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lives in your hands for a time: there is as much in this word as may make us go away singing, that may comfort us against all the troubles this time can afford us.
Ye will talk of news, here is good news, 'the prey shall be taken from the mighty, and the lawful captive delivered.'-But, say ye, there is little likelihood for it: wherefore, where is the man to do it? I know no noblemen, gentlemen nor commons;-we had to go within these few years; but now the commons are involved in the same guilt with the gentlemen, and are lying by as well as they; there is no minister nor professor to do it, and indeed the Lord will not lippen to one of us;—thanks be to God for that; for if it were lippened to us, we would be always under troubles, and the work would be razed to the foundation, so that there would be no memory of it to posterity—Then will you say to the Lord, How shall this pray be taken from the mighty, &c?———And I will tell you what will be the answer, which is this, 'For I will contend with them that contend with thee, and will save thy children, and will feed them that oppress thee with their own flesh,' &c.—Never think that ye will get salvation till God come and contend with his enemies. Some would invert this, they would first have salvation, and then contending with the enemies; but that is not the way that God minds to take, and therefore
