"Simeon and Levi are brethren; instruments of cruelty are in their habitations.
"O my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united: for in their anger they slew a man, and in their self-will they digged down a wall.
"Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel. I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel."
I know very well, that the Church hath been often censured for keeping holy this day of humiliation, in memory of that excellent king and blessed martyr, Charles I., who rather chose to die on a scaffold, than betray the religion and liberties of his people, wherewith God and the laws had entrusted him. But, at the same time, it is manifest that those who make such censures are either people without any religion at all, or who derive their principles, and perhaps their birth, from the abettors of those who contrived the murder of that prince, and have not yet shewn the world that their opinions are changed. It is alleged, that the observation of this day hath served to continue and increase the animosity and enmity among our countrymen, and to disunite Protestants; that a law was made, upon the restoration of the Martyr's son, for a general pardon and oblivion, forbidding all reproaches upon that occasion; and, since none are now alive who were actors or instruments in that tragedy, it is thought hard and uncharitable to keep up the memory of it for all generations.
Now, because I conceive most of you to be ignorant in many particulars concerning that horrid murder, and the rebellion which preceded it; I will,
First, relate to you so much of the story as may be sufficient for your information:
Secondly, I will tell you the consequences which this bloody deed had upon these kingdoms:
And, Lastly, I will shew you to what good uses this solemn day of humiliation may be applied.
As to the first: In the reign of this prince, Charles the Martyr, the power and prerogative of the king were much greater than they are in our times, and so had been for at least seven hundred years before; And the best princes we ever had, carried their power much farther than the blessed Martyr offered to do in the most blameable part of his reign. But, the lands of the Crown having been prodigally bestowed to favourites, in the preceding reigns, the succeeding kings could not support themselves without taxes raised by Parliament; which put them under a necessity of frequently calling those assemblies: And, the crown lands being gotten into the hands of the nobility and gentry, beside the possessions of which the Church had been robbed by King Henry the Eighth, power, which always follows property, grew to lean to the side of the people, by whom even the just rights of the Crown were often disputed.
But further: Upon the cruel persecution raised against the Protestants, under Queen Mary, among great numbers who fled the kingdom to seek for shelter, several went and resided at Geneva, which is a commonwealth, governed without a king, and where the religion, contrived by Calvin, is without the order of bishops. When the Protestant faith was restored by Queen Elizabeth, those who fled to Geneva returned among the rest home to England, and were grown so fond of the government and religion of the place they had left, that they used all possible endeavours to introduce both into their own country; at the same time continually preaching and railing against ceremonies and distinct habits of the clergy, taxing whatever they disliked, as a remnant of Popery, and continued extremely troublesome to the Church and state, under that great Queen, as well as her successor King James I. These people called themselves Puritans, as pretending to a purer faith than those of the Church established. And these were the founders of our Dissenters. They did not think it sufficient to leave all the errors of Popery, but threw off many laudable and edifying institutions of the primitive Church, and, at last, even the government of bishops; which, having been ordained by the apostles themselves, had continued without interruption, in all Christian churches, for above fifteen hundred years. And all this they did, not because those things were evil, but because they were kept by the Papists. From thence they proceeded, by degrees, to quarrel with the kingly government; because, as I have already said, the city of Geneva, to which their fathers had flown for refuge, was a commonwealth, or government of the people.
These Puritans, about the middle of the Martyr's reign, were grown to a considerable faction in the kingdom, and in the Lower House of Parliament. They filled the public with the most false and bitter libels against the bishops and the clergy, accusing chiefly the very best among them of Popery; and, at the same time, the House of Commons grew so insolent and uneasy to the King, that they refused to furnish him with necessary supplies for the support of his family, unless upon such conditions as he could not submit to without forfeiting his conscience and honour, and even his coronation oath. And, in such an extremity, he was forced upon a practice, no way justifiable, of raising money; for which, however, he had the opinion of the judges on his side; for, wicked judges there were in those times as well as in ours. There were likewise many complaints, and sometimes justly, made against the proceedings of a certain court, called the Star-chamber, a judicature of great antiquity, but had suffered some corruptions, for which, however, the King was nowise answerable, I cannot recollect any more subjects of complaint with the least ground of reason, nor is it needful to recollect them, because this gracious King did, upon the first application, redress all grievances by an act of Parliament, and put it out of his power to do any hardships for the future. But that wicked faction in the House of Commons, not content with all those marks of his justice and condescension, urged still for more; and joining with a factious party from Scotland, who had the same fancies in religion, forced him to pass an act for cutting off the head of his best and chief minister; and, at the same time, compelled him, by tumults and threatenings of a packed rabble, poisoned with the same doctrines, to pass another law, by which it should not be in his power to dissolve that Parliament without their own consent. Thus, by the greatest weakness and infatuation that ever possessed any man's spirit, this Prince did in effect sign his own destruction. For the House of Commons, having the reins in their own hands, drove on furiously; sent him every day some unreasonable demand, and when he refused to grant it, made use of their own power, and declared that an ordinance of both Houses, without the King's consent, should be obeyed as a law, contrary to all reason and equity, as well as to the fundamental constitution of the kingdom.
About this time the rebellion in Ireland broke out, wherein his Parliament refused to assist him; nor would accept his offer to come hither in person to subdue those rebels. These, and a thousand other barbarities, forced the King to summon his loyal subjects to his standard in his own defence. Meanwhile the English Parliament, instead of helping the poor Protestants here, seized on the very army that his Majesty was sending over for our relief, and turned them against their own Sovereign. The rebellion in England continued for four or five years: At last the King was forced to fly in disguise to the Scots, who sold him to the rebels. And these Puritans had the impudent cruelty to try his sacred person in a mock court of justice, and cut off his head; which he might have saved, if he would have yielded to betray the constitution in Church and state.
In this whole proceeding, Simeon and Levi were brethren; the wicked insinuations of those fanatical preachers stirring up the cruelty of the soldiers, who, by force of arms, excluded from the house every member of Parliament, whom they apprehended to bear the least inclination towards an agreement with the King, suffering only those to enter who thirsted chiefly for his blood; and this is the very account given by their own writers: From whence it is clear that this Prince was, in all respects, a real martyr for the true religion and the liberty of the people. That odious Parliament had first turned the bishops out of the House of Lords; in a few years after, they murdered their King; then immediately abolished the whole House of Lords; and so, at last, obtained their wishes, of having a government of the people, and a new religion, both after the manner of Geneva, without a king, a bishop, or a nobleman; and this they blasphemously called "The kingdom of Christ and his saints."
This is enough for your information on the first head: I shall therefore proceed to the second, wherein I will shew you the miserable consequences which that abominable rebellion and murder produced in these nations.
First: The Irish rebellion was wholly owing to that wicked English Parliament. For the leaders in the Irish Popish massacre would never have dared to stir a finger, if they had not been encouraged by that rebellious spirit in the English House of Commons, which they very well knew must disable the King from sending any supplies to his Protestant subjects here; and, therefore, we may truly say that the English Parliament held the King's hands, while the Irish Papists here were cutting our grandfathers' throats.
Secondly: That murderous Puritan Parliament, when they had all in their own power, could not agree upon any one method of settling a form either of religion or civil government; but changed every day from schism to schism, from heresy to heresy, and from one faction to another: From whence arose that wild confusion, still continuing in our several ways of serving God, and those absurd notions of civil power, which have so often torn us with factions more than any other nation in Europe.
Thirdly: To this rebellion and murder have been owing the rise and progress of atheism among us. For, men observing what numberless villainies of all kinds were committed during twenty years, under pretence of zeal and the reformation of God's Church, were easily tempted to doubt that all religion was a mere imposture: And the same spirit of infidelity, so far spread among us at this present, is nothing but the fruit of the seeds sown by those rebellious hypocritical saints.
Fourthly: The old virtue and loyalty, and generous spirit of the English nation, were wholly corrupted by the power, the doctrine, and the example of those wicked people. Many of the ancient nobility were killed, and their families extinct, in defence of their Prince and country, or murdered by the merciless courts of justice. Some of the worst among them favoured, or complied with the reigning iniquities, and not a few of the new set created, when the Martyr's son was restored, were such who had drunk too deep of the bad principles then prevailing.
Fifthly: The children of the murdered Prince were forced to fly, for the safety of their lives, to foreign countries; where one of them at least, I mean King James II., was seduced to Popery; which ended in the loss of his kingdoms, the misery and desolation of this country, and a long and expensive war abroad. Our deliverance was owing to the valour and conduct of the late King; and, therefore, we ought to remember him with gratitude, but not mingled with blasphemy or idolatry. It was happy that his interests and ours were the same: And God gave him greater success than our sins deserved. But, as a house thrown down by a storm, is seldom rebuilt without some change in the foundation; so it hath happened, that, since the late Revolution, men have sat much looser in the true fundamentals both of religion and government, and factions have been more violent, treacherous, and malicious than ever, men running naturally from one extreme into another; and, for private ends, taking up those very opinions professed by the leaders in that rebellion, which carried the blessed Martyr to the scaffold.
Sixthly: Another consequence of this horrid rebellion and murder was the destroying or defacing of such vast number of God's houses. "In their self-will they digged down a wall." If a stranger should now travel in England, and observe the churches in his way, he could not otherwise conclude, than that some vast army of Turks or heathens had been sent on purpose to ruin and blot out all marks of Christianity. They spared neither the statues of saints, nor ancient prelates, nor kings, nor benefactors; broke down the tombs and monuments of men famous in their generations, seized the vessels of silver set apart for the holiest use, tore down the most innocent ornaments both within and without, made the houses of prayer dens of thieves, or stables for cattle. These were the mildest effects of Puritan zeal, and devotion for Christ; and this was what themselves affected to call a thorough reformation. In this kingdom those ravages were not so easily seen; for the people here being too poor to raise such noble temples, the mean ones we had were not defaced, but totally destroyed.
Upon the whole, it is certain, that although God might have found out many other ways to have punished a sinful people, without permitting this rebellion and murder, yet as the course of the world hath run ever since, we need seek for no other causes, of all the public evils we have hitherto suffered, or may suffer for the future, by the misconduct of princes, or wickedness of the people.
I go on now upon the third head, to shew you to what good uses this solemn day of humiliation may be applied.
First: It may be an instruction to princes themselves, to be careful in the choice of those who are their advisers in matters of law. All the judges of England, except one or two, advised the King, that he might legally raise money upon the subjects for building of ships without consent of Parliament; which, as it was the greatest oversight of his reign, so it proved the principal foundation of all his misfortunes. Princes may likewise learn from hence, not to sacrifice a faithful servant to the rage of a faction, nor to trust any body of men with a greater share of power than the laws of the land have appointed them, much less to deposit it in their hands until they shall please to restore it.
Secondly: By bringing to mind the tragedy of this day, and the consequences that have arisen from it, we shall be convinced how necessary it is for those in power to curb, in season, all such unruly spirits as desire to introduce new doctrines and discipline in the Church, or new forms of government in the state. Those wicked Puritans began, in Queen Elizabeth's time, to quarrel only with surplices and other habits, with the ring in matrimony, the cross in baptism, and the like; thence they went on to further matters of higher importance, and, at last, they must needs have the whole government of the Church dissolved. This great work they compassed, first, by depriving the bishops of their seats in Parliament, then they abolished the whole order; and, at last, which was their original design, they seized on all the Church-lands, and divided the spoil among themselves; and, like Jeroboam, made priests of the very dregs of the people. This was their way of reforming the Church. As to the civil government, you have already heard how they modelled it upon the murder of their King, and discarding the nobility. Yet, clearly to shew what a Babel they had built, after twelve years' trial and twenty several sorts of government; the nation grown weary of their tyranny, was forced to call in the son of him whom those reformers had sacrificed. And thus were Simeon and Levi divided in Jacob and scattered in Israel.
Thirdly: Although the successors of these Puritans, I mean our present Dissenters, do not think fit to observe this day of humiliation; yet, since it would be very proper in them, upon some occasions, to renounce in a public manner those principles upon which their predecessors acted; and it will be more prudent in them to do so, because those very Puritans, of whom ours are followers, found by experience, that after they had overturned the Church and state, murdered their King, and were projecting what they called a kingdom of the saints, they were cheated of the power and possessions they only panted after, by an upstart sect of religion that grew out of their own bowels, who subjected them to one tyrant, while they were endeavouring to set up a thousand.
Fourthly: Those who profess to be followers of our Church established, and yet presume in discourse to justify or excuse that rebellion, and murder of the King, ought to consider, how utterly contrary all such opinions are to the doctrine of Christ and his apostles, as well as to the articles of our Church, and to the preaching and practice of its true professors for above a hundred years. Of late times, indeed, and I speak it with grief of heart, we have heard even sermons of a strange nature; although reason would make one think it a very unaccountable way of procuring favour under a monarchy, by palliating and lessening the guilt of those who murdered the best of kings in cold blood, and, for a time, destroyed the very monarchy itself. Pray God, we may never more hear such doctrine from the pulpit, nor have it scattered about in print, to poison the people!
Fifthly: Some general knowledge of this horrid rebellion and murder, with the consequences they had upon these nations, may be a warning to our people not to believe a lie, and to mistrust those deluding spirits, who, under pretence of a purer and more reformed religion, would lead them from their duty to God and the laws. Politicians may say what they please, but it is no hard thing at all for the meanest person, who hath common understanding, to know whether he be well or ill governed. If he be freely allowed to follow his trade and calling; if he be secure in his property, and hath the benefit of the law to defend himself against injustice and oppression; if his religion be different from that of his country, and the government think fit to tolerate it, (which he may be very secure of, let it be what it will;) he ought to be fully satisfied, and give no offence, by writing or discourse, to the worship established, as the dissenting preachers are too apt to do. But, if he hath any new visions of his own, it is his duty to be quiet, and possess them in silence, without disturbing the community by a furious zeal for making proselytes. This was the folly and madness of those ancient puritan fanatics: They must needs overturn heaven and earth, violate all the laws of God and man, make their country a field of blood, to propagate whatever wild or wicked opinions came into their heads, declaring all their absurdities and blasphemies to proceed from the Holy Ghost.
To conclude this head. In answer to that objection of keeping up animosity and hatred between Protestants, by the observation of this day; if there be any sect or sort of people among us, who profess the same principles in religion and government which those puritan rebels put in practice, I think it is the interest of all those who love the Church and King, to keep up as strong a party against them as possible, until they shall, in a body, renounce all those wicked opinions upon which their predecessors acted, to the disgrace of Christianity, and the perpetual infamy of the English nation.
When we accuse the Papists of the horrid doctrine, "that no faith ought to be kept with heretics," they deny it to a man; and yet we justly think it dangerous to trust them, because we know their actions have been sometimes suitable to that opinion. But the followers of those who beheaded the Martyr have not yet renounced their principles; and, till they do, they may be justly suspected. Neither will the bare name of Protestants set them right. For surely Christ requires more from us than a profession of hating Popery, which a Turk or an atheist may do as well as a Protestant.
If an enslaved people should recover their liberty from a tyrannical power of any sort, who could blame them for commemorating their deliverance by a day of joy and thanksgiving? And doth not the destruction of a Church, a King, and three kingdoms, by the artifices, hypocrisy, and cruelty of a wicked race of soldiers and preachers, and other sons of Belial, equally require a solemn time of humiliation? Especially since the consequences of that bloody scene still continue, as I have already shewn, in their effects upon us.
Thus I have done with the three heads I proposed to discourse on. But before I conclude, I must give a caution to those who hear me, that they may not think I am pleading for absolute unlimited power in any one man. It is true, all power is from God, and, as the apostle says, "the powers that be are ordained of God;" but this is in the same sense that all we have is from God, our food and raiment, and whatever possessions we hold by lawful means. Nothing can be meant in those, or any other words of Scripture, to justify tyrannical power, or the savage cruelties of those heathen emperors who lived in the time of the apostles. And so St Paul concludes, "The powers that be are ordained of God:" For what? Why, "for the punishment of evil doers, and the praise, the reward, of them that do well." There is no more inward value in the greatest emperor, than in the meanest of his subjects: His body is composed of the same substance, the same parts, and with the same or greater, infirmities: His education is generally worse, by flattery, and idleness, and luxury, and those evil dispositions that early power is apt to give. It is therefore against common sense, that his private personal interest, or pleasure, should be put in the balance with the safety of millions, every one of which is his equal by nature, equal in the sight of God, equally capable of salvation; and it is for their sakes, not his own, that he is entrusted with the government over them. He hath as high trust as can safely be reposed in one man, and, if he discharge it as he ought, he deserves all the honour and duty that a mortal may be allowed to receive. His personal failings we have nothing to do with, and errors in government are to be imputed to his ministers in the state. To what height those errors may be suffered to proceed, is not the business of this day, or this place, or of my function, to determine. When oppressions grow too great and universal to be borne, nature or necessity may find a remedy. But, if a private person reasonably expects pardon, upon his amendment, for all faults that are not capital, it would be a hard condition indeed, not to give the same allowance to a prince, who must see with other men's eyes, and hear with other men's ears, which are often wilfully blind and deaf. Such was the condition of the Martyr, and is so, in some degree, of all other princes. Yet this we may justly say in defence of the common people, in all civilized nations, that it must be a very bad government indeed, where the body of the subjects will not rather choose to live in peace and obedience, than take up arms on pretence of faults in the administration, unless where the vulgar are deluded by false preachers to grow fond of new visions and fancies in religion; which, managed by dexterous men, for sinister ends of malice, envy, or ambition, have often made whole nations run mad. This was exactly the case in the whole progress of that great rebellion, and the murder of King Charles I. But the late Revolution under the Prince of Orange was occasioned by a proceeding directly contrary, the oppression and injustice there beginning from the throne: For that unhappy prince, King James II., did not only invade our laws and liberties, but would have forced a false religion upon his subjects, for which he was deservedly rejected, since there could be no other remedy found, or at least agreed on. But, under the blessed Martyr, the deluded people would have forced many false religions, not only on their fellow-subjects, but even upon their sovereign himself, and at the same time invaded all his undoubted rights; and, because he would not comply, raised a horrid rebellion, wherein, by the permission of God, they prevailed, and put their sovereign to death, like a common criminal, in the face of the world.
Therefore, those who seem to think they cannot otherwise justify the late Revolution, and the change of the succession, than by lessening the guilt of the Puritans, do certainly put the greatest affront imaginable upon the present powers, by supposing any relation, or resemblance, between that rebellion and the late Revolution; and, consequently, that the present establishment is to be defended by the same arguments which those usurpers made use of, who, to obtain their tyranny, trampled under foot all the laws of both God and man.
One great design of my discourse was to give you warning against running into either extreme of two bad opinions, with relation to obedience. As kings are called gods upon earth, so some would allow them an equal power with God, over all laws and ordinances; and that the liberty, and property, and life, and religion of the subject, depended wholly upon the breath of the prince; which, however, I hope was never meant by those who pleaded for passive obedience. And this opinion hath not been confined to that party which was first charged with it, but hath sometimes gone over to the other, to serve many an evil turn of interest or ambition, who have been as ready to enlarge prerogative, where they could find their own account, as the highest maintainers of it.
On the other side, some look upon kings as answerable for every mistake or omission in government, and bound to comply with the most unreasonable demands of an unquiet faction; which was the case of those who persecuted the blessed Martyr of this day from his throne to the scaffold.
Between these two extremes, it is easy, from what hath been said, to choose a middle; to be good and loyal subjects, yet, according to your power, faithful assertors of your religion and liberties; to avoid all broachers and preachers of newfangled doctrines in the Church; to be strict observers of the laws, which cannot be justly taken from you without your own consent: In short, "to obey God and the King, and meddle not with those who are given to change."
Which that you may all do, &c.
"I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content"
The holy Scripture is full of expressions to set forth the miserable condition of man during the whole progress of his life; his weakness, pride, and vanity; his unmeasurable desires, and perpetual disappointments; the prevalency of his passions, and the corruptions of his reason; his deluding hopes, and his real, as well as imaginary, fears; his natural and artificial wants; his cares and anxieties; the diseases of his body, and the diseases of his mind; the shortness of his life; his dread of a future state, with his carelessness to prepare for it: And the wise men of all ages have made the same reflections.
But all these are general calamities, from which none are excepted; and being without remedy, it is vain to bewail them. The great question, long debated in the world, is, whether the rich or the poor are the least miserable of the two? It is certain, that no rich man ever desired to be poor, and that most, if not all, poor men, desire to be rich; whence it may be argued, that, in all appearance, the advantage lieth on the side of wealth, because both parties agree in preferring it before poverty. But this reasoning will be found to be false: For, I lay it down as a certain truth, that God Almighty hath placed all men upon an equal foot, with respect to their happiness in this world, and the capacity of attaining their salvation in the next; or, at least, if there be any difference, it is not to the advantage of the rich and the mighty. Now, since a great part of those who usually make up our congregations, are not of considerable station, and many among them of the lower sort, and since the meaner people are generally and justly charged with the sin of repining and murmuring at their own condition, to which, however, their betters axe sufficiently subject (although, perhaps, for shame, not always so loud in their complaints) I thought it might be useful to reason upon this point in as plain a manner as I can. I shall therefore shew, first, that the poor enjoy many temporal blessings, which are not common to the rich and the great: And, likewise, that the rich and the great are subject to many temporal evils, which are not common to the poor.
But here I would not be misunderstood; perhaps there is not a word more abused than that of the poor, or wherein the world is more generally mistaken. Among the number of those who beg in our streets, or are half-starved at home, or languish in prison for debt, there is hardly one in a hundred who doth not owe his misfortunes to his own laziness, or drunkenness, or worse vices.
To these he owes those very diseases which often disable him from getting his bread. Such wretches are deservedly unhappy: They can only blame themselves; and when we are commanded to have pity on the poor, these are not understood to be of the number.
It is true, indeed, that sometimes honest, endeavouring men are reduced to extreme want, even to the begging of alms, by losses, by accidents, by diseases, and old age, without any fault of their own: But these are very few in comparison of the other; nor would their support be any sensible burthen to the public, if the charity of well-disposed persons were not intercepted by those common strollers, who are most importunate, and who least deserve it. These, indeed, are properly and justly called the poor, whom it should be our study to find out and distinguish, by making them partake, of our superfluity and abundance.
But neither have these anything to do with my present subject; For, by the poor, I only intend the honest, industrious artificer, the meaner sort of tradesmen, and the labouring man, who getteth his bread by the sweat of his brows, in town or country, and who make the bulk of mankind among us.
First: I shall therefore shew, first, that the poor (in the sense I understand the word) do enjoy many temporal blessings, which are not common to the rich and great; and likewise, that the rich and great are subject to many temporal evils, which are not common to the poor.
Secondly: From the arguments offered to prove the foregoing head, I shall draw some observations that may be useful for your practice.
I. As to the first: Health, we know, is generally allowed to be the best of all earthly possessions, because it is that, without which we can have no satisfaction in any of the rest. For riches are of no use, if sickness taketh from us the ability of enjoying them, and power and greatness are then only a burthen. Now, if we would look for health, it must be in the humble habitation of the labouring man, or industrious artificer, who earn their bread by the sweat of their brows, and usually live to a good old age, with a great degree of strength and vigour.
The refreshment of the body by sleep is another great happiness of the meaner sort. Their rest is not disturbed by the fear of thieves and robbers, nor is it interrupted by surfeits of intemperance. Labour and plain food supply the want of quieting draughts; and the wise man telleth us, that the sleep of the labouring man is sweet. As to children, which are certainly accounted of as a blessing, even to the poor, where industry is not wanting; they are an assistance to honest parents, instead of being a burthen; they are healthy and strong, and fit for labour; neither is the father in fear, lest his heir should be ruined by an unequal match: Nor is he solicitous about his rising in the world, farther than to be able to get his bread.
The poorer sort are not the objects of general hatred or envy; they have no twinges of ambition, nor trouble themselves with party quarrels, or state divisions. The idle rabble, who follow their ambitious leaders in such cases, do not fall within my description of the poorer sort; for, it is plain, I mean only the honest industrious poor in town or country, who are safest in times of public disturbance, in perilous seasons, and public revolutions, if they will be quiet, and do their business; for artificers and husbandmen are necessary in all governments: But in such seasons, the rich are the public mark, because they are oftentimes of no use, but to be plundered; like some sort of birds, who are good for nothing, but their feathers; and so fall a prey to the strongest side.
Let us proceed, on the other side to examine the disadvantages which the rich and the great lie under, with respect to the happiness of the present life.
First, then; While health, as we have said, is the general portion of the lower sort, the gout, the dropsy, the stone, the cholic, and all other diseases, are continually haunting the palaces of the rich and the great, as the natural attendants upon laziness and luxury. Neither does the rich man eat his sumptuous fare with half the appetite and relish, that even the beggars do the crumbs which fall from his table: But, on the contrary, he is full of loathing and disgust, or at best of indifference, in the midst of plenty. Thus their intemperance shortens their lives, without pleasing their appetites.
Business, fear, guilt, design, anguish, and vexation are continually buzzing about the curtains of the rich and the powerful, and will hardly suffer them to close their eyes, unless when they are dosed with the fumes of strong liquors.
It is a great mistake to imagine that the rich want but few things; their wants are more numerous, more craving, and urgent, than those of poorer men: For these endeavour only at the necessaries of life, which make them happy, and they think no farther: But the desire of power and wealth is endless, and therefore impossible to be satisfied with any acquisitions.
If riches were so great a blessing as they are commonly thought, they would at least have this advantage, to give their owners cheerful hearts and countenances; they would often stir them up to express their thankfulness to God, and discover their satisfaction to the world. But, in fact, the contrary to all this is true. For where are there more cloudy brows, more melancholy hearts, or more ingratitude to their great Benefactor, than among those who abound in wealth? And, indeed, it is natural that it should be so, because those men, who covet things that are hard to be got, must be hard to please; whereas a small thing maketh a poor man happy, and great losses cannot befall him.
It is likewise worth considering, how few among the rich have procured their wealth by just measures; how many owe their fortunes to the sins of their parents, how many more to their own? If men's titles were to be tried before a true court of conscience, where false swearing, and a thousand vile artifices, (that are well known, and can hardly be avoided in human courts of justice) would avail nothing; how many would be ejected with infamy and disgrace? How many grow considerable by breach of trust, by bribery and corruption? How many have sold their religion, with the rights and liberties of themselves and others, for power and employments?
And, it is a mistake to think, that the most hardened sinner, who oweth his possessions or titles to any such wicked arts of thieving, can have true peace of mind, under the reproaches of a guilty conscience, and amid the cries of ruined widows and orphans.
I know not one real advantage that the rich have over the poor, except the power of doing good to others. But this is an advantage which God hath not given wicked men the grace to make use of. The wealth acquired by evil means was never employed to good ends; for that would be to divide the kingdom of Satan against itself. Whatever hath been gained by fraud, avarice, oppression, and the like, must be preserved and increased by the same methods.
I shall add but one thing more upon this head, which I hope will convince you, that God (whose thoughts are not as our thoughts) never intended riches or power to be necessary for the happiness of mankind in this life; because it is certain, that there is not one single good quality of the mind absolutely necessary to obtain them, where men are resolved to be rich at any rate; neither honour, justice, temperance, wisdom, religion, truth, or learning; for a slight acquaintance of the world will inform us, that there have been many instances of men, in all ages, who have arrived at great possessions and great dignities, by cunning, fraud, or flattery, without any of these, or any other virtues that can be named. Now, if riches and greatness were such blessings, that good men without them could not have their share of happiness in this life; how cometh it to pass, that God should suffer them to be often dealt to the worst, and most profligate of mankind; that they should be generally procured by the most abominable means, and applied to the basest and most wicked uses? This ought not to be conceived of a just, a merciful, a wise, and Almighty Being. We must therefore conclude, that wealth and power are in their own nature, at best, but things indifferent, and that a good man may be equally happy without them, provided that he hath a sufficiency of the common blessings of human life to answer all the reasonable and virtuous demands of nature, which his industry will provide, and sobriety will prevent his wanting. Agur's prayer, with the reasons of his wish, are full to this purpose: "Give me neither poverty nor riches. Feed me with food convenient for me; lest I be full and deny thee, and say, 'Who is the Lord?' Or, lest I be poor, and steal, and take the name of my God in vain."
From what hath been said, I shall, in the second place, offer some considerations, that may be useful for your practice.
And here I shall apply myself chiefly to those of the lower sort, for whose comfort and satisfaction this discourse is principally intended. For, having observed the great sin of those, who do not abound in wealth, to be that of murmuring and repining, that God hath dealt his blessings unequally to the sons of men, I thought it would be of great use to remove out of your minds so false and wicked an opinion, by shewing that your condition is really happier than most of you imagine.
First: Therefore, it hath been always agreed in the world, that the present happiness of mankind consisted in the ease of our body and the quiet of our mind; but, from what has been already said, it plainly appears, that neither wealth nor power do in any sort contribute to either of these two blessings. If, on the contrary, by multiplying our desires, they increase our discontents; if they destroy our health, gall us with painful diseases, and shorten our life; if they expose us to hatred, to envy, to censure, to a thousand temptations, it is not easy to see why a wise man should make them his choice, for their own sake, although it were in his power. Would any of you, who are in health and strength of body, with moderate food and raiment earned by your own labour, rather choose to be in the rich man's bed, under the torture of the gout, unable to take your natural rest, or natural nourishment, with the additional load of a guilty conscience, reproaching you for injustice, oppressions, covetousness, and fraud? No; but you would take the riches and power, and leave behind the inconveniences that attend them; and so would every man living. But that is more than our share, and God never intended this world for such a place of rest as we would make it; for the Scripture assureth us that it was only designed as a place of trial. Nothing is more frequent, than a man to wish himself in another's condition; yet he seldom doth it without some reserve: He would not be so old; he would not be so sickly; he would not be so cruel; he would not be so insolent; he would not be so vicious; he would not be so oppressive, so griping, and so on. From whence it is plain, that, in their own judgment, men are not so unequally dealt with, as they would at first sight imagine: For, if I would not change my condition with another man, without any exception or reservation at all, I am, in reality, more happy than he.
Secondly: You of the meaner sort are subject to fewer temptations than the rich; and therefore your vices are more unpardonable. Labour subdueth your appetites to be satisfied with common things; the business of your several callings filleth up your whole time; so that idleness, which is the bane and destruction of virtue, doth not lead you into the neighbourhood of sin: Your passions are cooler, by not being inflamed with excess, and therefore the gate and the way that lead to life are not so straight and so narrow to you, as to those who live among all the allurements to wickedness. To serve God with the best of your care and understanding, and to be just and true in your dealings, is the short sum of your duty, and will be the more strictly required of you, because nothing lieth in the way to divert you from it.
Thirdly: It is plain from what I have said, that you of the lower rank have no just reason to complain of your condition: Because, as you plainly see, it affordeth you so many advantages, and freeth you from so many vexations, so many distempers both of body and mind, which pursue and torment the rich and powerful.
Fourthly: You are to remember and apply, that the poorest person is not excused from doing good to others, and even relieving the wants of his distressed neighbour, according to his abilities; and if you perform your duty in this point, you far outdo the greatest liberalities of the rich, and will accordingly be accepted of by God, and get your reward: For it is our Saviour's own doctrine, when the widow gave her two mites. The rich give out of their abundance; that is to say, what they give, they do not feel it in their way of living: But the poor man, who giveth out of his little stock, must spare it from the necessary food and raiment of himself and his family. And, therefore, our Saviour adds, "That the widow gave more than all who went before her; for she gave all she had, even all her living;" and so went home utterly unprovided to supply her necessities.
Lastly: As it appeareth from what hath been said, that you in the lower rank have, in reality, a greater share of happiness, your work of salvation is easier, by your being liable to fewer temptations; and as your reward in Heaven is much more certain than it is to the rich, if you seriously perform your duty, for yours is the Kingdom of Heaven; so your neglect of it will be less excusable, will meet with fewer allowances from God, and will be punished with double stripes: For the most unknowing among you cannot plead ignorance of what you have been so early taught, I hope, so often instructed in, and which is so easy to be understood, I mean the art of leading a life agreeable to the plain and positive laws of God. Perhaps you may think you lie under one disadvantage, which the great and rich have not; that idleness will certainly reduce you to beggary; whereas those who abound in wealth lie under no necessity either of labour or temperance to keep enough to live on. But this is indeed one part of your happiness, that the lowness of your condition, in a manner, forceth you to what is pleasing to God, and necessary for your daily support. Thus your duty and interest are always the same.
To conclude: Since our blessed Lord, instead of a rich and honourable station in this world, was pleased to choose his lot among men of the lower condition; let not those, on whom the bounty of Providence hath bestowed wealth and honours, despise the men who are placed in a humble and inferior station; but rather, with their utmost power, by their countenance, by their protection, by just payment of their honest labour, encourage their daily endeavours for the support of themselves and their families. On the other hand, let the poor labour to provide things honest in the sight of all men; and so, with diligence in their several employments, live soberly, righteously, and godlily in this present world, that they may obtain that glorious reward promised in the Gospel to the poor, I mean the kingdom of Heaven.
Now, to God the Father, &c,