Seven treatises containing such direction as is gathered out of the Holy Scriptures, leading…Seuen treatises containing such direction as is gathered out of the Holie Scriptures, leading…

And this I do the more stand upon, to make this point clear, because I have observed by long experience, how grossly the people of our age do suffer themselves to be bewitched about this matter. For to bewail them who are soon healed, if they be pricked at all, and them who fall deadly to raging at the Minister, if their hearts be vexed by hearing their danger: I say, to bewail the estate of them, there is yet a third sort (in number an hundred for one of the other) who were never troubled in conscience for their §Csin, or the woe that it hath purchased them; neither do once dream that such a thing is needful for them: but eat, drink and sleep, some play,¹ and some work; and, as they did in the days of Noah, embrace this present evil world, profane, merry, yea and light-hearted, when (as S.² James saith) they should howl and mourn: and as though they feared no more then they would make men believe they do, are never scared, till the very time and hour of death, or deadly danger. But what do they then? when they have called in lustily, as men at a banquet, I mean, when they have taken their pleasure and lived therein? I say, when they see their reckoning, and day of accounts is near, then what do they? where is their mirth become? Oh, §Dthey die as Nabal, that is, as fools, and are as he was, when he heard he should die, as a stone, and a block: or despair, as Judas did, and some of them die as he died, that is, sooner then they needed (as well as they loved their life.) And the best sort of them are but as they that are spoken of by the Prophet, that is, they have no bands in their death: they die quietly, perhaps with a Lord have mercy on us: but they not regarding blessing in their life,³ it is now far from them at their death, and therefore dying without repentance, let other be feared by them.

And this I doe the more stand vpon, to make this point cleere, because I haue obserued by long experience, how grossely the people of our age doe suffer themselues to be bewitched about this matter. For to bewaile them who are soone healed, if they be pricked at all, and them who fall deadly to raging at the Minister, if their hearts be vexed by hearing their daunger: I say, to bewaile the estate of them, there is yet a third sort (in number an hundred for one of the other) who were neuer troubled in conscience for their