N00800:82
The peril of the times displayed. Or The danger of mens taking up with…
The peril of the times displayed. Or The danger of mens taking up with a form of godliness, but denying the power of it. Being the substance of several sermons preached: / by Samuel Willard, teacher of a church in Boston. N.E. ; [One line from Augustine in Latin]
Boston: printed by B. Green, 1700
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. Those that are truly Godly will be exposed to grievous persecution. It hath been a thing of frequent observation, that such as have spent the heat of their zeal upon forms, have been most virulent against them that have been careful to ⟨p. 58⟩maintain the power of Godliness. Christ himself had no such furious Persecutors as were the Scribes & Pharisees; these also were they who most bitterly prosecuted his Apostles; Paul tells us what a formalist he had been, and how he had employed the zeal of it, Gal 1.13, 14. beyond measure I Persecuted the Church of God and wasted it; being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers: and if men deny the power of Godliness in them selves, they will not be able patiently to bear it in others: and by this means Apostasy grows to that pass, that it will not be safe for any to stand up for real Holiness, as the Prophet complains of those times, Isa. 59 15. truth faileth, and he that departeth from evil maketh himself a prey. Hence it cometh to pass, that if any will be more strict than his neighbours, in the leading of a Godly life among men, and be a Nonconformist to the licentiousness of the times and places that he liveth in, he shall be revi•ed for it, jeered at by his neighbours, censured for an Hypocri•e, and ridiculed for a tender Conscience; and ⟨p. 59⟩men would further show their […] them, if it were in the power of their hands. This we have the Psalmist making a bitter complaint about, Psal. 69.9, &c. the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up, and the reproaches of them that reproached thee, are fallen upon me: which he proceeds to show in divers particulars: and tongue persecution is not a little mischievous, especially when it proceeds from those who pretend to Christianity.
5. Those that are truly Godly will be exposed to grievous persecution. It hath been a thing of frequent observation, that such as have spent the heat of their zeal upon forms, have been most virulent against them that have been careful to ⟨p. 58⟩