Unto these good works those with whom we have to do lay a vehement claim, as though they were the only patrons of them, and pleaders for them; but they have also excluded them out of Christian religion, and set up a deformed image of them, in defiance of God, of Christ, and the gospel. For the works they plead for are such as so far proceed from their own free will, as to render them meritorious in the sight of God. They have confined them partly unto acts of superstitious devotion, partly unto those of charity, and principally unto those that are not so;-such are the building of monasteries, nunneries, and such pretended religious houses, for the maintenance of swarms of monks and friars, filling the world with superstition and debauchery. They make them meritorious, satisfactory; yea, some of them, which they call of supererogation, above all that God requireth of us, and the causes of our justification before God. They ascribe unto them a condignity of the heavenly reward, making it of works, and so not of grace; with many other defiling imaginations. But whatever is done from these principles, and for these ends, is utterly foreign unto those good works which the gospel enjoineth as a part of our new or evangelical obedience. But having, as in other cases, lost all sense and experience of the power and efficacy of the grace of Christ, in working believers unto this duty of obedience, unto the glory of God and benefit of mankind, they have set up the image of them, in defiance of Christ, his grace, and his gospel.

These are some of the abominations which are portrayed on the walls of the Chamber of Imagery in the Church of Rome; and more will be added in the consideration of the image of Jealousy itself; which, God willing, shall ensue in another way. These are the shadows which they betake themselves unto, in the loss of spiritual light to discern the truth and glory of the mystery of the gospel, and the want of an experience of their power and efficacy, unto all the ends of the life of God in their own minds and souls. And although they are all of them expressly condemned in the letter of the Scripture, which is sufficient to secure the minds of true believers from the admission of them, yet their establishment, against all pleas, pretences, and force, for a compliance with them, depends on their experience of the power of every gospel truth unto its proper end, in communicating unto us the grace of God, and transforming our minds into the image and likeness of Jesus Christ.

SERMON XVI.

AN HUMBLE TESTIMONY

UNTO THE GOODNESS AND SEVERITY OF GOD IN HIS DEALING WITH SINFUL CHURCHES AND NATIONS;

OR,

THE ONLY WAY TO DELIVER A SINFUL NATION FROM UTTER RUIN

BY IMPENDENT JUDGMENTS:

IN A DISCOURSE ON THE WORDS OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST,

LUKE XIII. 1-5.

"Cry aloud, spare not; lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and show my people their transgression,

and the house of Jacob their sins "-ISA. lviii. 1.

"In publico discrimine omnis homo miles est."

38

VOL. VIIL

PREFATORY NOTE.

In his own preface to the reader Dr Owen very briefly alludes to the circumstances which had induced him to deliver to "a private congregation" several discourses on Luke xiii. 1-5, and afterwards to publish the substance of them in the following discourse. For obvious reasons, he evinces great caution in referring to passing events, which, about the time the discourse was published, excited "continual apprehensions of public calamities" in the minds of all the friends of liberty and order. The nation had been agitated with stormy discussions about the Exclusion Bill. The Whig party were bent on preventing the accession of James, the Duke of York, to the British throne on the demise of Charles II. In the agitation which shook the country in consequence of this attempt, "a whole year," says Macaulay, "elapsed,—an eventful year, which has left lasting traces in our manners and language. On the one side, it was maintained that the constitution and religion of the state would never be secure under a Popish king; -on the other, that the right of James to wear the crown in his turn was derived from God, and could not be annulled, even by the consent of all the branches of the Legislature."

...

The bill had been several times introduced into the House of Commons,-in 1679, in November 1680, a third time in the following January, and finally, in the Parliament which met at Oxford in March 1681, when the Whig measures were defeated by the dissolution of the Parliament only seven days after it had met.

Whatever judgment be formed as to the expediency of the Exclusion Bill, the strenuous exertions which the Whigs and Nonconformists made to secure the success of that measure, enable us to estimate the alarm and forebodings which filled their minds, when the power of the Court had triumphed.

Apart, however, from this defeat, there were other causes of anxiety and apprehension. Dissenters were subjected to severe and increasing oppression; and while the friends of the popular cause were disconcerted and baffled, a manifest reaction was taking place throughout England in favour of the Court. It was this change of public sentiment, and decay of patriotic zeal-arising in some degree from growing indifference to religious principle-that led our author to entertain, at this juncture, gloomy views in regard to the prospects of the nation, and to issue a solemn and urgent warning to his countrymen.

The discourse of Dr Owen is extremely suitable to the crisis which had elicited it. While he makes no reference to the proceedings of the government, he dwells upon evangelical truths and duties, in a strain peculiarly fitted to elevate his readers above unworthy fears, and to make the danger to which they might feel themselves exposed a motive to repentance and godliness. "The "Testimony,'" says Orme, contains much of that practical wisdom which the Doctor had acquired from his long and deep study of the Word of God, and from his extensive experience in the ways of Providence." The discourse was published in the year 1681.-ED.

TO THE READER.

THE ensuing discourse contains the substance of sundry sermons preached in a private congregation. Some who heard them, considering the subject-matter treated of, and the design in them with respect unto the present state of things in this nation, did judge that it might be convenient and seasonable to make them more public, for the use and benefit of others; but, knowing how remote I was from any such intention in their first composure, and how naked they were of all ornaments that might render them meet for public view, I was unwilling for a season to comply with their desires. Neither was it their importunity (which, as they did not use, so I should not in this case have valued), but their reasons, that prevailed with me, to consent that they might be published by any that had a mind thereunto; which is all my concernment therein. For they said, that whereas the land wherein we live is filled with sin, and various indications of God's displeasure thereon, yet there is an unexemplified neglect in calling the inhabitants of it unto repentance, for the diverting of impendent judgments. The very heathen, they said, upon less evidence of the approaches of divine vengeance than is now amongst us, did always solemnly apply themselves to their deities, for the turning it away. Wherefore, this neglect amongst us they supposed to be of such ill abode,' as that the weakest and meanest endeavour for relief under it might be of some use; and of that nature I cannot but esteem this discourse to be.

They added, moreover, that whereas, on various accounts, there are continual apprehensions of public calamities, all men's thoughts are exercised about the ways of deliverance from them; but whereas they fix themselves on various and opposite ways and means for this end, the conflict of their counsels and designs increaseth our danger, and is like to prove our ruin. And the great cause hereof is, a general ignorance and neglect of the only true way and means whereby this nation may be delivered from destruction under the displeasure of God. For if their thoughts did agree and centre therein, as it would insensibly work them off' from their present mutual destructive animosities; so also it is of such a nature as would lead them into a coalescency in those counsels, whose fruit would be the establishment of truth, with righteousness and peace. Now, this way is no other but sincere repentance, and universal reformation in all sorts of persons throughout the nation. That this is the only way for the saving of this nation from impending judgments and wasting desolations, that this way will be effectual unto that end when all others shall fail,-is asserted and proved in this discourse, from the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ himself, to confront the wisdom of politicians, who are otherwise minded, with a plain word of truth and power.

It was hoped also by them, that some intimation of their duty might be hereby given unto those who, having the ministerial oversight of the generality of the people, do divert their minds unto the petty differences and contests, whilst the fire of God's displeasure for sin is ready to devour their habitations. And the truth is, if they persist in their negligence, if they give not a public evidence, at this season, of their zeal for repentance and reformation of life among all sorts of persons,-going Abode is an old English word signifying omen or prognostic,—from "bode," to portend.-ED.