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whether it was that his sin might be pardoned, and his soul saved, or whether to be rid of his pain, I will not positively 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 cast off prayer, and began his old game, to wit, to be as bad as he was before. He then would send for his old companions; his sluts also would come to his house to see him, and with them he would be, as well as he 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.

Wise. His neck had gone instead of his leg, but that God was long-suffering towards him; he had deserved 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 horses when drunk as he; but they have gone from the pot to the grave; for they have broken their necks betwixt the ale-house and home. One hard by us also drunk himself dead; he drank and died in his drink.

Atten. It is a sad thing to die drunk.

Wise. So it is; but yet I wonder that no more do so. For considering the heinousness of that sin, and with how many other sins it is accompanied, as with oaths, blasphemies, lyes, revellings, brawlings, &c. it is a wonder to me, that any that live in that sin should escape such a blow from heaven, that should

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tumble them into their graves. Besides, when I consider also how, when they are as drunk as beasts, they, without all fear of danger, will ride like bedlams and madmen, even as if they did dare God to meddle with them if he durst, for their being drunk: I say, I wonder that he doth not withdraw his protecting providences from them, and leave them to those dangers and destructions that by their sin they have deserved, and that by their bedlam madness. they would rush themselves into: Only I consider again, that he hath appointed a day wherein he will reckon with them, and doth also commonly make examples of some, to shew that he takes notice of their sin, abhors their way, and will count with them for it at the set time.

Atten. It is worthy of our remark, to take notice how God, to shew his dislike of the sins of men, strikes some of them down with a blow; as the breaking of Mr Badman's leg: for doubtless that was a stroke from heaven.

Wise. It is worth our remark indeed. It was an open stroke, it fell upon him while he was in the height of his sin: And it looks much like to that in Job: “ Therefore he knoweth their works, and overturneth them in the night so that they are destroyed. He striketh them as wicked men in the open sight of others ;" or as the margin reads it, " in the place of beholders." He lays them with his stroke in the place of beholders. There was Mr Badman laid; his stroke was taken notice of by

every one: His broken leg was at this time the town-talk. Mr Badman has broke his leg, says one; how did he break it? says another; as he came home drunk from such an alehouse, said a third: a judgment of God upon him, says a fourth. This his sin, his shame, and punishment, are all made conspicuous to all that are about him. I will here tell you another story or two.

I have read in Mr Clark's Looking-glass for sinners, That upon a time, a certain drunken fellow boasted in his cups, That there was neither heaven nor hell; also he said, he believed, that man had no soul; and that for his own part, he would sell his soul to any 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 shape bought it of that man again at the same price; and so in the presence of them all, laid hold on the soul-seller, and carried him away through the air, so 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 carousing in a tavern; and he drank a health to the devil, saying, that if the devil would not come and pledge him, he would not believe that there was either God or devil. Whereupon his companions, stricken with fear, hastened out of the room: and presently after, hearing a hideous noise, and smelling a stinking savour, the vintner ran up into the chamber, and coming in, he missed

his guest, and found the window broken, the iron bar in it bowed, and all bloody: But the min 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 strects, saying, That his horse would carry him to the devil. And presently his horse threw him, and broke his neck. These things are worse than the breaking of Mr Badman's leg, and should be a caution to all of his friends that are living, lest they also fall by their sin into these sad judgments of God.

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

Atten. Well, and what did he think and do then?

Wise. He thought he must go to hell; this I know, for he could not forbear but say so. To my best remembrance, he lay crying out all one night for fear, and at times he would so tremble, that he would make the very bed shake under him. But, Oh! how the thoughts of death, of hell-fire, and of eternal judgment, did then wrack his conscience. Fear might be seen in his face, and in his tossings to and

fro: It might also be heard in his words, and be understood 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.

Wise. Ay! they were too weak indeed. They may serve to stifle conscience, when a man is in the midst of his prosperity, and to harden the heart against all good counsel, 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 sends, yea, comes with sickness to visit the soul of such a sinner for his sin. There was a man dwelt about twelve miles off from us, that had so trained up himself in his Atheistical notions, that at last he attempted to write a book against Jesus Christ, and against the divine authority of the scriptures. (But I think it was not printed.) Well, after many days, God struck him with sickness, whereof he died. So being sick, and musing upon his former doings, the book that he had written came into his mind, and with it such a sense of his evil in writing of it, that it tore his conscience as a lion would tear a kid. He lay therefore upon his death-bed in sad case, and much affliction of conscience: some of my friends also went to see him: and as they were in his chamber one day, he hastily called for pen, ink, and paper, which when

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