Selected quad for the lemma: mercy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
mercy_n	pardon_v	sin_n	transgression_n	2,321	5	9.8948	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A67756	The hearts-index, or, Self-knowledg [sic] together with I. the wonderful change that the word and spirit do work upon the heart when a sinner is converted II. the excellency of grace above nature III. the safety and calm of such as have sued out their pardon in Christ / by R. Younge ...	Younge, Richard.	1667 (1667)	Wing Y160; ESTC R16696	27,579	32

sin whatever it be you cannot be so infinite in sinning as he is infinite in pardoning if you repent yea sins upon repentance are so remitted as if they had never been committed I will put away thy transgressions as a cloud and thy sins as a mist Isa. 44.22 And what by corruption hath been done by repentance is undone As the former examples witness Come and let us Reason together saith the Lord though your sins be as scarlet they shall be as white as snow Isa. 1.18 Yea whiter than snow For the Prophet David laying open his blood guiltiness and his original impurity useth these words Purge me with Hysop and I shall be clean wash me and I shall be whiter than snow Psal. 51.7 And in reason did Christ come to call sinners to repentance and shall he not shew mercy to the penitent Or who would not cast his burden upon him that desires to give ease As I live saith the Lord I would not the death of a sinner Ezek. 18.32 and 33.11 Onely apply not this salve before the ulcer be searched to the bottome Lay not hold upon mercy until thou be'st throughly humbled The onely way to become good is first to believe that you are evil and by accusing our selves we prevent Satan by judging our selves we prevent God Are we as sick of sorrow as we are of sin Then may we hopefully go to the Physitian of our Souls who came into the World onely to cure the sick and to give light to them onely who sit in darkness and in the shadow of Death God does not pour the Oyl of Grace but into a broken and contrite Heart Wouldest thou get out of the miserable estate of Nature into the blessed estate of Grace and of Satans bond-slave become the Child of God and a Member of Christ Wouldest thou truly know thine own Heart and be very sensible how evil and wicked it is that so thou mayest have a more humble conceit of thy self Lay to heart these three particulars 1. The corruption of our nature by reason of original sin 2. Our manifold breach of Gods Righteous Law by actual sin 3. The guilt and punishment due to us for them both This being done thou wilt see and finde thy necessity of a Redeemer And it is Thirst onely that makes us relish our Drink Hunger our meat The full Stomack of a Pharisee surcharged with the superfluitics of his own Merits will loath the Honey-comb of Christs Righteousness This was it which made the Young Prodigal to relish even servants fare though before wanton when full fed at home No more relish feels the Pharisaical heart in Christs blood than in a chip But O how acceptable is the Fountain of living Waters to the chased Heart panting and braying The blood of Christ to the weary and tired soul to the thirsty Conscience scorched with the sense of Gods wrath He that presents him with it how welcome is he even as a special choice man one of a thousand And the deeper the sense of Misery is the sweeter the sense of Mercy is Sect. 21. Then if you would be satisfied for time to come whether your Repentance and Conversion be true and sound these particulars will infallibly inform you If you shall persevere when this trouble for sin is over in doing that which now you purpose it is an infallible signe your Repentance is found otherwise not If thou doest call to minde the Vow which thou madest in Baptism and doest thy endeavour to perform that which then thou didst promise If thou doest square thy life according to the Rule of Gods Word and not after the Rudiments of the World If thou art willing to forsake all sin without reserving one for otherwise that one sin may prove the bane of all thy Graces even as Gideon had seventy sons and but one Bastard and yet that Bastard destroyed all the rest that were legitimate Judg. 9.5 Sin is like the Ivy in the Wall cut off bough branch body stump yet some Sprigs or other will sprout out again Till the Root be pluckt up or the Wall be pulled down and ruined it will never utterly die Regeneration or New-birth is a creation of new qualities in the soul as being by nature onely evil disposed Gods children are known by this mark They walk not after the Flesh but after the Spirit Rom. 8.1 If Christ have called you to his service your life will appear more spiritual and excellent than others As for your fails it is a sign that sin hath not gained your consent but committed a Rape upon your Soul when you cry out to God If the ravished Virgin under the Law cryed out she was pronounced guiltless A sheep may fall into the mire but a swine delights to wallow in the mire Great difference between a woman that is forced though she cries out and strives and an alluring Adultress Again the thoughts of the godly are godly of the wicked worldly and by these good and evil men are best and truliest differenced one from another Would we know our own hearts and whether they be changed by a new birth Examine we our thoughts words actions passions especially our thoughts will inform us for these cannot be subject to hypocrisie as words and deeds are Sect. 22. Then by way of Caution know That a Childe may as soon create it self as a man in the state of nature regenerate himself We cannot act in the least unless God bestows upon us daily privative grace to defend us from evil and daily positive grace enabling us to do good And those that are of Christs teaching know both from the Word and by Experience that of themselves they are not onely weak but even dead to what is good moving no more than they are moved that their best works are faulty all their sins deadly all their Natures corrupted originally You hath he quickned that were dead in trespasses and sins Eph. 2.1 Yea we are altogether so dead in sin that we cannot stir the least joynt no not so much as feel our own deadness nor desire life except God be pleased to raise and restore our souls from the death of sin and grave of long custom to the life of grace Apt we are to all evil but reprobate and indisposed to all Grace and Goodness yea to all the means thereof My Powers are all corrupt corrupt my will Marble to good but Wax to what is ill Insomuch that we are not sufficient of our selves to think much less to speak least of all to do that which is good 2 Cor. 3.5 John 15.4 5. If we have power to chuse or refuse the object to do these well we have no power We have ability we have will enough to undo our selves scope enough Hell-ward but neither motion nor will to do good that must be put into us by him that gives both power and will and power to will Finally Each sanctified heart feels this but no words are able

come to deliver his people Whence commonly it comes to pass that those think best of themselves that have least cause yea the true Christian is as fearful to entertain a good opinion of himself as the false is unwilling to be driven from it They that have store of grace mourn for the want of it and they that indeed want it chant their abundance None so apt to doubt their Adoption as they that may be assured of it nor none more usually fear then they that have the greatest cause to hope We feel corruption not by corruption but by Grace and therefore the more we feel our inward corruption the more Grace we have Contraries the nearer they are one to another the sharper is the conflict betwixt them Now of all enemies the Spirit and the Flesh are nearest one to another being both in the Soul of a regenerate man and in all faculties of the soul and in every action that springeth from those faculties The more Grace the more Spiritual life and the more Spiritual life the more antipathy to the contrary whence none are so sensible of corruption as those that have the most Living Souls Sect. 19. Now for Remedy of the contrary there cannot be a better lesson for carnal men to learn than this All the promises of God are conditional to take place if we repent as all the threatnings of God are conditional to take place if we repent not But wicked men as they believe without repenting their Faith being meer presumption so they repent without believing their repentance being indeed Desperation and this observe we are cast down in the disappointment of our hopes in the same measure as we were too much lifted up in expectation of good from them Whence these peremptory presumers if ever they repent it is commonly as Francis Spira an Advocate of Padua did and never did any man plead so well for himself as he did against himself One Star is much bigger than the Earth yet it seems many degrees less It is the nature of fear to make dangers greater helps less than they are Christ hath promised peace and rest unto their souls that labour and are heavy laden and to those that walk according to rule Mat. 11.29 Gal. 6.16 even peace celestial in the state of grace and peace eternal in the state of glory Such therefore as never were distressed in conscience or live loosly never had true peace Peace is the Daughter of Righteousness Rom. 5.1 Being justified by faith we have peace with God But he who makes a Bridge of his own shadow will be sure to fall into the Water Those blocks that never in their life were moved with Gods threatnings never in any streight of conscience never groaned under the burden of Gods anger they have not so much as entred into the porch of this house or lift a foot over the threshold of this school of repentance Oh! that we could but so much fear the eternal pains as we do the temporary and be but so careful to save our souls from torment as our bodies In the mean time the case of these men is so much the worse by how much their fear is the less It faring with the soul as with the body Those diseases which do take away all sense of pain are of all others most desperate As the dead palsie the falling sickness the sleepy lethargy c. And the patient is most dangerously sick when he hath no feeling thereof In like manner whilest they suppose themselves to be free from judgment they are already smitten with the heaviest of Gods judgments a heart that cannot repent Rom. 2.5 In a Lethargy it is needful the Patient should be cast into a burning Feaver because the senses are benummed and this will waken them and dry up the besotting humours So in our dead security before our conversion God is fain to let the Law Sin Conscience and Satan loose upon us and to kindle the very fire of Hell in our souls that so we might be roused out of our security but thousands of these blocks both live and depart with as great hopes as men go to a Lottery even dreaming of Heaven until they awake in Hell For they too often die without any remorse of conscience like blocks or as an Ox dies in a ditch Yea thousands that live like Laban die like Nabal which is but the same word inverted whilest others the dear children of God die in distress of Conscience For it is not every good mans hap to die like Antonius Pius whose death was after the fashion and semblance of a kindly and pleasant sleep However St. Austins rule will be sure to hold He cannot die ill that hath lived well and for the most part He that lives conscionably dies comfortably and departeth rich And so you see how it fares with the wickedest and worst of men Wherefore if you are truly sensible of your wretchedness it is a good sign that you are in some forwardness to be recovered and really to become so good as formerly you but dreamed or imagined your self to be And indeed the very first step to grace is to feel the want of grace and the next way to receive mercy is to see your self miserable Therefore our constant and most diligent search should be to find out the naughtiness of our own hearts and to get strength from God against our prevailing corruptions Sect. 20. Loose Libertine But is there any hope for one so wicked as I who have turned the grace of God into wantonness applying Christs passion as a warrant for my licentiousness not as a remedy and taking his death as a license to sin his Cross as a Letters patent to do mischief As if a man should head his drum of rebellion with his pardon For I have most spightfully and malitiously taken up Arms against my Maker and fought against my Redeemer all my dayes Convert Do but unfeignedly repent you of your sins and forsake your former evill wayes and lay hold upon Christ by a true and lively faith my soul for yours God is very ready to forgive them be they never so many and innumerable for multitude never so hainous for quality and magnitude Yea I can shew you your Pardon from the great King of Heaven for all that is past the which you may read at large Isa 55.7 Ezek. 18.21 to 29. and 33.11 Joel 2.12 13 14. Yea read 1 Cor. 6.10 11. together with the story of Manasses Mary Magdalen the Thief and the Prodigal Son and you shall see presidents thereof Yea the very murderers of the Son of God upon their serious and unfeigned repentance and stedfast believing in him received pardon and salvation And indeed despair is a sin which never knew Jesus True every sin deserves damnation but no sin shall condemn but the lying and continuing in it True repentance is ever blest with forgiveness And know this that Gods mercy is greater than thy