The saints delight. To which is annexed a treatise of meditation

3. Hath not God spared you a long time? Whence is it that others are struck dead in the act of sin, as Ananias and Sapphira *, and you are preserved as a monument of patience? ⟨p. 150⟩Here is an experience; God hath done more for you than for the Angels; he never waited for their repentance, but he hath waited for you year after year, Isa. 30.18. Therefore will the Lord wait that he may be gracious. He hath not only knocked at your heart in the Ministry of the Word, but he hath waited at the door: How long hath his Spirit striven with you? like an importunate suitor, that after many denials, yet will not give over the suit. My thinks I see justice with a sword in its hand ready to strike, and mercy steps in for the sinner, Lord have patience with him a while longer: My thinks I hear the Angels say to God as the King of Israel once said to the Prophet Elisha, 2 Kings 6.22. Shall I smite them? shall I smite them? So my thinks I hear the Angels say, shall we take off the head of such a drunkard, swearer, blasphemer? and mercy ⟨p. 151⟩seems to answer as the Vinedresser; Luk. 13.8. let him alone this year. See if he will repent. Is not here an experience worth meditating upon? Mercy turns Justice into a rain-bow; the rain-bow is a bow indeed, but hath no arrow in it; that justice hath been like the rainbow without an arrow, that it hath not shot thee to death, Here is a receipt of patience to read over and meditate upon.

3. Hath not God spared you a long time? Whence is it that others are struck dead in the act of sinne, as Ananias and Saphira *, and you are preserv'd as a monument of patience? ⟨p. 150⟩Here is an experience; God hath done more for you than for the Angels; he never waited for their repentance, but he hath waited for you year after yeare, Isa. 30.18