judgments, thou wast hardened in thy sins, and refusedst to return. By all these divers kinds of judgments, how little did God prevail with thy magistracy, ministry, or commonalty to break oflf their sins, to repent, and to abhor themselves in dust and ashes ! Hath not God spent all his rods in vain upon tliee ? Were not all sorts of men generally seven times worse after those wasting judgments than they were before ? Jer. xxiv. 2, 3. And therefore thou hast cause to fear that tliis is that which hath kindled such a devouring fire in the midst of thee, and that hath turned thy glory into shame, thy riches, palaces, and stately houses into ashes. When after the raging pestilence men returned to the city, and to their estates and trades, &c.,they returned also to their old sins ; and as many followed the world more greedily than ever, so many followed their lusts, their sinful courses, more violently than ever ; and this has ushered in thy desolation, 0 London ! The pliysician, when he findeth that the potion which he hath given his patient will not work, he seconds it with one more violent ; and thus doth the chirurgeon too. If a gentle plaster will not serve, then he applies that which is more corroding ; and to prevent a gangrene, he makes use of his cauterising knife, and takes off the joint or member that is so ill affected. So doth the great God ; when men are not bettered by lesser judgments, he sends greater judgments upon them. God was first as a moth to Ephraim, which consumed him by little and little ; but when that would not better him, and reform him, then the Lord comes as a lion upon him, and tore him all to pieces, Hosea v. 12, 14. If the dross of men's sins will not come off, he will throw them into the melting-pot again and again, he will crush them harder and harder in the press of his judgments, and lay on such irons as shall enter more deep into their souls. If he strikes, and tliey grieve not ; if he strikes again, and they tremble not ; if he wounds, and they return not ; then it is a righteous thing with God to turn men out of house and home, and to burn up their comforts round about them. Now this has been thy case, 0 London ! and therefore God has laid thee desolate in the eyes of the nations.
Now this desperate incorrigibleness and unreformedness under wast- ing and destroying judgments I cannot groundedly fix upon those who did truly fear the Lord within and without the walls of London, because they made it their business, according to the different measures of grace they had received, to mourn under wasting judgments, and to lament after the Lord under wasting judgments, and to be bettered and re- formed under wasting judgments, and not only to understand, but also to obey the voice of the rod. Their earnest prayers, strong cries, bitter tears, sad sighs, and heavy groans under wasting judgments, may sufficiently evidence that they were not incorrigible under wasting judgments. But,
5. Fifthly, Insolent and cruel oppressing of the poor is a sin that brings desolating and destroying judgments upon a people. God sent ten wasting judgments one after another upon Pharaoh, his people, and land, to revenge the cruel oppression of his poor people, Exod. iii. 9. Prov. xxii. 22, 23, ' Rob not the poor, because he is poor ; neither oppress the afilicted in the gate : for the Lord will plead their cause.' To rob and oppress the rich is a great sin ; but to rob and oppress the
78 London's lamentations on [Isa. XLII. 24, 25.