History of the Plague in England | Page 9

stay, he was able effectually to preserve me in the midst of all the death and danger that would surround me; and that if I attempted to secure myself by fleeing from my habitation, and acted contrary to these intimations, which I believed to be divine, it was a kind of flying from God, and that he could cause his justice to overtake me when and where he thought fit.[27]
These thoughts quite turned my resolutions again; and when I came to discourse with my brother again, I told him that I inclined to stay and take my lot in that station in which God had placed me; and that it seemed to be made more especially my duty, on the account of what I have said.
My brother, though a very religious man himself, laughed at all I had suggested about its being an intimation from Heaven, and told me several stories of such foolhardy people, as he called them, as I was; that I ought indeed to submit to it as a work of Heaven if I had been any way disabled by distempers or diseases, and that then, not being able to go, I ought to acquiesce in the direction of Him, who, having been my Maker, had an undisputed right of sovereignty in disposing of me; and that then there had been no difficulty to determine which was the call of his providence, and which was not; but that I should take it as an intimation from Heaven that I should not go out of town, only because I could not hire a horse to go, or my fellow was run away that was to attend me, was ridiculous, since at the same time I had my health and limbs, and other servants, and might with ease travel a day or two on foot, and, having a good certificate of being in perfect health, might either hire a horse, or take post on the road, as I thought fit.
Then he proceeded to tell me of the mischievous consequences which attend the presumption of the Turks and Mohammedans in Asia, and in other places where he had been (for my brother, being a merchant, was a few years before, as I have already observed, returned from abroad, coming last from Lisbon); and how, presuming upon their professed predestinating[28] notions, and of every man's end being predetermined, and unalterably beforehand decreed, they would go unconcerned into infected places, and converse with infected persons, by which means they died at the rate of ten or fifteen thousand a week, whereas the Europeans, or Christian merchants, who kept themselves retired and reserved, generally escaped the contagion.
Upon these arguments my brother changed my resolutions again, and I began to resolve to go, and accordingly made all things ready; for, in short, the infection increased round me, and the bills were risen to almost seven hundred a week, and my brother told me he would venture to stay no longer. I desired him to let me consider of it but till the next day, and I would resolve; and as I had already prepared everything as well as I could, as to my business and who[29] to intrust my affairs with, I had little to do but to resolve.
I went home that evening greatly oppressed in my mind, irresolute, and not knowing what to do. I had set the evening wholly apart to consider seriously about it, and was all alone; for already people had, as it were by a general consent, taken up the custom of not going out of doors after sunset: the reasons I shall have occasion to say more of by and by.
In the retirement of this evening I endeavored to resolve first what was my duty to do, and I stated the arguments with which my brother had pressed me to go into the country, and I set against them the strong impressions which I had on my mind for staying,--the visible call I seemed to have from the particular circumstance of my calling, and the care due from me for the preservation of my effects, which were, as I might say, my estate; also the intimations which I thought I had from Heaven, that to me signified a kind of direction to venture; and it occurred to me, that, if I had what I call a direction to stay, I ought to suppose it contained a promise of being preserved, if I obeyed.
This lay close to me;[30] and my mind seemed more and more encouraged to stay than ever, and supported with a secret satisfaction that I should be kept.[31] Add to this, that turning over the Bible which lay before me, and while my thoughts were more than ordinary serious upon the question, I cried out, "Well,