A20762:2356
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. 4 That he guideth and governeth the godly with his grace and holy Spirit: 1. In their prosperity.
§. Sect. 4 That he guideth and gouerneth the godly with his grace and holy Spirit: 1. In their prosperity.
The third privilege which the Lord vouchsafeth unto the godly, is, that he so guideth and governeth them by his grace and holy Spirit, that they make a right use of all estates, both of prosperity and adversity, and turn all things which happen unto them by the Divine providence, to their spiritual good, the enriching of their souls with all saving graces, and the furthering and assuring of their eternal salvation. For whereas wicked men, enjoying worldly prosperity, do stand in slippery places, their table becoming a snare unto them, and their honours, riches and pleasures, the baits of sin, which make them to fall into the devils nets of perdition (for their honours nourish and increase their ambition, their riches serve as sweet drinks, to make them thirst the more, and increase their swelling dropsy of covetous desires, their pleasures make them more sensual and voluptuous, and all together work in them pride, and forgetfulness of God, carnal self-love, and love of the world, affiance in earthly vanities, and contempt of spiritual and heavenly things) The Lord preserveth those that fear and serve him, from falling into these tentations, by moderating their desires, and mortifying their carnal concupiscence, so as they do not excessively affect these worldly vanities, nor dote upon them when they have them, but use them only as helps and comforts of their pilgrimage, and not set their hearts upon them as their Paradise, and the rewards of their Country, because they know them to be vain and uncertain, both in their getting and keeping; momentany and mutable, being every day ready to leave us, or we them. Their honours do not puff them up in pride, but make them the more humble, seeing they possess them not as their own proprieties, but as Gods Talent, whereof one day they must give a reckoning; as we see in the example of David, who though he were advanced from a low estate to a Kingdom, yet professeth, that his heart was not haughty, nor his eyes