was in like sort betrayed in his master's intention, upon the dowry of the Philistines' foreskins. I fear to ask, who ever noted so foul a plot in David's rejected predecessor? Uriah must be the messenger of his own death, Joab must be a traitor to his friend, the host of God must shamefully turn their backs upon the Ammonites, all that Israelitish blood must be shed, that murder must be seconded with dissimulation: and all this to hide one adultery. O God, thou hadst never suffered so dear a favourite of thine to fall so fearfully, if thou hadst not meant to make him an universal example to mankind, of not presuming, of not despairing. How can we presume of not sinning, or despair for sinning, when we find so great a saint thus fallen, thus risen! CONTEMPLATION V. NATHAN AND DAVID. YET Bathsheba mourned for the death of that husband, whom she had been drawn to dishonour. How could she bestow tears enough upon that funeral, whereof her sin was the cause! If she had but a suspicion of the plot of his death, the fountains of her eyes could not yield water enough to wash off her husband's blood; her sin was more worthy of sorrow than her loss. If this grief had been right placed, the hope of hiding her shame, and the ambition to be a queen, had not so soon mitigated it; neither had she, upon any terms, been drawn into the bed of her husband's murderer. Every gleam of earthly comfort can dry up the tears of worldly sorrow. Bathsheba hath soon lost her grief at the court; the remembrance of a husband is buried in the jollity and state of a princess. David securely enjoys his ill-purchased love, and is content to exchange the conscience of his sin, for the sense of his pleasures. But the just and holy God will not put it up so; he that hates sin so much the more, as the offender is more dear to him, will let David feel the bruise of his fall. If God's best children have been sometimes suffered to sleep in a sin, at last he hath awakened them in a fright. David was a prophet of God, yet he hath not only stept into these foul sins, but sojourns in them. If any profession or state of life could have privileged from sin, the angels had not sinned in heaven, nor man in paradise. Nathan the prophet is sent to the prophet David, for reproof, for conviction had it been any other man's case, none could have been more quick-sighted than the princely prophet; in his own he : | is so blind, that God is fain to lend him others' eyes. Even the physician himself, when he is sick, sends for the counsel of those whom his health did mutually aid with advice. Let no man think himself too good to learn; teachers themselves may be taught that, in their own particular, which in a generality they have often taught others. it is not only ignorance that is to be re moved, but misaffection. Who can prescribe a just period to the best man's repentance? About ten months are passed since David's sin; in all which time I find no news of any serious compunction; it could not be but some glances of remorse must needs have passed through his soul long ere this; but a due and solemn contrition was not heard of till Nathan's message, and, perhaps, had been further adjourned, if that monitor had been longer deferred. Alas! what long and dead sleeps may the holiest soul take in fearful sins! Were it not for thy mercy, O God, the best of us should end our spiritual lethargy in sleep of death. It might have pleased God as easily to have sent Nathan to check David in his first purpose of sinning; so had his eyes been restrained, Bathsheba honest, Uriab alive with honour: now the wisdom of the Almighty knew how to win more glory by the permission of so foul an evil, than by the prevention; yea, he knew how, by the permission of one sin, to prevent millions. How many thousands had sinned, in a vain presumption on their own strength, if David had not thus offended! how many thousands had despaired, in the conscience of their own weaknesses, if these horrible sins had not received forgiveness! It is happy for all times, that we have so holy a sinner, so sinful a penitent: it matters not how bitter the pill is, but how well wrapped; so cunningly hath Nathan conveyed this dose, that it begins to work ere it be tasted. There is no one thing wherein is more use of wisdom, than the due contriving of a reprehension, which, in a discreet delivery, helps the disease; in an unwise, destroys nature. Had not Nathan been used to the possession of David's ear, this complaint had been suspected. It well beseems a king to take information by a prophet. While wise Nathan was querulously discoursing of the cruel rich man, that had forcibly taken away the only lamb of his poor neighbour, how willingly doth David listen to the story, and how sharply, even above law, doth he censure the fact!"As the Lord liveth, the man that hath done this thing shall surely die." Full little did he think that he | phrases, but for affections. The first piece had pronounced sentence against himself: of our amends to God for sinning is the it had not been so heavy, if he had known acknowledgment of sin: he can do little, on whom it should have lighted. We have that in a just offence cannot accuse himopen ears and quick tongues to the vices self. If we cannot be so good as we would, of others: how severe justicers we can be it is reason we should do God so much to our very own crimes in others! how flat- right, as to say how evil we are. And why tering parasites to another's crime in our- was not this done sooner? It is strange to selves! The life of doctrine is in application. see how easily sin gets into the heart; how Nathan might have been long enough in his hardly it gets out of the mouth: is it benarration, in his invective, ere David would cause sin, like unto Satan, where it hath have been touched with his own guiltiness; got possession, is desirous to hold it, and but now, that the prophet brings the word knows that it is fully ejected by a free conhome to his bosom, he cannot but be af- fession? or because, in a guiltiness of defected. We may take pleasure to hear men formity, it hides itself in the breast where speak in the clouds; we never take profit it is once entertained, and hates the light? till we find a propriety in the exhortation or because the tongue is so feed with selfor reproof. There was not more cunning love, that it is loath to be drawn unto any in the parable, than courage in the appli- verdict against the heart or hands? or is it cation: "Thou art the man.' If David out of an idle misprision of shame, which, be a king, he may not look not to hear of while it should be placed in offending, is his faults: God's messages may be no other misplaced in disclosing of our offence? than impartial. It is a treacherous flattery, in divine errands, to regard greatness. If prophets must be mannerly in the form, yet in the matter of reproof resolute: the words are not their own; they are but the heralds of the King of heaven: "Thus saith the Lord God of Israel." " How thunder-stricken do we think David did now stand! how did the change of his colour bewray the confusion in his soul, while his conscience said the same within, which the prophet sounded in his ear! And now, lest aught should be wanting to his humiliation, all God's former favours shall be laid before his eyes, by way of exprobration. He is worthy to be upbraided with mercies, that hath abused mercies unto wantonness. While we do well, God gives and says nothing; when we do ill, he lays his benefits in our dish, and casts them in our teeth, that our shame may be so much the more, by how much our obligations have been greater. The blessings of God, in our unworthy carriage, prove but the aggravations of sin, and additions to judgment. I see all God's children falling into sin; some of them lying in sin, none of them maintaining their sin: David cannot have the heart, or the face, to stand out against the message of God; but now, as a man confounded and condemned in himself, he cries out, in the bitterness of a wounded soul, "I have sinned against the Lord." It was but a short word, but passionate; and such as came from the bottom of a contrite heart. The greatest griefs are not most verbal. Saul confessed his sin more largely, less effectually. God cares not for However, sure I am, that God hath need even of racks to draw out confessions, and scarce in death itself are we wrought to a discovery of our errors. There is no one thing wherein our folly shows itself more than in these hurtful concealments. Contrary to the proceedings of human justice, it is with God," Confess and live." No sooner can David say, “I have sinned," than Nathan infers, "The Lord also hath put away thy sin." "He that hides his sins, shall not prosper; but he that confesseth and forsaketh them shall find mercy." Who would not accuse himself to be acquitted of God? O God, who would not tell his wickedness to thee, that knowest it better than his own heart, that his heart may be eased of that wickedness, which being not told, killeth? Since we have sinned, why should we be niggardly of that action, wherein we may at once give glory to thee, and relief to our souls? David had sworn, in a zeal of justice, that the rich oppressor, for but taking his poor neighbour's lamb, should die the death; God, by Nathan, is more favourable to David, than to take him at his word: "Thou shalt not die." O the marvellous power of repentance! Besides adultery, David had shed the blood of innocent Uriah. The strict law was, "Eye for eye, tooth for tooth. He that smiteth with the sword shall perish with the sword;" yet, as if a penitent confession had dispensed with the rigour of justice, now God says, " Thou shalt not die." David was the voice of the law, awarding death unto sin : Nathan was the voice of the gospel, awarding life unto the repentance for sin. What soever the sore be, never any soul applied | faith to preserve us from all afflictions: afthis remedy and died; never any soul escaped death, that applied it not. David himself shall not die for this fact; but his misbegotten child shall die for him. He that said, "The Lord hath put away thy sin," yet said also, "The sword shall not depart from thine house." The same mouth, with one breath, pronounces the sentence both of absolution and death: absolution to the person, death to the issue. Pardon may well stand with temporal afflictions. Where God hath forgiven, though he doth not punish, yet he may chastise, and that unto blood: neither doth he always bear correction, where he remits revenge. So long as he smites us not as an angry judge, we may endure to smart from him as a loving father. ren. Yet even this rod did David deprecate with tears: how fain would he shake off so easy a load! The child is stricken: the father fasts, and prays, and weeps, and lies all night upon the earth, and abhors the noise of comfort; that child, which was the fruit and monument of his odious adultery, whom he could never have looked upon without recognition of his sin, in whose face he could but have still read the records of his own shame, is thus mourned for, thus sued for. It is easy to observe that good man over-passionately affected to his childWho would not have thought, that David might have held himself well appaid that his soul escaped an eternal death, his body a violent, though God should punish his sin in that child in whom he sinned? Yet even against this cross he bends his prayers, as if nothing had been forgiven him. There is no child that would be scourged, if he might escape for crying: no affliction is for the time other than grievous; neither is therefore yielded unto, without some kind of reluctation. Far yet was it from the heart of David to make any opposition to the will of God: he sued, he struggled not: there is no impatience in entreaties he well knew that the threats of temporal evils ran commonly with a secret condition, and therefore might perhaps be avoided by humble importunity: if any means under heaven can avert judgments, it is our prayers. God could not choose but like well the boldness of David's faith, who, after the apprehension of so heavy a displeasure, is so far from doubting of the forgiveness of his sin, that he dares become a suitor unto God for his sick child. Sin doth not make us more strange, than faith confident. But it is not in the power of the strongest ter all David's prayers and tears, the child must die. The careful servants dare not whisper this sad news: they who had found their master so averse from the motion of comfort in the sickness of the child, feared him incapable of comfort in his death. Suspicion is quick-witted. Every occasion makes us misdoubt that event which we fear. This secrecy proclaims that which they were so loath to utter. David perceives his child dead, and now he rises up from the earth whereon he lay, and washeth himself, and changeth his apparel, and goes first into God's house to worship, and into his own to eat: now he refuses no comfort, who before would take none. The issue of things doth more fully show the will of God than the prediction: God never did any thing but what he would; he hath sometimes foretold that for trial, which his secret will intended not: he would foretell it; he would not effect it; because he would therefore foretell it, that he might not effect it. His predictions of outward evils are not always absolute; his actions are. David well sees, by the event, what the decree of God was concerning his child, which now he could not strive against without a vain impatience. Till we know the determination of the Almighty, it is free for us to strive in our prayers; to strive with him, not against him: when once we know them, it is our duty to sit down in a silent contentation. "While the child was yet alive, I fasted and wept; for I said, who can tell whether the Lord will be gracious to me, that the child may live; but now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? Can I bring him back again?" The grief that goes before an evil for remedy, can hardly be too much; but that which follows an evil past remedy, cannot be too little. Even in the saddest accident, death, we may yield something to nature, nothing to impatience: immoderation of sorrow, for losses past hope of recovery, is more sullen than useful; our stomach may be bewrayed by it, not our wisdom. CONTEMPLATION VI.AMNON AND TAMAR. It is not possible that any word of God should fall to the ground. David is not more sure of forgiveness than smart. Three main sins passed him in this business of Uriah; adultery, murder, dissimulation; for all which he receives present payment: for adultery, in the deflowering of his daughter : Tamar; for murder, in the killing of his son Amnon; for dissimulation, in the contriving of both yet all this was but the beginning of evils. Where the father of the family brings sin home to the house, it is not easily swept out. Unlawful lust propagates itself by example. How justly is David scourged by the sin of his sons, whom his act taught to offend! motions of that sinful lust; and had showed the prince of Israel how much those lewd desires provoked God, and blemished himself, and had lent his hand to strangle them in their first conception. There cannot be a more worthy improvement of friendship, than in a fervent opposition to the sins of them whom we profess to love. No enemy can be so mortal to great princes, as those officious clients, whose flattery soothes them up in wickedness: these are traitors to the soul, and by a pleasing violence, kill the best part eternally. How ready at hand is an evil suggestion! Good counsel is like unto well-water, that must be drawn up with a pump or bucket: ill counsel is like to conduit-water, which, if the cock be but turned, runs out alone. Jonadab hath soon projected how Amnon shall accomplish his lawless purpose. The way must be to feign himself sick in body, whose mind was sick of lust; and under this pretence, to procure the presence of her who had wounded, and only might cure him. Maacha was the daughter of a heathenish king by her had David that beautiful, but unhappy issue, Absalom, and his no less fair sister Tamar. Perhaps thus late doth David feel the punishment of that unfit choice. I should have marvelled, if so holy a man had not found crosses in so unequal a match, either in his person, or at least in his seed. Beauty, if it be not well disciplined, proves not a friend, but a traitor: three of David's children are undone by it at once. What else was guilty of Amnon's incestuous love, Tamar's ravishment, Absalom's pride? It is a blessing to be fair, yet such a blessing, as, if the soul answer not to the face, may lead to a curse. How commonly have we seen the foulest soul dwell fairest? It was no fault of Tamar's that she was beautiful: the candle offends not in burning; the foolish fly offends in scorching itself in the flame; yet it is no small misery to become a temptation unto another, and to be made but the occasion of other's ruin. Amnon is love-sick of his sister Tamar, and languishes of that unnatural heat. Whither will not wanton lust carry the inordinate minds of pampered and ungoverned youths? None but this half-prime of his age and hopes! It is not given sister will please the eyes of the young prince of Israel. Ordinary pleasures will not content those whom the conceit of greatness, youth, and ease, have let loose to their appetite. Perhaps yet this unkindly flame might in time have gone out alone, had not there been a Jonadab to blow these coals with ill counsel. It were strange, if great princes should want some parasitical followers, that are ready to feed their ill humours. " Why art thou, the king's son, so lean from day to day?" as if it were unworthy the heir of a king to suffer either law or conscience to stand in the way of his desires: whereas wise princes know well, that their places give them no privilege of sinning, but call them in rather to so much more strictness, as their example may be more prejudicial. The daily increasing languor and leanness and paleness of love-sick Amnon, might well give colour to a kerchief and a pallet. Now is it soon told David that his eldest son is cast upon his sick-bed: there needs no suit for his visitation. The careful father hastens to his bed-side, not without doubts and fears. He that was lately so afflicted with the sickness of a child that scarce lived to see the light, how sensible must we needs think he would be of the indisposition of his first-born son, in the to any prophet to foresee all things. Happy had it been for David, if Amnon had been truly sick, and sick unto death; yet who could have persuaded this passionate father to have been content with this succession of losses, this early loss of his successor! How glad is he to hear, that his daughter Tamar's skill might be likely to fit the diet of so dear a patient! Conceit is wont to rule much, both in sickness and in the cure. Tamar is sent by her father to the house of Amnon: her hand only must dress that dish which may please the nice palate of her sick brother. Even the children of kings, in those homlier times, did not scorn to put their fingers to some works of housewifery: "She took flour and did knead it, and did make cakes in his sight, and did bake the cakes, and took a pan, and poured them out before him." Had she not been sometimes used to such domestic employments, she had been now to seek; neither had this been required of her, but upon the knowledge of her skill. She doth not plead R the impairing of her beauty by the scorch- | his doors. Unruly passions run ever into ing of the fire, nor thinks her hand too extremities, and are then best appaid, when dainty for such mean services, but settles they are furthest off from reason and moto the work, as one that had rather regard deration. the necessities of her brother, than her own state. Only pride and idleness have banished honest and thrifty diligence out of the houses of the great. This was not yet the dish that Amnon longed for it was the cook, and not the cakes, which that wanton eye affected. Unlawful acts seek for secrecy: the company is dismissed; Tamar only stays. Good meaning suspects nothing: while she presents the meat she had prepared to her sick brother, herself is made a prey to his outrageous lust. The modest virgin entreats and persuades in vain: she lays before him the sin, the shame, the danger of the fact; and, since none of these can prevail, fain would win time by the suggestion of impossible hopes. Nothing but violence can stay a resolved sinner; what he cannot by entreaty, he will have by force. If the devil were not more strong in men than nature, they would never seek pleasure in violence. Amnon hath no sooner fulfilled his beastly desires, than he hates Tamar more than he loved her. Inordinate lust never ends but in discontentment; loss of spirits, and the remorse of soul, make the remembrance of that act tedious, whose expectation promised delight. If we could see the back of sinful pleasures, ere we behold their face, our hearts could not but be forestalled with a just detestation. Brutish Amnon, it was thyself whom thou shouldst have hated for this villany, not thine innocent sister! Both of you lay together; only one committed incest. What was she but a patient in that impotent fury of lust? How unjustly do carnal men misplace their affections! No man can say, whether that love or this hatred were more unreasonable. Fraud drew Tamar into the house of Amnon; force entertained her within, and drove her out. Fain would she have hid her shame where it was wrought, and may not be allowed it. That roof, under which she came with honour, and in obedience and love, may not be lent her, for the time, as a shelter for her ignominy. Never any savage could be more barbarous. Shechem had ravished Dinah; his offence did not make her odious; his affection so continued, that he is willing rather to draw blood of himself and his people, than forego her whom he had abused; Amnon, in one hour, is in the excess of love and hate, and is sick of her for whom he was sick: she that lately kept the keys of his heart, is now locked out of What could Amnon think would be the event of so foul a fact, which, as he had not the grace to prevent, so he hath not the care to conceal? If he looked not so high as heaven, what could he imagine would follow hereupon, but the displeasure of a father, the danger of law, the indignation of a brother, the shame and outcries of the world; all which he might have hoped to avoid by secrecy and plausible courses of satisfaction. It is the just judgment of God upon presumptuous offenders, that they lose their wit, together with their honesty; and are either so blinded, that they cannot foresee the issue of their actions, or so besotted, that they do not re gard it. Poor Tamar can but bewail that which she could not keep, her virginity, not lost, but torn from her, by a cruel violence. She rends her princely robe, and lays ashes on her head, and laments the shame of another's sin, and lives more desolate than a widow, in the house of her brother Absalom. In the meantime, what a corrosive must this news needs be to the heart of good David, whose fatherly command had, out of love, cast his daughter into the jaws of this lion! What an insolent affront must he needs construe this to be offered by a son to a father, that the father should be made the pander of his own daughter to his son! He that lay upon the ground weeping for but the sickness of an infant, how vexed do we think he was with the villany of his heir, with the ravishment of his daughter, both of them worse than many deaths! What revenge can he think of for so heinous a crime, less than death? and what less than death is it to him, to think of a revenge? Rape was, by the law of God, capital; how much more when it is seconded with incest! Anger was not punishment enough for so high an offence; yet this is all that I hear of from so indulgent a father, saving that he makes up the rest with sorrow, punishing his son's outrage in himself. The better natured and more gracious a man is the more subject he is to the danger of an over-remissness, and the excess of favour and mercy. The mild injustice is no less perilous to the commonwealth, than the cruel. If David, perhaps out of the conscience of his own late offence, will not punish this fact, his son Absalom shall; not out of any care of justice, but in a desire of revenge. |