The Doctrine of Repentance

4. Repentance is necessary for civil ¹persons: these have no visible spots on them; they are free from gross sin, and one would think they were unconcerned in the business of Repentance^*. They are so good, that they scorn a Psalm of mercy. Indeed these are often in the worst condition: these are they who ^*need no Repentance, Luke 15. 7. Their civility undoes them; they make a Christ of it, and so on this shelf suffer shipwreck. Morality shoots short of Heaven; it is only nature refined. A moral man is but old Adam dressed in fine cloths. The Kings Image counterfeited and stamped upon Brass, will not go currant. The civil person seems to have the Image of God, but he is but brass metal, which will never pass for currant: Civility is insufficient to salvation: though the life be moralized, the lust may be unmortified. The heart may be full of pride and Atheism. Under the fair leaves of a tree there may be a worm. I say not, repent that you are civil, but that you are no more than civil. The house that was only swept and garnished, Satan entered into, ⟨p. 89⟩Luke 11. 26. This was the emblem of a moral man, who is swept by civility, and garnished with common gifts, but is not washed by true Repentance; the unclean spirit enters into such an one. If civility were sufficient to salvation, Christ needed not to have died. The Civilian hath a fair Lamp, but it wants the oil of grace.

4. Repentance is necessary for civil ¹persons: these have no visible spots on them; they are free from gross sin, and one would think they were unconcerned in the business of Repentance^*. They are so good, that they scorn a Psalm of mercy. Indeed these are often in the worst condition: these are they who