A29686:99
A cabinet of choice jewels, or, A box of precious ointment being a plain…A cabinet of choice jevvels, or, A box of precious ointment being a plain…
A cabinet of choice jewels, or, A box of precious ointment being a plain discovery of, or, what men are worth for eternity, and how 'tis like to go with them in another world ... / by Thomas Brooks ...A cabinet of choice jevvels, or, A box of precious ointment being a plain discovery of, or, what men are worth for eternity, and how 'tis like to go with them in another world ... / by Thomas Brooks ...
London : Printed and are to be sold by John Hancock ..., 1669
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.
The third Maxim or Consideration.
Thirdly, consider, In propounding of evidences for men to try their spiritual and eternal estates by, there are two special Rules for ever to be minded and remembered, and the first is this, That he that propounds evidences of grace, which are only proper to eminent Christians, as belonging to all true Christians, he will certainly grieve and sad those precious Lambs of Christ that he would not have grieved and sadded. Look, as there is a strong faith, and a weak faith,1 so there are evidences that are proper to a strong faith, and evidences that are proper to a weak faith: Now, he that cannot find in himself the evidences of a strong faith, he must not conclude that he has no faith; for he may have in him the evidences of a weak faith, when he has not the evidences of a strong faith in him; in Christ's School, House, Church, there are several sorts and ranks of Christians, as babes, children, young men, and old men; and accordingly, Ministers in their preaching and writing, should sort their evidences, that so babes and children may not be found bleeding, grieving and weeping, when they should be sound joying and rejoicing. Secondly, no man must make such characters, marks or evidences of a child of God, which may be found in an hypocrite, a Formalist, &c. for this were to lay a stumbling block before the blind, this were to delude poor souls,2 and to make them glad whom God would not have made glad; yea, this is the high-way, the ready way, to make them miserable in both worlds. The rule or evidence that every Christian is to measure himself by, must be neither too long nor too short, but adequate to the state of a Christian; that is, it must not be so long on the one hand, as that all Christians cannot reach it, nor yet so short on the other hand, as that it will not reach a true Christian; but the rule or evidence must be such as will suit and fit every sincere believer, and none else: Some Christians are apt to judge of themselves, and to try themselves, by such rules ⟨p. 7⟩