A29703:589
The privy key of heaven, or, Twenty arguments for closet-prayer in a select discourse…The privie key of heaven, or, Twenty arguments for closet-prayer in a select discourse…
The privy key of heaven, or, Twenty arguments for closet-prayer in a select discourse on that subject with the resolution of several considerable questions : the main objections also against closet-prayer are here answered ... with twenty special lessons ... that we are to learn by that severe rod, the pestilence that now rageth in the midst of us / by Thomas Brooks.The privie key of heaven, or, Twenty arguments for closet-prayer in a select discourse on that subject with the resolution of several considerable questions : the main objections also against closet-prayer are here answered ... with twenty special lessons ... that we are to learn by that severe rod, the pestilence that now rageth in the midst of us / by Thomas Brooks.
London : Printed for and are to be sold by John Hancock, 1665
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.
In the Law of Moses the Priest was commanded to wash the inwards and the feet of the Sacrifices in water, and this was done, saith Philo, not without a mystery, to teach us to keep our hearts and affections clean when we draw nigh to God. In all your Closet-duties God looks first and most to your hearts, My Son 1give me thy heart. It is not a piece, it is not a corner of the heart, that will satisfy the maker of the heart; the ⟨p. 326⟩heart is a treasure, a bed of spices, a royal throne wherein he delights. God looks not at the clegancy of your prayers, to see how neat they are; nor yet at the Geometry of your prayers, to see how long they are; nor yet at the Arithmetic of your prayers, to see how many they are; nor yet at the Music of your prayers, nor yet at the sweetness of your voice, nor yet at the Logic of your prayers; but at the sincerity of your prayers, how hearty they are. There is no prayer acknowledged, approved, accepted, recorded, or rewarded by God, but that wherein the heart is sincerely and wholly. The true mother would not have the 2child divided. As God loves a broken and a contrite heart, so he loathes a divided heart. God neither loves halting nor halving, he will be served truly and totally. The Royal Law is, Thou shalt love and serve the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy soul. Among the Heathens, when the ⟨p. 327⟩beasts were cut up for sacrifice, the first thing the Priest looked upon 3was the heart, and if the heart was naught, the sacrifice was rejected. Verily, God rejects all those services and sacrifices, wherein the heart is not, as you may see by comparing the Scriptures in the margin together. Prayer without the heart is but as sounding brass or a tinkling Cymbal. Prayer is only lovely and weighty, as the heart is in it, and no otherwise. It is not the lifting up of the voice, nor the wringing of the hands, nor the beating of the breasts, nor an affected tone, nor studied notions, nor seraphical expressions, but the stirrings of the heart, that God looks at in prayer. God hears no more than the heart speaks: if the heart be dumb. God will certainly be deaf; no prayer takes with God, but that which is the travel of the heart.