N00766:142
The everlasting Gospel. The Gospel of justification by the righteousness of God; as 'tis…
The everlasting Gospel. The Gospel of justification by the righteousness of God; as 'tis held and preached in the churches of New-England: expressed in a brief discourse on that important article; made at Boston in the year, 1699. / By Cotton Mather. ; And, asserted with the attestations, of several Reverend and eminent persons, now most considerable in those churches.The everlasting Gospel. The Gospel of justification by the righteousness of God; as 'tis held and preach'd in the churches of New-England: expressed in a brief discourse on that important article; made at Boston in the year, 1699. / By Cotton Mather. ; And, asserted with the attestations, of several Reverend and eminent persons, now most considerable in those churches.
Boston: printed by B. Green for Nicholas Buttolph, 1700
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.
First. Despise, and ••nounce, all your own Despicable Righteousness. The Best Things that ever you did, What are they? There's Badness enough in them, to make you Ashamed of them. Said they of old, in Isa. 64.6. All our Righteousnesses are as Filthy Rugs; Even like the Nasty Plasters, that are laid upon loathsome▪ Ulcers ▪ ⟨p. 49⟩Art thou willing to appear clothed with none but such Nasty Plasters? There are Blemishes enough, in the most Splendid of all our Duties, to Defile them, to Deform •hem, to render them very Faulty▪ The Holiest of men may say, as indeed some of them have with much Reflection said, I never did any Good work in all my Life, but the Lord showed me some Sinful circumstance attending of it ▪ Christian, There are Motes in thy brightest Sun-Beams; there are Spots in thy whitest Garments; there is a world of Dross and Alloy among thy finest Gold: If thou art a Christian, thou art sensible of it. Yea, and when we have with Tears bewailed our own Defects, we have cause to Cry out with him, of old, Lava meas Lacrymas, Lord, My Tears themselves want washing! We read of, The Iniquity of our Holy Things. When we have been waiting upon God, in our most Holy Things, we may after all say with that Perfect and Upright man▪ in Job 40 4▪ Behold, I am Vile! The Exceeding Broad Law of our God; Let us Consider that, and all our pretences to Perfection in the most glorious Action that ever we did, will all come to an End at once. Luther speaks of one who had Lived very Holily; which when some Applauded him for; True, said he, In your Eyes: But the Eyes of man are not like the Eyes of God! That man, who pretends to have answered the the Law of God in any One Action, is, to speak truly, An Ignorant and an Arrogant Fool. Man, Single out any One Action, even the most Exact, that ever thou didst, and if thou dare ⟨p. 50⟩