N00802:1978
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.
3. To rejoice without this privilege, proceeds from the madness that is in mens hearts. The natural man labours of a spiritual frenzy, Eccles 9.3. And in nothing doth it more discover it self. We read of them that rejoice in a thing of nought, Amos 6 13. And if men are strangers to the joys of the people of God, they are things of no value which they take content in: there is enough to undermine and eat out all; for what can any thing else profit that man, who lies open every moment to Gods revenging Justice, from which these things cannot secure him.
3. To rejoyce without this priviledge, proceeds from the madness that is in mens hearts. The natural man labours of a spiritual frenzy, Eccles 9.3. And in nothing doth it more discover it self. We read of them that rejoyce in a thing of nought, Amos 6 13. And if men are strangers to the joyes of the people of God, they are things of no value which they take content in: there is enough to undermine and eat out all; for what can any thing else profit that man, who lies open every moment to Gods revenging Justice, from which these things cannot secure him.
4. Hence the Worldlings joy is a pitiful thing compared with this. Say there is something in it, tho' indeed it is but the hypocrisy of mirth; yet it cannot deserve to be named in the same day with that of Gods Children. The one is only from Gods patience and common goodness, the other from his love in Christ; the one hath only worldly things for its object, the other God himself; the one is perishing, the other endures for ever, Psal 16. ult.