Let us think, how this warning happen'd to us, in the time of lent; when they were revelling in their places of entertainment, both morning and evening, as if no such thing had been; and this on the very days; as if they confronted, and dar'd almighty vengeance. Much of a parallel case with that of the famous city of Herculaneum, which is now the entertainment of the curious. First it was miserably shatter'd by an earthquake; whilst the people were at their diversions in the theatre; where all assembled perished. This was in the first year of Titus the emperor: but such a partial judgment not mending their manners; 9 years after, the whole city was destroy'd by a lake of liquid fire and brimstone, from mount Vesuvius, just in the manner we now find it; 50 foot deep in cinders, and ashes.
When thy judgments, O God, are abroad, the inhabitants of the earth will learn righteousness.
The Lord is the true God; he is the living God; the everlasting King: At his wrath, the earth shall tremble, and the nations shall not be able to abide his indignation; says the prophet Jeremiah, x. 10.
God give us grace, that instead of these short-liv'd, and unsatisfying pleasures; instead of palaces and houses here, ornamented in a sumptuous and elegant taste; which may perhaps be swept away, with their owners, in a moment; we may aspire towards that heavenly city, which is above; whose foundations are not laid with hands, eternal in the heavens, &c.
FINIS.
