But setting aside these things which are done as it were by stealth, whether by mean or honourable men; how many are they, in every city, as well as in this, who prophane the sabbath with a high hand? How many in this, that openly defy both God and the king, that break the laws both divine and human, by working at their trade, delivering their goods, receiving their pay, or following their ordinary business, in one branch or other, and _wiping their mouths and saying_, “_I do no evil_?” How many buy and sell on the day of the Lord, even in the open streets of this city? How many open or (with some modesty) _half open_ their shops? ♦Even when they have not the pretence of perishable goods; without any pretence at all, money is their god, and gain their godliness.――――But what are all these droves in the skirts of the town, that well nigh cover the face of the earth? Till they drop one after another into the numerous receptacles prepared for them in every corner. What are these to gain by prophaning the day of the Lord? Nothing at all. They _drink in iniquity like water_. Nay many of them _pay_ for their sin; perhaps great part of what should sustain their family the ensuing week. I know not what is _finding our own pleasure, or doing our own ways_, if this is not. What then shall we plead in _your_ excuse? That “many others do it as well as you?” Nay, number is so far from extenuating your fault, that it aggravates it above measure. For this is open war against God. And a whole army of you joins together, and with one consent, in the face of the sun, _runs upon the thick bosses of his buckler_. ♦ “And” replaced with “Even” per Errata 16. It is once mentioned in the prophets, _In thee_ (Jerusalem) _they have set light by father and mother_. But frequent mention is made of their setting light by their civil parents, of their murmurings and rebellions against their governors. Yet surely _our_ boasting against them is excluded, even in this respect. For do not all our histories witness such a series of mutinies, seditions, factions and rebellions, as are scarce to be paralleled in any other kingdom, since the world began? And has not the wild, turbulent, ungovernable spirit of our countrymen, been continually acknowledged and lamented, (as abundance of their writings testify to this day) by the cool, rational part of the nation? Terrible effects whereof have been seen and felt, more or less, in every generation.