Part

Now for the use, for us in England, the case stands thus: our Church doubtless is God's corn field, and we are the corn heap of God: and those Brownists and Sectaries are blind and besotted, who cannot see that the Church of England is a godly heap of God's corn: but withal, we must confess, we are full of chaff: that is, of profane and wicked hypocrites, whose hearts and minds abound in sins and rebellions: and many of our best professors are also too full of chaff (that is) of corruptions, and do give themselves too much liberty in many sins: but alas, the pure wheat, how thin is it scattered? How hard to find a man (at least a family) which dedicate themselves to the Lord in holy and sincere obedience, and labor to make conscience of all sins: now therefore, seeing we are God's corn field, and we have some pure wheat among much chaff, therefore God will winnow us to find out the corn, if he have but one corn of wheat in a handful of chaff, but one good man of many, he will stir all the heap for those few corners, he will not care to blow all the chaff to hell, to find out those few corns of wheat, to lay them up in heaven: so that out of all question, England being so full of chaff, must look to be winnowed.

Now for the first Fan of his word, it has been used in this land these five and thirty years, and that as powerfully, and as plentifully as any where in the world, and yet (alas) many are more godless, more ignorant, more profane than ever they were, yes, wickedness grows, and the chaff increases above the wheat: be sure therefore, that God will bring his second fan upon us; because we will not suffer the first, and mild and gentle fan of his word to try and search us: therefore we will bring the fearful fan of his judgments, and with it, he will blow soul and body into hell, with those our sins and corruptions, which we would not suffer the fan of God's word to blow from us. The first has so long blown in vain, that the second must needs come to us, and it has already begun to blow: three or four blasts have blown over us; famine, pestilence, earthquakes, fire, water, wind, these have so blown some of us, that they have taken away a great number of us. For us that remain, this only remains, that we strengthen ourselves by grace, to be able to stand against the next blast, for come it will, and when it comes no wealth nor worldly thing can enable us to endure it, only faith and repentance, and the grace of God will stand at that day. Now therefore, in that so fearful a fanning abides us: seeing it is so near (as appears by the blasts already past over us, which are nothing but the forerunners of a greater tempest) what should be our care (except we care not to be blown body and soul into hell) but to labor to eschew this fearful fan of God's wrath: or at least, if it come upon us, that it may not blow us to hell, but hasten us to heaven. If your heart be touched to ask how this may be, I answer you, only to follow the Prophet's advice in this place, by searching and trying ourselves. The way to escape God's trial, is to try yourself: and to escape God's judgment, to be a judge to your own soul: and so the way to escape the fearful fan of God, is to fan their own heart by the law of God. For whomever the first fan (that is, the word of God) does work upon: these men are never blown away with the fan of God's judgments. O then, entertain the word of God into your heart, submit your soul to it, let it pierce and try, and ransack your heart, and lay before you your wretched estate by your sins, and when you see your nakedness and misery, confess it, bewail it, and be humbled for it, cry and call for mercy and forgiveness, pray against your special sins, strive to purge them out, as the poison of your soul, crave grace from God for all your sins: if you see any sins more welcome to your nature, more dear to you, and which more prevail against you, than others do, pray against these sins, and strive against them above all: and endeavor, that by the fan of God's word, they may be blown away from you. When you have done this, mark what will come of it: when you have fanned yourself, God will not fan you: but when the fan of his judgment comes and blows so strongly upon the wicked, then the Lord finding you already fanned, and cleansed by his word, will spare you, and his judgment shall either blow over you, and pass by you untouched (as over Lot, in the destruction of Sodom) or else shall fan out all your corruptions, and blow you up to heaven, to be laid up as pure wheat in the heavenly garners, and mansions of glory, which Christ ascribed to prepare for you.

Now then among those many businesses, with which this world does cumber every one of us (all which shall perish with the world itself) let us, good brethren, spare sometime for this great business. Martha may be cumbered about many things, but this is that one thing, which is necessary: therefore whatever is done, let not this be undone. Once a day put yourself and your life under the fan of God's law, try yourself what you are, and your life, how you live. Once a day keep a court in your conscience, call your thoughts, your words, and your deeds to their trial: let the ten commandments pass upon them, and your sins and corruptions which you find to be chaff, blow them away by repentance, so shall you remain pure and clean wheat, fit for the house and Church of God in this world, and for his kingdom in heaven. But, if we will not do this, then alas, what will follow? My heart grieves to utter it: but I must, unless I should be a false Prophet: and therefore I will. Our long peace, plenty, and ease, have bred great sins, so great, that they reach to heaven, and provoke God's Majesty to his face, and so strong, that they will violently draw down judgments from God upon us: which when they come, they will be so powerful, and so violent, that they will blow us away like chaff, and bring this kingdom to some miserable ruin. O therefore how happy are we, if we can entertain this doctrine, and practice it: for in so doing, we shall prevent God's judgments, we shall continue the Gospel to this land, and preserve this glorious nation from being destroyed or dispeopled, by some fearful judgment.

Beloved, you come here to this place, purposely to buy and sell, and thereby to better your estates in this world: how happy then are you, if besides the good markets you make for your bodies and estates, you learn also how to make yourselves abide the trial of God's judgments, and how to be made pure corn, fit to replenish the garners of heaven, and how to continue God's favor and the Gospel to this Nation. If you go away with this lesson, you have a jewel more worth, than you should go home possessed of all the huge riches of this Fair: you call this and such like times Fair times: but if you learn this lesson right, then you may say, that this was the fairest day indeed, that ever shone upon you, since you were born. This precious jewel which I have spoken of all this while, I here offer to you. Every one brings here something to be sold, this is the merchandise that I bring and set to sale to you: whatever commodity any of you bring, it is from some quarter of this land, but all is from the earth: but this that I bring, it is from heaven: and all the earth cannot yield it: and as it is from heaven, so it is of a heavenly virtue, and will work that which all the wealth in this Fair is not able to do: therefore cast not to buy the basest, and let pass the best of all: and never allege that it is above your compass, and being a jewel, it is too dear and costly for you: for I offer it freely to you, and to every one of you, I pronounce to you from the Lord, that here this blessed doctrine is offered to you all, in his name, freely, and that you may buy it without money. Happy is that day, when you coming so far to buy things for your body, and paying so dear for them, do meet with so precious a jewel, the virtue whereof, is to save your soul, and pay nothing for it. You may hereafter rejoice, and say: I went to buy and sell, and to help my body: but I have also learned to save my soul. I went there to help to maintain my own estate: but I have learned to help to maintain England in prosperity: for assuredly, if we would all of us learn this lesson, and practice it, we might assure ourselves of the glorious prosperity of England, to continue from generation to generation: whereas alas, if we continue and go forward in our sins, and impenitency, it is greatly to be feared, that neither the Gospel, nor this peace, will reach to our posterity. Therefore now to make an end; I once again, and lastly, commend this doctrine to you all, and every one of you (for this merchandise that I bring, is of that nature, that though some take it, yet there is also enough for every one) and I commend it to you, even from the very mouth of God himself: think of it I charge you, as ever you look to appear before the face of Christ Jesus the great Judge, at the last day; and if you would escape the rigour of that judgment, enter now into judgment with yourself, and search yourself: if you now will not receive this doctrine, then shall it at the last day be a bill of indictment against you, for if it save you not, it shall condemn you: think of it therefore seriously, as a matter that concerns your soul and body: yes, and your posterity, and this whole Realm, all which shall smart for it, if we repent not. And if the body of our people, and those, whose hearts are wedded to this world, will not entertain this doctrine; then I turn to you that fear the Lord, and to you I direct my last warning; Search, O search, and try your hearts and lives, renew and revive your faith and repentance, that if judgments do come and blow upon this Nation, and drive the Gospel from it, and it to hell: that yet you may have a testimony to your consciences, that you did not pull down this general calamity, but for your parts labored to have prevented it, by your earnest prayers and hearty repentance: that so, the posterity ensuing, may not curse you, but speak reverently of you, and praise God for you, and wish that all had done as you did; for then had they enjoyed this goodly land, and all God's blessings with it, as we their forefathers did before them: and so shall our names not rot, but flourish among the posterities to come, which shall be partakers of the desolation. And when we have renewed our repentance, let us then every one of us, deal with the Lord by earnest prayer for this Church and Nation, that the Lord would show his mercy upon it, and continue to it, this peace and the Gospel: it is nothing with the Lord to do it, his powerful hand is not shortened, he can continue our peace: when the Papists look for hurly-burlies, he can continue the Gospel, when they hope to set up their idolatry again: let us therefore apply the Lord with our prayers, and with Moses set ourselves in the breach, and pray for the ignorance of the multitude, and bewail their sins, who bewail not their own. So did Noah, Daniel, and Job, in their ages, and prayed for the people in general calamities: let us all be Noahs, Daniels, and Jobs, in our generations: if we do thus, then when judgments come, we shall either turn them away from our Nation, or at the least we shall deliver our own souls.

Let us now turn to the Lord in prayer, and because it cannot be hoped, but that this our general sinfulness must needs end with some heavy judgment: let us desire the Lord still to defer our deserved punishments, and still to spare us, and to give us time and leisure to repent: that so, we entering into ourselves, and searching our hearts, and turning to the Lord: we may turn away his imminent judgments, and that when his wrath does burn out indeed, we may then be counted worthy in Christ, to escape those things which must needs come upon the world. Amen.

William Perkins.

*Lamentations 3.* Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to the Lord.

Trin-vni Deo gloria.

FINIS.