5. My last is this, — That after God hath, by so many ways and so many means, declared unto us his displeasure against our sin, having declared the sentence in his word, yet he hath visibly granted an arrest of judgment. " The sentence shall not be put in txecution," saith God, " while I give this people a time, and space, and season of repentance and reformation." Alas! if God had utterly forsaken us, he would have taken us off in the midst of our security ; evil would have risen, and we should have known the morning of it ; destruction would presently have overtaken us. But now God hath given us va- rious calls, various warnings, and leaves us a space, as yet, to see what we will do, and what will become of us. " I will give them a trial," saith God; " the decree shall not yet go forth, — judgment shall not yet come forth to execution ; I will give them a space for repentance." And this consideration hath a double corroboration of this blessed space and season God hath given us, for to apply ourselves so far to his call as to remove his judgments that are impending over us.
FOR ENGLISH PROTESTANTS. 15
(1.) The first is, that he hath reserved a remnant among us that do make use of this space and season to apply themselves unto the throne of grace, and to cry mightily for mercy. God hath not taken his Holy Spirit from us. God hath not said, by any open work or secret intimation of providence, " Pray no more for this people ; my heart shall not be toward them." He hath not said so ; and, there- fore, there are yet among us precious souls who do lift up prayers to God night and day, not only for themselves and families, not only for the church of God, but for this poor land of our nativity, that, if it were the will of God, we may not see it soaked in blood ; — that God would not come forth to destroy it with a curse ; — that God would pity, and spare, and have mercy upon it; — that he would not make it an "Aceldama," — a field of blood. There are many cries to God to this purpose. So that there are some by whom this space and season God hath given us is made use of.
(2.) It hath strength from this, that there is an invitation and encouragement given to the whole nation to join together in their cries to God this day for the same end and purpose. I confess to you (give me leave to speak it), I am afraid the body of the nation, considering then conduct in this sort of duty, will make no great work of it, towards the averting of judgments in such a day as this is. And I am afraid, also, that the approaching carnival, or time of feast- ing, will quickly blot out all impressions that ought to be in the minds of men from such a day as this is. This is all I can say, — God is pub- licly acknowledged; and what influence that may have in a farther suspension of judgment, till the nation be better prepared to seek unto him, I know not.
Me thinks these are evidences (to me they are) that England is not yet utterly forsaken of the Lord its God : — The miraculous discovery of the plot for our destruction; — the pursuit of it by some of our rulers, and the body of the nation;— the embroilment of foreign nations in their own concerns; — the preservation of the political inte- rest and body, when all the ligaments of law, and love, and trust were dissolved ; — the space and season that God gives us (that we are not immediately hurried into blood and confusion), attended with a spirit of prayer in some of God's own people, and with a public acknow- ledgment of God in this day in the nation.
III. I should now proceed to my last thing, — to show you, that in this state, wherein a land is so filled with sin as absolutely to put the determination of all things into the hand of sovereignty, and where yet there remains some evidences that God hath not utterly forsaken us, what is required of us, what is expected from us, that may be a means to turn away the wrath and displeasure of God from this poor land and nation.
16 SEASONABLE WORDS FOR ENGLISH PROTESTANTS.
I should have spoken to the following things: —
1. That whatsoever be the language of God's calls, unless there be a general compliance with them, this land cannot be saved.
2. I should have shown you, that all the diligence, and the courage, and the watchfulness of the rulers, shall not be able to preserve us from that destruction which we have deserved ;— unless something else be done ere long, their hearts will faint, and their hands fail, and their thoughts be divided. For that alone will not do.
o. Prayer will not do in this case; though that be necessary and required, it will not do it. God doth not cry to us merely that we should cry to him. " Why criest thou?" said God to Joshua; " there is an accursed thing. Why dost thou lie upon thy face, and cry, and pray, when judgment is coming upon you? There is an accursed thing got among you." It is so with us.