N00302:395
Mercy magnified on a penitent prodigal, or A brief discourse, wherein Christs parable of…
Mercy magnified on a penitent prodigal, or A brief discourse, wherein Christs parable of the lost son found, is opened and applied, as it was delivered in sundry sermons, / by Samuel Willard teacher of a church in Boston in New-England. ; [Two lines from Luke]
printed by Samuel Green for Samuel Philips, 1684
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
1. The act it self is a deliberate pondering in the mind: called Communing with the heart, Psal 4. 4. The mind of man is naturally roving, consideration fixeth it; it is compared to chewing the cud, wherein the food is turned over and over: It is a looking upon, and into a thing with diligent inspection, it is called, a laying a thing to heart, Isa. 42. 25. which is a close and serious minding and weighing it.
2. The matter which it is conversant about, is such things as nearly concern us: It is every ones work to look to the concerns of his own ⟨p. 160⟩soul; if thou be wise, be wise for thy self. Our conversion is not advanced in being busy in other mens matters, but in our own, thy ways, and thy doings, is that which the Scripture directs us to be thinking of.
2. The matter which it is conversant about, is such things as nearly concern us: It is every ones work to look to the concerns of his own ⟨p. 160⟩soul; if thou be wise, be wise for thy self. Our conversion is not advanced in being busy in other mens matters, but in our own, thy wayes, and thy doings, is that which the Scripture directs us to be thinking of.
3. That which gives weight to these things within us, is that we give credit to them; If we do not believe the things, they will be of no moment in our consideration; many a man hears weighty and seasonable truths spoken in the ordinances, but he believes them not, and so rejecteth them: Truth must be believed before it can be improved: Hence that Psal 106. 24. They despised the pleasant land: they believed not his word.