A09466:278
A treatise tending unto a declaration whether a man be in the estate of…A treatise tending vnto a declaration whether a man be in the estate of…
A treatise tending unto a declaration whether a man be in the estate of damnation or in the estate of grace and if he be in the first, how he may in time come out of it: if in the second, how he may discern it, and persevere in the same to the end. The points that are handled are set down in the page following.A treatise tending vnto a declaration whether a man be in the estate of damnation or in the estate of grace and if he be in the first, how he may in time come out of it: if in the second, how he maie discerne it, and perseuere in the same to the end. The points that are handled are set downe in the page following.
London: printed by R. Robinson for T. Gubbin, 1590
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.
When I heard the law truly preached how that I ought to love and honour God with all my strength and might from the low bottom of the heart, because he did create me lord over it, and my neighbour, yea mine enemies as my self inwardly from the ground of my heart, because God hath made them after ⟨p. 124⟩the likeness of his own Image, and they are his sons as well as I, and Christ hath bought them with his blood, and made them heirs of everlasting life as well as I: and how I ought to do whatsoever God biddeth and to abstain from whatsoever God forbiddeth, with all love and meekness, with a fervent and burning lust from the entire of the heart. Then began my conscience to rage against the law and against God. No sea, be it never so great a tempest was so unquiet, for it was not possible for me a natural man to consent to the law that it should be good, or that God should be righteous which made the law: in as much as it was contrary unto my nature, and damned me and all that I could do, and never showed me where to fetch help, nor preached any mercya: but only set me at variance with God, and provoked and stirred me to rail on God, and to blaspheme him as a cruel tyrant. And indeed it was not possible to do otherwise, to think that God made me of so poisoned a nature, and gave me an impossible law to perform: I being not borne again by the spirit, and my wit, reason, and will being so fast glued, yea nailed ⟨p. 125⟩and chained unto the will of the Devil. This was the captivity and bondage whence Christ delivered me, redeemed and loosed me. His blood, his death, his patience in suffering rebukes and wrongs and the full wrath of God, his prayers and fastings, his meekness & fulfilling the uttermost points of the law, appeased the wrath of God, brought the favour of God to me again, obtained that God should love me first, & be my father, and that a merciful father that would consider my infirmity & weakness, and would give me his spirit again which he had taken away in Adam, to rule, govern, and strengthen me, and to break the bands of Satan wherein I was so straight bound. When Christ was on this wise preached, and the promises rehearsed which are contained in the book of God, (which preaching is called the gospel or glad-tidings,) and I had deeply considered the same: