A62053:496
The sinners last sentence to eternal punishment, for sins of omission
The sinners last sentence to eternal punishment, for sins of omission wherein is discovered, the nature, causes, and cure of those sins / by Geo. Swinnock.
London: printed for Geo. Swinnock, 1675
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Chapter 41: The grand cause of sins of Omission. An unregenerate heart, with the cure of it; a rene…
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.
The Cure of this, Reader, must be (if thou art not born again) to get a new heart. An old heart will never serve for, or enable unto the acts of new Obedience. The water will rise no higher than the Fountain head a whence it floweth. If you would have a Clock to move regularly, and the hand without to go true, you must have the wheels and poises right within. A good temperament of Body may cause a propensity to some things that are honest; but that excellency must be of little worth, that hath its Original from mans basest part, (as those materials are me••, which arise out of the potentiality of the matter,) and truly that honesty deserves not the name of Virtue, being not quickened with the command of Reason. An exact Constitution may help a man to be mild, meek, courteous, modest, shame-faced; but these cannot be adopted into the Family of goodness, because here, as they say, in the motion of the Serpent, the tail leads the way to the Head; the Body rules and governs the Soul, and the mans perfection is from his meanest and worst part. Besides, ⟨p. 373⟩the cause of all this seeming-virtue is mutable and mortal. Age, or Sickness, or change of Air, or of Condition, may alter a mans good nature; and then where is his Religion? Truly, as a Comet, it came without giving notice, and goeth away without giving warning. The Cause being taken away, the Effect ceaseth.
The Cure of this, Reader, must be (if thou art not born again) to get a new heart. An old heart will never serve for, or enable unto the acts of new Obedience. The water will rise no higher than the Fountain head a whence it floweth. If you would have a Clock to move regularly, and the hand without to go true, you must have the wheels and poizes right within. A good temperament of Body may cause a propensity to some things that are honest; but that excellency must be of little worth, that hath its Original from mans basest part, (as those materials are me••, which arise out of the potentiality of the matter,) and truly that honesty deserves not the name of Virtue, being not quickened with the command of Reason. An exact Constitution may help a man to be mild, meek, courteous, modest, shame-faced; but these cannot be adopted into the Family of goodness, because here, as they say, in the motion of the Serpent, the tayl leads the way to the Head; the Body rules and governs the Soul, and the mans perfection is from his meanest and worst part. Besides,