A27014:319
Sacrilegious desertion of the holy ministry rebuked, and tolerated preaching of the gospel vindicated,…Sacrilegious desertion of the holy ministery rebuked, and tolerated preaching of the gospel vindicated,…
Sacrilegious desertion of the holy ministry rebuked, and tolerated preaching of the gospel vindicated, against the reasonings of a confident questionist, in a book called Toleration not abused; with counsel to the nonconformists, and petition to the pious conformists / by one that is consecrated to the sacred ministry, and is resolved not to be a deserter of it ...Sacrilegious desertion of the holy ministery rebuked, and tolerated preaching of the gospel vindicated, against the reasonings of a confident questionist, in a book called Toleration not abused; with counsil to the nonconformists, and petition to the pious conformists / by one that is consecrated to the sacred ministry, and is resolved not to be a deserter of it ...
London : s.n., 1672
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.
1. You are fallible; and the notice of a possible pernicious danger, should be received with self-suspicion and thanks.
2. And you should love them the better for their averseness to sin, though they should mistake the matter of it. A proud heart saith swellingly, Am I to be accounted herein a sinner? A humble person will say: Alas, I am too likely to mistake and sin: but if I do not, I will love, even a mistaken enemy of sin. And to deal faithfully with you, Had those honest Conformists of my acquaintance, but come first to the ablest dissenters, and impartially heard and weighed all that they had to say, and not secretly slipped into Conformity, as if they had bin afraid of hearing all, I should have bin the more offended with their Censurers. But God hateth sin, and so must all that truly love him. And they are our best friends that do most to preserve us from it. And they are our greatest enemies, that would flatter us into it. To Preach against sin, is your Ministerial Office: And if any man thinks that you make a solemn Covenant to sin, that you may have leave to preach against sin; Yea, that you deliberately commit a great one, that you may have leave to preach against a less in other men, this man deserveth to be heard though he mistake. At Death and Judgment, nothing in the world but sin will be your danger: Unjust censures will be none. If we ⟨p. 122⟩say nothing to you yet its easy to gather by the costly terms on which we avoid it, that we take conformity for a sin.
2. And you should love them the better for their aversness to sin, though they should mistake the matter of it. A proud heart saith swellingly, Am I to be accounted herein a sinner? A humble person will say: Alas, I am too likely to mistake and sin: but if I do not, I will love, even a mistaken enemy of sin. And to deal faithfully with you, Had those honest Conformists of my acquaintance, but come first to the ablest dissenters, and impartially heard and weighed all that they had to say, and not secretly slipt into Conformity, as if they had bin afraid of hearing all, I should have bin the more offended with their Censurers. But God hateth sin, and so must all that truely love him. And they are our best friends that do most to preserve us from it. And they are our greatest enemies, that would flatter us into it. To Preach against sin, is your Ministerial Office: And if any man thinks that you make a solemn Covenant to sin, that you may have leave to preach against sin; Yea, that you deliberately commit a great one, that you may have leave to preach against a less in other men, this man deserveth to be heard though he mistake. At Death and Judgment, nothing in the world but sin will be your danger: Unjust censures will be none. If we