Page:The Philosophy of Earthquakes, Natural and Religious.djvu/56

 52 as the presence of God. Whither then can we go to hide ourselves? Must we call upon the rocks and mountains, to cover, and shelter us from the divine wrath! And they shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth, for fear of the, and for the glory of his majesty; when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth. Alas, those are the very instruments he employs for our destruction; to be our tombstones!

This unusual kind of death too, strikes us with horror; to be buried alive. The earth, the common mother of us all, and the common grave; to eat up her offspring alive; crouds all the images of amazement together, that can enter into the heart of man.

The greater the terror accompanying earthquakes, the greater a blessing is our deliverance from the danger of it! What can equal God's power and judgment but his mercy? Consider the wonderful consequence; that the whole city of London should so sensibly be shaken, and yet no one inhabited house to fall; nor one person kill'd. Amazing instance of power, and goodness, in our preservation! And this not only once, but the second time also; tho' evidently stronger was the concussion. So strong that almost every person was throughly persuaded, that some part, at least, of their houses, was falling down. Can we help