1 John iii. 15. Now, if an unprejudiced person considers what is implied in these and the like scriptures, remembering that God's law extends no less to our thoughts and wishes, than to our words and actions; be will be struck with that saying of our Lord, "He that is without sin among you, let him first" stand up as the proud pharisee, and “cast a stone at" an adulteress, a thief, or a murderer.

3. My reader and myself are as certainly condemned to die for sin, as any felon in the world, on whom an awful sentence of death is already past. And though I hope we shall not die so shamefully, yet a death a thousand times more lingering and painful probably awaits our perishing bodies.

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4. Again: when our Lord went to Calvary, bearing the ponderous cross, to which he was to be nailed, a company of people," composed no doubt of the most harmless and compassionate of the spectators, "bewailed and lamented him. But Jesus turning unto them said, Weep not for me," though I am going to suffer with some of the vilest malefactors; "but weep for yourselves and your children. For if," by divine permission, "they," my executioners, "do these things in a green tree," that is, if I, who am the ever-green tree of life, the ever-fruitful tree of righteousness, am going to be lifted up on this accursed wood on Calvary, or the place of a skull, "what shall be done in the dry," blasted, barren trees, that are fit for the axe of divine justice, just ready for the lightning of divine indignation, for the fiery furnace, the burning tophet of divine vengeance? Luke xxiii. 27, &c.

5. Once more: if Jesus Christ, our surety, suffered death for us, as well as for thieves; if he was executed for us, as well as for murderers; yea, if he was actually whipped, and then hanged upon the cross, the most infamous, excruciating, and bloody species of gallows, does it become us wantonly to drive the cart of our compassion from under poor dying criminals? And is it either humane or reasonable to turn them off from us with pharisaic abhorrence, as if we were creatures of

a far more excellent species than they? See an Appeal to Matter of Fact, or a Rational Demonstration of Man's Corrupt and Lost Estate, vol. i., page 46, &c.; where you will find a parallel drawn between a dying nobleman, and a dying highwayman, which will probably convince you, that the difference between them in their last moments, consists more in appearance than

in reality.

1

DREADFUL PHENOMENON

DESCRIBED AND IMPROVED:

BEING

A PARTICULAR ACCOUNT

OF

THE SUDDEN STOPPAGE OF THE RIVER SEVERN,

AND OF

THE TERRIBLE DESOLATION THAT HAPPENED
AT THE BIRCHES,

BETWEEN COLEBROOK-DALE AND BUILDWAS-BRIDGE, IN
SHROPSHIRE;

ON THURSDAY MORNING, MAY THE 27TH, 1773.

AND

THE SUBSTANCE OF A SERMON,

PREACHED THE NEXT DAY ON THE RUINS, TO A VAST CONCOURSE OF SPECTATORS,

"O COME and behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he hath made in the earth." Psalm xlvi. 8.

PARTICULAR ACCOUNT

OF

THE DREADFUL PHENOMENON

WHICH GAVE OCCASION TO THE
FOLLOWING DISCOURSE.

HEARING, on Tuesday, May 27th, 1773, that a place called "the Birches," (probably from some remarkable birch-trees which formerly grew there,) many acres of land that a gentleman of my parish holds, on the borders of Buildwas parish, had that morning, about four o'clock, suffered strange revolutions, as well as the river Severn, I went to see if there was any foundation for so extraordinary a report.

When I came to the spot, the first thing that struck me was the destruction of the little bridge that separated the parish of Madeley from that of Buildwas, and the total disappearing of the turnpike-road to Buildwas-bridge; instead of which nothing presented itself to my view but a confused heap of bushes, and huge clods of earth, tumbled one over another. The river also wore a different aspect; it was shallow, turbid, noisy, boisterous, and came down from a different point. Whether I considered the water or the land, the scene appeared to me entirely new; and as I could not fancy myself in another part of the country, I concluded that the God of nature had shaken his providential iron rod over the subverted spot before me. VOL. VIII.

M

Following a track made by a great number of spectators, who came already from the neighbouring parishes, I climbed over the ruins, and came to a field well grown with rye-grass, where the ground was deeply cracked in several places, and where large turfs, some entirely, others half, turned up, exhibited the appearance of straight or crooked furrows imperfectly formed by a plough drawn at

a venture.

Getting from that field over the hedge into a part of the road which was yet visible, I found it raised in one place, sunk in another, concave in a third, hanging on one side in a fourth, and contracted, as if some uncommon force had pressed the two hedges together. But the higher part of it surprised me most, and brought directly to my remembrance those places of mount Vesuvius where the solid, stony lava has been strongly worked by repeated earthquakes; for the hard, beaten gravel that formed the surface of the road was broken every way into huge masses, partly detached from each other, with deep apertures between them, exactly like the shattered lava. This striking likeness of circumstances made me conclude, that the similar effect might proceed from the same cause, namely, a strong convulsion in the surface, if not in the bowels, of the earth.

Going a little farther towards Buildwas, I found that the road was again totally lost for a considerable space, having been overturned, absorbed, or tumbled, with the hedges that bounded it, to a considerable distance towards the river. This part of the desolation appeared then to me inexpressibly dreadful.

Between the road and the river there was a large field of promising oats, running in length parallel to both. I got into it over a stile that had been shocked out of its proper position. Wonderful and unaccountable are the revolutions which that piece of ground had suffered. It was not flat, but diversified in its surface by some gradual falls and eminences; and now I found it had been tossed in so strange a manner, that the old mounts had sunk into hollows, and the hollows were raised into mounts, one of which is eight or nine yards higher than the road.