N03796:78
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.
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.
But whence shall I fetch my Arguments, or how shall I choose my Words? Lord, wherewith shall I woo them? wherewith shall I win them? Oh, that I could but tell! I would write unto them in Tears, I would weep out every Argument, I would empty my Veins for Ink, I would petition them on my Knees; verily (were I able) I would. Oh, how thankful I would be, if they would be prevailed with to repent and turn!
How long have I travailed in Birth with you? How frequently have I made Suit to you? How often would I have gathered you? Ho• instant have I been with you? This is that I ha•• prayed for, and studied for, for many Years, that I might bring you to God; Oh, that I might but do it? Will you yet be entreated? Oh, what a happy Man ⟨p. 2⟩might you make me, if you would but hearken to me, and suffer me to carry you over to Jesus Christ!
How long have I travailed in Birth with you? How frequently have I made Suit to you? How often would I have gathered you? Ho• instant have I been with you? This is that I ha•• prayed for, and studied for, for many Years, that I might bring you to God; Oh, that I might but do it? Will you yet be intreated? Oh, what a happy Man ⟨p. 2⟩might you make me, if you would but hearken to me, and suffer me to carry you over to Jesus Christ!
But, Lord, how insufficient am I for this work! I have been many a Year wooing for Thee, but the Damsel would not go with me Lord, what a Task hast thou set me to do? Alas, wherewith shall I pierce the Scales of Leviathan, or make the Heart to feel that it is hard as a Stone, hard as a Piece of the Nether-millstone! Shall I go and lay my Mouth to the Grave, and look when the Dead will obey me, and come forth? Shall I make an Oration to the Rocks, or declaim to the Mountains, and think to move them with Arguments? Shall I give the blind to see? From the beginning of the World was it not heard that a Man opened the Eyes of the Blind? But Thou, O Lord, canst pierce the Scales and prick the Hea of the Sinner. I can but shoot at Rovers, and draw the Bow at a venture, and do thou direct the Arrow between the Joints of the Harness, and kill the Sin, and save the Soul of a Sinner, that casts his Eyes on these Labours.