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You neither know how much, nor how long you can bear and suffer. It is not inherent, but assisting grace, by which your suffering abilities are to be measured. God can make that little stock of patience you have to hold out as the poor widow's cruise of oil did, 'till deliverance come; he can enable your patience unto its perfect work, (i. e.) to work as extensively to all the kinds and forts of trials, as intensively to the highest degree of trial, and as protensively to the longest duration and continuance of your trials, as he would have it: if this be a marvellous thing in your eyes, muft it be so in God's eyes al fo?

2. The Lord knows the proper season to come in to the relief of your fliding and fainting patience, and will assuredly come in accordingly in that season; for so run the promises, "The Lord shall judge his people, and repent himself for his " servants, when he seeth that their power is gone, and that

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there is none shut up or left," Deut. xxxii. 36. Cum duplicantur lateres venit Mofes ; in the mount of difficulties and extremities it shall be seen. "The rod of the wicked shall not " rest upon the lot of the righteous, lest the righteous put forth " their hands unto iniquity," Pfal. cxxv. 3. Ubi definit humanum, ibi incipit divinum auxilium; God's power watches the opportunity of your weakness.

Plea 7. But what if I should be put to cruel and exquisite tortures, suppose to the rack, to the fire, or such most dreadful fufferings as other Christians have been? What shall I do? Do I think I am able to bear it? Is my strength the strength of stone, or are my bones brass, that ever I should endure such barbarous cruelties? Alas! Death in the mildest form is terrible to me: how terrible then must such a death be?

Answer. Who enabled those Christians you mention to endure these things? They loved their lives, and sensed their pains as well as you, they had the fame thoughts and fears, many of them, that you now have; yet God carried them thro' all, and so he can you. Did not he make the devouring flames a bed of roses to some of them? Was he not within the fires ? Did he not abate the extremity of the torment, and enable weak and tender perfons to endure them patiently and chearfully? Some finging in the midst of flames, others clapping their hands triumphantly, and to the last fight that could be had of them in this world, nothing appeared but figns and demonstrations of joy unspeakable. Ah friends! we judge of fufferings by the out-side and appearance, which is terrible; but we know not the infide of sufferings, which is exceeding com

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Fortable, Oh! when shall we have done with our unbelieving iss and buts, our questionings and doubtings of the power, wisdom, and tender care of our God over us, and learn to trust him over all. Now the just fhall live by faith; and he that lives by faith shall never die by fear. The more you trust God, the less you will torment yourselves. I have done; the Lord strengthen, stablish, and fettle the trembling and feeble hearts of his people, by what hath been so seasonably offered for their

relief by a weak hand. Amen.

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THE

RIGHTEOUS MAN'S REFUGE.

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THE EPISTLE TO THE READER.

Chriftian Reader,

IF * Heinfius, when he had shut up himself in the library at Leyden, reckoned himself placed in the very lap of "eternity, because he conversed there with so many divine "fouls, and professed, he took his feat in it with so lofty a spi" rit and sweet content, that he heartily pitied all the great "and rich men of the world, that were ignorant of the happi" ness he there daily enjoyed:" How much more may that foul rejoice in its own happiness, who hath thut himself up in the chambers of the Divine Attributes, and exerciseth pity for the exposed and miferable multitude that are left as a prey to the temptations and troubles of the world.

That the days are evil, is a truth preached to us by the convincing voice of sense; and that they are like to be worse, few can doubt that look into the moral causes of evil times, the impudent height of fin, or into the prophefies relating to these

* Plerumque in qua fimulac pedem pofui, foribus pessulum obdo, et in ipfo æternitatis gremio inter tot illuftres animas fedem mihi fumo; cum ingenti quidem animo, ut fubinde magnatum me mifereat qui felicitatem hanc ignorant. Epistola primar.

VOL. IV.

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latter days; for whom the sharpest sufferings are appointed, to make way for the sweetest mercies. A faithful + watchman of our own, hath given us fresh and late warning in these words of truth: Hath God faid nothing? doth faith fee nothing of a flood coming upon us? Is there fuch a deluge of fin among us, and doth not that prophecy to us a deluge of wrath? Lift up your eyes, Chriftians, ftand, and look through the land, eastward and westward, northward and fouthward, and tell me what you See? Behold, a flood cometh; a flood of fin is already broken forth upon us, the fountains of the great deeps are broken up, and the windows of hell are opened, &c. In such an evil day as this is, happy is the foul that hath made God its refuge, even the most high God its habitation. He shall fit Noah-like, Mediis tranquillus in undis, fafe from the fear of evil. In confideration of the distress of many unprovided fouls for the misery that is coming on them, and not knowing how short my time will be ufeful to any, (for I know it cannot be long) I have endeavoured once more, the assistance of poor Christians in these two small treatises, one of fear, the other of preparation for the worst of times; which, it may be, is the last help I shall this way be able to afford them. It is therefore my earnest request to all that fear the Lord, and tremble at his word, to redeem their time with double diligence, because the days are evil; to clear up their interest in Christ and the promises, lest the darkness of their spiritul estate, meeting with such a night of outward darkness, overwhelm them with terrors insupportable. Some help is offered in this treatise to direct the gracious soul to its rest in God: May the blessings of his Spirit accompany them, and bless them to the foul of him that readeth; it will be a matter of joy, beyond all earthly joys, to the heart of,

Thy friend and fervant in Christ,

JOHN FLAVEL.

† Mr. R. A. of Godly Fear, p. 19.

Ila. xxvi. 20. Come my People, enter thou into thy chambers, and Sout thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be over-paft.

CHAP. I.

Wherein the literal and real importance of the text is confidered, the doctrine propounded, and the method of the following discourse ftated.

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Sect. I. M AN being a prudent and prospecting creature, can never be satisfied with present safety, except he may also see himself well secured againft future dangers. Upon all appearance of trouble, it is natural for him to seek a re fuge, that he may be able to shun what he is loath to suffer, and furvive those calamities which will ruin the defenceless and exposed multitude. Natural men seek refuge in natural things. "The rich man's wealth is his strong city, and as an high "wall in his own conceit," Prov xviii. 11. Hypocrites make lies their refuge, and under falshood do they hide themselves, Ifa. xxviii. 15. not doubting but they shall stand dry and safe, when the over-flowing flood lays all others under water. But,

Godly men make God himself their hiding-place, to him they have still betaken themselves in all ages, as often as calamities have befallen the world, Pfal. xlvi. 1. "God is our

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refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble." As chickens run under the wings of the hen for safety when the kite hovers over them, so do they fly to their God for sanctuary, Pfal. lvi. 3. "At what time I am afraid I will trust in thee;" q. d. Lord, if a storm of trouble at any time overtake me, I will make bold to come under thy roof for shelter; and indeed not so bold as welcome; it is no presumption in them after so gracious an invitation from their God, "Come, my people, enter " thou into thy chambers."

My friends, a sound of trouble is in our ears, the clouds gather and blacken upon us more and more: Distress of nations with perplexity seems to be near, our day hastens to an end, and the shadows of the night are stretching forth upon us. What greater service therefore can I do for your fouls, than by the light of this fcripture (as with a candle in my hand) to lead you

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to your chambers, and shew you your lodgings in the attributes and promises of God, before I take my leave of you, and bid you good night.

O with what fatisfaction should I part with you, were I but fure to leave you under Christ's wings! It was Christ's lamentation over Jerufalem, that they would not be gathered under his wings, when the Roman eagle was ready to hover over that city; and you know how dear they paid for their obstinacy and infidelity. Be warned by that dreadful example, and among the rest of your mercies bless God heartily for this, that so sweet a voice sounds from heaven in your ears this day, this day of frights and troubles; "Come, my people, enter thou in"to thy chambers," &c.

This chapter contains a lovely song fitted for the lips of God's Ifrael, notwithstanding their sad captivity; for their God was with them in Babylon, and cheered their hearts there with many promises of deliverance, and in the mystical sense, it relates to the new teftament churches, of whose troubles, protections, and deliverances, the Jews in Babylon were a type.

This chapter, though full of excellent and seasonable truths, will be too long to analize; it shall suffice to search back only to the 17th verse, where you find the poor captivated church under despondency of mind, comparing her condition to that of a woman in travail, who hath many sharp pains, and bitter throws, yet cannot be delivered, much like that in 2 Kings xix. 3. "The children are come to the birth, and there is no " strength to bring forth."

Against this discouragement a double relief is applied in the following verses, the one is a promise of full deliverance at Jast; the other an invitation into a furę fanctuary and place of defence for the present, until the time of their full deliverance came. The promise we have in verse 19. "Thy dead men shall

live, together with my dead body shall they arife: awake and "sing ye that dwell in the dust," &c. Their captivity was a civil death, and Babylon as a grave to them. So it is elsewhere described, Ezek. xxxvii. 1, 2, 3, 14. " I will open your graves, " and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you " into the land of Ifrael." And therefore their deliverance is carried under the notion of a refurrection in that promise.

Object. Yea, (might they reply) the hopes of deliverance at Jast is fome comfort, but alas, that may be far off: How thall we fubfift till then?

Solut. Well enough, for as you have in that promife a fure, ground of deliverance at last, so in the interim here is a graci

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