A39695:588
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.
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.
Rule 3.
A stronger propension in our Nature, and more frequent incidence in our practice to one sin than another; doth not presently infer our hypocrisy, and the unsoundness of our hearts in Religion. 'Tis true, every Hypocrite hath some way of wickedness: Some peccatum in deliciis, iniquity that he delights in, and rolls as a sweet morsel under his tongue; some lust that he is not willing to part with, nor ⟨p. 183⟩can endure that the knife of mortification should touch it, and this undoubtedly argues the insincerity and rottenness of his heart: and it is true also, that the nature and constitution of the most sanctified man inclines him rather to one sin than to another, though he allow himself in none; yea, though he set himself more watchfully against that sin than another, yet he may still have more trouble and vexation, more temptation and defilement from it than any other.
A stronger propension in our Nature, and more frequent incidence in our practice to one sin than another; doth not presently infer our hypocrisie, and the unsoundness of our hearts in Religion. 'Tis true, every Hypocrite hath some way of wickedness: Some peccatum in deliciis, iniquity that he delights in, and rolls as a sweet morsel under his tongue; some lust that he is not willing to part with, nor ⟨p. 183⟩can endure that the knife of mortification should touch it, and this undoubtedly argues the insincerity and rottenness of his heart: and it is true also, that the nature and constitution of the most sanctified man inclines him rather to one sin than to another, though he allow himself in none; yea, though he set himself more watchfully against that sin than another, yet he may still have more trouble and vexation, more temptation and defilement from it than any other.