Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	father_n	jesus_n	son_n	14,487	5	5.3429	4	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A86270	Repentance and conversion, the fabrick of salvation: or The saints joy in heaven, for the sinners sorrow upon Earth. Being the last sermons preached by that reverend and learned John Hewyt, D.D. Late minister of St. Gregories by St. Pauls. With other of his sermons preached there. Dedicated to all his pious auditors, especially those of the said parish. Also an advertisement concerning some sermons lately printed, and presented to be the doctors, but are disavowed by Geo. Wild. Jo. Barwick.	Hewit, John, 1614-1658.; Wilde, George, 1610-1665.; Barwick, John, 1612-1664.	1658 (1658)	Wing H1637; Thomason E1776_1; ESTC R209722	86,537	249

accomplish the work of our redemption The Law and the Prophets endured till John but since his time the Kingdom of God is Evangelized Luk. 16.16 Many Kings and Prophets have desired to see the things which were seen when Jesus Christ converst in the world and they have not seen them Luk. 10.24 And therefore Jesus Christ prefers the least that were under the Gospel before the greatest that were under the Law St. John pointed at him with his hand and shewed him to the World to be the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins for which cause he was raised above the Prophets and because he had not seen nor shew'd the glory and vertue which followed his death and his resurrection he was therefore set below the Apostles And St. Paul saith that the grace which hath been given us in Jesus Christ from eternal times is now manifested by the apparition of our Saviour Jesus Christ who hath destroyed death and put into light both life and immortality by the Gospel It seems then that this mystery of our redemption hath been hidden from precedent ages and that the ancient Fathers have had nothing but shadows and figures of things that were to come And yet Jesus Christ himself gives this testimony to Abraham that he desired to see this day of his and hath seen it and rejoyced Joh. 8.56 and St. Peter 1 Pet. 1.10 that the Prophets have enquired and made diligent search concerning the salvation of souls the reward of faith and by the Prophetick spirit in them have declared the sufferances which were to come to Jesus Christ and the joyes which were to follow them And for this reason it is that the Son of God sayes He had the testimony of Moses and the Prophets and that the Scriptures of the old Testament bare witness of him Joh. 5.39 To know then how that must be understood to resolve us in this appearance of contrariety and to begin our undermining at the foundation of Papistical errors touching the state of the souls of the Fathers deceased before the coming of Christ let us learn then from this confession of faith so fair so firm so clear as it can be in the noon day of the Gospel that we have no other faith nor other means of salvation then what the ancient Patriarchs had before us and that the ancient Covenant contracted with them in the substance and truth is the same thing with the new one contracted with us that are fallen into these later times all the difference which is in them consisting only in the order and the means of the dispensation which according to the diversity of times hath made it assume divers visages for as the Apostle Heb. 1.1 2. God hath heretofore many times and after many sorts spoken to the fathers by the Prophets and in these later times by his Son Jesus Christ. Where he seems to distinguish the times by the coming of the Son of God betwixt the preceding ages and those that were to come after The first part hath had divers seasons and divers manners according to which this dispensation hath been ordered The first season is counted from the fall of Adam unto Abraham during which we had no declaration more express of this eternal alliance of God with men then that which is contained in few words but of an high and full signification The seed of the woman shall bruise the head of the Serpent Gen. 3.15 upon which promise confirmed declared and entertained by the usage of sacrifices and carried from hand to hand and from father to son during all the first age of the world this faith was sustained and the hope of the faithful founded In the second season from Abraham to Moses during which Job lived a true Son of Abraham both according to the flesh and to the promise this general promise was as it were restrained in the family and posterity of this Holy Patriarch when God made this alliance with him that he would be their God and they his children and discocovered to him that from him should go forth the Redeemer of the World when he said that in his seed all the Nations of the World should be blessed Genes 12. giving him beside the sacrifices the particular seal of the circumcision as a sign of the justice of faith Rom. 4.11 The third was from Moses to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ where in a more especial and ample manner God was pleased to instruct his people exposing and confirming his Covenant unto them after divers fashions in which are remarkable two principal parts having reference each to other and ordained one for the love of the other Like the two Cherubims who being placed one right against the other and extending their wings one toward the other did both of them look toward the propitiatory Exod. 25.20 the one was the Law promising life and everlasting benediction under the condition of a most perfect observation of his commands A condition impossible to corrupted nature whose imaginations were nothing but evil at all times and yet very necessary and useful to make men know the duty wherein they were obliged to make them sensible of weakness and to make them comprehend the horrour of that condemnation into which their transgressions had precipitated them by that means to conduct them to the second part of the Covenant which was all of it purely Evangelical as that which under divers figures and ceremonies did represent mans reconciliation to God and his plenary deliverance by the ransom of that infinite merit of the sacrifice of the death and passion of Christ After this in the fulness of time came the great Redeemer of our soules who abolished the first means that he might establish the second abolish'd I say not wholly but in part not in the substance but in the accidents For as for the first part he exacts no more as it were by force of maledictions that perfect obedience of the Law but supplying the defects of nature by the abundant effusion of his spirit of grace he draws from sanctified hearts a voluntary obedience And in the second he hath caused the body to succeed the shadows the truth the figures the thing the signes all these things having been fulfilled in the death of Christ And from hence may we easily comprehend the difference that there is betwixt the new Covenant and the old between the faith of the Fathers that lived under the Law and theirs that live under the Gospel For it is the same thing in substance Having God for the Author his grace and mercy for the cause and the satisfaction of Christ for the meritorious foundation The same things promised grace and glory God is to us both a Sun and a Shield he gives both grace and glory and withholds no good thing from such as wait upon him Distributed in general by the same means and the preaching of the word Hearken and your soules shall live Isai 55.3 the

what is feigned of the Phoenix in a bed of spices in odors of devotion kindled by the beams of the true Sun of righteousness quickning out of the ashes an acceptable sacrifice to the Father of Lights for he delighteth not in the death of a sinner but rather that he should turn from his wickedness and live 'T is not a light sorrow or petty sigh or a Miserere mei Domine at the last gasp when the soul is going to give his ultimum vale to the body will serve your turn or procure pardon of your sins from God no no you must labour to be humbled more deeply for your enormous offences and hainous sins which seale the heavens with their clamor and cry for vengeance from the Lord of heaven so that if we could possibly shed tears of blood for our crimson scarlet sins we should do it for all come short of that grief for sin and real contrition of heart that we ought to have Could we stream out the residue of our dayes that it shall please the Almighty to allow us in this vale of misery could we consume and wast the Taper of our life in sighs and heart-breaking groans 't were all little enough to beg and obtain pardon of God for our sins You must bath the Leprosie of your sin in a Jordan of tears before you can come to the Land of Canaan the Zoar of salvation Life you know is uncertain death certain you had best therefore beloved take hold of opportunity by the fore-lock for post est occasio calva an opportunity once slipt is seldom recover'd whilst it is call'd to day harden not your heart Nemo sibi crastinum promittat Let no man assure himself of the morrow for death wrestleth with every man and serius aut citius mortem properamus adunam sooner or later he gets a fall he hath tript up the heels of all our Ancestors and you know not how soon he may foyl you Venienti occurrite morbo meet the distemper and remedy it whilst it is curable Delays in rebus sanctis are very dangerous repent therefore of your sins before death that though he be termed by the Heathen Philosophers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he may be to you a Messenger that bringeth glad tidings a guide to conduct you from a momentany unto eternal life which we shall enjoy with God in secula seculorum I could wish cordially that that saying of that good old man St. Cyprian were not so true as daily experience manifests it In aetate senescunt in pietate juvenescunt Most men now adayes have gray heads and green wits capita cana and corda vana and when their heads are ful of silver hairs they have not so much as suckt in their Rudiments they have need of milk the food of babes and sucklings instead of the more solid grounds and fundamentals of Religion Whereas ancient Christians should be walking Laws and talking Statutes their dicta edicta and their actiones axiomata as Gregory Nazianzen saith 'T is a sad thing to be near heaven and never the near to be at the gates of death before they have learnt one lesson of repentance and if their repentance be sorrowless 't will prove but a sorry one Old men should like trees of righteousnesse bear fruit in their old age when their heads are candied with hoary hair but not the fruits of old age covetousness suspicion and the like If the Evangelists in their time could cry out Repent repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand it must of necessity be nearer at hand now then it was then therefore beloved I have the more cause to press this Doctrine of repentance upon you and let me tell you that there is no musick so melodious in the ears of God as that which resounds from a broken instrument God loves a broken heart and yet he 'll have the whole heart or none 't is strange and yet true repentance is a consumption yet no sickness and what man would not willingly condescend to undergo such a consumption here that he might not be consumed in endless easeless and remediless flames and torments hereafter One thing I do very much admire at viz. how they can expect favour from God that will grant favour to none but upon the divels conditions in the 24 of St. Matthew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if falling down thou wilt worship They would have others fall down and worship them when as they will not worship and adore God Dejecisti eos dum elevarentur saith the Psalmist a strange kind of expression Thou hast taken them down whilest thou liftedst them up this seems to have an allusion to the Eagle and other birds of prey who having found an Oyster that they with their own strength cannot break or open they soar aloft and spying the clift of a rock for they are very quick-sighted as natural Philosophers inform us they let the Oyster fall perpendicularly and so it breaking to pieces they come to their desired food so God he lifts them up on high that they may the better get a fall Tolluntur in altum Ut lapsu graviore ruant Such haughty minds are not season'd aright they have no true frame of a penitent spirit neither will God accept of such persons and till you be reconciled to God through his son Jesus Christ and are washed and cleansed from all your iniquities by the tears of repentance and be converted from sin to God your case is desperate and it had been better for you to have been a beast than a man Display your sins before God not hypocritically but really for there is no dissembling with God and confession in your mouth if it be hypocritical will be like a Shibboleth in the Hebrew you cannot pronounce it without lisping your sins are hainous confess them cordially to be so your sins are many in number acknowledg them to be so the Terra incognita of your corruptions is far larger then the Terra cognita But let not the hainousness of thy sin the number or multitude of them deter thee from repentance but proceed with a holy resolution to go through all difficulties by the help of Christ Jesus and all objections that the world the flesh and the devil can alleadge against you till you have obtained pardon and remission of your sins never cease till you come to a period for he that intends to sing Te Deum to the Almighty must not break off till he come to the end Proceed I say beloved ad finem usque and rely upon the merits of our Jesus and be not put off by the hainousness of your sins and the rigour of the Law of God for if the most holy man that ever breath'd upon the face of the earth should be weighed in the balance of the Sanctuary and no grain of favour be allowed him then without all doubt mene tekel might be applied to him he would be found too light There

administration of the Sacraments He that shall not be circumcized shall be cut off Gen. 17.14 and the inward working of the spirit of God Isai 59.21 My spirit that is upon thee and my words which I have put into thy mouth shall not depart from thy mouth nor from the mouth of thy seed nor from the mouth of thy seeds seed from henceforth and for ever Aiming at the same end to wit salvation and life eternal But as to the accidents and in the manner of dispensation there is no small difference For in the Gospel the manifestation of doctrine is more clear express and efficacious as much more clear as accomplishments are before prophesies and things present then things which are as yet hid in the length of ages to come and so much the more clear in that at this day of exterior manifestation hath been added a greater abundance of the Spirits interior light according as it was prophesied Joel 2.28 And it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh and your sons and your daughters shall prophesie your old men shall dream dreams your young men shall see visions so that whereas they of old saw Jesus Christ but under shadows and images of what was to come we hold him as come already and look upon him as crucified before our eyes To this may be added their Covenant was contracted by the mediation of Moses ours by that of Christ The old Covenant was confined to one corner of the world and tyed to one family the new one hath reach'd to the ends of the earth and hath embraced the Nations The old one lasted but for a time whereas the new one shall not terminate but by the end of ages Jesus Christ is the same yesterday to day and for ever Heb. 13.8 This is the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world Revel 13.8 'T is he that is a light to the nations and the salvation of God unto the ends of the earth in waiting for him those of old found their consolation as we have ours in seeing him and the odor of his sacrifice expanding it self as well over the fore-going as following ages hath restored those souls who before or since have put their whole trust in him Wherefore although wee see those of old in rudiments which are seemingly gross let us not the lesse value their faith who for having the less of clarity have not the less of certainty Certainly prophesie was like a candle giving light in an obscure place the Law like the dawning of the day or the Star of the morning and the Gospel like the clear noon But all these lights though differing in clarity have been enough to make us see and follow the wayes of salvation 2 Pet. 1.19 And though it seem to us that we see no more promised to the people of Israel and their Patriarchs then a Canaan flowing with milk and hony and with a thousand sweets of temporal blessings yet let us not think that they stopt there or that they did not with Job raise their souls and carry up their desires to things spiritual to that inward peace and never-decaying glory which was represented to them under those shadows of an earthly happiness For in whatsoever was heretofore offered and presented to them they still cast their eyes on Jesus Christ the promised Messias in whom all Gods promises are yea and amen 2 Corinth 1.20 The consideration of whom would by no means suffer them to dwell upon the transitory sweetnesses of this world his Kingdom being represented to them by Prophesies not as a carnal or worldly one but as one altogether celestial and spiritual The Scepter said Jacob to his sons shall not be taken from Judah nor the Law-giver from betwixt his feet till Silo come Gen. 40. That is to say The seed of the woman the man to be born without a Father and to him the people shall assemble themselves He was to come forth of Judah but at the time that he was to come Judah must lose the Scepter not then to rule or signorize in Judah for if he were to raise Judah above the Nations he should not then be the hope of his people since his coming was to vanquish and subjugate them but to him all Nations were to run and to offer him voluntary obedience because under his yoke they should come to seek their liberty because he shall raigne over their souls and conduct them with a rod of comfort delivering them from the bonds of sin and the tyranny of Satan whose head he shall bruise and take away his Empire So likewise when the Prophets speak of the deliverance of Babylon of the peoples return into the land of promise and the re-establishment of the Temple presently you see them transported with a consideration of the Kingdom of this great Messias of the deliverance of the souls of the true temple which is the Church As if they would teach the people that the possession of Canaan and all the contentment depending thereon were but shadows not to be trusted to their felicity not consisting to live to govern and reigne here below but to serve God to be govern'd by him as that by the Scepter of his word and efficacy of his spirit he might reign in us and be fully obeyed So saith Esai that the branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and glorious and the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel Isai 42.3 4. But with what glory It is and he adds that he that is left in Zion and he that remains in Jerusalem shall be called holy and those that shall be in Jerusalem shall all be written to life when the Lord shall have washt away the filth of the daughters of Zion and shall have purged the blood of Jerusalem from the midst thereof by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of burning and in the 11 Chapter he shews that the gifts he hath received from above to communicate to the world are all spiritual when he saith Isai 11.2 The spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him the spirit of wisdom and understanding the spirit of counsel and might the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord He saith moreover that he will bring his people from the North and from the South and that the earth shall be too narrow to contain them that Kings and Queens shall be their nursing fathers and nursing mothers But this is not to promise a temporal Kingdom but to represent an arrival of all Nations to his Church and of their Kings themselves under whose protection she should abundantly prosper And here you may see the difference which is betwixt the advancements which the Eternal promises to Kings and he entrance which he prepares for his Son into the world Behold how he speaks to Cyrus Isai 45.12 3. I have taken thee by thy right band that thou

of God that we understand not what it is to love him This Tree of Knowledge grows not in our Eden This flower springs not up in our Garden 't is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a gift dropt out of Heaven proceeding from the Father who is Love and Charity as St. John saith This is a divine liquor the true Nectar that God poures into our souls guttatim drop by drop as in narrow-neckt vessels Wherefore to accommodate our selves to our native slowness we 'll endeavour to infuse into our spirits by little and little so by degrees to arrive at the highest degree and Apex of Love There are five degrees of this our Love to God 1. The first is to love God for the good he doth us and we expect to receive from him still 2. Secondly To love him propter seipsum or sui ipsius gratia for his own sake because he is most excellent and most amiable 3. Thirdly To love God above all things nay your own selves but to love nothing in the World but for his sake 4. Fourthly To detest and abhor himself for the Love of God 5. Fifthly to love him as we shall in the life to come when we shall be in glory with this love the Saints are extasied and assist at the Throne of God in secula seculorum We call these Degrees of Love and not species or kinds because the superior contain the inferior as the chiefest white differs from the other parcels of the same colour that are less clear and transparent not in specie but in gradu we must remount up these degrees or stairs and rest our selves a little upon every one of them 1. The first degree and lowest is Five degrees by which we are brought to love God To love God for the good he doth us upon this step of Love was King David when in the 116 Psalm and in the 1 verse I love the Lord because he hath heard my voice and my supplication and so in the 18 Psalm for God will have respect and love from us because he extends his bounty so liberally to us 'T is God that created us 't is God that preserves and keeps us being created that nourisheth our bodies that cherisheth our souls that redeemeth us by his Son that governs us by his holy Spirit that instructeth us by his word that hath vouchsafed to admit us as his servants nay his friends and children and which is more the same with himself Plato playing the Philosopher with the grace of God Plato blessed God for three things thanked him for three things 1. That he was created a man and not a beast 2. That he was born a Graecian and not a Barbarian and 3. That he was a Philosopher Now we that are instructed in the School of Christ a School of more strict discipline So ought we for these especially make another kind of distribution of the grace of God and return him thanks for these three things 1. That of all Creatures we were created men 2. That of all men Christians And 3. That among those that are Christians he hath made us in the number of the true elect And if you please you may add a fourth That he hath adopted us by his Son Jesus Christ before the foundation of the World having been carefull of us not onely before we had any existence but even before the world had its creation Now if God did manifest his love to us before we were how liberally will he extend it to us how bountifully will it flow from him when we invocate and call upon his Sacred Name and affect him with a filial and reverential love Now the smaller our number is the larger is our priviledge the more extensive and diffusive is his bounty and goodness to us to endow us with sight among so many blind persons as the portion of Jacob in Aegypt solely enlightned in the midst of obscurity Cimmerian darkness like the fleece of Gideon that was only bedewed with the grace of God when the rest of the earth was dry and destitute of it God hath encircled us with abundance of examples of stupendious caecity or blindness that he might raise our estimation of light and that we might make a farther progress in the way of salvation that so whilest it is called to day we may steer the ship of our souls by the Lanthorn of his Word All these vertues the constellation of all these graces depend upon one Soveraign and Prime one viz. reconciliation with God by the passion of our blessed Jesus This is the Chanel through which the graces of God stream unto us 'T is Jacobs Ladder that joyns Heaven and Earth together that rejoyns God and Man The Angels ascending this Ladder represent our prayers that we piously dart up to Heaven the Angels descending signifie the blessings of God that are distilled in answer to our prayers Jacob sleeping at the foot of the Ladder intimates unto us the quiet and tranquillity of conscience that we enjoy under the cool and comfortable shade of his intercession Before man was environed with horror and astonishment he could not cast his eye aside but he met with an object of fear If he look't upon God he discerned a consuming fire a supream Justice armed with revenge against sinners If he cast his eye upon the Law he immediately perceived the arrest of condemnation If he viewed the Heaven he concluded himself excluded thence by reason of sin If the World he saw his irreparable loss of dominion over the Creatures if himself a thousand spiritual and corporal infirmities At the signes of Heaven and the Earth-quake he was ague-struck with fear Then Satan Death Hell were his inveterate foes that either drew him to perdition or did behel and wrack him with the expectation of them But now every person that hath confidence in Christ Jesus changes his language and speaks in a more pleasing dialect If he look upon God he 'll say 'T is my Father that hath adopted me If his thoughts pitch upon the day of Judgement he 'll bespeak himself thus My Elder Brother sits there and he that is my Judge is also my Counsellor If he think on the Angels he cries out They are my guardians Psalm the 34. If he view the Heaven he terms it his habitation If he hear it thunder he 'll reply 'T is the voice of my Father If he consider the Law The Son of God saith he hath accomplisht it for me If he swim with the flowing tide of prosperity he 'll say God hath reserved better things for me If in the low ebb of adversity Jesus Christ hath endured far more for me God exerciseth or proves corrects or afflicts me making me therein conformable to his Son If he thinks on Hell the Devil or Death then he will triumph over all with the holy Apostle in the 1 to the Corinth the 15 Ch. and the 55 56 and 57 vers O Death where is thy

movings of the body trembling and uncertain what can be said but that his body is so miserably agitated that his soul must be in great disorder And in this condition it is as uncapable to produce a good action as to take good counsel but from thence as from an infernal jakes do issue the most infamous vices and execrable actions that can be committed by men And as in an army after a terrour taken the battalions break their rankes in disorder all flye all run and nothing seen but blood and slaughter so it is when fear possesses the soul she troubles her self all vertues abandon her and the vices make a horrible wast and spoil From hence sprung up superstition and so many execrable sacrifices the very report whereof breeds horrour Cruelty claims her for her mother perfidiousness treason and dissembling owe her their original She hath hatcht tyranny and ill counsels and it is none but she that breaking the sacred bonds of nature is capable to animate fathers and mothers against their proper blood and their own bowels In a word 't is impossible to love the thing which we fear Behold then this monster which these Doctors nourish in these poor souls which God by so many promises of his love and assistance chases and banishes from the hearts of his children Fear not little flock for it is your fathers pleasure to give you a Kingdom Luk. 12.32 Nay but say they To day I am well assured but who can continue me this assurance till to morrow and afterwards He that perseveres to the end shall be saved Matth. 24.13 And what is there more changeable and inconstant then man So many assaults that Satan gives us so many dangers that beset us so many infirmities that are in us so many examples of Apostates that make shipwrack of their faith do they not give us cause enough to doubt Yes verily and to despair absolutely if we look no farther then to our selves But the power of God is perfected in our weakness 2 Cor. 12.19 If we be weak he is strong if we be changelings he 's immutable I have loved thee with an everlasting love and have therefore extended my loving kindness to thee Jerem. 31.3 Those whom he hath loved he hath loved to the end and the gifts and calling of God are without repentance Rom. 11.29 His foundation continues firm 2 Tim. 2.19 He knows who are his and none shall ravish them out of his hands and it is impossibile that his elect should be seduced Matth. 24.24 but those whom he hath foreknown he hath predestinated called justified and glorified Rom. 8.29 This chain of his love is altogether inviolable and therefore rest thy self upon his favourable power and upon his unchangeable goodness saying with David Psal 138. The Lord will perfect that which concerneth me thy mercy O Lord endureth for ever forsake not the works of thine own hands Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the dayes of my life and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever This assurance is the true humility which beats down the pride of man that he may glorifie God pride and presumption are to be feared when we go about to rely upon our selves when we sacrifice to our own nets and exalt the merit of our vertues but let not that man fear to glorifie himself that seeks his glory in the shame of the cross of Christ that strips himself of all other ornaments to put on Christ that celebrates not his own justice but the compassions of God I do not glorifie my self because I am just said St. Ambrose but because I am redeemed I will not glorifie my self at all because I am without sin but because I have obtained pardon of my sins I will not glorifie my self that I have profited any but because Christ is Advocate for me towards the Father 1 Joh. 1.2 that he hath shed his blood for my sake and for me hath tasted of death this is not arrogance but faith To preach and to publish that which thou hast received is not pride but devotion said St. Augustine And for conclusion it is least to be feared that this doctrine should make men negligent or be as a pillow under their elbowes to make their souls sleepy in the neglect of the means of salvation St. Paul draws a quite contrary consequence when he saith Philip. 2.12 13. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling and adds this for a reason for it is God that works in you both the will and the performance according to his good pleasure Will you say then that this belief makes men sleepy and choakes in their consciences both the duties of prayer and the exercises of charity contrarywise there is not a sharper spur to this acknowledgment then the knowledge of the Love of God and the assurance of his grace Who hath ever seen fear produce a good action And what is there in the world that is either fair or generous which is not to be attributed to hope It were a devilish malice to be wicked because God is good to turn the back upon him when he turns his face upon us to flye him because he seek us to change affection toward him because his love is for ever unchangeable toward us and because he will give a kingdom in heaven for us to cast our selves into the way that leads to infernal pains The children of God go another way and from the faith and assurance which they have of the love of their father they enflame their loves the more to him and feel themselves the more obliged to his obedience They fear to offend so good a Father and being purchased by so excellent a price they consecrate their bodies and spirits to his glory And as the sick man to whom Physitians have given assurance of recovery keeps himself from things that are contrary to his health and takes more willingly the remedies that are ordained him whereas he that despaires of his health abandons himself to his appetite So the faithful man knowing that God will impart to him of his glory goes by the way of sanctity and good works that he may attain to the other and having so many fair promises cleanses himself from all pollution of flesh and spirit finishing the sanctification in the fear of God 2 Cor. 7.1 So Daniel knew that when the 70 years of the captivity were at an end God should deliver his people and therefore about that time he put himself upon prayer and fasting Dan. 9.2 3. So St. Paul Act. 23.24 31. had a promise for all those that were with him in the ship that none should be lost but yet when he saw the Mariners ready to withdraw themselves he did not spare to tell them that if they did not tarry with us we could not be saved The Pagans themselves never entred into combats with more courage then when they had their birds or the entrails favourable they never