Full and easy satisfaction which is the true and safe religion in a conference…Full and easie satisfaction which is the true and safe religion in a conference…

R. Alas poor man; You talk as if you knew not your self nor mankind! how bad a thing corrupt unsanctified nature is! Why do you not also ask, How cometh it to pass, that the far greatest part of the World (even five parts of six) are Heathens and Mohammedans! and that most of the World are wilful self-destroyers; many ruining their very bodies, Eating, and Drinking, and Whoring, and Idling them into Gout, Stone, Dropsies and an hundred Maladies: but far more ruining their souls. Why do you not also ask, How reasonable Creatures (of all Professions) are so worse than mad, as to sell their souls and everlasting hopes, for a dream and shadow, or for dirt and dung; even for a few Cups or Morsels, or merry hours, which they know are like the mirth of drunkenness, which is quickly gone, and ends in sickness and in shame! For a great Name, and a large attendance in their way to the grave! For the thoughts and breath of mortal man! And for that which all men first or last, are forced to call mere Vanity and Vexation! Were not men mad in sin, had they never heard a Preacher, the sight of a dead Carcass and a grave would do more to make them sober and considerate, than is done with most. When most of the World will obstinately follow the Devil their enemy, by known sin to everlasting misery, against all the commands, exhortations, promises, threatenings, mercies and warnings of God himself, and all the persuasions of their truest friends, What wonder if the same men can be Papists or any thing? But I will tell you some of the particular Causes. ⟨p. 171⟩I. Abroad in other Countries, there are all these Reasons easily discernible. 1. Who knoweth not how great an advantage Education hath, to form mens judgements to almost any thing, how bad soever? That which children receive, if it be not disagreeable to their sensible interest, how commonly and tenaciously do they follow? Whence is it that the whole Empires and Kingdoms of Pagans are all of one mind; and the Kingdoms of Mahometans of another? One Kingdom almost all Greek Christians and another Papists, and another Lutherans, and another Reformists, &c? Hath not education a great hand in this? 2. And the custom of the Country, and the company which they converse with, is of no small power with mens minds.

R. Alas poor man; You talk as if you knew not your self nor mankind! how bad a thing corrupt unsanctified nature is! Why do you not also ask, How cometh it to pass, that the far greatest part of the World (even five parts of six) are Heathens and Mahometanes! and that most of the World are wilful self-destroyers; many ruining their very bodies, Eating, and Drinking, and Whoreing, and Idling them into Gowt, Stone, Dropsies and an hundred Maladies: but far more ruining their souls. Why do you not also ask, How reasonable Creatures (of all Professions) are so worse than mad, as to sell their souls and everlasting hopes, for a dream and shadow, or for dirt and dung; even for a few Cups or Morsels, or merry hours, which they know are like the mirth of drunkenness, which is quickly gone, and ends in sickness and in shame! For a great Name, and a large attendance in their way to the grave! For the thoughts and breath of mortal man! And for that which all men first or last, are forced to call meer Vanity and Vexation! Were not men mad in sin, had they never heard a Preacher, the sight of a dead Carkass and a grave would do more to make them sober and considerate, than is done with most. When most of the World will obstinately follow the Devil their enemy, by known sin to everlasting misery, against all the commands, exhortations, promises, threatnings, mercies and warnings of God himself, and all the perswasions of their truest friends, What wonder if the same men can be Papists or any thing? But I will tell you some of the particular Causes.