14: They took counsel against me, but I trusted in thee. And upon this, he prays in faith, that the face of God may shine upon him, and the wicked may be ashamed.

Thus, then, as many as are looking after a day of mercy to the church of God, pray and believe upon this ground, that the time of it is neither in the frail hands of those that favour and seek it, nor in the hands of those that oppose it, how strong and subtile soever they be, but in that Almighty hand that doth in heaven and earth what pleaseth him. If he have said, Now, and here, will I give a day of refreshment to my people that have long groaned for it, a day of the purity and power of religion; if, I say, this be his purpose, they must have somewhat more than omnipotence that can hinder it. When his appointed time comes, to make a day of deliverance dawn upon his church, after their long night, either of affliction or of defection, or both; they that contrive against that day-spring, are as vain as if they would sit down to plot how to hinder the sun from rising in the morning. And they that let go their hopes of it, because of great apparent difficulties that interpose betwixt their eye and the accomplishment of that work, they are as weak as if they should imagine, when mists and thick vapours appear about the horizon in the morning, that these could hinder the rising of the sun, which is so far out of their reach, and comes forth as a bridegroom, and rejoices as a mighty man to run his race, says David. Those mists may, indeed, hinder his clear appearance, and keep it from the eye for a time; but reason tells us, even then, that they cannot stop his course. And faith assures us no less in the other, that no difficulties can hold back God's day and work of mercy to his people. But you will say, "All the difficulty is to know whether the appointed time be near or not." It is true we have no particular prophecies to assure us; but certainly when God awakes his children and makes them rise, this is a probable sign that it is near day.

I mean, when he stirs them up to more than usual hopes, and prayers, and endeavours, it is very likely that he intends them some special good; but yet more, when he himself is arisen, (as it pleaseth him to speak,) that is, when he is begun to appear, in a more than ordinary manner of working by singular and wonderful footsteps of Providence. This is, no doubt, a sign that he will go on to shew remarkable mercy to Zion, and that the time to favour her, yea, the set time is come, Psalm cii. 13.

Howsoever, then, let the wonderful workings of the Lord move those of you that have any power and opportunity, to be now (if ever) active, for the greatest good, both of the present age and of posterity. And you that can be no other way useful, yet you shall be no small helpers if you be much in prayer; let both your hopes and your fears serve to sharpen your prayers. Be not too much dejected with any discouragement, neither be ye carnally lifted up with outward appearances; for the heart of him that is lifted up is not upright in him, Hab. ii. 4; but live, as the just do, by your faith and if the deferring of your hopes should sicken your hearts, as Solomon speaks, yet stay and comfort them with the cordial of the promises. This you are sure of, you have God's own word engaged for it, that in those latter days Babylon shall be brought to the dust, and the true church of Christ shall flourish and increase: And this vision is for an appointed time (as Habakkuk says of his); at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; it will surely come, it will not tarry. Hab. ii. 3.

In that day. In the day of Ephraim's or Israel's calamity, denounced in the former verses, which, as most do conceive, was when the Assyrian oppressed them, and in the end led them captive, in the reign of Hoshea, as you have the history of it, 2 Kings xvii.; at which time Hezekiah was king of Judah, as you find in the following chapter; and in that notable reformation wrought by him, with those blessings that followed upon it, is found the accomplishment of this

promise to Judah, In that day, &c. The parallel of God's different dealing with these two kingdoms, at the time there specified, (In that day,) does afford divers lessons, which might be here not impertinently taken notice of. Only this,

Though Judah also had its own corruptions when Hezekiah came to the crown, yet it pleased the Lord to spare them, and work a peaceable reformation, making Israel's punishment their warning. Truly that nation, with whom the Lord deals thus graciously, is vilely ingrate if they observe it not with much humility and thankfulness, and with profit too. If the Lord should answer your desires and hopes with a reformation in a peaceable way, and should yet lengthen out your long-continued peace, and should make this little past shaking of it cause it to take root the faster; if he should, I say, do this, where would ye find fit praises for such a wonder of mercy; especially considering, that in the meanwhile he hath made other reformed churches fields of blood, and made, as it were, the sound of their stripes preach repentance to us? But certainly, if the hearing the voice of the rod prevail not, we shall feel the smart of it, as this people of Judah did afterwards, because they were not so wise as to become wiser and better by Israel's folly and calamity. We are expecting great things at our Lord's hands, and our provocations and sins against him are great; yet there is none of them all puts us in so much danger of disappointment as impenitence. Were there more repentance and personal reformation amongst us, we might take it as a hopeful forerunner of that public reformation which so many seem now to desire.

The Lord of hosts. This style of his, you know, is frequently in the prophets, in their predictions of mercy and judgment; intimating both his greatness and majesty, and his supreme power for accomplishing his word. No created power can resist him; yea, all must serve him. The most excellent creatures can have no greater honour; the greatest are not ex

empted, nor the meanest excluded from serving him. In Acts xii. 23, you find one of the noblest creatures, and a number of the vilest, made use of at the same time in the same service. Because Herod did accept of the sacrilege of the people, and gave not back to this Lord of hosts his own glory, the angel of the Lord smote him, and the vermin devoured him. And in Egypt, you know, the employing of the destroying angel, and what variety of hosts this Lord of hosts did employ to plague them. What madness then, is it to oppose and encounter this great general; even in doubtful cases, to run on blindly, without examining, lest peradventure a man should be found a fighter against God! And on the other side, it is a great weakness to admit any fear under his banner. If a man could say, when he was told of the multitude of the ships the enemy had, Against how many do ye reckon me? How much more justly may we reckon this Lord of hosts, against multitudes of enemies, how great soever! They are to him as the drop of a bucket, and the smallest dust of the balance. It is ignorance and mean thoughts of this mighty Lord that makes his enemies so confident; and it is the same evil, in some degree, or, at the best, forgetfulness of his power, that causeth diffidence in his followers. Isa. li. 12, 13. Now, the same Lord of hosts, you know, is likewise called the God of peace; he is indeed, et pace et bello insignis, splendid both in peace and war. The blessing of peace and the success of war are both from him; and to him alone is due the praise of both.

Shall be a crown, &c. He shall dignify and adorn them by his special presence; to wit, in the purity of his ordinances and religion amongst them; the profession and flourishing of that shall be their special glory and beauty; for as the other two benefits concern their civil good, justice flourishing within, and wealth and opulency from without, so doubtless this first, this glory and beauty, is religion, as the chiefest of the three, and the other two are its attendants. In

Psalm xxvi. 8, the sanctuary, the place of their solemn worship, is called the place where God's honour dwelleth, or the tabernacle of his honour; and Psalm xcvi. 9," the glorious sanctuary," or "the beauty of holiness." And the ark of God, you know, was called the glory. The glory is departed from Israel, (said the wife of Phineas,) for the ark of God is taken. Pure religion, and a pure worship, is the glory of God amongst his people, and consequently, their glory. Now, referring this prophecy to Hezekiah's time, the accomplishment of it is evident in that work of reformation, whereof you have the full history, 2 Chron. xxix. 30, 31, &c.

If it be thus, that the purity of religion and worship is the crown and glory of a people; and therefore, on the other side, that their deepest stain of dishonour and vileness, is the vitiating of religion with human devices; then, to contend for the preservation or the reformation of it, is noble and worthy of a Christian. It is for the crown of Jesus Christ, which is likewise a crown of glory and diadem of beauty to them, he being their head. It is, indeed, the true glory both of kings and their kingdoms. Labour, then, for constancy in this work; let no man take your crown from you. You know how busy the emissaries of the Church of Rome have been to take it from us, or, at least, to pick the diamonds out of it, and put in false, counterfeit ones in their places; I mean, they stole away the power of religion, and filled up the room. with shadows and fopperies of their own devising. It is the vanity of that church to think they adorn the worship of God when they dress it up with splendour in her service, which, though some magnify so much, yet may most truly be called a glistering slavery and captivity. Then is she truly free and wears her crown, when the ordinances of God are conformable to his own appointment. It is vanity in men, I say, when they dress it up with a multitude of gaudy ceremonies, and make it the smallest part of itself, whereas, indeed, its true glory consists not in pomp,