A44344:433
A comment upon Christ's last prayer in the seventeenth of John wherein is opened…
A comment upon Christ's last prayer in the seventeenth of John wherein is opened the union believers have with God and Christ, and the glorious privileges thereof ... / by that faithful and known servant of Christ, Mr. Thomas Hooker ... ; printed from the authors own papers written with his own hand, and attested to be such in an epistle by Thomas Goodwin and Philip Nigh.A comment upon Christ's last prayer in the seventeenth of John wherein is opened the union beleevers have with God and Christ, and the glorious priviledges thereof ... / by that faithful and known servant of Christ, Mr. Thomas Hooker ... ; printed from the authors own papers written with his own hand, and attested to be such in an epistle by Thomas Goodwin and Philip Nye.
London: printed by Peter Cole, 1656
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.
Nay though thy place and privileges be never so high and great, they indeed may be glorious, as having some impression of Gods power and authority painted upon them, but yet, if thy heart be void of Grace, and thy life of Holiness; Thou art wholly destitute of any true glory. Thy place and the impression of Gods power must be honoured in thee, bu• thy self art despicable and worthless, as that King Jehoram that died undesired. 2, Chro. 21.20.
Nay though thy place and priviledges be never so high and great, they indeed may be glorious, as having some impression of Gods power and authority painted upon them, but yet, if thy heart be void of Grace, and thy life of Holiness; Thou art wholly destitute of any true glory. Thy place and the impression of Gods power must be honoured in thee, bu• thy self art despicable and worthless, as that King Jehoram that died undefired. 2, Chro. 21.20.
2. We here see the ready way, and the Kings road in which we must walk, if we would be truly glorious in the eyes of wise, and in the account of our Saviour, that we may be sure to get such glory, as will go in Heaven. Be truly, savingly gracious: then art thou truly glorious in the account of the Almighty, and shalt be received into glory when this life shall not be. But they must be grace of ⟨p. 81⟩the right make, and true stamp, issuing from the glorious spirit of the Lord. Its not any of those counterfeits of morality & civility which carry a mere show of Godliness, without the power of it: nor yet the Gilt, (as I may so call it) of those higher Strokes of Illuminations, which appertains to Apostates, of whom the Apostle faith. That they tasted of the Heavenly gift and the good word of the Lord, and of the powers of the world to come: this is hansom gilt, and yet the heart base and lewd, therefore miserable; therefore I ad that which follows of the Apostle and ye should ad it also, We hope better things of you, and those that accompany Salvation, not gilt in appearance, but true Gold in the substance of it: not the ast of these, but the truth of these, something better than astonishing terrors, than fleshy and groundless enlightenings and raptures; better humiliations, better evidences, better and more real expressions of the power and conquering virtue of the saving work of God. The Church is said to be all glorious within