An exposition by way of supplement, on the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth chapters of the prophecy of Amos where you have the text fully explained ... : together with a confutation of Dr. Holmes, and Sir Henry Vane, in the end of the commentary / by Tho. Hall ...

OBSERVATIONS.

1 Open sinners must bee openly reproved.

Those that sin before all, must bee reproved before all, that others may fear, 1 Tim. 5.20. These Judges who acted un∣righteously in the gate, must bee reproved by the Prophets in the gate.

2 Obs. It is a sad aggravation of mens sins to hate those, whom God hath authorised and commissioned to reprove them for their sins. To lay snares for him that reproveth in the gates, Isa. 29.21. To devise devices against plain-dealing Ieremies, and with Ahab to hate Gods faithful Micaiahs, and to seek their death and destruction, who labour to bring us to life and salvation, is the heighth of wickedness, Gen. 19.9. 1 King. 22.24, 26. Ier. 38.6. Matth. 14.3. Act. 7.54. and 9.29.

Truth breeds hatred, and light is irksome to the sore eyes of wicked men. They draw the Curtains, and cannot endure the light that reproves them; and it is worth observing that the viler men have been, the more they have hated plain re∣proofes, as the Sodomites, Pharaoh, Ahab, Herod, &c. they were all reprehension-proof. But the better men have been, the more submissive to reproofs, as David, when Abigail stopt him on one hand, and Nathan on the other, hee blesseth the one, and loves the other. So Hezekiah when the Prophet Isaiah told him that hee must lose all▪ hee receives it meekly, with a Good is the word of the Lord which thou hast spoken, Isa.

39 ult. So Constantine and Theodosius, how tractable and sub∣missive were they to the Ministers of Christ, when the Roman Caesars (most of them) persecuted to the death such as oppo∣sed them in their Tyrannical practises, they were punished as seditious and troublers of the State, that did in the least trouble them for their sins.

And this is the great sin of England, and bodes some judgement approaching, that we cannot endure a plain-sound-soul-searching-Ministery: wee must have smoothe things, or nothing, Isa. 30.10. The Idolater must not be told of his I∣dols, the superstitious man of his ceremoniousness, nor the in∣continent man of his Herodias, &c. Men love such as will daub over their vices, and give them such service or starvis as will not bite them, Missa non mordet. It is observed that the French Reformed Churches some years before that bloody massacre, did affect a frothy, flashy kinde of preaching, not regarding that which touched the conscience. Whether this be not our case, let the Reader judge.

Notes

• See my Com. on 2 Tim 4.10. p. 421.
• Amant lucem splendentem, non redarguen∣tem.
• See Hildersham on Psal. 51. Lect. 9. p. 52. &c.