Strange. I bought that book months ago. It’s already been released…
EDIT: ah, now I see…paperback is coming.
What struck me the hardest the first time I read the piece was the response to the charges that the King had been attacking the colonies: " The Acts of a justly incensed Sovereign for suppressing a most unnatural , unprovoked Rebellion, are here assigned as the causes of this Rebellion."
The colonists attacked the government. When the government responded in kind, the colonists acted aggrieved. It reminds me of the current situation in American cities: “Peaceful protestors” riot, then when police respond with force to quell the riot, the cries of “fascism” rise. It’s chutzpah, but in industrial quantities.
And to reap what our fathers sowed, Jefferson is cited in defense of tearing down statues of Jefferson. May God have mercy on us.
Thanks for the link to the Loyalist sermons. I pre-ordered it.
1 Like
The Declaration of Independence has a lot more list than merely taxation.
1 Like
How is it slander to remind readers of someone’s political views and track record? It’s called context.
Do you have evidence that he was a traitor or corrupt, or are you relying on the mob to make your decisions for you? Let me remind you what the mob thinks about people like you and me today…
Perhaps you didn’t notice those words, but they cannot be described as his political views or his track record.
1 Like
De Tocqueville cites a history of Massachusetts Bay colony by one Hutchinson. I looked up the history book on a hunch and, turns out Thomas Hutchinson was the author. I don’t know how scholars view his work, but he had enough affection for Massachusetts that he bothered to write a history of the colony.
My go to source of Wikipedia says that some of Hutchinson’s manuscript was destroyed by a mob that invaded his home. Reading about Boston during those days felt…familiar.
Hutchinson lived in exile in London after 1774. He was treated rather poorly by the British prime minister, Lord North. His home and possessions in America were seized and given to the family of a political enemy. I had never heard of him until like, this week, but he seems to have gotten a raw deal.
Well I did say ‘he was viewed’ rather than ‘in my opinion he was’ which isn’t the mob’s decision made for me, but historian’s. They (more than just a mob) regarded him as such regardless of what I think of his political views. Looking back I think it’s too easy for us to let Hutchinson off the hook, though an argument can certainly be made, a convincing one at that. But can we really say that while he had some good solid and held some good personal views, that he, at the time, was unfairly treated? Maybe, but maybe not. He was a political figure and had a public responsibility for the people he was governing and to the King and Parliament. I think it’s far too tricky to pin him down on either side fully and completely, but I do think a case can be made that from the colonist point of view, he certainly was against them, and from their perspective wrong, and therefore justified in some sense of viewing him a traitor. I’m not trying to be relativistic, but trying to look at things at ground level.
The problem for Hutchinson was that he was continually, throughout his career, on the side against natural rights. (I guess that’s not a problem for those who are also against natural rights). Even if–in spite of his skepticism of natural rights–he personally was sympathetic to the other side and sided with them in minor instances, he was publicly not on their side. That cast him in a light (fair or unfair) that called into question all of his decisions from the moment he let that flag fly. For example, when a petition to Parliament wasn’t worded as strongly as it could have been, even though he was voicing the complaint of the colonists, he was blamed for secretly siding with Parliament.
There’s no doubt he was stuck between a rock and a hard place, but in a land where people had no representation, in a number of instances when the people felt he should’ve been publicly on their side, effectively representing their views to Parliament, he came off as wishy washy. I think we get the same vibe today when republican voters call a politician a RHINO or part of the establishment. Good men (we were told!) who continually drop the ball at the precise moment we need them to score. It’s natural for us to begin to wonder about them.
While it is true that Hutchinson was the subject of conspiracy theories that attributed to him motives and actions that were exaggerated or outright false, Hutchinson himself attributed exaggerated or false motives to the citizens of Boston, including men we hold in high esteem today, like Samuel Adams. And over time you can detect a strong contempt (fair or unfair) of his view of the citizens of Boston. He was also habitually tone deaf. Even England, while agreeing with him in principle, questioned they way in which he handled things, noting he tended to increase the heat in an already boiling pot.
So there was distrust from both sides and when Samuel Adams released a pamphlet discussing the rights of the citizens of Boston and the limits of Parliament, Hutchinson publicly sided with Parliament, and it was he himself that sort of laid down the line and by his own reasoning concluded that either the colonies were vassals of the Parliament or completely independent.
The final straw was what we’d call a ‘leak’ today. Letters from Hutchinson discussing how the Mass. government could be restructured in such a way as to essentially give Parliament more power. In it a number of issues were discussed (such as the desire to send certain ‘dangerous’ patriot leaders to England for trial and statements about abridging liberties) which more or less sealed the deal for him. Here’s where we start seeing him called a traitor, demands for him to resign, etc. And this was all before the Tea Party debacle, in which all of the previous suspicions were augmented for both solid and shaky reasons. (His actions leading up to the Tea Party, in light of other governors who were dealing with the same issues at the time and how they defused the situation, reveal how intransigent he was, and highlights the real grievances of the citizens of Massachusetts. In a real, legitimate way, even with his bad reputation, had he handled this situation like the other governors by just sending the ships back, things may have never escalated as they did, and who knows what would have happened.)
Despite his personal views, despite his efforts to follow the letter of the law, he publicly became an embarrassment in the colonies and eventually an embarrassment in England. The best I can surmise is that he was a moderate politician, but in the worst way. Mostly right personally, mostly wrong publicly. When the time came to make the right decision (whether it was the right decision for the colonies or for England) he seemed to bungle it up (usually for both at the same time) and I get the sense that he felt he, not the patriots or the Parliament, was the only person who was right. He was so conscientious as to be completely useless to anyone, and worse than useless, he became incendiary.
But let’s be done with the idea that he was considered a traitor or corrupt merely by the mob. Unless you include such persons as John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, John Hancock, and Samuel Adams as ‘the mob’. Mobs don’t react by calling public debates. Mobs don’t call together a Continental Congress in reaction to political decisions and office holders foisted upon them by people like Hutchinson later did in England. (To be fair, Hutchinson did suffer early on at the hands of a mob which was rightly criticized and punished). If you want to cast the Boston Tea participants as ‘the mob’ well then I’ll just have to say May God grant us more mobs like that.
3 Likes
I think you misunderstood me. I was not arguing anything about Hutchison.
My previous response should have been simpler. Here is my point, simplified: Andrew was not accusing anybody of slander, and especially not you. I needed to make that clear, given the comment I was responding to. He was simply saying we better be careful, given the incentives at the time, to not simply take what the people of that time thought about him uncritically.
I do not want this topic to turn acrimonious based on a single commenter’s misconstrual of what was said.
1 Like
If that’s the context, I agree, but I didn’t think my comments were made in a way that made it seem I was accepting or pushing something uncritically.
I see the danger of romanticizing the American story of independence, but I also see the danger of modernizing it too, such as believing that all the founders were purely political with no other motivations influencing them.
1 Like
Watching Mel Gibson’s The Patriot this very moment. That is all. 
2 Likes
I’ve been watching that movie too! One of my favorite movies for sure.
2 Likes
I spent some time studying John Witherspoon the past few weeks. I was interested to understand how a Presbyterian parson could get so deeply involved in the politics of his time that he would serve the Continental Congress and sign the Declaration, even as he continued his work as the president of Princeton.
Part of the reason I believe he got involved in politics was the fact that he was president of a seminary. His students (divinity students, remember) got caught up in the political fervor. At the same time as the Boston Tea Party (1773), a group of Princeton students stole the campus steward’s winter tea supply, burned it along with an effigy of John Hutchinson. Witherspoon’s punishment: the gang-leader, who would have been valedictorian, was not given commencement honors. Witherspoon was forced to navigate these issues because he had charge of men who would shepherd the coming generation of the church in America.
In May 1776, the Continental Congress asked the Colonies’ pastors to lead the people to contemplate the difficulties that were likely to come very quickly into their lives. On that occasion—Friday, May 1776—Witherspoon delivered a sermon on Psalm 76:10—“Surely the wrath of man shall praise Thee; the remainder of wrath shalt thou restrain.”
Take the time to read the sermon (I’ve pasted a large portion of the sermon below. See bold for my highlights).
I think it is exemplary in that he gets first things first (pleading for souls of a mixed multitude present to hear the sermon), warns against belligerating, expresses that he has seldom entered the pulpit to address political issues (which, I assume, was the continual feature of a certain portion of the rabid Patriots’ pulpits) because he had been committed with the ministry of reconciliation, and gives reasonable answers as to why independence was necessary (distance from Great Britain, being foremost). The whole is sober, humble, practical, and Biblical.
THE DOMINION OF PROVIDENCE OVER THE PASSIONS OF MEN
Surely the Wrath of Man shall praise thee; the remainder of Wrath shalt thou restrain.
Psalm LXXVI. 10.
There is not a greater evidence either of the reality or the power of religion, than a firm belief of God’s universal presence, and a constant attention to the influence and operation of his providence. It is by this means that the Christian may be said, in the emphatical scripture language, “to walk with God, and to endure as seeing him who is invisible.”
The doctrine of divine providence is very full and complete in the sacred oracles. It extends not only to things which we may think of great moment, and therefore worthy of notice, but to things the most indifferent and inconsiderable; “Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing,” says our Lord, “and one of them falleth not to the ground without your heavenly Father”; nay, “the very hairs of your head are all numbered.” It extends not only to things beneficial and salutary, or to the direction and assistance of those who are the servants of the living God; but to things seemingly most hurtful and destructive, and to persons the most refractory and disobedient. He overrules all his creatures, and all their actions. Thus we are told, that “fire, hail, snow, vapour, and stormy wind, fulfil his word,” in the course of nature; and even so the most impetuous and disorderly passions of men, that are under no restraint from themselves, are yet perfectly subject to the dominion of Jehovah. They carry his commission, they obey his orders, they are limited and restrained by his authority, and they conspire with every thing else in promoting his glory. There is the greater need to take notice of this, that men are not generally sufficiently aware of the distinction between the law of God and his purpose; they are apt to suppose, that as the temper of the sinner is contrary to the one, so the outrages of the sinner are able to defeat the other; than which nothing can be more false. The truth is plainly asserted, and nobly expressed by the psalmist in the text, “Surely the wrath of man shall praise thee; the remainder of wrath shalt thou restrain.”
This psalm was evidently composed as a song of praise for some signal victory obtained, which was at the same time a remarkable deliverance from threatening danger. The author was one or other of the later prophets, and the occasion probably the unsuccessful assault of Jerusalem, by the army of Sennacherib king of Assyria, in the days of Hezekiah. Great was the insolence and boasting of his generals and servants against the city of the living God, as may be seen in the thirty-sixth chapter of Isaiah. Yet it pleased God to destroy their enemies, and, by his own immediate interposition, to grant them deliverance. Therefore the Psalmist says in the fifth and sixth verses of this psalm, “The stout-hearted are spoiled, they have slept their sleep. None of the men of might have found their hands. At thy rebuke, O God of Jacob! both the chariot and the horse are cast into a deep sleep.” After a few more remarks to the same purpose, he draws the inference, or makes the reflection in the text, “Surely the wrath of man shall praise thee; the remainder of wrath shalt thou restrain”: which may be paraphrased thus, The fury and injustice of oppressors shall bring in a tribute of praise to thee; the influence of thy righteous providence shall be clearly discerned; the countenance and support thou wilt give to thine own people shall be gloriously illustrated; thou shalt set the bounds which the boldest cannot pass.
I am sensible, my brethren, that the time and occasion of this psalm, may seem to be in one respect ill suited to the interesting circumstances of this country at present. It was composed after the victory was obtained; whereas we are now but putting on the harness and entering upon an important contest, the length of which it is impossible to foresee, and the issue of which it will perhaps be thought presumption to foretell. But as the truth, with respect to God’s moral government, is the same and unchangeable; as the issue, in the case of Sennacherib’s invasion, did but lead the prophet to acknowledge it; our duty and interest conspire in calling upon us to improve it. And I have chosen to insist upon it on this day of solemn humiliation, as it will probably help us to a clear and explicit view of what should be the chief subject of our prayers and endeavors, as well as the great object of our hope and trust, in our present situation.
The truth, then, asserted in this text, which I propose to illustrate and improve, is, That all the disorderly passions of men, whether exposing the innocent to private injury, or whether they are the arrows of divine judgment in public calamity, shall, in the end, be to the praise of God: Or, to apply it more particularly to the present state of the American colonies, and the plague of war, The ambition of mistaken princes, the cunning and cruelty of oppressive and corrupt ministers, and even the inhumanity of brutal soldiers, however dreadful, shall finally promote the glory of God, and in the mean time, while the storm continues, his mercy and kindness shall appear in prescribing bounds to their rage and fury.
In discoursing on this subject, it is my intention, through the assistance of divine grace,
I. To point out to you in some particulars, how the wrath of man praises God.
II. To apply these principles to our present situation, by inferences of truth for your instruction and comfort, and by suitable exhortations to duty in the important crisis.In the first place, I am to point out to you in some particulars, how the wrath of man praises God. I say in some instances, because it is far from being in my power, either to mention or explain the whole. There is an unsearchable depth in the divine counsels, which it is impossible for us to penetrate. It is the duty of every good man to place the most unlimited confidence in divine wisdom, and to believe that those measures of providence that are most unintelligible to him, are yet planned with the same skill, and directed to the same great purposes as others, the reason and tendency of which he can explain in the clearest manner. But where revelation and experience enables us to discover the wisdom, equity, or mercy of divine providence, nothing can be more delightful or profitable to a serious mind, and therefore I beg your attention to the following remarks.
In the first place, the wrath of man praises God, as it is an example and illustration of divine truth, and clearly points out the corruption of our nature, which is the foundation stone of the doctrine of redemption. Nothing can be more absolutely necessary to true religion, than a clear and full conviction of the sinfulness of our nature and state. Without this there can be neither repentance in the sinner, nor humility in the believer. Without this all that is said in scripture of the wisdom and mercy of God in providing a Saviour, is without force and without meaning. Justly does our Saviour say, “The whole have no need of a physician, but those that are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” Those who are not sensible that they are sinners, will treat every exhortation to repentance, and every offer of mercy, with disdain or defiance.
But where can we have a more affecting view of the corruption of our nature, than in the wrath of man, when exerting itself in oppression, cruelty and blood? It must be owned, indeed, that this truth is abundantly manifest in times of the greatest tranquility. Others may, if they please, treat the corruption of our nature as a chimera: for my part, I see it every where, and I feel it every day. All the disorders in human society, and the greatest part even of the unhappiness we are exposed to, arises from the envy, malice, covetousness, and other lusts of man. If we and all about us were just what we ought to be in all respects, we should not need to go any further for heaven, for it would be upon earth. But war and violence present a spectacle still more awful. How affecting is it to think, that the lust of domination should be so violent and universal? That men should so rarely be satisfied with their own possessions and acquisitions, or even with the benefit that would arise from mutual service, but should look upon the happiness and tranquility of others, as an obstruction to their own? That, as if the great law of nature, were not enough, “Dust thou art, and to dust thou shalt return,” they should be so furiously set for the destruction of each other? It is shocking to think, since the first murder of Abel by his brother Cain, what havock has been made of man by man in every age. What is it that fills the pages of history, but the wars and contentions of princes and empires? What vast numbers has lawless ambition brought into the field, and delivered as a prey to the destructive sword?
If we dwell a little upon the circumstances, they become deeply affecting. The mother bears a child with pain, rears him by the laborious attendance of many years; yet in the prime of life, in the vigor of health, and bloom of beauty, in a moment he is cut down by the dreadful instruments of death. “Every battle of the warrior is with confused noise, and garments rolled in blood”; but the horror of the scene is not confined to the field of slaughter. Few go there unrelated, or fall unlamented; in every hostile encounter, what must be the impression upon the relations of the deceased? The bodies of the dead can only be seen, or the cries of the dying heard for a single day, but many days shall not put an end to the mourning of a parent for a beloved son, the joy and support of his age, or of the widow and helpless offspring, for a father taken away in the fullness of health and vigor.
But if this may be justly said of all wars between man and man, what shall we be able to say that is suitable to the abhorred scene of civil war between citizen and citizen? How deeply affecting is it, that those who are the same in complexion, the same in blood, in language, and in religion, should, notwithstanding, butcher one another with unrelenting rage, and glory in the deed? That men should lay waste the fields of their fellow subjects, with whose provision they themselves had been often fed, and consume with devouring fire those houses in which they had often found a hospitable shelter.
These things are apt to overcome a weak mind with fear, or overwhelm it with sorrow, and in the greatest number are apt to excite the highest indignation, and kindle up a spirit of revenge. If this last has no other tendency than to direct and invigorate the measures of self-defence, I do not take upon me to blame it, on the contrary, I call it necessary and laudable.
But what I mean at this time to prove by the preceding reflections, and wish to impress on your minds, is the depravity of our nature. James iv. i. “From whence come wars and fighting among you? come they not hence even from your lusts that war in your members?” Men of lax and corrupt principles, take great delight in speaking to the praise of human nature, and extolling its dignity, without distinguishing what it was, at its first creation, from what it is in its present fallen state. These fine speculations are very grateful to a worldly mind. They are also much more pernicious to uncautious and unthinking youth, than even the temptations to a dissolute and sensual life, against which they are fortified by the dictates of natural conscience, and a sense of public shame. But I appeal from these visionary reasonings to the history of all ages, and the inflexible testimony of daily experience. These will tell us what men have been in their practice, and from thence you may judge what they are by nature, while unrenewed. If I am not mistaken, a cool and candid attention, either to the past history, or present state of the world, but above all, to the ravages of lawless power, ought to humble us in the dust. It should at once lead us to acknowlege the just view given us in scripture of our lost state; to desire the happy influence of renewing grace each for ourselves; and to long for the dominion of righteousness and peace, when “men shall beat their swords into plow-shares, and their spears into pruning hooks; when nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.” Mic iv. 3.
[TWO] The wrath of man praiseth God, as it is the instrument in his hand for bringing sinners to repentance, and for the correction and improvement of his own children. Whatever be the nature of the affliction with which he visits either persons, families, or nations; whatever be the disposition or intention of those whose malice he employs as a scourge; the design on his part is, to rebuke men for iniquity, to bring them to repentance, and to promote their holiness and peace. The salutary nature and sanctifying influence of affliction in general, is often taken notice of in scripture, both as making a part of the purpose of God, and the experience of his saints. Heb. xii. 11. “Now, no affliction for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: Nevertheless, afterwards it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.” But what we are particularly led to observe by the subject of this discourse is, that the wrath of man, or the violence of the oppressor that praiseth God in this respect, it has a peculiar tendency to alarm the secure conscience, to convince and humble the obstinate sinner. This is plain from the nature of the thing, and from the testimony of experience. Public calamities, particularly the destroying sword, is so awful that it cannot but have a powerful influence in leading men to consider the presence and the power of God. It threatens them not only in themselves, but touches them in all that is dear to them, whether relations or possessions. The prophet Isaiah says, Is. xxvi. 8, 9. “Yea, in the way of thy judgments, O Lord, have we waited for thee,—for when thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.” He considers it as the most powerful mean of alarming the secure and subduing the obstinate. Is. xxvi. 11. “Lord when thy hand is lifted up, they will not see, but they shall see and be ashamed for their envy at the people, yea the fire of thine enemies shall devour them.” It is also sometimes represented as a symptom of a hopeless and irrecoverable state, when public judgments have no effect. Thus says the prophet Jeremiah, Jer. v. 3. “O Lord, are not thine eyes upon the truth? thou hast stricken them, but they have not grieved; thou hast consumed them, but they have refused to receive correction: they have made their faces harder than a rock, they have refused to return.” We can easily see in the history of the children of Israel, how severe strokes brought them to submission and penitence, Ps. lxxviii. 34, 35. “When he slew them, then they sought him, and they returned and inquired early after God, and they remembered that God was their rock, and the high God their redeemer.”
Both nations in general, and private persons, are apt to grow remiss and lax in a time of prosperity and seeming security; but when their earthly comforts are endangered or withdrawn, it lays them under a kind of necessity to seek for something better in their place. Men must have comfort from one quarter or another. When earthly things are in a pleasing and promising condition, too many are apt to find their rest, and be satisfied with them as their only portion. But when the vanity and passing nature of all created comfort is discovered, they are compelled to look for something more durable as well as valuable. What therefore, can be more to the praise of God, than that when a whole people have forgotten their resting place, when they have abused their privileges, and despised their mercies, they should by distress and suffering be made to hearken to the rod, and return to their duty?
There is an inexpressible depth and variety in the judgments of God, as in all his other works; but we may lay down this as a certain principle, that if there were no sin, there could be no suffering. Therefore they are certainly for the correction of sin, or for the trial, illustration, and perfecting of the grace and virtue of his own people. We are not to suppose, that those who suffer most, or who suffer soonest, are therefore more criminal than others. Our Saviour himself thought it necessary to give a caution against this rash conclusion, as we are informed by the evangelist Luke, Luke xiii. 1. “There were present at that season some that told him of the Galileans, whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And Jesus answering said unto them, Suppose ye that these Galileans were sinners above all the Galileans, because they suffered such things? I tell you nay, but except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.” I suppose we may say with sufficient warrant, that it often happens, that those for whom God hath designs of the greatest mercy, are first brought to the trial, that they may enjoy in due time the salutary effect of the unpalatable medicine.
I must also take leave to observe, and I hope no pious humble sufferer will be unwilling to make the application, that there is often a discernible mixture of sovereignty and righteousness in providential dispensations. It is the prerogative of God to do what he will with his own, but he often displays his justice itself, by throwing into the furnace those, who though they may not be visibly worse than others, may yet have more to answer for, as having been favored with more distinguished privileges, both civil and sacred. It is impossible for us to make a just and full comparison of the character either of persons or nations, and it would be extremely foolish for any to attempt it, either for increasing their own security, or impeaching the justice of the Supreme Ruler. Let us therefore neither forget the truth, nor go beyond it. “His mercy fills the earth.” He is also “known by the judgment which he executeth.” The wrath of man in its most tempestuous rage, fulfills his will, and finally promotes the good of his chosen.
[THREE] The wrath of man praiseth God, as he sets bounds to it, or restrains it by his providence, and sometimes makes it evidently a mean of promoting and illustrating his glory.
There is no part of divine providence in which a greater beauty and majesty appears, than when the Almighty Ruler turns the counsels of wicked men into confusion, and makes them militate against themselves. If the psalmist may be thought to have had a view in this text to the truths illustrated in the two former observations, there is no doubt at all that he had a particular view to this, as he says in the latter part of the verse, “the remainder of wrath shalt thou restrain.” The scripture abounds with instances, in which the designs of oppressors were either wholly disappointed, or in execution fell far short of the malice of their intention, and in some they turned out to the honor and happiness of the persons or the people, whom they were intended to destroy. We have an instance of the first of these in the history to which my text relates. We have also an instance in Esther, in which the most mischievous designs of Haman, the son of Hammedatha the Agagite against Mordecai the Jew, and the nation from which he sprung, turned out at last to his own destruction, the honor of Mordecai, and the salvation and peace of his people.
From the New Testament I will make choice of that memorable event on which the salvation of believers in every age rests as its foundation, the death and sufferings of the Son of God. This the great adversary and all his agents and instruments prosecuted with unrelenting rage. When they had blackened him with slander, when they scourged him with shame, when they had condemned him in judgment, and nailed him to the cross, how could they help esteeming their victory complete? But oh the unsearchable wisdom of God! they were but perfecting the great design laid for the salvation of sinners. Our blessed Redeemer by his death finished his work, overcame principalities and powers, and made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in his cross. With how much justice do the apostles and their company offer this doxology to God, “They lift up their voice with one accord, and said, Lord thou art God which hast made heaven and earth, and the sea, and all that in them is; Who by the mouth of thy servant David hast said, Why did the Heathen rage, and the people imagine vain things? The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord, and against his Christ. For of a truth, against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel were gathered together, for to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.” Acts iv. 24. 28.
In all after ages, in conformity to this, the deepest laid contrivances of the prince of darkness, have turned out to the confusion of their author; and I know not, but considering his malice and pride, this perpetual disappointment, and the superiority of divine wisdom, may be one great source of his suffering and torment. The cross hath still been the banner of truth, under which it hath been carried through the world. Persecution has been but as the furnace to the gold, to purge it of its dross, to manifest its purity, and increase its lustre. It was taken notice of very early, that the blood of the martyrs was the seed of christianity; the more abundantly it was shed, the more plentifully did the harvest grow.
So certain has this appeared, that the most violent infidels, both of early and later ages, have endeavored to account for it, and have observed that there is a spirit of obstinacy in man which inclines him to resist violence, and that severity doth but increase opposition, be the cause what it will. They suppose that persecution is equally proper to propagate truth and error. This though in part true, will by no means generally hold. Such an apprehension, however, gave occasion to a glorious triumph of divine providence of an opposite kind, which I must shortly relate to you. One of the Roman emperors, Julian, surnamed the apostate, perceiving how impossible it was to suppress the gospel by violence, endeavored to extinguish it by neglect and scorn. He left the Christians unmolested for sometime, but gave all manner of encouragement to those of opposite principles, and particularly to the Jews, out of hatred to the Christians; and that he might bring public disgrace upon the Galileans, as he affected to stile them, he encouraged the Jews to rebuild the temple of Jerusalem, and visibly refute the prophecy of Christ, that it should lie under perpetual desolation. But this profane attempt was so signally frustrated, that it served, as much as any one circumstance, to spread the glory of our Redeemer, and establish the faith of his saints. It is affirmed by some ancient authors, particularly by Ammianus Marcellinus, a heathen historian, that fire came out of the earth and consumed the workmen when laying the foundation. But in whatever way it was prevented, it is beyond all controversy, from the concurring testimony of heathens and Christians, that little or no progress was ever made in it, and that in a short time, it was entirely defeated.
It is proper here to observe, that at the time of the reformation, when religion began to revive, nothing contributed more to facilitate its reception and increase its progress than the violence of its persecutors. Their cruelty and the patience of the sufferers, naturally disposed men to examine and weigh the cause to which they adhered with so much constancy and resolution. At the same time also, when they were persecuted in one city, they fled to another, and carried the discoveries of popish fraud to every part of the world. It was by some of those who were persecuted in Germany, that the light of the reformation was brought so early into Britain.
The power of divine providence appears with the most distinguished lustre, when small and inconsiderable circumstances, and sometimes, the weather and seasons, have defeated the most formidable armaments, and frustrated the best concerted expeditions. Near two hundred years ago, the monarchy of Spain was in the height of its power and glory, and determined to crush the interest of the reformation. They sent out a powerful armament against Britain, giving it ostentatiously, and in my opinion profanely, the name of the Invincible Armada. But it pleased God so entirely to discomfit it by tempests, that a small part of it returned home, though no British force had been opposed to it at all.
We have a remarkable instance of the influence of small circumstances in providence in the English history. The two most remarkable persons in the civil wars, had earnestly desired to withdraw themselves from the contentions of the times, Mr. Hampden and Oliver Cromwell. They had actually taken their passage in a ship for New England, when by an arbitrary order of council they were compelled to remain at home. The consequence of this was, that one of them was the soul of the republican opposition to monarchical usurpation during the civil wars, and the other in the course of that contest, was the great instrument in bringing the tyrant to the block.
The only other historical remark I am to make, is, that the violent persecution which many eminent Christians met with in England from their brethren, who called themselves Protestants, drove them in great numbers to a distant part of the world, where the light of the gospel and true religion were unknown. Some of the American settlements, particularly those in New-England, were chiefly made by them; and as they carried the knowledge of Christ to the dark places of the earth, so they continue themselves in as great a degree of purity, of faith, and strictness of practice, or rather a greater, than is to be found in any protestant church now in the world. Does not the wrath of man in this instance praise God? Was not the accuser of the brethren, who stirs up their enemies, thus taken in his own craftiness, and his kingdom shaken by the very means which he employed to establish it.
II. Proceed now to the second general head, which was to apply the principles illustrated above to our present situation, by inferences of truth for your instruction and comfort, and by suitable exhortations to duty in this important crisis. And,
In the first place, I would take the opportunity on this occasion, and from this subject, to press every hearer to a sincere concern for his own soul’s salvation. There are times when the mind may be expected to be more awake to divine truth, and the conscience more open to the arrows of conviction, than at others. A season of public judgment is of this kind, as appears from what has been already said. That curiosity and attention at least are raised in some degree, is plain from the unusual throng of this assembly. Can you have a clearer view of the sinfulness of your nature, than when the rod of the oppressor is lifted up, and when you see men putting on the habit of the warrior, and collecting on every hand the weapons of hostility and instruments of death? I do not blame your ardor in preparing for the resolute defence of your temporal rights. But consider I beseech you, the truly infinite importance of the salvation of your souls. Is it of much moment whether you and your children shall be rich or poor, at liberty or in bonds? Is it of much moment whether this beautiful country shall increase in fruitfulness from year to year, being cultivated by active industry, and possessed by independent freemen, or the scanty produce of the neglected fields shall be eaten up by hungry publicans, while the timid owner trembles at the tax gatherers approach? And is it of less moment my brethren, whether you shall be the heirs of glory or the heirs of hell? Is your state on earth for a few fleeting years of so much moment? And is it of less moment, what shall be your state through endless ages? Have you assembled together willingly to hear what shall be said on public affairs, and to join in imploring the blessing of God on the counsels and arms of the united colonies, and can you be unconcerned, what shall become of you for ever, when all the monuments of human greatness shall be laid in ashes, for “the earth itself and all the works that are therein shall be burnt up.”
Wherefore my beloved hearers, as the ministry of reconciliation is committed to me, I beseech you in the most earnest manner, to attend to “the things that belong to your peace, before they are hid from your eyes.” How soon and in what manner a seal shall be set upon the character and state of every person here present, it is impossible to know; for he who only can know does not think proper to reveal it. But you may rest assured that there is no time more suitable, and there is none so safe, as that which is present, since it is [546] wholly uncertain whether any other shall be your’s. Those who shall first fall in battle, have not many more warnings to receive. There are some few daring and hardened sinners who despise eternity itself, and set their Maker at defiance, but the far greater number by staving off their convictions to a more convenient season, have been taken unprepared, and thus eternally lost. I would therefore earnestly press the apostles exhortation, 2 Cor. vi. i, 2. “We then, as workers together with him, beseech you also, that ye receive not the grace of God in vain: For he saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I succoured thee: Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.”
Suffer me to beseech you, or rather to give you warning, not to rest satisfied with a form of godliness, denying the power thereof. There can be no true religion, till there be a discovery of your lost state by nature and practice, and an unfeigned acceptance of Christ Jesus, as he is offered in the gospel. Unhappy they who either despise his mercy, or are ashamed of his cross! Believe it, “there is no salvation in any other. There is no other name under heaven given amongst men by which we must be saved.” Unless you are united to him by a lively faith, not the resentment of a haughty monarch, but the sword of divine justice hangs over you, and the fulness of divine vengeance shall speedily overtake you. I do not speak this only to the heaven, daring profligate, or grovelling sensualist, but to every insensible secure sinner; to all those, however decent and orderly in their civil deportment, who live to themselves and have their part and portion in this life; in fine to all who are yet in a state of nature, for “except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” The fear of man may make you hide your profanity: prudence and experience may make you abhor intemperance and riot; as you advance in life, one vice may supplant another and hold its place; but nothing less than the sovereign grace of God can produce a saving change of heart and temper, or fit you for his immediate presence.
Read the rest here.
3 Likes