Wesley Corpus

Are they ashamed when they have committed abomination;” when they have openly profaned the day of the Lord; when they have committed lewdness; or when they have uttered such curses and blasphemies as are not heard of among the Heathens? Nay, “they are not at all ashamed, neither can they blush.” And though God send unto them all his servants, rising up early and sending them, yet “will they not hear; they harden their neck; they do worse than their fathers.” What, then, can “God do more for his vineyard which he hath not done?” He hath long tried us with mercies, “giving rain and fruitful seasons, filling us with the flour of wheat.” But still “this revolting and rebellious people say not, Let us now fear the Lord our God.” Nay, they gave him no thanks for all his mercies; they did not even acknowledge them to be his gift. They did not see the hand of God in any of these things; they could account for them another way. O ye unwise, when will ye understand? Know ye not yet, there is a God that ruleth the world? What did ye see with your eyes? Was the “race to the swift, or the battle to the strong?” Have ye forgotten Dettingen already? Does not England know that God was there? Or suppose your con tinuance in peace, or success in war, be the mere result of your own wisdom and strength; do ye command the sun and the clouds also ? Can ye pour out or “stay the bottles of heaven?” But let it all be nature, chance, anything,-so God may have no hand in governing the earth ! 29. Will his judgments bring us to a better mind? Do we “hear the rod, and Him that has appointed it?” Let us observe: What fruit do we find in those who are “even consumed by means of his heavy hand?” Let any one that desires to be clearly satisfied herein visit the hospitals of this city. Let him judge for himself how the patients there receive God’s fatherly visitation; especially there, because mercy also is mixed with judgment; so that it is evident “the Lord loveth whom he chasteneth.” Go then into any ward, either of men or women; look narrowly from one end to the other: Are they humbling themselves under the hand of God?