A short form of Thanksgiving to GOD, for staying the contagious sickness of the Plague: To be used in Common Prayer, on Sundays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. ¶ Set forth by Authority. Imprinted at London by Robert Barker, Printer to the Kings most Excellent Majesty. ANNO 1604. elaborate decorative border containing the royal Anglo-Irish blazon or coat of arms, personifications of Fidelity and Humility, and the attributes of the Gospel writers: St Matthew's angel, St John's eagle, St Mark's lion, and St Luke's bull FIDES HUMILITAS royal Anglo-Irish blazon or coat of arms ¶ Read the ordinary Service till you come to the Psalms. And in stead of those which are appointed of course, read some of these: Viz. 34. 95. 103. 116. 107. 118. 145. 146. 147. ¶ After the second Lesson, read this Psalm following. Psal. 85. LOrd, thou art become gracious unto thy Land, thou hast turned away the afflictions of thy servants. Thou hast taken away all thy displeasure, and turned thyself from thy wrathful indignation. Psal. 94. For if thou Lord hadst not helped us, it had not failed, but our souls had been put to silence. But when we said our feet have slipped, thy mercy, O Lord, helped us up. In the multitude of the sorrows that we had in our hearts, thy comforts have refreshed our souls. Psal. 62.63 Our souls waited still upon the Lord, our souls hanged upon his help, our hope was always in him. In the Lord's word did we rejoice, in God's word did we comfort ourselves. Psal. 50. For the Lord said: Call upon me in the time of trouble, and I will hear thee, and thou shalt praise me. Psal. 40.69 So when we were poor, needy, sickly, and in heaviness, the Lord cared for us: he was our help and our Saviour according to his word. Psal. 27. In our adversity and distress he hath lift up our heads, and saved us from utter destruction. Psal. 33.91 He hath delivered our souls from death, he hath fed us in the time of dearth, he hath saved us from the noisome Pestilence. Psal. 27. Therefore will we offer in his holy Temple, the oblation of Thanksgiving with great gladness: we will sing and speak praises unto the Lord our Saviour. Psal. 106. We will give thanks unto the Lord, for he is gracious, and his mercy endureth for ever. Psal. 86.103. The Lord is full of compassion and mercy, long suffering, plenteous in goodness and pity. Psal. 57.108. His mercy is greater than the heavens, and his gracious goodness reacheth unto the clouds. Psal. 103. Like as a father pitieth his own children: even so is the Lord merciful unto them that fear him. Psal. 71. Therefore will we praise thee and thy mercies, O God, unto thee will we sing, O thou Holy one of Israel. Psal. 98. We will sing a New song unto thee, O God, we will praise the Lord with Psalms of Thanksgiving. Psal. 47. O sing praises, sing praises unto our God: O sing praises, sing praises unto our King. For God is the King of the earth, sing praises with understanding. Psal. 145. We will magnify thee, O God our King, we will praise thy Name for ever and ever. Every day will we give thanks unto thee, and praise thy Name for ever and ever. Our mouth shall speak the praises of the Lord, and let all flesh give thanks to his holy Name for ever and ever. Psal. 21.72 Blessed be the Lord God of Israel for ever: and blessed be the Name of his Majesty world without end. AMEN. AMEN. In stead of the other Prayers used in the time of the Sickness, Read some of these following. We will magnify thee, O God our King, and we will praise thy name for ever and ever: because in the midst of thine anger, thinking upon mercy, thou hast delivered our souls from death, and preserved us from that noisome pestilence, which not long since, raged in this City, sweeping away the rich with the poor, the aged with the young, leaving whole houses desolate, and filling all places with dead bodies: So that in man's judgement there was no hope remaining, but that this year would have thereby proved yet more dreadful and infectious than the former. But because thou wilt have it known, that thou only woundest and canst heal again, that thou killest and revivest, bringest even to hell and back again: thou hast vouchsafed, contrary to all human expectation (such is thy power and goodness) to command thine Angel to stay his hand, and spare this City, and hast turned thine anger and the fierceness thereof upon many other Cities and Towns within this Realm. We therefore at this time offer up unto thee a double sacrifice, at once, of hearty Thanksgiving for this our strange deliverance, and of humble and earnest Prayers, for those doleful places, thus grievously afflicted: beseeching thee for thy Son jesus Christ his sake, to be gracious unto them also, that both they and we in joint affection, may acknowledge thy justice in thy punishments, and record thine infinite mercies in sparing us miserable sinners, through jesus Christ thy Son, and our Saviour, to whom, etc. O Most gracious God, seeing it hath pleased thee in the multitude of those sorrows which we had in our hearts, by reason of that grievous contagion which thou lately didst send amongst us (besides the fear and expectation of the like, or a more violent infection this present year) to send thy comforts for the refreshing of our souls, and to remove that fearful pestilence from us, not for any desert of ours, who are most wretched sinners; nor by any means of man's devise, but only of thine own favour, and for thy mercy's sake: we yield unto thy divine Majesty all thanks and praise, for this thine especial goodness; trusting that we shall take warning, by this last dreadful judgement, for ever provoking thee to such a wrathful indignation again. And having felt the weight of thy heavy hand upon ourselves, tenderly compassionating the woeful case of those Cities and Towns in this Realm, which are now stricken with the same; we most humbly beseech thee, most merciful Father, to extend the like mercy to them, that thou hast done to us. Good Lord spare them, and hear their prayers, now crying unto thee in the vexation of their spirits, and the anguish of their souls, and us for them, that so this whole land may joyfully praise thy Name, and say; Lord thou art become gracious unto thy land, thou hast turned away all thy displeasure. Grant this O Lord, for thine only sons sake, jesus Christ our Lord and only Saviour, Amen. Almighty and eternal God, which strikest and healest, bringest down to death and quicken'st again, who in thy just judgement for our sins didst lately sore plague us in our chief City and round about, with great sickness and mortality: yet remembering thy mercy hast turned thyself most graciously unto us, and comforted us again, by ceasing the plague therein, even then when as by all likelihood both of the time and place, and concourse of people, and our little amendment of life, we could not but justly fear & expect the continuance and increasing of the same: we most humbly acknowledge with all due thankfulness from the bottom of our hearts, this thine exceeding gracious goodness and undeserved mercy, evermore praising thy great & glorious name, for so wonderful grace and clemency towards us most vile and wretched sinners so freely and mercifully extended: most humbly beseeching thee of thy fatherly goodness, not only to continue this gracious course of thy loving favour, in mitigating and lessening more and more this noisome Pestilence, till it be clean removed from us: But also to power thy heavenly Grace into our hearts, that we never forgetting how grievously and justly we have been chastened for our sins, and yet in Mercy not consumed, but raised up again and comforted, may learn thereby, both to fear thy dreadful judgements against sin, and so by true Repentance to turn unto thee from our wicked ways, lest a worse Plague fall upon us; And also to put our whole trust in thy Mercy, and approach with confidence unto thy Throne of Grace, for help and secure in all our troubles and adversities, Evermore thanking & praising thy glorious Majesty for this thy most merciful and marvelous deliverance, through jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour. O God the Father of our Lord jesus Christ, the God of all Mercy and Comfort, which art Lord of life and death, and rulest all things in heaven and earth by the word of thy Power: Look down mercifully from thy Holy place, upon the people of this Land yet grievously afflicted in many places, with great sickness and mortality. And as by thy great Mercy, the Plague which lately raged in our chief City, threatening utter consumption and desolation to the same, is now slaked and assuaged to our great comfort, for which we praise and magnify thy glorious Name: So likewise we most humbly beseech thee, in the tender bowels of thy endless Compassion, to be gracious and merciful to the other parts of this land, now fearfully affrighted and afflicted with this grievous Plague & pestilence. Send them good Lord, speedy help and secure from thy Holy habitation; And as thou didst sometimes turn away thy fierce wrath from the Ninivites, being justly threatened out against them, and even hanging over their heads, by giving them Repentance through thy Grace: So now visit the hearts of thy people in this Land with thine heavenly Grace, and holy Spirit, that they may speedily and sound return unto thee from all their wicked ways, in true Repentance, and a living Faith in jesus Christ: That so we may be delivered from this heavy wrath & Plague, which our sins have pulled down and scattered amongst us; And learn by thy fearful judgements to walk hereafter before thee, in continual reverence and obedience, And for thy gracious mercy to give thee Everlasting praise and glory, through jesus Christ our Lord. O Almighty God, which art the Resurrection of the dead, and the Life of them which live, who in thy displeasure carriest us down in a moment to the gates of death, and in thy mercy recallest our Souls back to dwell in the land of the living: We give thee humble thanks, that it hath pleased thee to restore us when we were almost past hope, to strengthen us in the extremity of our weakness, to deliver us thy people of this City from the Contagion, when in the eye of man's reason it was most likely to have increased. This we acknowledge to be thy doing, O Lord, and it is wonderful in our eyes, which have seen these thy great mercies surpassing the strength of our hope: and we beseech thee to continue thy gracious goodness towards us still, whereby all the world may see and know, that thou art our merciful Father, and wonderful Deliverer, to the glory of thy holy Name, and to the comfort of us thy children, through jesus Christ our Lord. O Heavenly Father, which art the Fountain of Life, and the GOD of our health, in whom alone we live, and move, and have our being: we beseech thee, that as thou hast been gracious unto this City, and the parts about it, in removing from hence that fearful Plague, which for our sins thou hadst most justly sent among us: So it would please thee to hear these our intercessions for our brethren, which in other places of this Realm do yet groan under thy punishing hand. O Lord, be gracious also unto them, and command thine Angel to sheathe his Sword, that a remnant may be saved. So shall we all jointly magnify thy Mercies, and compass about thine Altars with songs of deliverance, to our unspeakable comfort, and to thy everlasting Glory, through jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.