1 Sam. 10. p. 56, 57. Lessius de Attributis, p. 625. Dr. Gouge his Arrows, p. 373. Rutherford Lect. Latine, c. 11. p. 122. Corbet Fast Ser. on 1 Cor. 1.27. p. 5, &c. Dyke on Matth. 4.4. p. 260, &c. Strong 31 select Ser. p. 657. Raworth Iacobs Ladder, p. 5, &c. B. Andrews Catechis. chap. 7. folio. mihi p. 29. Herberts Poems, p. 109, &c. Pemble, folio. p. 263. to 279. Minutius felix per totum. Par his Grounds of Divinity, p. 33, &c.]
3 Obs. God is the destroyer of sinful Cities. If you would know, who it is that overthrows your Cities, It is I saith the Lord, that in justice for your provocations have made your Ci∣ties a desolation; I fired Sodom, destroyed No, Niniveh, Sa∣maria, Babylon, Ierusalem. As the Lord raiseth Cities, and defends the good (2 King. 19.34. & 20.6.) so he ruines and layes waste the bad, Hos. 13.16. Luke 19.44. keep sin then out of your Cities, if you desire to keep them from fire, plunder, ruine. Take heed of offending God, who is a consu∣ming Fire, and can in a trice consume us, and turn our dwel∣lings into ashes.
4 Obs. In the midst of Iudgements God remembers mercy. Hee doth not stirre up all his wrath, nor suffer his whole dis∣pleasure to arise, but lets fall only some drops upon us, when he might pour a whole Sea of wrath upon our heads, Psalm 78.38. God might justly have destroyed all these Israelites for their Idolatry and Apostasie, yet he remembred his Cove∣nant, though they had fouly forgot it, and transgrest it (Hos. 6.7.) and saves a remnant, he destroyed but some, not all their Cities. So oft elsewhere we read of a remnant that were saved, 2 King. 19.31. & Isa. 1.9. & 10.22. Rom. 9.27.
5 Obs. Neither Iudgements nor Mercies can work upon hardned Sinners. Some of these Israelites were destroyed like Sodom, and others in mercy were pulled like a Brand out of the fire; yet nothing works upon them, but they are Israel still, as Idolatrous and obstinate as ever. VVhen the heart is once hardned by a long custom of sinning, it is not all that Mount Ebal, or Mount Gerizim, Mount Sinai, or Mount S••on can afford; not all the dreadful Curses of the one, nor all the gracious Promises of the other, that can work upon mens hearts, Prov. 23.29, 34, 35. Ezek. 20.5, 6, 7, 8, 18, 21.