SERMON, PREACHED UNE the 17th. 1688. Upon the J: Bayne's Coll Christ BIRTH OF THE PRINCE By John Turner, Hofpitaller of St. Thomas Licensed, June the 19th. 1688. LONDON, Printed for Randal Taylor, near Stationers- SERMON, PREACHED JUNE the 17th. 1688. Upon the BIRTH OF THE PRINCE JUD G. 17. 6. In those days there was no King in Ifrael, but every Man did that which was right in his own Eyes. W E have already taken an imperfect View of the Miseries and Calamities to which Anarchy, or the Want of Government, in a Nation is exposed; which are so many, and so great, A 2 that that they want Numbers and Magnitudes to express them by, their Nature is fo exquifitely cruel, their Aggravations and Circumstances fo barbarous and horrid, their Proportion fo large,their Sum fo vaft and infinite,that there is no Landskip of Confufion able to defcribe them, no Imagination fo fruitful as to reprefent them, no Conception fo difcerning as to reach or comprehend them, no Volume, no Library fo large as to contain them, and to infift Particularly, as even a common Fancy and Experience might do upon the Calamities and Hardships, with which fuch a State is naturally encompassed, is but to fright and discompofe our felves without any End or Measure, by raising up the pale Ghosts, and rueful Apparitions of the most miferable Realities that the World affords. If therefore we reflect only in general upon the Bleffings of Government, which is no other than an imperfect Draught of that Divine Wisdom and Goodness by which this Universe was made at first, and is fupported till now, and by which the difagreeing Seeds and Principles of Things are reduced into a perfect Concord and Harmony with each other, for the Defence and Prefervation of the Whole ; yet yet this alone will afford us fufficient Matter of Thankfulness to Almighty God, that he is pleased to give us fo fair and comfortable a Profpect, by a Male Branch added to the Royal Family, notwithstanding those Sins of ours that call fo loud for Vengeance at his Hands, that yet the Scepter fhall not depart from Judah, nor a Law-giver from between his Feet. There is no Form of Government fo bad, or fo ill contrived, but it is ftill infinitely better than no Government at all, and not only the Destruction of Government it felf, but even the Alteration of the moft inconvenient Eftablifhment, if it have been of any long Continuance, is usually fo fatal to Mankind, by being exposed to the interfering Ambitions and Defigns of Men that feek themselves, and yet cannot all be gratified as they defire; that an everlafting Submiffion to the fame unhappy Circumstances, is much more defirable to the Wife and Good, than those Convulfions and Agonies of State, thofe Throws and Pangs of an ufually Abortive Birth, that are by experience found to be the conftant Attendants of real or pretended Reformations. |