A61391:172
The husbandmans calling showing the excellencies, temptations, graces, duties &c. of the Christian husbandmanThe husbandmans calling shewing the excellencies, temptations, graces, duties &c. of the Christian husbandman
The husbandmans calling showing the excellencies, temptations, graces, duties &c. of the Christian husbandman : being the substance of XII sermons preached to a country congregation / by Richard Steele.The husbandmans calling shewing the excellencies, temptations, graces, duties &c. of the Christian husbandman : being the substance of XII sermons preached to a country congregation / by Richard Steele.
London: printed by M.S., 1668
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.
SECT. 1.
The First Temptation of the Husbandman 1is, Earthly-mindedness. The Earth is his Element, therein is his business, and there he is in danger to lose his heart, as it is said John 3. 31. He that is of the Earth is earthly, and speaketh of the Earth. The Husbandman is sprung as it were out of the Earth, and the frame of his heart is prone to be earthly, and his words are much of the same subject. As it is impossible to behold the Heavens above us with one Eye, and Earth under our feet with the other; so it is a very hard business, to have the Eye of the Soul upward, and the Eye of the Body, downward at the same time. •e World looks little when one is in Heaven a great way off it; but while on it, it looks ⟨p. 60⟩vast and great. On a Mountain, whole Fields at a distance look no bigger than a leaf of this book; but he that is at them finds them bigger. And a small Hat held near our Eye, will hinder our sight of the Sun, more than a great Mountain at a distance. O Sirs, the Husbandman is near the Earth, and it looks great in his eye, and endangers to fill the heart and all; it swallows up his heart, and devours his time, and dulls his spirits; he is ready to account these things the greatest things, because they are next him, and he lives in them and upon them; he looks on his money, and sees more beauty in it, than in the Sun that shines; and the face upon his Silver, he thinks the beautifullest face in the world: The lowing of his Cattle, is better Music to him, than the best Music, and a good Crop more welcome (suppose him yet without an Eye of Faith) than all the Promises in the Bible. Psal. 17. 14. Deliver me from men of this world, which have their Portion in this life, and whose belly thou fillest with hidden treasures. When the Belly is full of the hid treasures of the Earth, the Heart is often empty of the hidden treasures of Heaven. Described again,