A divine herbal together with a forrest of thorns In five sermons. ... By…A divine herball together with a forrest of thornes In five sermons. ... By…

Men commonly deal with their sins, as hedgers do, when they go to plash thorny bushes: they put on tinning gloves, that the Thorns may not prick them. So these harden their hearts, that their own thorns may give them no compunction. But all vanities are but like the fools ⟨p. 142⟩laughter, ¹which Solomon compares to the crackling of thorns under a p•t: they make a noise, and suddenly go out. But sin never parts with the wicked, without leaving a sting behind it.² Luther saith, there are two fiends, that torment men in this world: and they are sin, and a bad conscience. The latter follows the former: or if you will, the former wounds the latter: for sin is the thorn, and the conscience the subject it strikes. This thorn often pricks deep; to the very heart. Acts 2. to the very bones, Psal. 38.³ There is no rest in my bones because of my sin. ⁴Vis nunquam esse tristis? bene vive. Nunquam securus est reus animus. Wouldest thou never be sorrowful? live well. A guilty mind cannot be securely quiet. An evil mind is haunted and vexed with the thorns of his own conscience. Sin to the affections, whiles it is doing, is oleum ungens, supple oil. Sin to the conscience when it is done, is tribulus pungens, a pricking thorn. What extreme contraries do often wicked conceits run into? In their time of security they cannot be brought, to think sin to be sin. At last desperately, they think it such a sin, that it cannot be forgiven. At first they are delighted with the sense and smell of their iniquity, as of a sweet rose: but the rose of their delight withers, and there is a thorn under it, that pricks the hart. Hereupon Solomon couples pleasant vanity, and troublesome vexation together. If that tickles the flesh, this shall wound the spirit. You shall hear an Usurer in the madness of presumption ⟨p. 143⟩