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…

Let a man examine himself before he eat. ¹Here is first an examination:² secondly an examination of our selves: thirdly, an examination before we come to the Sacrament. Touching the first, here Paul saith, Examine your selves, but in 2. Corinth. 13. he doubleth his charge, Prove your selves; and again at next word, Examine your selves: as if he should say, this work must be done when it is done, because it is never throughly done; & therefore we must double our examination, as Paul doubleth his counsel. If a man suspect his enemy, he will try him with a question; if that will not search him, he will put forth another; if that be spied, he will move another, like one which putteth divers keys into a lock until it open: So he which examineth, must try and try, prove, and prove, search and search:³ for the angel of darkness is like an angel of light,⁴ and we have no way to discover him, but that of John, Try the spirits. God examineth with trials, the devil examineth with temptations, the world examineth with persecutions: we which are thus examined, had need to examine too. If any man skill not what Examining meaneth, the very word Examine is so pregnant, that it prompteth us how we should examine: for it signifieth to put our selves unto the ⟨p. 133⟩Touch-stone, as if we would try gold from copper. Therefore one saith, that Examination is the eye of the soul,⁵ whereby she seeeth her self, and her safety, and her danger, and her way which she walketh, and her pace which she holdeth, and the end to which she tendeth: she looks into her glass and spieth every spot in her face, how all her graces are stained; then she takes the water of life, and washeth her blots away. After she looks again, and beholdeth all her gifts, her faith, fear, love, patience, meekness, and marketh how every one doth flourish or wither. If they fade and decay, that she feeleth a consumption; then she takes preservatives and restoratives of prayer, and counsel, and repentance, before the sickness grow. Thus every day she letteth down a bucket into her heart, to see what water it bringeth up, lest she should corrupt within, and perish suddenly.