of the World. 379

And as for secret sins, l think shame maytake place there too. It was a precept of thePythagoreans, Ylivlœv juzlhif dty/vvto mulou.

Of ail Men reverence your self most: be asha-med to do that before your It If, which beforeothers you would abhor or blush to do ; ci-ther wife you must lusier dishonour from yourself, and condemn your own Actions, whichWill in all reason be more grievous and affli-ctive than the ill Opinion and Word of otherMen. Hence Conscience of sin is esteemed amost painful and tormenting thing, by thegenerality of all Mankind, tho no other Manbe privy to it.

But to return from whence we digressed, * Danielthough * shame and everlasting contempt shallat the general Resurrection be the portion ofthem who persist and die in their sins, yeta serious and unfeigned Repentance, attestedby a holy Conversation for the future, is aneffectual means to deliver us from this shame,whatever our forepast sins have been. Forthey shall not be produced against us, theyshall not be objected to us at that day ; theyshall be buried in eternal silence and oblivion,and be as tho' they had not been. And thisOpinion I hold, 1. More agreeable to theScripture, which in this matter makes useof the Terms of hiding, and covering, andblotting out, and forgetting, Ffalm 32. i.

Blessed