AN ALARM FOR LONDON Partly delivered in a Sermon the last Fast, near by BISHOPSGATE in LONDON. By John HACKLUYT, a wellwisher to the Peace of England's ISRAEL.  Awake thou that sleepest. EPHES. 5.14. 
LONDON Printed by I. Coe, 1647.   

To the truly Christian Reader.  

THe title may strike terror, but in whom.  
Those, by heaven's finger marked out for doom?  
Celestial powers are just; and therefore will  
Never destroy the good men, with the ill.  
Though storms fall fierce, and floods o'er mountains roar,  
Noah shall have an ark; what would he more?  
The corn must now be fannd; strive then t'appear,  
Good seed not mixed with either Chafe, or tear.   

To the City.  
Nor think him for, who now so rudely roars,  
And beats alarms at thy tainted doors.  
Cease thou to sin; and than his Pen shall say,  
Thy fable night shall be a summer's day.  
And those stretched clouds of wrath, all wrath shall bury,  
And drop with fatness then, as now with fury.    

Praemonitus Praemunitus.  
VIewing with a serious, (but a sad) eye; into what a sabarinth of woes, the kingdom in general, and the City in particular, is like unavoidably to plunge, unless those two grand Compurgators of a sin-desiled Nation; Repentance and Reformation do make a speedy and forcible step into the gap, made wide for judgement. I am constrained, by the great engagements of nature, and Religion, thus in public, to unmask my ne●rest thoughts, and with the strong (echoes of a troubled spirit, to unbosom my sad complaints:  
What is become of those quondam days, those harmless times, which well may be accounted happy; for though they were ignorantly zealous, yet they were not learnedly, knowingly, vicious! O Sodom and Gomorah, and ye Cities of Pentaepolis, now the ruinous monuments of celestial vengeance, had those things been heard of you, done in you, that have been done, and heard of in thee, O England's Jerusalem! ye had remained until this day.  
O City of harlots, though now thou sittest like a Queen, among the virgin Daughters of Zion, and by thy sorceries art become mighty; thou, that hast subdued that terrible enemy conquered Princes; at last, hast lost thyself, by thyself; shall the blood of goats and Calves propitiate? no, not the obl●●ion of many thousand souls, where is the prin● of all thy faults? where is the returns of all thy tears? thou fasted, but not to the Lord; thou wept, but not for sin: they were but the lowings of beasts for want of Fodder; howling for supplies of nature, not mournings for defects of grace.  
Abating of sin, is the allaying of Judgement, unfined humiliation: the only Antidote against destruction; balance thy sorrows with thy sins, thy repentance with the true effects, then tell me, are not thy transgressions sealed, thy days numbered.  
O City of stirs! is not thy hand drunk with the blood of innocents? hath not thy arm laid wast the dwelling places of thy sisters, and art thou better than they, no, 'tis thou hast sinned, is for those sheep, those lambs, what have they committed? Heaven made thee the word of his fury; when the Children bleeds, shall not the world be burnt? Though Babel was that fatal Engine to level Israel with the earth; yet as she hath done, so shall it be done unto her, the hammer shall be broken, Babel shall become desolate among the Nations. Jer: 50.15.23. And why? because she hath been a golden cup in the Lord's hand (by whom he poured out his vengeance) that made all the earth drunken; the Nations have drank of her wine; therefore do the people rage (because of the great afflictions they sustained by her) therefore will the Lord render unto Babel, all the evil she hath done to Zion, A Post shall run to meet the Post, and a Messenger to meet the Messenger, to show the King of Babel, the passages are stopped, the City is taken, come therefore, and let us go every one to his own country; for her Judgement is come up to heaven, and is lifted up unto the clouds. Ier. 51.7.9 31.  
O City of blood! how hast thou slain the Priests of the Lord; and cast them out, (like Dung) from the Inheritance of the God of Jacob, how hast thou exalted in their rooms, Prophets that prophesy falsely; because the people love to have it so: thy adulterate palate loathed Manna, choosing rather Egiption morsels, stinking garlic before the bread of Heaven. Thou hast pull down Ceremony, and set up heresy, cast out innovation, and brought in confusion, the basest of thy people winged with thy shelter, have exchanged stalls for Pulpits; as if no rabbi so seraphical as an ambitious mechanic (under the false gloss of illumination) to make the proselyte. Rotten sticks do yield a light, but not profitable, if stars appear by day, 'tis no less than ominous; and what influence these glow-worms have on thy diviner part, to act thy soul for heaven, to the judicious eye is held miraculus; shall not these things be required of thee.  
O City of pride, hath England trembled, and art thou exalted, what a miseable solecism is this humilem deum, & superbum hominem, to have a humble God in heaven, and a proud man on Earth! Oh blush for shame, if yet be left one drop of grace within thy veins, should one of our forefathers arise from his bed of earth, behold our garbs, and take a strict survey of all our vain attire; would he not stand amazed, and disacknowledge us his generation, being so divercified in mood and figure from our quondam days? what a monstrous birth flows from thy fruitful womb? what prodigious meteors, apparitions of men and women, see we daily in our streets? what? the glorious Queen become so base a whore, to prostitute under every hedge, to open her quiver to every arrow, to act every new invented sin, to embrace lovers of all sorts, of all fashions, knowest thou not that Pride goes before destruction, Prov. 16.18. Therefore because the Daughters of Zion, yea and persons too, are haughty, walking with stretched out necks, and with wandering eyes, walking and mincing as they go, &c. the Lord shall make their heads bald, and discover their secret parts, Esa. 3.16.17. and because thy wantonness is so exceeding great, as to act thy shame in public, with such brazen impudence; instead of sweet savour, there shall be a stink, and instead of a girdle, a rent; instead of dressing (frizlig podering) the hare baldness instead of a stomach, sackcloth, & burning instead of beauty; yea thy men shall fall by the sword, and thy strength in the battle; then shall thy gates mourn, and thou being desolate shall sit upon the ground. Esa. 3.24,25,26.  
O City of sin! how do thy streets ring with oaths? & thy houses with such hideous blasphemies, enough to blast the universe, and make it crack into a dissolution: The very Pagan Gods (whereof the devil was one) durst never (without death) be so blasphemed, as is (by thee) that glorious deity whose Character thou bearest, by whose name thou art called Christian; do not thy horrid oaths, thy hellish execrations peal lower than the thunder, though those elemental jars makes the earth to quake, and the very roof of heaven to tremble. To slay a man is death; but to murder the son of God, a twelve-penny fine is a sufficient expiation; nay it were well if that were done; our iniquity intolerable! good laws; bad executioners.  
In a word, what cries, what cruelties, what yellings of the poor, what clamours of distressed souls, what roaring of the bruised bones, what crashing of broken limbs, proclaims thy ruin? what drunkenness and open vomitings, what whoredoms and unheard of filthiness? (the nomination whereof would sparkles blushes in a heathen cheek) what profanations of the Lord's day, what tragical tyrannies and bloody expressions, what unmerciful extortions infects the very air, and like so many shrill alarms, trumpets forth thy desolation. Niniveth had but forty days to breath repentance in, thou hast had many thousands; but she repented, go to sinner's school O City of abomination; copy out, practice Niniveth. Art thou sure of her privileges hast thou forty days to turn thee in? General sorrow may beget a general safety; but without a speedy humiliation, expect a speedy desolation; what is thy Beloved more than other beloved's? this City more than other Cities? The Lord is just, and his spirit will not always strive: when the lion roars, all the Beasts of the forest tremble, when the Lord shall utter his voice, and the Almighty Thunderer blow upon a people, is then the time, to sit down to eat and drink, for to morrow they must die? the great Belteshazars joints uncymented, his whole frame fell into an Earthquke, when the finger of heaven was penning out his doom, Dan. 5. Oh that thou hadst an eye to see, an ear to hear, a heart to consider, thy grievous sin, thy great reproach, thy approahing ruin, shall the Lord whistle for an executioner from far; behold the son eut of thy bowels, longs for thy days of mourning, and the Lord will reinforse that arm, thou hast strengthened, exalted, to destroy thee.  
Therefore if any room for sighs, if any way for tears be left unto the throne of grace, step into the gap, quench the wrath gone forth, make an atonement for the people; if but ten faithful ones, be found within thy specious walls, cry aloud, spare not; the Lord will do great things for the tens sake, And the everlasting God gracious and merciful, who forgiveth iniquity, transgression and sin, pardon thy rebellions, and grant thee favour in his sight, that thou mayst live to laugh thine enemies in the face; to be the joy and comfort of this dejected Nation, and the glory of the world; for his sake, that bought thee with his own heart's blood, Jesus Christ true, God blessed for ever. Amen.  Discite justitiam moniti. Prudentia non exigua, alieno sapere periculo. 
FJNJS.