A96093:107
The beatitudes
The beatitudes: or A discourse upon part of Christs famous Sermon on the Mount. Whereunto is added Christs various fullness. The preciousness of the soul. The souls malady and cure. The beauty of grace. The spiritual watch. The heavenly race. The sacred anchor. The trees of righteousness. The perfume of love. The good practitioner. By Thomas Watson, minister of the word at Stephens Walbrook in the city of London.The beatitudes: or A discourse upon part of Christs famous Sermon on the Mount. Wherunto is added Christs various fulnesse. The preciousnesse of the soul. The souls malady and cure. The beauty of grace. The spiritual watch. The heavenly race. The sacred anchor. The trees of righteousnesse. The perfume of love. The good practitioner. By Thomas Watson, minister of the word at Stephens Walbrook in the city of London.
London: printed for Ralph Smith, 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.
Ans. 1. In that they are enriched with heavenly blessings, Ephes. 1.3. They are [Greek or Hebrew], partakers of the Divine nature, 2 Pet. 1.4. not by an incorporation into the Divine essence, but by a transformation into the Divine likeness. This is beatitudo inchoata, blessedness begun; as the new-borne babe is said to have life in it aswell as he who is fully grown: So the Saints who are partakers of the Divine nature, have an inchoative blessedness, though they have not arrived yet at perfection. Believers have Semen manens, The seed of God in them, 1 John 3.9. And this is a seed of blessedness. The Flower of glory grows out of the seed of grace; grace and glory differ, not in kind, but degree, the one is the root, the other the fruit; grace is glory in the dawning; and glory grace in the meridian; and in this sense that assertion of Austin is true, Beati sumus fide, & spe; grace is the first link of the chain of blessedness; now he that hath the first link of the chain in his hand, hath the whole chain. The Saints have the Spirit of God in them, 2 Tim. 1.14. The Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us. How can the blessed Spirit be in a man and he not blessed? a godly mans heart is a Paradise, planted with the choicest fruit, and God himself walks in the midst of this Paradise, and must he not needs be blessed?
Ans. 1. In that they are enriched with heavenly blessings, Ephes. 1.3. They are 〈non-Latin alphabet〉, partakers of the Divine nature, 2 Pet. 1.4. not by an incorporation into the Divine essence, but by a transformation into the Divine likenesse. This is beatitudo inchoata, blessednesse begun; as the new-borne babe is said to have life in it aswell as he who is fully grown: So the Saints who are partakers of the Divine nature, have an inchoative blessednesse, though they have not arrived yet at perfection. Believers have Semen manens, The seed of God in them,