A09445:137
Of the calling of the ministry two treatises, describing the duties and dignities of…Of the calling of the ministerie two treatises, discribing the duties and dignities of…
Of the calling of the ministry two treatises, describing the duties and dignities of that calling. Delivered publicly in the University of Cambridge, by Master Perkins. Taken then from his mouth, and now diligently perused and published, by a preacher of the word with a preface prefixed touching the publishing of Master Perkins his works, & a catalogue of all such particulars thereof, as are to be expected.Of the calling of the ministerie two treatises, discribing the duties and dignities of that calling. Delivered publickly in the Vniuersitie of Cambridge, by Maister Perkins. Taken then from his mouth, and now dilligently perused and published, by a preacher of the word with a preface prefixed touching the publishing of Maister Perkins his workes, & a catalogue of all such particulars thereof, as are to bee expected.
London: printed by I. Roberts for William Welby, 1605
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.
Now follow the causes of his fear, which are two. The first is, his own pollution and sinfulness, and the sinfulness of his people: his own he freely confesseth in these words; I am a man of polluted lips: that is, I am a miserable and sinful man, and therefore I fear and tremble to stand in Gods presence: nay, I dare not look upon the Lord, for my sins. But it may be demanded, how could the Prophet say thus truly, for he was a holy man, and justified in Gods presence, by his true faith in the Messiah, and sanctified by repentance: can a man justified and sanctified, say, he is a man polluted? I answer, It is doubtless, he was so, he therefore complaineth here not of any great and enormous sins, which he had committed to the public scandal of the ⟨p. 14⟩Church, but first of the corruption of his nature; which in him as in all men is a very sea of iniquity, & which always appears the more, the nearer a man comes to God and therefore did now most apparently discover it self in the Prophet, when he was in the presence of the Lord himself. Secondly, he complaineth of some actual sins of his life, and it is more likely of some sins of omission, then of Commission: for we find not that the Prophet was ever touched with any great sin, and where we know it not, we are in charity not to imagine it. So that it ts most probable, he complaineth of some smaller faults, or negligences in his Ministry: as not preaching to the people at some time when he ought, or not preaching so willingly, or cheerfully as he should, or desire to lea•e preaching, because the people were stubborn and disobedient, or some impatience in his Ministry, when the people were rebellious and resisted his doctrine, which passion might the rather vex him (as we read it did Jeremiah) the ⟨p. 15⟩Jews were so stubborn and stifnecked a people: or it may be some want of zeal or forwardness, these, or some such were the cause of his fear: And the conscience of ••ese makes him here cry out that he cannot stand in the sight of God. Where we le•r•e, first, what a tender conscience godly Ministers must have above all men: •am•ly, that they must make conscience, […] of the great and gross sins only, but even of the lowest & least sins: