surely
in more pathetick and bewailing Accents than himself, who gives us so
melancholly a Description of their dismal Misery, as affects the Mind with
the same Passions and despairing Sorrow they were then overloaded with;
and as _Virgil_ has it,

_Horror ubique Animos, simul ipsa silentia terrent.
Haerent in fixi pectore Vultus._

The _British_ Nation wept for the Miseries of her Metropolis. In some
Houses Carcases lay waiting for Burial; and in others, Persons in their
last Agonies; in one Room might be heard dying Groans, in another the
Raveings of a Delirium, and not far off Relations and Friends bewailing
both their Loss and the dismal Prospect of their own sudden Departure;
Death was the sure Midwife to all Children, and Infants passed immediately
from the Womb to the Grave; Who would not burst with Grief to see the
Stock of a future Generation hang upon the Breasts of a dead Mother? or
the Marriage-Bed changed the first Night into a Sepulchre, and the unhappy
Pair meet with Death in the first Embraces? Some of the Infected run about
staggering like drunken Men, and fall and expire in the Streets; while
others lie half dead and comatous, but never to be waked but by the last
Trumpet; some lie vomiting, as if they had drank Poison; and others fall
dead in the Market while they are buying Necessaries for the Support of
Life.

Not much unlike was it in the following Conflagration; where the Altars
themselves became so many Victims, and the finest Churches in the whole
World carried up to Heaven Supplications in Flames, while their marble
Pillars, wet with Tears, melted like Wax; nor were Monuments secure from
the inexorable Flames, where many of their venerable Remains passed a
second Martyrdom; the most august Palaces were soon laid waste, and the
Flames seem'd to be in a fatal Engagement to destroy the great Ornament
of Commerce; and the burning of all the Commodities of the World together,
seem'd a proper Epitome of this Conflagration: Neither confederate Crowns,
nor the drawn Swords of Kings could restrain its phanatick and rebellious
Rage; large Halls, stately Houses, and the Sheds of the Poor, were
together reduced to Ashes; the Sun blush'd to see himself set, and envied
those Flames the Government of the Night which had rivall'd him so many
Days: As the City, I say, was afterwards burnt without any Distinction, in
like Manner did this Plague spare no Order, Age, or Sex; the Divine was
taken in th