The real Christian, or, A treatise of effectual calling wherein the work of God…

First Position. The work of the Spirit in Conviction is not in general, that the person is a sinner.

First Position. The work of the Spirit in Conviction is not ingeneral, that the person is a sinner.

Those who are not Atheists in judgment (whether there be any such is much questioned, and denied, though those whom Voetius mentions, and our times, ¹would make one conclude there are many such) in whom the sparks of natural light are not quite extinct, and live under the ⟨p. 46⟩preaching of the Word, and hear others say they are sinners, are content to acknowledge themselves sinners; And who is not? This is no matter of shame, being every bodies case, they are but as their neighbours; they seem then to be convinced of sin; but if you come to ask these persons, of what particular sin are they guilty? they know not one. If you say this is not possible: Yes, I have found it in my own observation, amongst those who have offered themselves to the Lords Supper, when I have examined them, about the sense of their own sinful condition, fearing lest they had no more then this general notion (conviction I cannot call it) that they (as all else) are sinners; I have asked them, what particular sin they have been guilty of, not that I desired to know their sins, I told them, but only to know, whether there were any more then this general notion they had taken up, that all are sinners. Hence they reported, I brought up Auricular Confession: But this I found, not one particular sin could they give an account of: I went over the ten Commandments, and told them how I was guilty, to see if by this means I could convince them of any particular sin; but when I had done all, I could not hear of any one sin they were guilty of. The same a neighbour Minister, eminent in Gods work, found in a woman, who came to him, seeming to be under great horror of Conscience, the woman cried out so loud, that he desired her to restrain her self. But what is the matter: Oh she is a sinner; and this was all for a good space of time he could get from her, she was a sinner: He then asked her what sin she was guilty of? No particular sin he could get from her: He then went over the ten Commandments, and told her how he was guilty; but when he had so done, there was not one she was guilty of, for he asked her in particular. I doubt not but there are many thousands more of this stamp, if we did but search into ignorant families, especially among women, whom modesty, or rather the restraining Providence of God, hath kept in from breaking forth into open and gross vices.