Baxter - Houston-Packer Collection BX5200 .B352 1835 v2

514 BAXTER'S FAREWELL SERMON. and his head reach unto the clouds,yet he shall perish forever like his own dung. They which have seen, him shall say, Where is he? He shall fly away as a dream, and shall not be found; yea, he shall be chased away as a vision of the night. The eye' also which saw him shall see him no more, neither shall his place be- hold him;" Job xx. 4 -9. Though pride do compass them about as a chain, and violence cover them as a garment, and they are corrupt, and speak oppression, or calumny, wickedly, they speak loftily, or from on high. Though they set their mouth against the heavens, and their tongue walketh through the earth, yet surely they are set in slippery places. God doth cast them down into destruction. How are they brought into desolation as in a mo- ment? They are utterly consumed with terrors ; as a dream* from one that awaketh, so, O Lord, in awaking, (or raising, up, that is, saith the Chaldee paraphrase, in thy day of judging, or as all the other translations, in civitate tua, in thy kingdom or govern- ment) thou shalt despise their image, that is, show them and all the world how despicable that image of greatness, and power, and felicity was which they were so proud of. If such a bubblet of vain-glory, such an image of felicity, such a dream of .power and greatness be all that the church of God bath to be afraid of, it may well be said " Cease ye fromman,whose breath is in his nostrils;" Isa. ii. 29. " For wherein is he to . be accounted of? " Psalm cxlvi. 4. His breath goeth forth ; he returneth to his earth ; in that very day his thoughts perish. And, " Behold, the Lord God will help me ; who is he that shall condemn me ? Lo, they all shall wax old as a garment ; the moth shall eat them up ;" Isa. 1. 9. And,'" Hearken unto me, ye that know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law. Fear ye sot ` the reproach of men, neither be ye afraid of their revilings, for the moth shall eat them up like a garment, and the worm shall .eat them like wood, but my righteousness shall be forever, and my salvation from genera- tion to generation ; " Isa. li. 7, 8. The sorrows which so short- lived power can inflict,can be but short. You read of their vic- tories atld persecutions in the news-books one year, and quickly after of their death. Use. Hence, therefore, you may learn how injudicious they are, e Or as Amyraldus Paraphras., " Cum olim edigilabunt, prosens eorum felici- tas ern instar somnii, quod somno discusso dissipatúm est : quin etiam antequam evigilent, in ipsa ilia urbe in qua antea florebantvanam istamfelicitatis pompom, in qua antea volitabant, reddes contemnendam, tanquam umbram aut imagmem evanescentem ; in qua nihil solidi est." t " Nubecula estcito evanescit," said Athanasius ofJulian. $ When Juliañ's death was told at' Antioch, they all cried out, " Maxime fatue! ubi aunt vaticina tua? Vicit Deus et Christus ejus." Abbas Uspar- gens. page 91.

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