Chap. 18. Wf/irn e.vpofitiosrs wpon the oo,t¿, óf J o n. Verf. 2 t. 135 ped, when theft threatnings are fo often renewed ? when every page of Scripture, teflifies the deftruér:on of wicked men ; and i;;aies wrath upon them, if they goe on in their wickedneffe. Low deeply (hall theybe condemned when they are condemned by the mooches of fo many wicnef es ! David faith, ('Pfal. 62: I r. ) God bath fpoken once, twice have I heard ir, that power belong eth unto God; the meaning is, either that God fpake that often, or chat David heard it often, though God fpake it but once that is, he thoroughly weig'.redand conlidered it, at once fpeak-. ing, that power belongetb to god. A holy heart heares that twice, that God (peaks but once ; Grace hath a quiche care, it makes us as the Apoltle lames fpeakes, ( Chap. t.. 19. ) Swift to heare but God fpeaks twice, and thrice, yea a hundred times, to wic- ked men and they will not heare once ; Then how great wilt their Judgement he, and how will their mouthes be ftopt, be- caufe they ftopt their Bares. Hath not God Paid it againe and againe; This is thedwellingofthe wicd,and this is the place ofhim that knoweth not God. Hath he not fpoken it ;in figures, and alle- gories ? Hath he not fpoken it in plaine words, and in exam- ples? bath henot fpoken it in blond ? bath he not fpoken it in fire, in fword and famine ? How often bath he made his wrath fmóake, yea blaze and burne before the eye of fence; how of- ten hath he made (inners finell the hrimftone of his difpleafure ? Have they not heard of, have they not feene the defolations, which.fin hath made?how it bath left tbofe places which were as the garden of God, like a waft or wildernes? Have they ne- ver read or heard of the old world drowned with water ? Have they never heard of Sodome and Gomorrah confümed with fire? Have they not heard of Pharoab over- whelmed in the red Sea, for vexing the people ofGod, and ofCorah, Dathan and Ahiratn. (wallowed up alive by the earth for their murmuring againft Mofes ? Whole volumes ofexamples have been col Idled, where- in the threatnings ofGod againft fin have been made vifi ble irs the ruine and downfall of (inners themfelves, and in the root- ing out oftheir pofteritie. As therefore the Apofkle argues from the holy lives and happy deatbb of the old Patriarchs and o- thers enumerated in the eleventh Chapter of the Epiftle to the. Hebrews, fo may we from the unhappy deaths of manywhole lives
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