Seasonable truths in evil-times in several sermons / lately preached in and about London

Object. I but you will say to me, Then am I afraid that I never had any truth of grace, because I do not find that I do grow in grace: where there is truth, there will be growth, and there will be increasing: but as for me, I do not find any such growth and increase, and therefore I fear that I never had grace at all.

Object. I but you will say to me, Then am I afraid that I never had any truth of grace, because I do not finde that I do grow in grace: where there is truth, there will be growth, and there will be increasing: but as for me, I do not finde any such growth and increase, and therefore I fear that I never had grace at all.

Answ. For answer: As a man may have grace and not know it, so he may have grace and not perceive it: his earnest desire of having more and more still, makes him forget what he hath.

The more grace one hath, the more he doth see sin; and the more a man sees his sin, the more his own grace will be hidden from his own eyes. Godly men do oftentimes measure themselves by Metaphors; as sometimes we that are Preachers of the Word, we fall upon a Scripture-metaphor, as where Christ is called a sun, a shield, or bread; and we run the Metaphor off its legs, further then the Holy-ghost did intend: so sometimes we do. So it is with Christians too; they fall upon a Scripture-metaphor, and they run it and themselves off their legs, beyond what the Holy-ghost doth intend. For example, increase of grace in Scripture-phrase is called a growth: now because a Christian cannot find his own spiritual increase answerable to all outward growth, therefore he thinks that he doth not increase in grace: whereas there is a great deal of difference between a spiritual increase, and an outward growth, in many things: As now, a mans body grows, but all the parts of his body do not grow out of his head; but now in our spiritual growth it is so, as you read in