The sound believer, or, A treatise of evangelical conversion discovering the work of Christs…The sound beleever, or, A treatise of evangelicall conversion discovering the work of Christs…

I do not mean by this, as if all men had the like measure of sorrow; but a great sorrow it is in all. Every child is delivered by some throws; those that stick long in the birth may feel them longer and very many. Nor yet do I press a necessity of tears, or violent and tumultuous complaints; the deepest sorrows run with least noise. If a man can have tears for outward losses, and none for sins, tis very suspicious whether he was ever truly sorrowful for sin; Otherwise as the greatest joys are not alway expressed in ⟨p. 80⟩laughter, so the greatest sorrows are not alway expressed in shedding of tears; what the measure of this great sorrow is, we shall hear hereafter.

I doe not meane by this, as if all men had the like measure of sorrow; but a great sorrow it is in all. Every child is delivered by some throwes; those that stick long in the birth may feele them longer and very many. Nor yet doe I presse a necessity of teares, or violent and tumultuous complaints; the deepest sorrowes run with least noyse. If a man can have teares for outward losses, and none for sins, tis very suspitious whether he was ever truly sorrowfull for sinne; Otherwise as the greatest joyes are not alway exprest in ⟨p. 80⟩laughter, so the greatest sorrowes are not alway exprest in shedding of teares; what the measure of this great sorrow is, we shall heare hereafter.

Thirdly, it is a constant mourning, for so it is here called, a spirit of heaviness; as that woman that had a spirit of infirmity, and was bowed down many years: Hannah constantly troubled, is called a woman of a sorrowful spirit, 1 Sam. 1.12.15. As the spirit of pride and whoredom, Hos. 4.12. •is a constant frame, where though the acts be sometime suspended, yet the spirit remains; so a spirit of mourning, is such sorrow, as though the acts of mourning be sometime hindered, yet the spirit and spring remains; Hypocrites will mourn under sin and misery, but what is it?