The sermons of Master Henry Smith gathered into one volume. Printed according to his…The sermons of Maister Henrie Smith gathered into one volume. Printed according to his…

If we read the Scriptures, ¹we must go on and continue in prayer: ²if we give alms, we must ⟨p. 1030⟩step on one foot further,³ and give them with cheerfulness: and thus as the Eagle continually soareth till she come to the highest: so must we still increase till we come to perfection. Let us be led forward unto perfection: ⁴as if a faithful man were like a ship under sail, never anchoring till he arrive at heaven. The greater is our sin which hear, and hear, but are never the more reformed for our hearing, like Pharaohs ill favoured kine which devoured the fat kine, but remained as il favoured as they were before; so many of us, when we have lugged the breast almost dry, after twenty or thirty years feeding, are as scragged and lean as we were before. No man almost among us is more zealous, no man more faithful, no man more constant for the truth, no man more fervent in religion, no man more sanctified, no man more diligent in practising, nor less vicious now, then he was one hundred sermons a go, as if we were night black-ravens, which cannot be washed with all the soap of the Gospel. Though we have long heard and still desire to hear, yet we do not grow by our hearing, we are very dwarfs in Christ scant able to go, little in faith, little in love, little in patience, little in obedience, little in zeal, like Zacheus, so little that we cannot see Christ. This is an undoubted evidence that we have not fleshly ⟨p. 1031⟩but stony hearts, which though they be washed, yet they cannot be watered with the sweet showers of the Gospel: For, is there not in every tavern, and in every shop, and in every house, and in every hall, as much covetousness, as much bribery, as much cozening, as much wantonness, as much maliciousness after this long shine of the word, as there was before? Are we not now as slothful in Gods service, as dissolute in the practise of Christian duties, as dishonest in our dealing between man and man, as proud in our attire, as light in our behaviour, as hypocritical abroad, as sinful at home, as we were before? And what is the reason hereof, but that we come to the fountain rather, to draw, than to drink: rather to hear, than to be bettered, and sanctified, and increased by our hearing? One sort heareth not at all, like Eutichus which was sleeping when Paul was preaching: