Christ has ' brought us to his bnnqiicting-housc, and his banner over us has been love'? the city in wliich Christ has ' staid us with flagons, and comforted us with apples'? the city in which Christ's ' left hand hath been luider our heads, and his right hand hath embraced us ' ? Cant. ii. 3-6 ; the city wherein the Lord of hosts hath ' made unto his people a feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined ' ? Isa. xxv. 6. London, the city of our solemnities, is now laid desolate : and therefore for this why should not we be disconsolate, and mourn in secret before the Lord ? This frame of spirit hath been upon the people of God of old : Zeph. iii. 18, ' I will gather them that are sorrowful for the solemn assembly, who are of thee, to whom the reproach of it was a burden.' By ' solemn assemblies' are meant their several conventions, at those set times which God had appointed them, viz., on the weekly Sabbath, the new moons, the stated feasts and fasts, which they were bound to observe, Deut. xvi. Now for the want, the lack, the loss of those solemn assemblies, such as did truly fear the Lord were solemnly sorrowful. Of all losses,, spiritual losses are most sadly resented by gracious souls. When they had lost their houses, their estates, their trades, their relations, their liberties, and were led captive to Babylon, which was an iron furnace, a second Egypt to them, then the loss of their solemn assemblies made deeper impressions upon their hearts than all their outward losses did. The Jews w^re famous artists. They stand upon record for their skill, especially in poetry, mathe- matics, and music: but when their city was burnt, and their land laid desolate, and their solemn assemblies broken in pieces, then they could sing none of the songs of Zion, Ps. cxxxvii. 1-5 ; then they were more for mourning than for music, for sighing than for singing, for lament- ing than for laughing. Nothing goes so near gracious hearts as the loss of their solemn assemblies, as the loss of holy ordinances. Health, and wealth, and friends, and trade, are but mere Ichabods to the saints' solemn assemblies, and to pure ordinances. When the ark was taken, Eli could live no longer : but whether his heart or his neck was first broken upon that sad tidings, is not easy to determine, 1 Sam. iv. 17, 18. When Nehemiah understood that the walls of Jerusalem were broken down, and that the gates thereof were burnt with fire, and that the whole city was laid desolate by Nebuzar-adan and his Chaldean army, he sits down and weeps and mourns, and fasts and prays, 2 Kings xxv. 8-10 ; he did so lay the burning of the city of their solemnities to heart, that all the smiles of King Artaxerxes could not raise him nor rejoice him, Neh. i. 3, 4, and ii. It was on the tenth day of the fifth month that Jerusalem was burnt with fire ; and upon that account the Jews fasted upon every tenth day of the fifth month, Jer. Hi. 12-14. Now shall the Jews solemnly fast and mourn on the tenth day of the fifth month during their captivity, Zech. vii. 3, because their city and temple and solemn assemblies were on that day buried in ashes, and turned into a ruinous heap ; and shall not we fast and mourn to see the city of our solemnities buried in its own ruins ? But,
[10.] Tenthly and lastly, That {ncendiar)/, that mischievous villain Hubert, confessed the fact of f ring the frst house in Pudding Lane,
ISA. XLII, 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 163
though lie ivould not confess who set him at loork, and accordingly luas executed at Tyburn for it.^ Now who can look upon the dreadful consequences, the burning of a renowned city, that followed upon the firing of the first house, and not mourn over London's desolations ? Hubert did confess to several persons of note and repute that he was a Catholic ; and did further declare that he believed confession to a priest was necessary to his salvation. And being advised, by a chaplain to a person of honour, to call upon God, he repeated his A ve Mary, which he confessed was his usual prayer. Father Harvey confessed him, and instructed him, and we need not doubt but that he absolved him also, according to the custom cf the Romish Church. Hubert died in the profession of the Romish faith, stoutly asserting that he was no Hugonite.2 I know that men of the Romish religion, and such who are one in spirit with them, would make the world believe that this Hubert, who, by order of law, was executed upon the account of his own public and private confessions, was mad, distracted, and what not. But what madmen do these make the judge and jury to be ? for who but madmen would condemn to such a shameful death a madman, for confessing himself guilty of such a heinous and horrid fact, which he had never committed ? Doubtless both judge and jury were men of more wisdom,, justice, and conscience, than to hang a madman upon his own bare confession. The German histories tell us 3 what encouragement men of a Romish faith have had from Rome to make way for their religion throughout Germany, by fire and sword ; and when some of those incendiaries have been taken in setting houses on fire, they have confessed that there have been many more in combination with them, who, by all the ways they could, were to consume Silesia and other parts with firings. When the Spanish Armada came against this nation in 1588 with an invin- cible navy, as they counted it,, they had two thousand eight hundred and forty-three great ordnance, twenty-eight thousand eight hundred and forty mariners, soldiers,, and slaves^ rowing in galleys, with innumerable fire-balls and granadoes, in order to the making of Eng- land desolate by fire and sword.* Did not F. Parsons, Doleman, and Holt the Jesuit draw other incendiaries into a combination to fire the royal navy with wildfire in Queen Elizabeth's reign, for which they were stretched at Tyburn, a.d. 1595 ?5 On that very day when King James was crowned, when the generality of the people were intent upon that noble spectacle, five were suborned by the Jesuits to set London on fire in several places, but were frustrated, as is evident upon record.6 Mr Waddesworth did depose, both in writing and viva voce at the Lords' bar, that one Henry, alias Francis Smith, alias Lloyd, alias Rive4:'s, alias Simons, before the beginning of the Scotch wars, did tell him in Norfolk, where he met him, ' That the popish
^ There were some ministers, and several other sober prurient citizens, who did con- verse again and again with Hubert, and are ready to attest that he was far from being mad ; and that he was not only very rational, but also very cunning and subtle, and so the fitter instrument for the conclave of Kome, or some subtle Jesuit to make use of to bring about our common woe. It was never known that Rome or hell did ever make use of madmen or fools to bring about their devilish plots.