N00526:49
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 2: The Second 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.
Secondly, Gospel Services cannot be attended by an Unregenerate Man. We are told, That the Kingdom of God, is Righteousness, and Peace, and Joy in the Holy Ghost; but without Regeneration there is no Attaining of them. There is a certain Homage which we are to pay unto our Great King; but the Unregenerate Man being of, The Brutish among the People, does labour under an utter and a mortal Incapacity to render that, Reasonable Service. Thus 'tis said, in Rom. 8.8. They that are in the Flesh cannot please God. The man is told, and warned, and charged from time to time about, The Thing that Good is; but he can Do nothing! He can yield unto God, no Worship that is Right for the Matter ▪ the Manner, and the Motive of it. He cannot Serve God Spiritually ▪ for he is all Flesh; and his very Soul within him, is as One of the Ancients has it, after a sort Incarnated: he may too truly say, The Law is Spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under Sin! When he pretends to wait upon God, it is with an Application of his whole Soul: every Sacrifice that he brings has the Ill Omen of being, without an Heart; he may say, I Lift up my Eyes, my Hands, my Voice! but he cannot say with the Psalmist, Lord, I Lift my Soul unto thee; nor, Serve the Lord, O my Soul, and all that is within me! ⟨p. 30⟩Nor can he Serve God Sincerely; for he was conceived with what i• contrary to, Tr•th in the Inward Parts; and it is nothing but Fear of some Temporal Inconvenience, or Pride of being Applauded among men, that makes him do what he does. 'Tis only Self, that Clay•••ol, Self, which puts this Pharisee upon Shows of Piety or Charity; and God is not before him. It was said, in Joh. 4.24. They that Worship God must Worship him in Spirit and in Truth. But what a vain Worship then, is that of the Unregenerate! Useless Wretch, what is he good for?
Secondly, Gospel Services cannot be attended by an Unregenerate Man. We are told, That the Kingdom of God, is Righteousness, and Peace, and Joy in the Holy Ghost; but without Regeneration there is no Attaining of them. There is a certain Homage which we are to pay unto our Great King; but the Unregenerate Man being of, The Bruitish among the People, does labour under an utter and a mortal Incapacit to render that, Reasonable Service. Thus 'tis said, in