1. This is the best way to enter our protestation and dissent against the iniquity of the times. When we cannot help a thing, it is good to retract it, and commit it by tears to God ; for then it shall not be laid to our charge. When the Corinthians mourned for incest committed among them, and sorrowed with a godly sorrow, 2 Cor. vii. 13, 'Ye are verily clear in this matter,' many of them did not only not approve, but abhor that foul act before ; but they were not clear till they mourned, and purged the church from the imputation. So you are not clear till you have done this duty.
2. God may take occasion to punish you from their sins. We are all fuel fit for the burning. God's dispensation is not unrighteous as to you, but that may be the occasion : Zech. x, 3, ' My anger was kindled against the shepherds, and I punished the goats.' So Prov. xxviii. 2, ' For the transgression of a people ; many are the rulers thereof.' The people's sins may make great changes and alterations of government.
3. You are one body with them. Nations are one political body, churches one political body. In God's plea about Sodom with Abra- ham, ten righteous persons have an influence to save or ruin it. The sins of one generation may be the cause of another. It is said God turned not from the fierceness of his anger that was kindled against
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Judali, because of all the provocations that Manasseh had provoked him withal. Manasseh was dead thirty or forty years before. Manasseh had repented, and Josiah was a great reformer, none like him. You see God may punish their sins many years after ; nay, in the process of vengeance the whole lump is involved, as being one body. So all Israel were troubled for one Achan. Do not tax God's dispensation of severity and rigour, for it is the condescension and art of divine mercy by this means to prevent public ruin ; and you are involved in their portion, that every man in his place may study the prevention of sin and ruin. So churches are one lesser body ; one root of bitterness defileth many, Heb. xii. 15 ; not only by the con- tagion of the sin, but also by imputation of guilt. So at Corinth : 1 Cor. V. 6, ' A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump.' So also in households and families, which are one lesser body.
4. Many of their sins may be thine. It is a good prayer, though it be a harsh expression, to desire God to be delivered from other men's sins : Ab alieno libera me Domine. They ha.ve sinned the more because thou hast been wanting as a magistrate, as a minister, as a neighbour, a fellow-member, as a private Christian. As a magistrate : a negligent prince all the sin is put upon him. Eli was a high priest, and was a judge in that case ; and therefore, though he were innocent, God saith he would cut off his house for the iniquity of his sons : 1 Sam. iii. 17, ' Because his sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them not.' When magistrates suffer all things to run at random in religion, instead of God's ministers, they prove the devil's agents ; though they be holy for their persons, yet there is a great guilt lieth upon them. So for ministers : we are to watch as those that must give an account, Heb. xiii. 17;' I will require him at thy hands,' &c. He may be a good man, yet not a good minister, when he is not so diligent in inspection, so faithful to his trust, as he should be ; so frequent in exhortation, prayer, mourning, care of the flock : much hurt cometh by our connivance. So for private Christians, they are bound to watch over one another. It may be you do not look after them, Heb. iii. 13. You suffer hardness to grow upon them/ and would not warn them. Ye are witnesses from God to the people of Israel. You may be guilty of much evil example, and unwary carriage : Heb. xi. 7, ' By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, prepared an ark to the saving of his house ; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness that is by faith ; ' and Ezek. xvi. 51, 52, ' Thou hast justified thy sisters in all thine abominations which thou hast done. Thou also, which hast judged thy sisters, bear thine own shame, for thy sins that thou hast committed more abomin- able than they : they are more righteous than thou : yea, be thou con- founded also, and bear thy shame, in that thou hast justified thy sisters.' You either justify or condemn the world. So that in effect they may be your sins : you are sensual, vain. We easily catch a disease from one another, but do not get health. Nature is more susceptible of evil than of grace.
5. By seeing of their sins conscience may awaken, and thou mayest remember thy own ; as Pharaoh's butler said, ' I remember my faults this day.' Their lives are but a glass of the deformity of our natures.