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be; wouldst thou (thinkest thou) when brought to thy home again, chuse to thyself thy former life, to wit, to return to thy folly again? No; if belief of what thou sawest remained with thee, thou wouldst eat fire and brimstone first.

The

4. I will propound again. Suppose that there was amongst us such a law, (and such a magistrate to inflict the penalty) that for every open wickedness committed by thee, so much of thy flesh should with burning pincers be plucked from thy bones; would thou then go on in thy open way of lying, swearing, drinking, and whoring, as thou with delight doest now? Surely, surely, no. fear of the punishment would make thee forbear, yea, would make thee tremble, even then when thy lusts were powerful, to think what a punishment thou wast sure to sustain, so soon as the pleasure was over. But oh! the folly, the madness, the desperate madness that is in the hearts of Mr Badman's friends, who in despite of the threatnings of an holy and sin-revenging God, and of the outcries and warnings of all good men; yea, that will in despite of the groans and torments of those that are now in hell for sin, (Luke xvi. 24, 28.) go on in a sinful course of life; yea, tho' every sin is also a step of descent down to that infernal cave. saying of Solomon, of men is full of evil, heart while they live,

O how true is that The heart of the sons and madness is in their and after that they go

to the dead,' Eccles. ix. 3. To the dead! that is to the dead in hell, to the damned dead; the place to which those that have died bad men are gone; and that those that live bad men are like to go to, when a little more sin, like stolen waters, hath been imbibed by their sinful souls.

That which has made me publish this book is,

1. For that wickedness like a flood is like to drown our English world: It begins already to be above the tops of the mountains; it has almost swallowed up all; our youth, our middle age, old age, and all, are almost carried away of this flood. O debauchery, debauchery, what hast thou done in England! Thou hast corrupted our young men, hast made our old men beasts; thou hast deflowered our virgins, and hast made matrons bawds: Thou hast made our earth to reel to and fro like a drunkard, it is in danger to be removed like a cottage; yea, it is because transgression is so heavy upon it, like to fall and rise no more,' Isa. xxiv. 20.

O! that I could mourn for England, and for the sins that are committed therein, even while I see, that without repentance the men ⚫ of God's wrath are about to deal with us, each having his slaughtering weapon in his hand, Ezek. ix, 1, 2. Well, I have written, and by God's assistance shall pray that this flood may abate in England; and could I but see the tops

of the mountains above it, I should think that these waters were abating.

2. It is the duty of those that can, to cry out against this deadly plague, yea, to lift up their voice as with a trumpet against it, that men may be awakened about it, fly from it, as from that which is the greatest of evils. Sin pulled angels out of heaven, pulls men down to hell, and overthroweth kingdoms. Who, that sees an house on fire, will not give the alarm to them that dwell therein? Who, that sees the land invaded, will not set the beacons on a flame? Who, that sees the devils, as roaring lions, continually devouring souls, will not make an outcry? But above all, when we see sin, sinful sin, a swallowing up a nation, sinking of a nation, and bringing its inhabitants to temporal, spiritual, and eternal ruin, shall we not cry out, and cry, “They are drunk, but not with wine; they stagger, but not with strong drink; they are intoxicated with the deadly poison of sin, which will, if its malignity be not by wholesome means allayed, bring soul and body, and estate, and country, and all to ruin and destruction?

3. In and by this my outcry, I shall deliver myself from the ruins of them that perish; for a man can do no more in this matter, I mean as man in my capacity, than to detect and condemn the wickedness, warn the evil doer of the judgment, and fly there from myself. But O! that I might not only deliver myself! Oh! that many would hear, and

turn at this my cry, from sin! that they may be secured from the death and judgment that attend it.

Why I have handled the matter in this method, is best known to myself: And why I have concealed most of the names of the persons whose sins or punishments I here and there in this book make relation of, is,

1. For that neither the sins nor judgments were all alike open; the sins of some were committed, and the judgments executed for them only in a corner. Not to say that I could not learn some of their names; for could I, I should not have made them public, for this reason.

2. Because I would not provoke those of their relations that survive them; I would not justly provoke them; and yet, as I think, I should, should I have entailed their punishment to their sins, and both to their names, and so have turned them into the world.

3. Now would I lay them under disgrace. and contempt, which would, as I think, unavoidably have happened unto them, had I withal inserted their names.

As for those whose names I mention, their crimes or judgments were manifest; public almost as any thing of that nature that happeneth to mortal men. Such therefore have published their own shame by their sin, and God, his anger, by taking of open venge

ance.

As Job says, "God has struck them as

wicked men in the open sight of others," Job xxxiv. 26. So that I cannot conceive, since their sin and judgment was so conspicuous, that my admonishing the world thereof should turn to their detriment: For the publishing of these things, are, so far as relation is concerned, intended for remembrances; that they may also bethink themselves, repent, and turn to God, lest the judgments for their sins should prove hereditary. For the God of heaven hath threatened to visit the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, if they hate him, to the third and fourth generation, Exod xx. 5.

Nebuchadnezzar's punishment for his pride being open, (for he was for his sin driven from his kingly dignity, and from among men too, to eat grass like an ox, and to company with the beasts) Daniel did not stick to tell Belshazzar his son to his face thereof; nor to publish it, that it might be read and remembered by the generations to come. The same may be said of Judas and Annanias, &c. for their sin and punishment were known to all the dwellers at Jerusalem, Acts, chapters 1, and 5.

Nor is it a sign but of a desperate impenitence and hardness of heart, when the offspring or relations for those who have fallen by open, fearful, and prodigious judgments, for their sin, shall overlook, forget, pass by, or take no notice of such high outgoings of God against them and their house. Thus Da

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