A27017:265
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.
SECT. III.1
- 1§ 3.
Thirdly.8 The third comfortable Attribute of this Rest is, That it is the Saints prop and peculiar possession. It belongs to no other of all the sons of men; not that it would have detracted from the greatness or freeness of the gift, if God had so pleased, that all the world should have enjoyed it: But when God hath resolved otherwise, that it must be enjoyed but by few; to find our names among that number, must needs make us the more to value our enjoyment. If all Egypt had been light, the Israelites should not have had the less; but yet to enjoy that light alone, while their neighbours live in thick darkness, must make them more sensible of their privilege. Distinguishing, separating Mercy, affecteth more then any Mercy. If it should rain on our grounds alone; or the Sun shine upon our alone habitations; or the blessing of Heaven divide between our flocks, and other mens, as between Jacobs and Labans; we should more feelingly acknowledge Mercy, then now, while we possess the same in common. Ordinariness dulleth our sense; and if Miracles were common, they would be slighted. If Pharaoh had passed as safely as Israel, the Red Sea would have been less remembered. If the first-born of Egypt had not been slain, the first-born of Israel had not been the Lords peculiar. If the rest of the World had not been drowned, and the rest of Sodom and Gomorrah burned, the saving of Noah had been no wonder, nor Lots deliverance so much talked of. The lower the weighty end of the balance descends, the higher is the other lifted up; and the falling of one of the sails of the Wind-Mill, is the occasion of the rising of the other. It would be no extenuation of the Mercies of the Saints here; if all the world were as holy as they, and the communication of their Happiness is their greatest desire; yet it might perhaps dull their thankfulness, and differencing grace would not be known. But when one shall be enlightened, and another left in darkness; one reformed, and another by his lusts enslaved; it makes them cry out with the Disciple,