A27017:2064
The Saints' Everlasting Rest
The saints everlasting rest, or, A treatise of the blessed state of the saints in their enjoyment of God in glory wherein is showed its excellency and certainty, the misery of those that lose it, the way to attain it, and assurance of it, and how to live in the continual delightful forecasts of it and now published by Richard Baxter ...The saints everlasting rest, or, A treatise of the blessed state of the saints in their enjoyment of God in glory wherein is shewed its excellency and certainty, the misery of those that lose it, the way to attain it, and assurance of it, and how to live in the continual delightful forecasts of it and now published by Richard Baxter ...
London: printed by Rob. White for Thomas Underhil and Francis Tyton, 1650
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.
But, ah my Lord, thy feast is nothing to me without an appetite: Thou must give me a stomach as well as meat. Thou hast set the dainties of heaven before me, but alas, I am blind, and cannot see them; I am sick, and cannot relish them; I am so benumbed, that I cannot put forth a hand to take them. What is the glory of Sun and Moon to a clod of earth? Thou knowest I need thy subjective grace, as well as thine objective, and that thy works upon mine own distempered soul, is not the smallest part of my salvation. I therefore humbly beg this grace, that as thou hast opened heaven unto me in thy blessed word, so thou wouldest open mine eyes to see it, and my heart to affect it: else heaven will be no heaven to me. Awake therefore O thou Spirit of Life, and breath upon thy Graces in me; blow upon the garden of my heart, that the spices thereof may flow out; Let my beloved come into his garden and eat his pleasant fruits (Cant. 4.16.) And take me by the hand, and lift me up from earth to thy self, […] I may fetch one walk in the garden of glory, and see by Faith what thou hast laid up for them that love thee and wait for thee.
But, ah my Lord, thy feast is nothing to me without an appetite: Thou must give me a stomack as well as meat. Thou hast set the dainties of heaven before me, but alas, I am blinde, and cannot see them; I am sick, and cannot relish them; I am so benummed, that I cannot put forth a hand to take them. What is the glory of Sun and Moon to a clod of earth? Thou knowest I need thy subjective grace, as well as thine objective, and that thy works upon mine own distempered soul, is not the smallest part of my salvation. I therefore humbly beg this grace, that as thou hast opened heaven unto me in thy blessed word, so thou wouldest open mine eyes to see it, and my heart to affect it: else heaven will be no heaven to me. Awake therefore O thou Spirit of Life, and breath upon thy Graces in me; blow upon the garden of my heart, that the spices thereof may flow out; Let my beloved come into his garden and eat his pleasant fruits (Cant. 4.16.) And take me by the hand, and lift me up from earth to thy self, 〈…〉 I may fetch one walk in the garden of glory, and see by Faith what thou hast laid up for them that love thee and wait for thee.