A30587:442
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.
CHAP. XIV.
Dividing Distempers, the lusts of mens hearts.
These divide us not only from God, but from one another.1 This I learn, says Luther, from mine own experience, that I have more cause to fear what is within me, then what is without. What ever others do to divide us would prevail little, were it not for the lusts of our hearts within. Vapours that are got within the earth, are the cause of all earthquakes, they rend and tear: the winds, storms, and tempests without never move it. Ill humours within the body, disturb more then the air without. James 4. 1. Whence are wars and fighting amongst you? are they not hence, even from your lusts? Whence come they? The answer is soon made, Do you not see plainly that they came from your lusts? Yet were this Question put to some of us, Whence are all our divisions? Some would answer, Such kind of men are the cause of them, and others would answer, Nay but such men cause them. We all put off the cause of our divisions from our selves; few would give ⟨p. 103⟩Saint James his answer, They are from hence, even from our lusts. There would not be such evil distillations from the head, if it were not for the malignant vapours that arise from the stomach. The curing the heart will sooner cure the head, then the curing the head will cure the heart:
THese divide us not onely from God, but from one another.1 This I learne, sayes Luther, from mine owne experience, that I have more cause to feare what is within me, then what is without. What ever others do to divide us would prevail little, were it not for the lusts of our hearts within. Vapours that are got within the earth, are the cause of all earthquakes, they rend and tear: the winds, storms, and tempests without never move it. Ill humours within the body, disturb more then the ayre without.