her, then them.

This woman, as I said, was a Samaritan sinner, a sinner of the worst
complexion: for the Jews abhorred to have ought to do with them,
ver. 9; wherefore none more fit than she to be made one of the decoys
of heaven, to bring others of these Samaritan wild-fowls under the
net of the grace of Christ. And she did the work to purpose. Many,
and many more of the Samaritans believed on him; ver. 40-42. The
heart of man, though set on sin, will, when it comes once to a
persuasion that God is willing to have mercy upon us, incline to come
to Jesus Christ for life.

Witness those turn-aways from God that you also read of in Jeremiah;
for after they had heard three or four times over, that God had mercy
for backsliders, they broke out, and said, "Behold, we come unto
thee, for thou art the Lord our God." Or as those in Hosea did, "For
in thee the fatherless find mercy;" Jer. iii. 22; Hos. xiv. 1-3.

Mercy, and the revelation thereof, is the only antidote against sin.
It is of a thawing nature; it will loose the heart that is frozen up
in sin; yea, it will make the unwilling willing to come to Jesus
Christ for life. Wherefore, do you think, was it that Jesus Christ
told the adulterous woman, and that before so many sinners, that he
had not condemned her, but to allure her, with them there present, to
hope to find favour at his hands? (As he also saith in another
place, "I came not to judge, but to save the world.") For might they
not thence most rationally conclude, that if Jesus Christ had rather
save than damn an harlot, there was encouragement for them to come to
him for mercy.