A saint or a brute the certain necessity and excellency of holiness, &c. ...…

A great stir you make in seeking for preferment, or dominion over others, or about your lands, your honours or your delights; so great that your neighbours can scarce live quietly by you; and the Kingdom cannot be quiet for some of you, nor your own consciences be quiet within you for the desperate work that you engage them in, which they know must be heard of another day: And when all is done, you will find you have been but hunting of a feather: You would see this now if God would open your eyes by grace: but if you miss of so seasonable an information, you will see it too late in the land of darkness: When death hath opened your eyes, and your impenitent souls do suddenly awake in another world, you will understand that you made all this stir but in your sleep: As busily and seriously as you acted the parts of Lords and Ladies, of Gentlemen, Tradesmen, or Husbandmen in the world, if you did not seriously and first do the work of true Believers for the world to come, you will then find too late that your labour is lost, and all was acted but as in a dream.

Do you believe this now, or do you not? If you do, will you yet go on? If you do not believe it, show me now what you have gotten by all the stir that you have made in the world, that will follow you one step further then the grave, and that you can say shall be your own to morrow? If you were to die this hour, will it be any lasting comfort to you, that you have laboured to be Rich or Honourable, or that you have attained it? or that you had your glut of sensual delights; and a merry life as to the fleshly pleasure as long as it would last? Will you dye the more comfortably for any of this? or much the less? That yet you are alive, is the great mercy of God, and not to be ascribed to any of these: And when you cease to live, then these will be your grief and torment.

Do you believe this now, or do you not? If you do, will you yet go on? If you do not believe it, shew me now what you have gotten by all the stir that you have made in the world, that will follow you one step further then the grave, and that you can say shall be your own to morrow? If you were to die this hour, will it be any lasting comfort to you, that you have laboured to be Rich or Honourable, or that you have attained it? or that you had your glut of sensual delights; and a merry life as to the fleshly pleasure as long as it would last? Will you dye the more comfortably for any of this? or much the less? That yet you are alive, is the great mercy of God, and not to be ascribed to any of these: And when you cease to live, then these will be your greif and torment.