I shall despatch the point in these considerations : —
1. That there is a righteous God who governeth the world. All things are not hurled up and down by chance, as if the benefit we receive were only a good hit, and the misery a mere misfortune. No ; all things are ordered by a powerful, wise, and just God ; his word doth not only discover this to us, but his works : Ps. Iviii. 11, 'So that a man shall say, Verily there is a reward for the righteous ; verily there is a God that judgeth the earth;' that is, many times there are such providences that all that behold them shall see, and say that godliness and holiness are matters of advantage and benefit in this world, abstracted from the rewards to come, and so an infallible evidence that the world is not governed by chance, but administered by an almighty, all-wise, and most just providence. So elsewhere: Ps. ix. 16, ' The Lord is known by the judgments which he executeth ;' by some eminent instances God showeth himself to be the j udge of the world, and keepeth a petty sessions before the day of general assizes. Upon this account the saints beg the Lord to take oft' the veil from his providence, and to appear in protecting and delivering his children, and punishing their adversaries : Ps. xciv, 1, 2, ' 0 thou judge of the oarth, show thyself.' He is the supreme governor of the world, to whom it belonaetli to do ridit.
VeR. 52.] SERMONS UPON rSA.LM C'XiX. 49
2. This righteous God hath made a hiw according to which he will j^'overn, and estabhshed it as the rule of commerce between him and his creatures. The precept is the rule of our duty, the sanction is the rule of his proceedings ; so that by this law we know what we must <lo, and what we may expect from him. Man is not made to be law- less and ungoverned, but hath a conscience of good anil evil, for with- out the knowledge of God's will we cannot obey him ; nor can we know his will, unless it be some way or other revealed. No man in his wits can expect that God should speak to us immediately and by oracle ; we cannot endure his voice, nor can we see him and live. Therefore he revealed his mind by the light of nature and by scripture, which givetli us a clearer and more perfect knowledge of his will. Certainly those that live under that dispensation must expect that God will deal with them according to the tenor of it. The apostle telleth us, Eom. ii. 12, ' As many as have sinned without the law, shall perish. without the law ; and as many as have sinned in the law, shall be judged by the law,' God hath been explicit and clear with them, to tell them what they should do and what they should expect.
3. In the course of his dispensations he hath showed from the beginning of the world unto this day that he is not unmindful of this law, that the observance of this rule bringeth suitable blessings, and the violation of it the threatened judgments: Eom. i. 18, ' The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteous- ness of men.' The impious and the unrighteous are breakers of either table, and the wrath of God is denounced and executed upon both, if there be any notorious violation of either; for in the day of God's patience he is not quick and severe upon the world : Heb. ii. 2, ' Every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense of reward ;' thereby his word is owned. Execution, we say, is the life of the law ; it is but words without it, and can neither be a ground of sufiicient hope in the promises, nor fear in the comminations. When punish- ments are inflicted it striketh a greater terror : when the offenders are punished, the observers rewarded, then it is a sure rule of commerce between us and God.
4. That the remembrance of the most illustrious examples of his justice, power, and goodness, should comfort us, though we do not perfectly feel the effects of his righteous government.
[1.] 1 will prove we are apt to suspect God's righteous administra- tion when we see not the effects of it. When the godly are oppressed with divers calamities, and the wicked live a life of pomp and ease, flourishing in prosperity and power, according to their own heart's desire, they are apt to think that God taketh no care of worldly affairs, or were indifferent to good and evil, as those profane atheists, Mai, ii. 17, ' Every one that doth evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and he delighteth in him, or where is the God of judgment? ' as if God took pleasure in wicked men, and were no impartial judge, or had no provi- dence at all, or hand in the government of the world. Tem])tations to atliei.-iui begin ordinarily at the matter of God's providence. First men carve out a providence of their own, that God loveth none but w4iom he dealeth kindly with in the matters of the world ; and if his dispensations be cross to their apprehensions, then his providence is