n the blood of many thousands, yea,
thousands of thousands of souls, which have been lost by the one, or might
have been saved by the other. God will require the blood of the children
which those righteous Abels might have begotten unto him. There is, beside
all this, more blood-guiltiness, which is secret, but shall sometime be
brought to light. O blood! blood! O let the land tremble, while the
righteous Judge makes "inquisition for blood," Psal. ix. 12; O let England
cry, "Deliver me from blood-guiltiness, O God"! Psal. li. 14.

But you will say, peradventure, many of these things whereof I have spoken
ought not to be charged upon the kingdom, they were only the acts of a
prevalent faction for the time.

I answer, First, God will impute them to the kingdom, unless the kingdom
mourn for them. God gives not a charge to the destroying angel (Ezek. ix.
4) to spare those who have not been actors in the public sins and
abominations, but to spare those only who cry and sigh for those
abominations.

Secondly, When the ministers of state, or others having authority in
church or commonwealth, take the boldness to do such acts, the kingdom is
not blameless; for they durst not have done as they did, had the Lord but
disclaimed, discountenanced, and cried out against them. It is marked both
of John Baptist (Matt. xiv. 5), and of Christ (Matt. xxi. 46), and of the
apostles (Acts iv. 21), that so long as the people did magnify them, and
esteem them highly, their enemies durst not do unto them what else they
would have done.

3. A third consideration concerning the kingdom is this. Notwithstanding
of all the happiness and gospel-blessings which it hath wanted in so great
a measure, and notwithstanding of all the sins which have so much abounded
in it, yet the servants of God have charged it with great
presumption,(1383) that the church of England hath said with the church of
Laodicea, "I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing,"
Rev. iii. 17. It hath been proud of its clergy, learning, great revenues,
peace, plenty, wealth, and abundance of all things, and as the Apostle
chargeth the Corinthians, "Ye are puffed up, and have not rather mourned,"
that the wicked ones "might be taken away from among you," 1 Cor. v. 2.
And would God this presumption had taken an end when God did begin to
afflict the land. It did even make an idol of this Parliament, and trusted
to its own strength and armies, which hath provoked Go