:398 RUIN AND RECOVERY, &C. every city of the universe, and in every age of man since the first creation. SECT. IL A particular F'iera of the Miseries of Man. But we will lay aside the sins andfollies of mankind, atnd` only take his miseries into our present view ; let us see whether from them .alone the cannot infer, that we are ä very degene- rate race of beings, with most evident marks of the displeasure of our Maker upon us, and under the punishment of the wise and righteous Governor of all things*. Let us take a turn amongst the historians, of the world ;' and what is almost all history but a description of the wretched- ness of mankind, under the mischiefs they bring upon them- selves, and the judgments of the great God? The scenes of happiness and peace are very thin set among all the nations, and they have had rather a transient glimpse of these bright scenes- here and there appearingand. vanishing, than any pretences to durable felicity. Let us spread our thoughts over the universe, what public desolations by plague and famine, by storms and earthquakes, by wars and pestilence, which strike and affect our ears cáutinually : Even th'e report is terrible. -What secret mischiefs reign among men, which pierce into the soul, and cor- rode the vitals of nature ? What smarting wounds-and bruises what lingering diseases attack and torment the 'satins] frame ? Surely those who sustain these maladies would not suppose out- great poet had exaggerated matters when liedesc^tïbes them thus as set before Adam our forefather by the angel hphael : :' A luau. house it seemed, wherein were. Paid Numbers of all diseas'd, all maladies Of ghastly spasm, or racking torture, ei udms Of heart-sick agony, all feverous kinds,. Convulsions, epilepsies, fierce cattarrhs,, Intestine stone and ulcer, 'colic pangs, Demoniac phrenzy, mooing nvelaud'oyy, And monn.strock madness, pining al regrhy, Consumption, and wide.wasting peeitmare, Dropsies, and asthmas, and joint- rr,eking rheurns. Dire was the tossing, deep the gr nans, despair 'Tended the sick, busiest from co aclf to couch ; And over them triumphant ,death iris. dart Shook, but delay'd to strike, du nigh oft invok'd. ". But lazar-honses arenot the only places whereby we may . judge of the numbers of the wretched_ Where is the family, if there are seven or eiglit.persous in it,, 'wherein there is not olio ^nr other of them afflicted with some to otrblesonie malady, orsome ' I hope the reader Will forgile a sho, t repetition of some of the same ,thoughts which may be found under the first rt?aestion in this book: for it was 'hardly possible to avoid then ; especially a oasidering,, that these two discourses' Were Written with a distinct view, and Ware not at flint ,designed to be publish's&d in the same book.
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