A77608:254
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.
But you may say to me, O! we would Quest. fain have our bosom sins subdued, we desire above all that they may be effectually mortified; these sons of Zerviah we would have slain to choose: But what course must we take to bring under our darling sins, to get off our Golden Fetters, to get out of these Silken Snares? To this Question I shall give these Answers.
But you may say to me, O! we would Quest. fain have our bosom sins subdued, we desire above all that they may be effectually mortified; these sons of Zerviah we would have slain to chuse: But what course must we take to bring under our darling sins, to get off our Golden Fetters, to get out of these Silken Snares? To this Question I shall give these Answers.
First, If ever thou wouldst have1 mastery over this, or that bosom sin, then engage all thy power and might against thy bosom sin, draw up thy spiritual forces, and engage them wholly against the sin that doth so easily beset thee. As the King of Syria said to his Captains, Fight neither ⟨p. 219⟩2with small nor great, save only with the King of Israel: So I say, your wisdom, and your work, O doubting souls, lieth not in skirmishing with this, or that sin, but in coming up to a close sharp fight with the King of Israel, with that darling sin that hath a Kingly interest in you, and a Kingly power over you. Constantine the Great his Symbol was (Immedicabile vulnus ense rescindendum est) when there is no hope of curing, men must fall a cutting. Believe it souls, you must fall a cutting your bosom sins in pieces by the Sword of the Spirit, as Samuel cut Agag in3 pieces in Gilgal before the Lord, or else you will never obtain a perfect cure. Slight skirmishes will not do it, you must pursue your bosom sins to the death, or they will be the death of your souls.