A77608:136
Heaven on Earth
Heaven on earth or a serious discourse touching a well-grounded assurance of mens everlasting happiness and blessedness. Discovering the nature of assurance, the possibility of attaining it, the causes, springs, and degrees of it, with the resolution of several weighty questions. By Thomas Brooks, preacher of the Gospel at Margarets Fishstreet-Hill.Heaven on earth or a serious discourse touching a wel-grounded assurance of mens everlasting happiness and blessedness. Discovering the nature of assurance, the possibility of attaining it, the causes, springs, and degrees of it, with the resolution of several weighty questions. By Thomas Brooks, preacher of the Gospel at Margarets Fishstreet-Hill.
London: printed by R.I. for John Hancock, 1654
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.
5 Again, a man may have true grace, and yet want assurance; and this may arise from that smoke and clouds, those fears and doubts that corruption raises in the soul; so that ⟨p. 61⟩the soul cannot see those excellent1 graces that otherwise might be discerned, though there may be many precious gems and jewels in the house, yet the smoke may hinder a man from seeing them sparkle and shine: So though there be many precious graces in the souls of Saints, yet corruption may raise such a dust, such a smoke in the soul, that the soul is not able to see them in the beauty and glory.2 The Well of water was near Hagar, but she saw it not till her eyes were opened by the Lord. So grace is near the soul, yea in the soul sometimes, and yet the soul doth not see it till God opens the3 eye and shows it. The Lord was in this 4place, said Jacob, and I knew it not; so many a precious soul may say, Grace was in my heart, and I knew it not, I saw it not. Blessed Bradford in one of his Epistles, saith thus, O Lord, methinks, I feel it so with me, sometimes as if there were no difference between my heart and the heart of the wicked; my mind is as blind as theirs, my spirit as stout, stubborn, and rebellious as theirs, and my thoughts as confused as theirs, and my affections as disordered as theirs, and ⟨p. 62⟩services as formal as theirs, &c. Ah, Christians, have not many of your souls found it so? Surely yes; no wonder then, that though you have grace, yet you have not seen it sparkling and shining in your souls, as some have thought that their fields have had no corn, because they have been so full of weeds, and that their heap hath no wheat, because nothing hath appeared but chaff, & that their pile hath no gold, because it hath been covered with much dross: So some have thought that their hearts have been void of grace, because they have been so full of5