A20752:367
The Christian warfare wherein is first generally showed the malice, power and politic stratagems…The Christian warfare wherein is first generally shewed the malice, power and politike stratagems…
The Christian warfare wherein is first generally showed the malice, power and politic stratagems of the spiritual enemies of our salvation, Satan and his assistants the world and the flesh, with the means also whereby the Christian may withstand and defeat them : and afterwards more specially their particular temptations, against the several causes and means of our salvation, whereby on the one side they allure us to security and presumption, and on the other side, draw us to doubting and desperation, are expressed and answered : written especially for their sakes who are exercised in the spiritual conflict of temptations, and are afflicted in conscience in the sight and sense of their sins / by I. Downame ...The Christian warfare wherein is first generally shewed the malice, power and politike stratagems of the spirituall ennemies of our saluation, Sathan and his assistants the world and the flesh, with the meanes also whereby the Christian may vvithstand and defeate them : and afterwards more speciallie their particvlar temptatiions, against the seuerall causes and meanes of our saluation, whereby on the one side they allure vs to security and presumption, and on the other side, draw vs to doubting and desperation, are expressed and answered : written especially for their sakes who are exercised in the spirituall conflict of temptations, and are afflicted in conscience in the sight and sense of their sinnes / by I. Dovvname ...
London: printed for Cuthbert Burby, 1604
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.
§ Sect. 5 If therefore we do keep the covenant of the Lord, nay, if we but think upon his commandments, to the end we may do them, the loving kindness of the Lord shall endure for ever upon us, as it is Psal. 103.17.18; if we can from our harts say with good Nehemiah, Nehem. 1.11.1 O Lord I beseech thee let thine ear now hearken to the prayer of thy servant, and to the prayer of thy servants who desire to fear thy name, the Lord will hear us indeed and grant our requests. If with the Prophet David we have but a respect to Gods commandments, with a care to fulfil them, we shall not be confounded,2 as it is Psal. 119.6. If we but desire to obey Gods commandment, the Lord will accomplish our desire, and quicken us in his righteousness,3 though we be dull, yea dead unto all goodness, as it is vers. 40.4 If with the Apostle Paul we do the evil which we would not, and consent to the law that it is good, delighting therein in the inner man; then though we are with him led captive unto sin, yet it is not we that offend, but sin that dwelleth in us, that is, our old man, our corrupt and unregenerate ⟨p. 124⟩part,5 which cannot fitly be called by our name, because it is mortified already in some measure, and shall be fully abolished by the spirit of God; neither doth it live the same spiritual life with us, seeing it is not quickened by the same spirit: and therefore as those who have divers souls, which give unto them life and motion, are themselves divers and also called by divers names; so the new and old man living as it were by divers souls, the one being quickened with Gods spirit, the other by Satan (whereof it cometh to pass, that the more the one liveth the other dieth, the more strong the spirit is, the weaker is the flesh; and the actions of both are quite contrary) therefore they may fitly be called by divers names: neither can the actions of the flesh be ascribed to the spirit properly, seeing they are contrary the one to the other. For as if a science of a crab tree, and another of a pippin tree being grafted into the same stock do both bring forth their several fruits, the one crabs, the other pippins, it may fitly be said this tree bringeth forth either pippins or crabs, because they grow in the same stock; but yet it cannot be truly said that the crab tree science bringeth forth pippins, or the pippin science crabs: