XLIV. EVER, NEVER.

WE read, Psalm lv. 19: Because they have no changes, therefore they [the wicked] fear not God.

Profaneness is a strange logician, which can collect and infer the same conclusion from contrary premises. Libertines here in England, because they have had so many changes, therefore they fear not God.

Jacob taxed Laban, Gen. xxxi. 41: Thou hast changed my wages ten times. I have neither list nor leisure to inquire how far our alterations of government, within these few years, fall short of that number.

But it is a sad truth, that as King Mithridates is said to have fed on poison so long, that at last it became ordinary food to his body; so the multitude of changes have proved no change in many men’s apprehensions, being so common and ordinary it hath made no effectual impression on their spirits. Yea, which is worse, they (as if all things came by casualty) fear God the less for these alterations.