Human nature in its fourfold state ... In several practical discourses

Be awakened then, O young sinner; be awakened, O old sinner, who art yet in the state thou wast born in. Your security is none of God's allowance, it is the sleep of death: rise out of it ere the pit close its mouth on you. It is true, you may put on a breast-plate of iron, make your bow brass, and your hearts as an adamant: who can help it? But God will break that brazen bow, and make that adamantine heart, at last, to fly into a thousand pieces. Ye may, if ye will, labour to put those things out of your heads, that ye may yet sleep in a sound skin, tho' in a state of wrath. Ye may run away with the arrows sticking in your consciences to your work, to work them away; or to your beds, to sleep them out; or to company, to sport and laugh them away: but convictions so stifled, will have a fearful resurrection: and the day is coming, when the arrows of wrath shall so stick in thy soul, as thou shalt never be able to pluck them out through' the ages of eternity, unless thou take warning in time.

Be awakened then, O young sinner; be awakened, O old sinner, who art yet in the state thou wast born in. Your security is none of God's allowance, it is the sleep of death: rise out of it ere the pit close its mouth on you. It is true, you may put on a breast-plate of iron, make your bow brass, and your hearts as an adamant: who can help it? But God will break that brazen bow, and make that adamantine heart, at last, to fly into a thousand pieces. Ye may, if ye will, labour to put those things out of your heads, that ye may yet sleep in a sound skin, tho' in a state of wrath. Ye may run away with the arrows sticking in your consciences to your work, to work them away; or to your beds, to sleep them out; or to company, to sport and laugh them away: but convictions so stifled, will have a fearful resurrection: and the day is coming, when the arrows of wrath shall so stick in thy soul, as thou shalt never be able to pluck them out thro' the ages of eternity, unless thou take warning in time.

But if any desire to flee from the wrath to come; and for that end, to know what course to take; I offer them these few advices, and obtest and beseech them, as they love their own souls, to fall in with them. (1) Retire yourselves into some secret place, and there meditate on this your misery. Believe it, and fix your thoughts on it. Let each put the question to himself, How can I live in this state? How can I die in it? How will I rise again, and stand before the tribunal of God in it? (2) Consider seriously the sin of your nature, heart and life. A kindly sight of wrath flows from a deep sense of sin. They who see themselves exceeding […], will find no great difficulty to perceive themselves to be heirs of wrath. (3.) Labour