t written (Gen.
ix. 6): "Whosoever sheddeth Man's Blood, by Man his Blood shall be
shed"? And if an Eye be given for an Eye, a Tooth for a Tooth, how shall
the Murderer escape with his dishonoured Life? 'Tis further forbidden by
the Christian Law (proportionably stronger).

But on this head we would speak no word, for were not you all, O
miserable Sinners, born not in the Darkness of Heathendom, but in the
burning Light of Christian England?

'Secondly, we will consider the peculiar wickedness of Parricide, and
especially the Murder of a Wife. What deed, in truth, is more heinous
than that a man should slay the Parent of his own Children, the Wife he
had once loved and chose out of all the world to be a Companion of his
Days; the Wife who long had shared his good Fortune and his ill, who
had brought him with Pain and Anguish several Tokens and Badges of
Affection, the Olive Branches round about his Table? To embrew the hands
in such blood is double Murder, as it murders not only the Person slain,
but kills the Happiness of the orphaned Children, depriving them of
Bread, and forcing them upon wicked Ways of getting a Maintenance, which
often terminate in Newgate and an ignominious death.

'Bloodthirsty men, we have said, shall not live out half their Days. And
think not that Repentance avails the Murderer. "Hell and Damnation are
never full" (Prov. xxvii. 20), and the meanest Sinner shall find a place
in the Lake which burns unto Eternity with Fire and Brimstone. Alas!
your Punishment shall not finish with the Noose. Your "end is to be
burned" (Heb. vi. 8), to be burned, for the Blood that is shed cries
aloud for Vengeance.' At these words, as Pureney would relate with a
smile of recollected triumph, Matthias Brinsden screamed aloud, and a
shiver ran through the idle audience which came to Newgate on a
Black Sunday, as to a bull-baiting. Truly, the throng of thoughtless
spectators hindered the proper solace of the Ordinary's ministrations,
and many a respectable murderer complained of the intruding mob. But the
Ordinary, otherwise minded, loved nothing so well as a packed house, and
though he would invite the criminal to his private closet, and comfort
his solitude with pious ejaculations, he would neither shield him from
curiosity, nor tranquillise his path to the unquenchable fire.

Not only did he exercise in the pulpit a poignant and visible influence.
He boasted the confidence of many heroes. His green old age ch