See _Act_ 15th, _Sess._ 2d, _Parl._ 1649. And how happy we had been, if
we had constantly acted in conformity to these agreeable laws,
experience, both former and latter, will bear witness. How much better
had it been for us to have walked in God's statutes, and executed his
judgments, than by our abhorrence of them, and apostasy from them, to
provoke him to give us statutes that are not good, and judgments whereby
we cannot live (_Ezek._ xx, 25), or have any comfortable enjoyment and
possession of the blessings and privileges of his everlasting gospel, as
it is with us at this day. And yet, this is what _Seceders_ would have
us caressing, embracing and (with them) blessing God for, under the
notion of a present good; and so bless God for permitting his enemies
(in anger against an ungrateful and guilty people) to overturn his work
and interest, and establish themselves upon the ruins thereof; to bless
him for making our own iniquities to correct us, and our backslidings to
reprove us, until we know what an evil and bitter thing it is to depart
from the LORD GOD of our fathers; to bless him (for what is matter of
lamentation) that the adversaries of _Zion_ are the chief, and her
enemies prosper, _Lam.
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