will hold a mad Man's Tongue, no Fetters can restrain the Ramble of his Discourse, nor bind any one Faculty of his Soul or Body to its good Behaviour: But all that is within him, is promifcuoufly thrown out; and his Credit, with all that is dear to him, is at the Mercy of this unruly Member, (as St. James calls it) which, in the present Cafe, has no Mercy upon him, whom it belongs to; nor any Thing to govern it, but a violent, frantick Humour, wholly unable to govern itfelf.

(5.) God fometimes lets loose the Sinner's Confcience upon him, filling it with fuch Horrour for Sin, as renders it utterly unable to bear the Burden it labours under, without publishing, or rather proclaiming it to the World.

For fome Sorts of Sin there are, which will lie burning and boiling in the Sinner's Breaft, like a kind of Vefuvius, or Fire pent up in the Bowels of the Earth; which yet muft, and will (in fpite of all Obstacles) force its Way out of it at length; and thus, in fome Cafes of Sin, the Anguish of the Mind grows fo exceeding fierce and intolerable, that it finds no Reft within itself, but is even ready to burft, till it is de

livered

livered of the swelling Secret it labours with: Such kind of Guilt being to the Confcience, like fome offenfive Meats to the Stomach, which no fooner takes them in, but it is in Pain and Travail, till it throws them out. again.

Who knows the Force, the Power, and the remorfless Rage of Confcience, when God commiffions it to call the Sinner to an Account? How strangely it will fift and winnow all his Retirements? How terribly it will wring and torture him, till it has bolted out the hidden Guilt, which it was in search of? All which is fo mighty an Argument of the Prerogative of God over Mens Hearts, that no Malefactor can be accounted free, though in his own keeping, nor any one concealed, though never fo much out of Sight; for ftill God has his Serjeant, or Officer in the Sinner's Breaft; who will be fure to attack him, as foon as ever the great Judge fhall but give the Word: An Officer so strictly true to his Truft, that he is neither to be Softened, nor fweetened; neither to be begged, nor bought off; nor confequently, in a word, fit to be of the Jury, when a rich, or potent Malefactor comes to be tryed, in hopes to be brought off.

And

And this also fhews the great Importance· and Wisdom of that Advice of Pythagoras, namely, that every Man, when he is about to do a wicked Action, should, above all Things in the World, ftand in awe of himSelf, and dread the Witness within him: Who fits there as a Spy over all his Actions; and will be fure, one Day or other, to accuse him to himself; and perhaps put him upon fuch a Rack, as fhall make him accufe himfelf to others too.

For this is no new Thing, but an old experimented Cafe; there having been several in the World, whofe Confcience has been fo much too hard for them, that it has compelled them to disclose a villanous Fact, even with the Gibbet and the Halter fet before their Eyes; and to confess their Guilt, though they faw certain and immediate Death the Reward of that Confeffion.

But most commonly has Confcience this difmal Effect upon great Sinners, at their Departure out of this World; at which Time, fome feel themselves fo horribly ftung with the Guilty Sense of fome frightful Sin, that they cannot die with any tolerable Peace, till they have revealed it; finding it some fmall Relief (it feems) and Eafement of

their Load, to leave the Knowledge of their Sin behind them, though they carry the Guilt of it along with them.

(6.) And lastly. God fometimes takes the Work of Vengeance upon himself, and immediately, with his own Arm, repays the Sinner, by fome notable Judgment from Heaven: Sometimes, perhaps, he strikes him dead fuddenly; and fometimes he imites him with fome loathfome Dileafe (which will hardly be thought the Gout, whatsoever it may be called) and, fometimes again, he ftrangely blasts him in his Name, Family, or Estate, so that all about him ftand amazed at the Blow; but God, and the Sinner himfelf know well enough the Reason, and the Meaning of it too.

Juftice, we know, ufes to be pictured blind, and therefore it finds out the Sinner, not with its Eyes, but with its Hands; not by feeing, but by ftriking: And it is the Honour of the great Attribute of God's Justice, which he thinks fo much concerned, to give fome Pledge or Specimen of itself upon bold Sinners in this World; and fo to affure them of a full Payment hereafter, by paying them fomething in the Way of Earneft here.

And

And the Truth is, many and marvellous have been the Inftances of God's dealing in this Manner, both with Cities and whole Nations. For when a Guilt has fpread itfelf fo far, as to become National, and grown to fuch a Bulk, as to be too big for all Controul of Law; fo that there feems to be a Dispute, whether God or Sin governs the World; furely it is then high Time for God to do his own Work with his own Hand, and to affert his Prerogative against the impudent Defiers of it, by fomething every whit as Signal and National, as the Provocation given; whether it be by War, Plague, or Fire, (all which we have been visited with, though neither corrected, nor changed by ;) and to let the common Nufances of the Age, the profeffed Enemies of Virtue and Religion, and the very Blots and Scandal of humane Nature itself know, that there still remains upon them a flaming Guilt to account for, and a dreadful Judge to account

to.

And thus I have gone over feveral of those Ways, by which a Man's Sin overtakes and finds him out in this World. As first, the very Confidence itself of Secrecy, is a direct and natural Cause of the Sinner's Difcovery. Secondly.