A94156:591
The Christian-man's calling: or, A treatise of making religion ones business. Wherein the nature…
The Christian-man's calling: or, A treatise of making religion ones business. Wherein the nature and necessity of it is discovered. : As also the Christian directed how he may perform it in [brace] religious duties, natural actions, his particular vocation, his family directions, and his own recreations. / By George Swinnock ...
London: printed for T.P., 1662
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.
Consider therefore what thou dost, when thou goest unpreparedly to the Lords Table; Thou art guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. Simple murder is a crying sin: The voice of thy Brothers blood crieth to me from the earth, Gen. 4.10. It is one of those sins which will give God no rest, till he take vengeance on the actor and author of it, and is therefore called a crying sin. The light of Nature taught the Barbarians, that Vengeance would not suffer a murderer to live, Acts 28.4. The Scripture acquainteth us, that no satisfaction shall be taken for the life of a murderer; for blood defileth the land, Numb. 35.31, 36. But the murder of a Superior is a far greater sin. Cicero telleth ⟨p. 260⟩us, He that killeth his Father, committeth many sins in one; he killeth him that begot him, and brought him up; he sinneth against many obligations. To kill a King is High-Treason: Who can stretch his hand against the Lords Anointed, and be guiltless? 1 Sam. 26.9. But what is it to murder the Son of God? no tongue can tell, no pen can write the horrid, heinous nature of Christ-murder. He is thy everlasting Father. It made a dumb child speak to see another stabbing his Father; and wilt thou imbrue thine own hands in thy Fathers blood? Jesus Christ is thy King, and wilt thou stretch forth thy hands against thy Head, thy Sovereign? Had Zimri peace, who slew his Master? Nay, Jesus Christ is thy Redeemer; and wilt thou put him to death, who is the Author of thy life? He gave thee thy being; and wouldst thou deprive him of his being? He is the only Physician that can cure thee; and wilt thou kill him? Once more, Jesus Christ is God, and wilt thou lift up thy hand (I would say a thought) against the blessed God? God deserveth infinitely more love then thou canst possibly give; and shall thine heart be so full of hatred, as to let fly against the God of Heaven? Oh! say with David, (when Abishai persuaded him to slay Saul) The Lord forbid that I should stretch forth my hand against the Lords anointed. When Satan, or thy own heart, would persuade thee to be slight in the examination of thy self, and formal in thy humiliation for sin, that thou mightest be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord, let Conscience cry out, God forbid that I should stretch out my