A26921:779
Richard Baxter's dying thoughts upon Phil. I, 23 written for his own life and…
Richard Baxter's dying thoughts upon Phil. I, 23 written for his own life and the latter times of his corporal pains and weakness.
London: printed by Tho. Snowden for B. Simmons, 1683
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Appendix › The Reasons and Helps of my Belief and Hope of this Perfection.
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.
II. Reason assureth me that all men are bound by Nature to prefer the least probability of a Life of Everlasting Joy, before all the Prosperity of this World; and to suffer the loss of all this short Vanity, to escape the least possibility of endless misery: And Nature hath such notices of Rewards and Punishments after Death, that no Man can say that he is sure there is no such thing. From whence it followeth that all men are bound by the very Law of Nature to be Religious, and to seek first and most their Salvation in the Life to come. And if so, It's certain that there is such a thing to be obtained: Else God had made the very Nature of Man to be deceived by itself, and to spend the chief part, yea all his life, through labour and suffering for that which is not; and so made his greatest duty to be his greatest deceit and misery: And the worst men should be least deceived. But all this is not to be imputed to our wise and good Creator.
III. The universal sense of Moral Good and Evil in all Mankind, is a great evidence of another life. The vilest Atheist cannot abide to be accounted a Knave, a Liar, a bad Man; nor will equal a vicious Servant with another. All would be thought good who will not be good. And doth not God make a greater difference than Man? And will he not show it?
III. The universal sense of Moral Good and Evil in all Mankind, is a great evidence of another life. The vilest Atheist cannot abide to be accounted a Knave, a Lyer, a bad Man; nor will equal a vicious Servant with another. All would be thought good who will not be good. And doth not God make a greater difference than Man? And will he not shew it?
IV. The World is actually ruled much by the hopes and fears of another life, and cannot well be ruled without it, according to the Nature of Man: But the Almighty, most Wise and most Holy God, needs not, and will not rule the World by mere deceit.