376 APPENDIX. 



US SO long. For without his divine manutenency, 

 our strongest fabrics had fallen immediately upon 

 their very builders ; he that made all things at 

 first, by preserving makes them still; now makes 

 them every moment ; and for his will's sake alone 

 they were and are created. He carries nature 

 always in his bosom, fostering and cherishing her; 

 and that not only as she came out of his own hand, 

 and bears the impresses of his infinite wisdom and 

 power ; but as we have transformed and disguised 

 her by our petty skill ; as she is, fettered and 

 shackled by our silly artifices : even the world of 

 fancy too, the poor attempts and bunglings of art, 

 our houses of dirt and clay (which we call palaces 

 and so please ourselves in) would quickly fall 

 asunder, and moulder all into the dust they consist 

 of, did not an Almighty hand uphold them. If 

 He keep not the house and the city, in vain the 

 builder builds, and the watchman wakes, and the 

 sentinel stands perdu. And, therefore, give we 

 him the glory of his mercy, saying, * Thanks be 

 to the Lord, who so long showed us marvellous 

 great kindness, I say not, with the Psalm, in a 

 strong city (though the strongest without him is 

 weakness) but in a very weak one : a city in the 

 meanness of the materials, the oldness of the build- 

 ings, the straightness of some streets, the ill situ- 

 ation of others, and many like inconveniences, so 

 exposed to this dismal accident, that it must 



* Psm. xxxi. 21. 



