A96093:139
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.
The Reasons are:
1. Till we are poor in spirit, we are not capable of receiving Reason 1 grace; he who is swelled with an opinion of self-excellency and self-sufficiency, is not fit for Christ; he is full already; intus existens prohibet extraneum; if the hand be full of pebbles, it cannot receive gold; the glass is first emptied before you pour in wine; God doth first empty a man of himself, before he pours in the precious wine of his grace; none but the poor in spirit are within Christs Commission. Isa. 61.1. The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me; he hath sent me to bind up the broken-hearted; that is, such as are broken in the sense of their unworthiness.
1. Till we are poor in spirit, we are not capable of receiving Reason 1 grace; he who is swell'd with an opinion of self-excellency and self-sufficiency, is not fit for Christ; he is full already; intus existens prohibet extraneum; if the hand be full of pebbles, it cannot receive gold; the glass is first emptied before you poure in wine; God doth first empty a man of himself, before he poures in the precious wine of his grace; none but the poor in spirit are within Christs Commission. Isa. 61.1. The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me; he hath sent me to bind up the broken-hearted; that is, such as are broken in the sense of their unworthiness.
2. Till we are poor in spirit, Christ is never precious; Reason 2 before we see our own wants, we never see Christs worth; poverty of spirit, is sal & condimentum, the sauce which makes Christ relish sweet to the soul; mercy is most welcome to the poor in spirit; he who sees himself clad in filthy rags,