A30122:269
The barren fig tree, or, The doom and downfall of the fruitless professor showing…The barren fig tree, or, The doom and downfall of the fruitless professor shewing…
The barren fig tree, or, The doom and downfall of the fruitless professor showing that the day of grace may be past with him long before his life is ended : the signs also by which such miserable mortals may be known / by John Bunyan ; to which is added his Exhortation to peace and unity among all that fear God.The barren fig tree, or, The doom and downfall of the fruitless professor shewing that the day of grace may be past with him long before his life is ended : the signs also by which such miserable mortals may be known / by John Bunyan ; to which is added his Exhortation to peace and unity among all that fear God.
London: printed for J. Robinson, 1688
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.
4. These Men may go whither they will, do what they will, they may range from Opinion to Opinion, from Notion to Notion, from Sect to Sect, but are steadfast no where, they are left to their own Uncertainties: they have not Grace to establish their Hearts, and though some of them have boasted themselves of this Liberty, yet Jude calls them wandering Stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever, Jude 13. They are left, as I told you before, to be Fugitives and Vagabonds in the Earth, to wander every where, but to abide no where, until they shall descend to their own place, (Acts 1. 5.) with Cain and Judas, Men of the same fate with themselves.
4. These Men may go whither they will, do what they will, they may range from Opinion to Opinion, from Notion to Notion, from Sect to Sect, but are stedfast no where, they are left to their own Uncertainties: they have not Grace to establish their Hearts, and though some of them have boasted themselves of this Liberty, yet Jude calls them wandering Stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever, Jude 13. They are left, as I told you before, to be Fugitives and Vagabonds in the Earth, to wander every where, but to abide no where, until they shall descend to their own place, (Acts 1. 5.) with Cain and Judas, Men of the same fate with themselves.
A Third Sign that such a Professor is quite past Grace, is, When his heart is grown so hard, so stony and impenetrable, that nothing will pierce it. Barren ⟨p. 104⟩Fig-tree, dost thou consider? A hard and impenitent Heart is the Curse of God. A Heart that cannot repent, is instead of all Plagues at once; And hence it is that God said of Pharaoh,