Page:The works of the Rev. John Wesley, M.A., late fellow of Lincoln-College, Oxford (IA worksofrevjohnwe3wesl).pdf/144

 the Heathen nations. Go no farther than the admired, the virtuous Romans. And you will find these, when at the height of their learning and glory, ''filled with all unrighteousness; fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity: whisperers, backbiters, despiteful, proud boasters, disobedient to parents: covenant-breakers, without natural affection; implacable, unmerciful''.

8. The strongest parts of this description are confirmed by one, whom some may think a more unexceptionable witness. I mean, their brother Heathen, Dion Cassius: who observes, that before Cæsar's return from Gaul, not only gluttony and lewdness of every kind, were open and barefaced; not only falshood, injustice and unmercifulness abounded, in public courts as well as private families: but the most outrageous robberies, rapine and murders, were so frequent in all parts of Rome, that few men went out of doors without making their wills, as not knowing if they should return alive.

9. * As gross and palpable are the works of the devil, among many (if not all) the modern Heathens. The natural religion of the Greeks, Cherokees, Chicasaws, and all other Indians, bordering on our southern settlements (not of a few single men, but of entire nations) is, to torture all their prisoners from morning to night, till at length they roast them to death; and upon the slightest, undesigned provocation, to come behind