N00527:57
Warnings from the dead. Or Solemn admonitions unto all people
Warnings from the dead. Or Solemn admonitions unto all people; but especially unto young persons to beware of such evils as would bring them to the dead. / By Cotton Mather. ; In two discourses, occasioned by a sentence of death, executed on some unhappy malefactors. ; Together with the last confession, made by a young woman, who dyed on June 8. 1693. One of these malefactors.
printed by Bartholomew Green for Samuel Phillips, 1693
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.
I am to tell-you,
Secondly, That a true Repentance is the Thing your Madness must be Rectified withal. Tis Repentance, which must Undo now in a few days, all that you have been Doing ever since you came into the World. Repentance, I say; a Great-Word: What is Repentance, but a Growing Wise-again? You have been mad; but by Repentance you must Bewail, and Confess, and Forsake all your Madness; and by Repentance you must Repair to the Lord Jesus for the Redress of all thee. Guilt, and all that Woe, which by your Madness you are involved in. A Soldier that was to Die for Stealing a few Grapes, went Eating of them-on-the way to ⟨p. 32⟩his Execution: being rebuked for it, he answered, Pray, Envy me not my Grapes, I have paid for them dear enough! Alas, you may say the like of all your Mad Courses, I have Paid dear, or those forbidden Grapes! But for that very cause, you should now throw them all away. You are mad, and worse than so, till a Profound Repentance be discovered in you. Among the Romans of old, They that were under a Public Accusation, betook themselves to a Squalid and Ragged Habit, a dejected Countenance, and the Hair of their Head; and Face neglected; and One famous man procured a Banishment, because he would not submit unto the Ceremonies. Doubtless, he was mad! Surely, All that can show Repentance well becomes you, that are now arrived unto a righteous Condemnation; neither Earth must keep you, nor will Heaven receive you, if your madness continue any longer.
Secondly, That a true Repentance is the Thing your Madness must be Rectify'd withal. Tis Repentance, which must Undo now in a few days, all that you have been Doing ever since you came into the World. Repentance, I say; a Great-Word: What is Repentance, but a Growing Wise-again? You have been mad; but by Repentance you must Bewayl, and Confess, and Forsake all your Madness; and by Repentance you must Repair to the Lord Jesus for the Redress of all thee. Guilt, and all that Wo, which by your Madness you are involved in. A Souldier that was to Dy for Stealing a few Grapes, went Eating of them-on-the way to ⟨p. 32⟩