A39695:271
The touchstone of sincerity, or, The signs of grace and symptoms of hypocrisy opened…The touchstone of sincerity, or, The signs of grace and symptomes of hypocrisie opened…
The touchstone of sincerity, or, The signs of grace and symptoms of hypocrisy opened in a practical treatise upon Revelations III 17, 18 being the second part of the Saint indeed / by John Flavell ...The touchstone of sincerity, or, The signs of grace and symptomes of hypocrisie opened in a practical treatise upon Revelations III 17, 18 being the second part of the Saint indeed / by John Flavell ...
London: printed for Tho. Parkhurst, 1698
Title page typeset from the transcription.
THE Touchstone of Sincerity: OR, THE SIGNS Of GRACE, AND Symptoms o… › Chapter 5 › Section 3
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.
I do not say that an upright man cannot commit a moral evil, to escape a penal evil. O that daily observation did not too plentifully furnish us with sad instances of that kind! but upright ones do not, dare not upon a serious deliberate discussion and debate choose sin rather than affliction; what they may do upon surprisals, and in the violence of temptation is of another nature.
I do not say that an upright man cannot commit a moral evil, to escape a poenal evil. O that daily observation did not too plentifully furnish us with sad instances of that kind! but upright ones do not, dare not upon a serious deliberate discussion and debate chuse sin rather than affliction; what they may do upon surprisals, and in the violence of temptation is of another nature.
But a false and unsound heart discovers it self in the choice it makes upon deliberation, and that frequently, when sin and trouble come in competition: put case, saith Augustine, a Ruffian should with one hand set the cup of drunkenness to thy mouth, & with the other a dagger to thy breast; and say, drink or die: thou shouldst rather choose to die sober, than to live a drunkard: and many Christians ⟨p. 75⟩have resisted unto blood striving against sin, and with renowned Moses chosen affliction, the worst of afflictions; yea death it self in the most formidable appearance, rather than sin: and it is the habitual temper and resolution of every gracious heart so to do, tho' those holy resolutions are sometimes over-born by violence of temptation.
But a false and unsound heart discovers it self in the choice it makes upon deliberation, and that frequently, when sin and trouble come in competition: put case, saith Augustine, a Ruffian should with one hand set the cup of drunkenness to thy mouth, & with the other a dagger to thy breast; and say, drink or die: thou shouldst rather chuse to die sober, than to live a drunkard: and many Christians ⟨p. 75⟩