A51842:687
One Hundred and Ninety Sermons on Psalm 119
One hundred and ninety sermons on the hundred and nineteenth Psalm preached by the late reverend and learned Thomas Manton, D.D. ; with a perfect alphabetical table directing to the principal matters contained therein.
London: printed for T.P. &c, 1681
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.
1. In both the notion by which the word of God is expressed and diversified, Precepts, Ways. The word precepts implieth Gods Authority, by which the counsels of the word are ratified. Ways implieth a certain direction for our walk to heaven. There are Gods ways to us declared in his Promises; so it is said Psal. 25. 10. All the paths of God are mercy and truth. Our ways to God, ver. 4. of that Psalm. Show me thy ways, teach me thy paths. These are his precepts.
1. In both the notion by which the word of God is expressed and diversified, Precepts, Ways. The word precepts implieth Gods Authority, by which the counsels of the word are ratified. Ways implieth a certain direction for our walk to heaven. There are Gods ways to us declared in his Promises; so it is said Psal. 25. 10. All the paths of God are mercy and truth. Our ways to God, ver. 4. of that Psalm. Shew me thy ways, teach me thy paths. These are his precepts.
2. Observe, the one is the fruit of the other: I will meditate; and then, I will have respect. Meditation is in order to practice; and if it be right, it will beget a respect to the ways of God. We do not meditate, that we may rest in contemplation, but in order to obedience. Joshua 1. 8. Thou shalt meditate in the book of the law day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein. So Phil. 4. 8, 9. Think of these things, do these things. [Greek or Hebrew], when you cast up your accounts, and consider what God hath required of you, it is that you may set upon the work. Meditation is not a flourishing of the wit, that we may please the fancy by playing with divine truths: (Sense is diseased, that must be fed with quails) but a serious inculcation of them upon the heart, that we may urge it to practice. Nor yet an acquainting our selves with the word, that we may speak of it in company: Conference is for others, Meditation for our selves when we are alone. Words are but the female issue of our thoughts, works the male. Nor merely to store our selves with curious notions, and subtle inquiries; study searcheth out a truth, but Meditation improveth it for practical use: it is better to be sincere than subtle.