THE TJNPEOSPEKOUS BUILDEE.
VOL. VII.
THE UNPROSPEROUS BUILDER.
NOTE.
' The Unprosperous Builder ' is another of the sermons from ' Evangelical Sacrifices' (4to, 1640). Its separate title-page is given below.* G.
* THE VNPEOSPEROVS BVILDER.
A Sermon preached upon the 5"' of
November, in remembrance of Our
Deliverance from the Papists
Powder- Treason.
BY
The late Learned and Reverend Divine,
Rich. Siebs:
Doctor in Divinity, M^. of Katheeine Hall
in Cambridge, and sometimes Preacher
to the Honourable Society of
Geayes-Inne.
Hab. 2. 12. Woe to him that huildeth a Towne with blood, and estahlisheth a Citie by Iniquity.
LONDON,
Printed by T. B. for N. Bourne, at the Royall Exchange,
and R. Harford, at the guilt Bible in Queenes-head
Alley in Pater-noster-Row. 1639.
THE UNPROSPEROUS BUILDER.
Cursed he the man before the Lord that riseth up and builds this city Jericho: he shall lay the foundation of it in his first-born, and in his youngest son set up the gates thereof. — Joshua VI. 26.*
The words are a terrible denunciation of a curse of the man of God Joshua ; wherein you have the curse generally set down — ' Cursed be the man before the Lord that riseth to build this city Jericho ' — and then a specification in particular, wherein the curse stands. The two branches of the curse are these, ' He shall lay the foundation of it in his first-born, and in his youngest son set up the gates thereof.' It shall be with the raising! O'^t of ^is posterity. So that the test is nothing else but a terrible denunciation, under a curse, of the destruction of the family of that person that should labour to build up Jericho again. I will not speak much of cursing or blessing, being not pertinent to my purpose, only to give a touch of it. As in blessing there are three things considerable, that come near one another, — there is a blessing, a prayer, and a prophecy : the prayer is for a blessing to come; the prophecy is of the certainty of it, that it shall be ; the blessing is an efficacious application of the thing to the person ; I mean those three, because the one gives light to the other, — so is it likewise in cursing : there is a prayer that God would pour forth his vengeance upon the enemies of the church, and a prophetical predic- tion that God will do it ; and a cursing, when it comes from a qualified person, that is led by a better spirit than his own ; for every one is not fit to cast these bolts. Cursing is an efficacious application of the curse to the person ; when a man is, as it were, the declarative instrument whereby God works and brings the curse upon the person. So that we must account a curse to be a wondrous deep thing. The persons qualified for cursing or blessing, they are parents, either politic, as magistrates, or parents natural, to curse or bless their children, as we see in Noah, — * Cursed be Ham,' &c.. Gen. is. 25, — or else parents spiritual, whose office it is indeed especially to bless or curse. It is a greater matter than the world takes it for, a blessing or a curse, especially from a spiritual father. The apostles, that were spiritual fathers of the church, they began their epistles with blessings ; and so the prophets and patriarchs.
Therefore we should regard the blessing that God gives by his ministers. * Misprinted '10.'— G. t Qu. 'razing?'— Ed.
20 THE UNPROSPEROUS BUILDER.
Some arc ready to run out before the blessing, as not esteeming either blessing or curse. Luther, a man of great parts and grace, saith of him- self, ' That if a man of God should speak anything terrible to him, and denounce anything against him, he knew not how to bear it, it would be BO terrible' (a). The Jesuits themselves, amongst the rest one De Lapide, he saith, ' The priest cannot sooner come into the pulpit, but if there be a nobleman there, down he falls, and all look for the blessing of the priest' (h). The devil is always in extremes, either to drive people to supersti- tion, or else to profaneness and atheism ; either to regard the blessing of those whom they should not regard, or not to regard any blessing at all ; not to regard that good men should pray for them or their children. If the devil can bring men to hell by either extremes, he hath his will. As for the blessing of Rome, we expect it not; and for their curse, we need care no more for it than an armed man needs to care for a headless arrow or for a child's pop-gun.* But those men that come in the name of God, and are qualified with callings to pray and to bless, their prayers and blessings are highly to be esteemed; and so likewise their curses. I would it were more esteemed; it would be a means to convey God's blessing more than it is.
' Cursed be the man before the Lord.'
Take this caution by the way : though Joshua were a man of God, he was a mixed person; he was both a magistrate and, in some sort, a minister. As we say of kings, they are mixed persons, they are keepers of both tables : custodes utrinsque tabula;. There is more in the supreme magistrate than is common. Every one must not take upon him to curse upon every motion of the flesh ; for here it is not, as one of the ancients saith well, ' the wrath of a man in commotion and fury, but the sentence of a man in a peaceable temper, who is the conveyer of God's curse' (c). It is passive here as well as active.