face of things to flourish with beauty and delight. So God promiseth to be unto his people in their troubles, "as a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest." The spiritual joy and heavenly comfort, which the peace and grace of God ministereth to the consciences of believers', is said to make "the bones flourish like an herbs:" as on the other side, a broken spirit is said to "dry up the bones '." "Their soul," saith the prophet, "shall be as a watered garden, they shall sorrow no more; I will turn their mourning into joy, and will comfort them "."

X

SECT. 10. By all which we should learn, First, As to be sensible of our own personal and spiritual dryness, barrenness, emptiness of fruit and peace, hard hearts, with red consciences, guilty spirits, under our own particular sins; so, in regard of the whole land, to take notice of that tempest of wrath, which, like an east wind out of the wilderness, "drieth up our springs, and spoileth our treasures," as the prophet complains ; and to be humbled into penitent resolutions, as the church here is. If God, who was wont to be as dew to our nation, who made it heretofore like a paradise and a watered garden,-be now as a tempest, as a consuming fire unto it,-turning things upside down,-burning the inhabitants of the earth,-causing "our land to mourn, and our joy to wither," (as the prophet speaks';)—this is an evident sign, that "the earth is defiled under the inhabitants thereof. Therefore as our sins have turned our dew into blood, so our repentance must turn our blood into dew again. If ever we look to have a happy peace, we must make it with God. Men can give peace only to our bodies, our fields, our houses, our purses;-nor that neither without his over-ruling power and providence, who alone manageth all the counsels and resolutions of men ;-but he alone can give peace to our consciences by the assurance of his love, "which is better than life." And if there should be peace in a nation, made up only by human prudence and correspondences, without public repentance, and thorough reformation in church, in state, in families, in persons, in judgement, in manners,it would be but like those short interims between the Egyp

9 Isai. xviii. 4.

Ixvi. 14.

y Joel i. 12.

r Rom. xv. 13. v. 1. Phil. iv. 4. 1 Pet. 1. 8.
u Jer. xxxi. 12, 13.

t Prov. xvii. 22.

Isai. xxiv. 4, 5.

• Isai. * Hos. xiii. 15, 16.

tian plagues *; a respiting only, not a removing of our afflic tion; like the shining of the sun on Sodom, before the fire and brimstone fell upon it. We all cry and call for peace; and while any thing is left, would gladly pay dear, very dear to recover it again. But there is no sure and lasting purchase of it, but by unfeigned repentance and turning unto God: this is able to give peace in the midst of war. In the midst of storm and tempest, Christ is sufficient security to the tossed [ship. "This man is the peace, even when the Assyrian is in the land d." Whereas impenitency, even when we have recovered an outward peace, leaves us still in the midst of most potent enemies: God, Christ, angels, scripture, creatures, conscience, sins, curses, all our enemies. The apostle tells us, that "lusts war against the soul." There is a strong emphasis in the word soul, which is more worth than all the world; nothing to be taken in exchange for it. So long as we have our lusts conquered, we are under the wofulest war in the world, which doth not spoil us of our blood, our money, our coin, our cattle, our houses, our children, but of the salvation of immortal souls. Time will repair the ruins of other wars; but eternity itself will not deliver that poor soul, which is lost and fallen in the wars of lust.

Therefore, if you would have peace as a mercy, get it from God; let it be a dew from heaven upon your conversion unto him. A king's favour' is said to be as 'dew on the grass, and as a cloud of the latter rain ;' and it would with all joyfulness be so apprehended, if by that means the blessing of peace were bestowed upon these distressed kingdoms. How much more comfortable would it be to have it as a gift from God unto a repenting nation! For God can give peace in anger, as well as he doth war. A ship at sea may be distressed by a calm, as well as broken by a tempest. The cattle which we mean to kill, we do first prefer unto some fat pasture: and sometimes God gives over punishing, not in mercy, but in fury; leaving men to go on quietly in their own hearts' lusts, that they who are filthy, may

m

be filthy still. God was exceeding angry with Israel, when he gave them their hearts' desire,' and sent them quails'. Many men get their wills from God's anger by murmuring, as others do theirs from his mercy by prayer; but then there comes a curse along with it. Now therefore when our own sword doth devour us, when our land is, through the wrath of the Lord of Hosts, so darkened," that the people thereof are "as fuel of the fire, no man sparing his brother, every man eating the flesh of his own arm," (it is the sad character which the prophet gives of a civil war ;) let us take heed of God's complaint, "In vain have I smitten your children, they receive no correction"." Let us make it our business to recover God. It is he that "causeth wars to cease in the earth °;" and it is he "who poureth out upon men the strength of battle, and giveth them over to the spoilers P." A sinful nation gains nothing by any human treaties, policies, counsels, contributions, till by repentance they secure their interest in God, and make him on their side. God, being prevailed with by Moses in behalf of Israel, after the horrible provocation of the golden calf, sends a message to them: "I will send an angel before thee, and will drive out the Canaanite." And presently it follows, "When the people heard these evil tidings, they mourned "." What, were these evil tidings,-To have an angel to protect and lead them? to have their enemies vanquished? to have possession of a land, flowing with milk and honey? was there any thing lamentable in all this? Yes; To have all this and much more, and not to have God and his presence, was heavy tidings unto God's people. And therefore Moses never gave God over, till he promised them his own presence again; with which he chose rather to stay in a wilderness, than without it to go into the land of Canaan ; "If thy presence go not along, carry us not up hence "."

SECT. 11. Secondly, We should from hence learn, whatever our spiritual wants are, to look up to Heaven for a supply of them. Neither gardens, nor woods, nor vineyards, nor fields, nor flowers, nor trees, nor corn, nor spices, will flourish or revive, without the dew and concurrence of hea

* Psalm lxxxi. 12. Hos. iv. 14, 17. Isai. i. 5. Ezek. xxiv. 13. 1 Numb. xi. 32, 33. m Isai. ix. 19, 20. n Jer. ii. 30. Psalm xlvi. 10. Exod. xxxiii. 13, 14, 15.

Isai. xlii. 24, 25.

q Exod. xxxiii. 2, 3, 4.

venly grace: Christ alone is all in all unto his church. Though the instruments be earthly, yet the virtue which gives success unto them, comes from Heaven.

1. The beauty of the lilies,' or as the prophet David calls it," the beauty of holiness," ariseth from the dew of the morning. He is the ornament, the attire, the comeliness, of his spouse. For his people to forget him, is for a maid. to forget her ornaments, or a spouse her attire. The perfect beauty of the church, is that comeliness of his, which he communicates unto her ". Of ourselves, we are "wretched, miserable, poor, naked;" our gold, our riches, our white raiment, we must buy of him. He is "the Lord our righteousness, whom therefore we are said to "put

He hath made us kings and priests unto our God"; and being such, he hath provided beautified robes for us, as once he appointed for the priests". This spiritual beauty of holiness in Christ's church, is sometimes compared to the marriage-ornaments for a queen: sometimes to the choice flowers of a garden, roses and lilies: sometimes to a most glorious and goodly structure: sometimes to the shining forth of the moon, and the brightness of the sun. All the united excellences of the creatures are too low to adumbrate and figure the glories of the church.

2. The root and stability of the church is in and from him he is the root of David. Except he dwell in us, we cannot be rooted nor grounded. All our strength and sufficiency is from him'. The graft is supported by another root, and not by its own. This is the reason of the stability of the church, because it is "founded upon a rock ";" not upon Peter, but upon him whom Peter confessed"; upon

u Ezek. xvi. 14.
y Rev. ii. 18.
Rev. iv. 4, 6. xi. 7, 9.
d Cant. ii. 1, 2.

k Ephes. iii. 17.

m Matth. xvi. 18.

Vide Gul.

z Rom. xiii. 14. c Psalm e Rev. xxi. 11, 23.

8 Et quæ divisa beatos Efficiunt, collecta h Folio-Edition, p. 566.

1 Phil. iv. 13. Ephes. vi. 10. 1 Pet. • Ασφαλής ομολογία, ἣν ἐμπνευθεὶς ὁ

xlv. 14. Rev. xviii. 7, 8. xxi. 2. f Cant. vi. 10. Rev. xii. 1. tenes. Claud. xxi. 34. Gesner, vol. i. p. 311. i Rev. v. 5. v. 10. Πέτρος παρ' αὐτοῦ ὡς κρηπῖδα καὶ βαθμὸν ἀπέθετο· ἐφ ̓ ᾖ τὴν ἑαυτοῦ ἐκκλησίαν é Kúpios kodóμnoev. Isidor. Pelusiot. 1. 1. Ep. 235.-Ut ædificaretur Ecclesia super petram, quis factus est petra? Paulum audi dicentem; "Petra autem erat Christus:" Aug. in Psalm Ix. vol. 4. p. 438. Super hanc petram quam conVOL. III.

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the apostles only doctrinally, but upon Christ personally, as "the chief corner-stone, elect and precious," in whom whosoever believeth, shall not be confounded,-or, by failing in his confidence, be any ways disappointed and put to shame °. This is the difference between the righteousness of creation, and the righteousness of redemption; the state of the world in Adam, and the state of the church in Christ. Adam had his righteousness in his own keeping; and therefore when the power of hell set upon him, he fell from his steadfastness. There was no promise given unto him, that the gates of Hell should not prevail against him; being of an earthly constitution, he had corruptibility, mutability, infirmity, belonging unto him out of the principles of his being. But Christ, the second Adam, is "the Lord from Heaven," over whom death hath no claim, nor power: and the righteousness and stability of the church is founded and hath its original in him. The powers of darkness must be able to evacuate the virtue of his sacrifice,--to stop God's ears unto his intercession,-to repel and keep back the supply and influences of his Spirit,-to keep or recover possession against his ejectment,-in one word, to kill him again, and to thrust him away from the right hand of the Majesty on High, before ever they can blow down or overturn his church. As Plato compared a man, so may we the church, unto a tree inverted, with the root above, and the branches below. And the root of the tree doth not only serve to give life to the branches, while they abide in it,

fessus es, super hanc petram quam cognovisti, dicens, "Tu es Christus, Filius Dei vivi," ædificabo Ecclesiam meam : de Verbis Dom. Serm. 13. vol. 5. p. 290. Quid est super hanc petram?' Super hanc fidem; Super id quod dictum est, Tu es Christus, Filius Dei :' Tract. 10. in Epist. 1. Joan.-Felix fidei Petra, Petri ore confessi Tu es Christus Filius Dei. Hilar. de Trin. lib. 2. Super hanc confessionis petram Ecclesiæ ædificatio est. lib. 6. Ἐπὶ ταύτῃ τῇ πέτρα, τουτέστι, τῇ πίστει Tns duoλovías. Chrysost. in loc.-Vid. Reynold. Conference with Hart. cap. 2. divis. 1.-Casaub. Exercitat. ad. Annal. Eccles. xv. c. 12 et 13.-Sixt. Senen. 1. 6. Annot. 68. 69. • Ephes. ii. 20, 21. 1 Pet. ii. 6. p Istam gratiam non habuit homo primus, qua nunquam vellet, malus esset: Sed sane habuit, in qua si permanere vellet, nunquam malus esset. Sed deseruit et desertus est.-Hæc prima est gratia, quæ data est primo Adam: sed hac potentior est in secundo Adam. Prima est enim qua fit, ut habeat homo justitiam, si velit : secunda ergo plus potest qua fit etiam ut velit, et tantum velit, tantoque ardore diligat, ut carnis voluntatem contraria concupiscentem voluntate Spiritus vincat, &c. August. de corrept. et grat. cap. 11. et 12. vol. x. p. 507.