11 - Satan's Grand Instrument
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 March 2010
Summary
They are wise in their own eyes; their notions, which the pride of their hearts tells them are so bright and clear, serve them for a righteousness, and they trust in themselves and despise others.
john newtonTo the question, ‘What have the Evangelicals to fear?’ I reply, ‘Themselves’.
lord shaftesburyFor every Evangelical during those great years of the Bible and Church Missionary Societies there was a sure indication of the divine approbation, for nothing else could have made possible the advance of the nation in virtue and piety that was clearly visible around them. Years before, John Newton had expressed the solemn view, never questioned by any Evangelical, that the execution of the divine vengeance on a sinful land was kept off only for the sake of ‘the few who lov'd the Saviour's name’.
Lord, still increase thy praying few!
Were Olney left without a Lot,
Ruin like Sodom's would ensue.…
See the commission'd angel frown!
That vial in his hand,
Fill'd with fierce wrath, is pouring down
Upon our guilty land!
Ye saints, unite in wrestling pray'r,
If yet there may be hope;
Who knows but mercy yet may spare,
And bid the angel stop?
‘So the inhabitants of Sodom were weary of Lot, though the destruction of their city was only retarded by his continuance in it’, Newton wrote to Mrs More in December 1798, ‘and the very day when he was removed they all perished.’
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- Fathers of the VictoriansThe Age of Wilberforce, pp. 393 - 486Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1961