Judgment and mercy for afflicted souls Author:Francis Quarles Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: THE SWEARER. HIS APOLOGY. Will Boanarges never cease ? and will these plague-denouncers never leave to thunder judgments in my trembling ear? Nothing but p... more »lagues f nothing but judgments ! nothing but damnation f What have I done to make my case desperate ? and what have they not done to make my soul despair? Have I set up false gods like the Egyptians ? or have I bowed before them like the Israelites ? Have I violated the Sabbath like the libertines? or, like cursed Ham, have I discovered my father's nakedness ? Have I embrued my hands in blood like Barabbas ? or like Absalom defiled my father's bed ? Have I like Jacob supplanted my elder brother ? or like Ahab intruded into Nabal's vineyard ? Have I borne false witness like the wanton elders ? or like David covet-, ed Uriah's wife ? Have I not given tithes of all I have ? or hath my purse been hidebound to my hungry brother? Hath not my life been blameless before men ? And my demeanour unreprova- ble before the world ? Have I not hated vice with a perfect hatred ? and countenanced virtue with, a due respect ? What mean these strict observers of my life, to ransack every action, to carp at every word, and with their sharp censorious tongues to sentence every frailty with damnation ? Is there no allowance to humanity ? no grains to flesh, and blood ? Are we all angels ? Has mortality no pnvilege to supersede it from the utmost punish- ment of a little necessary frailty ? Come, come, my soul, let not these judgment-thunderers fright thee : let not these qualms of their exuberant zeal disturb thee. Thou hast not cursed like Shimei,. nor railed like Rabshekah, nor lied like Ananias, nor slandered like thy accusers. They that censure thy gnats, swallow their own camels. What if the luxuriant style of thy discourse do chance to...« less