sore afflictions and sad sufferings that he brings upon them. Of such the prophet Isaiah complains, chap. xxvi. 11, ' Lord, when thy hand is lifted up, they will not see.' The hand, the power of the Lord was so remarkable and conspicuous in the judgments that were inflicted upon them, as might very well wring an acknowledgment out of them that it was the Lord that had stirred his wrath and indignation against them ; and yet they wilfully and desperately shut their eyes against all the severities of God, and would not behold that dreadful hand of his that was stretched out against them. 0 sirs, God looks upon himself as reproached and slandered by such who will not see his hand in the amazing judgments that he inflicts upon them : Jer. v. 12, ' They have belied the liord, and said. It is not he' — or, as the Hebrew runs, 'he is not.' Such was the atheism of the Jews, that they slighted divine warnings, and despised all those dreadful threatenings of the sword, famine, and fire, which should have led them to repentance, and so tacitly said, The Lord is not God. Such who either say, that God is not omniscient, or that he is not omnipotent, or that he is not so just as to execute the judgments that he has threatened ; such belie the Lord, such deny him to be God. Many feel the rod, that cannot hear it ; and many experience the smart of the rod, that/lo not see the hand that holds the rod ; and this is sad. How can the natural man, with- out faith's prospective, look so high as to see the hand of the Lord in wasting and destroying judgments? By common experience we find that natural men are mightily apt to father the evil of all their suf- ferings upon secondary causes. Sometimes they cry out. This is from a distemper in nature; and at other times they cry out, This is from a bad air. Sometimes they cry out of the malice, plots, envy, and rage of men ; and at other times they cry out of stars, chance, and fortune, and so fix upon anything rather than the hand of God, But now a gracious Christian under all his sufferings, he overlooks all secondary causes, and fixes his eye upon the hand of God. You know what Joseph said to his unnatural brethren, who sold him for a slave : Noii vos, sed Deus: ' It was not you, but God that sent me into Egypt,' Gen. xlv. 7. Job met with many sore losses and sad crosses, but under them all he overlooked all instruments, all secondary causes ; he over- looks the Sabeans, and the Chaldeans, and Satan, and fixes his eje upon the hand of God : ' The Lord hath given, and the Lord hath taken away ; blessed be the name of the Lord,' Job i. 21. Judas, and Annas, and Caiaphas, and Pilate, and Herod, and the bloody soldiers, had all a deep hand in the sufferings of Christ, but yet he overlooks them all, and fixes his eye upon his Father's hand. ' The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it,' John xviii. 11. This cup was the cup of his sufferings. Now in all his sad sufterings he had still an eye to his Father's hand. Let us in all our sufferings write after this copy that Christ has set before us. But of this I have spoken very largely already, and therefore let this touch suffice here,
2. Secondly, Labour to justify the Lord in cdl that he has done; say^ the Lord is righteous, though he hath laid your city desolate. When Jerusalem was laid desolate, and the wall thereof broken down, and the gates thereof were burned with fire, Nehemiah justifies the Lord : chap. ix. 33, ' Howbeit thou art just in all that is brought upon us;
218 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.
for tliou hast done rit^lit, but we have done wickedly.' i The same spirit was upon Jeremiah: Lam. i. 1, 4, 18, 'How doth the city sit soHtary that was full of people ! how is she become as a widow ! she that was great among the nations, and princess among the pro- vinces, how is she become tributary ! The ways of Zion do mourn, because none come to the solemn feasts: all her gates are desolate ; her priests sigh, her virgins are afflicted, and she is in bitterness. The Lord is righteous ; for I have rebelled against his commandment.' The same spirit was upon David : Ps. cxix. 75, ' I know, 0 Lord, that thy judgments are right, and that thou in faithfulness hast afflicted me.' So Ps. cxlv. 17, ' The Lord is righteous in all his ways, and holy in all his works.' This maxim we must live and die by, though we do not always see the reason of his proceedings. It is granted on all hands that voluntas Dei est summa, perfcctissima, et infalUbilis regula divime justitice, et Deus sibi ipsi lex est, The will of God is the chiefest, the most perfect and infallible rule of divine justice, and that God is a judged to himself: ' Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?' Gen. xviii. 25. In this negative question is emphatically im- plied an affirmative jiosition, which is, that God, above all others, must and will do right ; because from his judgment there is no appeal, Abraham, considering the nature and justice of God, was confidently assured that God could not do otherwise but right. Hath God turned you out of house and home, and marred all your pleasant things, and stripped you naked as the day wherein you were l^orn ? Yes. Why, if he hath, he hath done you no wrong ; he can do you no wrong ; he is a law to himself, and his righteous will is the rule of all justice. God can as soon cease to be as he can cease to do that which is just and right. So Ps. xcvii. 2, ' Clouds and darkness are round about him ; righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his throne,' Clouds and darkness notes the terribleness of God's administrations. Though God be very terrible in his administrations, yet righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his throne. It hath been a day of God's wrath in London, a day of trouble and distress, a daj^ of wast- ing and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness, as it was once in Jerusalem, Zeph. i. 15 ; yet righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his throne ; or, as it may be translated, ai'e ' the foundation of his throne.' God's seat of judgment is always founded in righteousness. So Dan. ix. 12, 'And he hath confirmed his words which he spake against us, and against our judges that judged us, by bringing upon us a great evil : for under the whole heaven hath not been done as hath been done upon Jerusalem;' ver. 14, ' The Lord our God is righteous in all his works which he doeth ; for we obeyed not his voice.' God is only righteous, he is per- fectly righteous, he is exemplarily righteous, he is everlastingly right- eous, he is infinitely righteous, and no unrighteousness dwells in him, Ps. xcii. 15 ; Job xxxvi. 23. There are four things that God cannot do: (1.) He cannot lie; (2.) He cannot die; (3.) He cannot deny