A30122:394
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.
Thirdly; In choosing Men to rule (if you would endeavour to keep the Unity of the Spirit, and the Bond of Peace thereby) be careful you choose Men of peaceable Dispositions. That which hath much annoyed the Peace of Churches, hath been the froward and perverse Spirits of the Rulers thereof: Solomon therefore adviseth, That with a furious Man we should not go, lest we learn his Ways, and get a Snare to our Souls, Prov. 22. 24, 25. and with the Froward we learn frowardness. How do some Mens words eat like a Canker; who instead of lifting up their Voice like a Trumpet, to sound a Parley for Peace, ⟨p. 51⟩have rather sounded an Alarm to War and Contention. If ever we would live in Peace, let's reverence the Feet of them that bring the glad-Tidings of it.
Thirdly; In chusing Men to rule (if you would endeavour to keep the Unity of the Spirit, and the Bond of Peace thereby) be careful you chuse Men of peaceable Dispositions. That which hath much annoyed the Peace of Churches, hath been the froward and perverse Spirits of the Rulers thereof: Solomon therefore adviseth, That with a furious Man we should not go, lest we learn his Ways, and get a Snare to our Souls, Prov. 22. 24, 25. and with the Froward we learn frowardness. How do some Mens words eat like a Canker; who instead of lifting up their Voice like a Trumpet, to sound a Parley for Peace, ⟨p. 51⟩have rather sounded an Alarum to War and Contention. If ever we would live in Peace, let's reverence the Feet of them that bring the glad-Tidings of it.
O how have some Men made it their Business to preach Contentions, and upon their entertainment of every novel Opinion, to preach Separation! How hath God's Word been stretched and torn, to furnish these Men with Arguments to tear Churches! Have not our Ears heard those Texts, that saith, Come out from among them, and be separate, &c. and, withdraw from every Brother that walks disorderly? I say, have we not heard these Texts, that were written to prevent Disorder, brought to countenance the greatest Disorder that ever was in the Church of God, even Schism and Division? whereas one of these Exhortations was written to the Church of Corinth, to separate themselves from the Idol's Temple, and the Idol's Table, in which many of them lived in the participation of, notwithstanding their profession of the True God; as appears