A sermon preached to the Honourable House of Commons at their late solemn fast,…A sermon preached to the Honourable House of Commons at their late solemne fast,…

To the Christian Reader.

Whether time or the fashion hath obtained of me (worthy Reader) that this Sermon should come under the providence of your favourable judgement and Candour, I can hardly determine: But you have it as it is, only I shall heartily desire, in reviewing of it, your serious thoughts in these ensuing considerations.

WHether time or the fashion hath obtained of me (worthy Reader) that this Sermon should come under the providence of your favourable judgement and Candor, I can hardly determine: But you have it as it is, onely I shall heartily desire, in reviewing of it, your serious thoughts in these insuing considerations.

1. What I speak here of God and his excellency, is but a shadow to the expressions of others; and what others can say, men or Angels, is but a short and rude shadow of that infinite All, the High Jehovah, Creator of Heaven and Earth: so my thoughts come forth as shadows of shadows, for there behoved to be much honey in the Ink, much of Heaven in the breast, much of God in the Pen of any who speaketh of such a transcendent subject; yet if these do affect you, it is possible I say more, if not, I shall desire not to spill the Lords highest praises with my low-creeping under-expressions. 2. Concerning Gods dispensation now in Britain, and his Churches condition; I shall be your debtor, in all humble modesty, to beg these thoughts to go along with God. As 1. Let the Lord have a charitable sense and good construction of his most wise dispensation,§1 and believe that he who hath his fire in Zion, ¹and his furnace in Jerusalem, seeth good that Christs Cross should be the Church of Christs birth-right, and that a life-rent of afflictions, is a surer way for Zion, then Summer-days. 2. You are not to stumble that God