N00526:29
Unum necessarium awakenings for the unregenerate. Or, The nature and necessity of regeneration. Handled…
Unum necessarium awakenings for the unregenerate. Or, The nature and necessity of regeneration. Handled in a discourse designed for the service of any that may be thereby assisted in the grand concern of conversion unto God; but especially the rising generation. : With an addition of some other sermons relating to that important subject. / By Cotton Mather. ; [Five lines from Ezekiel]
Boston printed: printed by B.H. i.e for Duncan Campbell, 1693
Title page typeset from the transcription.
AWAKENINGS FOR THE UNREGENERATE. › Proposition 1: The First PROPOSITION.
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.
First, It is a REAL Change, that the Regenerate Man has passed upon him. 'Tis not merely a Relative Change; and so the Change in Regeneration differs from that in Justification. In one there is a Change of Estate, in t'other a change of Temper. In that, the Guilt of Sin is Blotted out; in this, the the Filth of Sin is washed away. That is a Sentence on the Sinner; like that in 2 Sam. ⟨p. 9⟩12.13. The Lord hath put away thy sin, thou shalt not die. This is a Filling of the Sinner; as we may read, Eph. 2.1. You hath he filled, who were Dead in Trespasses and Sins. Nor is it merely a Nominal or a Notional Change: 'tis no Brain-sick Imagination. We have one picture of this Change drawn from Inanimate Things; in Isa. 55.13. Instead of the Thorn, shall come up the Fir tree, and instead of the Briar, shall come up the Myrtle-tree. We have another shadow of this Change, fetched from Animate Things; in Isa. 11.6. The Wolf shall dwell with the Lamb, and the Leopard shall lye down with the Kid. In Regeneration thus it is; the man varies from what once he was, as much as a Fir from a Thorn, as much as a Lamb from a Wolf! Thus, One of the Primitive Christians, after his Conversion, being met by an Idolater of his old Acquaintance, had that Salutation from him, Ego Sum, Sir, 'tis I? whereupon he Replied, At Ego non sum Ego; But Sir, 'Tis not I; I am not the man I was. We may therefore add,
First, It is a REAL Change, that the Regenerate Man has pass'd upon him. 'Tis not meerly a Relative Change; and so the Change in Regeneration differs from that in Justification. In one there is a Change of Estate, in t'other a change of Temper. In that, the Guilt of Sin is Blotted out; in this, the the Filth of Sin is wash'd away. That is a Sentence on the Sinner; like that in 2 Sam. ⟨p. 9⟩