162 ItSFOIMATION OF 1nANNtit5. your families, and let your own household starve, while you are . endeavouring to ruin the household of Satan. But there are many leisure hours oflife that may be employed in this holy war- fare ; and the time spent in this service will turn to good account in the days of eternity. As for the expense of money which is necessary to carry on this war, there are some hundreds of gentlemen and ladies in the present assembly, that can an- swer this objection much better than I. My best method of answering it, is but to persuade you, my honoured friends, to attempt and try what you can da towards it. One line under your hands, or a single item in your will, is an answer more to the purpose than whole sheets of my writing, or than if I should continue my discourse till the sun go down. The charge of the prosecution of lewd houses is very great, as I am informed, and had the societies more assistance of this kind the reformation would be carried on more sensibly. Let me address the richer part of this audience: Will it not be a joyful prospect on your dying bed to think that the battle grows strong against sin when your heads lie down in the dust, and that by means of the sinews you have added to the war in your last testament ? Will it not be a hopeful evi- dence of your hatred of sin, that you contend against it, even in the grave, and maintain an everlasting fight? IV. The danger and risk of life in this cause is another discouragement : But was there ever any war without danger, or victory without courage ! Besides, the perils you run here are almost infinitely less than those which attend the wars of na- tions, where the cause is not half so divine. The fields of battle in Flanders, and almost all over Europe, have drunk up the blood ofmillions, and have furnished graves for large armies but it canhardly be said that you have hitherto resistedunto blood striving against sin Heb. xii. 4. In a warof more than twelve yearscontinuance there has but one man fallen. The providence ofGod has put helmets of salvation upon your heads. Same of you can relate wonders of deliverance and safety, when youhave been beset by numbers, and their rage has kindled into resolu- tions of revenge: the Lord has taken away their courage in a moment, the men of might have notfound their hands; thus he has caused even the wrath ofman topraise him, and the remain- der of wrath he hath restrained; Ps. lxxvi. 5, 10. Read over this psalm, and with divine valour pursue the tight. . But if your life should be lost in such a cause as this, it will be esteemed martyrdom in the sight of God, and shall be thus written down in the book of the wars of the Lord. Believe me, these red lines will look well in the records of heaven, when the judgment shall be set, and the books opened in the face of mea and angels. .
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