From this fearful denunciation of Divine wrath upon obstinate and hardened disobedience, what an awful lesson may be learnt, under the present circumstances of this country. How descriptive are many of the terms employed of that fatal pestilence which has broken out in the land! in the suddenness of the seizure, it resembles “THE WHIRLWIND;” by its destructiveness, it causes “DESOLATION;” and from the intensity of the sufferings which it produces, arise “DISTRESS AND ANGUISH.” God grant that the threatened vengeance be not equally verified;—“THEN SHALL THEY CALL UPON ME, BUT I WILL NOT ANSWER; THEY SHALL SEEK ME EARLY, BUT THEY SHALL NOT FIND ME.” Oh! let not any individual risk incurring such a fearful doom by delaying his repentance! The Lord now calls every one with a voice that all must hear; He has “bared an arm,” which all must see; let not any longer refuse, let not any longer disregard, lest they should fill up the measure of their iniquity, and be swept away by the blast of Divine displeasure! Let not any trust to that, at all times presumptuous, if not always fallacious, hope, a death-bed repentance. That man, whose existence hangs upon a thread, which a moment may suffice to snap, should defer his preparation for death and judgment, is such an act of madness, that nothing but a knowledge of its certainty could make a religious mind credit the fact. What! risk an eternity of joy or misery on the chances of a moment! for beyond the present moment, man possesses no security of the continuance of life. And the very presumption which leads him to calculate upon long years to come may call forth that awful sentence,—“Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee.” But if the postponement of turning and calling upon God be, under ordinary circumstances, full of presumption and danger, what is it now in times of pestilence? From the many instances of mortality which encompass us on every side, “there comes a voice, which solemn sounding bids the world prepare.” The judgments of the Almighty,—to those who are living in forgetfulness of Him, and disobedience to His commands, but have not entirely thrown off His service,—speak the language addressed to Jonah, “What meanest thou, O sleeper? Arise, and call upon thy God.” {28a} But to those who refuse to turn, who “harden their necks against the reproof, and will have none of the counsel of God;” they resemble the characters of flame upon the walls of the palace of Belshazzar, which announced the terrible decree,—“THOU ART WEIGHED IN THE BALANCES, AND ART FOUND WANTING.” {28b}