liverance, how distant soever it seems from us, rather than attempt to deliver ourselves by any means not agreeable to his precise pleasure. Neither can there be so stupid a reliance upon a miracle, as that God should suffer us to preserve or redeem ourselves by ill and crooked arts, and contribute his blessings upon such a preservation; which would be more miraculous, than what seems to them most wonderful. There cannot be a more mischievous position, than that we should be always doing, always endeavouring to help ourselves. He that hath lost his way in a dark night, and all the marks by which he should guide himself, and know. whether he be in the way or not, cannot do so wisely as to sit still till the morning; especially if he travel upon such uneven ground and precipices, that the least mistake in footing may prove fatal to him: and it will be the same in our other journey; if we are be-nighted in our understandings, and so no path to tread in but where thorns and briars and snakes are in our way and where the least deviation from the right track will lead us into labyrinths, from whence we cannot be safely disentangled, it will become us, how bleak and stormy soever the night is, how grievous and pressing soever our adversity is, to have patience till the light appears, that we may have a full prospect of our way, and of all that lies in our way. If the ma lice and power of enemies oppress us, and drive us to those exigents, that there appears to us no expedient to avoid utter ruin, but submitting and concurring with their wickedness, we ought to believe that either God will convert their hearts, or find some other as extraordinary way to deliver us; and if he does not, that then our ruin is necessary, and that he will make it more happy to us than our deliverance would be. We have no such liberty left us to choose one evil, under pretence that we avoid a greater by so doing. It may be a good rule in matter of damage and inconvenience; but that which in itself is simply evil, must not be consented to under any extenuation or excuse; and the project of doing good, or redeeming the ill we have done, by such concessions, is more vain, more unjustifiable. We are so far from any warrant for those undertakings, that we have an infallible text, "That we are not to do evil that good may come of it;" we ought not to presume that God will give us time and opportunity to do it, and then the intention of doing well will be no good excuse for the ill we have actually committed; neither have we reason to be confident that we shall have the will to do it, if we have the opportunity; since every transgression, so deliberated and resolved on, leaves the mind vitiated and less inclined to good; and there is such a bashfulness naturally attends on guilt, that we have not afterwards the same alacrity to do well, and grow ashamed and afraid of that conversation, without which it will not be possible for us to do that good. It will be said, our not concurring in this particular act, may ruin us, but not hinder the act from being done; and therefore that it is too vain an affectation of our ruin to oppose that so fruitlessly and this consideration and objection, I fear, hath prevailed over too many to submit to that which they have long opposed, as not agreeable to their understandings and conscience; that they have done their parts, opposed it as long as they were able; that it shall be done whether they will or no; and that it is only in their power to perish with what they would preserve, but not to preserve it by perishing; and therefore, that they may for their own preservation join in the doing that, or consenting to it, which will be done in spite of any resistance they can make. This is said in the business of the church: it is : actually oppressed; the government of it actually and remedilessly altered; nothing that I can say or do can preserve it; and that the question is not, whether I would desire to preserve both church and kingdom, but whether, when there can be one, and but one preserved, I will lose that because I cannot keep both. But these arguments cannot prevail with a conscience informed and guided aright. If my religion oblige me to do my duty no longer than conveniently I might, and that when wants and necessities and dangers pressed upon me, I might recede and yield to what I believe wicked or unlawful, I had no more to do, but to make that necessity and danger evident to the world for my excuse. But no union and consent in wickedness can make my guilt the less; and if nothing I can do can preserve the church, it is in my power to preserve my own innocence, and to have no hand in its destruction; and I ought to value that innocence above all the conveniences and benefits my submission can bring to me. And I must confess, I want logic to prove to myself, that it may be lawful for me to do that to recover or redeem my fortune, which was not lawful for me to do to preserve it; or that after I have borne great afflictions and calamities, I may conscientiously consent to that, which, if I could have done, I might have prevented all those calamities. No man is so insignificant as that he can be sure his example can do no hurt. There is naturally such a submission of the understanding, as many do in truth think that lawful to be done which they see another do, of whose judgment and integrity they have a great opinion; so that my example may work upon others to do what no other temptation or suffering could induce them to; nay, it may not only increase the number of the guilty, but confirm those, who, out of their reverence to my carriage and constancy, began to repent the ill they had done; and whosoever is truly repenting, thinks at the same time of repairing. I doubt many men in these ill times have found themselves unhappily engaged in a partnership of mischief, before they apprehénded they were out of the right way, by seriously believing what this man said (whose learning and knowledge'was confessedly eminent) to be law, and implicitly concluding what another did (whose reputation for hon esty and wisdom was as general) to be just and prudent; and I pray God, the faults of those misled men may not be imputed to the other, who have weight enough of their |