A14992:181
A care-cloth
A care-cloth: or a treatise of the cumbers and troubles of marriage intended to advise them that may, to shun them; that may not, well and patiently to bear them. By William Whately, preacher of the word of God in Banbury, in Oxfordshire.A care-cloth: or a treatise of the cumbers and troubles of marriage intended to aduise them that may, to shun them; that may not, well and patiently to beare them. By William Whately, preacher of the word of God in Banbury, in Oxfordshire.
London: printed by Felix Kyngston for Thomas Man, 1624
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.
3. Then must he take to him petitions and requests, begging help from heaven, crying earnestly for the Spirit of God to help him, (for by the Spirit alone can we mortify the deeds of the body) urging and enforcing upon the divine Majesty, all his comfortable promises which he hath written in his Word:1 (Sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under the law, but under grace. 2I will put my fear in their hearts, that they shall not depart from me. 3The law of the Spirit of life in Christ, hath freed me from the law of sin and death. And specially, that excellent branch of the new Covenant,4 They shall all know me, from the least to the most, and I will put my law in their hearts, and in their minds will I write them,) and so, suing with the greatest fervency of desire that he can attain, say, O Lord, perform these promises: O let no wickedness have dominion over me: O make me sound in thy precepts: O incline mine ⟨p. 142⟩heart unto thy testimonies, and not to such a sin. When God is thus importuned by the cries and prayers of his servants, he cannot but stir up himself, and come and help them, and hear the voice of their prayers when they cry unto him. When Israel felt the oppression of their outward enemies, and cried unto the Lord, (as it is often noted in the book of Judges) the Lord had pity upon them, and raised them up a Judge and a deliverer: shall he not be much more attentive to the voice of their supplications, when they cry unto him, against pride, vainglory, lust, wrath, and those spiritual enemies that seek to oppress them? Certainly the Lord will remember, and will up, and help, and set them at liberty, whom sin and Satan had ensnared.
3. Then must hee take to him petitions and requests, begging helpe from heauen, crying earnestly for the Spirit of God to helpe him, (for by the Spirit alone can wee mortifie the deeds of the body) vrging and inforcing vpon the diuine Maiesty, all his comfortable promises which he hath written in his Word: