Acts xvi. 26. When Paul and Silas were in prison. At mid-night when they pray'd, and sang hymns to God, suddenly there was a great earthquake; so that the foundations of the prison were shaken. And immediately all the doors were opened, and every one's bands were loosed.
Observe the consequence it had upon the gaoler; He called for a light, and sprang in, and came trembling, and fell down before Paul and Silas, and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved?
The gaol trembled; and the gaoler trembled, as is observed by a writer on this head, an earthquake could soften his hard heart, and open what he had lock'd. It awaken'd him out of his spiritual slumber, as well as his natural sleep, and made his conscience, as well as the foundations of the prison, to quake. A bad conscience is as a troubled sea, that cannot rest, but casteth up mire, and clay. The gaoler perceiv'd the celestial warning, and made a proper use of it.
There are many circumstances in the nature of earthquakes, which render them peculiarly proper to be the instruments in God's hand, to give warning to a people, to amend their ways.
The suddenness is one. We saw, not long ago, what an effect was produced by a solar eclipse, tho' it was expected long before. We had the prediction, and calculations about it in all our almanacs; yet there was an universal seriousness that followed it. All that morning, we could walk the street, without hearing an oath, and the churches were full, in time of prayer. But the suddenness of an earthquake that comes at an instant, unthought of, without warning, that seems to bring unavoidable death along with it; is able to touch an adamantin heart. To see death stalking o'er a great city, ready to sweep us all away, in an instantaneous ruin, without a single moment to recollect our thoughts; this is fear without remedy; this is far beyond battle and pestilence. The lightning and thunderbolt, the arrow that flieth by day, may suddenly take off an object or two, and leave no space for repentance: but what horror can equal that, when above a million of people are liable to be buried, in one common grave!
Another consideration that inhances the dread of earthquakes, is the unavoidableness of the calamity. Famine, and war, and rebellion, and pestilence we may run from, the disease among the cattle, and locusts, and the like stripes of angry heaven, we may have some chance to escape: but no means, no precaution, no remedy, no prudence can screen us, from so universal a desolation as this: 'tis as the presence of God. Whither then can we go to hide ourselves? Must we call upon the rocks and mountains, to cover, and shelter us from the divine wrath! And they shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty; when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth. Alas, those are the very instruments he employs for our destruction; to be our tombstones!
This unusual kind of death too, strikes us with horror; to be buried alive. The earth, the common mother of us all, and the common grave; to eat up her offspring alive; crouds all the images of amazement together, that can enter into the heart of man.
The greater the terror accompanying earthquakes, the greater a blessing is our deliverance from the danger of it! What can equal God's power and judgment but his mercy? Consider the wonderful consequence; that the whole city of London should so sensibly be shaken, and yet no one inhabited house to fall; nor one person kill'd. Amazing instance of power, and goodness, in our preservation! And this not only once, but the second time also; tho' evidently stronger was the concussion. So strong that almost every person was throughly persuaded, that some part, at least, of their houses, was falling down. Can we help admiring, that judgment should be so temper'd with mercy! Do we look only at the second causes with our unbelievers; and sport away the divine presence, as if it was an ordinary occurrence of every day? They want to see a miracle. Nought can affect them, but a direct, supernatural agency.
I answer, behold a visible, and notorious miracle; plainly obvious, and before all their senses. For can there be a greater miracle, can any thing be more directly the finger of God than this, which we ourselves saw with our eyes; that befell the whole city of London.