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truth_n according_a holy_a scripture_n 2,400 5 5.5262 4 true
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A59601 Immanuel, or, A discovery of true religion as it imports a living principle in the minds of men, grounded upon Christ's discourse with the Samaritaness : being the latter clause of The voice crying in a wilderness, or, A continuation of the angelical life / mostly composed at the same time by S.S. Shaw, Samuel, 1635-1696. 1667 (1667) Wing S3038; ESTC R35174 154,749 423

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and wickedness a gulf is fized and they that would pass from God to sin and the devil cannot not that there shall ever be in any a real and predominant desire so to pass as I suppose I have already proved but it denotes the impossibility of the thing It is equally impossible that a godly soul should fall from God and become an hater of him fall from his love and image and take upon him the image of the devil as it was for L●zarus to quit Abrahams bosome for the flames of hell the case seems to be the same the former being the most reall Heaven and the latter the truest Hell True Religion is that holy fire which being once kindled in the soul from Heaven never goes out whereof the fire of the altar was but a faint and imperfect resemblance It is as true in this respect of good men as it is of wicked men in an other their fire never goes out And here now we are presented with another great difference between true and counterfeit Religion All counterfeit Religion will fade in time though never so specious and flourishing All dew will pass away though some lye much longer than other All land-floods will fail yea the flood of Noah at length dryed up though it were of many moneths duration But this well of water which our Saviour speaks of here will never utterly fail cold Adversity cannot freeze it up scorching prosperity cannot dry it up The upper springs of uncreated grace and goodness will evermore feed those nether springs of grace and holiness in the creature Though Heaven and earth pass away yet shall the seed of God remain he that hath begun a good work will certainly perform it Eph. 1. 6. Where the grace of God hath begotten a Divine principle and spirit of true Religion in a soul there is the central force even of Heaven itself still attracting and carrying the soul in its motions thitherward untill it have lodged it in the very bosome and heart of God If any principle lower than true Religion do actuate a man it will certainly waste and be exhausted though it may carry him swiftly in a rapid motion yet not in a steady though it may carry him high yet not quite through A meteor that is exhaled from the earth by a forreign force though it may mount high in appearance and brave it in a blaze enough to be envyed by the poor twinkling stars and to be admired by ordinary spectators yet its fate is to fall down and shamefully confess its base original That Religion which men put on only for a cloak w●ll wear out and drop into rags if it be not presently thrown by as a garment out of fashion You have read of the seeming righteousness of Jehu founded in ambition and cruelty the piety and devotion of Joash grounded upon a good and vertuous education the zeal of Soul for the worship of God and his fat Sacrifices growing upon a root of superstition as Samuel that man of God interprets it 1 Sam. 15. 22. and you have seen the shamefull issue of all these dissemblers and the stinking snuff in which all this candle-light Religion ended very much unlike to that sun-light lustre of true and genuine goodness which shineth more and more unto the perfect day according to that elegant description which the spirit of God makes of it in the writings of Solomon whose pen hath as much adorned this great truth as his life hath blotted it Prov. 4. 18. To this purpose I might fairly alleadge the frequent testimonies which the Holy Ghost in Scripture gives concerning such hypocritical and unprincipled professors that having no root they wither away in a scorching season that they are again entangled in the pollutions of the world and overcome that like dogs they turn to their own vomit again and like Sows wallow in the mire from which they had been washed 2 Pet. 2. 20 22. together with many others of the same nature as also the prophesies that are made concerning them that that which they seemed to have shall be taken away from them Luke 8. 18. that they shall proceed no further for their folly shall be manifest to all men 2 Tim. 3. 9. that evil men and seducers and of those self-seducers are the worst shall wax worse and worse 2 Tim. 3. 13. with other places of the like nature It were easie to record many histories of many men especially great men who have speedily I had almost said disdainfully thrown off that semblance of humility meekness self-denyal justice and faithfulness which they had put on for a vizard during their probationarship for preferment the better to accomplish their selfish designs and to be possest of some base ends of their own But yet I will not deny but that a hypocrite may maintain a fair conformity to and correspondence with the letter of the law of God he may continue fair and specious to the very end of his life yea perhaps may go to his grave undiscovered either to himself or any in the world besides I believe many men have lived and dyed Pharisees have never apostatized from that righteousness which they profest but have persevered in their formality and hypocrisie to the last But yet although that counterfeit righteousness and Religion may possibly not fade away yet nevertheless being of an earthly and selfish constitution it is transitory and fading and if it were soundly assaulted and battered with persecutions and temptations no doubt would actually vanish and disappear on the other hand the promise of God is pregnant and precious Isa 40. 31. They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength they shall walk and no faint Take encouragement from hence all ye that love the Lord go on in the strength of God Be the more lively by how much the more you are assured that this well of water shall spring up in you into everlasting life Make this good use of this comfortable doctrine will God indeed work in you both to will and to do why then so much the rather work out your own salvation according to the Apostle Phil. 2. 12. will the Lord God be with you will he not fail you nor forsake you till you have finished all your work why then Be strong and of good courage and do as good David inferrs and argues 1 Chron. 28. 20. Have you this hope this firm ground of hope in the promise and goodness of God why then purifie your selves as God is pure according to the Apostle 1 Joh. 3. 3. stop the mouths of those men that say the Doctrine of perseverance is prejudicial to godliness let them see and be forced to acknowledge it that the more a godly soul is assured of the infinite and unchangeable love and care of God towards him the more is he winged with love and zeal with speed mounting up thither daily where he longs to arrive They that understand the doctrine of perseverance
do also understand that they must accomplish it in a way of dutifull diligence and watchfull willingness and if any grow prophane and licentious and apostatize from the way of righteousness which they have known it is an evident argument to them that they are no Saints and then what will the doctrine of the perseverance of Saints avail them CHAP. VII Religion considered in the consequent of Not thirsting the phrase explained two wayes both resulting into the same general truth viz. that divine grace gives a solid satisfaction to the soul This Aphorisme confirmed by some Scriptures and largely explained in six propositions The first that there is a raging thirst in every soul of man after some ultimate and satisfactory good The second that every natural man thirsteth principally after happiness in the creature The third that no man can find that soul-filling satisfaction in any creature enjoyment which every natural man principally seeketh therein this prosecuted in two particulars The fourth that grace takes not away the souls thirst after happiness but much enflames it the reason assigned The fifth that the godly soul thirsteth no more after Rest in any worldly thing but in God alone this prosecuted in both the branches of it in the former more largely where enquiry is made how far a godly man may be said to thirst after the creature and answered in four particulars the latter briefly toucht upon The sixth that in the enjoyment of God the soul is at Rest and this in a double sense viz. so as that it is perfectly matcht with its object two things noted for the clearing of this Secondly so satisfied as to have joy and pleasure in him a double account given of that joy The chapter expires in a passionate lamentation taken up over the levity and earthliness of Christian minds John 4. 14. Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst c. HItherto we have taken a view of true Religion as it stands described in this pregnant text by its original nature and properties we are now to consider it in the certain and genuine consequent of it and that is in one word Affirmatively satisfaction or if you will negatively not thirsting for so it is in our Saviours phrase whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst Whilest I address my self to the explication of this phrase I suppose I need not be so exact and curious as to tell you in order with a certain kind of Scholastical gravity first what is nor and then what is meant by it For I presume no body will dream of a corporeal or gross kind of thirsting to be meant here Grace doth no more quench the thirst of the body than elementary water can relieve the panting of the soul Nay he himself was subject to this gross kind of thirst who gave to others the water whereof if they drank they should never thirst more If it be understood of a spiritual thirst yet I suppose I need not to tell you neither that then it must not be understood absolutely For it cannot possibly be that the thirst of a Soul should be perfectly allayed till all its faculties be filled up to the brim of their respective capacities which will never be untill it be swallowed up in the infinite and unbounded Ocean of the supream good But I conceive we may fairly come to the meaning of this phrase never thirst either by adding or distinguishing First Then let us supply the sentence thus whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst after any other water There is no worldly liquor can be so accommodated or attempered to the Palate as to give it an universal satisfaction so as that a man should be perfectly mortified to all variety But this Heavenly water which our Saviour treats of here is so fitted to the Palate of spirits and brings such satisfaction along with it that the soul that is made to drink of it do's supercede its chase of all other delights counts all other waters but a filthy and stinking puddle thirsts no more after any other thing neither through necessity nor for variety The more the soul drinks of this water indeed the more it thirsteth after fuller measures and larger potions of the same and do's not only suck in divine vertue and influences but even longs to be itself suckt up in the divinity as we shall see further in the procedure of this discourse But its thirst after all created good all the waters of the Cistern are hereby extinguished or at least mastered and mortified Or Secondly By distinguishing upon thirst the sense of the phrase will be clearly this whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never be at a loss more never be to seek any more never be uncertain or unsatisfied as to his main happiness or supream object be shall not rove and range up and down the world in an unfixedness and suspense any more shall not run up and down to seek satisfaction and rest any more From an internal unsatisfiedness of the body spring violent and restless motions and runnings up and down by which thirst is contracted so that by a Metonymy thirst comes to be used for unsatisfiedness which is the remote cause of it and by a metaphor the same phrase comes to be applyed to the soul I suppose I am warranted by the sacred style thus to interpret especially by the use and explication of the phrase in Jer. 2. 25. where the Prophet intimates that by thirst is to be meant a restless and discontented running up and down to seek satisfaction withhold thy foot from being unshod and thy throat from thirst which two phrases are of the same importance and signifie no more than cease from gadding after your Idols and that this is the meaning of that thirsting appears by the answer that the wilfull and desperate people make in the sequel of the verse For instead of saying no but we will thirst they cry no but after them will I goe To thirst then is in an unsatisfiedness and spiritual disquiet to range up and down seeking something wherein ultimately to acquiesce And in this sense it is most true what our Lord here pronounceth that whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst Of which thirst that famous Proclamation of our Saviours is to be understood Joh. 7. 37. If any man thirst let him come unto me and drink in which place also we must necessrily understand what is here exprest that then he shall never thirst more It matters not much by which of these two wayes we explain the phrase here of not thirsting for according to either of them it will result into this theological maxime viz. that Divine grace or true Christian Religion gives a real and solid satisfaction to the soul that is principled with it This will appear plain though we apply