A66106:222
Mercy magnified on a penitent prodigal, or, A brief discourse
Mercy magnified on a penitent prodigal, or, A brief discourse wherein Christs parable of the lost son found is opened and applied as it was delivered in sundry sermons / by Samuel Willard ...
printed by Samuel Green for Samuel Philips, 1684
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
Answ. It is the first legal work that is usually wrought in a sinner, making him to apprehend his present state of perdition, notwithstanding all that is either in himself, or in the world. It is, though not the full of a lost estate, yet leading to it, or a step towards it. In the Description observe,
1. I call it a legal work; now Divines are wont to call those works legal.
1. Which are usually wrought by the application of the Law, in which is the curse, and by which is the knowledge of sin, Rom. 7. 8. Misery ariseth out of the curse, and the curse comes upon the breach of the Law, Gal. 3. 12. The Law therefore firstly discovers it.
2. Which are common works, and not in themselves saving; and so the word legal is often used in Divinity, of which nature is this before us: Conviction of misery may befall hypocrites,