage a whole army? what policy, what insinuations could he use which was slow of speech, stammering of tongue? Unwilling to receive his commission when 'twas given him; unwilling to execute it when he had it; fearing those very miracles which should confirm him, flying from his rod now made a serpent which should encourage him. Or grant that ambitious minds do politicly decline that, which they most greedily affect, what was there here that could inflame their desires? pugna est de paupere reg●o, a bare Sovereignty over naked Men whom they must guide through a tedious Wilderness, and feed and furnish with all necessaries in a forty years' journey; and when they have Canaan their desires in view, then be swept away and leave them. Unlikely that any men aspired to be thus miserable or chose so burdensome a dominion. And more unlikely the People chose them to it, who were more likely to rebel against them then to obey them: And for all their pains paid them no other tribute but that of murmurings and revile, inconstant fickle men whose queasy stomaches sometimes affect garlic & onions before quails & Manna. The Levites which but lately drew their swords with them, now bandy themselves against them; and these which at the beginning of the Chapter give praise for a late deliverance, before the end murmur for a new affliction. But commissions signed from Heaven are armour of proof against all the conspiraces of the Earth. Moses knew, I am that I am, altars not; and though the Princes of the Congregation take censers in their hands, they do but kindle a fire to their own destruction, the brass of their censers shall make a lasting Monument of their rebellion: That so long as the altar has a being, Men may learn from thence, that no Man may take that honour to himself, but he that was called of God, as was Aaron: 5 Heb. 4. And sure the love of God was such that he would choose none but the best of Governments for his Church; Had all the Princes of the tribe of Levi had an equal share, they by an Aristocrasy would have bred an emulation; had all the People enjoyed a parity, their democracy would have brought in confusion; but exalting Aaron in the high Priests chair, and disposing of the rest in subordinate offices under him, God maintained so blessed a Harmony in his Church, as that it was an imperfect shadow of that blessed Harmony in heaven.  
But 3. It was Aaron's rod for the house of Levi upon whom the priesthood was entailed. The Reubenites thought they had a fair plea for it, because they were the first born of their Father Jacob: and the other tribes wished well toward it, witness the rods which every tribe put into the lottery, in hopes it might be taken. But God which is constant to all his purposes had chosen Levi of all the Tribes of Israel, to be his Priest: as the Man of God testifies 1 Sam. 2.28. To offer upon his altar and to burn incense before him. And it is well that this honour was once esteemed so great, that all the tribes were ambitious of it. When the Ephod and the embroidered coat were esteemed glorious: The dregs of Jeroboams corruptions have a greater influence upon our times, who made Priests of the lowest of the people; and when God requires the most comely bodies and proportionable countenances for his service; If any by nature be made so decrepit, that he be unfit for any other employment he will come and crouch and say, put me into the Priest's office, that I may eat a morsel of bread. Yet this Act of God which made the Priesthood Levi's impropriation, as it debars others from affecting of it, witness the destruction of the Reubenites, Dathan, Abiram and their Confederates, or so much as intermeddling with it, which cost poor Uzziah dear, 2 Sam. 6.7, Who going to uphold the ark, was smitten down, so neither does it privilege the Levites themselves to perform his service after their own fancy: If Aaron's own sons Nahab and Abihu shall presume to offer up any other fire than that which descended from Heaven upon God's Altar, that fire which should consume their sacrifices shall devour themselves. The service of the Sanctuary must be entire: It will admit of no Mechanics to officiate, nor yet must the fiery zeal of Clergymen themselves coin any new fangled forms of services and worship which God has not prescribed. Both are enemies to Aaron's rod here; for as the one break it in pieces or steal it away, and clap their own in the room, so the other bow it to their humour and make it crooked after their own fancy.  
Hitherto we have beheld the rod withered and dead: let us now consider it in the miracle and see what fruit it bears, which is branched in 3. degrees, it budded, it blossomed, it brought forth Almonds.  
Every tribe in Israel, had provided his rod, and every rod was stripped alike, and had the name of the Prince of the tribe engraven on it, Aaron's rod had no more sap in it, no more earth about it. Only it had Aaron's name upon it: Where God has made a secret choice, he will make an open difference. They go to the wrong end of the ladder which climb up into God's breast first, and there trace out those unsearchable points of his election, and from thence ground themselves upon their impossibility of barrenness and falling off, and by consequence, their necessity of budding and blossoming and bearing fruit. Would such a course as this have comforted Aaron, or satisfied the other tribes? What difference between a Log and a Tree before it spring again? But than is salvation sure when you work it out: Then faith is alive when it is manifested by its works: Then is Aaron declared to be Gods chosen when his rod quickens.  
And quicken it must or else he cannot be the chosen of God. No surer token of the life of grace then fruitfulness. Barrenness was banished at the first creation out of his garden of the World. Increase and multiply, says he, to all his creatures, and if any fall short cut it down, why cumbereth it the ground: And he that is not marred by the Devil, is always thus increasing: he is always going forward either budding new or ripening his last blossomed fruit. It was a curse laid upon avarice Esaiah 5.10. that ten acres of Vines should yield but one bath, and the seed of an Homer should yield but an Ephah, but one part for ten: sure that is an encumbrance not a crop; and those Vines are fit for winter's fire than summer's vintage.  
Nor yet will standing still in the same condition, serve the turn, (as they say an Oak will for an hundred years together.) 'tis a true saying in Divinity, qui Deo non progreditur, regreditur, he that goes not forward to God, goes backward to the Devil: It was no excuse to the idle servant, that had hid his talon, although he had buried it up for fear of losing ' ont, and put it in a napkin for fear of rusting of it: It was taken from him, for his negligence, he had gained nothing to it. Yet who is there here present, that cannot strike upon his heart and say, Lord, I am in a worse condition? He was idle, I am sinful. He hide his talon and brought it to light again, I have spent mine, and can show no portion of it. He did not ripen his blossoms, I have made strip and waste of mine. My beauty I have abused to voluptuousness, my wealth to luxury, my wit to knavery, my zeal to hypocrisy, my natural ingeny to maintain schism and heresy. Utinam nescirem literas, O that thou hadst given me no talon, that having little I might had the less required: The heat of thy spirit has sometimes quickened in me the buds of grace, but the coldness of my devotion has nipped them: Or if the warmth, the sunshine of thy mercy or the fire of thy judgements has thawed my frozen heart and made it vigorous enough to bring forth blossoms, the Prince of this air has mildewed them: Or if the fruit has been set, it has either been blown down by the storms of Affliction, or wormeaten in the sunshine my prosperity, and grown rotten at the Core. Thus have our rods which should bud and blossom, and bring forth fruit, turned like the sorcerers to Serpents and stung us to death.  
Observe yet farther, as Aaron's rod had three degrees of fruitfulness, budding, blossomming, and bearing fruit, so those three degrees met at one season, spring, summer, ana harvest was joined together; as the one fed his hopes so the other confirmed his assurance. A comfort it was to Aaron, no doubt, to see the budding of his rod, that there was life in it, that God had quickened it, and yet we know that a branch cut down, so long as the stock of sap which is in it, will feed it, it will do so. But when it shall prove like Jeremy's tree planted by the waters. Jer. 17.8. Which spreads out her root by the river, and shall not feel when the heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green, and she shall bring forth blossoms: This is delight as well as comfort. And yet Hosea calls Israel vitem frondosam a vine full of leaves, Hosea. 10.1. Although within a few verses it withered and was plucked up. But where the fruit is come to perfection, grown hard and ripe, and lasting, then may it well be laid up in the Sanctuary, to testify for him in the latter day. And surely, beloved, Aaron's rod in a mystical sense continues fruitful to this day. No Sermon which you hear, which is but a branch cut off from the tree of God's word, shall return in vain, but if it be dead to some, and prove the savour of death, it will quicken in others, and prove the savour of life unto life everlasting: Thus the very budding of this rod, the watchful attention of you that hear us, puts us in some hopes that our labour is not in vain in the Lord. Or if after hearing, you fall a discoursing of some point delivered, praise the Preacher, commend the fitnese semen accipitis, verba redditis, (says St, Austin) good seed you receive, good words you give back: laudes vestrae folia sunt, fructus quaeritur (as he goes on) good words are but leaves, or at the best but blossoms, it is fruit we preach for: and this St. Matthew, calls Chap. 3. ver. 8. fruit worthy of repentance: restorative fruit, which may be antitidote against the fruit of that other forbidden tree, which poisoned us all. If this fruit appear, it will testify for us in the latter day; Us, that we are of Gods sending, called of God as was Aaron. You that you are of Gods planting, and if by him planted you shall never be rooted up. Mat. 15.13. Thus whilst some are budding, others in the blossom, others grown ripe, God may every day receive a fruitful harvest.  
One word more, behold these Almonds grow upon the rod still and are not gathered off: and it is a good reason which a reverend Prelate has given, why Aaron's rod was treasured up and not Moses, because this carried the miracle still in itself, whereas the wonders of that other rod were past and gone. Those are rotten fruits which fall off from the bough that bears them. The parable in 13 Mat. Tells us of seed sprung up hastily amongst the stones, but because it had not depth of Earth it withered. There is I know a sort of Gospelers, whose hearts on a sudden are all on fire but are soon quenched again. Jonahs' gourd cannot outgrow them: but smitten by a worm they whither. Those are Gods Champions which stand fast in the faith, those are his chosen that fall not away, whose buds grow blossoms, whose blossoms grow fruit, and so they grow on in grace, from one degree unto another, till they become perfect in the Lord of all perfection Jesus Christ.  
The 2. Circumstances yet remain, and I shall handle them but as Circumstances, the Time and Place, On the morrow; in the Sanctuary.  
1. For the time, this change was wrought on a sudden, one night was spring, summer, and harvest to the rod, on the morrow it bore fruit. We must not limit the eternal God, to time; miracles are his works, and his works are like himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in an instant. And as the high Priest under the law, so the Apostles and Bishops in the Gospel on a sudden were advanced: There was but an insufflavit, he breathed upon them, and with his breath they received the holy Ghost. Which Spirit so changed their Spirits that it amazed their Adversaries to behold such Idiots, as Saint Luke calls them, Acts 4.13. men unlearned and simple, command so many tongues, and cure such diseases: So what the Schools say of the Apostles, I may say of this Rod, probatur Deus per Virgam, as this sudden change proves Aaron and the Apostles preferment came from God, so by them it proves there is a God, since none but he could work the Miracles.  
Then secondly for the place, 'twas in the Sanctuary, and no place so fit as Gods own House for Gods own Work. That house which budded in David's thoughts, for which God commends him, 1 Kings 3.18. But it flourished in Solomon's hands, who raised the glorious structure of it: And however the zeal of some in these wretched days, go about to eat it up, as the zeal of that eat up David's Heart, Psal. 69.9. or rather Christ in David typified, 2 John 17. Yet God's House it shall remain still, so long as there be Nations upon the Earth to inhabit any other: and that in a twofold respect. First as God dwells in it, it is his Temple: secondly as his services are performed in it, it is his House of prayer. My house, (says the Prophet Isaiah 56.7. repeated by our Saviour in three Evangelists) shall be called the House of prayer to all Nations. And now let the brainsick Separatists brood what conceit they list, that Temples were but ceremonial, and Christ's Passion put them out of date: either they must grant the fullness of the Gentiles before the descension of the holy Ghost, and that all Nations met at prayers at Jerusalem, (which is ridiculous enough) or that whilst nations, acknowledge a God to be worshipped, he shall have a House to be worshipped in.  
And truly Sirs we need not wonder that Harons' rod in our days seems withered, since the Sanctuary in which it is kept is so neglected. But alas! What speak I of the crosier, when the crown itself has found the same doom. When the traitor Jeroboam seduced the ten tribes of Israel against their King he forbids them to go to the Temple at Jerusalem, and sets up his highway Religion to worship his calves at Dan and Bethel. Nay he drives away the Priests of the Lord, the Sons of Aaron and Levi (with the Sanctuary away goes the budding rod: They are Relatives you see, pull down Church government and the Church will not stand long after it) 2 Chron. 13.9. and made him Priests like the people of other countries': Whosover comes to fill his hand with a young bullock and seven rams, the same may be a Priest of them that are no Gods. But what speak I of earthly Princes, when neglect of the Sanctuary ushers in Rebellion against the King of heaven, Hence we find those precepts so frequently conjoined of Observing Gods Sabbaths and reverencing his Sanctuary. 'tis strange that the one should be Moral the other Ceremonial. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 say the Heathen. Psal. 74.8. they will burn up all the Synagogues in the Land. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 say the Septuagint (changing one letter) they will forbid all his festivals. But the first part of the verse reconciles both, Let us say they destroy them altogether: so that no Sanctuary, no budding rod; on budding rod, no Aaron; no Aaron, no worship of God.  
Thus we have dispatched the history of the Text, with such inferences touched upon by the way, as could not well be balked: Now since whatsoever was written of Old was written for our instruction, it will not be amiss to see how this rod of Aaron points down to us, and is laid up to testify against these latter days. And first I must not balk the next high Priest, next in time, though first in honour, our Saviour Christ, who although he succeeded not of Aaron's order but of Melchisedecs, yet he is the Architype and substance which that other Priesthood shadowed. The Author to the Hebrews his saved me the labour of making an Analogy between them. And I hope his Offices without dispute will furnish him with a rod: as a King, a rod of power and correction, as a Prophet of guidance and instruction, as a Priest, of comfort and sustentation. In vain was that scape-goat of the Jews upon whose head was laid the sins of the Congregation, if it were not for this Lamb slain from the beginning, this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, this high-Priest which sacrificed himself, and laid, the burden of all our sins upon his own shoulders: He it is that took the censer in his hand as Aaron did, when the fire of God's wrath was gone out against us, and stood between the living and the dead, nay he fell down amongst the dead, and was numbered among the transgressors that by his stripes we might be healed. He, he it is who in the last act of his life erected his cross, the rod of his exaltation, that rod upon which his name was wrote, which bore most precious fruit, the fruit of his own Body, which whosoever can lay up in a sanctified heart, the Temple of the holy Ghost, may be sure to have it testify for him in the latter day.  
But being thus gone up on high, and lead captivity captive, and received gifts for Men, is he grown a niggard of them, and bestowed none upon his Church which he hath left behind him? Were the Jews better provided for, who were only ad memoriam, but types and figures of him that was to come; then we which are a memoria his remembrancers, and Priests in his stead: in persona ejus, says the vulgar, his deputies which here personate him and act him over again? No: his Church has Aaron's still, and the Aaron's have their rods too: Nay the Aaron's of the Gospel shall be refined too says Malachi 3. Chap. 3. God shall purge the Sons of Levi, which St. Hierome interprets the Evangelical Ministers. If the Testament be above the law; God forbidden the Ministration should be beneath it.  
St. Paul 1 Cor. 12. tells us of divers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 free graces or gifts proceeding from the Spirit verse 4. and that we may not think them to be heaped confusedly all upon one, in the next verse he speaks of several 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 administrations and offices among which they are divided, the graces are reckoned up verses 8, 9, 10. Some peculiar to the Apostles some streaming down upon the skirts of the Church. The offices are recounted, v. 28. and of them likewise some merely Apostolical, some permanent and perpetual; namely those three, Teachers, Helpers, Governors. Perpetual I call them, for besides that the light of nature instructed the heathen, so far as the morality of the service of a God carried them to the same division of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their helpers, their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their teachers, and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their governor's, they are the very same which God prescribed his own people the Jews, in their Levites, their Helpers, and as it were their Deacons; their Priests, their Teachers, and instructers; the sons of Aaron their Praelates and Governors. And thus we find the oyntmentt poured upon Aaron's, head has run down o his beard, and wet the borders of his garments. But this quick sighted generation amongst whom we live has seen farther into the words then any of the ancient Fathers, and out of the word Governors has extracted an Elixir their ruling Elders. A Government it is indeed, but such as Jothams' bramble was, which burned down the Cedars of Libanon, the pillars of the Temple: An opinion so full of novelty and void of authority that fourscore years ago it scarce had a being. As if God's Church all the time before had been hid with Eliah in his cave; or fled with the woman into the Wilderness. Some there are I know which have deeply strained their wits to fetch this Government out of the Scriptures, and pinch hard upon that text, 1 Tim. 5.17. (when all other fail them) The Elders that rule well are worthy of double honour, especially they which labour in the word, and Doctrine: Ergo by implication Elders there are (say they) which labour not and those are lay-ruling-Elders. But St. Chrisostome which lived nearer, and knew more of the Apostles practise than we, found out another sense. All Priests (says he) which may administer the Sacraments are not allowed to preach: the meaner sort may deal with Baptism, the wiser only with the Word; Which difference St. Paul found in himself, 1 Corin. 1.17. Christ hath sent me not to baptise (says he) but to preach the Gospel. If then thou hast such a Minister over thee as is gifted for both Offices, allow him a double honour. And let no man mistake the name of Elder or Presbyter in Scripture, which is no other than Priest or Minister, so St. John styles himself in his two last Epistles, so St. Peter 1 Ep. 5.1. and so all the pen men of God's holy Word have called the Ministers of the Gospel. Which is so notoriously true, that the very patrons of this Government have disclaimed the jus divinum of it, and make it only a State convenience: Undeniably true it is that our Saviour in his time did choose his twelve Apostles as Superiors, his seventy as subordinate. Subordinato I say they were; for besides that they were forbidden by the other in the time of Christ, Luke 9.49. They were commanded by them afterward as Silas was by Paul, Acts 17.15. and so were within their power. Afterward that the Apostles left their successor's Bishops may be evident by St. Paul's own Epistles, to Timothy the Bishop of Ephesius, and Titus Bishop of Crete, and the undoubted testimony of Ireneus confirms it, who lived immediately upon the Apostles age: But what need we more Authority? St. Judas v. 11. Speaks of some in his time which perished in the gainsaying of Corah. What that was, ye have heard; he would be Aaron's equal, how any could perish in it was impossible, unless by desiring or affecting a parity with their Governors. In the fear of God, Brethren, suffer then a word of Exhortation: This rod of Aaron has sap in it still and sprouts to this day. Oh shake not of the blossoms, pluck not off the fruit: if God have laid it up in the Tabernacle, let not Sacrilegious hands steal it thence: 'tis a rod of power, submit to it, a rod of correction, be afraid of it, a rod of instruction, obediently receive it a rod of sustentation, rely on it. Obey them which are set over you in the Lord. Let no Uzzah presume to touch the Ark; nor Uzziah to offer sacrifice, let the sons Levi only wait upon the altar. If a quis aequisivit, be terrible at the last day, who has required these things at your hands? will not prohibita sunt, have I not fobid thee; be much more terrible? We find in Exodus that Pharaohs sorcerers had got them rods too, but Moses his Serpent soon devoured them: And the Sons of Sceva Act. 15.19. would be conjuring in the name of Jesus; but the Devil soon proved himself their Master. Beware that fearful curse which befell the nolumus hunc regnare, those that would not let Christ reign over them: And such are they that despise his Ordinances, and so do all such as disobey his substitutes. His substitutes I call them, for they are his Labourers, but one degree removed from himself, he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he is, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉: if God be the chief guide, Moses and Aaron are the hands to lead his people: if God be chief Shepherd, Peter and his partners have the office under him to feed the flock. 1 Pet. 5. And if in temporals the civil Magistrate at this day thinks himself sufficient without bringing the difficultest causes to Aaron and the Priests, as God prescribes Deuter. the 17.8, 9 if Jehoshaphat, I say, think his Judges able to dispatch 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the affairs of State, yet let the Priest dispense 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, 2 Chro. 19.8. The Lord's business, the judgement cause of the Lord. Make not thyself the Devil's instrument, since he hath left disputing about Moses his body, for thee to dispute Aaron's authority. But rather join with that Captain of Israel in his prayer for Levi. Deuter. 33. Let thy Urim and Thumim be with thy holy one, bless O Lord his substance and accept the work of his hands, and smite through the loins of them that rise up against him, and of them that hate him, that they rise not again. To conclude: Aarans rod is God's rod and God's rod will always bring forth fruit, either sweet or bitter Almonds: sermons prove either the savour of Life or death. May that rod and this Sermon take such deep rooting in our heart, that it may bring forth fruit abundantly in our lives, to Gods honour his Church's glory, our own comfort, etc.  
Gloria Deo in Excelsis.