An exposition with practical observations continued upon the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters…

The scope of the holy Ghost here in the threatening the taking away the beasts and the fowls and the fishes, it is this, To show the severity of Gods wrath against the ten Tribes, that as a King doth not only execute a Traitor but pull down his house and burn all that i• in it, so the great wrath of God shall be upon these ten Tribes, that he shall not only destroy them but for their sakes he shall bring even destruction upon the creatures. And this seems to be a threatening of greater wrath tha• […] let out when he destroyed the world: In destroying the ol• world the w•ath of God was not so great as that here threatened against these ten Tribes, for then the fishes of the Sea we do not read of any hurt unto them; but here the beasts of the field the fowls of the air & the fishes of the Sea shall be taken away. It referreth unto some fearful plague, wherein not only the air but the waters are pestilential and the cattle and the fish die. So it hath been in other Countries, even in England, in the time of Edward the third, our Chronicles report of such a pestilential quality that was in ⟨p. 67⟩the air and water that birds and fishes were found with botches upon them,¹ And then there were in one Church-yard in one years space (I think it was about the Charter house) fifty thousand buried of pestilential diseases. Such advantage hath God us at and can let out his wrath by such ways as these, and such plagues are very fearful fruits of Gods wrath upon a Country. What cause have we to bless God that he hath delivered us from the infection of the air! If God should have but brought a plague upon London the last year, Oh it would have been a plague indeed, we had been in a sad condition; it would have been the heaviest plague that ever was upon any Kingdom in the world, if we had had but such a plague that should have caused men to have fled and the Parliament not have set and even by that should have been dissolved, and so all the Kingdom would have been in a lamentable estate at this day. Bless God for that.

The scope of the holy Ghost here in the threatning the taking away the beasts and the fowls and the fishes, it is this, To shew the severity of Gods wrath against the ten Tribes, that as a King doth not only execute a Traytor but pull down his house and burn all that i in it, so the great wrath of God shall be upon these ten Tribes, that he shall not only destroy them but for their sakes he shall bring even destruction upon the creatures. And this seems to be a threatning of greater wrath tha let out when he destroyed the world: In destroying the ol world the wath of God was not so great as that here threatned against these ten Tribes, for then the fishes of the Sea we do not reade of any hurt unto them; but here the beasts of the field the fowls of the air & the fishes of the Sea shall be taken away. It referreth unto some fearful plague, wherein not only the air but the waters are pestilential and the cattel and the fish die. So it hath been in other Countries, even in England, in the time of Edward the third, our Chronicles report of such a pestilential quality that was in