Deliverance-Obstruction: OR, The Set-backs of Reformation. Discovered in a SERMON Before the Right Honourable The House of Peers, IN PARLIAMENT Now assembled. Upon the Monthly Fast, March 25. 1646. By THO. CASE, Preacher in Milk street London, and one of the Assembly of Divines.  Isa. 49.1. 
Behold, the Lords hand is not shortened that he cannot save, etc.  Hos. 13.9. 
O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself.  Vers. 13. 
He is an unwise son: for he should not stay long in the place of bringing forth children.  
London, Printed by Ruth Raworth, for Luke Fawn, at the sign of the Parrot in Paul's Churchyard. 1646.   

Die Veneris, 27 Marcii, 1646.  
IT is this day Ordered by the Lords in Parliament assembled, That this House gives Thanks to Master Case, one of the Assembly of Divines, for his great pains taken in the Sermon he preached on the last Fastday before their Lordships in the Abbey-Church Westminster. And he is hereby desired to print and publish the same; which is to be printed by Authority under his own hand only.  
Jo. Browne, Cler. Parliamentorum.   

I appoint Luke Fawn to print my Sermon.  
THO. CASE.   

To the Right Honourable the House of PEERS, In Parliament now assembled.  
MY LORDS,  
WHat Complaint that blessed Reformer HEZEKIAH sent once to the Prophet ISAIAH, that the ISAIAHS of our time do now make in your ears, who are our REFORMERS, The children are come to the birth, 
2 King. 19.3.  and there is not strength to bring forth. To make some discovery where the OBSTRUCTION lieth, is the humble and faithful endeavour of this Sermon; which as it waits the second time upon your Commands; so if your Lordships please (at your sparer times) to let your eye second the travel of your ear, it may through his power, 
Rom. 4.17.  who quickens the dead, and calls things that ARE NOT, as though they WERE, become some way serviceable to the Work you have in hand (the end of its first and second attendance upon your Honours.) There was a time when Temple-work 
* Ezra 6.14.  PROSPERED in the hands of the LORDS AND COMMONS OF JUDAH, by the prophesyings of HAGGAI AND ZECHARIAH: O that such might be the blessed fruit of that abundance of GOSPEL-PROPHESIE which hath been preached in the ears of England's Parliament, since the time you were first engaged in this great Work, not only of STATE, but of CHURCH-Reformation. Truly, my Lords, we desire to look upon your Call of us the poor Ministers of Christ to this Service, not a STATE-COMPLEMENT, but as your truly 
* Acts. 17.11.  NOBLE desires of consulting with the Oracles of God. And for a real evidence thereof, give me leave, I beseech you, to become an humble Petitioner to your Honours for two things.  
First, that now you are in the work of Temple-Reformation, you would provide an Antidote against Gospel-contempt, in some remarkable punishment to be inflicted upon Sermon scorners, especially when they shall dare such a wickedness in the face of Heaven and earth, of God and the Church: since it cannot but be taken notice of by your Lordships, that there be some, who to this day hear Sermons, in the very same posture they were wont to see stageplays: to the infinite scandal of Religion, and provocation of Almighty God.  
Secondly, that in your own persons you will give a precedent to all the Kingdom of your willing and ready submission to the Gospel of JESUS CHRIST: With what eyes you are pleased to look upon the Ministers thereof, I know not; sure I am, whatever faithful advice in their humble Addresses to you hath the Imprimature of SCRIPTURE upon it, comes armed with the AUTHORITY OF HEAVEN; He that heareth YOU, heareth ME; and he that despiseth YOU, despiseth ME; 
Luke 10.16.  and he that despiseth ME, despiseth HIM that SENT ME. Upon such an account, it was an heavy word which the Prophet spoke once to a King; I know God hath determined to destroy thee, BECAUSE thou hast not harkened to MY COUNSEL: The contemptible Prophet had no contemptible GOD to back him: The application of it be to the enemies of CHRIST, and of the WORK you have in hand. However, it is a thing not to be thought of without trembling at; All power in heaven and earth is in HIS HANDS, 
Matth. 8.18. 2 Cor. 10.6.  to avenge all Gospel-Disobedience, to WHOM great and small must give an account (and who knows how soon?) what they have done with all the Sermons that ever they heard: Which that it may be seriously and savingly laid to heart by Parliament and Kingdom, shall be the instant Supplication of  
Your Honours to serve you, while you serve Christ, Tho. Case.   

A SERMON Preached before the Right Honourable House of PEERS.  EXOD. 5.22, 23. 
And Moses returned unto the Lord, and said, Lord, wherefore hast thou so evil entreated this people? why is it that thou hast sent me? For since I came to Pharaoh to speak in thy Name, he hath done evil to this people: neither haste thou delivered thy people at all.  
YOu have in these words 

1. A Grievous distress.  
2. A Gracious address.    
The Address indeed is first in the order of words; but the Distress is first in the order of time and sense: And this it was briefly:  
Moses and Aaron according to their Commission, had been now with Pharaoh to deliver their Embassy and Command from God concerning Israel's dismission: Let my people go, etc. 
Vers. 1.   
The Israelites wait to hear what news from Court, full of glad expectations of a speedy and present Deliverance from the Egyptian servitude, 
Chap. 12.40.  under which they had groaned now these Four hundred and thirty years. But the tidings doth not answer their expectations: 
Vers. 2.  Pharaoh will not let Israel go; he knows no God but himself, neither shall Israel stir. Yea their hopes of enlargement, are turned into the doubling of their bondage: in stead of keeping Holiday in the wilderness, they must to work again in the Brickils of Egypt: yea, make Bricks they must, 
Vers. 7, 8, 9  and find themselves straw too: more work, and less wherewithal to do it. This was sad news indeed: Yet they had some hopes that this might be but the cruelty and encroachment of the Commissioners set over them; therefore they'll to the Court themselves with their Petitions; happily the King may give them a better answer; it is possible His Majestia gave no such command concerning Israel. But when they come they find it was no mistake; Pharaoh speaks the same language the Task masters did: Ye are idle, ye are idle, get you to your work; 
Vers. 17, 18.  there shall be no straw given you, yet shall ye deliver the tale of Bricks, etc. This kills their very hearts; now they see themselves worse than ever: 
Vers. 19  and thus coming out from the Presence-chamber full of anguish and impatience, they meet with Moses and Aaron, 
Vers. 20.  fall foul upon them, charge them with being the cause of bringing them into this sad and hopeless condition; and in plain terms call for vengeance from God upon them: 
Vers. 21.  The Lord look upon you, and judge.  
And this now is the Distress, the matter of Moses complaint, Vers. 23. Since I came to Pharaoh to speak in thy Name, he hath done evil to this people; neither haste thou delivered thy people at all.  
Yet in this distress he doth not behave himself like the Israelites.  
They murmur, He mourns.  
They run to Moses, He runs to God.  
They proudly quarrel out the matter with him; He sweetly, humbly expostulates the matter with God.  
They (in a manner) fall a cursing; He in a holy manner fails a praying:  
Moses returned unto the Lord, and said, Lord, wherefore hast thou so evil entreated this people? Why is it that thou hast sent me?  
This was Moses gracious Address.  
The words thus briefly divided and opened, will afford us Two most remarkable Observations or Doctrines. The first, from the Distress; the second, from the Address.  
From the Distress thus:  
A Deliverance of Gods own promising and setting on foot, may meet with such desperate opposition and set-backs, 
1 Doct.  as to the very eye of a Moses may render it a lost design, no deliverance at all: Thou hast not delivered thy people at all.  
From the Address, you may take a Second Doctrine, and that is this:  
A gracious heart, in the deepest distress, 
2 Doct.  in the most hopeless condition, will yet go to God, and reason out the matter with God in Prayer: it will empty itself into the bosom of God by prayer and holy plaints.  
Whether I shall be able to reach this second Doctrine or no, I know not. If time will not serve to handle it as a Doctrine, yet in its place it may come to do us good service as an Use.  
I begin therefore with the First Doctrine.  
A Deliverance of Gods own promising and beginning, may meet with such desperate opposition and set-backs, that to the eye of a Moses it may appear a lost design, no deliverance at all. For since I came to Pharaoh, to speak in thy Name, he hath done evil to this people; neither haste thou delivered thy people at all.  
You see there be Two branches in this Doctrine.  

1. That a Deliverance of Gods own purposing and forming, may meet with sharp encounters and desperate set-backs.  
2. That a Moses himself may at the first blush look upon it, at such a nonplus, as a lost design, a no-deliverance at all.   
These are of such a various nature, that they well deserve to be handled distinctly: But fullness of matter, and straits of time, will necessitate me to handle them both together; which yet may be easilier done in the instances then in the Reasons of the Doctrine; they being of a most differing account; and therefore when I come to the Reasons, I must take leave of the Second Branch, to pursue the account of the first only.  
Instances indeed there be that will reach both.  
This in hand doth: For here, you see, is a Deliverance of Gods own promising: Four hundred years before, it was promised to Abraham, as you may see, Gen. 15.13, 14. At the end whereof, God himself set it on foot, by singling out Moses and Aaron for this service, 
Chap. 3 & 4.  and promising his presence with them, and his blessing so upon them, that they should undoubtedly do the work; which yet meets with such fierce opposition, and desperate discouragements, that not the Israelites only, but Moses himself gives it up for a LOST DESIGN; Thou hast not delivered thy people at all.  
But alas, it was early days when Moses made this complaint; this was but the beginning of the sorrows of their travel; Israel must endure sharper pains and harder throws, before she be delivered, that shall make her even despair of Life. Oh how doth the Deliverance after this hover up and down between Hopes and Fears? Good news to day; the plague of the Frogs hath made Pharaoh another man; 
Exod. 8.8.  he sends for Moses and Aaron, calls for prayers, promiseth to let Israel go: Moses thinks he is in good earnest; tells his Majesty he may command his prayers, Have this honour over me; bids him appoint his time, and it shall be done. 
Vers. 9  Surely now said they one to another, Our bondage is at an end; we hope, before a week go over our heads, to be well onward in our journey towards Canaan. I but before that week came about, What news from Court? Oh, as bad as ever; Pharaoh is of another mind; he speaks big, 
Exod. 10. 10, 11.  threatens, curseth: it is well if we be not put to the sword! Well, but there is tidings since that, very good; what the Frogs could not do, the Locusts have: Pharaoh melts. 
Vers. 17.  confesseth his sin against God and Moses, begs pardon, which be desires but this once more, and then certainly Israel shall be gone. I but this fair weather lasts not; the clouds return after rain: Pharaoh hardens again; Moses and Aaron are banished the Court upon pain of death; and there seems to be no possibility now of their departure, since all means of negotiating thereof is obstructed.  
In a word; look how many plagues passed upon Pharaoh and the Egyptians, so many desperate encounters and non plus's Israel's enlargement meets withal; so many hard pulls it cost, before they could get lose: And when they had got their shoes on their feet, and their staves in their hand, and their kneading-troughs upon their shoulders, and they well onward on their way, encouraging themselves now that the worst was passed; behold, the hardest pull of all was behind; they find themselves (or ever they were ware) environed with death and destruction: If they look before them, there is a Red-sea; if behind them, lo, there is Pharach, with I know not how many thousands of Horse and Foas, like another Red-sea, roaring, and threatening to swallow them up; if on either hand, there is an unpassable wilderness; and now, say the people to Moses, Because there were no graves in Egypt, host thou brought us out to die in the wilderness? 
Exod. 14, 11, 12.  This was nothing else but a very Plot of Moses and Aaron, an ambushment laid on purpose to deliver Israel up at once to the Egyptians, that they might utterly destroy us: we can neither fight nor flee; die we must every mother's child.  
See at how many dead lifts and desperate losses they were, and all this but in reference to the terminus a quo, of their deliverance, their coming out of Egypt.  
When you have leisure, you may follow Israel Forty year's journey in the wilderness. How do they tread the Maze as it were! backward and forward, up and down; advance to day, and to morrow a turn again; march ten miles perhaps, and then fetch a compass and retreat twenty it may be: and all the way encountered with such difficulties and desperate hazards, that they, would have been an hundred and an hundred times contented with all their hearts, to have exchanged their New liberty for their Old bondage; to have sold Canaan for Egypt again, and have though they had made a good bargain. Yea, once more, when now at length, through innumerable dangers and deaths, for Forty years together, they had set foot on the Borders of Canaan, their terminus ad quem; and one would have thought there had been nothing more to have been done, but to have taken possession; behold, they meet with such a fresh unexpected discouragement; their valley of Jericho is turned into a valley of Anchor; their fair fruitful meadows, into another wilderness; where they were at such a plunge, as not to Israel only, but unto their gallant General, Joshua himself, seems the loss of their design; 
Josh 7.5.6.  makes him rend his clothes, his heart being first rent, 
Vers. 7.  and wish that they had taken up their Quarters on the other side Jordan.  
It fared not much better with them upon their second Return out of Captivity; their return out of Babylon I mean: Indeed they met not with altogether so many difficult encounters and desperate obstructions, in respect of the terminus a quo, their getting lose from Babylon; that came off better, though it wanted not its discouragements: but look upon the terminus ad quem, and there you shall find them oftener at the loss, then when they came to take their first possession: the Building of the Temple, and the setting up of Religion and the Ordinances of God, stuck more than thrice so long then their travel in the wilderness. It was about One hundred and eleven years after, before the 
b In the 6 year of Darius Notho, the Temple was finish, which was anno 3531.  Temple was built; Twenty years after that, before the 
c In the 7 year of Artaxerxes Mnemon, Ezra came from Babylon, and set upon the Reformation of Church and State, anno 3550.  Reformation of their Ecclesiastical and Civil Policy was accomplished by Ezra: and Forty five years after that, before the 
d In the 20 year of his reign, Nehemiah began to build the wall of Jerusalem, which was anno 3564, and perfected them in 12 years.  wall of Jerusalem was perfected by Nehemiah: So that from their coming out of Captivity, to the completing of the work, was not less than about One hundred seventy six years; almost the length of the wildernesse-travel four times told. All which time, they meet with so many open oppositions and secret treacheries and plots, that might well have made it seem a lost Design, no deliverance at all; as you may find in the Stories of Ezra and Nehemiah. 
a They came out of Babylon 1 Cyri; which was about the year of Creation 3420.   
While this Captivity was yet threatened; the Church was in travel, in Hezekiah's time, and great hopes there was of a fair and speedy Deliverance: 
Isa. 37.3.  The children were come to the birth; i. e. every thing seemed to concur that might promise a desirable issue; and yet you know whose complaint it was, There is no strength to bring forth; her strength failed; 
Isa. 37.3.  her pangs left her, and Zion was now like a woman laid by of her Midwives for death. Hezekiah himself looks upon it as a LOST DESIGN, NO DELIVERANCE at all: There is not strength to bring forth.  
You know David, long before him, had the promise of the Kingdom; he was anointed by Samuel at the special designment of GOD; and yet how many Faith-shaking discouragements doth he meet withal? every step he took, he treads upon a thorn; oftentimes more like to lose his head then to wear a Crown upon it. Everywhere danger and death stairs him in the face; in the bed, in the house, in the wilderness, etc. insomuch that at length he gives his hopes of a Kingdom and himself too for lost; I shall one day perish by the hand of Saul; 
1 Sam. 27.1.  and in his haste, in his passion, in his ecstasy, 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Psal. 116.11.  as the Septuagint translate it, giveth the Lie to all the sons of men; I said in my haste, All men are Liars; even Samuel himself, that made me believe I should be KING, He did but deceive and flatter me with a prophecy of his own head. Alas, he despaired of life, and what hopes then of a Crown?  
It were easy to multiply instances: How oft do you find the Church giving herself for lost, 
Isa. 49.14. Psal. 44.9. Jer. 14.19, 21 & 15.18. & 20.7, 8, etc.  and ready almost to accuse God of Forgetfulness, and even breach of Covenant?  
Take but one instance more for all: The Deliverance of Deliverances, the Redemption of the world by Jesus Christ; how fiercely and furiously was it encountered by men and devils? how long was it adjourned after it was in the promise? how low was it brought after it was set on foot in the fullness of time? Surely so low, 
Luke 24.21.  that at length the Disciples themselves give it for lost; We trusted it had been he which should have redeemed Israel: we trusted it had been He; that implies, now they had given over the Hopes of it, and look upon it as a lost design, no Redemption at all.  
And so it fares with Believers in their Spiritual estate, their soul condition: alas, how often, even after they have received the promise, yea, have been sealed up to the day of Redemption, are they at a loss before they come to heaven!  
It fares with the Church in both these respects, as it doth with travellers who are going toward a City or House; peradventure they may have it in their eye Twenty or Thirty miles off; yet by reason of Valleys and Woods thorough which they travel, lose the sight of it Twenty times before they come at it; yea, perhaps their way too; so that they even despair of coming safe to their journey's end. So, etc.  
But I must hold you no longer in the Instances, lest I fall short of mine own design; I hasten therefore to the Reasons or Grounds.  
Wherein I must now (as I said) sever these Two branches, and follow only the account of the first, viz.  
What the Reasons may be, why a Deliverance of Gods own promising and setting on foot, may meet with such desperate set-backs and nonplusses, as may seem, sometimes, to give all for lost.  
And you may please to observe a Fourfold Spring-head, out of which several and various accounts do issue: viz.  

1. The Enemies of Deliverance.  
2. The Subjects of Deliverance.  
3. The Instruments of Deliverance.  
4. The Author of Deliverance, GOD HIMSELF.   
I begin with the first Spring head of accounts:  

Sort of Reasons. The enemies of the Church's Deliverance.  The ENEMIES of the Church's Deliverance.  
Here you see was a Pharaoh, and all his Malignant Courtiers and Subjects, opposing and obstructing Israel's deliverance: yea, when they had got lose, arming all the Milicia of Egypt, and putting them into Array, to reduce Israel again into their old Servitude and Bondage.  
And I would He had been the last Pharaoh the Church had been troubled with. But no though that Pharaoh was drowned in the Sea, there arise up after him new Pharaoh, in every age of the Church, that know not the Lord, and that will be opposing and fight against the Deliverance and enlargement of the Church of God, though they venture another tumbling cast in the waters for it. Whether they be open opposers, or secret underminers of the Church's Peace and Reformation; Tobijahs and Sanballats, 
Ezra 4.1, 2.  who under a pretence of building with the Jews, do hinder the work.  
Such as since the beginning of this Parliament, have been members of either House, who did his Majesty better service at Westminster, than they could have done at Oxford.  
These by what principles they are led, Tyranny, Ambition, Pride, Covetousness, Revenge, etc. (some by one, and some by others) I cannot stand to discover: Sure I am, they are all acted by that great principle of Enmity spawned into them by the old Serpent the Devil, whereby they are carried out into desperate hatred and opposition against the Government of Christ. Nolumus hunc regnare, 
Luke 19.14.  We will not have this man to reign over us; there is the first and great Quarral.  
And Secondly, against the Peace and Welfare of the Church: Come, and let us cut them off from being a Nation, that the name of Israel be no more in remembrance: 
Psal. 83.4. Minu. Foelix.  like their father the devil that sets them a-work, ad solamen calamitatis suae non desinunt perditi perdere, etc. lost themselves, they seek to destroy as many as they can.  
Hence it is, that the Church is never in travel with a Man-child, some eminent and famous deliverance and Reformation, but there is a great red Dragon standing before her, 
Revel. 12.4.  ready to devour the child assoon as ever it is born.  
But I must leave these: it shall content me but thus to have given you a touch in general of the opposition which the Church's Deliverance meets with from the Enemies: And truly well I may; for I profess unto you, the Enemies, Satan and all his Imps, do not do the Tenth part of that mischief to the Church, in obstructing and retarding her Deliverances, as the Church doth herself, take it for the mixed multitude of those that make up a visible Church, in the profession of the true Religion and Worship of God; which brings me to The Second Springhead of Reasons follow, 
Second sort of Reasons. The Delivered.  taken from The Delivered, or Subjects of Deliverance.  
Happy were it for the Church, if the oppositions and Set-backs of her Deliverance were managed only by her Enemies.  
Look upon the instance here before us, and you shall find that God was now as much troubled with Israel (if I may so say) as before he was with Egypt: yea you shall find that the work stuck not so long on Pharaoh's and the Egyptians hands, as it did after upon Israel's.  
First indeed, Pharaoh hardened, and Pharaoh hardened, etc. but than you shall find, And Israel hardened, and Israel hardened, etc. not perhaps in the letter, but in the reality. And God made quick work with Pharaoh; that conflict lasted not long; probably a matter of Forty days ended that dispute and controversy about Israel's departure; but of Israel you hear God say Forty years was I grieved with this generation, 
Psal. 95.10.  etc. That journey unto Canaan which might have been dispatched in Forty days, they quarrelled and sinned into a Forty years mazing of it in the wilderness: neither are they the last instances of a People that have laid in desperate obstructions and Set-backs in the way of their own Deliverance and Enlargement. It was so, 2 Chron. 20.33. Hos. 13.12, 13. But I must not stand upon Instances.  

How the Delivered hinder their own Deliverance.  The Ways and Mediums how they have done it, is the thing which I would as briefly as may be represent unto you.  
In general, all sin will do it; any sin will do it; witness what God said once to Israel: 
Isa. 59.1.  Behold, the Lords hand is not shortened that he cannot save, neither his ear heavy that he cannot hear: 
2.   
But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you. A passage quoted out of the 
* Num. 11.23.  history of the Wilderness, and therefore the more proper.  
But in special,  
These sins.  

1. By Pride.  1. Vnhumblednesse of spirit, Pride of heart: It was not Pharaoh only that knew not the Lord; surely Israel himself knew not their God: what a world of pride, and stomackfulnes, and selfwih'dnesse, and impatience they expressed not in Egypt only, 
Num. 14.3.  but in the wilderness too? Sometime they will make them a Captain to return into Egypt; anon, they will advance forward, 
Vers. 40, 41.  they will up into the mountain whether God will or no: and yet the Text tells us, verse 39, The people mourned greatly; but alas, they were unhumbled in their mournings; their hearts were not broken: on they will, against an express Command, Go not up, for the Lord is not among you: 
Verse 42. Vers. 44.  But they they presumed to go, etc. and for this they smarted.  
And so afterward, even while they were in the Babylonian Captivity, where they kept two solemn Fasts every year; 
Zech. 7.5. Sc. in the fifth and seventh month. Hos. 5.5.  yet neither their Captivity nor their Fasting humbled their hearts: The pride of Israel testifieth to his face. And again, The pride of Israel testifieth to his face, and they do not return to the Lord their God, nor seek him for all this; and for this the yoke of their Captivity was strenthned upon them, and their deliverance retarded; They shall go with their flocks, and with their herds, 
Vers. 6.  to seek the Lord; but they shall not find him: he hath withdrawn himself from them.  

2. By Unbelief.  2. A second Deliverance-obstructing sin is Unbelief; deeply laid to heart by God, Numb. 14.11. How long will this people provoke me? how long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I havo shown among them? To tell you the story of their unbelief, were endless: but this was the sum of it; They had not faith enough to carry them from one miracle to another: Let God do never so great wonders for them to day, in the next strait they were as far to seek as before: they could not dispute faith into the conclusion, from the strongest premises which Omnipotence itself could make: nay, they got a wretched art of perverting God's Logic; they dispute Gods arguments backward; 
Psal. 78.20.  Behold he smote the rock that the waters gushed out, and the streams overflowed; can he give bread also? can he provide flesh also for his people? CAN HE? nay, they should have said, Can he not? Here is unbelief with a witness, from premises of God's power, to conclude weakness: from a can to reason a cannot. And this unwheeled the chariot of their deliverance as it were, that with Pharaoh's, it drove heavily: The Lord heard this, and was wroth: 
Vers. 21.  so a fire was kindled against Jacob, etc. 
Num. 13.32, 33.  See what contradictions their unbelief speaks: The land thorough which we have gone to search it, is a land that eateth up the inhabitants thereof; and all the men that we saw in it are men of great stature: and there we saw Giants. A strange tale; the land eats up the inhabitants, and yet they are men of great stature, and Giants; surely than they were no starvelings: show me not the meat, show me the man; if Giants, surely they wanted no victuals. UNBELIEF unreasons a man: 
Unreasonable men and faithless. 2 Thess. 3.2.  so the Apostle joins them, when he prays to be delivered from unreasonable men; for all men have not faith. No wonder if unbelief be such an obstruction to a people's deliverance: it ungods GOD, it UNMANS man. He did not many mighty works there, because of their unbelief. 
Matth. 13.58. Mark 6.5. Matth. 9.29.  He DID NOT, so Matthew; but he COULD NOT, so Mark. God is said to can do no more than faith believes he can do. UNBELIEF TIES UP THE HANDS OF THE ALMIGHTY: According to your faith, be it unto you.  

3. By Murmur.  Thirdly, from hence proceeds another obstructing sin, and that is Murmur: you may find it treading upon the heels of their unbelief all the way; they murmur against God, and murmur against their Leaders, Moses and Aaron; and this arose from their Jealousy: sometime they suspect them of treachery; Moses and Aaron certainly had a plot first to betray them to Pharaoh (as you saw before) and then to destroy them in the wilderness. Wherefore have ye brought us into the wilderness to kill us?  
Sometime of ambition, and affecting superiority and Lordship over their brethren: Ye take too much upon you; wherefore lift you up yourselves above the Congregation of the Lord? Yea, that which would trouble a man most to see, the very Princes of the people, 
Num. 16. Vers. 2.  two hundred and fifty of them, are carried away with this foolish, groundless JEALOUSY: Certainly these men affect arbitrary Government; if power and authority be in their hands, we shall be in as great subjecton and slavery as we were in Egypt, if not greater.  
And this murmuring against them, GOD takes as against HIMSELF: 
Chap. 14.22.  How long shall I bear with this evil congregration which murmur against me? I have heard the murmur wherewith the children of Israel murmur AGAINST ME: and for this, God threatens them with their own Jealousies and causeless misgivings; they murmurs themselves to DEATH in the wilderness, and their children into a FORTY YEARS TRAVEL: As I live, saith the Lord, as you have spoken in mine ears, so will I do unto you: 
Num. 14 28, 29, etc.  Your carcases shall fall in the wilderness, etc. all which have murmured against me.  
And your children shall wander in this wilderness forty years, 
Vers. 33, etc.  etc.  
A Fourth sin is Adultery 

Corporal,  
Spiritual. 
4. By Adultery bodily and spiritual.     
I put them both together, because they both go together for the most part; the one, whereby a people or person take in a false Lover; the other, whereby they take in a false God, or a false Worship of the true God. And into both these that witch Balaam bewitched the people in the wilderness, 
Numb. 25.1, 2, 3, 4, 9  to a great not abstruction only, but destruction, as you may read in the story. And how often afterward these two bastned their Captivity, and hindered their enlargement out of it, I cannot stand to tell you: the whole Prophecle of Hosea inculcates it over and over.  
You know upon what Commandment it is, that God calls himself a jealous God; namely, 
Second Com.  upon that Commendment which forbids Idolatry; to show that much unto us, that as a jealous husband cannot endure a wanton look in his wife upon a stranger; so God cannot endure a whorish glance in his people towards Idolatry and Superstition: 
Ezek. 20.24.  Their eyes went after their father's Idols; it was no more hut an adulterous look; and for this when they might have expected a REFORMATION, God blasted them with a DEFORMATION: Wherefore I gave them Statutes that were not good, 
Vers. 25.  and Judgements whereby they should not live. Idolatry, and Superstition, and false Worship, which before was their sin, now became their curse and plagues; Idolatry was established by a Law, by Jeroboam, and Manasseh, etc. for to the whole story and series of their wicked Kings, doth that judgement refer.  

5. By Divisions  Fifthly, a Church or People have infinitely troubled and set back their own Deliverance and Reformation by Divisions. Divisions are like great Breaches in the banks of the Ocean, which let in a Sea of wischief and confusion among a people to hinder their work. The Spiritual walls of the Church of Corinth, went up as slowly as once the material wall of Jerusalem in Nehemiah's time, and all by reason of their divisions: I could not speak unto you (saith the Apostle) as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal; 
1 Cor 3.1. Verse 2.  a great obstruction to their Spiritual growth: they were not capable of the SPIRITUALITY OF THE GOSPEL. Hitherto ye were not able to bear it, nor yet are ye able. 
Verse 3.  Why? There is among you strife, and envyings, and divisions; are ye not carnal? The divisions and mutiny of CORAH DATHAN, and ABIRAM, what a sad obstruction did it cast in the way of this expedition here before us? They incense the Princes and the people against Moses and Aaron, 
Num. 16.2.  by raising Jealousies, and crying up the power and holiness of the people above their just proportions: and what a fire did this kindle in their habitations, which had like to have burnt down to the very foundation?  
This Troubles of Frankford might come in as a sad witness to this truth. But not to instance any further in such as have been pretenders only to godliness, who have always made a major part by odds in the Church: You may take notice that the very differences and dissensions of them who are godly indeed, have been most eminently fatal to Gospel-designes; witness the differences of LUTHER and CALVIN, which were greater obstructions to the propagation of the Reformation in their days, than all the opposition and persecution raised by the man of sin, and all his Antichristian party in Germany.  
It was the Church of Philadelphia, called so, for Love and unity between Brethren, before whom God promiseth to make her hypocritical enemies to bow and fall. 
Revel. 3.7, 9   
It is Babel men build, and not Jerusalem, where there is confusion of tongues: 
Mark 3 25.  neither can the house divided stand long.  

6. By Carnal confidence. Jer. 17.5.  Sixthly, as much have they disadvantaged themselves by Carnal confidence; a sin not only crossed, but cursed. Thus saith the Lord, Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm: Why? The reason follows, whose heart departeth from the Lord. Look how much men DEIFY men, by so much they UNGOD Jehovah: by how much a people IDOLISE Parliaments, or Armies, or the best of Creature-helps, by so much they withdraw their confidence and dependence from the Rock of Ages; and therefore for this doth God oftentimes infatuate Counsels, and blast all the beauty and strength of a people, wherein there trusted. The wisdom of their wisemen shall perish, 
Isa. 29 14.  and the understanding of the prudent shall be hid. 
Chap. 20.5.  They shall be afraid and ashamed of Ethiopia their expectation, and of Egypt their glory. Alas, can a people prosper that have forsaken their strength for weakness? that have exchanged God for the Creature? Can a design thrive that is under a Curse? Therefore cries the Prophet in the ears of all the world, Cease ye from man whose breath is in his nostrils; 
Isa. 2.22.  for wherein is he to be accounted of?  
And therefore on the contrary, when Israel after her Captivity is put into a thriving posture, she is brought in repenting of and disclaiming all her Creature-confidences, with the Spouse in the Canticles, coming up from the wilderness of Captivity, LEANING UPON HER BELOVED: Ashur shall not save us, we will not ride upon horses, 
Hos. 14.2.3.  neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, You are our gods (she had said so before, but she will say so no more) for with thee the fatherless findeth mercy. We break our stays, by leaning too hard upon them.  
Seventhly, by undervaluing thoughts of a Deliverance or Reformation. An ignorant inadvertency of the worth of such a mercy, is very distasteful unto God: Oh Jerusalem, 
Luke 19.42.  hadst thou known in this thy day the things that belong to thy peace! HADST THOU KNOWN the worth, HADST THOU KNOWN the necessity! God will have a people know what he doth for them; God will have a deliverance valued, before he perfect it: When Garlic and Onions are as good as milk and honey; when trading, and lands, and riches, and honours, etc. be as good as a Reformation; and men can take up with these, and let Reformation go its own pace, and come at leisure, if at all; Let them wander, saith God in the wilderness, till they know what CANAAN IS WORTH: 
Hos. 5. ult.  I will go and return to my place till they seek my face: in their affliction they will seek me early.  
This I suppose is that account given why the Reformation in good Jehoshaphats time was not a thorough-reformation: Though much was done, 
Chro. 20.33.  Howbeit the high places were not taken away; for as yet the people had not prepared their hearts unto the God of their fathers.  
I come now to the Third Springhead of Reasons or Causes, arising from  
The Deliverers.  

obstructions in Deliverers ●art.  For certainly the work of Deliverance and Reformation may stick long upon the hands of them that are to be the Deliverers and Reformers of a people: Yea, you may observe it sometimes, God hath more trouble (to speak after the manner of men) to deliver a people from their Deliverers, than he hath to deliver them from the enemies of their deliverance; yea, though the work be entrusted in the hands of a Moses and an Aaron, God hath enough to do to keep them from spoiling of it: a great part of the Deliverance, is to deliver a people from their Deliverers, before he deliver them by them. So little is God beholding to second Causes. You shall see it in the Instances or Causes.  
Take in the first place Luther's account.  
There be three things, saith Luther, that are the bane of Christian Religion; 
Melch. Ad. in vita Luth. p. 151 〈◊〉 Oblivio bene●●ctorum ab E●●angelio acce●●torum. 〈◊〉. Deinde secu●itas quae passim & ubique regnat.  and therefore much more of a REFORMATION.  
First, Forgetfulness of former mercies.  
Secondly (for I will put them together) Security.  
They were both the sins of as famous a Reformer as ever the Church of God knew, Hezekiah's; for which the work of Reformation and the whole Kingdom, suffered deeply: I'll but read you the Text; But Hezekiah RENDERED NOT AGAIN ACCORDING TO THE BENEFIT DONE UNTO HIM; 
Chro. 37.25.  for his heart was lifted up: therefore THERE WAS WRATH upon him, and upon Judah and Jerusalem. Unthankfulness and Pride had like to have undone all that he had done. Oh when Reformers forget old Mercies, and old Deliverances (and them it may be that God hath used as Instruments of them) and new mercies and successes serve but to make them secure, and swell them with pride, to overlook their Brethren, and overvalue themselves; to think themselves no longer Stewards, but Lords; not only petty kings, but little gods, to do what they PLEASE in the work and with the people of God: this shakes the very foundation of Church and State. God is highly displeased. You have a sad instance in Vzziah, of whom the holy Ghost records, 
2 Chro. 26.15, 16.  He was marvellously helped till he was strong.  
But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction: for he transgressed against the Lord his God, and went in to the Temple of the Lord to burn incense upon the Altar of Incense. Alas, how was the man, and all the worthy things he had done for Church and State (of which you may read from the beginning of the Chapter forward) even lost in Pride, Unthankfulness, and Security!  

Sapientia mundi qua vult omnia redigere in ordinem; & publicae utilitati impiis consiliis mederi. Exod. 32.22, 23, 24. 1 King. 12. from vers. 26 to the end of the Chap. Joh. 11.48.  Thirdly, Carnal policy worldly wisdom, which applies fleshly medicines to Spiritual distempers; when men will cast the affairs of Christ's Kingdom in the moulds and models of humane policy and principles.  
Aaron he will make a GOLDEN CALF to still the people and secure his own life: and Jeroboam will make two; ordain Offices, Feasts, Worship, which never come into God's heart, to secure the Kingdom to himself, though by this very means he lost it. The Builders in Christ's time would not own Christ for their King and Deliverer, for fear of forfeiting their kingdom to the Romans; and thereby ran upon that very mischief they would avoid: yea, they lost Two Kingdoms, while they would secure one. So dangerous a thing it is when men will be wiser than God, or at least, than God would have them. HUMANE POLICY before Scripture-precept, or Scripture-patern, is nothing else but DISLOYALTY; it gives God counsel, when God looks for obedience.  

Fourth sin, Vnprayerfulnes.  Fourthly, Vnprayerfulnesse in Reformers and Deliverers, is a great Obstruction and Set-back to their work; when relying upon the goodness of their Cause, they withdraw prayer, and leave all to God.  
It is Master calvin's observation upon Psal. 17. vers. 1. Hear the right, O Lord, attend unto my cry, 
Psal. 71.1.  give EAR UNTO MY prayer. Though David was sure he was in the Right, yet he goes to God by prayer to own both it and him. Hear, attend, give ear: 
Saepe contingit prophanos quoque homines jure gloriari de bona cousa, quia tamen non agroscunt mundum divinitus gubernari, subsidunt in conscientiae suae theatro, a● fraenum rodentes contumaciter magis quam constanter ferunt injurias; quia ex fide & invocatione Dei nullam perunt consolationem. At fideles non tantum nitumur causae suae bonitate, etc. Calv. in Psal. 17.1. Judg. 20.  he prays, and multiplies prayer: He prays, and Jacob like wrestles with God in prayer; so the repetition of the words implies.  
Calvin, I say, observes, that the children of God do not trust merely to the goodness of their Cause, but make their continual addresses to God by prayer, for his counsel and patronage in the managing of it. The neglect hereof, was the miscarriage of Two famous Battles wherein God himself sent the children of Israel to do execution upon their Brethren the children of Benjamin, who refused to give up their Delinquents to the hand of Justice: in the first whereof, they lost Two and twenty thousand; in the second, Eighteen thousand men, and all because they went out to the work full of carnal confidence, trusting to the goodness of their Cause, their Commission in their hand, with the broad Seal of heaven to it; but did not go forth with that fear and trembling, with that humiliation and seeking of God by prayer, as became a Service of that nature and importance. You may know what the cause of their miscarriage was, by their Recovery; for when in the 26 verse you find them going up to the House of the Lord with FASTING, and WEEPING, and SUPPLICATIONS, etc. then they go forth and prosper. Oh, God takes it very ill when men think they can do their work alone without God; and leaves them to encounter with desperate difficulties and opposition, to convince them of their folly, while he may justly say unto them. Nay, if you have done praying, I have done helping.  
A Fifth Cause of miscarriage or obstruction, 
5. Self-ends.  on the Deliverers part, is, When they are acted by personal interests, self-ends; when they seek their own, not the things of Jesus Christ, as the Apostle complains, Phil. 2.21.  
Oh, when the enemies of the Church's Peace and Reformation can spy such tempers and dispositions among the Heads of the Tribes, they will be sure to be tampering with and operating upon them; ply them with suitable and powerful temtations: 
Dan. 11.32.  Just the King's plot, KING ANTIOCHUS'; Such as deal treacherously against the Covenant, he shall corrupt by flatteries. Observe men's tempers, and boil up your temptation to the height; spice it well with rich and sparkling ingredients; an hundred to one but it will take; promise Offices, Honours, Estates, Pleasures, you may easily make your party strong; they shall warp, cool, grow flat, be no more like the men they were, then if they were not the same. Others that will not serve the design, let them be discountenanced, crossed, obscured, unless they be men of high principles and ponderous spirits; in time they will be discouraged; and if they do not come up to act with you, they will have no great stomach to act against you; they will sit still, and let things work as they may. I do not know I Cease ye indeed from man, etc.  
Aaron himself hath a spice of this disease: He and his sister the Prophetess speak against Moses, Num. 12. 
Num. 12.1.  Why what is the matter? the Ethiopian woman is laid in his dish; I but that was but the pretence; there lay somewhat else at the bottom; Self was at the bottom; Moses his GLORY obscured theirs; he had more respect than came to his share; they are nobody now: Hath the Lord indeed only spoken by Moses, 
Vers. 2.  and hath he not also spoken by us? This breeds ill blood; they care not for stirring any further in the work: if Moses must have all the honour, let him do all the work. What an Obstruction was this like to prove I Ah Lord, what influence self-ends and interests may have upon the very godly, to public prejudice, if they do not narrowly watch their own hearts I Oh it is extremely sad and ominous, when men come once to drive private Designs in stead of a Reformation.  

6. Over-credulity.  Sixthly, not less mischief may come to Public designs by Over-credulity, in them that manage them, to the fair and specious Overtures of Accommodations and Peace made by the Enemies: It cost his Excellency dear, Gedaliah the General of the Jews Forces; and I know not how many hundreds or thousands of Jews and men of War lost their lives by his too easy belief of PRINCE ISHMAEL'S FLATTERIES, 
Jer. 41.14, 15, 16. with Chap. 42.1, 2, 3  though he were sufficiently cautioned of his bloody intentions.  
And so it had fared with them at their return from Babylon; the Adversaries of Judah pretend to build, but intent to slay; an Accommodation at the top, Ezra 4.1, 2, but a Massacre at the bottom, Nehem. 4.11. and it had taken as sure as can be, had not God given Zerubbabel and Jehoshuah a singular spirit of providence and discerning.  
Oh the mischiefs that have redounded to the Church and her Reformation by unwary Treaties: all the Massacres and bloody treacheries which you read of in Ecclesiastical histories almost, 
Dan. 11.25.  have been ushered in by Treaties; witness king Antiochus, KING CHARLES the ninth of France: that bloody Massacre of above Sixty thousand Protestants, was nothing but a covered dish served in under the pretence of Peace and Marriage, confirmed by Oaths and Sacraments. The Church never got by Treaties: how should she? since not love of Peace, but want of Power brings the enemy to Articles, which he will keep no longer than he wants opportunity and advantage to break them.  

7. Preposterous methods.  Seventhly, Preposterous methods have been mighty Set-backs to Reformation: when Reformers begin at the wrong end. As long as they cried, 
Hagg. 1.2, 4.  The time is not come, the time that the Lords House should be built is not yet come, and began with their own houses, the work stuck, they made no earnings of it; they put their wages into a broken bag: 
Vers. 6.  you cry, saith the Prophet, It is not time, it is not time: the truth is, saith he, if you had not wanted hearts more than time, the work had been done before now: half so much time and cost on God's house, as on your own; on the Church-affairs, as you have spent on State-businesses, might have done the deed. 
Verse 8.  Up to the mountains, fall a building God's house that lies waste, and do it in good earnest, if you mean to prosper. That is the sum of the Prophet's speech. And therefore it was the singular wisdom and piety of Hezekiah (recorded to his everlasting honour) that in the first year of his reign, 
2 Chron. 29.3, 4, 5.  in the first month, he opened the doors of the house of the Lord, and repaired them, and brought in the Priests, etc. He made Church-Reformation his first work.  
And so Josiah; In the eighth year of his reign, while he was yet young, 
2 Chron. 34.3, 4, etc.  he began to seek the Lord; and in the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places.  
It was a brave Speech of one that was once a Member of Parliament (Oh that there had been such a heart. 
S. E. D. )  For my part, let the Sword reach from the North to the South, and a general Perdition of all our remaining Right and Safety threaten us in open view; it shall be so far from making me to decline the first settling of Religion, that I shall ever argue, and rather conclude it thus; The more great, the more eminent our perils of this world are, the stronger, the quicker ought our care to be for the glory of God, and the pure Law of our souls. 
In the Ninth place, you shall find that want of due execution upon Delinquents, hath obstructed, if not dashed hopeful beginnings in the Church's Deliverance and enlargement.  
Saul spares Agag, it was a present stop in the work, and had like to have been the after-ruin of the whole seed of the Jews. Haman that plotted their Massacre in Babylon, 
Esth. 3.1.  was an AGAGITE, i. e. of the posterity of Agag: Out of the Serpent's root came a Cookatrice, 
Isa. 14.29.  and his fruit had like to have been a fiery flying Serpent, to have consumed the whole house of Judah.  
And how Ahab sped for sparing Benhadad, the story will tell you, 1 King. 20.42.  
Ninthly, Want of solid and substantial Principles in Reformers, hath been not only sad, but fatal in the Church's affairs: when her Counsellors have been young, unexperienced, unprincipled men, led rather by fancy then by judgement, taken with every new thing that hath a fair and specious face upon it, and not able to dive into the bottom and difference of things.  
A company of young, giddyheaded fellows, that never knew any more of true Policy or Religion then a few Compliments in both, came to, lost Rehoboam, a King as wise in taking their counsel, as they in giving, his Kingdom: which makes me think that Woe to thee, O Land, when thy King is a child, 
Eccles. 10.10  was the Legacy which his father SOLOMON left behind him, by a kind of Prophetical spirit, as well as a Caution to after-ages. And when God would plague a people to purpose, he says but this; I will give children to be their Princes, 
Isai. 3.4.  and babes shall rule over them.  
In the tenth and last place, Irreformednesse in Reformers doth exceedingly trouble and hinder their work; when they that should reform a people are Swearers, or Drunkards, or  persons, or Haters of the power of Godliness, etc. this is an obstruction of a double influence.  
1. An influence of sin: For will a wicked man, think ye, prepare a yoke for his own neck, or a rod for his own back? will he be forward and active to settle a Rule, to make a Law that he knows will curb and cross his own lusts? No, their endeavour shall be some way or other to bring down the Rule to their hearts, when they love not to bring up their hearts to the Rule.  
2. It hath an influence of Divine Justice: For will God use such, think ye, or honour such in his service? No saith God, Them that honour me, 
Sam. 3.  I will honour: Shall he reform MY HOUSE, that will not reform HIS OWN? Shall he reform OTHERS, that will not reform HIMSELF? No, Every one of the House of Israel which setteth up his Idols in his heart, and putteth the stumbling-block of his iniquity before his face, 
Ezek. 14.7.  and cometh to inquire concerning me, I the Lord will answer him by myself:  
I will answer him according to the multitude of his idols. 
Vers. 4.   
God may use indeed a Cyrus, a Darius, about his Out-Works; but, Sanctificabor in appropinquantibus mihi; I will be sanctified in all them that draw nigh unto me. 
Levit. 10.3.   
The Princes and Lords of Israel brought wrath not only upon themselves, but upon the people, by their whoredoms, Numb. 25.1. so far from bringing them into the land of promise, that they were a means to slay them in the wilderness. They that accompany the Lamb, must be CALLED, and CHOSEN, 
Revel. 17.14.  and FAITHFUL.  
I come to the Fourth and Last Account: sc. The Reasons taken from the Author of Deliverance, God himself.  
For truly in all these things, God hath an overruling hand: it pleaseth God, 
Reasons on God's part.  for reasons best known to himself, to suffer a Deliverance or Reformation of his own promising or setting on foot, to meet with many desperate oppositious and set-backs, which do render it many times, in the eye of rational conjecture, a lost Design, no Deliverance. We will glean up some of those accounts which he hath been pleased to let fall in Scripture, for our support and satisfaction herein.  

1. For trial of men's spirits.  First, God doth it for the discovery of men's Spirits; for the discovery of them to others, for the discovery of them to themselves.  
Thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these Forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, 
Deut. 8.2.  and TO PROVE THEE, TO KNOW WHAT WAS IN THY HEART, etc. Oh, suffering times are trying times. Set an empty pot over the fire, and it will break and flee in your face; so will men of empty, hollow spirits over a fiery trial: which is therefore called God's fire, and God's furnace, 
Isa. 31.9. and 48.10.  because thorough this fiery furnace God will bring his choice ones, to be vessels of honour. Oh what a discovering time hath this time of jacob's troubles been I how many hundreds and thousands of Hypocrites and rotten spirits of all ranks have been discovered, that had the work of Reformation go on as we vainly hoped (at first) it would have done, had lain hid to this day I and I am almost confident God hath not done his discovering-work yet: Goldsmiths use to run their metal more than once thorough the fire. Look to your hearts; the furnace is not yet extinguished.  

2. To humble his people.  To Humble his people also God doth this; the last quotation told you so beforehand; TO HUMBLE THEE, and prove thee. Proud men are not fit for a Reformation; they'll scorn any thing but what suits with their own humours, and quickly be weary of that too. 
Psal. 149.4.  The meek he will beautify with salvation.  

3. To exercise grace.  Thirdly, it is the exercise of their Graces. Prayer WRESTLES, Patience SUFFERS, Hope WAITS, Faith puts forth PURE ACTS, in hope, abouè hope; Love is ACTIVE, Self-denial watcheth over PUBLIC CONCERNMENTS, and Poverty of Spirit saith, If he have no delight in me, HERE I AM, LET HIM DO WHAT IS GOOD IN HIS EYES, 
2 Sam. 15.26. Job 13.15.  and holy resolution says, THOUGH HE KILL ME, YET I WILL TRUST IN HIM.  
Oh what a glorious sight it is to see a people come with exercised graces to take poss ssion of the Land of promise!  

4. To warn the enemy.  Fourthly, In the mean time while Deliverance is thus delayed, God gives the enemy's warning: He sets them a day as it were to come in: He sets Kings their day, when Parliaments do not: 
Psal. 2.12.  KISS THE SON, saith he to the Kings and Princes that are in conspiracy against his Holy Child JESUS: Will ye, 
Exod. 9.17.  or will ye not? AS YET EXALTEST THOU THYSELF AGAINST ME? said he to the Egyptian Tyrant after the sixth plague; AS YET? Wilt thou not come in for all th●se warnings? Come in by such a day, or thou art but a dead man. And thus he bespeaks the briers and thorns that come against him in battle; Let him take hold of my strength, that he may make peace with me, and he shall make peace with me; else I will go thorough them, 
Isa. 27 5.  I will burn them together.  
And surely this dealing of God brings in many. While God and Pharaoh were bussling, some of the Egyptians came in and compounded.  
He that feared the Word of the Lord amongst the servants of Pharaoh, 
Exod. 9.20.  made his servants and his  flee into the Houses: And what, would they, think you, secure their , and not themselves? that had been a brutish fear indeed: nay, the Text tells us, 
Chap. 12.38.  A mixed multitude went up also with them. Oh the Patience and goodness of God To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your heart. 
Psal. 95.7, 8.   

5. To take them else in their own plots. Psal. 9.16.  Fifthly, else, by this means God takes the enemies in their own snares: The enemy's plots are nothing else but God's ambushments to snap them in: every new opposition of Pharaoh, is but a preparation to a new Plague. The wicked is snared by the work of his own hand. HIGGAJON SELAH.  

6. To destroy them by degrees.  Sixthly, by new oppositions, he wastes and destroys them by degrees; every plague devours some: The Frogs some, and the Lice some, the Locusts some, & sic in cat. So, Edge-hill some, Newberry some, York some, Salt-heath some, Alton-heath some, Naseby-field some. A man might reckon you a good many hundred sums; and so God sums them out by degrees, and thereby gratifies his people's prayers, as well as promotes his work.  
God shall let me see my desire upon mine enemies (saith the 
Psal. 59.10.  Church.) What is her desire? Slay them not at once, lest my people forget it. 
Vers. 11.  If all the enemies of God had been destroyed at Edge-hill, it had been forgotten by this time. Scatter them by thy power, and bring them down, O Lord our Shield: so he hath pretty well, blessed be his Name. And by this means, 
Psal. 111 4.  he hath made his wonderful works to be remembered: The deliverance out of Egypt shall never be forgotten: no nor Englana's out of our Episcopal Bondage, while the world stands.  

7. By delay, God multiplies Deliverances.  Indeed by this means, God makes many deliverances of one. It fares with a Deliverance sometimes, as it did with the loaves which CHRIST blest; while he broke them, they multiplied under his hand: so while God seems to BREAK a deliverance, he multiplies it into many: had Israel gone without opposition the next way to Canaan, it had been but one deliverance: opposition, protraction, MULTIPLIED it into many Deliverances, before they came to their Rest: had England stepped out of Episcopal bondage into a Reformation, it had been but one Deliverance; while God hath seemed to break it, I am confident he hath multiplied it into above a thousand already: to your Chronicles else, if ye believe me not: above Fourscore in eight months; what think you in the several Counties, in these three Kingdoms, in these five years, since the Parliament began: And how many Deliverances more God will make of it, before he hath done, who can divine?  
Eighthly, 
8. He makes a full Deliverance at length.  his meaning is sure by these methods to make a full Deliverance of it.  
Full, in respect of the enemy's destruction; the ten plagues bring in their particular sums, as you saw before. The Summa totalis is, Pharaoh and his Hosts hath he drowned in the bottom of the Sea. 
Exod. 14.4.  It was a full Deliverance at length.  
And as it was full in respect of the enemy's destruction, so it was full in respect of Israel's liberty and enlargement. Pharaoh would compound: first, Go ye, 
Exod. 8.25. Chap. 10.8.  sacrifice to your God IN THE LAND; then, Go ye: but who are they that shall go? GO YE THAT ARE MEN, etc. then, go ye serve the Lord, men, 
Verse 21.  women and children; ONLY LET YOUR FLOCKS AND YOUR HERDS BE STAYED. 
Verse 24.  Thus the enemies of God, if they cannot altogether hinder Reformation, would yet fain beat it as low as they can: if it must be a Reformation, let it be as ill-favoured, as beggarly as may be, not worth the having: but no, saith Moses, we'll go all, men, women and children; 
Verse 25, 26.  our  also shall go with us; there shall not an hoof be left behind: we will have a thorow-enlargement, or none: and so God forced it at length whether Pharaoh would or no: they ALL went I, and glad to be so rid of them. The Psalmist remembers that, 
Psal. 103.38.  Egypt was GLAD at their departure. My Brethren, I have not the gift of Prophecy, as some men have; but I yet have some hopes that though our unhappy differences have hitherto kept us, and our Reformation very low, and we look upon it now with weeping eyes and bleeding hearts (as there is just cause; for our sin and free grace may meet in the same action) I say, There is yet hope in Israel concerning this, that the fruit of all these Jarrings shall be the rendering of our Reformation taller by head and shoulders then otherwise it might have been. 
Zech. 8.6.  My Brethren, because this is wonderful in our eyes, shall it therefore be wonderful in God's eyes? Oh that I had faith enough to say, The zeal of the Lord of hosts shall perform this: and let all that love the Lord Jesus say, Amen.  
Ninthly, 
9 He makes himself known. Isa. 63 12.  Thus shall be known to be God: oppositions lift up God. Israel sees the Creature NOTHING, God ALL, in a deliverance so fetched out of the fire. He led them by the right hand of Moses with his glorious Arm, dividing the water before them, TO MAKE HIMSELF AN EVERLASTING NAME. And again.  
At a beast goes down into the valley, 
Verse 14.  the Spirit of the Lord caused him to rest: so didst thou lead thy people. TO MAKE THYSELF A GLORIOUS NAME. Here is nothing to be seen in such deliverances, but God, God: God will out his people by this means of themselves; their own wisdom, their own counsels, their own strength, etc. and God will be All in All. The Lord alone shall be exalted in that day, Isa. 2.11.  

10. By this means God endears deliverance.  Tenthly and Lastly, By this way, and these methods, God endears Deliverances unto his people. If they were easily got, they would be light set-by; but O how sweet is a land of Rest after forty year's travel! how sweet Peace after War! how beautiful a Creation when it comes out of a Chaos! as heaven is worth two heavens to a poor soul that comes out of hell; so Deliverance is Deliverance indeed, and Reformation is Reformation twice told, that is fetched out of the jaws of Difficulty, out of the bowels of devouring apposition: it will be meat indeed, when it comes out of the eater; and sweetness indeed, when out of strong conflicts and long expectation: then may the Church tune her Psalms of Thanksgiving with the sweet singer of Israel, 
Psal. 40.1.  I waited patiently for the Lord, and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry; and so forward.  
O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God how unsearchable are his judgements, 
Rom. 11.33.  and his ways past finding out!  
And thus, Right Honourable and Beloved, I have dispatched the Fourfold account of this sad Truth, etc.  
That a Deliverance of Gods own promising and setting afoot, may meet with such desperate non-plusses and setbacks as may make it seem a lost design.  
As for the other part of it, sc.  
Why the people of God, even a Moses himself may so judge of it; how it comes to pass that they should so mistake the ways and meanings of God, were indeed an account worth the enquiring into, were there time and room for such a work; which since there is not, I must hasten to make some improvement of what hath been already spoken, for  
Use and Application.  
Wherein notwithstanding it is possible we may meet with some opportunity and occasion to give you some little kint and touch of this also.  
First therefore, 
1 Use, for Caution, not to judge of Undertake by Success. Eccles. 2.9.  it may serve to Caution us not to measure the lawfulness or unlawfulness, goodness or badness of a Cause or Undertaking by the encouragements or discouragements, the present success or opposition it meets with: No man knoweth either love or hatred by all that is before them. Wicked hellish designs may go on smoothly and prosperously, hardly meet with a rub in the way; as it is said of the wicked themselves, There is no bands in their death; 
Psal 73.4.  or as the Hebrew signifies, no 
* 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉  knots in their death: they live like Lions and Wolves, tearing and devouring, and yet die many times like Lambs; not any knot to untie, no doubt of their salvation, no trouble of conscience; a Lamblike death (the great Idol of carnal ignorant people.) So it is with their designs; there is no bands or knots in their designs; they meet with no rub in their way; they go off as smoothly as heart can wish, many times, the devil driving them on, and God in a secret and a just judgement, permitting, for the hardening of wicked men to their own destruction.  
Whereas Designs of Gods own forming and animating, may, you see, meet with such dismaying Cross and Turnbacks, that many times might make one think there is no life in the business. And therefore call not in question the goodness and warrantableness of the work of Reformation in hand, or any other Gospel-designe, because of the obstructions and oppositions it hath, or may meet with: we are very prone to it: The Israelites after their first and second discomfiture before their Brethren of Benjamin, 
Judg. 20.23.  are at their Shall I go up again to battle against the children of Benjamin my Brother? and so again, Shall I go up, 
Verse 23.  or shall I cease? thereby secretly making a doubt of the warrantableness of their War; although God expressly bid them go. And so you may find the Israelites, even Joshua himself, 
Josh. 7.7.  repenting of their adventure, as it were; Would to God we had been contented, and dwelled on the other side Jordan: they distrust their Cause, though it had the Imprimatur of heaven upon it, a promise of above Four hundred years old.  
And have not we done so upon the desperate exigences, and straits, and non-plusses into which this design hath been driven up many times? Have we not been at our Ifs and our Woulds-to-god, & c.? Remember, I beseech you, what reasonings and discourses you have had in your own hearts. And get a better and a more infallible Rule to judge the goodness of Public or personal designs by, not successes or opposition, but the Word; 
Psal. 73.34.  if it be according to that Rule, Wait on the Lord, and keep his way, the issue shall be good, whatever the present posture of things be.  
Secondly, if so, then take heed when you meet with such Turn-agains and non-ultra's in your work; take heed, I say, of charging God foolishly; 
2. Not to charge God foolishly.  take heed of entertaining any hard thoughts of God. This is our sin and our folly, That when any Church-deliverance is on foot, we think it must be carried on without any interruption, it must be done all at once; and so when the work meets with unexpected hardship and contradiction of sinners, we are ready to call Providence, as well as the Cause into question. I said in my haste. I am cut off from before thine eyes: You know whose complaint it was. 
Psal. 31.22.  And Zion said, The Lord hath forgotten me, 
Isa. 49.14.  and my Lord hath forgotten me. HARD THOUGHTS! And so we are ready to think the work is at an end; we have seen the best on't. Moses you see is at this pass here: I would be loath to do the good man any wrong; but methinks he dasheth a little upon God in his complaint (though there be a great deal of grace in it too) Wherefore hast THOU evil entreated this people? Why hast THOU sent me? THOU hast not delivered, etc. Ah good man, he think this was hard dealing of God; and fears he is at his furthest, it will all end in a cloud.  
And the reason of all this is (to give you the hint intimated before) Because the people of God take their eye off God and the promise, and fix it upon Second causes: 
Why the people of God reason thus unbelievingly in their straits. Isa. 33.10. Isa. 15.17.  because they do not wisely consider God's times, how that the Churches despairing times, are God's helping times: Now will I rise, etc. They do not wisely ponder God's methods: Moses might have remembered how that God when he made Abraham a promise of bringing his seed out of Egypt; he shown him also, as in a glass, the Methods he would use in doing of it, in that Emblem of the smoking furnace, 
Gen. 15.7.  and the burning Lamp, the smoking furnace passeth before Abraham first an Emblem of black opposition, of sad and affrighting discouragement and trouble; and then comes the burning Lamp, an Emblem of JOYFUL AND GLORIOUS DELIVERANCE. 
Psal. 97.11.  Light is sown for the righteous, and joy for the upright in heart. Alas, Moses might have thought with himself, and have said to God, Lord, this opposition of Pharaoh, this doubling of thy people's bondage, is nothing else but the vision thou show'dst to thy servant ABRAHAM; whereby we know assuredly the WORK IS BEGUN, it is the arrow of the Lords deliverance: we are now, Lord, in the SMOKING FURNACE; the BURNING LAMP WILL APPEAR SHORTLY; O hasten it, Lord, and help thine Israel well thorough this Smoking furnace, that they may not be weary nor faint in their minds, nor sin against thee by IMPATIENCE and UNBELIEF till thou pleasest to cause the BURNING LAMP TO ARISE upon us, etc. And with these words he might have quieted and stilled the people also. But the people of God have their failings and faintings, their short spiritedness and short sightedness; they look not to the time and methods of God; they eye not the ends and aims which God hath in these kind of dispensations of his providence: and hence it is that they give way to Unbelief and misgiving thoughts.  
And therefore since by this short hint you see what the bottom of the disease is, labour to make a Cure of this Discovery. Take heed of hard thoughts of God.  
Second Use, Examination.  
And yet in the Second place, though in such Exigencies and Emergencies as these be, we should labour to keep up good thoughts of the Cause, 
1 King. 8.47.  and good thoughts of God; yet there is great reason that we should at such times turn in upon ourselves, and bring back to heart our own ways, and our own do, to see what the CAUSE may be on our parts, why Gospel-designes, Church-deliverances stick so long in the birth, meet with such desperate retardings and retrograde motions: for this is certain, Deliverance seldom sticks in the birth, but there is some sin and folly at the bottom.  
Ephraim is an unwise son: 
Hos. 13 13.  for he should not stay long in the place of bringing forth children. A metaphorical expression, importing thus much, that he should not have stayed so long for his deliverance out of Babylon, had there not been some great folly bound up in his heart; 
Prov. 22.15.  which was to be fetched out with this rod of Correction.  
Truly, Honourable and Beloved Christians, we had need then to lay our hand upon our heart, and bring ourselves to the Bar this day: This is certain, God is angry; wrath is gone forth against us, we have great cause to fear.  
Object. You will surely say, What cause? the War goes on prosperously; never had Joshua better, swifter success in the conquering of Canaan, than our Armies in all places of the Kingdom almost, have had in reducing this almost-lost nation; Eighty admirable successes in eight months. We have had as much success as we could desire, more by odds than we could expect: The War is as good as finished.  
Answ. It is true, Brethren; if you will look upon these progresses as Mercies, we have great cause to be thankful: but if we would look upon them as evidences, I see not any strong argument of rejoicing in them. I see not any bottom in them upon which a man, if he will look with both his eyes, can build any clear conjecture what God will yet do with us: My Reason is this:  
The War goes on; I, but does the Work go on? Oh there is as sad a face of things in the Kingdom, as ever was either since the War or since the Parliament began; and sadder, in as much as now the obstructions do arise from ourselves, whereas formerly they have risen from our enemies. And O happy Israel it was, when the obstruction of their deliverance lay on Pharaoh's hand only; it stuck but a few days there; God quickly conquered those briers and thorns; he went thorough them, and burned them together. But when the obstruction lay upon Israel's part. in those days God began to cut Israel short; the Deliverance stuck there many years.  
Quest. But how may we know whether the work rest on our part, or on Gods, and the enemies?  
Answ. Truly very easily: Take this Rule. When there be but difficulties in the way, though huge and many; Enemies may be in it, and God, overruling those enemies and their designs to his own ends. For this cause I have raised thee up, 
Exod. 9.16.  to show my power, etc. But when we see sin in the way, then know the work sticks upon a people's hands: and this may make us tremble.  
Truly, as I say, when we consider how God carries on his work, it looks as if it would be a Deliverance; God works as if he were in good earnest; and we have cause to turn our days of mourning into days of rejoicing. But when we consider how we work, truly it looks as if we were in jest, or as if we we afraid of Deliverance, afraid of Reformation; and we have cause to turn days of Thanksgiving into days of Humiliation and mourning.  
For thus it is; while God is working wildernesse-wonders, we are working wildernesse-sins, wildernesse-prevocations.  
I appeal else to the List and Catalogue of those sins which on the Delivereds part you have seen to be the great obstructions and set-backs to their Deliverance. 
Sins of England   
First, 
Pride.  doth not the Pride of England testify to our very faces? Alas, neither Judgements nor days of humiliation have taken down the pride of our hearts. Oh the pride of Apparel, the pride of Houses, the pride of our Tables; but above all, the pride of Judgement, and the pride of Heart that is found in the midst of us to this day! England is very proud.  
Again, 
Unbelief. Heb. 3.12.  Is there not yet an unbelieving heart in the midst of us, causing us to departed from the living God? to departed from his Truths, and to departed from his Commands, and to departed from his Promises? Surely we have not faith enough left to carry us from one miracle to another. Though God hath caused us to walk upon the waters, yet if there do but arise one wave higher than other, with Peter we are ready to sink. Though we live in an Age of Miracles, yet in every new danger our Faith is to seek. May not Christ reprove us still with. O ye of little faith! wherefore did ye doubt?  
And for Murmur; I am confident the wilderness never rung more with that hideous sound than England doth; 
Murmur.  and the noise of it is gone up to heaven, and calls for vengeance. I am confident, had there been but half so much praying as there hath been murmuring, we had not been now to have been delivered.  
And for Adultery, 
Adultery.  that peccatum non nominandum, that sin not to be named; Spiritual and Corporal; O that it had been Israel's sin only! O that it had died in the wilderness! The hearts of men go after strange flesh, and our eyes after our father's Idols. O how fain would some return into Egypt! At best, Brethren, we have but changed our Idolatry, not forsaken it: we set up new Idols every day, there is a world of new Idolatry among us.  
And On our vain and Carnal confidences! 
Carnal confidence.  We make gods of any thing; gods of our Parliament, and gods of our Armies; a god of any thing but Him that is our God.  

undervaluing of Reformation.  Is Reformation prized? I would it were: men love it well, but they love their ease better, and their trading better, and riches better, and preferment better, etc. I am much afraid God might stop our mouths with these things, though we never saw a Reformation. How little is it that men will do, or suffer, or part with, or deny themselves in for a Reformation!  
Lastly, Are there not Divisions among us? 
Divisions.  Surely for the Divisions of England, for the Divisions of London, for the Divisions of Brethren, there be great thoughts of heart: And how many there be that cast Oil in stead of Water upon these flames of Contention I how few study to be of an healing spirit! All cry for Peace; but most men by peace mean nothing else but their own wills. How few be there that do deny their own wills to seek for Peace? The Lord help us; we are in a thousand times more danger from our own Divisions, than we are from all the power and policy of all our enemies abroad and at home. And in this case now though your enemies flee and fall apace before your Armies, yet I remember what God by the Prophet told the people, Jer. 37.9.10. Thus saith the Lord, Deceive not yourselves, saying, The Chaldeans shall surely departed from us: for they shall not departed:  
For though ye had smitten the whole army of the Chaldeans that fight against you, and there remained but wounded men among them, yet should they rise up every man in his tent, and burn this City with fire. There is no believing of Successes when SIN lies at the door.  
And now, my Lords, for that Catalogue of Obstructions which the Deliverers of a People cast in their own way by  

Forgetfulness of Mercies.  
Pride and Security.  
Carnal Policy.  
Vnprayerfulnesse.  
Personal interests, base self-ends.  
Over-credulity of the enemies good meanings.  
Preprosterous Methods.  
Defaults of execution of Justice upon Delinquents.  
Want of solid and substantial Principles.  
Irreformednesse in their own persons and families.   
I say in all these I have given you only the History; I have made no Application, neither do I intent it: I leave the application of each particular to yourselves. You know more by yourselves then any slander by in the world doth; or at least, you may do, if you study yourselves, and study your own hearts; I pray God you may: And you may deal more plainly and thoroughly with yourselves, than it is meet for any Minister to do. You are our Fathers, and we would gladly go backward and cover your nakedness; mourn in secret for you, and lift up a prayer to God in your behalf. What therefore another can do but by Hints and loof-intimations at any time, you may do in downright accusations, between God and your souls: you may say, if there be occasion, Lord, I am the man; I have forgotten mercies; Honour and success have made me proud and secure, and lifted up my heart with Hezekiah: I have consulted with Carnal policy rather than the Oracles God: I am an Vnprayerful wretch; my Chaplain prays, but I pray not; my Closet is a stranger to such duties: Ah God be merciful to me, I have pursued base ends and self-interests: I have been too easy to believe fair and specious pretences, but have not searckt into the bottom and truth of things: Preposterous methods have been my sin, and I was never troubled for it. There be Delinquents of an high nature; Trinity-blasphemers, Scripture-Traitors, etc. and I have not done my best to bring them to judgement: I want solid Principles: I am a child, said Solomon; Lord, I may much more say so: and that which is worse, I that should reform others, am unreformed myself; I and my bosome-sin are not yet parted: Oh will God make use of such a wretch as I am, in so glorious a work as this is whereto I am called? God be merciful to me a sinner. I say, This language would not become a Minister; but this language would exceedingly become you, as you shall find occasion. Oh deal faithfully between God and your own souls: Yea, all that stand before God this day; deal impartially in this business of Self-examination this day: Reformation sticks in the birth; the children are come to the birth, but there is not strength to bring forth. God is certainly angry; 
Josh, 7.11.  he hath seen some accursed thing in the midst of us: And O that every one would begin to ask with the Disciples, Nunquid ego Domine mi? LORD IS IT I? Say, DELIVERED, Lord, is it I? Say, DELIVERERS, Lord, is it I? Every one say, Lord, I and my father's house are the troublers of England, the Hinderers of Reformation: It may be Israel had been in Canaan, had I been stoned to death; the storm had ceased, happily, had I been cast into the sea with Ionas; the Reformation perfected, had I been removed.  
Christians, it is a day of sould-affliction, of self-judging, of self-condemnation before the Lord: let us make it a little judgement-day: how near the great day is, who knows? oh prevent i: Set up Thrones, and set Christ upon those Thrones, and cast ourselves down before him, and smite upon our thighs, and bear our shame, and cry, Guilty, guilty: this were the way to atone God, to save the kingdom, to hasten Reformation: God would certainly take it well at our hands. 
1 Cor. 11.31.  If we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged of the Lord.  
I might enlarge here; but it is more proper for the work of Confession and Prayer; which the day calls for. I hasten to Conclude with a word of Exhortation; the third Use.  
And first, Noble Peers. Do you desire to serve Jesus Christ faithfully in this work of Reformation? do you desire to manage it so, as no obstruction may be on your part? I know you do! Give then a poor Minister of Jesus Christ that desires as much to serve you, leave, to present you with a few Cautions, or Directions, or Rules (call them which you will) to help you in your work.  

Rules for Deverers.  Directions, or Cautions, or Rules for Deliverers.  

1. Eye duty more than danger.  1. Eye duty more than danger. It was a brave answer that Luther returned to Melancton, when surprised with fear, he wrote to Luther to be more moderate; Oh, says he, If the Cause be not Gods, let us lay aside; but if it be, let us go on, and trust God. Providence of means is ours; Providence of success and safety is God's. Do you your work, and God will do his. Sibi nim fore cetera curae. 
Ovid.  IN THE MOUNT THE LORD WILL BE SEEN.  

2. Take heed of Short spiritedness.  2. Take heed of short spiritedness: Moses had a dash of it; Hear, ye Rebels, must we fetch water out of this Rock? It cost him dear; he must only see, he must not enter the Land of promise It was a brave Resolution of Nehemiah: Should such a man as I flee? Short spirited men will give away their souls, 
Florus says of the French, They are primo ●●petu ignis, exitu vero sumus. James 1 4.3. Observe. God's go forth. 2 Sam 5.24.  much more a kingdom for nothing. There is Saul, because God will not answer him, the Devil shall. Let patience have her perfect work.  
3. Observe God's go forth, and then bestir yourselves. Saith God to David, When thou hearest the sound of a going in the top of the Mulberry-trees, then bestir thyself; for than shall the Lord go out before thee, to smite the host of the Philistines. My Lords, God hath smitten the Host of the Philistines; is not this his walking on the top of the Mulberry-trees? Are not these the signals of God's presence? O bestir yourselves now to do something worthy of God, and worthy of these wonders, in the work of Reformation. When God doth great things for a people. He looks for great things from a people; and if they answer not his expectation, 
Matth. 5.47.  they are und one. What singular thing do you do?  

4. Take heed of Tolerations.  4. Take heed of Tolerations: do you know what they are? Truly in the latitude as they are cried up; and contended for, they are nothing else but a Gunpowder-Treason to blow up Religion; a Balaam's plot to bring God in an enemy upon us: and I am confident the hand of the Romish Balaam is in it: as sure as you are there, 
That Witch of Rome that bewitcheth the Nations. Cant. 2.19.  my Lords, Priests and Jesuits are working these fireworks underground, and put them into the hands of active Engineers to throw them abroad. Oh that you could take us those foxes that spoil the Vines, now that the tender grapes are sprouting forth: Methinks it were not a matter of impossibility to earth them; to follow them by the print of their feet, to their burrows, where they skulk up and down in every place both in City and Country. What engines did Julian the Apostate and Valens the Emperor use, 
Aug. Ep. 166. Theod. Eccles. hist.. l. 4. c. 22.  when they would undermine and ruin Christian Religion, but a Toleration of all Religions, Liberty of Conscience, as we call it; but Libertatem perditionis, as Austin more rightly phraseth it; a Libeyty of perdition? For what is it in English but If men will go to the devil, you must not hinder them?  
Ob. Why but shall the godly be persecuted or banished the Kingdom, after they have done so much for it?  
Answ. No, God forbidden. I hope through God's mercy and the Parliaments piety and wisdom, there will be a medium found out between Banishment and a Toleration; or else for my part, I had rather be banished even life itself, then live to see the misery and confusion that will come upon this Church and State. Surely you know how you may do it; sc. by making a pure Rule, settling a thorough Reformation indeed.  
For God's sake, my Lords, let us not have a Reformation that shall need a Toleration, much less that shall enforce it; to have found such a one, would have been grievous; but to make such a one, would be intolerable; what could Episcopacy itself have done more? It is as if you put a scandalous Minister upon a people, and give them leave to go from him; make a smoky house, and give the children leave to run out of doors! The Lord keep you, that such a thought may not come into your hearts; I hope he will. My Fathers, my Fathers, the charets of England and the Horsemen thereof, 
Toleranda sunt quae emendari non possunt.  PURITY IS THE BEST WAY TO UNITY; and as many as walk according to this Rule, peace shall be upon them; peace shall be among them, mercy, and upon the Israel of God. Therefore,  
Fifthly, take heed, I beseech you also, of that which is the next door to a Toleration, and that is Connivance: 
5. Take heed of Connivance.  It is but a Toleration in figures, though not in words at length. The plot of the Bishops for the advance of Popery (whereby indeed it was thriven to a formidable height among us.) A Toleration will sound too broad, we shall hear ill among the people: but, said they to the Papists and Jesuits, do what you will, we will secure you; if ye be fined, we will take it off; if ye be imprisoned, we will quickly fetch you out: O LET NOT YOUR SOULS COME INTO THEIR SECRETS; AND TO THEIR COUNSELS LET NOT YOUR HONOURS BE UNITED.  

6. Provide for Religion before Dispensations.  And therefore in the Sixth place, let it be your wisdom and piety to provide well and thoroughly for Religion, before you provide for the Religious: Settle a Rule according to the Word (and, if I may say so) according to the example of the best Reformed Churches, before you debate a Dispensation from the Role. Let us know who be Saints, before the Saints know their Thirty: For let me say this freely, If either Saints may make Opinions, or Opinions may make Saints, we shall quickly have more Opinions than Saints in the Land.  

7. Mind Covenant.  Well, Seventhly, Be pleased, for Christ's sake, to mind your Covenant, all over.  
Let me speak one word, not only to you the Nobles and Princes of this Land, but to both Kingdoms; I would I could speak so that all might hear: God hath brought us into the Boad of the Covenant, to Himself, to One another: THAT NATION THAT BREAKS FIRST, WILL BE A SCORN, and (that which is worse) A CURSE TO ALL THE WORLD: It is not all the Militia nor Provisions in the world, that can secure their Peace and Safety. Shall he prosper? 
Ezek. 17.15.  shall he escape that doth such things? or shall he break the Covenant and be delivered? You know who said so, and upon what occasion.  

8. Be humbled for old Superstitions.  Eighthly, Be humbled, I beseech you, for former Superstitions: It concerns you that are the Nobles of the Land, and all that are called to be our Reformers, as well as the Ministers of the Gospel, to be deeply sensible of your former Compliances with Episcopal Superstitions and Idolatrous mixtures in the Worship of God. It is the very Law, upon which God hath engaged himself to take off the vail from before Reformers eyes: 
Ezek. 43.11.  If they be ashamed of all that they have done, show them the form of the house, and the fashion thereof, the go out thereof, and the come in thereof, and all the forms thereof, and all the Ordinances thereof, and all the forms thereof, and all the Laws thereof, and write it in their sight, etc. Who knows whether our Unhumblednesse for these things, be not the cause that the Curtain is not yet drawn?  

9 Be tender of Christ's prerogative.  Ninthly, Be tender of Christ's Prerogative. You are very jealous of your own Privileges; whoso toucheth them, toucheth the apple of your eye: Do you think Jesus Christ will not be as jealous of his own Prerogative? And oh if you should do any thing which the Parliament in heaven, that upper House (for I know you look upon yourselves but as the nether House of Parliament) should vote a breach of Privilege, a trespass upon the Prerogative Royal of the King of Saints; how would ye be able to answer it in the day of Accounts? Oh therefore see I beseech you to these things.  

1. That Christ's person be adored; that men honour the Son, 
Joh. 5.23.  even as they bonour the Father.  
2. That his Ordinances be preserved in their purity.  
3. That his Officers be preserved in their power.  
4. That his Offices be preserved in their latitude.  
5. That all his Administrations and Censures be put into faithful and proper hands. If we come into your Houses, we see no confusion there: The Groom doth not usurp the Steward's Office; The Cook doth not crowd into the Bedchamber; The Secretary doth not do the Chaplain's work: Even so Christ hath ordained that in his House all things be done in decency and in order; 
1 Cor. 14.40. Vers. 32.  and that the spirit of the Prophets be subject to the Prophets.   

10. Look to Self-Reformation.  In the Tenth and last place, Especially look to Self-reformation. Reform your Persons, reform your Families: say as Joshua, I and my house will serve the Lord. Do as Jacob did, who when he went to build an Altar to the Lord, 
Josh. 24.15.  said to his family, Put away the strange gods that are among you, and be clean, and change your garments. If they will not put away their strange gods, their lying, their swearing, their whoredoms, their Sabbath-breaking, etc. Do you put them away. Say with David, He that walketh in a perfect way, shall serve me. 
Psal. 101.6.  He that worketh deceit, shall not dwell in my house: he that telleth lies, shall not tarry in my sight, etc. And for yourselves, 
7.  I will walk in my house with a perfect heart; 
Verse 2.  I will set no wicked thing before mine eyes, etc. It was David's resolution, 
3.  when he came to the Kingdom, and set upon the work of Reformation, he resolved he would begin at home. Oh show yourselves the sons of Jacob, the line of David. An Vnreformed Reformer is a dry Sea, a dark Sun, a cold Fire, an ungood God; Contractio in adjecto; a Monster among men; a devil among Saints; a what not? Oh that we could see Religion in your families, the power of godliness in your persons, Nobleman's houses, patterns of Piety; then should we hope God meant to do England good indeed: Find me a man, and I will pardon it.  
In a word, 
Jer. 5.  Noble Peers and Patriots, you have in your hands the fairest opportunity and the richest advantages to make Christ glorious, the Church beautiful, the State honourable, your Names precious, your selves so many Moses and Joshua's, the Saviour's of the People, that ever Nobility or Parliament had. Oh take heed of sinning away such an opportunity.  
One word to all that stand before God this day, 
To All.  and the whole people of this Land, and I have done.  

Despair not.  1. Despair not, though you may see the work at many a loss and many a dead-lift, as you have seen it already. When was it otherwise? Call for the Chronicles, read over the Stories of all Church-deliverances: when was it otherwise? If ye will not believe, 
Isai. 7.9.  surely you shall not be established. Know this, a Deliverance of Gods promising and setting on foot, shall go on in spite of all Set-backs and opposition: there is Comfort.  
Ob. I, but we have no promise for our Deliverance, as Israel had for theirs.  
Answ. 1. If we had, an unbelieving heart will be an unbelieving heart in spite of promises: It is not a promise will make us believe, if we want faith. As long as we have Israel's heart, we should doubt, though we had Israel's promise.  
2. Note this in the Second place, that Special, yea personal Promises made to the Saints in Scripture, are ours, so far as  

Their straits are ours.  
Their work ours.  
Their faith ours.  
Their concernments ours.   
I had never looked for my share in Joshua's promise, had not the Holy Ghost taught me to apply it: Be content with such things as you have; for he hath said, 
Heb. 13.5. ex Josh. 1.5.  I WILL NEVER LEAVE THEE NOR FORSAKE THEE.  
3. There be standing Promises in Scripture, which are the Magazine of the Church throughout all her descents and Generations.  
4. Know this also, that Scripture- Command supplies the want of Scripture- Promise. Go with me to Heb. 11.13, and ye shall find Abraham with his staff in his hand, and his sandals on his feet, and his loins girt: Please to let me ask him Two or three questions by the way; see what he will answer. Reverend Patriarch, Whither are you going? Answ. I know not. When shall you return? Answ. I know not. How will you subsist? Answ. I know not. He is in haste as well as we, and therefore I'll ask him but one question more. Abraham, Why then do you go at such UNCERTAINTIES? To this he will answer, I go not upon uncertainties; I have a call; I have a Command, and that will secure my person, and bear my charges. By faith Abraham, when he was CALLED to go into a place which be should after receive for an inheritance, OBEYED, and went out, NOT KNOWING WHITHER HE WENT. 
Heb. 11.8.   
3. Christians, observe, a Call is as good as a Promise at any time. With a Call, a man may travel from one end of the world to another, though he hath not a penny in his purse. And whether or no you have a Call, a Warrant, a Scripture-Command for what you do, I hope it is not now to dispute.  
5. But lastly, we have not only a Call, but a Promise; not in general only, but in special: The whole Book of the Revelation, is nothing else but one great Promise of the downfall of Antichrist, and Gospel-Reformation; and that is the work Parliament and Kingdom have now in hand in these three Nations. Be of good courage; both it, and you, that are faithful, and called, and chosen, are in the hands of a God that knows how to carry on his Work, not only against, but by the opposition of men and devils.  

2. Obstruct not, hinder not the work.  2. Only therefore, in the next and last place, Take heed that none of you be obstructions in the way yourselves; labour to remove the hindrances that lie at your door (what they are, you saw before.) Study to promote this great Design by your counsel, purses, persons, prayers, REFORMATION, with all you have, and all you are, and the work is done; at least your work is done.  
Here is our exceeding mistake and mischief; We stand, like Jacob's sons, looking one upon another, and can very hardly be brought to think, 
Ecces. 9.18.  that one man's Sin can do much harm, or one man's Reformation can do much good. But be not deceived, Brethren, God is not mocked: Achan was but one, and yet he troubled Israel; Jonah was but one, and yet he had gone nigh to have sunk the Ship; Adam but one, and yet he sunk all the world: In a word, the holy Ghost will tell you, One sinner destroys much good: And if thou should be that one, or one amongst many; how wilt thou look when thou shalt see the Kingdom afire about thine ears with the flames which thou hast kindled? And when thou art buried in her ashes, this shall be thy Inscription that shall stand till Dooms day;  
Here lies a State-murderer, a Church-killer, a Destroyer of himself and of Reformation.  
On the other side, remember for your encouragement; Joshua was but one, and yet he brought Israel to Canaan; Caleb was but one, and yet he stilled the people; Phineas was but one, and yet he turned away God's wrath; Paul was but one, and yet he saved the ship; 
Rom. 5.16, 17, 18, 19 Isa. 63.3. Jer. 5.1. Job 22.30.  and Christ Jesus the second Adam was but one, and yet he redeemed the world: I trod the winepress alone, etc. In a word, you hear God promising, Find me one man, and I will pardon; and the holy Ghost telling us, He shall deliver the Island of the innocent, and it is saved by the pureness of thy hands. And if thou shouldst be that one, or one of those few, what an honour would it be to be called, The Repairer of the breaches, the Restorer of the desolate paths to dwell in; the Saviour of Church and State. 
Isa. 58.12. Obad. v. ult.   
However, Happy, yea, thrice happy shall he be called, that can be able to say, when he comes to give up his Account, Lord, I have done my best to promote Reformation, and to save the Kingdom.  
FINIS.