Captives bound in chains, made free by Christ their surety

1. Who was it that did assure thee that thou shalt certainly live to that time in which thou purposest to repent? Did God or Man? Man cannot; God doth not want to tell sinners how long they shall live. How comest thou to have this knowledge above others? no, I have not. No? what? and yet purpose to repent, and shake off the Devil's bonds hereafter, when thy body might be in thy grave, and thy soul in hell before that time may come? where will be thy repentance then? are not as young as thou art, gone down into the pit of grave and hell too? Go and view the burial places of the dead, measure and see if ⟨p. 152⟩there be no grave as short as thou art, and many graves of Infants there. Thou art here to day and mightest be in eternity to morrow. Now alive, to morrow mayst be dead. All flesh is compared to grass, Isa. 40.6, 7, 8. Mat. 6.30. to a vapour, Jam. 4.13, 14, 15. Was not he a fool that reckoned he had many years to live, Luke 12.19, 20? When thou goest to bed, how knowest thou, that thou shalt rise any more? when thou fallest a sleep that thou shalt awake, till the Trumpet sound, and the call be, Arise ye dead and come to judgment?

2. How knowest thou that when thou shalt be sick, that thou shalt have the use of thy Reason and Understanding? if not; where is thy repentance then? hast thou not often seen sick persons to be deprived of their understanding? Not capable of asking or receiving of counsel and advice.