A09339:3400
A Golden Chain
A golden chain: or The description of theology containing the order of the causes of salvation and damnation, according to Gods word. A view whereof is to be seen in the table annexed. Hereunto is adjoined the order which M. Theodore Beza used in comforting afflicted consciences.A golden chaine: or The description of theologie containing the order of the causes of saluation and damnation, according to Gods word. A view whereof is to be seene in the table annexed. Hereunto is adioyned the order which M. Theodore Beza vsed in comforting afflicted consciences.
Cambridge: printed by John Legat, 1600Cambridge: printed by Iohn Legat, 1600
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
The pure heart is most necessary, because it is the fountain of speech, and if the fountain be defiled,1 the streams that issue thence can not be clean.
The pure heart is most necessary, because it is the fountaine of speech, and if the fountaine be defiled,1 the streames that issue thence can not be cleane.
And because the heart of man by nature is a bottomless gulf of iniquity, two things are to be known: first, how it must be made pure: & then how it is always afterward to be kept pure.
And because the heart of man by nature is a bottomlesse gulfe of iniquitie, two things are to be knowne: first, how it must be made pure: & then how it is alwaies afterward to be kept pure.
The way to get a pure heart is this. First, thou must seriously examine thy life and thy conscience, for all thy sins past: then with a heavy and bleeding heart confess them to God, utterly condemning thy self. Thirdly, with deep sighs and groans of spirit cry unto heaven to God the father, in the name of Christ for pardon, I say, for pardon of the same sins, as it were for life and death, and that, day and night, till the Lord send down from heaven a sweet certificate into thy perplexed conscience by his holy spirit, that all thy sins are done away. Now at the same instant in which pardon shall be granted, God likewise will once again stretch forth that mighty hand of his, whereby he made thee when thou wast not, to make thee a new creature, to create a new heart in thee, to renew a right spirit in thee, and to stablish thee by his free spirit. For whom he justifieth, them also at the same time he sanctifieth.