A17286:482
The excellency of a gracious spirit Delivered in a treatise upon the 14. of…The excellency of a gracious spirit Deliuered in a treatise upon the 14. of…
The excellency of a gracious spirit Delivered in a treatise upon the 14. of Numbers, verse 24. By Jer. Burroughs minister of Gods Word.The excellency of a gracious spirit Deliuered in a treatise upon the 14. of Numbers, verse 24. By Ier. Burroughes minister of Gods Word.
London: printed by Miles for R. Dawlman, 1639
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.
Fourthly, stubborn hearts do 1not use to seek God to uphold them, to strengthen them, to bless them in that way; they do not bless God for being with them, helping of them to persist in their way, as Gods servants do; they go to God to get strength to enable them to be immovable; they give God the glory of it, when they have found themselves enabled to withstand temptations.
Fourthly, stubborne hearts doe 1not use to seek God to uphold them, to strengthen them, to blesse them in that way; they doe not blesse God for being with them, helping of them to persist in their way, as Gods servants doe; they go to God to get strength to inable them to bee immoveable; they give God the glory of it, when they have found themselves inabled to withstand temptations.
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Fifthly, those who are of stubborn dispositions, do not use to be most 1stubborn, when the heart is most broken with afflictions; stout hearts, though in their prosperity are unyeeldable, there is no dealing with ⟨p. 425⟩them then; their hearts are presently up; if you move them to any thing they have no mind to, their words are stout, their answers are fierce; but let afflictions come, then, as Es. 29. 4. Their hearts are brought down, and they speak as one out of the ground, and their speech is low, as one out of the dust; then they are willing to hear what you say; As the young Gallant that Solomon speaks of in Proverbs 5. there was no speaking to him in his prosperity; but when his flesh and body were consumed, then he mourns at the last, and cries out, How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof! I have not obeyed the voice of my Teachers, &c. But now, those that are godly, in their greatest afflictions, when their hearts are most broken, when God humbles them most, even then they are most settled and unmoveable in that way they walked in before, and it is then the greatest grief of their souls, that they walked no closer with God in it, than