N00802:1434
The truly blessed man
The truly blessed man: or, The way to be happy here, and for ever: being the substance of divers sermons preached on, Psalm XXXII. / By Samuel Willard, teacher of a church in Boston. N.E. ; [Five lines from Isaiah]
printed by B. Green for Michael Perry, 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.
Untractableness under the means, is a note of great brutishness, and want of understanding. Such are here compared with the horse and mule, which in order to their breaking must be treated after a sensible manner: and the reason of it is rendered, because they have no understanding. q. d. if they had, they would not need to be thus treated. What this untractableness is, hath been handled under the •ormer Doctrine; the brutishness and unreasonableness of it now comes under consideration. That […] reason why men refuse Gods instructions, is because they are unreasonable, and act like brutes, ⟨p. 468⟩is asserted in the word of God; on this account it is that wicked men are there branded with the ti•le of Fools; for sin is the worst •olly: they then that will not part with it, are egregious fools. God chargeth his people, because refractory, for being sottish and void of understanding, Jer. 4.22. Compares them to a mad horse in a fight, Chap. 8.6 The wise man puts the Horse, and A•s, and Fool together, Prov. 26.3. Yea they are represented as worse then mere sensitive Creatures, Isa. 1.3 Jer. 8.7. That which lieth before us, is to enquire after the ground or evidence of this. Ungodly men think themselves most rational, to be more prudent for themselves, than the Children of God. Here then these things may be offered for Demonstration.
UNtractableness under the means, is a note of great brutishness, and want of understanding. Such are here compared with the horse and mule, which in order to their breaking must be treated after a sensible manner: and the reason of it is rendered, because they have no understanding. q. d. if they had, they would not need to be thus treated. What this untractableness is, hath been handled under the •ormer Doctrine; the brutishness and unreasonaleness of it now comes under consideration. That reason why men refuse Gods instructions, is ecause they are unreasonable, and act like bruits,