N00355:30
A sermon occasioned by the execution of a man found guilty of murder preached…
A sermon occasioned by the execution of a man found guilty of murder preached at Boston in N.E. March 11th 1685[/]6. : (Together with the confession, last expressions & solemn warning of that murderer to all persons; especially to young men, to beware of those sins which brought him to his miserable end.) / By Increase Mather, teacher of church of Christ.
Boston: printed by R.P. i.e, 1687
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
Propos. 2. Murder is an exceeding great Sin▪ It's an expression in the Scriptures, he is as if he flew a man, Isa. 66. 3. Implying that to slay a man is a thing most horrid & hateful: it is indeed the greatest Sin against the 2nd Table of the Moral Law, and is therefore set in the first place, amongst negative Precepts therein. God forbids the greatest sin in the first place. It is a Crying Sin: The Lord said to Cain. The voice of thy brothers blood cry••h to me from the ground, Gen. 4 10. In the Original, the word is in the Plural Number, the voice of thy brothers bloods. Every drop of […] blood, had as it were a voice▪ a tongue in […] for vengeance against his brother that had murdered him. But that This is a grievous sin is manifest: 1. In that it is a most unnatural thing. Creatures of the same kind are not wont to destroy one another. Naturalists observe concerning Wolves, that though they be cruel creatures, they will never kill one mother: therefore if Men do so they are worse than Wolves & lygers: so that Murder is an unnatural and a monstrous Wickedness. 2. The Vengeance which is wont to follow this Sin, proves that it is an horrid and heinous Transgression. There is a peculiar Vengeance that does pursue this sin at the heels of it. The Gentiles had the notion of this fixed in their minds: hence those Barbarians could say, No doubt this man is a murderer, whom tho' he escaped the seas, yet Vengeance ⟨p. 9⟩suffereth-not to live, Act. 21. 4.‖ The Heathen esteemed [dike] (the word there used for Vengeance) as a Deity that would not suffer great Sinners, and in special Murderers to go unpunished. Temporal Vengeance pursueth this Sin. Hence they that have been guilty of it, seldom live long in quiet. Bloody and deceitful […] shall not live out half their days. Psal. 55. 23. Either they are cut off by the Sword of Civil Justice, or if their Murders happen to be undiscovered, a secret Curse of God follows them: Often times they are themselves Murdered, as both Divine and humane Records do abundantly declare Nay, tho men should truly repent of this sin, and are then through' the Merit of Christ saved from everlasting Punishment, yet not from Temporal Judgment. I cannot tell whether ever any man that was found guilty of this sin, did escape Temporal Judgment at last.