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therewith, has had fast
hold of them. Others who before had been somewhat religious, and
concerned for their salvation, have been awakened in a new manner; and
made sensible that their slack and dull way of seeking, was never like
to attain that purpose.
These awakenings when they have first seized on persons, have had two
effects; one was, that they have brought them immediately to quit their
sinful practices; and the looser sort have been brought to forsake and
dread their former vices and extravagances. When once the Spirit of God
began to be so wonderfully poured out in a general way through the town,
people had soon done with their old quarrels, backbitings, and
intermeddling with other men's matters. The tavern was soon left empty,
and persons kept very much at home; none went abroad unless on necessary
business, or on some religious account, and every day seemed in many
respects like a Sabbath-day. The other effect was, that it put them on
earnest application to the means of salvation, reading, prayer,
meditation, the ordinances of God's house, and private conference; their
cry was, What shall we do to be saved? The place of resort was now
altered, it was no longer the tavern, but the minister's house that was
thronged far more than ever the tavern had been wont to be.
There is a very great variety, as to the degree of fear and trouble that
persons are exercised with, before they attain any comfortable evidences
of pardon and acceptance with God. Some are from the beginning carried
on with abundantly more encouragement and hope than others. Some have
had ten times less trouble of mind than others, in whom yet the issue
seems to be the same. Some have had such a sense of the displeasure of
God, and the great danger they were in of damnation, that they could not
sleep at nights; and many have said that when they have laid down, the
thoughts of sleeping in such a condition have been frightful to them;
they have scarcely been free
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