N03796:16
An alarm to unconverted sinners. In a serious treatise: showing I. What conversion is…An alarm to unconverted sinners. In a serious treatise: shewing I. What conversion is…
An alarm to unconverted sinners. In a serious treatise: showing I. What conversion is not, and correcting some mistakes about it. II. What conversion is, and wherein it consisteth. III. The necessity of conversion. IV. The marks of the unconverted. V. The miseries of the unconverted. VI. Directions for conversion. VII. Motions [i.e., Motives] to conversion. : Whereunto are annexed Divers practical cases of conscience judiciously resolved. / By Joseph Alleine, late Minister of the Gospel at Taunton, in Somersetshire.An alarm to unconverted sinners. In a serious treatise: shewing I. What conversion is not, and correcting some mistakes about it. II. What conversion is, and wherein it consisteth. III. The necessity of conversion. IV. The marks of the unconverted. V. The miseries of the unconverted. VI. Directions for conversion. VII. Motions [i.e., Motives] to conversion. : Whereunto are annexed Divers practical cases of conscience judiciously resolv'd. / By Joseph Alleine, late Minister of the Gospel at Taunton, in Somersetshire.
Philadelphia: printed by B. Franklin, 1741
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Dedication: To all the Ignorant, Carnal, and Ungodly, who are Lovers of Pleasure more than God, and…
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 have told you our Motives, I have told you our Business, and the Terms of our Undertaking ⟨p. vi⟩It is God, and you Sinners, that next must tell us what our Entertainment and Success shall be. Shall it still be Neglect and unthankful Contempt, and turning away your Ear and Heart, and saying, we have somewhat else to mind? Will you still be cheated by this deceiving World? And spend all your Days in pampering your Guts, and providing for your Flesh, that must lie rotting very shortly in a Grave? Were you made for no better Work than this? May not we bring you to some sober thoughts of your Condition, nor one awakened look into the World where you must be forever? Nor one Heart-raising Thought of the everlasting Glory? Not one Heart-piercing Thought of all your Saviour's Love? Not one Tear for all your sinful Lives? O God forbid! Let not our Labour be so despised: Let not your God, your Saviour, and your Souls be set so light by. O let there be no profane Person among you like Esau, who, for one morsel, sold his Birth-right.
Poor Sinners! we talk not to you as on a Stage in customary words, and because that talking thus was our Trade; we are in as good earnest with you as if we saw you all Murdering yourselves, and we are persuading you to save your Lives. Can any Man be in a Jest with you who believeth God? Who by Faith foreseeth whither you are going, and what you lose, and where the Game of Sin will end? It is little better to jest now in Pulpit or in private, than to stand jesting over your departing Souls, when at Death you are Breathing out your last.
Alas! with Shame and Grief we do confess that we never speak to you of these things as their truth and weight deserve, nor with the Skill and Wisdom, the Affection and Fervency which beseemeth one engaged in the saving of poor Souls. But yet you may perceive that we are in good Sadness with you (for God is so) what else do we study for, labour for, suffer for, live for? Why else do we so much trouble ourselves, and trouble you with all this ado, and anger them that would have had us silent? For my own Part, I will make my free confession to you