The _Kite’s_ Death-bed Devotion and Repentance works like the Charity and
Piety of a great many Penitents we meet with in the World; that after
the Robbing of Temples, the prophaning of Altars, and other Violences
of Rapine and Oppression, Build an Hospital perhaps, or some little
Alms-House, out of the Ruins of the Church, and the spoils of Widows and
Orphans; put up a Bill for the Prayers of the Congregation; Wipe their
Mouths, and All’s well again. But ’tis not for a Wicked Life to trust
to the Hazzards of an Uncertain State, and Disposition at the Point of
Death. When Men come to that Last Extremity once, by Languor, Pain, or
Sickness; and to lie Agonizing betwixt Heaven and Hell, under the stroke
either of a Divine Judgment, or of Human Frailty, they are not commonly
to sensible of their Wickedness, or so Effectually touch’d with the
remorse of a true Repentance, as they are Distracted with the terrors of
Death, and the Dark Visionary Apprehensions of what’s to come. People in
that Condition do but discharge themselves of Burdensom Reflexions, as
they do of the _Cargo_ of a Ship at Sea that has sprung a Leak: Every
thing is done in a Hurry, and men only part with their Sins in the
one Case, as they do with their _Goods_ in the other; to Fish them up
again, so soon as the Storm is over. Grace must be very strong in these
Conflicts, wholly to Vanquish the weaknesses of Distressed Nature. That
certainly is none of the time to make Choice of for the Great Work of
reconciling our selves to Heaven, when we are divided, and confounded
betwixt an Anguish of Body, and of Mind: And the Man is worse then Mad
that Ventures his Salvation upon that Desperate Issue. We have abundance
of these _Sick Kites_ in the World, that after a Sacrilegious Life, spent
in the Robbing of the Church, would willingly be thought to Die in the
Bosom of it.