A29696:120
London's lamentation, or, A serious discourse concerning the late fiery dispensation that turned our…
London's lamentation, or, A serious discourse concerning the late fiery dispensation that turned our (once renowned) city into a ruinous heap also the several lessons that are incumbent upon those whose houses have escaped the consuming flames / by Thomas Brooks.
London: printed for John Hancock and Nathaniel Ponder, 1670
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
and 1yet this people, with Job, will still worship the Lord, and bless a taking God, as well as a giving God: They will still keep close to the Lord and his ways, whatever God doth with them or against them. Psal. 44. 17, 18, 19. All this is come upon us ('tis a terrible All, as you may see from the 9. to the 17. verse) yet have we not forgotten thee, neither have we dealt falsely in thy Covenant; our heart is not turned back, neither have our steps declined from thy way, though thou hast sore broken us in the place of dragons, and covered us with the shadow of death. In spite of all the wrath and rage of Antiochus Epiphanes, that cruel and bloody Persecutor of the Saints, these Servants of the Lord show their sincerity by their constancy in keeping close to the Lord and his ways in the face of the greatest opposition and hottest persecution that they met withal. When the Emperor sent to Basil to subscribe 2to the Arian Heresy, the Messenger at first gave him good language, and promised him great preferment, if he would turn Arian; to which Basil replied, Alas, these ⟨p. 51⟩speeches are fit to catch little children withal that look after such things; but we that are nourished and taught by the holy Scriptures, are readier to suffer a thousand deaths, then to suffer one syllable or tittle of the Scripture to be altered. The same Basil affirms, that many of the Heathens seeing the Heroic zeal, courage, and constancy of the primitive Christians in the face of all oppositions and persecutions, turned Christians. Justin Martyr confesseth, that the constancy of the Christians in their sufferings, was the chief motive tha• converted him to Christianity: for I my self (saith he) wa• once a Platonist, and did gladly hear the Christians reviled; but when I saw they feared not death, nor any of those miseries which most frighten all other men, I began to consider with my self, that it was impossible for such men to be lovers of pleasures more then lovers of piety, and that made me fi•st think of turning Christian. Now by these means and methods, God convinceth the blind world of the integrity and sincerity of his people.