God's DELIVERANCE OF MAN by PRAYER. AND man's thankfulness to GOD in praises.  
In a Sermon, by reason of the Lecturers absence in the Church of Saint Bartholomew's EXCHANGE, on Ash-wednesday, at the general Fast, proposed. But at that time, by a Company of CHURCH Intruders very rudely opposed. And now at this time, for the public satisfaction of All men faithfully in Print exposed.  
By I. G. D. D. Rector there.  
LONDON, Printed for Thomas Paybody, dwelling in Queen's Head COURT in Paternoster row. 1642.   

TO My Parishioners of St. bartholmew's Exchange London, Respective, or Disrespective, all manner Salutation.  
ON our Fast Day (doubly, a Fast Day, by Ancient use, by Recent Authority) The Curate, by the throng of people in the Church, not able to get in, I began Prayers. The Exhortation, and Confession were endured; But, the Absolution entered on, A psalm was confusedly began. I read, They sang (rather howled.) Such was the rudeness of the swervers from their own Congregation; and Disturbers of all Congregations, whether they intrude.  
Entreated I was, to be take me to the Pulpit; I yielded, The Lecturer being not come, as I conceived. In the Pulpit I was outfaced; in every corner of the Church, disgracefully nicknamed; outprated, rudely and savagely. Having got through my Prayer, I propounded my Text: Such were the Yellings, they would not endure the reading of it; for all my deep charge, and citing of the disturbers to the Lord's tribunal. Well, down I came, and Master Ash (The Lecturer, then come) went up, rebuked the disorder, orderly Preached, and soundly; In the afternoon I finished my work; And here You have it to review; Which, my Prayer is may be to your Aedification in the serious way of Right Christianity,  
The loving pastor of you All, John Grant D. D.   
PSALM. 50. 15 Call upon me in the day of trouble, I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me. 
IN the forenoon few Auditors of those many had the patience so much as to hear my Text named, I hope to find you in a better temper this afternoon, however here I am again to do my duty, and from the Lord of hosts is my message; It is the charge of that supreme general to all; Call upon me in the day of trouble, I will deliver thee &c. A heavy load of trouble is on our shoulders; yea, on our souls, a load for us unsupportable; we have long burdened our God which our sins, and his judgements have we felt many ways to our smart, I would I could once say, to our amendment. We are now under a general humiliation, a fast by public authority enjoined the whole kingdom, and the first day falls on Ash. Wednesday, a solemn day of fasting in the Church of Antiquity, in the purer times of the gospel; when Jonah the Prophet and Messenger of the Highest to Niniveh, the great, the Head City of Nations began to enter therein (as his Commission served him) he cried, and said; yet forty days, and Niniveh shall be overthrown, Jonah 3. 4. what followed? so the people of Niniveh believed God and proclaimed a Fast, and put on Sackcloth from the greatest to the least of them: For the word came to the King of Niniveh, and he arose from his throw, and he laid his robe from him, and he covered him with sackcloth and sat in ashes, and he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Niniveh, saying; Let neither man, nor beast, heard, nor flock, taste any thing, let them not feed, nor drink water, but let man, and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God; Yea let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands; Who can tell if God will turn, and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger that we perish not? And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way, and God repented of the evil that he had said that he would do unto them, and he did it not. Our danger is as near (for aught we know) and as great (we may fear) as was that by Jonah threatened unto Niniveh; Nay God's judgements have been, and are upon us in much Variety; we are all a public Fast, a Fast by the highest authority over us on earth solemnly proclaimed, and sadly enjoined: O let it not be a mock▪ fast in a bulrushed Popishness or pharisaical disfigured-n●ss; what ever our outward garments, deportments, abstinence be, betake we ourselves to ardent prayers, and unfeigned resolutions to shake off all our exorbitances, and sacrilegious actions, and intentions; god-robbers can be no right fasters, neither the robbers of the honour due to his great name, nor of his Church revenues, the maintenance of those set a part to the administration of duties holy, and of God's own appointment for the best welfare of his people; God's sword is drawn, and will not be sheathed till we be amended, God's wrath is out, and will not be recalled in, till our sins be cast out, the troubles on us shall not be mitigated, but multiplied; not remitted, but increased; not away removed, but with armies of new ones aggravated till we be not humorous, but ingenuous, in our humiliations.  
Soon, and easily may we be deceived, and deceive each others, but God is not, cannot, will not be mocked by any of us all; he is serious, be not we ludicrous, regular be out approaches, and addresses unto him, and the blessing of our text will come home into our bosoms, God will make us a yet more happy nation then ever we have been, and we shall be the trumpeters of God's praises all the world over.  
The Contents, and extents of our present text are these. A deep Invocation; A seasonable exaudition; A due return of thankfulness. Call upon me in the day of trouble; there is the first, the deep Invocation. I will deliver thee; there is the next, a seasonable Exaudition. And thou shalt glorify me; there is the last, of thankfulness a due return; a glorifying of the deliverour out of troubles in trophies of praises  
Call upon me in the day of trouble; a deep Invocation. Out of the depths have I cried unto thee O Lord, is the Psalmists expression, psalm 130. He was plunged in the depths of sins, and in the depths of Calamities for sins committed. None can sin and escape unpunished, be they never so high in worldly estate, or in the favour of the highest; presumptions have precipitations, and heights of sin, have their depths of punishment. God's own people are not privileged from miseries, when against God they do harden their hearts, provoke him, tempt him, grieve him with their transgressions; when they do err in their hearts, and will not know his ways. Israel like troubles upon troubles involve even them, and till they humble themselves in repentance unfeignedly, no hope of entrance is there at all into his rest: When sin, one depth, hath plunged us into misery, another depth, and misery into sorrow, another depth; it is then high time to take hold on the encouragement in our Text, Call upon me in the day of trouble. Had not we this gracious warrant, with small comfort should we life up our drooping heads out of these depths; by solemn Covenant, we Christians are the selected people of God, drawn out of the mass of corruption, to be the heirs of salvation.  
The scope of our faith, and the aim of our Christian hope is to be joined unto the God whom we seek to be undistractedly, and unseparably his for ever in the Lord Jesus; this life of ours is but momentany: the life believed, and expected is the life of eternity, this is but a breathing: after that now, in our attendance by faith, and hope on that blessed day of eternity, which shall not have any night's interposition.  
God hath not left us to ourselves, but communicates himself to us, to uphold us in that attendance, by His Word addresseth He himself to us, and by our Invocation, is he unto us open; seek ye my face, is His expression to us; thy face we do seek, is our hearts, faiths returned answer, and practice; a blessed harmony in harmonious blessedness, Psalm. 27. 8. In the prophecy of Hosea, we find this in an accurate way of expression set down, Thou shalt call me Ishai, and not Baali, chap. 2. ver. 16. Ishai, not Baali, My Husband, not my idolised Lord; God will have us entire, not divided, half his, half not his, half the idol of our hearts, what ever that Idol be: mongrel Religion, is to the only true God abominable. Now go we on with the Prophet, verse 18. and so forward; for I will take away the name of Baalim out of her mouth; And they shall no more be remembered by their name: And in that day will I make a Covenant for them, with the Beasts of the field, and with the fowls of the heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground; And I will break the bow, and the sword, and the battle of the earth, and will make them to lie down safely, (and here comes in the cordialness of the business) I will betrothe thee unto me for ever; yea I will betrothe thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgement, and in loving kindness, and in mercy. I will even betrothe thee unto me in faithfulness, and thou shalt know the Lord. And it shall come to pass in that day, I will hear (saith the LORD) I will hear the Heavens, and they shall hear the earth, and the earth shall hear the corn, and the Wine, and they shall hear Jezreel, and I will sow her to me in the earth, and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy, and I will say to them which were not my people; Thou art my people, and they shall say, thou art my God. God's promises and our prayers thence make sure work indeed, none like it. Without the Word of God, and that sounding, and resounding in our ears with the ministerial application thereof to our hearts by the spirits operation we should live and die in the grossness of ignorance: and without Prayer also in humble, and fiducial manner put up unto our God in the merits, and mediation of Jesus Christ, we should be hopeless, helpless, destitute altogether of the consolations from above, the heavenly consolations in the times of afflictions, disturbances, fears. That prayer is a most important part of our Religious service to God ward, appears in this most clearly, that the sacred book of God under those appellations of prayer, and Invocation comprehendeth even the whole service of God: Let that among the rest be deeply weighed, and pondered in our hearts, Whosoever shall call on the Name of the Lord shall be saved, Acts 2. 21. God's whole worship is contained under this one phrase, to call upon God, no duty of godliness is to him more acceptable, no sacrifice in better part taken, than is that: the calling on the name of the Lord is, the open profession of him without dauntedness, Gen. 4. 26. Where ever Abraham, the Father, and pattern of the faithful, where ever he came, there erected he an Altar, and called upon the Name of the Lord, Gen. 12. 7, 8. The house of prayer is the name of God's house, and God gave it that name by his Prophet Isaiah, and our blessed Jesus ratifies it; Preaching we have here, and Sacraments we have here; but prayer gives it the denomination, as the major service of God, and both implying, and including all the rest, needs must we all if there be any ingenuity of Christianity in us, needs must we acknowledge prayer to be a matter of the greatest consequence even upon this consideration deeply volved, and revolved in our hearts, that every soul to heaven-ward settled makes the recommendation of his spirit into the hands of God, his practice uncessant, as being in no hands late but his; that of David's is by frequency made his. Into thy hands I commend my spirit, thou hast redeemed, me O Lord God of truth, Psal. 31. 5. God's promises are the faithfuls' encourgaments, and in them presenting themselves to God, acceptance is to them confidently assured.  
Prayer is that hand which we reach, and stretch forth unto our merciful God, to receive from him all his {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman}, Saint James calls them, all his givings, and all his good gifts, his good givings, and his perfect gifts; In the hand of faith prayer is a key, Heaven it openeth unto us, and from Heaven enricheth us with the best of treasures, our wounds lays it open to the right curer of them, the binder up, and exquisite healer of them all, up carrieth it, and dispreads before our piteous God the sobbings and groanings of our disturbed hearts in an humble, and holy familiarity, that will have no denial, no repulse: of that force it is with God, when put forth a right, that it makes the rods and scourges of God's correcting hand even fall there out, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 powerfully his fatherly affections, and removeth his justly conceived indignations.  
Prayer in parties, and in Families well ordered is the customary sacrifice, is the Morning, and Evening perfume of the devoutly Religious: Let my prayer, (writes David) be set forth before thee as incense and the lifting up of mine hands as an Evening sacrifice, Psalm. 141. 2.  
Call upon me in the day of trouble. Saint Paul utters it thus, pray {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman}, without ceasing, without fainting, 1 Thes. 5. 17. What ever the troubles be. Our Saviour thus; Watch, and pray that ye enter not into tentation, Matth. 26. 41. As justly we may, and sufficiently we cannot, admire the goodness of our God deigning his word to address himself in speech to our capacities; So are we to esteem likewise, that as an high, and honourable favour, that he will hear us in prayer, and praises approaching unto him, giving way to our importunities; nay even commanding us expressly to be importunate; to such prayers, yea only to such are his ears opened, and his Fatherly affections chained; And mark it, he wills us to call upon him importunately, but so resteth not; he prescribeth us forms of prayer in his sacred word, puts the matter into our hearts and the very words, and terms into our mouths. Hence it is, that the spirit by the Prophet is called the Spirit of grace, and of supplication: Zach. 12. 10. Hence that also of the holy Apostle, The Spirit helpeth our infirmities, for we know not what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groaning which cannot be uttered; And he that searcheth the heart knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the Saints according to the will of God, Rom. 8▪ 26, 27. Alas, faulty and guilty are we all of us, and durst not without warrant and enablement approach unto our God; the troubles on us would even overwhelm us, and as it were keep us from so much as looking up, were we not thus amiably invited thereunto, Call upon me in the day of trouble.  
What troubles of ●●te have these three kingdoms under one sovereign been cast into? Nay still are in, and under? Our sister Nation Ireland even weltreth in blood, and burneth in mutual enragements: none there secured of▪ his life, scarce for a moment: and are not we, or we ought to be surely even drowned in tears for them? for them: Yea, and for ourselves too, who are in mutual enragements and various sudden uproars through our misaffections, and misinterpretations, and misconstructions of every thing; bloody mindedness takes place in the most, and the casting about how to entrap, and enwrap one another in miseries, is the common misery of us all; what calumniations are vented, printed, uncensured, unpunished? what jealousies each 'gainst others are everywhere closely fomented? Charity the badge of Christianity, and coverer of what may be covered is from us exiled, and who can be most of all uncharitable, is the thing everywhere laboured after. By this shall all men know (saith the pattern, and Patron of Charity our Lord Jesus) even by this shall all men know that ye are my Disciples, if ye love one another, John 13. 35. But with sorrow, and shame enough too may it now be said, All men by this may know; We are none of Christ's Disciples, that we hate one another; So raging, so outrageous, so notorious is our mutual hatred. Many knots tie us, none will hold us being one to another eye-soares, if not heart-soares: As strangers are our enter-viewers not as compatriots, our conferences, differences; our 
* Moaning the practice of Separatists, &c.  protestations, detestations; Reformation is intended, deformation even in our Church assemblies, and most remarkably there, and unblushingly practised; O! into what schisms do we run? Into what Sects are we dissected? Asunder are we rent, one from the other; yea where men rope together, it is but in a sandy manner, the least motion dissipateth, parteth the sandily roped together, and commotions not usual in this age Amsterdam, England. Beloved who so is not troubled with these troubles, hath no life, no soul of Christianity at all left in him.  
These and the like considerations, as diverse others there are, aught to incite us unto constant, and instant prayer amidst them all, in throngs upon us of these Nations at this time; let us, I say, pray that from us they may yet timely be removed, that the full, and final blow from heaven decide not our controversies in so much rancour steeped.  
O! that it were come to the Character of the Church, Christians Primitive age, Corunum, via una. One heart, one way, and till it come to that, troubles will involve us; and when it comes to that to all the world about us may we be a precedent, and an encouragement thereunto; methinks the many, manifold, and manifest preservations of our God should frame us all as one Man to bring this about, to be exemplary Christians to the whole world round about us; I shall recite but a few, yet these pregnant, and of fresh memory, and remarkable observation: Can that Octogessimus octavus mirabilis annus▪ that wondrous year of 88 ever be forgotten? It was the year of England's preservation, and of Spain's, and Rome's abasement, trouble was on us, and we rid of trouble, ere we knew it was so near: nor must the year 97. pass unremembered, Spain then had a second blow, and England, a second triumph; As formerly the Armado, styled invincible was ruined; so than were their forces, and policies too shamefully defeated, and the English fleet for another purpose designed, brought upon them by the winds to sink them into the waters, or bring them Captivated unto our Land: Those fell out in the days of the Maiden Queen, famous Elizabeth, for peace at home, and victory abroad, renowned.  
The next fell out in King James his reign, in the year 1605. The powder Treason was an hellish plot, contrived most strangely; Heaven went beyond hell in the business, and providence outreached devilishness, entangled them who long had the trap ready to have ruinated Protestancy for ever: In the year 1639. were not these two Nations in one Island, under one King (the present breath of our Nostrils) put upon a mutual internetion? and is not that turned into a most blessed reunion? We are both the wonder, & the envy of Popish Territories; God even then preserving us when we were ready to be seized on as a prey unto merciless teeth, and to the sepulchre throats of the Pontifician generation amongst us; no stories can more represent the vigilancy of mercy over any people than can ours, as David when he was to encounter Goliath, the stripling shepherd (that Tower of flesh loaden with arms, and Instruments of death) said, He that delivered me from the Lion, and the bear, will likewise from this uncircumcised Philistine deliver me; so may we say, He that delivered us from such, and such troubles, is the same still, is willing, and ready to deliver us from our troubles incumbent, and imminent, all these intricacies we are in, and all the hovering and surrounding mischiefs what ever. If our prayers can but lay hold on God's promises, no troubles can trouble us.  
Call upon me in the day of trouble, and I will deliver thee.  
Will deliver thee. God's promises are as good as performances, they are Yea, and Amen in Christ unto God's glory, 2 Cor. 1. 20. Yea in the giving forth, Amen in the performance, certain, constant, most firmly firm for evermore. Our welfare, and God's glory are enwrapped in them: No marvel then is it that Prayer is so effectual with God, when by the heart, hand, mouth of faith unto him presented in the Name of Our Lord Jesus Christ: when thus we are enabled to pray▪ no marvel that our prayer is to purpose effectual; No marvel, that God hearing himself in us, upon that audience giveth us deliverance in a way, and manner to the whole world remarkable: And observe with me that the commandment, Call upon me, includeth the very promise of GOD therein. Beloved, God never calls us to call upon him as humble, and faithful suitors, to send us from him empty away, unsupplied. Can we not be when our resorts are unto God warrantable, regular, orderly? Our hearts, Eyes, hands are unto him never lifted up in vain, never unanswered, but for the most part above our thoughts and beyond even our hopes too answered.  
Of prayers effectualness memorable are the examples we have in the book of God, and recorded they are for our close imitation and encouragement to that weighty and most useful duty. Moses the Man of God, stood often in the breach between God enraged, and the people mad in their open rebellions against him. We read of Joshuah's prayer that made a stay of the sun, and moon in the firmament, that he might cut off the malicious enemies of God, and the Church. Jonah his prayer mounted powerfully, and prevailingly mounted out of the whale's belly, (which he calls hell) unto God's Throne of Mercies, and Glories in the highest Heavens, Chapter 2. verse 2. Eliah by prayer both stayed, and procured rain, kept close and opened those cloudy bottles. And Daniel thereby kept the affamished lion's paws, and jaws from doing him the least harm amidst them. Ecclesiastical stories mention, that the Christian soldiers were Legio fulminatrix, the lightning and thundering legion of Aurelius the Roman Emperor; by their prayers were the enemies thundered to destruction, and the whole camp whereof they were a part with a supply of rain in their extremity of drought refreshed.  
Sweetly remarkable is that passage, Isaiah 65. 24. Before they call, I will answer, and while they are yet speaking, I will hear. A preventing God often, and a God timely succouring is our God ever, none wait, none depend upon him in vain; He that supplies the Lions, and Ravens in their affamishments (as the Psalmist relateth) will not be wanting in extremities to the redeemed with his son's blood, and by his spirit in them, calling in prayer on him. Even that unjust Judge importuned by the oppressed Widow righted her: much more will God help them that suffer wrong, much more will he avenge the cause of his chosen in all their tentations, tribulations, persecutions, instantly calling upon him. Say not, Often have I prayed in trouble, but still in troubles am entangled; prayed I have for my King, for my Country, for a reunion of all our distractions, but the work comes on slowly, hath many pullbackes, and various interruptions; I have prayed for friends in Captivity, but still they are unfettered, for friends on their sick beds, but their death beds have they proved; against the Churches open, and close Enemies have I prayed, but more, and more are they prevalent; prayed for peace, but behold war in his dismal colours; Nay that favourite of God; holy Paul prayed to God to be rid of Satan's buffeting: yet must rest in this, My grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is in weakness perfected. To these and the like objections might this be an unreplyable answer: ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask a miss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts. Saint James gives us that, Chapter 4. verse 3. how may we say, and say truly, God not hearing us, hears us the more? Hurtful things demanded, and received would be a curse on us not a blessing, would be to us as were the quails to the Israelites, not blissful, but baneful; Plato the Heathen Philosopher could fay, O God give us good things though we ask them not, give us not evil things though we ask them; but to that of Saint John, I refer you, and in that may we all rest as a direction, and as an encouragement, God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in 
1 John 5. 11.  his Son. By believing on the name of the Son of God we may know that we have eternal life, v. 13 mark now his inference, v. 14. and 15. And this is the confidence that we have in him, that if we ask any thing according to his will he heareth us, & if we know, that he hear us whatsoever we ask, we know, that we have the petitions that we desired of him, eternal life, & the things thereunto directly tending are the proper object of our faith Christian. The Creed apostolical is closed up with that, and for that have we an absolute warrant to pray, and are enjoined not to waver in expectation thereof: hear the Apostle; Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, Heb. 10. 22. hold we fast the confidence, and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end, Chapter 3. 6. 14. Where we have an Implication of their condemnation who so in a proud humility, and in a modesty impudent enough teach men to hold the life eternal and their salvation by the Lord Jesus in a doubtful tenure. What do they other, then labour to be faithless with reason? Methinks closely, thus they seem to be speak God; We find ourselves unworthy to pitch our credence on thy Word, unworthy to believe what thou promisest, the life eternal in Christ Jesus.  
These do make the gospels doctrine, a doctrine of unsettledness, of distrustfulness, of distraction, which is the only settler of a waving and wavering Conscience; no rest hath this Dove, but in this ark; yet these not relyers on eternal life by Christ, a rocky foundation and a building answerable are ridiculously persuaded to rely on their own sandy merits, in which no marvel is it that they do sink into distrustfulness, and are swallowed up in the gulf of desperation. Leave we the Popish generation to their rotten absurdities, and be we close in our mutual and spiritual edification of one another to Heaven-wards, in that faith which was once delivered unto the Saints, in Saint jude's words, verse 3. of his Epistle; On that faith, most holy faith build we up ourselves, praying in the Holy Ghost, and keeping ourselves in the love of God, looking for the mer●y of our Lord Jesus unto eternal life, ver. 20. 21. of the same Epistle. It is prayer that holdeth us in acquaintance with God, the peace making acquaintance, yet in this acquaintance, we must in the next place, in our prayer approaches to him both remember what he is, and what we are, he our God, we his dependent subjects, not able one moment to subsist without his protection and suppliance of good givings and perfect gifts, from whom they all descend, James 1. 17. he Jehovah the eternal, we mortals, and miserables, in ourselves vanity, yea lighter than vanity itself, dust and ashes, borne in sinful, and hastening to shameful corruption in the slime-pits, our graves; worms meat and ourselves worms most contemptibly contemptible. As those who address themselves often to the Potentates of the Earth, Princes, Kings, Emperors, Monarchs, clothe themselves the more neatly, and more heedfully order their language than others do; So he that frequently betakes himself to God in prayer, the duty of every Christian must compose himself aright, and be ever readier to hear than to offer the sacrifice of fools, babbling, raw, undigested prayers unto the GOD of awe, and order.  
In the third place know, that prayers rightly modelled and moulded up will frame us to avoid that defiler of all good exercises, base hypocrisy. It is before God, that we appear in prayer, whether it be in private, or in public, alone in our closets, or with others in our Families, or in Church Assemblies, God sees us, hears us, observes us, there's no dallying with him, no deluding of him. The Copy of a fair countenance, and looks demurely composed cannot in his sight be available, whose eyes pierce all darkness even that of hell, and do see through, and through the thickest mantles, and coverture of the closest hypocrisy, even that which hypocrites in the very cabinets of their hearts cannot themselves discern.  
Further Prayer in conscience bindeth us that use it, not to wrong any, no not the easiest to be wronged; to quit our hands speedily of what is others, not our own; Nay it importunes us to detest and abhor even as hell, all ravenous, greedy, oppressing courses; None of which in whomsoever can possibly stand with the right profession of Christianity; observe that expression of God in his Prophet, Isai. 1. 15. When you spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you, yea when you make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood. In that consideration religious David said, I will wash mine hands in innocency; so will I compass thine Altar O Lord, psalm 26. 6. Hence that exquisite counsel of Saint Paul, advising us to pray everywhere lifting up holy hands without wrath or doubtings, I Timothy 2. 8.  
Further yet prayer adviseth us to be rich to God-wards in the relievance of his poor Saints, as now the distressed and dissipated Irish Protestants: The ablest in power, honour, wealth is, or aught to be a daily begging suitor unto God. And can any think of God to be heard and answered in his petitions, that suffers the godly to perish for want of their redundancies? Suffers bleeding Ireland, which makes our King's heart bleed, still to wallow, and welter in blood, without stenching that bloody issue? Who so perish through want of our timely compassionate remedy, their blood, (I fear me) will be put on our accounts against the reckoning day of the doom final. Can our prayers work our deliverance, our ears and hearts rejecting the suits of bleeding Protestants, or not seasonably relieving their almost desperate condition, and humanly forlorn hopes? The sentence is peremptory, Prov. 21. 13. Who so stoppeth his ears at the cry of the poor, he also shall cry himself, and shall not be heard. On the contrary, Blessed are the merciful (evermore blessed) for they shall obtain mercy, Matth. 5. 7. Nothing so sure as their deliverance out of what ever troubles, dangers, cares, fears.  
In the fifth place, Prayer it is that obligeth to diligence in hearing God's Word, and using aright the Sacraments of his Ordination. For how think we that God will regard our prayers, if we be overly in the observation of his serious enjoyments? will he receive our demands, if we ●light over his commands? if we wait not constantly in his Sanctuary, on his sacred behests and appointments?  
Sixthly, Prayer doth bind us all to the good behaviour, one towards another, nay more to the Reciprocation of interchangeable Reconciliation in the occurrences of what ever differences and offences. That passage is full and fair, Matth. 5. 23, 24. If thou bring thy gift to the Altar, and there remember'st that thy brother hath aught against thee, leave there thy gift before the Altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift. If we serve not one another in love, which is an enjoyment apostolical, neither our persons, nor our prayers can please God. When our Saviour had prescribed us a form of Prayer he reassumeth and reinforceth that Petition in it, Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors, for, saith he, If ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if ye forgive not men their trespasses; Neither will your Father forgive your trespasses, Matth. 6. 14, 15. We have it thus related by Saint Mark, chap. 1. verse 25. 26. When ye stand praying, forgive if ye have aught against any, that your Father also which is in Heaven may forgive you your trespasses. Hold we to this, and we shall be happy in deliverances; but if thus cordially and really we pecce not up, in pieces shall we be like a potter's vessel graceless, useless, in all troubles remediless, which God avert, and bring us all into the right tune and temper of Christianity, and regular charity.  
I now pass on to the last parcel in our▪ Text;  Our due return of glory to our deliverer out of all troubles. 
We are never right till God ingenuously be acknowledged by us, to be {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman}, the remover of evils, and of whatsoever is good the gracious bestower. What we do must all be done to the glory of God, 2 Cor. 10. 31. To this end were all things made, in all creatures God sets forth his glory, and in them all will he be glorified; light cannot be hid, and God of lights is the Father, and in them all is represented; to be glorified by Men, the son of God became man; he is God manifested in the flesh, and for that manifestation never can we men glorify our God enough. By this hath God made his wisdom manifest in finding out a way to satisfy his Justice exactly, without the least prejudice at all to his Mercy.  
Nay, His Mercy is most evident in his Justice, his son's death on the cross was the price of our Redemption, and the purchase of Heaven for us who had merited hell by the heinousness of our transgressions. To be glorified will God again send his son, and in our nature too, but glorified. To be judged and to death sentenced for our offences was his first coming; to be the visible Judge both of quick and dead shall his second coming be. To be glorified, God sets up, and takes down whom he pleaseth, Kings and kingdoms are at his disposal; to the Kings of the earth is he terrible (writes the Psalmist) Psalm. 76. 12. And the Courtly Prophet is plain; The Nation and Kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish; yea those Nations utterly shall be wasted Esay 60. 12. To be glorified, God remarkably punisheth his own transgressing people, and at his own house many times begins his judgement, but ends in The ruin of his enemies. We see that in part fulfilled, and to the height at last shall it be made full; As truly as I live all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord, Num. 14. 21. Yet think not here, beloved, that God stands in need of being glorified by men, or felt in himself a titillation from men; No, no, before we were, before the world was, glorious was he above our thoughts. Stood he in need of Glory, the Angels are abler, and readier to extol him then all the whole race of mortals possibly can.  
As we are less than the very least of all his mercies, so his praises are to him an abatement, to us only an advancement; our very thanksgivings are beggings, and our own Interest and improvements in his various blessings, the foundation of our exalting his Name. It is a most gracious vouchsafement of our God that he will by us be glorified.  
I might expatiate here, but my weak and spent lungs press me to abbreviate, and to contract much, which I purposed largely to have discoursed of into a narrow compass of time. Thus than we are to glorify God.  
First, by speaking of his supreme majesty with all due submissiveness and reverence; All colloguings, all dissemblings, all hypocrisies must here be far, far from us; this, this it is to give glory unto God, to speak the truth though it be against a man's self: Give God the glory, (said Joshuah to Achan.) That giving of glory was the open confession of his close sin, Iosh. 7. 19 It is the acknowledgement that of all hearts God is the searcher, and the just avenger of wickedness, though never so palliated. We must not shrink from confession in the case of God's honour although it be to our own temporal confusion; It was achan's case, and in every oath and solemn protestation we make and take, it is ours. Juggle we not with our all knowing God, equivocations, mental reservations, and other cunning evasiions, may deceive, elude, and delude men, and be we not deceived; God can we not deceive, he will not be mocked: as we sow, we shall reap, or corruption or life everlasting, Gal. 6. 7, 8. If we hide our sins, we shall not prosper, God will not lose his glory, but if we confess them and forsake them, God shall have the glory, and we shall have the comfort; he that confesseth, and forsaketh them shall have mercy, Prov. 28. 13.  
Again we do glorify God when his promises even in all our troubles are laid hold on by our faith. We read of Abraham, of all in the Faith the Father, that he staggered not at the promise, through unbelief, but was strong in faith giving glory to God, Rom. 4. 20. The Receiver of Christ's testimony hath set to his seal, that God is true (as Saint John the Baptist hath it) in the gospel by Saint John cha. 3. 33. When God hath made known his will unto us in his Word, good reason it is that every one of us should thereunto give our full assent and consent, we must confess it ingenuously, & profess it openly never be ashamed thereof. And this is as a setting too of our seal, that God is true, and in so doing, we do glorify our God, and it is a chief point of honour which of us he requireth, and indeed to repent, and believe the gospel is the sum and substance of the gospel, the full of a Christian, of God accepted for man's righteousness, Mark 1. 15. Rom. 4. 3.  
Thirdly, we do glorify God in a perpetuated course of good works; So our Saviour plainly and expressly. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in Heaven, Matth. 5. 16.  
Fourthly, we then do glorify our God when we do prostrate ourselves in the truth of humility, and and humiliation before God. That of Jesus Christ to the proud generation of the Pharisees is remarkably observable. How can ye believe which receive honour one from another, and seek not the honour that cometh from God only? John 5. 44. An usual and a just course is it with God to abase the lifted up, and to lift up the abased in their own eyes, to cast down the mighty from their seats, and to exalt the humble and meek; As the not givers of glory unto God shall be unglorious at the last for ever; so the glorifiers of God in the right way of humbleness shall after petty disregards and disgraces here from unadvised men be shining stars above in glory.  
Lastly, we do glorify our God in our close defending the cause of God, where ever and however opposed and vilified in the scornful world, and in being seriously transported with a regular zeal unto the glory of our God, not regarding at all our disesteem in the world in that regard. In this frozen age variously humorous this is rarely practised, the least, very least word that toucheth our own reputation, goes as a dagger to our hearts; but God in horrid oaths and execrations is everywhere lewdlic and lewdly blasphemed: his Church servants by the most vilified and scorned, and it troubles not our hearts at all, yea scarce our ears. O times, O manners!  
Alas! how few Lots are there in this Sodom, the present evil world? Let vexed his righteous soul day by day, in seeing and hearing the unlawful deeds of that City where he sojourned. 2. Pet 2. 8. We see and hear enough the like every day, and every night, and all hours and moments of both: God is dishonoured impudently everywhere, his ordinances abused, his holy name and attributes odiously polluted with rotten language, out of their reeking sepulchre throat vented, and poisoning where it is with delight entertained: no sin abstained from, yea even with greediness unashamedly committed. It may be said of the most of both sexes in this age which the Prophet Esay uttereth of Jerusalem, and Judah, Their tongue, and their doings are against the Lord, to provoke the eyes of his glory, the show of their countenance doth witness against them, and they declare their sin as Sodom; they hide it not, woe unto their soul, for they have rewarded evil unto themselves, Esay 3. 8, 9 We may add with the Prophet Ezechiel, and parallel this Nation with that. Behold this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom. Pride, fullness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy; And they were haughty and committed abomination before me, therefore I took them away as I saw good, Ezek. 16▪ 49, 50. That ourselves prove not an History in this kind let the recorded Histories of Sodom, Gomorra, Jerusalem be our forewarning, their plagues will befall us, if by serious and timely repentance we break not off our courses in the very same kind and degrees of sinning. Saint Paul's spirit was exceedingly stirred in him, when he saw the City of Athens wholly given to Idolatry, Acts 17. 16. And do not some dote on Images with the Romanists, and others on Imaginations with Factionists? How few are right in the right way of God's prescriptions? which is Jehovah Elohenu, Jehovah Echad, the Lord our God is one Lord, Deut. 6. 4. Out of him all is but a fiction; and no Religion sound and solid, but what we have from the dictates of his holy spirit. This Lord our God, this one Lord hath made all things for himself, even the wicked for the day of evil, Prov. 16. 4. Assuredly God will be glorified if not by us, then on us; if not for his mercies in our deliverance▪ Surely then for his judgements in our sentencing to hell, according to that in the Psalmist, The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the Nations that forget God. He that will not voluntarily glorify God as the Father of mercies, in the rigour of justice will our God glorify himself in his eternal ruin. If we prove not the Heralds of his glory; examples shall we be of his just indignation. When his wrath is kindled but a little, O blessed are they that in him repose their trust, Psal. 2. 12. accursedness shall enfetter all others in the chains of everlasting darkness. O! my beloved in the Lord; What ever we have been heretofore, be this hence forward to the end of our pilgrimage, and warfare on earth, our mainest care never any more to receive the grace of God in vain, never turn the same into lasciviousness, which Saint Jude fitly calls, the denying of the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ: improve we rather with all manner of alacrity and industriousness the talents thereof unto us concredited to the glory of our God, upon our receiving the end of our faith, even our endless salvation.  
By words; by works, in our lives and at our deaths set we forth the praises of our gracious deliverer, with the Psalmist from the ground of our hearts, saying; Blessed be the Lord God, who daily loadeth us with his benefits, even the God of our salvation, he that is our God, is the God of our salvation, And unto God the Lord belong the issues from death, psalm 68 19, 20. Endangered is the Church of God at this day everywhere in the world, and in this Island, from the world divided endangered amongst Atheists, Papists, Sectaries, in troubles are all right Christians involved; O! now is the time of instant prayer for their gracious deliverance out of them all; Call we heartily upon our God, and his bowel mercies will tenderly reach us, and savingly relieve us, we shall find and feel his timely succours, there is yet balm in Gilead, yet mercies and the plenteous redemption with our God; He, he it is that shall redeem Israel from all his iniquities, bring all his people everywhere out of all their depths of sins, sorrows, miseries, Psa. 130. Utterly will he never forsake his own people, the Israel of God, but upon their unfeigned repentance and faith without hypocrisy, settle them unremovably in himself, and let them see even their full desires on all their malicious enemies, and ungracious opposers; for, seeing God for the love of his Church made the world; Satan who labours the world's ruin cannot with all his forces and devices ruinate the Church. The eternal God, the Lord of Armies, and Mercies, who from that roaring, and circuiting Lion, hath many times and many ways delivered us from the hands of men his Captives, and instruments how ever maliciously bent against us will still and still deliver us. Our Petitions shall be prevalent with him for us, and against them. And after he hath given us deliverance, upon deliverance here on earth, he will possess us in Heaven with our inheritance there, our Inheritance immortal, undefiled, and that can never fade away, 1 Pet. 1. 4. to this inheritance the King of glory bring us that there we may for evermore glorify him und●stractedly.  
AMEN.  
FINIS.   

Postscript W. A. D. D. Minor invidiâ I. G. D. D. Major contemptu.  

Lesser than envy; greater than contempt;  
From th' One, and th' other, let me be exempt:  
I wish not Much; with little am content:  
So let My years run on; My Life be spent.   
There are some words misprinted, others misplaced; and the pointing here and there, unobserved. Pardon, and amend, friendly; then peruse, courteously.   

The Lord's Prayer enlarged. The PREFACE.  
Gracious and glorious Father, all good, all mighty thou art, with us always present; but thy majesty principally demonstrates itself in and from Heaven; in thee do we live, move, and have our being; as thou hast created us of nothing, so dost thou nourish, maintain, defend us in the order, and rank of our creation. We have our gracious enjoyment to betake ourselves in prayer unto thee, whose title is the hearer and answerer of prayers, the helper of us to pray aright▪ and the succourer of us too in right prayer to thy glory in our salvation.  
pension 1. O! cause thy Name and thy self to be made known upon Earth, and thy saving health among all nations, manifest thyself yet more & more in and to the habitable world, and be thou, holy and heavenly Father, by all of all conditions and sorts of Mankind honoured, and glorified in the thoughts of our hearts, in the words of our mouths, in the deeds of our holy lives and conversations even upon earth, heavenly.  
Petition 2. O! grant that the sceptre of thy kingdom, the word of thy power, and the power of thy Word may be efficacious and prevalent all the world over; let us receive it humbly, retain it in our hearts closely, grow up thrivingly by it in the clear knowledge of thee and thy Christ day by day. O let all Christian Churches agree in the truth of thy holy and lively word, and be strengthened in grace by it, and fitted by degrees for glory.  
Petition 3. What thou willest be that accomplished, and all the opposers of thy will confuted really, and everlastingly confounded. O be thy revealed will the rule of our thoughts, words, actions, and thy very least beck, our sway, as it is of all thy holy Angels thy ministering spirits by thee sent forth to minister for them, who shall be the heirs of thy salvation.  
Petition 4. What is needful for this outward man let thy divine providence supply us withal, and on that let our dependence be always and in all things, and teach us that lesson, in what estate so ever we are with thine allotments to rest contented, and in every thing to be unto thy Majesty unfeignedly thankful.  
Petition 5. O! look not severely upon our innumerous errors, transgressions, sins, but cover them, pardon them, cast them all into the sea's bottom, never to rise thence against us unto condemnation, and separation from thee, and give us all mutually forgiving hearts in the case of arising differences, and offences.  
Petition 6. We are in the midst of snares, O let us never be ensnared, uphold us in thy fear, and deliver us from the fear of all thine and our enemies, Satan, sin, death, hell, destruction.  

The doxology.  
WE are in thy Kingdom, O with thy golden sceptre rule us: we are under thy power, O shelter us from all adversary forces, we breathe after the propagation of thy glory in our eternal salvation, O manifest the same in thy due time, and that in all clearness and fullness to our redeemed souls. Amen, So be it is our prayer. Amen, be it so, will be thy ratification, thou art faithful, and we are happy.  
Amen, Amen.