❧ The wonderful work of God showed upon a child, whose name is William Withers, being in the town of Walsam, within the County of Suffolk: who being eleven years of age, lay in a Trance the space of ten days, without taking any manner of sustenance, and at this present lieth, and never speaketh, but once in twelve, or four and twenty hours, and when he cometh to himself, he declareth most strange and rare things, which are to come, and hath continued the space of three weeks.  PSALM. 50. 1. The Lord, even the most mighty God hath spoken▪ and called the world from the rising up of the sun, unto the going down thereof. 
¶ Imprinted at London, by Robert waldgrave, dwelling in the Strand, near unto Sommersette house.   

¶ To the right worshipful and virtuous gentleman▪ M. Edward Dennye Esquire. john Philip, 〈◊〉 humble well willer in the Lord, wisheth the fear of God, peace and prosperity i● our Lord and merciful Sautoir Christ▪ jesus.  
Things that be called new things namely being of great importance and certain true, ought not to be rejected, contemned, nor despised, but s●oul● with great reverence be esteemed, set by, and regarded of every Christian: and chiefly when they concern such things as may rouse us up in these dangerous days, from the secure carelessness of our condition and calling, to the diligent worshipping and zealous honouring of our God: from sin to purity, fro● hell to h●●auen, from destruction of 〈◊〉 and soul in the bottomless lake of everlasting torments, to salvation and blessedness through faith in Christ jesus, in his kingdom of everlasting righteousness. But (alas) right worshipful, for the most part of us, we seem though we be called by the preaching of the Gospel. to be partakers of those ceaseless joys prepared by the bloody death and passion of the innocent Lamb Christ, profaners of his religion, faint hearted soldiers, & readier to yield like cowards, then to resist or endure the skirmish against our dangerous enemies: namely, the world, fles be and sathan, who glory in our perdition. If this be not true, the time 〈◊〉 and experience openly voucheth it: How pride flourisheth in all estates, even from the highest to the lowest it is too evident, ●ow harlots are haunted, who beholdeth it not, how drunkenness is esteemed, who see it not▪ how the glorious name of our God is generally blasphemed amongst us, who beareth it not? how usury the spoil of common weal is entertained for pri●ate commodity in all places? who feeleth it not? how covetousness hath buried good conscience, who perceiveth it not? how charity is convinced by cruelty, who tasteth it not? ●ow neighbourly love is vanquished by dissimulation, who findeth it not? how hypocritic all flattery defaceth true and farthfull friendship? who seethe not how plain dealing is defaced, and just dealing plucked up by the roots amongst us: and in fine, how for the most part all goodness is quenched in a number of counterfeited Christians, every man may plainly as it were in a glass, bebolde, it▪ how ready Dathan, Coran, and Abiram, is to rebel against God & his Anointed, who beareth not? how Baal's priests are ready to stand up againct Elias, the Prophets, patriarchs, and Christ himself it is evident. God like a loving father▪ though he have bend his ●ow of displeasure against us, feathered the consuming arrows of our destruction, whet his sword, and set in the fullness of his fury a dull edge on the same, to cut and crop us down that are wild Olives, fruitless figtrees, very stubble, and no good corn. Let us humbly with Peter that have with him in our deeds denied our master, turn back again with tears, and lo●ke faithfully v●on Christ, and he will bring us to the blessed fold of his sheep, feed us with the food of life in the gladsome pasture of his grace: ye●, and by this present example, not far ●ence, but within the borders of Suffolk, given by a child of x●▪ years of age, who with great vehemency cry●th, that the end of all things is at ba●d, threatening our destruction, except we speedily repent, the which God grant for his sons sake. Thus ceasing further to trouble your worship, I commit you to the safe preservation of the Almighty, beseeching him of his infinite goodness to prosper you in all your affairs, to send you long life, health, and great increase of worship in this life, and in the world to come, life everlasting.  
Your worship's most humble and faithful well-willer in the Lord. JOHN PHILIP.   

The wonderful work of God, showed on a child in Walsam.  
I Know not, neither yet can conjecture with myself, whereunto many of our nation are wedded: but well I w●t, the bridegroom to whose heavenly banquet we are ●idden, is utterly forgotten, the fat kid is contemned, the delicate dishes of endless joy and ever enduring glory are nothing esteemed, self-love triumpheth, pride vaunts herself in her 〈…〉 is so set to sale, that the poor common● are devoured up alive, whoredom now fla●nteth, her minions are given to 〈◊〉 ●ile and vicious l●st, avarice hath vtter●ly vanquished good conscience, 〈◊〉 beastly epicure delighteth in his darling gluttony, Dives is not forgotten, his rules are observed, cloth of Bisse and gay garments of purple colour, are every where, and in all places frequented, but poor and miserable Lazarus can scantly be so much favoured as to catch the crumbs that fall from the board of a number of Dives near kinsmen▪ and whence springeth the effect hereof, verily from self-love, which rather for pleasure's sake will feed a kennel of dogs, then comfort their needy brethren, which for want of food are oft times ready to perish in the streets. Pity is made an outcast, conscience is drowned, compassion is buried in the ground of forgetfulness, and verily for the most part (though Christians by name) yet not in deed, great bragger's, maru●ilous boasters, and yet in trial found to be most feeble, faint hearted, and impudent cowards, not who calleth Christ a Saviour, but who armeth himself with fruitful faith, by the virtue whereof he may enjoy the benefit of Salvation. Who is he now that will not ●aun●e of 〈◊〉 new regeneration and begetting again to God in Christ: bu● who is he that consi●ereth the promi●● he hath made Christ in baptism: verily to be brief and to speak plain, we forsake C●rist, couple our s●lues t● the worlie, 〈◊〉 ourselves to sin, and of f●ee 〈◊〉 ●o make ourselves bondmen to the devil, whi●h to consider is most lamentable: how carefully the labourers of the harvest in this 〈◊〉 season, seek by the preaching of the gospel to 〈◊〉 the profitable grai● of the truth, confirmed in the bloody death of Christ ●esus amongst us, we 〈…〉, but how 〈◊〉 the greatest number of us bring forth in●● 〈…〉 where seen and made● evident, in stead of good grain which is required, me bring forth 〈◊〉 〈…〉, and most 〈…〉 the great long 〈…〉 and patience of the almighty, ●n forbearing to punish us according to the 〈…〉 contemned, we ma●●e on as shameless in the paths of all in impurity, we stretch forth our necks with the stubborn jews and stand still in our own, conceits, we range from virtue to vice, we hate Christ, and love B●liall we abhor the heavenly Manna, and lust vehemently after quails, we 〈◊〉 weary of the land that floweth with milk and honey, and have an inordinate desire to be banqueted with the filthy flesh-pots of Pharaoh, thus most miserable is our estate and condition for neither the great mercies of God given us freely by his undeserved grace can reclaim us home to the sheepfold of our shepherd, neither yet his terrible threats and com●●●●tions pronounced against us for the continual ex●rcise of sin by the watchmen of the house of Israel, can cause us to embrace hearty repentance, our hearts that should be as soft as 〈◊〉, and mollified by the comfortable oil of his mercy and grace, are made far harder than the Adamant, stiffer than steel, and stronger then is brass or iron, neither signs nor tok●ns in the firmament, as comets, blazing stars, arms of warlike wighees, scarce and terrible lightnings, this late 〈◊〉 Star which appeareth at this present 〈◊〉 God's heavy judgements against us for the use of sin, can cause us to cry out with David, and to confess we have sinned, strange tokens are nothing regarded, Cart! quakes are made none account off, great foods 〈◊〉 inundations of waters are accounted trifles, alas what shall I say, if ever people desirued the fullness of God's indignation. Let us enter into our conscie●●ces that live past all fear, and we shall both say and how if there be any remorse at all in us, we are worthy to ●nioye all the plagues that God in his justice may use against us. But alas, I fear me, that security hath so blinded us with the vale of forgetfulness, that scarcely one among a thousand hath the good feeliug or motion of God's holy spirit 〈…〉 child, to cry out bitterly, and weep hearty for their iniquities. Nay who is it that will say he hath sinned, and is not worthy to lift up his eyes to heaven, who is it that will say he is not worthy to be called a son by adoption and grace, and yet scarcely may be thought fit to have the name of a hired servant. Iniquity hath gotten the primacy in such sort, that repentance and amendment of life is never thought upon: all which considered, might provoke God to power his plagues upon us: to take from us the bright shining beams of the Gospel, to give us a prey to our enemies to scour● us thoroughly with famine, sword▪ and fire, yet he spareth us, as most sorry to punish us, if case that we would convert, for it is written, he hath no pleasure in the death of a sinner, but rather that he might live, and turn from his wickedness and be saved in the day of destruction, though we hate him, and abhor to walk in the way of his commandments: yet our mediator. Christ jesus prayeth for us, and for his sake he yieldeth forth unto us wretches, the silvered sceptre of his mercy & grace, to see if in this time of our last calling, we will humble ourselves before the throne of his majesty, & be humbly sorry for our sins, whereunto to bring us like a gracious god, he hath raised up a second Daniel, a young child of the age of xi. years, borne in the Town of Walsam in the county of Suffolk, whose name is William Withers, his parents living, being of good name and fame, which child is an instrument given to us by the providence of God, if it may be to waken us out of the perilous s●umber of our si●ne. This child about the 24. day of December lay in a trance the space of t●nne days, to the great admiration of the beholders, and the grief of his parents the space of ten days without taking any sustenance, and then according to the good will and pleasure of our God, came to himself again, and declared to the comfort of the standers by, the glory of God, who in the fullness of his mercy ●ad divers & sundry ways called us home from the peril of sins, & miry soil of our filthiness, but all i● vain, for the ripenesss of our sins was such and so great that without speedy repentance the day of our destruction was at hand, brotherly love he pronounced was strangled, the vowels of compassion and pity were shut up one towards another, neighbourly affection was changed to flattery, the widows were rob of their dowry, the fatherless dispossessed of their patrimonies, and inheritances, pride of heart was every where bewrayed by too too strange disguisings of our bodies, m●u were become monsters, and women shameless wantoness in using the ornaments of men far unseemly, if modesty might rule or govern them, the threatenings of God he publisheth by the authority of the scriptures in such sort as though he were a learned Divine, & when he speaketh his voice seemeth to be of such power that all the bed shaketh, to the astonishment of the hearers, and this usually doth once in twelve, or four and twenty hours. To behold this rare token of God's singular love and severe justice set forth in this child for the reformation of our lives, there resorted Master Gatton, a learned preacher, remaining at Berrie, with divers worshipful Gentlemen, with w●ich child he reasoned, and found him perfect in the Scriptures, to whom in the hearing of all that were present he inveighed sharply against pride, and the people's infidelity, that neither would believe, nor yet learn by signs and tokens to imitate Christ, to fly from sin, and to bring forth the fruits that belong to repentance, which of you all saith he, that remembreth the late Earthquake, when the Lord passed by you, as it were, but with one touch of his finger, the effects whereof as yet hath not taken th●ir beginning, but assure yourselves of far greater plagues than ever you possessed: and if I should tell you of a far greater Earthquake, which you shall feel & taste of shortly, unless you repent: your hearts are so stony, & your ears so deaf▪ that you will neither conceive hear nor believe the same, no not if it should presently shake the houses on your heads, or make the earth openly to receive and swallow you up alive, This the great handy work of God showed unto us, in and by this child may terrify our guilty consciences, rouse us up from our sins, and enforce us if there be any hope of salvation in us, to subdue the old Adam, to stand at defiance with the world and manfully under the standard of Christ jesus, to resist the proud prince of darkness, with all his damnable ministers, but I fear me that our hearts are so drowned in uncleanness that in steed of repentance, infidelity shall so abound in us, and sin be so bolstered in our rebellious minds, that God in his justice shall utterly in the imaginations of our hearts vanquish us, the 〈◊〉 of these strange news being dispersed abroad. Thither came Master Ashly Esquire, a Gentleman of great credit and worship, with certain of his men to hear and behold the child, who speaking as before, and perceiving one Smith his man, that had been there with his Master two times, whom he had sharply taunted for his great and monstrous ruffs, spoke unto him very vehemently, and told him that it were better for him to put on sackcloth & mourn for his sins, then in such abominable pride to prank up himself like the devils darling, the very father of pride and lying, who sought by the exercise of that damnable sin to make himself a prey to everlasting torments in hell fire, whereupon at the second time as one pricked in conscience, he sorrowed & wept for his offence, rend the band from his neck, took a knife and cut it in pieces, and vowed never to wear the like again. God for his great mercy's sake by the example of this Serving man, make all the rest to follow his example, make them humble and meek hearted, that this horrible sin of theirs and all others that mask like monsters, and stage players, which are more regarded in these days, than predication is reverenced to amend their lives. With this Child there hath been (as it is credibly reported) the right worshipful and virtuous knights: Sir William Spring, and Sir Robert ●armine, men of great zeal to God, lovers of religion, and loyal subjects to her Majesty: for whose prosperity let us not cease to pray to God, who continue her health to his gracious pleasure, and the comfort of all true hearted Subjects, who power upon her the sweet smelling dews of his mercy and grace, confound and overthrow all her enemies, foreign and domestical, and make us all both high and low, rich and poor, in time whilst time doth last to take time and happy happy time, to turn from our sins, for as he telleth us, the end of all things is at hand: so let us assure ourselves that god's judgement for the use of our ●innes and iniquities, hangeth over our heads, and his wrath standeth at the gates of Cities ready to enter, if we defer from day to day and delight in our uncleanness. God for his mercy's sake touch our ●artes with the finger of his grace that with the true repentance Niniui●es, we may fast from sin, pu● on sackcloth, and weep bitterly for our iniquities, & in so doing, God will be our God, and we shall be his people, he will purge us from all the spots of our deformity, in the blood of the lamb, pardon & freely forgive us all that is past, & continue the bright shining beams of thy glorious face towards us: which grant good Lord and dear father, for the love of thy Christ our king Anointed: to whom with thee and the holy Ghost, be all praise and honour, for ever and ever. Ame●.  
FINIS.   

A godly and most fruitful Prayer, to be said of every fa●thfull Christian, to obtain pardon and remission of sins in the ●lood of the Lamb jesus Christ, and to appease his heavy indignation, which threateneth our destruction for the use of our impiety.  
O Heavenly God, and most gracious father, we know and confess, that wilfully and of a set purpose, we all ingenerally even from the highest to the lowest, have most grievously offended thy glorious majesty, and have by our disobedience provoked thee to displeasure, in such sort that the coals of thy wrath are kindled up against us, like unto hot consuming fire, wherein we for our deserts might worthily in thy eternal justice be overthrown and confounded, but yet such and so abundant is the love of thy son our Saviour jesus Christ that he prayeth to thee without ceasing, earnestly entreating thee to forget his anger, justly conceived against us, and to behold with the fatherly eyes of thy compassion, those bloody and painful wounds which he suffered on the cross for our redemption, the which when thou beholdest, thy fury is changed to love, and thou in thy mercy layest aside the heavy scourges of thine indignation, wherewith all we might most worthily have been thoroughly chastised and corrected, yet still stand we sturdy and stiff in our own conceits, and like a most froward people, perverse and stubborn generation, for all thy great and rich graces bestowed upon us, enter into contempt of thy graces, and lie wallowing like filthy ●wine in the miry puddle of our corruption & uncleanness: we, I say, most wretched & miserable creatures, wander wilfully from the pathways of thy testimonies, despise and utterly forget the covenant that thou hast made with us, neglect the benefit of our redemption, and utterly begin to leave the Lord of health, altogether delighting in the practise of sin: the use whereof both in body and sou●e wound●th us to destruction, which is end●es in the dungeon of hell. But alas (good Lord) who is it that in this age con●idereth how oft, and how many times he in one ho●re offendeth thee: (alas Lord) all have declined a●d gone away from the sh●epefolde of thy grace, even from the highest to the lowest, and there is no goodness on the face of the earth, yet who prepareth to humble himself before the Lord, and to ask mercy for his offences, we know we are all wounded, & wretched Samaritans, and are thoroughly spoiled of thy grace, wherewith we were clothed as a ●esture, by our ceaseless enemies, namely the world, flesh, & that old Leviathan, the ancient enemy of man's felicity & happiness, yet good Lord, pass thou not by us, for neither the oblation of the priest nor the Levite can prevail us, if thou leave us, that art no fuller wounded with sin, what shall become of us (alas) the dangerous dart of o●r transgression hath taken a deep entrance into our hearts, wherein it cleaveth so fast that it can not without their aid be removed, our souls which thou hast in the fullness of thy divine wisdom framed to thine own similitude and likeness are become so leprous that if thou pour forth the wine of thy eternal justice we shall be sure to smart eternally for our offences, and become miserable slaves and bondmen to the prince of darkness which hath rob us of our felicities in them, our consciences corrupted with the canker of our corruption that are made most deformed through uncleanness, and show in thy sight, full of all spots of impiety, festered ●ores, ougle ulcers, botches, blains, and vyles, can never be cured without the refreshing oil of thy mercy sweet Christ, that art the heavenly Samaritane, thou art the Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world, thou art the sweet physician that ministrest unto us the delightsome Nectar of thy grace, return now unto us that have forsaken thee, we repent, we come unto thee crying out bitterly for our manifold iniquities: think upon us, hear us, continue thy plea to thy father, whose ears will attentively listen unto thee, pray thou for us & we sha●l be sure to be preserved from those plagues that we have constrained thy justice for our disobedience to heap up against us. Thou art the pitiful Chirurgeon, pour into our monstrous consciences overladen with all kinds of sins: as pri●e, avarice, juxury, fornication, etc. The precious balm of thy bountiful favour, distill into our leprous souls, the sweet smelling drops of thy innocent blood, ●or if thou of thy goodness vouchsafe to wash & purge us therein we shall be made safe, yea we shall be purified and as thy dear begotten, by grace he made strong & mighty, & be able to cry with thee Aba, Aba▪ O Father forsake us not, but be merciful unto us. For if thou refuse us now whose destruction by thy word: sins and tokens in the heaven, unkind and most monstrous concep●ion among reasonable and brui● creatures, is by thy justice presaged, we can not choose but perish for ever: give us grace therefore now in this season the end of all things being at hand, sith the preachers of thy word which plentifully break forth unto us the bread of life, can not prevail to bring us home like sorrowful sinners and hearty repentant sons to the fold, neither by thy inestimable Levite, nor yet by thy threatenings, and heavy comminations pronounced against us for our Zodomi●rie and filthiness, in time to convert unto thee, and sith all warnings hitherto have been insufficient to pierce our ston●e stubborn & flinty hearts, how loving or terrible soever they have been now in this last time, wherein to our shame thou hast opened the mouth of a child to foreshow unto us the fullness of thy fury, to reclaim us home unto thee, give us grace to be warned from our ill doing, & perform in us a good work through the fullness of thy favour, that we may learn in time, which time 〈◊〉 but a small while to bring forth the fruits of repentance and to ●scape those most miserable plagues which a●e threatened to come ●pon ●s, and that speedily, for his wrath hangeth over our heads, as it were by a twine thread, the burden whereof will be so intolerable ●or us to abide, that without speedy amendment of our lives, which God grant, we shall perish in our wickedness. L●t us therefore, from the highest to the lowest, of what degree or calling soever: we whilst gods vndeser●ed grace proffereth us for our deserved 〈◊〉, a space of repentance, deplore our sins, weep & sorrow for our sins, and then sha●l we be preserved and delivered from the b●rt●en of our sins, and be made of the vessels of wrath, the vessels of honour, and enter with him, as the glorious members of his mystical body, to endless rest and glory everlasting, the which grant good Lord we beseech thee.  
FINIS.