Page:A Journal of the Plague Year (1722).djvu/292

 it would not have been long, that there would have been any more Neighbours to be infected; indeed it is hardly credible, what dreadful Havock the laſt three Weeks had made, for if I might believe the Perſon, whoſe Calculations I always found very well grounded, there were not leſs than 30000 People dead, and near 100 thouſand fallen ſick in the three Weeks I ſpeak of; for the Number that ſickened was ſurpriſing, indeed it was aſtoniſhing, and thoſe whoſe Courage upheld them all the time before, ſunk under it now.

In the Middle of their Diſtreſs, when the Condition of the City of London was ſo truly calamitous, juſt then it pleaſed God, as it were, by his immediate Hand to diſarm this Enemy; the Poyſon was taken out of the Sting, it was wonderful, even the Phyſicians themſelves were ſurprized at it; wherever they viſited, they found their Patients better, either they had ſweated kindly, or the Tumours were broke, or the Carbuncles went down, and the Inflammations round them chang’d Colour, or the Fever was gone, or the violent Headach was aſſwag’d, or ſome good Symptom was in the Caſe; ſo that in a few Days, every Body was recovering, whole Families that were infected and down, that had Miniſters praying with them, and expected Death every Hour, were revived and healed, and none died at all out of them.

Nor was this by any new Medicine found out, or new Method of Cure diſcovered, or by any Experience in the Operation, which the Phyſicians or Surgeons had attain’d to; but it was evidently from the ſecret inviſible Hand of him, that had at firſt ſent this Diſeaſe as a Judgment upon us; and let the Atheiſtic part of Mankind call my Saying this what they pleaſe, it is no Enthuſiaſm; it was acknowledg’d at that time by all Mankind; the