N01064:94
A discourse concerning earthquakes. Occasioned by the earthquakes which were in New-England, in the…
A discourse concerning earthquakes. Occasioned by the earthquakes which were in New-England, in the province of Massachusetts-Bay, June 16. and in Connecticut-Colony [sic], June 22. 1705. : Also, two sermons, showing, that sin is the greatest evil; and, that to redeem time is the greatest wisdom. / By Increase Mather.A discourse concerning earthquakes. Occasioned by the earthquakes which were in New-England, in the province of Massachusetts-Bay, June 16. and in Conecticot-Colony [sic], June 22. 1705. : Also, two sermons, shewing, that sin is the greatest evil; and, that to redeem time is the greatest wisdom. / By Increase Mather.
Boston: printed by Timothy Green for Benjamin Eliot, 1706
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.
We proceed then to Apply the Doctrine. First, by way of Instruction, & several things are to be Inferred.
Inf. I. If Sin is the Greatest Evil, then to be kept and delivered from Sin is a great happiness. A man had better fall into many Afflictions, than into one Sin. It is therefore a very great mercy to be kept from falling into scandalous sins, such as Drunkenness, Uncleanness, Thefts, and the like Crimes. There have been some whom God has kept all their days, that they never fell into any sin which the World looks on as shameful & scandalous. Yea, some who are Unregenerate, and in a State of Sin, yet are they civil moral men: They have Externally kept the Commandments from their Youth up, Mat. 19. 20. Paul before his Conversion was touching the righteousness of the Law blameless, Phil. 3. 5. It must be acknowledged ⟨p. 74⟩that Re•training Grace is not so great a mercy as Converting Saving Grace, nevertheless a great mercy it is. God said to Abimelech I with held thee from •i•ning against me, Gen. 20. 6. This was a mercy to him▪ for if he had committed the sin he intended, he had been a dead man. God sometimes layeth the restraints of his Providence on Sinners, that they cannot do the evil they would do; He hedgeth their way with thorns. When Balaam was going on a wicked design of mischief to the Lords People, the Lord stopped him in the way, which was a present mercy to him; for had he gone on, his ruin had been sooner. Suppose men should die and perish in their Unregeneracy, yet their being restrained from vicious courses is a mercy to them, for that such sins leave an eternal blot of Infamy on the names of those that have been guilty of them; A wound and dishonour do they get, and a proach which shall not be wiped away,