The saints dignity and duty· Together with the danger of ignorance and hardness. /…The saints dignitie and dutie· Together with the danger of ignorance and hardnesse. /…

But you will say to me (I will conclude in a word or two) How shall a man come to bow his neck, and take up the yoke of Christ? Here is all the labour, my brethren, and if we could once obtain this, the business would be done. God is not less merciful then he was, the Word is not less powerful then it was; but these hearts of ours are stubborn and loth to yield to the truth. Labour therefore for this, and have all. But what course shall we take to compass this?

But you will say to me (I will conclude in a word or two) How shall a man come to bow his neck, and take up the yoke of Christ? Here is all the labour, my brethren, and if we could once obtain this, the businesse would be done. God is not lesse mercifull then he was, the Word is not lesse powerfull then it was; but these hearts of ours are stubborn and loth to yeeld to the truth. Labour therefore for this, and have all. But what course shall we take to compasse this?

In a word, the means that I would suggest for the present are these.

First, labour to work upon thy own soul a kind of reasonable contentedness, to part with that beloved corruption that lieth in thy bosom. I do not say thou canst do it, but I say labour to bring thy heart to a reasonable kind of contentedness this way. For my brethren, here is all the quarrel between you and the Minister of God, it all lieth here, the Lord saith, thou must forsake thy sins, or else I must damn thy soul. For we come for souls when we come to preach, we do not come here only to spend an hour, and so an end of the matter: No, but we see a poor company of creatures in the Congregation, and we know that many among them are yet hardened and blinded, and going headlong to perdition, it is now our labour and care to prevent your ruin, and therefore many a prayer we put up, and many a tear we shed on your behalf. Oh suffer your Minister therefore, because he desireth and studieth your good, he sees you walking in a way in which you must needs perish, and therefore he draweth the sword of the word of God against you; Oh stoop to the word of God revealed. Here now I say is all the quarrel, the Minister saith, you must leave your sins, the soul saith, I will not, I will have those fins, and I will practise those courses, and therefore thou stomachest the Minister, and thy heart works against the Word of God. Alas, Why do you contend against him, and murmur against him, we seek not our selves but you, nor do we aim at our own ends, but at the salvation of your precious souls, and notwithstanding all your oppositions, here is