A17412:760
Sermons upon the ten first verses of the third chapter of the first Epistle…
Sermons upon the ten first verses of the third chapter of the first Epistle of S. Peter Being the last that were preached by the late faithful and painful minister of Gods word, Nicolas Byfield. Wherein method, sense, doctrine, and use, is, with great variety of matter, profitably handled; and sundry heads of divinity largely discussed. Published since the authors death by William Gouge.Sermons upon the ten first verses of the third chapter of the first Epistle of S. Peter Being the last that were preached by the late faithfull and painfull minister of Gods word, Nicolas Byfield. Wherein method, sense, doctrine, and vse, is, with great varietie of matter, profitably handled; and sundry heads of divinitie largely discussed. Published since the authors death by William Gouge.
London: printed by H. Lownes for George Latham, 1626
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.
Life, in Scripture is either natural or spiritual: as for natural life (especially since the fall) that is so poor a thing, as to be an heir to, it is no great preferment. By natural life, I mean that life that men live while they are unregenerate: I say, that life is a very poor thing; Which will appear, if we consider the quality of it,1 or the means of preserving it, or the short continuance of it, or the subject of it, or the things with which it is oppressed, or the whole nature of it.
Life, in Scripture is either naturall or spirituall: as for naturall life (especially since the fall) that is so poore a thing, as to be an heire to, it is no great preferment. By naturall life, I meane that life that men live while they are unregenerate: I say, that life is a very poore thing; Which will appeare, if we consider the quality of it,1 or the meanes of preserving it, or the short continuance of it, or the subject of it, or the things with which it is opprest, or the whole nature of it.
- 1Natural life but a mean thing in divers respects.Naturall life but a meane thing in divers respects.
1 For the quality of it; What is life? It is but a wind, or breath: God breathed into man the breath of life, as if his life were but his breath, Gen. 2.7. and so it is said; Every thing that had the breath of life, Gen. 6.17. & 7.15.22. My life is a wind, saith Joh, Joh 7.7. What is your life (saith S. James)? it is even a vapour that appeareth for a little while, and then vanisheth away,