| |
| SAD Natures sights gave the Alarms, | |
| And all her frighted hosts stood to their arms, | |
| Waiting whom the great Soveraign would employ | |
| His all deserted rebels to destroy: | |
| Gen. 3.8. | When God descended out of heaven above | 5 |
| His disobedient Viceroy to remove. | |
| Yet though himself had seen the forfeiture, | |
| Which distance could not from his eyes obscure, | |
| To teach his future Substitutes how they | |
| 2 Sam. 23.3. | Should judgements execute in a right way, | 10 |
| He would not unexamin’d facts condemn, | |
| Nor punish sinners without hearing them. | |
| Therefore cites to his bar the Criminals, | |
| And Adam first out of his covert calls, | |
| Gen. 3.9–12. | Where art thou Adam? the Almighty said, | 15 |
| Here Lord, the trembling sinner answer made, | |
| Amongst the trees I in the garden heard | |
| Thy voice, and being naked was afeard, | |
| Nor durst I so thy purer sight abide, | |
| Therefore my self did in this shelter hide. | 20 |
| Hast thou (said God) eat the forbidden tree, | |
| Or who declar’d thy nakedness to thee? | |
| She, answer’d Adam, whom thou didst create | |
| To be my helper and associate, | |
| Gave me the fatal fruit, and I did eat; | 25 |
| ver. 13. | Then Eve was also call’d from her retreat, | |
| Woman what hast thou done? th’ Almighty said; | |
| Lord, answer’d she, the serpent me betray’d, | |
| And I did eat. Thus did they both confess | |
| Their guilt, and vainly sought to make it less, | 30 |
| By such extenuations, as well weigh’d, | |
| The sin, so circumstanc’d, more sinful made: | |
| A course which still half softned sinners use, | |
| Transferring blame their own faults to excuse, | |
| They care not how, nor where, and oftentimes | 35 |
| Rom. 9.19. | On God himself obliquely charge their crimes, | |
| Expostulating in their discontent, | |
| Ez. 18.2. | As if he caus’d what he did not prevent; | |
| Jam. 1.13,14,15. | Which Adam wickedly implies, when he | |
| Cries, ’Twas the woman That thou gavest me; | 40 |
| Oft-times make that the devils guilt alone, | |
| Which was as well and equally their own. | |
| His lies could never have prevail’d on Eve | |
| But that she wisht them truth, and did believe | |
| A forgery that suited her desire, | 45 |
| Whose haughty heart was prone enough to’ aspire. | |
| The tempting and the urging was his ill, | |
| But the compliance was in her own will. | |
| And herein truly lies the difference | |
| Of natural and gracious penitence, | 50 |
| The first transferreth and extenuates | |
| Psal. 51.3,4,5. | The guilt, which the other owns and aggravates. | |
| & 32.5. | While sin is but regarded slight and small, | |
| It makes the value of rich mercy fall, | |
| 1 Joh. 1.8,9,10. | But as our crimes seem greater in our eyes, | 55 |
| So doth our grateful sense of pardon rise. | |
| Poor mankind at Gods righteous bar was cast | |
| And set for judgement by, when at the last | |
| Satan within the serpent had his doom, | |
| Whose execrable malice left no room | 60 |
| For plea or pardon, but was sentenc’d first; | |
| Thou (said the Lord) above all beasts accurst, | |
| Shalt on thy belly creep, on dust shalt feed, | |
| Between thee and the woman, and her seed | |
| 1 Pet. 5.8. | And thine, I will put lasting enmity; | 65 |
| Thou in this war his heel shalt bruise, but He | |
| Mat. 13.25. | Thy head shall break. More various Mystery | |
| Ne’re did within so short a sentence lie. | |
| Jude 6. | Here is irrevocable vengeance, here | |
| Mal. 3.6. | Love as immutable. Here doth appear | 70 |
| Zac. 6.13. | Infinite Wisdome plotting with free grace, | |
| 1 Cor. 2.9. | Even by Mans Fall, th’ advance of humane race. | |
| Rom. 11.22. | Severity here utterly confounds, | |
| Here Mercy cures by kind and gentle wounds, | |
| The Father here, the Gospel first reveals, | 75 |
| Esa. 7.14. | Here fleshly veils th’ eternal son conceals. | |
| Rom. 8.2,3,4. | The law of life and spirit here takes place, | |
| Act. 13.10. | Given with the promise of assisting grace: | |
| Mat. 3.7. | Here is an Oracle fore-telling all, | |
| Psal. 22.30. | Which shall the two opposed seeds befall. | 80 |
| Jer.31.22, Eph.6.12. | The great was hath its first beginning here, | |
| Joh. 8.44. | Carried along more than five thousand year, | |
| Jude 9. | With various success on either side, | |
| Gen. 6.2,4,5. | And each age with new combatants suppli’d: | |
| Heb. 2.10. | Two Soveraign Champions here we find, | 85 |
| Act. 5.31. | Satan and Christ contending for mankind. | |
| Eph. 2.2. | Two Empires here, two opposite Cities rise, | |
| Joh. 15.18,19. | Dividing all in two Societies. | |
| Lu. 12.32. | The little Church and the worlds larger State | |
| Ps. 105.12–15. | Pursuing it with ceaseless spite and hate. | 90 |
| Each party here erecting their own walls, | |
| As one advances, so the other falls. | |
| Esa. 9.6,7. | Hope in the Promise the weak Church confirms, | |
| Hell and the world fight upon desperate terms, | |
| Rev. 12.12. | By this most certain Oracle they know, | 95 |
| Joh. 16.30. | Their war must end in final overthrow. | |
| Joh. 16.20. | Some little present mischief they may do, | |
| And this with eager malice they pursue. | |
| Mat. 10.34. | The Angels whom Gods justice did divide, | |
| Psal. 2.1. | Engage their mighty powers on either side, | 100 |
| Rev. 12.7,9. | Hells gloomy Princes the worlds rulers made, | |
| Heavens unseen host the Churches guard and aid. | |
| Dan. 10.13,21. | Till the frail womans conquering son shall tread | |
| Psa. 104.4. | Beneath his feet the serpents broken head; | |
| Rom. 16.20. | Though God the speech to mans false foe address, | 105 |
| The words rich grace to fallen man express, | |
| Which God will not to him himself declare, | |
| Psa. 50.15. | Till he implore it by submissive prayer; | |
| Es. 41.9. | Sufficient ’tis to know a latitude | |
| Psa. 130.4. | For hope, which doth no penitent exclude. | 110 |
| Luk. 1.74. | Had deaths sad sentence past on man, before | |
| Gal. 3.8,16. | The promise of that seed which should restore | |
| 1 Cor. 15.54,57. | His fallen state, destroying death and sin, | |
| Cureless as Satans had his misery been. | |
| But though free grace did future help provide, | 115 |
| 1 Cor. 3.15. | Yet must he present loss and woe abide; | |
| And feel the bitter curse, that he may so | |
| Gal. 3.13. | The sweet release of saving mercy know. | |
| Gen. 3.16, &c. | Prepar’d with late indulged hope, on Eve | |
| Th’ almighty next did gentler sentence give. | 120 |
| I will, said he, greatly augment thy woes, | |
| And thy conceptions, which with painful throes | |
| Thou shalt bring forth, yet shall they be to thee | |
| But a successive crop of misery. | |
| Thy husband shall thy ruler be, whose sway | 125 |
| Thou shalt with passionate desires obey. | |
| Alas! how sadly to this day we find | |
| Th’ effect of this dire curse on womankind; | |
| Eve sin’d in fruit forbid, and God requires | |
| Her pennance in the fruit of her desires. | 130 |
| When first to men their inclinations move, | |
| Gen. 39.7. | How are they tortur’d with distracting love! | |
| What disappointments find they in the end; | |
| Constant uneasinesses which attend | |
| 1 Cor. 7.34,39,40. | The best condition of the wedded state, | 135 |
| 1 Pet. 3.5. | Giving all wives sense of the cures weight, | |
| Which makes them ease and liberty refuse, | |
| And with strong passion their own shackles chuse: | |
| Now though they easier under wise rule prove, | |
| Gen. 29.20. | And every burthen is made light by love, | 140 |
| Yet golden fetters, soft lin’d yoaks still be, | |
| Though gentler curbs, but curbs of liberty, | |
| As well as the harsh tyrants iron yoak, | |
| More sorely galling them whom they provoke, | |
| 1 Sam. 25.25. | To loath their bondage, and despise the rule | 145 |
| Of an unmanly, fickle, froward fool. | |
| Whate’re the husbands be, they covet fruit, | |
| Gen. 30.1. & 35.18. | And their own wishes to their sorrows contribute. | |
| Mat. 24.19. | How painfully the fruit within them grows, | |
| What tortures do their ripened births disclose, | 150 |
| How great, how various, how uneasie are | |
| The breeding sicknesses, pangs that prepare | |
| Joh. 16.21. | The violent openings of lifes narrow door, | |
| Whose fatal issues we as oft deplore! | |
| What weaknesses, what languishments ensue, | 155 |
| Scattering dead Lillies where fresh Roses grew. | |
| What broken rest afflicts the careful nurse, | |
| Extending to the breasts the mothers curse; | |
| Which ceases not when there her milk she dries, | |
| The froward child draws new streams from her eyes. | 160 |
| How much more bitter anguish do we find | |
| Labouring to raise up vertue in the mind, | |
| Then when the members in our bowels grew, | |
| Prov. 10.1. | What sad abortions, what cross births ensue? | |
| What monsters, what unnatural vipers come | 165 |
| Pro. 15.20. | Eating their passage through their parents womb; | |
| How are the tortures of their births renew’d, | |
| Unrecompenc’d with love and gratitude: | |
| Even the good, who would our cares requite, | |
| Would be our crowns, joys, pillars, and delight, | 170 |
| Affect us yet with other griefs and fears, | |
| Opening the sluces of our ne’re dried tears. | |
| Luk. 2.48,35. | Death, danger, sickness, losses, all the ill | |
| Mat. 2.18. | That on the children falls, the mothers feel, | |
| Repeating with worse pangs, the pangs that bore | 175 |
| Them into life, and though some may have more | |
| Of sweet and gentle mixture, some of worse, | |
| Yet every mothers cup tasts of the curse. | |
| And when the heavy load her faint heart tires, | |
| Gen. 27.46. | Makes her too oft repent her fond desires. | 180 |
| Now last of all, as Adam last had been | |
| Drawn into the prevaricating sin, | |
| Gen. 3.17. | His sentence came: Because that thou didst yield, | |
| (Said God) to thy enticing wife, The field | |
| Producing briars and fruitless thorns to thee, | 185 |
| Accursed for thy sake and sins shall be. | |
| Thy careful brows in constant toyls shall sweat, | |
| Thus thou thy bread shalt all thy whole life eat, | |
| Till thou return into the earths vast womb; | |
| Whence, taken first, thou didst a man become; | 190 |
| Ps. 103.14. | For dust thou art, and dust again shalt be | |
| & 104.29. | When lifes declining spark goes out in thee. | |
| In all these Sentences we strangely find | |
| Gods admirable love to lost mankind; | |
| Who though he never will his word recal, | 195 |
| Or let his threats life shafts at randome fall, | |
| Yet can his Wisdome order curses so | |
| 2 Cor. 4.6. | That blessings may out of their bowels flow. | |
| Thus death the door of lasting life became, | |
| Dissolving nature, to rebuild her frame, | 200 |
| 2 Tim. 1.10. | On such a sure foundation, as shall break | |
| All the attempts Hells cursed Empire make. | |
| Thus God reveng’d mans quarrel on his foe, | |
| To whom th’ Almighty would no mercy show, | |
| Lu. 18.7,8. | Making his reign, his respite, and success, | 205 |
| All augmentations of his cursedness. | |
| Zac. 9.10–12. | Thus gave he us a powerful Chief and Head, | |
| By whom we shall be out of bondage led. | |
| And made the penalties of our offence, | |
| Precepts and rules of new obedience, | 210 |
| Mat. 11.29,30. | Fitted in all things to our fallen State, | |
| Under sweet promises, that ease their weight. | |
| 1 Joh. 5.3. | Our first injunction is to hate and flie | |
| The flatteries of our first grand enemy; | |
| Prov. 1.10, &c. | To have no friendship with his cursed race, | 215 |
| Eph. 5.11. | The int’rest of the opposite seed t’ embrace, | |
| 1 Tim. 6.12. | Where though we toyl in fights, tho’ bruis’d we be, | |
| Jude 3. | Yet shall our combate end in victory: | |
| Rev. 2.10. | Eternal glory, healing our slight wound, | |
| Mic. 7.16,17. | When all our labours are with triumph crown’d. | 220 |
| The next command is, mothers should maintain | |
| Posterity, not frighted with the pain, | |
| Which tho’ it make us mourn under the sense | |
| Of the first mothers disobedience, | |
| Yet hath a promise that thereby she shall | 225 |
| 1 Tim. 2.15. | Recover all the hurt of her first fall, | |
| Es. 9.6. | When, in mysterious manner, from her womb | |
| Heb. 2.12,13. | Her father, brother, husband, son shall come. | |
| Eph. 5.25, &c. | Subjection to the husband’s rule enjoyn’d, | |
| In the next place, that yoak with love is lin’d, | 230 |
| Luk. 1.35. | Love too a precept made, where God requires | |
| 1 Pet. 3.1,2. | We should perform our duties with desires; | |
| And promises t’ encline our averse will, | |
| Whose satisfaction takes away the ill | |
| Of every toyl, and every suffering | 235 |
| That can from unenforc’d submission spring; | |
| The last command, God with mans curse did give, | |
| Was that men should in honest callings live, | |
| Eating their own bread, fruit of their own sweat; | |
| 1 Thes. 4.11,12. | Nor feed like drones on that which others get: | 240 |
| And this command a promise doth implie, | |
| 2 Thes. 3.12. | That bread should recompence our industry. | |
| One mercy more his sentence did include, | |
| Rev. 14.13. | That mortal toyls, faintings and lassitude, | |
| Should not beyond deaths fixed bound extend, | 245 |
| Mat. 10.28. | But there in everlasting quiet end; | |
| Job 3.17,18,19. | When men out of the troubled air depart, | |
| And to their first material dust revert, | |
| Eccl. 3.20. | The utmost power that death or woe can have | |
| Is but to shut us pris’ners in the grave, | 250 |
| Bruising the flesh, that heel whereon we tread, | |
| 1 Thes. 4.14. | But we shall trample on the serpents head. | |
| Our scatter’d atoms shall again condense, | |
| Es. 26.19. | And be again inspir’d with living sense; | |
| Captivity shall then a captive be, | 255 |
| Job 19.26,27. | Death shall be swallow’d up in victory, | |
| 1 Cor. 15.20–22, 26, | And God shall man to Paradise restore, | |
| 54,55, 57. | Where the soul tempter shall seduce no more | |
| Act. 2.24. | How far our parents, whose sad eyes were fixt | |
| Psa. 68.18. | On woe and terror, saw the mercy mixt, | 260 |
| We can but make a wild uncertain guess, | |
| As we are now affected in distress, | |
| Esa. 43.2, &c. | Who less regard the mitigation still | |
| 1 Pet. 4.12,13. | Than the slight smart of our afflicting ill; | |
| And while we groan under the hated yoak, | 265 |
| Jer. 30.11, &c. | Our gratitude for its soft lining choak. | |
| Mic. 7.18,19. | But God having th’ amazed sinners doom’d, | |
| Put off the Judges frown and reassum’d | |
| Es. 49.15. | A tender fathers kind and melting face | |
| Jer. 31.20. | Opening his gracious arms for new embrace, | 270 |
| Psal. 50.5. | Taught them to expiate their heinous guilt | |
| 1 Pet. 1.19. | By spotless sacrifice and pure blood spilt, | |
| Heb. 11.4. | Which done in faith did their faint hearts sustain, | |
| Dan. 9.26,27. | Till the intended lamb of God was slain, | |
| Joh. 1.29. | Whose death, whose merit, and whose innocence, | 275 |
| Ps. 40.6,7. | The forfeit paid and blotted out th’ offence. | |
| 1 Joh. 2.2. | The skins of the slain beasts, God vestures made, | |
| Rev. 1.5. & 5.9,10. | Wherein the naked sinners were array’d, | |
| Rom. 5.10,19. | Not without mystery, which typifi’d | |
| Col. 2,14. | That righteousness that doth our foul shame hide. | 280 |
| Ps. 32.1,2. | As when a rotting patient must endure | |
| Rev. 19.8. | Painful excisions to effect his cure, | |
| Rom. 3.22. & 13,14. | His spirits we with cordials fortifie, | |
| Gal. 3.27. | Left, unsupported, he should faint and die: | |
| Zac. 3.4,5. | So with our prayers the Almighty dealt, | 285 |
| Before their necessary woes they felt, | |
| Deut. 33.27. | Their feeble souls rich promises upheld, | |
| And their deliverance was in types reveal’d, | |
| Even their bodies God himself did arm | |
| Mat. 6.30. | With clothes that kept them from the weathers harm, | 290 |
| Psa. 89.32–34. | But after all, they must be driven away, | |
| Nor in their forfeit Paradise must stay. | |
| Gen. 3.22. | Then, said the Lord, with holy ironie, | |
| Whence man the folly of his pride might see, | |
| The earthy man like one of us is grown, | 295 |
| To whom, as God, both good and ill is known, | |
| Now left he also eat of th’ other tree | |
| Whose fruit gives life, and an Immortal be, | |
| Let us by just and timely banishment | |
| His further sinful arrogance prevent. | 300 |
| Then did he them out of the garden chace, | |
| And set a Cherubim to guard the place; | |
| Who wav’d a flaming Sword before the door, | |
| Through which the wretches must return no more: | |
| Heb. 1.7, | May we not liken to this Sword of flame | 305 |
| 12,18–21. | The threatning law which from Mount Sinai came, | |
| With such thick flashes of prodigious fire | |
| As made the mountains shake and men retire: | |
| Forbidding them all forward hope, that they | |
| Could enter into life that dreadful way. | 310 |
| Whate’re it was, whate’re it signifies, | |
| It kept our parents out of Paradise, | |
| Who now returning to their place of birth | |
| 1 Pet. 2.11. | Found themselves strangers in their native earth. | |
| Heb. 11.13. | Their fatal breach of Gods most strict command | 315 |
| Psa. 39.12. | Had there dissolv’d all concord, the sweet band | |
| Of universal loveliness and peace. | |
| And now the calm in every part did cease; | |
| Love, tho’ immutable, its smiles did shrowd | |
| Rev. 3.19. | Under the dark veil of an angry cloud. | 320 |
| And while he seem’d withdrawn, whose grace upheld | |
| Psal. 75.3. | The order of all things, confusion fill’d | |
| The Universe. The air became impure, | |
| And frequent dreadful conflicts did endure | |
| With every other angry element; | 325 |
| The whirling fires its tender body rent. | |
| From earth and seas gross vapours did arise, | |
| Turn’d to prodigious Meteors in the skies; | |
| Psal. 107.25–27. | The blustring winds let loose their furious rage, | |
| And in their battels did the floods engage. | 330 |
| The Sun confounded was with natures shame, | |
| And the pale Moon shrunk in her sickly flame; | |
| Jud. 5.20. | The rude congressions of the angry Stars | |
| In Heaven, begun the universal wars, | |
| While their malicious influence from above, | 335 |
| On earth did various perturbations move, | |
| Droughts, inundations, blastings, kill’d the plants; | |
| Worse influence wrought on th’ inhabitants, | |
| Inspiring lust, rage, ravenous appetite, | |
| Psa. 78.45–48. | Which made the creatures in all regions fight. | 340 |
| The little insects in great clouds did rise, | |
| And in Battalia’s spread, obscur’d the skies; | |
| Armies of birds encountred in the air, | |
| With hideous cries deciding battles there; | |
| The birds of prey to gorge their appetite, | 345 |
| Seiz’d harmless fowl in their unwary flight. | |
| When the dim evening had shut in the day, | |
| Troops of wild beasts, all marching out for prey, | |
| Psal. 104.20–22. | To the restless flocks would go, and there | |
| Oft-times by other troops assailed were, | 350 |
| Who snatcht out of their jaws the new slain food, | |
| And made them purchase it again with blood. | |
| Thus sin the whole creation did divide | |
| Into th’ oppressing and the suffering side; | |
| Those still employing craft and violence | 355 |
| To’ ensnare and murther simple innocence, | |
| True emblems were of Satans craft and power | |
| 1 Pet. 5.8. | In daily ambuscado to devour. | |
| Rev. 12.8,12. | Nor only emblems were, but organs too, | |
| In and by whom he did his mischiefs do, | 360 |
| While persecuting cruelty and rage | |
| Them in his cursed party did engage. | |
| Love, meekness, patience, gentleness, combin’d | |
| The tamer brood with those of their own kind. | |
| Wherefore God chose them for his sacrifice, | 365 |
| When he the proud and mighty did despise, | |
| Rom. 8.20,21. | And his most certain Oracles declare, | |
| They mans restored peace at last shall share: | |
| Es. 11.7. | But to our parents, then, sad was the change | |
| & 65.25. | Which them from peace and safety did estrange, | 370 |
| Brought universal woe and discord in, | |
| Es. 57.20,21. | The never failing consequents of sin; | |
| Eph. 2,12–14. | Nor only made all things without them jar, | |
| But in their breasts rais’d up a civil war, | |
| Reason and sense maintain’d continual fight, | 375 |
| Urging th’ aversion and the appetite, | |
| Which led two different troops of passions out, | |
| Confounding all, in their tumultuous rout. | |
| The less world with the great proportion held: | |
| As winds the caverns, sighs the bosomes fill’d; | 380 |
| So flowing tears did beauties fair fields drown, | |
| As inndations kept within no bound. | |
| Fear earth-quakes made, lust in the fancy whirl’d, | |
| Turn’d into flame, and bursting fir’d the world: | |
| Spite, hate, revenge, ambition, avarice | 385 |
| Made innocence a prey to monstrous vice. | |
| The cold and hot diseases represent | |
| The perturbations of the element. | |
| Thus woe and danger had beset them round, | |
| Distrest without, within no comfort found. | 390 |
| Even as a Monarchs Favourite in disgrace | |
| Suffers contempt both from the high and base, | |
| And the most abject most insult o’re them, | |
| Whom the offended Soveraigns condemn; | |
| So after man th’ Almighty disobey’d, | 395 |
| Each little fly durst his late King invade, | |
| Aswell as the woods monsters, wolves and bears, | |
| And all things else that exercise his fears. | |
| Methinks I hear sad Eve in some dark Vale | |
| Her woful state, with such sad plaints, bewail: | 400 |
| Ah! why doth death its latest stroke delay, | |
| If we must leave the light, why do we stay | |
| By slow degrees more painfully to die, | |
| And languish in a long calamity? | |
| Have we not lost by one false cheating sin | 405 |
| All peace without, all sweet repose within? | |
| Is there a pleasure yet that life can show, | |
| Doth not each moment multiplie our woe: | |
| And while we live thus in perpetual dread, | |
| Our hope and comfort long before us dead? | 410 |
| Job 3. | Why should we not our angry maker pray | |
| Jonah 4.3. | At once to take our wretched lives away? | |
| Hath not our sin all natures pure leagues rent | |
| And arm’d against us every element? | |
| Have not our subjects their allegiance broke, | 415 |
| Doth not each worm scorn our unworthy yoak? | |
| Are we not half with griping hunger pin’d, | |
| Before we bread amongst the brambles find? | |
| All pale diseases in our members reign, | |
| Anguish and grief no less our sick souls pain, | 420 |
| Whereever I my eyes, or thoughts convert, | |
| Each object adds new tortures to my heart. | |
| If I look up, I dread heavens threatning frown, | |
| Thorns prick my eyes, when shame hath cast them down, | |
| Dangers I see, looking on either hand, | 425 |
| Before me all in fighting posture stand. | |
| If I cast back my sorrow-drowned eyes, | |
| I see our ne’re to be recover’d Paradise, | |
| The flaming Sword which doth us thence exclude, | |
| By sad remorse and ugly guilt pursued. | 430 |
| If I on thee a private glance reflect, | |
| Confusion doth my shameful eyes deject, | |
| Seeing the man I love by me betray’d, | |
| By me, who for his mutual help was made, | |
| Who to preserve thy life ought to have died, | 435 |
| And I have kill’d thee by my foolish pride; | |
| Defil’d thy glory, and pull’d down thy throne. | |
| O that I had but sin’d, and died alone! | |
| Then had my torture and my woe been less, | |
| I yet had flourisht in thy happiness. | 440 |
| If these words Adams melting soul did move, | |
| He might reply with kind rebuking love. | |
| Cease, cease, O foolish woman, to dispute, | |
| Psa. 115.3. | Gods soveraign will and Power are absolute. | |
| Rom. 9.20–23. | If he will have us soon, or slow to die, | 445 |
| Frail worms must yield, but must not question why. | |
| When his great hand appears, we must conclude | |
| Ps. 119.68. | All that he doth is wise, and just, and good; | |
| Rom. 3.4. | Though our poor, sin-benighted souls, are blind, | |
| Psal. 51.4. | Nor can the mysteries of his wisdome find, | 450 |
| Gen. 18.25. | Yet in our present case we must confess | |
| His justice and our own unrighteousness. | |
| He warn’d us of this fatal consequence, | |
| Rom. 6. ult. | That death must wait on disobedience; | |
| Yet we despis’d his threat, and broke his law, | 455 |
| So did destruction on our own heads draw; | |
| Now under his afflicting hand we lie, | |
| Reaping the fruit of our iniquity. | |
| Which, had not he prevented, when we fell, | |
| Gen. 6.3. | At once had plung’d us in the lowest hell; | 460 |
| 1 Pet. 3.20. | But by his mercy yet we have reprieve, | |
| Joh. 11.25. | Any yet are shew’d how we in death may live, | |
| If we improve our short indulged space | |
| To understand, prize, and accept his grace. | |
| Did all of us at once like brutes expire, | 465 |
| And cease to be, we might quick death desire: | |
| But since our chief and immaterial part, | |
| Not fram’d of dust, doth not to dust revert: | |
| Its death not an annihilation is, | |
| Mat. 25.41,46. | But to be cut off from its supream bliss: | 470 |
| Luk. 16.21,22. | Whatever here to mortals can befal, | |
| Compar’d to future miseries is small, | |
| The saddest, sharpest, and the longest have | |
| Mat. 10.28. | Their final consummations in the grave, | |
| These have their intermissions and allays, | 475 |
| Though black and gloomy ones, these nights have days, | |
| Psa. 130.1. | The worst calamities we here endure | |
| Admit a possibility of cure; | |
| Psal. 107. | Our miseries here are varied in their kind, | |
| And in that change the wretched some ease find. | 480 |
| Esa. 29.8. | Sleep here our pained senses stupifies, | |
| And cheating dreams in our sick fancies rise, | |
| But in our future sufferings ’tis not so, | |
| There is no end, no intermitted woe, | |
| Lu. 16.26. | No more return from the accursed place, | 485 |
| No hope, no possibility of grace, | |
| No sleepy intervals, no pleasant dreams, | |
| No mitigations of those sad extreams, | |
| Rom. 2.8,9. | No gentle mixtures, no soft changes there, | |
| Jude 13. | Perpetual tortures, heightned with despair, | 490 |
| Mat. 13.50. | Eternal horror, and eternal night, | |
| Lu. 16.24. | Eternal burnings, with no glance of light, | |
| Mat. 8.12. | Eternal pain. O ’tis a thought too great, | |
| & 22.13. | Too terrible, for any to repeat, | |
| Rev. 19.20. | Who have not scap’d the dread. Let’s not to shun | 495 |
| Hos. 13.9. | Heavens scorching rays, into hells furnace run: | |
| Rom. 3.16. | But having slain our selves, let’s flie to him | |
| Psa. 103.4. | Who only can our selves from death redeem, | |
| To undo what’s done is not within our power, | |
| No more than to call back the last fled hour. | 500 |
| To think we can our fallen state restore, | |
| Or without hope, our ruine to deplore, | |
| Are equal aggravating crimes; the first | |
| Eph. 2.4,6–10. | Repeats that sin for which we were accurst, | |
| While we with foolish arrogating pride, | 505 |
| Rom. 3.27. | More in our selves than in our God confide; | |
| The last is both ungrateful and unjust, | |
| That doth is goodness, or his power distrust. | |
| Which wheresoe’re we look, without, within, | |
| Above, beneath, in every place is seen. | 510 |
| Psal. 36,5,6. | Doth Heaven frown? Above the sullen shrouds | |
| God sits, and sees through all the blackest clouds | |
| Esa. 44.22. | Sin casts about us, like the misty night, | |
| Which hide his pleasing glances from our sight, | |
| Lam. 3.44, | Nor only sees, but darts on us his beams | 515 |
| 31,32,25. | Ministring comfort in our worst extreams. | |
| Job 37.11–13. | When lightnings flie, dire storm and thunder roars, | |
| He guides the shafts, the serene calm restores. | |
| Esa. 40.1,2. | When shadows occupie days vacant room, | |
| & 57.18,19. | He makes new glory spring from nights dark womb. | 520 |
| When the black Prince of air lets loose the winds, | |
| Joh. 14.18. | The furious warriours he in prison binds. | |
| If burning stars do conflagrations threat, | |
| Esa. 25.4. | He gives cool breezes to allay the heat. | |
| Psal. 78.16,17. | When cold doth in its rigid season reign, | 525 |
| Psal. 30.5. | He melts the snows, and thaws the air again; | |
| Luk. 8.24,25. | Restoring the vicissitude of things, | |
| Esa. 27.8. | He still new good from every evil brings. | |
| Esa. 4.6. Cant. 2.11,12. Gen. 8.22. Psal. 147.17,18. Esa. 45.6–8. |
| Psal. 75.3. | He holds together the worlds shaken frame, | |
| Jam. 1.17. | Ordaining every change, is still the same. | 530 |
| Psal. 102,26,27. | If he permit the elements to fight, | |
| The rage of storms, the blackness of the night; | |
| Mal. 3.6. | ’Tis that his power, love and wisdome may | |
| Esa. 54.11. | More glory have, restoring calm and day; | |
| Jer. 31.35,36. | That we may more the pleasant blessings prize, | 535 |
| Laid in the ballance with their contraries. | |
| 2 Cor. 4.17. | Though dangers then, like gaping monsters stand | |
| Esa. 54.6–10. | Ready to swallow us on either hand; | |
| Let us despise them, firm in this faith still, | |
| Psal. 46.1,2. | If God will save, they can nor hurt nor kill; | 540 |
| If by his just permission we are slain, | |
| Esa. 8.9,10, | His power can heal and quicken us again. | |
| 12–14. | If briers and thorns, which from our sins arise | |
| Esa. 51.11, &c. | Looking on earth, pierce through our guilty eyes, | |
| Gen. 50.20. | Let’s yet give thanks they have not choak’d the seed | 545 |
| Which should with better fruit our sad lives feed. | |
| 2 Sam. 17.14. | If discord set the inward world on fire, | |
| Esther 5.14. | With hast let’s to the living spring retire, | |
| & 6.13. | There quench, and quiet the disturbed soul, | |
| & 7.10. | There on Loves sweet refreshing green banks rowl, | 550 |
| Ezek. 37.1, &c. | Where ecstasied with joy, we shall not feel | |
| The Serpents little nibblings at our heel. | |
| Esa. 19.22. | If we look back on Paradise, late lost, | |
| Jer. 30.17. | Joys vanisht like swift dreams, thaw’d like a frost, | |
| Act. 14.17. | Converting pleasant walks to dirt and mire, | 555 |
| Would we such frail delights again desire, | |
| Joh. 7.37,38. | Which at their best, however excellent, | |
| Psal. 23.1,2. 6.7. | Had this defect, they were not permanent? | |
| Col. 3.1,2. Psal. 107.35,36,34,33. 1 Cor. 7.31. Eccles. 1.2. 2 Cor. 4.18. |
| Psal. 49.4,15. | If sin, remorse, and guilt give us the chace, | |
| Let us lie close in mercies sweet embrace, | 560 |
| Rev. 3.18,20. | Which when it us asham’d, and naked found | |
| In the soft arms of melting pity bound; | |
| Psa. 32.1,2. | Eternal glorious triumphs did prepare, | |
| Arm’d us with clothes against the wounding air, | |
| 1 Joh. 2.25. | By expiating sacrifices taught, | 565 |
| How new life shall by death to light be brought. | |
| If we before us look, although we see | |
| All things in present fighting posture be: | |
| Yet in the promise we a prospect have | |
| 1 Cor. 15.54,55,26. | Of victory swallowing up the empty grave; | 570 |
| Hos. 13.14. | Our foes all vanquisht, death it self lies dead, | |
| Rom. 16.20. | And we shall trample on the monsters head. | |
| Entring into a new and perfect joy, | |
| Mat. 25.21. | Which neither sin nor sorrow can destroy: | |
| Rev. 20.4. | A lasting and refin’d felicity, | 575 |
| Mal. 3.2,3. | For which even we our selves refin’d must be. | |
| Col. 1.12. | Then shall we laugh at our now childish woes, | |
| Joh. 16.21,22. | And hug the birth that issues from these throes. | |
| Let not my share of grief afflict thy mind, | |
| But let me comfort in thy courage find; | 580 |
| ’Twas not thy malice, but thy ignorance | |
| That lately my destruction did advance; | |
| Nor can I my own self excuse; ’twas I | |
| Undid my self by my facility. | |
| Let’s not in vain each other now upbraid, | 585 |
| But rather strive to’ afford each other aid: | |
| And our most gracious Lord with due thanks bless, | |
| Who hath not left us single in distress. | |
| When fear chills thee, my hope shall make thee warm, | |
| When I grow faint, thou shalt my courage arm; | 590 |
| When both our spirits at a low ebb are, | |
| We both will joyn in mutual fervent prayer | |
| To him whose gracious succour never fails, | |
| When sin and death poor feeble man assails, | |
| He that our final triumph hath decreed, | 595 |
| And promis’d thee salvation in thy seed. | |
| Ah! can I this in Adams person say, | |
| While fruitless tears melt my poor life away? | |
| Of all the ills to mortals incident, | |
| None more pernicious is than discontent, | 600 |
| That brat of unbelief, and stubborn pride, | |
| And sensual lust, with no joy satisfied, | |
| That doth ingratitude and murmur nurse, | |
| And is a sin which carries its own curse; | |
| This is the only smart of every ill; | 605 |
| But can we without it sad tortures feel? | |
| Yes; if our souls above our sense remain, | |
| And take not in th’ afflicted bodies pain, | |
| When they descend and mix with the disease, | |
| Then doth the anguish live, reign, and encrease | 610 |
| Which when the soul is not in it, grows faint, | |
| And wastes its strength, not nourisht with complaint, | |
| Submissive, humble, happy, sweet content | |
| A thousand deaths by one death doth prevent; | |
| When our rebellious wills subdued thereby | 615 |
| Gal. 2.20. | Into th’ eternal will and wisdome, die; | |
| Nor is that will harsh or irrational, | |
| Mat. 11. | But sweet in that which we most bitter call, | |
| Who err in judging what is ill or good, | |
| Only by studying that will, understood. | 620 |
| What we admire in a low Paradise, | |
| If they our souls from heavenly thoughts entice, | |
| Here terminating our most strong desire, | |
| Which should to perfect permanence aspire, | |
| From being good to us they are so far, | 625 |
| That they our fetters, yoaks and poysons are, | |
| The obstacles of our felicity, | |
| The ruine of our souls most firm healths be, | |
| Quenching that life-maintaining appetite, | |
| Which makes substantial fruit our sound delight. | 630 |
| The evils, so miscall’d, that we endure | |
| Are wholsome medicines tending to our cure, | |
| Only disease to these aversion breeds, | |
| The healthy soul on them with due thanks feeds. | |
| If for a Prince, a Mistress, or a Friend, | 635 |
| Many do joy their bloods and lives to spend, | |
| Luk. 9.23,24. | Wealth, honour, ease, dangers and wounds despise, | |
| Should we not more to Gods will sacrifice? | |
| And by free gift prevent that else sure loss? | |
| Whate’re our will is, we must bear the cross, | 640 |
| Which freely taken up, the weight is less, | |
| And hurts not, carried on with chearfulness; | |
| Besides, what we can lose, are gliding streams, | |
| Psal. 90.5,6,9. | Light airy shadows, unsubstantial dreams, | |
| & 49.10–13. | Wherein we no propriety could have | 645 |
| But that which our own cheating fancy gave; | |
| Lu. 12.20. | The right of them was due to God alone, | |
| And when with thanks we render him his own, | |
| Either he gives us back our offerings, | |
| Job 1.21. | Or our submission pays with better things: | 650 |
| & 42.10–12. | Were ills as real as our fancies make, | |
| They soon must us, or we must them forsake; | |
| We cannot miss ease and vicissitude, | |
| Till our last rest our labours shall conclude. | |
| Natural tears there are, which in due bound | 655 |
| Do not the soul with sinful sorrow drown, | |
| 2 Cor. 7.10. | Repentant tears too are no fretting brine, | |
| But loves soft meltings, which the soul refine, | |
| Like gentle showers, that usher in the spring, | |
| These make the soul more fair and flourishing. | 660 |
| No murmuring winds of passions here prevail, | |
| But the life-breathing Spirits sweet fresh gale, | |
| Which by those fruitful drops all graces feeds, | |
| And draws rich extracts from the soaked seeds, | |
| But worldly sorrow, like rough winters storms, | 665 |
| All graces kills, all loveliness deforms, | |
| Augments the evils of our present state, | |
| And doth eternal woes anticipate. | |
| Vain is that grief which can no ill redress, | |
| But adds affliction to uneasiness; | 670 |
| Unnerving the souls powers, then, when they shou’d | |
| Most exercise their constant fortitude. | |
| With these most certain truths let’s wind up all, | |
| Whatever doth to mortal men befall | |
| Not casual is, like shafts at randome shot, | 675 |
| But Providence distributes every lot, | |
| In which th’ obedient and the meak rejoyce, | |
| Above their own preferring Gods wise choice: | |
| Nor is his providence less good than wise, | |
| Tho’ our gross sense pierce not its mysteries. | 680 |
| As there’s but one most true substantial good, | |
| And God himself is that Beatitude: | |
| So can we suffer but one real ill, | |
| Divorce from him by our repugnant will, | |
| Which when to just submission it returns, | 685 |
| The reunited soul no longer mourns, | |
| His serene rays dry up its former tears, | |
| Dispel the tempest of its carnal fears, | |
| Which dread what either never may arrive, | |
| Or not as seen in their false perspective; | 690 |
| For in the crystal mirror of Gods grace | |
| All things appear with a new lovely face. | |
| When that doth Heavens more glorious palace show | |
| We cease to’ admire a Paradise below, | |
| Rejoyce in that which lately was our loss, | 695 |
| And see a Crown made up of every Cross. | |
| Psa. 116.7. | Return, return, my soul to thy true rest, | |
| As young benighted birds unto their nest, | |
| There hide thy self under the wings of love | |
| Till the bright morning all thy clouds remove.
FINIS. | 700 |
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