N00124:58
Woe to drunkards. Two sermons testifying against the sin of drunkennessWo to drunkards. Two sermons testifying against the sin of drunkenness
Woe to drunkards. Two sermons testifying against the sin of drunkenness: wherein the woefulness of that evil, and the mystery of all that are addicted to it, is discovered from the word of God. / Preached by Increase Mather, teacher of a church in Boston in New-England. ; [Ten lines of Scripture texts]Wo to drunkards. Two sermons testifying against the sin of drunkenness: wherein the wofulness of that evil, and the mistery of all that are addicted to it, is discovered from the word of God. / Preached by Increase Mather, teacher of a church in Boston in New-England. ; [Ten lines of Scripture texts]
printed by Marmaduke Johnson. 1673., 1673
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
1. That woeful Judgements have ever followed this sin. The Text faith it, and woeful Experience proveth it. What hath been formerly said concerning the woefulness of the sin of Pride, may here be applied to this of Drunkenness. Personal Miseries come from hence upon the Estates, Names, Bodies, Souls of guilty ones, as was more fully showed the last Sermon. And this sin brings Family-judgements; Thousands of Families that have been brought to ruin thereby. Drunkards bring a curse upon their Children, and poor Posterity after them; nay, it may be one act of drunkenness, and that committed by a good man, shall bring a Curse upon some of his Children to the worlds end. Do we not see it in Noah? he was a righteous man, and was drunken but once in all his life that we read of, and much might be said to excuse him, in that he knew not that there was an inebriating quality in Wine, nevertheless that Drunkenness brought a Curse upon one of his Children, which continueth to this day, although it be Four thousand years since that sin was committed. Whose heart then is it that doth not tremble to live in such an evil? Yea, and this sin is the woeful procuring Cause of many Public Calamities in the world: Was not this one Principal cause of the Babylonian Captivity? see else Isa. 56. 9. All the beasts of the field come to devour, yea all the beasts in the forest. Here now the ravenous Babylonians are called upon to make a prey of the Jews, and the reason of it we may see ver. 12. Come ye, say they, I will fetch wine, and we will fill our selves with strong drink: So that the luxury and drunkenness which abounded amongst the Jews, especially considering that their Watchmen, their Ministers, who should have been examples of Sobriety, and Mortification to all round about them, were some of them given to this iniquity, was one principal cause of their enemies coming to devour them. The like we may see Chap. 5.V. II. Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning that they may follow strong drink, that continue until night, till wine inflame them. Now mind what followeth, ver. 13. Therefore my people are gone into Captivity. And the sin also was in a special manner the procuring Cause of ⟨p. 23⟩that Assyrian Captivity, wherein the ten Tribes were carried away, and never restored to this day, although it be now above Two thousand years since that Judgement befell them: