from the most;-sin banishing the love of God from their hearts,
hindered the knowledge of God from continuing in their minds.1
After many revivings, by visions, revelations, and covenants, it was
at length called in from the wide world, and wholly restrained to the
house, family, and seed of Abraham,' with whom alone all the means
of grace continued for thrice fourteen generations. They alone were
in Goshen, and all the world besides in thick darkness;-the dew of
heaven was on them as the fleece, when else all the earth was dry.
God "showeth his word unto Jacob, his statutes and his judgments
unto Israel. He hath not dealt so with any nation," Ps. cxlvii.
19, 20. The prerogative of the Jews was chiefly in this, that to
them were committed the oracles of God, Rom. iii. To them per-
tained "the adoption, and the glory, the covenants, and the giving of
the law, and the service of God, and the promises," Rom. ix. 4. But
when the fulness of time came, the Son of God being sent in the
likeness of sinful flesh, drew all men unto him; and God, who had
before winked at the time of their ignorance, then called them every
where to repent, commanding the gospel to be preached to the uni-
versality of reasonable creatures, and the way of salvation to be
proclaimed unto all;-upon which, in few years, the sound of the
gospel went out into all nations, and the Sun of righteousness dis-
played his beams upon the habitable parts of the earth. But yet
once more this light, by Satan and his agents, persecutors and se-
ducers, is almost extinguished, as was foretold, 2 Thess. ii.,-remain-
ing but in few places, and burning dim where it was,—the kingdom
of the beast being full of darkness, Rev. xvi. 10. Yet God again
raiseth up reformers, and by them kindles a light, we hope, never to
be put out. But, alas! what a spot of ground doth this shine on,
in comparison of the former vast extents and bounds of the Chris-
tian world! Now, is all this variety, think you, to be ascribed unto
chance, as the philosopher thought the world was made by a casual
concurrence of atoms? or hath the idol free-will, with the new
goddess contingency, ruled in these dispensations? Truly neither
the one nor the other, no more than the fly raised the dust by sitting
on the chariot wheel;-but all these things have come to pass accord-
ing to a certain unerring rule, given them by God's determinate
purpose and counsel.

2. Presupposing this variety in the outward means, how is it that
thereupon one is taken, another left? The promise is made known
to Cain and Abel;-one the first murderer, the other the first mar-

'Gen. vi. 5. Gen. v. 24, vi. 18, xii. 1, xviii. 1, 2; Ps. lxxvi. 1, 2; John iv. 22.
3 Gal. iv. 4; John xii. 32; Acts xvii. 30; Mark xvi. 15; Mal. iii. 4; Prov. viii. 31.
See Tertullian, Lib. ad Jud., reckoning almost all the known nations of the
world, and affirming that they all,—that is, some in them,-in his days, submitted
to the sceptre of Christ. He lived in the end of the second century.

tyr. Jacob and Esau had the same outward advantages; but the one becomes Israel, the other Edom,-the one inherits the promises, the other sells his right for a mess of pottage. At the preaching of our Saviour, some believed, some blasphemed;—some said he was a good man; others said, nay, but he deceived the people. Have we not the word in its power this day, and do we not see the like various effects,—some continuing in impenitency, others in sincerity closing with Jesus Christ? Now, what shall we say to these things? What guides these wheels? who thus steers his word for the good of souls ? Why, this also, as I said before, is from some peculiarly distinguishing purpose of the will of God.

3. To open the third thing proposed, I shall show,—(1.) That all this variety is according to God's determinate purpose, and answereth thereunto; (2.) The particular purposes from whence this variety proceedeth.

(1.) Eph. i. 11, "He worketh all things according to the counsel of his own will." As a man may be said to erect a fabric1 according to the counsel of his will, when he frameth it before in his mind, and maketh all things in event answer his preconceived platform,—all things (especially rà závra, all those things of which the apostle there treateth, gospel things) have their futurition and manner of being from his eternal purpose:—whence also is the idea in the mind of God of all things, with their circumstances, that shall be; that is, the first mover, continuing itself immovable, giving to every thing a regular motion, according to the impression which from that it doth receive: "For known unto him are all his works from the beginning of the world," Acts xv. 18.

3

If any attendants of actions might free and exempt them from the regular dependence we insist upon, they must be either contingency or sin; but yet for both these we have, besides general rules, clear, particular instances. What seems more contingent and casual than the unadvised slaying of a man with the fall of the head of an axe from the helve, as a man was cutting wood by the way side? Deut. xix. 5; yet God assumes this as his own work, Exod. xxi. 13. The same may be said of free agents and their actions. And for the other, see Acts iv. 27, 28,--in the crucifying of the Son of God's love, --all things came to pass according as his counsel had before determined that it should be done. Now, how in the one of these liberty

1 Piscat. in loc.

1 Πάντα δὲ λέγω τὰ οὐκ ἐφ' ἡμῖν, τὰ γὰρ ἐφ' ἡμῖν, οὐ τῆς προνοίας, ἀλλὰ τοῦ ἡμετέρου αὐτε ouris.-Damascen. Satis impie.

'Matt. x. 29; Job xiv. 5; Prov. xvi. 33, xxi. 1, 30, xix. 21. "Nihil fit nisi omnipotens fieri velit, vel ipse faciendo, vel sinendo ut fiat."-Aug.

Gen. iv. 5-7; 1 Kings xxii. 19-21; 2 Kings v. 18, 19; Ps. lxxvi. 10; Eccles. vii. 26; Isa. vi. 9-11, &c.

is not abridged, the nature of things not changed in the other, sin is not countenanced,' belongs not to this discourse. "The counsel of the LORD," then, " standeth for ever, the thoughts of his heart unto all generations," Ps. xxxiii. 11. "His counsel standeth, and he will do all his pleasure," Isa. xlvi. 10. For he is the LORD, and he changeth not, Mal. iii. 6. With him is neither variableness nor shadow of turning, James i. 17. All things that are, come to pass in that unchangeable method in which he hath laid them down from all eternity.

(2.) Let us look peculiarly upon the purposes according to which the dispensations of the gospel, both in sending and withholding it, do proceed.

[1.] For the not sending of the means of grace unto any people, whereby they hear not the joyful sound of the gospel, but have in all ages followed dumb idols, as many do unto this day.

In this chapter of which we treat, the gospel is forbidden to be preached in Asia and Bithynia;—which restraint, the Lord by his providence as yet continues to many parts of the world. Now, the purpose from whence this proceedeth, and whereby it is regulated, you have, Rom. ix. 22, "What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction?" compared with Matt. xi. 25, 26, "Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent. Even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight;" and with Acts xiv. 16,he "suffered all nations to walk in their own ways." Now, God's not sending the truth, hath the same design and aim with his sending the efficacy of error; viz., "that they all may be damned" who have it not; "there being no other name under heaven, whereby they may be saved," but only that which is not revealed unto them; -God, in the meantime, being no more the cause of their sins, for which they incur damnation, than the sun is the cause of cold and darkness, which follow the absence thereof: or he is the cause of a man's imprisonment for debt, who will not pay his debt for him, though he be no way obliged so to do. So, then, the not sending of the gospel to any people, is an act regulated by that eternal purpose of God whereby he determineth to advance the glory of his justice, by permitting some men to sin, to continue in their sin, and for sin

3

"Deus non operatur in malis, quod ei displicet; sed operatur per eos quod ei placet, recipientur vero non pro eo, quod Deus bene usus est ipsorum operibus malis, sed pro eo, quod ipsi male abusi sunt Dei operibus bonis."-Fulgent. ad Monim.

22 Thess. ii.; Acts iv.

3" Liberatur pars hominum, parte pereunte. Sed cur horum sit misertus Deus― illorum non misertus, quæ scientia comprehendere, quæ potest investigare sapientia? Latet discretionis istius ratio, sed non latet ipsa discretio."-Prosp. de Vocat. Gen., [lib. i. cap. 15.]

to send them to their own place;-as a king's not sending a pardon to condemned malefactors is an issue of his purpose that they shall die for their faults. When you see the gospel strangely, and through wonderful varieties and unexpected providences, carried away from a people, know that the spirit which moves in those wheels is that purpose of God which we have recounted.

[2.] To some people, to some nations, the gospel is sent. God calls them to repentance and acknowledgment of the truth,-as in my text, Macedonia: and England, the day wherein we breathe. Now, there is in this a twofold aim. 1. Peculiar, towards some in their conversion. 2. General, towards all, for conviction. And therefore it is acted according to a twofold purpose, which carries it along, and is fulfilled thereby.

2

First, His purpose of saving1 some in and by Jesus Christ, effectually to bring them unto himself, for the praise of his glorious grace. Upon whomsoever the seal of the Lord is stamped, that God knows them, and owns them as his, to them he will cause his gospel to be revealed. Acts xviii. 10, Paul is commanded to abide at Corinth, and to preach there, because God had much people in that city. Though the devil had them in present possession, yet they were God's in his eternal counsel. And such as these they were for whose sake the man of Macedonia is sent on his message. Have you never seen the gospel hover about a nation, now and then about to settle, and anon scared and upon wing again; yet working through difficulties, making plains of mountains and filling valleys, overthrowing armies, putting aliens to flight, and at length taking firm root like the cedars of God? Truly if you have not, you are strangers to the place wherein you live. Now, what is all this but the working of the purpose of God to attain its proposed end, of gathering his saints to himself? In the effectual working of grace also for conversion and salvation, whence do you think it takes its rule and determination, in respect of particular objects, that it should be directed to John, not Judas,-Simon Peter, not Simon Magus? Why, only from this discriminating counsel of God from eternity, to bring the one and not the other to himself by Christ. "The Lord added to the church such as should be saved," Acts ii. 47. The purpose of saving is the And Acts xiii. 48, "As

rule of adding to the church of believers. many believed as were ordained to eternal life." Their fore-ordain

* Eph. ii. 1, 11.
elegi, nisi quia non
Non quia præ-
Electi sunt itaque

1 Rom. viii. 28, 29; Eph. i. 4; 2 Tim. ii. 19. "Non ob aliud dicit, non vos me elegistis, sed ego vos elegerunt eum, ut eligeret eos; sed ut eligerent eum, elegit eos. scivit eos credituros, sed quia facturus ipse fuerit credentes. ante mundi constitutionem, eâ prædestinatione, quâ Deus ipse sua futura facta prævidit: electi sunt autem de mundo eâ vocatione, quâ Deus id, quod prædestinavit, implevit."-August. de Prædest. Sanctorum. cap. xvi., xvii.

ing to life eternal gives them right to faith and belief. pose of God's election is the rule of dispensing saving grace.

The pur

Secondly, His purpose of leaving some inexcusable1 in their sins, for the farther manifestation of his glorious justice, is the rule of dispensing the word unto them. Did you never see the gospel sent or continued to an unthankful people, bringing forth no fruits meet for it? Wherefore it is so sent, see Isa vi. 9, 10;-which prophecy you have fulfilled, John xii. 37-41; in men described, Jude 4, and 1 Pet. ii. 8. But here we must strike sail, the waves swell, and it is no easy task to sail in this gulf. The righteousness of God is a great mountain, easy to be seen; but his judgments are like the great deep: who can search into the bottom thereof? Ps. xxxvi. 6. And so I have, I hope, discovered how all things here below, concerning the promulgation of the gospel, are, in their greatest variety, straightly regulated by the eternal purposes and counsel of God.

The uses of it follow.

Use 1. To discover whence it is that the work of reforming the worship of God, and settling the almost departing gospel, hath so powerfully been carried along in this nation;-that a beautiful fabric is seen to arise in the midst of all oppositions, with the confusion of axes and hammers sounding about it, though the builders have been forced oftentimes, not only with one hand, but with both, to hold the weapons of war;-that although the wheels of our chariots have been knocked off, and they driven heavily, yet the regular motions of the superior wheels of providence have carried on the design towards the resting-place aimed at;-that the ship hath been directed to the port, though the storm had quite puzzled the pilots and mariners:—even from hence, that all this great variety was but to work out one certain fore-appointed end, proceeding in the tracts and paths which were traced out for it from eternity; which, though they have seemed to us a maze or labyrinth, such a world of contingencies and various chances hath the work passed through, yet, indeed, all the passages thereof have been regular and straight, answering the platform laid down for the whole in the counsel of God. Daniel, chap. ix., makes his supplication for the restoration of Jerusalem; verse 23, an angel is sent to tell him, that "at the beginning of his supplication the commandment came forth,"-viz., that it should be accomplished. It was before determined, and is now set on work; but yet what mountains of opposition, what hinderances lay in the way! Cyrus must come to the crown by the death or slaughter of Darius, his heart be moved to send some to the work: in a short time Cyrus is cut off.

4

1 Matt. xi. 21; Acts xiii. 46.
2 Luke ii. 34; 1 Pet. ii. 7;
8 Neh. iv. 17.

Ezek. ii. 5; Matt. xxiv. 14; Rom. ix. 22, 23.
Zech. iv. 7.
Scal. de Emend. Temp.