Chap.9. AnExpofitionupon the BookofJ O B. , Verf. 23. . 313 taken fromwaters) is a common, fpreading, (weeping judge - inent,which like an over-flowing river encompaffes,circlesabout, . and fetches in all. Slay fuddenly. Every fcourge loth not flay, and many which flay do not fla y Sbu tro,(latt,, fuddcnly. We ufually hear thechilling of the fcourge before we itautnon joy. feel the fnart of it. The Lord (hews the fcourge and threatens tiaru?donec it before he (Mites with it, he lets judgement hang like a black res fst° cloud over the heads of fettle, long before it falls upon them. But . others Heflayes fttddeny. Some rake this fuddennefs of the fceurge in flaying fora mitti- gation of the judgement, and others for the heighrning of it. In the former fenfefùddennefs_doth not imply the fudden coming ofir, but the hidden killing of it, a fcourge which Both its work quickly ; Ib that a man doth not hang long as it were upon the rack ofau a1fh Lion. The Church bftne Jews (Lam. I. 6,) com- plainsof their af$idions, as if the judgement ofSodome and Go. morrah had been more eafìeand eligibe then that which the Lord brought upon erufalem ;- not that they thought God had dealt worfe with them then with Sodome and Gemorrah,bnt as to this particular, becaufe Sodome wasoverthrown in a moment,but Jerufalem was pined away by degrees with famine. Afuddelt fcourge lit a kind of mercy. Better dye once then die alwayes : Or, as the Apoftie (peaks concerning theafidions oftheSaints(Rom. 8.36. )10 be killed allthe daylong. When one under torture peti- tioned Tiberius the Roman Emperour, a bloody cruel tyrant,that he might be quickly difpatcht,hedefired not lifeor pardon, but a fpeedy death ; the Emperour Pent him word, That asyet, he was Nondum term not reconciled to him, or becomehiafriend. His cruelty would nei- in?rotiam re- ther fuffer the man to live longer, nor to dye fpeedily. And feriae dij obfaave, that as the Prophet cxpreffes his trouble at the, profpe- city of the wicked in their lives, fo at this kind of profperity in their deaths, There are no bands in their death, but they are lufty andJtrong, (Pfal. 73.4 ) that is, when they dye, in their flrength, ñn fog' tee,íun they are not pined away with long and tediousfïckneffes :They live in pieafure, and dye with eafe. They are not bound to their beds, and ty: d downwith the cords of chronical Iingring di-. fetes. It is fotne favour (if the fcourge mutt flay) to be !lain, in thisfen fe,fuddeny. S f But
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