QUESTION I. 239 wisdom can bring good out of evil, and extract conveniences and comforts out of the most hideous and desolate aspect of things. And thus his wisdom and goodness.are glorified in the midst of these formidable scenes. And there remain still sufficient evi- dences of the perfections and glory of the Creator in this earth, notwithstanding the many appearances of judgment and ruin which are foundhere, as in Rom. i. 20. But let us proceed into this melancholy spectacle. What resistless deluges of water in a season of great rains come roll- ing down the hills, bear down all things in their course, and threaten spacious desolation ? What roaring and tremendous water-falls in some partsof the globe? What burning mountains, in whose caverns are lakes of glowing metal, or of liquid fire, ready to overflow andburst upon the lower lands ; or their bowels are consumed within ; and they are turned into a mere shell of earth, covering prodigious cavities of smoke, and furnaces of flame ? And they seemto wait only for a divine command to break inward, and bury towns and pròvinces in fiery ruin What un- known and active treasures of air or wind, are pent' up in the bowels of the earth by the rarefractions produced from subterra- neous ferments and fires, all prepared to break out into wide and surprisingmischief? What huge torrents of water rush and roar through the hollows of the globe we tread? What dreadful sounds and threatening appearancesfrom the region of meteors in the air? What clouds charged with flameand thunder, which are ready to burst on the earth, and discompose and terrify all nature for many miles round, and to make dreadful havoc of mankind ? When I seriously take a survey of some such scenes as these, I am very reads' to say within myself, Surely this earth of ours, in these rude and broken appearances, this unsettledand dangerous state of it, was designed as a dwellingfor some un- happy inhabitants, who did or would transgress the law of their. Maker, and deeply merit desolationfrom his hand, and he has here stored up his magazines of divine artillery and death against the day of punishment. But to take one step further, how often have the terrible occurrences of nature in the air, earth and sea, and the calami- tous incidents in divineprovidence in several countries, how often have they given an actual confirmation to this sentiment? What sweeping and destrucctive storms have we and our fathers seen by land and sea, even in this temperate island of Great Britain ? What particular floods of water and violent explosions of fire we do read of in the histories of the world ? What shocking convul- sions of the globe stretching far and wide under the affrighted nations for three or four thousand miles, and spreading terror through every heart? What sudden and huge diruptions of the
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