A77608:365
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.
Sixthly, That Knowledge that accompanies ⟨p. 348⟩salvation, is, Soul-abasing, soul-humbling knowledge, it makes a man very, very little, and low in his own eyes, as you may see in the most knowing Apostle, Ephes. 3. 8. Unto me, 1who am less then the least of all Saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles, the unsearchable riches of Christ. Pauls great light makes him very little; though he was the greatest Apostle, yet he looks upon himself, a• less then the least of all Saints. Of all the Evangelists, John was most sharp-sighted,2 most Eagle-eyed, he had the clearest sight of Christ, he lay most in the bosom of Christ, he knew most of the mind of Christ, he had the fullest manifestations, and revelations of Christ; and yet, O how little, how low is John in his own eyes. John 1. 26, 27. John answered them, saying, I baptize with water, but there standeth one among you, whom ye know not: He it is, who coming after me, is preferred before me, whose shoes latchet I am not worthy to unloose. In this phrase, John alludes to the custom of the Hebrews, those among them which were more noble then others, had ⟨p. 349⟩Boys who carried their shoes, and untied them when they laid them by. O, says John, I am a poor weak, worthless Creature, I am not worthy to be admitted to the meanest, to the lowest service under Christ, I am not worthy to carry his shoes, to unloose his shoes. After Peter had been in the Mount, and instructed and enlightened by Christ, he cries out, Depart from me, O Lord, for I am a sinful man. ([Greek or Hebrew].) A man, a sinner, a very mixture, and compound of dirt and sin, of vileness, and baseness; as you may see in comparing Matth. 17. 1, 2, 3, 4. with Luke 5. 8. Abraham under