N00302:661
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.
5. Be content with the portion of mercy that you enjoy: It it pride that acknowledgeth not God in what we have, because we want our wills in something that God denies us: An humble soul is content with any thing: though he be poor, despised, afflicted, yet that he lives, hath any health, strength, &c. sets him down quiet: Learn to be humble, and that will teach you to close with all God's dispensations.
2. Carry humbly towards men: As true apprehension of our own vileness will make us little in our own eyes. Hence,
1. Beware of despising any, we mistake, if we think it an effect of true grace to carry it contemptuously to any: Are they unworthy? so are you, Are they Prodigals? so you have been.
2. Think better of others than your selves, Phil. 2. 3. He that sees himself vile, will think these cannot be worse than I, it may be they are better, it may be they have better moral excellencies; or have never finned so fearfully, so scandalously and against such means as I.