A96109:303
The saints delight. To which is annexed a treatise of meditation
The saints delight. To which is annexed a treatise of meditation. / By Thomas Watson, minister of Stephens Walbrook in the city of London. Imprimatur, Edm. Calamy.
London: printed by T.R. & E.M. for Ralph Smith, 1657
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Treatise › Chapter 15: Concerning the usefulness of meditation.
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.
2. Meditation doth make the heart serious and then it is ever best, Meditation doth ballast the heart; when the ship is ballasted it is not so soon overturned by the wind, and when the heart is ballasted with Meditation it is not so soon overturned with vanity. Some Christians have light hearts, Zeph. 3.4. his Prophets are light. A light Christian will be blown into any opinion or vice, you may blow a feather any way: there are many feathery Christians, the devil no sooner comes with a temptation but they are ready to take fire; now meditation makes the heart serious, and God saith of a serious, Christian as David of Goliaths sword, there is ⟨p. 237⟩none like that, give it me. Meditation consolidates a Christian; solid gold is best; the solid Christian is the only metal that will pass currant with God. The more serious the heart grows, the more spiritual, and the more spiritual the more it resembles the Father of Spirits. When a man is serious he is fittest for employment. The serious Christian is fittest for service, and it is meditation brings the heart into this blessed frame.
2. Meditation doth make the heart serious and then it is ever best, Meditation doth ballast the heart; when the ship is ballasted it is not so soon overturned by the wind, and when the heart is ballasted with Meditation it is not so soon overturned with vanity. Some Christians have light hearts, Zeph. 3.4. his Prophets are light. A light Christian will be blown into any opinion or vice, you may blow a feather any way: there are many feathery Christians, the divel no sooner comes with a temptation but they are ready to take fire; now meditation makes the heart serious, and God saith of a serious, Christian as David of Goliahs sword, there is ⟨p. 237⟩none like that, give it me. Meditation consolidates a Christian; solid gold is best; the solid Christian is the only metal that will pass currant with God. The more serious the heart grows, the more spiritual, and the more spiritual the more it resembles the Father of Spirits. When a man is serious he is fittest for imployment. The serious Christian is fittest for service, and it is meditation brings the heart into this blessed frame.