more days on earth, and then thy nights and days shall end: thy thoughts, and cares, and pleasures, shall all be devoured by eternity; thou must enter upon the state which shall never be changed. As the joys of heaven are beyond our conception, so are the pains of hell. Everlasting torment is inconceivable torment. § 17. But methinks I see the obstinate sinner desperately resolving, "If I must be damned, there is no remedy; rather than I will live as the Scripture requires, I will put it to the venture; I shall escape as well as the rest of my neighbors, and we will even bear it as well as we can." Alas! poor creature, let me beg this of thee, before thou dost so flatly resolve, that thou wouldst lend me thy attention to a few questions, and weigh them with the reason of a man. Who art thou, that thou shouldst bear the wrath of God? Art thou a god, or a man? What is thy strength? Is it not as the strength of wax or stubble to resist the fire; or as chaff to the wind; or as dust before the fierce whirlwind? If thy strength were as iron, and thy bones as brass; if thy foundation were as the earth, and thy power as the heaven; yet shouldst thou perish at the breath of his indignation: How much more when thou art but a piece of breathing clay, kept a few days from being eaten with worms, by the mere support and favor of Him whom thou art thus resisting?—Why dost thou tremble at the signs of almighty power and wrath? At claps of thunder, or flashes of lightning; or that unseen power which rends in pieces the mighty oaks, and tears down the strongest buildings; or at the plague, when it rageth around thee? If thou hadst seen the plagues of Egypt, or the earth swallow up Dathan and Abiram; or Elijah bring fire from heaven to destroy the captains and their companies, would not any of these sights have daunted thy spirits? How then canst thou bear the plagues of hell?—Why art thou dismayed with such small sufferings as befal thee here? A toothach; a fit of the gout, or stone, the loss of a limb, or falling into beggary and disgrace? And yet all these laid together, will be one day accounted a happy state, in comparison of that which is suffered in hell. Why does the approach of death so much affright thee? O how cold it strikes to thy heart! And would not the grave be accounted a paradise, compared with that place of torment which thou slightest?—Is it an intolerable thing to burn part of thy body, by holding it in the fire? What then will it be to suffer ten thousand times more for ever in hell?—Why does the thought or mention of hell occasion any disquiet in thy spirit?—And canst thou endure the torments themselves?—Why doth the rich man complain to Abraham _of his torment in hell_? Or thy dying companions lose their courage, and change their haughty language? Why cannot these make as light of hell as thyself?—Didst thou never see or speak with a man under despair? How uncomfortable was his talk? How burdensome his life? Nothing he