A saint or a brute the certain necessity and excellency of holiness, &c. ...…

5. The manner of our Holy Knowledge, maketh it more Delightful. 1: It is a Certain and Infallible Knowledge. It is not a [may be], or bare possibility: It is not, It is possible there may be a Heaven and Happiness hereafter: But it is as true as the Word of God is true: We have his own hand, and seal, and earnest for it: Even his precious promises, and oath, confirmed by miracles, and fulfilled-prophecy, and bearing his own image and superscription, and shining to us by its own light: We have in our hearts the spirit which is Gods earnest, by which we are sealed up to the day of our final full redemption. And if the soul yet stagger at the promise of God through the remnants of unbelief, that shall not make the promise of God of none effect; but his foundation shall still stand sure: His word shall not pass till all be fulfilled, though heaven and earth shall pass away. A message by one that were sent to us from the dead, were not more credible then the Word of God. And this Certainty of Holy Faith and Knowledge is a very great contentment to the soul. When the Glory of the Saints is a thing as sure as if we saw it with our eyes, and as sure as these things which we daily see; it is a great pleasure to the soul, when it can but apprehend this joyful Certainty.

2. And that there is a certain easiness and plainness in the great and necessary points of faith, as to the manner of Revelation, doth add much to Faith's, Satisfaction and Delight. The points that life and death lie on, are not left so obscure as might perplex us, lest we did not know the meaning of them. But they are so plain, that he that runs may read them; and the simple, that are but honest-hearted, may certainly understand them: Which quiets, and pleaseth, and satisfies the mind.

3. And yet there is an exciting Difficulty in many things that are offered to our Knowledge, which doth but make our holy studies the more delightful. If the Word of God were so plain and obvious to all, that it might be all understood at the first reading, the plainness would bring our Sacred Knowledge into contempt,