A77618:349
The silent soul, with sovereign antidotes against the most miserable exigentsThe silent soul, with soveraign antidotes against the most miserable exigents
The silent soul, with sovereign antidotes against the most miserable exigents: or, A Christian with an olive-leaf in his mouth, when he is under the greatest afflictions, the sharpest and sorest trials and troubles, the saddest and darkest providences and changes, with answers to divers questions and objections that are of greatest importance, all tending to win and work souls to be still, quiet, calm and silent under all changes that have, or may pass upon them in this world, &c. / By Thomas Brooks preacher of the Word at Margarets New Fish-street London, and pastor of the Church of Christ meeting there.The silent soul, with soveraign antidotes against the most miserable exigents: or, A Christian with an olive-leaf in his mouth, when he is under the greatest afflictions, the sharpest and sorest trials and troubles, the saddest and darkest providences and changes, with answers to divers questions and objections that are of greatest importance, all tending to win and work souls to bee still, quiet, calm and silent under all changes that have, or may pass upon them in this world, &c. / By Thomas Brooks preacher of the Word at Margarets New Fish-street London, and pastor of the Church of Christ meeting there.
London: printed by R.I. for John Hancock, 1660
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.
Quest. But what are the reasons that God doth so delay and put off his people from time to time as we see he doth?
Quest. But what are the reasons that God doth so delay and put off his people from time to time as wee see hee doth?
Answ. First, For the trial of his people, and for the differencing1 and distinguishing of them from others. As the furnace tries gold, so delays will try what metal a Christian is made of; delays will try both the truth and the strength of a Christians graces; delays are a Christian-touchstone, a lapis Lydius, that will try what metal men are made of, whether they be gold or dross, silver or tin; whether they be sincere or unsound, whether they be real or rotten Christians. As a Father by crossing and delaying his children tries their dispositions, and makes a full discovery ⟨p. 334⟩of them, so that he can say, that child is of a muttering and grumbling disposition, and that is of an humorous and wayward disposition, but the rest are of a meek, sweet, humble and gentle disposition: So the Lord by delaying and crossing of his children, he discovers their different dispositions. The manner of the Psylli, 2(which are a kind of people of that temper and constitution that no venom will hurt them) is, that if they suspect any child to be none of their own, they set an Adder upon it to sting it, and if it cry, and the flesh swell, they cast it away as a spurious issue, but if i• do not cry, if it do not so much as quatch, nor do not grow the worse for it, then they account it for their own, and make very much of it: So the Lord by delays, which are as the stinging of the Adder, tries his children; if they patiently, quietly and sweetly can bear them, then the Lord will own them, and make much of ⟨p. 335⟩