Iffues of thy Folly, and Inconfiderate Adventure, than true Affliction.

But for meddling with Places of Magiftracy, Honour, or Pub. lick Imployment, I would not have it thought that it is my intention that Good Men, lawfully called, and duly qualified, fhould morofely or frowardly wholly rejec their due call unto them. The World cannot be kept in order without Magiftracy: and Good Men, if otherwife fitted for it, and duly called unto it, are likely to Administer it beft for the Publick Good of Mankind: and it were an unreasonable thing for them to expect the benefits of Magiftracy and Government from others, when under fuch circumftances they wilfully decline the communion of the like advantage to others: and therefore the wifeft Kingdoms, States and Politicians have impofed a neceffity upon Men of honefty and abilities to take upon them Publick Imployments: Ariftot. 2. Politicorum, although he condemns Ambition after Magiftracy, [that Men fhould be incouraged or permitted to ftand or folicit for places] Nemo enim Magiftratum petet, nifi Honoris fis affectator, atque pleraque eorum quæ bomines injuftè faciunt, per Ambitionem & Avaritiam committuntur: yet tell us, Oportet enim & volentem & non volentem ad Magiftratum affumere, fi dignus fit eo Magiftratu. That therefore which I mean, is, I. That Men that love their own Peace and Tranquility fhould not feek great Imployments. 2. That if they are offered, they do, as far as confifts with modefty and duty to their Superiors and Country, decline and avoid them. 3. That if upon fuch an account they are perfuaded to undertake them, yet they be fure that before they undertake them, they have fufficient abilities to perform them. 4. If by the Command of the Soveraign Power they are required to undergo them, and are able and fit for the Imployment, they do not either frowardly or ungrateful refufe them: For, 1. Herein they are but Paffive; it is an act of their Submiffion and Duty, not of their Choice. 2. Being thus called to it, if they meet with any rubs in their way, they have no reafon to blame themselves

fo

fo long as they obferve their Duty in the exercise thereof: The Prince that injoyned them to this Province, is to be their fupport in it. 5. Readily and Chearfully to entertain a difiniffion from it when it pleaseth the Prince to call them from it, or when by reason of difabling occurrences they may fairly attain fuch difmiffion.

III. And thus I have done with fome of thofe principal Confiderations touching our Deportment under Afflions; now concerning the frame and temper of a Soul under our Deliverance from them.

1. Accept of thy deliverance with all Thankfulness to God, and Humility in thy felf. Attribute it wholly to his Goodness and Mercy; Think not that thou art delivered because of thy Worth or Defert; for any one fin that ever thou committeft would detain thee everlastingly under the fevereft Affliction: Think not thy Affliction hath expiated thy Demerit, and that thou oweft thy Deliverance to the fatisfaction that is made by thy fuffering; for most certainly the greatest Affliction under Heaven cannot fatisfie for the leaft Trangreffion; nothing but the Blood of the Son of God can countervail the weight of the least Sin against God: Think not that thy Deliverance is due to thy Wit, Friends, or Interest ; for though God be pleased to use the intervention of Means, yet he adminiftred that Means, and blessed that Means, and made it effectual, or otherwise it would have been but a flat and unprofitable Means. As God fends Afflictions to evidence his Power, and Wisdom, and Soveraignty, so he fends Deliverance to manifest his Goodnefs and Bounty: and the Tribute that he most juftly expects for the fame, is but eafie and reasonable: Call upon me in the day of trouble, and I will deliver thee, and thou halt glorify me, Pfal. 50. 15.

2. Forget not the time of thy Trouble, and the promifes and ingagements that thou didst then make. We obferved in the beginning of this Difcourfe, the difficulty of pre-apprehenfion of Adverfity before it comes; and truly it is almoft as hard to think of Adversity when it is paft; we

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please our selves with what we enjoy, and never reflect upon what is paft, unless it be to heighten and advance our prefent enjoyments: and if we do chance to think upon the serious refolutions we then entertained, we look upon them as the weak refults of our Infirmity, ufeful indeed for that time, but now antiquated and grown unfeasonable.

3. Not only call to mind thy Promises, but call them to mind with a Refolution to obferve and perform them, in fuch expoftulations as thefe; Alas! the time was when I was under great Afflictions, it may be of a painful and defperate fickness, and then I refolved, if God would reftore my health, I would walk more strictly with him; I would pray more frequently, and more conftantly, and more fervently than formerly; I would be more diligent to make even my Accounts with him, to make fure my Calling and Election, for which I found the time of my Sickness was very unfeafonable; I would redeem my precious Time, and value thofe Minutes of Life, that God fhall lend me, at a dearer rate than formerly; I would neglect no opportunity of doing Good to others, or improving my Everlasting Peace; how precious then was one hour of repose, and quietness, and freedom from pain? and how much fhould I then have valued it? and how induftriously should I then have improved it in the great concerns of my Everlasting Soul; God bath now heard my Prayers, restored my Health, put that precious Opportunity into my bands of performing my Vows and Promifes, which I then made in the fadness of my Soul, and Shall I deal falfly in my Covenant, difappointing my God that bath delivered me? No, I will up and be doing; I will perform all my Vows to him: nay, the fenfe of the Mercy and Ċondefcention of God to my requests fhall increase my Ingagements before him; As he bath added Mercy to me, so I will add new Obligations to my self of better Obedience, and farther Duties than the fenfe of my Mifery could fuggeft unto me, or draw from me.

4. Be very watchful over thy Self, and remember thy Saviour's Counsel, Go away and Sin no more, left a worse thing befall thee: and in a fpecial manner recollect and call to mind thofe Sins that did moft trouble and dif

quiet thee in the time of thy Adverfity; renew thy Repentance for them, and take a special care to avoid Relapfes into them; Remember the mischiefs they then did thee, and let them know they fhall do thee no more: be moft severe and ftrict against them.

5. Make a frequent Use of thy Deliverance as a fingular Prefervative against the Power of thy Temptations and Corruptions. Deliverance carries in the very apprehenfion of it these two things: 1. A fuppofition of a former Mifery or Vifitation: 2. A prefent injoyment of a freedom from that Mifery. Therefore if any Corruption or Temptation unto Sin, follicit thee, improve this confideration to this, or the like effect: I was lately under the Rack, under the Rod, under extream Want, Imprisonment, Difgrace, Loffes, Sickness, Sorrows, Fears, and an imminent expectation of the worst of Evils; and though these were fore and Sharp Afflictions, yet the fenfe of my former Sins, and the importunate restlessness of that Guilt that was contracted from them, were more bitter and tormenting than all the rest of my fufferings; it was that which was the fting and venom of all my Afflictions; and it hath pleafed Almighty God to accept of my Humiliation, and to remove my Afflictions, and to give me beauty for afhes, and shall I be fo very a fool as by committing of a new Sin to run the hazard of another plunge, another Scourge? which in all probability must be much more fevere than the former, because it would be the fue not only of Sin, but of Prefumption; a Sin committed against the experience that I bave had of the bitterness of Sin; and with what face or hope could I expect any poffibility of Deliverance from a fecond Relapse into Mifery, occafioned by fo Defperate a presumptuous relapfe into Sin? But fuppofe it were poffible, that notwithstanding my yielding to this Temptation, I might efcape the Vengeance, yet can I be fo falfe, fo ungrateful to that God, that hath delivered me from my Sufferings and from my Fears, as to recompcnce his Love, and Mercy, and Goodness, with a presumptuous Apoftacy from him? fhall I thus requite his Mercy, and Goodness, that heard me in my Anguish and Sadness of Soul, in my Extremity and Mifery, and fo beard me that he bath delivered me out of all my Troubles and Miferies? Certainly if either common

Pru

Prudence, or common Ingenuity be left in a Man, the fenfe of a former Calamity, and the fenfe of fo great a Mercy, will make a Man abhor the leaft fubmiffion to that Temptation that may at once hazard the continuance of his prefent Comfort, and cannot be entertained without the Prefumptuous Rejection of him that thus mercifully fent Deliverance.

6. Let the remembrance of thy Mifery, and thy prefent Mercy, make thee most jealously and paffionately careful to keep thy Intereft, and (if it be not too bold a word) thy Friendship with God. Remember he was thy support in thy Affliction, and he was thy Deliverer out of thy Affliction; let Gratitude bind thee to it, as he was thy Benefactor; and let Prudence bind thee to it, thou knoweft not how foon thou mayft have the fame neceffity again, and where canft thou find fuch a friend? The truth is, when we are in extremity, and have no whither elfe to fly, O then we run to God, and we pray unto him, and promife him fair: but when once our turn is ferved, and we have gotten our ends, and think our felves out of Gunfhot, we are like Mariners after a Storm, and God hears no more of us: but this is, as extream Ingratitude, fo, extream Folly. Oh keep thy God thy Friend! for moft certain it is, thou wilt have occasion to use him again, and thou knoweft not how foon: keep thine intereft in him, and eftrange not thy felf from him in thy Recovery, whom thou canst not be without in thy Afflictions.

7. As I would have thee recollect what were the things in thy life past, that most troubled thee in thy Affliction, that fo thou may'ft avoid them; fo think what things or practices, or expence of time in thy life past was most Acceptable and Comfortable to thee in thy Affliction, that fo thou may'ft practise them after thy reftitution. Confider,whether in thy Affliction thou didst remember thy paft Recreations, thy Merriment, thy Feaftings, thy Luft, thy Honours, thy Greatness, with any Comfort or Contentment; or whether the remembrance of the Hours thou haft formerly Spent in Prayer, Reading the Scriptures, Hearing Ser

mons,