A26955:640
The mischiefs of self-ignorance and the benefits of self-acquaintance opened in divers sermons at…
The mischiefs of self-ignorance and the benefits of self-acquaintance opened in divers sermons at Dunstan's-West and published in answer to the accusations of some and the desires of others / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed by R. White for F. Tyton, 1662
THE Mischief of Self-ignorance, AND Benefit of Self-acquaintance. › Part
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.
Dir. 2. BE not unreasonably tender of a little disturbance at the present, nor unbelievingly careless of the misery to come. Cannot you endure to know your sin and misery, and yet can you endure to bear it? will you go to Hell for fear of ⟨p. 478⟩knowing that you are in the way? Must you not know it with everlasting woe and vengeance when you come thither, if by knowing your danger you prevent not your coming thither? Is it easier to bear Gods wrath for ever, than to find at present that you have offended him? Sirs, the question is whether you are under the condemnation of the law, or not? Whether you are regenerate and justified, or yet in your sin? If you are Justified, far be it from me to persuade you to think that you are under condemnation: I leave that to Satan and the malicious world, who are the condemners of those that Christ doth Justify. But if you are unregenerate and unjustified, what will you do at death and judgement? Can you stand before God, or be saved upon any other terms? You cannot; if God be to be believed, you cannot: and if you know the Scriptures, you know you cannot! And if you cannot be saved in an unrenewed unjustified state, is it not needful that you know it? Will you cry for help before you find your selves in danger? or strive to get out of sin and misery, before you believe that you are in it? If you think that you have no other sin than the pardoned infirmities of the Godly, you will ⟨p. 479⟩•ever so value Jesus Christ, and pray and ••rive for such grace as is necessary to them ••at have the unpardoned reigning sins of ••e ungodly. If it be necessary that you […] saved, it is necessary that you value and ••ek salvation; and if so, it is necessary at you know your need of it, and what ou must be and do if you will obtain it! […] is a childish or brutish thing, below a man of reason, to stick at a little present trouble, when Death cannot otherwise be prevented: If you can prove that ever any was converted and saved by any other way then by coming to the knowledge of their sin and misery, then you have some excuse for your presumption: