both in act and maintenance. If the Israelites had not held marriage and issue a very great blessing, they had not thus revenged themselves of Benjamin: now they accounted the withholding of their wives a punishment second to death. The hope of life in our posterity, is the next contentment to an enjoying of life in ourselves.

They have sworn, and now, upon cold blood, repent them. If the oath were not just, why would they take it? and if it were just, why did they recant it? If the act were justifiable, what needed these tears? Even a just oath may be rashly taken. Not only injustice, but temerity of swearing, ends in lamentation. In our very civil actions, it is a weakness to do that which we would after reverse; but in our affairs with God, to check ourselves too late, and to steep our oaths in tears, is a dangerous folly. He doth not command us to take voluntary oaths; he commands us to keep them. If we bind ourselves to inconvenience, we may justly complain of our own fetters. Oaths do not only require justice, but judgment; wise deliberation, no less than equity.

Not conscience of their fact, but commiseration of their brethren, led them to this public repentance. "O God! why is this come to pass, that this day one tribe of Israel shall want?" Even the justest revenge of men is capable of pity. Insultation, in the rigour of justice, argues cruelty; charitable minds are grieved to see that done, which they would not wish undone: the smart of the offender doth not please them, which yet are thoroughly displeased with the sin, and have given their hands to punish it. God himself takes no pleasure in the death of a sinner, yet loves the punishment of sin: as a good parent whips his child, yet weeps himself. There is a measure in victory and revenge, if never so just, which to exceed, loses mercy in the suit of justice.

If there were no fault in their severity, it needed no excuse: and if there were a fault, it will admit of no excuse: yet, as if they meant to shift off the sin, they expostulate with God: "O Lord God of Israel, why is this come to pass this day?" God gave them no command of this rigour: yea, he twice crossed them in the execution; and now, in that which they entreated of God with tears, they challenge him. It is a dangerous injustice to lay the burden of cur sins upon him, which tempteth no man, nor can be tempted with evil; while we so remove our sin, we double it.

A man that knew not the power of an

oath, would wonder at this contrariety in the affections of Israel: they are sorry for the slaughter of Benjamin; and yet they slay those that did not help them in the slaughter. Their oath calls them to more blood: the excess of their revenge upon Benjamin may not excuse the men of Gilead. If ever oath might look for a dispensation, this might plead it: now they dare not but kill the men of Jabesh-Gilead, lest they should have left upon themselves a greater sin of sparing than punishing. Jabesh-Gilead came not up to aid Israel, therefore all the inhabitants must die. To exempt ourselves, whether out of singularity or stubbornness, from the common actions of the church, when we are lawfully called to them, is an offence worthy of judgment. In the main quarrels of the church, neutrals are punished. This execution shall make amends for the former; of the spoil of Jabesh-Gilead shall the Benjamites be stored with wives. That no man may think these men slain for their daughters, they plainly die for their sin; and these Gileadites might not have lived without the perjury of Israel; and now, since they must die, it is good to make benefit of necessity. I inquire not into the rigour of the oath: if their solemn vow did not bind them to kill all of both sexes in Benjamin, why did they not spare their virgins? and if it did so bind them, why did they spare the virgins of Gilead? Favours must be enlarged in all these religious restrictions. Where breath may be taken in them, it is not fit nor safe they should be straitened.

Four hundred virgins of Gilead have lost parents, and brethren, and kindred, and now find husbands in lieu of them. An enforced marriage was but a miserable comfort for such a loss: like wards, or captives, they are taken, and choose not, These suffice not; their friendly adversaries consult for more upon worse conditions. Into what troublesome and dangerous straits do men thrust themselves, by either unjust or inconsiderate vows!

In the midst of all this common lawlessness of Israel, here was conscience made on both sides of matching with infidels. The Israelites can rather be content their daughters should be stolen by their own, than that the daughters of aliens should be given them. These men, which had not grace enough to detest and punish the beastliness of their Gileadites, yet are not so graceless as to choose them wives of the heathen. All but atheists, howsoever they let themselves loose, yet in some

people, did they not remember how far Jacob walked to Padan-Aram? Was it farther from Moab to Bethlehem, than from Bethlehem to Moab? And if the care of themselves led them from Bethlehem to Moab, should not their care of obedience to God have as well carried them back from Moab to Bethlehem? Yet if their wives would have left their idolatry with their maidenhead, the match had been more safe; but now, even at the last farewell, Naomi can say of Orpah, that she is returned to her gods. These men have sinned in their choice, and it speeds with them accordingly. Where did ever one of these unequal matches prosper? The two sons of Elimelech are swept away childless in the prime of their age, and, instead of their seed, they leave their carcases in Moab, their wives widows, their mother childless and helpless amongst in fidels, in that age which most needed comfort. How miserable do we find poor Naomi, which is left destitute of her country, her husband, her children, her friends, and turned loose and solitary to the mercy of the world! Yet even out of these hopeless ruins will God raise comfort to his servant. The first good news is, that God hath visited his people with bread; now, therefore, since her husband and sons were unrecoverable, she will try to recover her country and kindred. If we can have the same conditions in Judah that we have in Moab, we are no Israelites if we return not. While her husband and sons lived, I hear no motion of retiring home; now these her earthly stays are removed, she thinks presently of removing to her country. Neither can we so heartily think of our home above, while we are furnished with these worldly contentments: when God strips us of them, straightways our mind is homeward.

She that came from Bethlehem under the protection of a husband, attended with her sons, stored with substance, resolves now to measure all that way alone. Her adversity had stripped her of all but a good heart: that remains with her, and bears up her head, in the deepest of her extremity. True Christian fortitude wades through all evils; and, though we be up to the chin, yet keeps firm footing against the stream: where this is, the sex is not discerned; neither is the quantity of the evil read in the face. How well doth this courage become Israelites, when we are left comfortless in the midst of the Moab of this world, to resolve the contempt of all dangers in the way to our home! as, contrarily, nothing

doth more misbeseem a Christian, than that his spirits should flag with his estate, and that any difficulty should make him despair of attaining his best ends.

Goodness is of a winning quality, wheresoever it is; and, even amongst infidelɛ, will make itself friends. The good disposition of Naomi carries away the hearts of her daughters-in-law with her, so as they are ready to forsake their kindred, their country, yea, their own mother, for a stranger, whose affinity died with her sons. Those men are worse than infidels, and next to devils, that hate the virtues of God's saints, and could love their persons well, if they were not conscionable.

How earnestly do these two daughters of Moab plead for their continuance with Naomi; and how hardly is either of them dissuaded from partaking of the misery of her society! There are good natures even among infidels, and such as, for moral disposition and civil respects, cannot be exceeded by the best professors. Who can suffer his heart to rest in those qualities, which are common to them that are without God!

Naomi could not be so insensible of her own good, as not to know how much comfort she might reap to the solitariness, both of her voyage and her widowhood, by the society of these two younger widows, whose affections she had so well tried. Even every partnership is a mitigation of evils: yet, so earnestly doth she dissuade them from accompanying her, as that she could not have said more, if she had thought their presence irksome and burdensome. Good dispositions love not to pleasure themselves with the disadvantage of others, and had rather be miserable alone, than to draw in partners to their sorrow; for the sight of another's calamity doth rather double their own, and, if themselves were free, would affect them with compassion; as, contrarily, ill minds care not how many companions they have in misery, nor how few consorts in good: if themselves miscarry, they would be content all the world were enwrapped with them in the same distress. I marvel not that Orpah is by this seasonable importunity persuaded to return from a mother-in-law, to a mother in nature; from a toilsome journey to rest; from strangers to her kindred; from a hopeless condition, to likelihoods of contentment. A little entreaty will serve to move nature to be good unto itself. Every one is rather a Naomi to his own soul, to persuade it to stay still, and enjoy the delights of Moab, rather than to hazard our enter.

tainment in Bethlehem. Will religion allow me this wild liberty of my actions, this loose mirth, these carnal pleasures? Can I be a Christian, and not live sullenly? None but a regenerate heart can choose rather to suffer adversity with God's people, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for

a season.

The one sister takes an unwilling farewell, and moistens her last kisses with many tears: the other cannot be driven back, but repels one entreaty with another: "Entreat me not to leave thee; for whither thou goest I will go, where thou dwellest I will dwell, thy people shall be my people, thy God my God, where thou diest I will die, and there will I be buried." Ruth saw so much, upon ten years' trial, in Naomi, as was more worth than all Moab; and, in comparison whereof, all worldly_respects deserved nothing but contempt. The next degree unto godliness is the love of goodness: he is in a fair way to grace, that can value it. If she had not been already a proselyte, she could not have set this price upon Naomi's virtue. Love cannot be separated from a desire of fruition: in vain had Ruth protested her affection to Naomi, if she could have turned her out to her journey alone. Love to the saints doth not more argue our interest in God, than society argues the truth of our love.

As some tight vessel that holds against wind and water, so did Ruth against all the powers of a mother's persuasions; the impossibility of the comfort of marriage, in following her (which drew back her sisterin-law), cannot move her. She hears her mother, like a modest matron (contrary to the fashion of these times), say, "I am too old to have a husband ;" and yet she thinks not, on the contrary, I am too young to want a husband. It should seem, the Moabites had learned this fashion of Israel, to expect the brother's raising of seed to the deceased: the widowhood and age of Naomi cuts off that hope; neither could Ruth then dream of a Boaz that might advance her: it is no love that cannot make us willing to be miserable for those we affect. The hollowest heart can be content to follow one that prospereth. Adversity is the only furnace of friendship. If love will not abide both fire and anvil, it is but counterfeit; so, in our love to God, we do but crack and vaunt in vain, if we cannot be willing to suffer for him.

But if any motive might hope to speed, that which was drawn from example was

most likely: "Behold, thy sister-in-law is gone back unto her people, and to her gods; return thou after her.' This one artless persuasion hath prevailed more with the world, than all the pleas of reason. How many millions miscarry upon this ground: Thus did my forefathers; thus do the most; I am neither the first nor the last; " Do any of the rulers?" We straight think that either safe or pardonable, for which we can plead a precedent. This good woman hath more warrant for her resolution than another's practice. The mind can never be steady, while it stands upon others' feet, and till it be settled upon such grounds of assurance, that it will rather lead than follow; and can say with Joshua, whatsoever become of the world, "I and my house will serve the Lord."

If Naomi had not been a person of eminent note, no knowledge had been taken at Bethlehem of her return. Poverty is ever obscure; and those that have little may go and come without noise. If the streets of Bethlehem had not before used to say, " There goes Naomi," they had not now asked, "Is not this Naomi ?" She that had lost all things but her name, is willing to part with that also; "Call me not Naomi, but call me Marah." Her humility cares little for a glorious name in a dejected estate. Many a one would have set faces upon their want, and, in the bitterness of their condition, have affected the name of beauty. In all forms of good, there are more that care to seem, than to be: Naomi hates this hypocrisy, and, since God hath humbled her, desires not to be respected of men. Those who are truly brought down, make it not dainty, that the world should think them so, but are ready to be the first proclaimers of their own vileness.

Naomi went full out of Bethlehem to prevent want, and now she brings that want home with her, which she desired to avoid. Our blindness ofttimes carries us into the perils we seek to eschew. God finds it best, many times, to cross the likely projects of his dearest children, and to multiply those afflictions which they feared single.

Ten years have turned Naomi into Marah. What assurance is there of these earthly things whereof one hour may strip us? What man can say of the years to come, Thus I will be? How justly do we contemn this uncertainty, and look up to those riches that cannot but endure when heaven and earth are dissolved!

M

CONTEMPLATION IV. BOAZ AND RUTH.

WHILE Elimelech shifted to Moab to avoid the famine, Boaz abode still at Bethlehem, and continued rich and powerful. He stayed at home, and found that which Elimelech went to seek and missed. The judgment of famine doth not lightly extend itself to all. Pestilence and the sword spare none; but dearth commonly plagueth the meaner sort, and baulketh the mighty. When Boaz's storehouse was empty, his fields were full, and maintained the name of Bethlehem. I do not hear Ruth stand upon the terms of her better education, or wealthy parentage; but now that God hath called her to want, she scorns not to lay her hand unto all homely services, and thinks it no disparagement to find her bread in other men's fields. There is no harder lesson to a generous mind, nor that more beseems it, than either to bear want or to prevent it. Base spirits give themselves over to idleness and misery, and, because they are crossed, will sullenly perish.

That good woman hath not been for nothing in the school of patience; she hath learned obedience to a poor stepmother; she was now a widow past reach of any danger of correction; besides that penury might seem to dispense with awe. Even children do easily learn to contemn the poverty of their own parents; yet hath she inured herself to obedience, that she will not so much as go forth into the field to glean without the leave of her motherin-law, and is no less obsequious to Marah, than she was to Naomi. What shall we say to those children that, in the main actions of their life, forget they have natural parents? It is a shame to see, that, in mean families, want of substance causeth want of duty; and that children should think themselves privileged for unreverence, because the parent is poor. Little do we know, when we go forth in the morning, what God means to do with us ere night! There is a providence that attends on us in all our ways, and guides us insensibly to his own ends that divine hand leads Ruth blindfold to the field of Boaz. That she meets with his reapers, and falls upon his land amongst all the fields of Bethlehem, it was no praise to her election, but the gracious disposition of Him in whom we move. His thoughts are above ours, and do so order our actions, as we, if we had known, should have wished. No sooner is she come into the field, but the reapers are friendly to her. No sooner is Boaz

come into his field, but he invites her to more bounty than she could have desired. Now God begins to repay into her bosom her love and duty to her mother-in-law. Reverence and loving respects to parents never yet went away unrecompensed. God will surely raise up friends among strangers to those that have been officious at home.

It was worth Ruth's journey from Moab, to meet with such a man as Boaz, whom we find thrifty, religious, charitable: though he were rich, yet he was not careless; he comes into the field to oversee his reapers. Even the best estate requires careful managing of the owner: he wanted no officers to take charge of his husbandry, yet he had rather be his own witness. After all the trust of others, the master's eye feeds the horse.

The Master of the great household of the world gives us an example of this care, whose eye is in every corner of his large possession. Not civility only, but religion, binds us to good husbandry. We are all stewards; and what account can we give to our Master, if we never look after our estate? I doubt whether Boaz had been so rich, if he had not been so frugal; yet was he not more thrifty than religious. He comes not to his reapers but with a blessing in his mouth. -"The Lord be with you;" as one that knew, if he were with them, and not the Lord, his presence could avail nothing. All the business of the family speeds the better for the master's benediction. Those affairs are likely to succeed, that take their beginning at God. Charity was well matched with his religion, without which, good works are but hypocrisy. No sooner doth he hear the name of the Moabitess, but he seconds the kindness of his reapers, and still he rises in his favours. First, she may glean in his field; then she may drink of his vessels ; then she shall take her meal with his reapers, and part of it from his own hand; lastly, his workmen must let fall sheaves for her gathering. A small thing helps the needy. A handful of gleanings, a lapful of parched corn, a draught of the servants' bottles, a loose sheaf, was such a favour to Ruth, as she thought was above all recompense. This was not seen in the estate of Boaz, which yet makes her for the time happy. If we may refresh the soul of the poor with the very offals of our estate, and not hurt ourselves, woe be to us if we do it not! Our barns shall be as full of curses as of corn, if we grudge the scattered ears of our field to the hands of the needy.

How thankfully doth Ruth take thest