A27016:729
A saint or a brute the certain necessity and excellency of holiness, &c. ...…
A saint or a brute the certain necessity and excellency of holiness, &c. ... / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed by R.W. for Francis Tyton, 1662
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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. The Principle of true Honesty is the high esteem of God and everlasting life, in our understandings, and the belief of Gods revelations necessary to the attaining of that life, and the prevailing Love of God in the heart, and the Love of man for his sake. Without these Principles of Honesty, no man can be Honest. How can he be an Honest man that Believeth not his maker? He that taketh God for a liar, hath no reason to be taken for any better himself. For would he be thought better then he takes God himself to be? nor can he in reason be expected to believe any man else: For none can be better then God. And is that an honest man that professeth himself a Liar, and taketh all men to be so too?
1. The Principle of true Honesty is the high esteem of God and everlasting life, in our undestandings, and the belief of Gods revelations necessary to the attaining of that life, and the prevailing Love of God in the heart, and the Love of man for his sake. Without these Principles of Honesty, no man can be Honest. How can he be an Honest man that Believeth not his maker? He that taketh God for a lyer, hath no reason to be taken for any better himself. For would he be thought better then he takes God himself to be? nor can he in reason be expected to believe any man else: For none can be better then God. And is that an honest man that professeth himself a Lyer, and taketh all men to be so too?
And how can that be an Honest man, that Loveth not Go• well as his fleshly lusts and pleasures? And this is the case of all the wicked. If they did not Love their Riches and honour and sensual pleasures more then God, they would not keep them against his command, nor lose his favour rather then lose them, nor seek them more carefully then they seek him and his Kingdom, and think of them and speak of them with more delight. And certainly he that Loveth his Riches, or Honours, or filthy sins, better then God and Heaven it self, must needs be thought to prefer them before his nearest Friends, or the common good. And is that an Honest man that would rather cast off Father or Mother then cast off his filthy sins? and that would rather forsake his chiefest friend, then forsake his vices? and would sell