A30587:1032
Irenicum, to the lovers of truth and peace heart-divisions opened in the causes and…
Irenicum, to the lovers of truth and peace heart-divisions opened in the causes and evils of them : with cautions that we may not be hurt by them, and endeavours to heal them / by Jeremiah Burroughs.Irenicum, to the lovers of truth and peace heart-divisions opened in the causes and evils of them : with cautions that we may not be hurt by them, and endeavours to heal them / by Jeremiah Burroughes.
London: printed for Robert Dawlman, 1653
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 sixth.
Consider when any thing falls out that occasions strife, it may be this is but for a trial, this is a temptation.
Consider when any thing falls out that occasions strife, it may be this is but for a triall, this is a temptation.
When men provoke us we are ready to fly upon them, looking no further then the men with whom we are displeased. But if you look a little further, perhaps you may see the Devil is on the other side of the hedge, and hath been the chief agent in this business. Augustine presseth this by a most excellent similitude. When a Fowler, saith he, hath set his net to catch Birds, he sets it at a distance from the hedge, and when he has done he takes stones and throws at the hedge, upon this the Birds fly out, and flutter about. The Fowler does not intend any hurt to the hedge, neither does he think to hit any Birds with his stones, but that which is in his eye is the net on the other side of the hedge, he hopes to drive the Birds in there. So says he, the Devil prepares his net to catch men in, he raises up contentions, and causes much trouble to be in Churches, and among brethren, you think all the evil is in the trouble of your present contentions. Oh no: the Devil is behind, he intends to bring some of you into some great sin by these; he hath set his net for you, when you are troubled and vexed by such contentions, the Devil sees you fit for a temptation, now I hope I shall get him to do such and such things, which otherwise I could never have got him to. Oh that we had hearts when we find contentions stirring to consider, But is there not a temptation in them?