Wife. Yes; once as he came home drunk from the ale house.

Atten. Pray how did he break it ?

Mr Badman breaks his leg.

Wife, Why upon a time he was at an ale-houfe, that wicked houfe about two or three miles from home, and having there drank hard the greatest part of the day, when night was come, he would ftay no longer but calls for his horfe, gets up, and like a madman (as drunken persons ufually ride away be goes, as hard as horfe could lay legs to the ground. Thus he rid, till coming to a dirty place, where his horfe flouncing in, fell, threw his master, and with his fall broke his leg; fo there he lay But you wouldnot think how he fwore at first. But after a while, ke coming to himself, and feeling by his pain, and the ufeleffaels of his leg, what cafe he was in, and also fearing that this bout might be his death, he began to ery out after the manner of fuch, Lord help me! Lord: bave mercy upon me! good God deliver me! and the tike. So there he lay, till fome came by, who took. him up, carried him home, where he lay for fome time, before he could go abroad again.

Atten. And then you fay he called upon God.

Wife. He cried out in his pain, and would say. O God

and, O Lord help me! But whether it was that his fin might be pardoned, and his foul faved or whether to be rid of his pain. I will not pofitively determine: though i fear it was but for the last; because when his pain was gone, and he had got hopes, of mending, even before he could go abroad, he call off prayer, and began his old game to wit to be as bad as he was before. He then would fend for his old companions; his fluts alfo would come to his houfe to fee him, and with them he would be, as well as he could

could for his lame leg, as vicious as they could be for their hearts.

Atten. It was a wonder he did not break his neck."

Wife. His neck bad gone inftead of his leg, but that God was long-fuffering towards him; he had deferved it ten thousand times over. There have been many, as I have heard, and as I have hinted to you before, that have taken their hories when drunk as he; but they have gone from the have broken their necks betwixt the ale house and home. One hard by us alfo drunk himself dead; he drank, and died in his drink.

pot to the grave; for they

Atten. It is a fad thing to die drunk.

Wife. So it is; but yet I wonder that no more do fo. For confidering the heinoufness of that fin, and with how many other fins it is accompanied, as with oaths, blafphemies, lies, revellings, brawlings, &c. it is a wonder to me, that any that live in that fin fhould escape such a blow from heaven, that fhould tumble them into their graves.

How many fins do accompany drunkenness.

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Besides, when I confider alfo how, when they are as drunk as beafts, they, without all fear of danger, will ride like bedlams and madmen, even as if they did dare God to meddle with them if be durft, for their being drunk: I fay, I wonder that he doth not withdraw his producting providences from them, and leave them to those dangers and deftru&ti-, ons that by their fin they have deserved, and that by their bedlam madness they would rush themselves into : Only I confider again, that he hath appointed a day. wherein he will reckon with them, and doth alfo commonly make examples of fome, to fhew that he takes notice of their fin, abhors their way, and will count with them for it at the fame time.

Atten.

Atten. It is worthy of our remark, to take notice how God, to fhew his diflike of the fins of men, ftrikes fome of them down with a blow; as the breaking of Mr Badman's leg: for doubtless that was a (troke from heaven.

"

beholders

of beholders.

It was an

Wife. It is worth our remark indeed. open stroke, it fell upon him while he was in the height of his fin: And it looks much like to that in Job: "Therefore he knoweth their works, and overturneth them in the night, fo that they are deftroyed. He ftriketh them as wicked men in the open fight of others;' or, as the margin reads it, "the place of He lays them with his ftroke in the place There was Mr Badman iaid; his ftroke was taken notice of by every one: His broken leg was at this time the town talk. Mr Badman has broke his leg. fays one; how did he break it ? fays another; as he came home drunk from fuch an ale houfe, faid a third; a judgment of God came upon him, faid a fourth. This his fin, his flame, and punishment, are ail made confpicuous to all that are about him. I will here tell you another flory or two

Anopen ftroke.

I have read in Mr Clark's Looking glass for finners, That upon a time, a certain drunken fellow boafted in his cups, That there was neither heaven nor hell; alfo he said, he believed, that man had no foul; and that for his own part, he would fell his foul to any body that would buy it. Then did one of his companions buy it of him for a cup of wine, and presently the devil in man's fhape bought it of that man again at the fame price; and fo in the prefence of them all, laid hold on' the foot feller, and carried him away through the air, fo that he was never more heard of.

He tells us also, That there was one at Salisbury, in the midst of his health, drinking and carouting in a tavern ;

tavern; and he drank a health to the devil, faying, That if the devil would not come and pledge him, he would not believe that there was either God or devil. Whereupon his companions, ftricken with fear, hastened out of the room and presently after, hearing a hideous noife, and fmelling a flinking favour, the vintner ran up into the chamber, and coming in, he miffed his guest, and found the window broken, the iron bar in it bowed, and all bloody: But the man was never heard of afterwards.

Again, he tells us of a bailiff of Hedley, who upon a Lord's day being drunk at Melford, got upon his horse to ride through the ftreets, faying, That his horfe would carry him to the devil. And prefently his horfe threw him, and broke his neck. These things are worse than the breaking of Mr Badman's leg, and Thould be a caution to all of his friends that are living, left they alfo fall by their fin into thefe fad judgments of God.

But, as I faid, Mr Badman quickly forgot all his confcience was choked,before his leg was healed. And therefore, before he was well of the fruit of one fin, he tempts God to send another judgment to seize upon him: And fo he did quickly after. For not many months after his leg was well, he had a very dangerous fit of fickness, infomuch that now he began to think he must die in very deed.

Mr Badman

fallen fick.

Atten. Well, and what did he think and do then? Wife. He thought he must go to hell; this I know, for he could not forbear but fay fo.

To my beft remembrance, he lay cry. His confcience. ving out all one night for fear, and at his wounded. times he would fo tremble, that he

But,

would make the very bed shake under him. Oh! how the thoughts of death, of hell fire, and of

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eternal judgment did now rack his confcience. Fear might be seen in his face, and in his toffings to and fro It might also be heard in his words, and be underflood by his heavy groans. He would often cry, I am undone, I am undone; my vile life has undone me!

:

Atten. Then his former Atheistical thoughts and principles, were too weak now to support him from the fears of eternal damnation.

Wife. Ay! they were too weak indeed. They may ferve to stifle confcience, when a man is in the midst of his profperity, and to harden the heart againft all good counfel, when a man is left of God, and given up to his reprobate mind. But, alas! Atheistical thoughts, notions, and opinions, must shrink and melt away, when God fends, yea, comes

His Atheism will not help him now.

with lickness to vifit the foul of fuch a finner for his fin. There was a man dwelt about twelve miles off from us, that had fo trained up himfelf in his Atheistical notions, that at laft he attempted to write a book against Jesus Christ, and against the divine authority of the fcriptures. (But I think it was not printed) Well, after many days, God ftruck him with fickness, whereof he died. So being fick, and mufing upon his former doings, the book that he had written came into his mind, and with it fuch a fenfe of his evil in writing of it, that it tore his confci. ence as a lion would tear a kid. He lay therefore upon his death bed in fad cafe, and much affliction of confcience: fome of my friends alfo went to fee him : and as they were in his chamber one day, he haftily called for pen, ink, and paper, which when it was given him, he took it and writ to this purpose. I, fuch a one, in fuch a town, must go to hell fire, for writing a book against Jefus Chrift, and against the holy fcrip

tures.