A26906:1015
The cure of church-divisions, or, Directions for weak Christians to keep them from being…
The cure of church-divisions, or, Directions for weak Christians to keep them from being dividers or troublers of the church with some directions to the pastors how to deal with such Christians / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for Nevil Symmons, 1670
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.
GOD who is One, hath made the creatures MANY and divers: And the further they go from Him, the more they run into multiplicity and diversity: It is admirable in Nature to see that among the millions of persons in the world, there are no two that differ not sufficiently to be discernible from each other: And among the brutes and inanimates it is so too: Among horses and oxen and sheep and all creatures, yea though non ovum ov• similius be a proverb, yet there are no two that do not differ: No nor among the millions of stones which lye scattered over the surface ⟨p. 349⟩of the earth. There are no two persons in all the world, who are just of the same intellectual complexion and degree, nor no two who are in all things of the same opinions or apprehensions: No nor any one man who is in all things long of the same apprehensions and opinions with himself: Nor is there any man whose thoughts and affections do perfectly consent with themselves in matter and order, any two hours in all his life. And if multiplicity and diversity have so much cause in nature, how much more must needs be added by the common corruption and pravity of nature? When all mankind hath so much ignorance of the mysteries of Religion, and so many degrees of enmity and unsuitableness to holy things, a great difference of judgement is an unavoidable consequent of this.
GOD who is One, hath made the creatures MANY and divers: And the further they go from Him, the more they run into multiplicity and diversity: It is admirable in Nature to see that among the millions of persons in the world, there are no two that differ not sufficiently to be discernable from each other: And among the bruits and inanimates it is so too: Among horses and oxen and sheep and all creatures, yea though non ovum ov• similius be a proverb, yet there are no two that do not differ: No nor among the millions of stones which lye scattered over the surface ⟨p. 349⟩of the earth. There are no two persons in all the world, who are just of the same intellectual complexion and degree, nor no two who are in all things of the same opinions or apprehensions: No nor any one man who is in all things long of the same apprehensions and opinions with himself: Nor is there any man whose thoughts and affections do perfectly consent with themselves in matter and order, any two hours in all his life. And if multiplicity and diversity have so much cause in nature, how much more must needs be added by the common corruption and pravity of nature? When all mankind hath so much ignorance of the mysteries of Religion, and so many degrees of enmity and unsuitableness to holy things, a great difference of judgement is an unavoidable consequent of this.