N00429:204
Speedy repentance urged. A sermon preached at Boston, Decemb. 29. 1689. In the hearing,…
Speedy repentance urged. A sermon preached at Boston, Decemb. 29. 1689. In the hearing, and at the request of one Hugh Stone, a miserable man under a just sentence of death, for a tragical and horrible murder. : Together with some account concerning the character, carriage, and execution of that unhappy malefactor. : To which are added, certain memorable providences relating to some other murders; & some great instances of repentance which have been seen among us. / By Cotton Mather Pastor of the Gospel in Boston.
Boston: printed by Samuel Green, 1690
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.
Article. II.
Isa. LV. 7. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return unto the Lord and He will have mercy, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.
It was once the affectionate Out-Cry of a Condemned but a Converted and a Comforted Malefactor, God is a great forgiver, God is a great forgiver! It is indeed rarely seen that Bad livers to, ever become ⟨p. 7⟩Sincere Penitents in Old Age. When the Devils have had a Possession of many years, they plead a sort of Prescription against the Holy Spirit of God, and make their interest so strong, that very Extraordinary must be the Influences of the Grace that shall destroy it. Scripture seems to pronounce a sinner of an hundred years old to be cursed, and Experience commonly discovers a Sinner of Fifty years old to be hardened beyond all recovery. The Generality of them that are brought home to God under the constant Dispensations of the Gospel, will find that between Fifteen and Thirty is the Age in which most of the Elect become Called ones. But as nothing is more Sovereign than the Free-Grace of God, He calls both Whom and When he will; and He leaves many Civil and Moral people in their Unbelief, when He Renews the Worst of men, and those that not only have done evil an hundred times, but likewise an hundred years been in the rebellious Tents of the Ungodly; So nothing is more glorious than that Free-Grace which pardons without bounds, and forgives the Sins which no Conscience has vigour enough to describe all the Aggravations of. Let no man that begins to have sad Thoughts