A20762:1063
A guide to godliness or a Treatise of a Christian life showing the dutiesA guide to godlynesse or a Treatise of a Christian life shewing the duties
A guide to godliness or a Treatise of a Christian life showing the duties wherein it consisteth, the helps enabling & the reasons persuading unto it the impediments hindering the practise of it, and the best means to remove them whereunto are added divers prayers and a treatise of carnal security by John Douname Bachelor in Divinity and minister of Gods Word.A guide to godlynesse or a Treatise of a Christian life shewing the duties wherein it consisteth, the helpes inabling & the reasons parswading vnto it ye impediments hindering ye practise of it, and the best meanes to remoue them whereunto are added diuers prayers and a treatise of carnall securitie by Iohn Douname Batcheler in Diuinitie and minister of Gods Word.
London: printed by Felix Kingstone and William Stansby for Ed, 1622
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. 2 That we must spend our solitary hours in good exercises, shunning vain thoughts and entertaining Christian meditations.
§. Sect. 2 That we must spend our solitary houres in good exercises, shunning vaine thoughts and intertaining Christian meditations.
And as our care must be, that we be not idle, so much more that we do not spend our solitary hours in doing that which is ill, the which notwithstanding inseparably accompanieth the other. For no sooner do we cease to do good, but we begin to do evil; no sooner do we leave the Oar, as we are rowing towards the haven of rest, but the wind and tide of our corruption carrieth us down the stream towards the dead sea of ⟨p. 298⟩death and destruction. And therefore if we would not be drawn unto ill, we must still be employed in good exercises; keeping always a narrow watch over our minds, hearts, and actions, that on the one side they be not overtaken with any evil, nor prostituted unto any sin; and on the other side, that they be wholly taken up and exercised in all Christian and holy duties. First, above all observations we must look to our deceitful minds and hearts, that they be not stolen from us by the subtlety of the devil when we are alone; and that they do not (as naturally they are apt) wander in this solitariness, and go astray from the way of Gods commandments, and so losing themselves (like Lambs in the Desert) in the by-ways of sin, become an easy prey to the ravening Wolfe. In which regard we must keep a careful watch over our minds and cogitations, that they do not take their liberty when we are alone, to rove and range after worldly vanities, the pleasures of sin, and things that being utterly unprofitable do us no good, though we spend many hours in thinking on them. For what sin and pity is it, that such excellent faculties of the soul, the mind, imagination, and discourse of reason, should be so vainly employed, either about things evil and hurtful, or fruitless and impertinent, that if, after much time thus spent, we should call our selves to account, and say; Soul, what good hast thou reaped by so many hours study and Meditation, either for the subduing of thy corruption, or thine enriching with grace, and enabling unto any holy duty; either for thy better securing from sin and death, or further assurance of life and happiness; it would be stricken dumb, and not able to answer any word?