The new birthThe nevv birth

That is growth. As a natural life,¹ so likewise a spiritual, by degrees increaseth & waxeth stronger & stronger, approaching nearer to perfection; & that with a proportionable & suitable increase of every part and member, as I may call it, of the new man. For though in some parts he may be weaker then in others; yet in those weaker parts also, considering the weakness, there is a growth correspondent to the growing of other parts.² All the branches that bring forth fruit in Christ the vine, the Father the good husbandman purgeth, that they may bring forth more fruit; and in Christ all the body having nourishment ministered, and knit together,³ increaseth with the increase of God; and that also according to the effectual working of every part. A living branch, in a living tree, will draw sap, and get growth. A living member, of a living body, cannot (by the course of nature) but attract fit nurture, and procure to it self a going forward in stature, till the stature be full and perfect. Doubtless Christ is a living tree, his mystical body a living body; wherefore the regenerate must needs be growing. But this matter of growth doth stand in need of a sound explanation. Understand therefore that there is a double growth, one in greatness, the other in goodness; one in quantity, the other in quality. So you may see a man from his birth, to 24. or 25. years grow bigger and bigger, he is higher and thicker, hath larger limbs, and stronger joints; but from ⟨p. 64⟩these years upward he grows wiser, sager, more stable, more sober and better settled also in his bodily might. So an apple from Spring to Midsummer or after, grows larger and larger in bigness; from thence to the time of its pulling, it grows pleasanter and pleasanter in taste, and better and better relished. Thus it is with a Christian man: For a good space of time, he doth sensibly increase in knowing and leaving more sins, and in knowing and doing more duties; this is to grow in bigness: but after a good time spent in Christs school, and that there be but few new lessons (not above his form, as it were) to be learnt, he cons over the old lessons again, and gets them more perfectly by heart, and better understood. Those sins he leaveth, he leaveth with more sincerity, with more rectified zeal, with more love to God, with more detestation of sin.