The Return of Prayers

Reas. 2 2. Reason: If he may fall into some gross sin, which at first conversion, he did above all other humble himself for; and yet, that same initial repentance, did not put him ⟨p. 344⟩into such an impossibility of falling into that sin again: Why then should a renewed act of repentance for the same, or for some other reiterated sin, be supposed to have such virtue in it, as to make him shot-free for ever, from the same fiery dart again?

Reas. 2 2. Reason: If he may fall into some grosse sin, which at first conversion, hee did above all other humble himselfe for; and yet, that same initiall repentance, did not put him ⟨p. 344⟩into such an impossibility of falling into that sinne againe: Why then should a renewed act of repentance for the same, or for some other reiterated sin, be supposed to have such vertue in it, as to make him shot-free for ever, from the same fiery dart againe?

Reas. 3 Again thirdly: Let it be considered, from whence it should be, that a renewed, or indeed any act of true repentance, though never so great, and intense, should have such a transcendent, eternal, and invincible virtue in it, and privilege annexed to it; for how is it, that repentance doth strengthen ⟨p. 345⟩us against sin, but by restoring the decayed frame of Grace, to a better constitution and greater degree of strength then before; and by raising it, above a mans lusts, and above that lust, more then all other? as in David, when he prayed, Create in me a clean heart, which, through his sin of uncleanness, was in an especial manner, defiled with a proneness to that sin: But yet withal remember, that, that new frame of heart, & strength gotten by that renewed repentance, and that augmentation, and increase of hatred against, and abominating that ⟨p. 346⟩