Discourses, or, Sermons on several Scriptures

O think with your selves how long and tedious a little time seems to you when you are in pain, you complain then that Time hath leaden Feet, and wish the Days and Hours would roll away faster with you, and you never find ⟨p. 91⟩them so slow paced, as when they pass over a sick Bed. Oh then what will it be when you shall lie sweltering under the dread Wrath and Vengeance of the living God, the intolerableness of your Pain and Torment will make every Day seem an Age, and every Year as long as Eternity, and yet you must lie there an Eternity of those long Years. Me thinks this consideration of Eternal Torments should astonish the Heart, and sink the Spirits of every wicked Wretch; for though they were not to be so excessively sharp as they are, yet the Eternity of them, is that which should make them altogether intolerable. There is scarce any pain so small but it would make us desperate, were we assured it would never wear off, that we should never obtain any ⟨p. 92⟩ease or freedom from it. What ever Pain we suffer, our usual encouragement unto Patience is, that shortly it will be over: But now in Hell there is no period sixth to their Torments, they are all eternal, and therefore whatsoever they are for the Degree and Measure of them, yet are they utterly intolerable, at least for their Duration and Continuance. Couldst thou shove away Millions of Years with a Wish, yet all this would avail nothing; for there are as many Years in Eternity as there are Moments, and as many Millions of Years as there are Years, that is, it is an infinite and boundless Duration, and when thou hast struck thy Thoughts as deep into it as thou canst, yet still thou art but at the top of the heap, and it is ⟨p. 93⟩still a whole Eternity to the bottom.

O think with your selves how long and tedious a little time seems to you when you are in pain, you complain then that Time hath leaden Feet, and wish the Days and Hours would roll away faster with you, and you never find ⟨p. 91⟩them so slow paced, as when they pass over a sick Bed. Oh then what will it be when you shall lie sweltring under the dread Wrath and Vengeance of the living God, the intolerableness of your Pain and Torment will make every Day seem an Age, and every Year as long as Eternity, and yet you must lie there an Eternity of those long Years. Me thinks this consideration of Eternal Torments should astonish the Heart, and sink the Spirits of every wicked Wretch; for though they were not to be so excessively sharp as they are, yet the Eternity of them, is that which should make them altogether intolerable. There is scarce any pain so small but it would make us desperate, were we assured it would never wear off, that we should never obtain any