N01310:95
Thoughts for the day of rain. In two essay's
Thoughts for the day of rain. In two essay's: I. The Gospel of the rainbow. In the meditations of piety, on the appearance of the bright clouds, with the bow of God upon them. II. The Saviour with his rainbow. And the covenant which God will remember to his people in the cloudy times that are passing over them. / By Cotton Mather., D.D. ; [Seven lines of quotations]
printed by B. Green, 1712
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.
And here, first; I do not ask you, to fall into Basils Meditation; who, when he saw (for at that time of day, they would see no more,) the Rainbow appearing in Three Colours, but One Bow, applied it unto the Doctrine of the Trinity; Three Persons, but One God. Christian, To Converse with the Great GOD, and very distinctly with each of the Three Persons in the God-head, is the very distinguishing Spirit and Glory of Christianity. May this part of the Divine Ascetics be more Studied a more Practised! I confess, the Rainbow will do a Good Office, if it Excite such a Study and Practice; tho' this be not the Office it was firstly intended for.
And here, first; I do not ask you, to fall into Basils Meditation; who, when he saw (for at that time of day, they would see no more,) the Rainbow appearing in Three Colours, but One Bow, applied it unto the Doctrine of the Trinity; Three Persons, but One God. Christian, To Converse with the Great GOD, and very distinctly with each of the Three Persons in the God-head, is the very distinguishing Spirit and Glory of Christianity. May this part of the Divine Asceticks be more Studied a more Practised! I confess, the Rainbow will do a Good Office, if it Excite such a Study and Practice; tho' this be not the Office it was firstly intended for.
Nor Secondly, was it intended for a Representation of our Three Graces; Faith, and Hope, and Love. Yet I find some, drawn from the Three Colours which were all that Antiquity distinguished in the Rainbow into a Tropological Meditation on the Three Graces. And it will do us no Hurt on this Occasion, to lift up our ⟨p. 31⟩Hearts unto the God of all Grace, with our Supplications; Lord, Let me have an Holy Faith, and Hope, and Love, ever shining in my Soul!
It has been on all hands agreed, That in the Rainbow, we have, the Mercy of our God, in Lively Colours Painted out unto us. And some will more Particularly have the Three Colours of Red, and Green, and Blue, in the Rainbow, to intimate the sweet Mixture of Justice and Mercy, accomplished by the Blood of the Covenant. But it is a Prejudice to those Niceties, that the Colours of the Rainbow are more than Three, This however, may, Thirdly, be a very Proper Meditation on the Sight of the Rainbow. It Proclaims the Mercy of God unto a Sinful World. Yea, how Emblematically! It was noted by Ambrose of old; That our God says, I will put my Bow in the Cloud. He says nothing of any Arrows. Tis a Bow without Arrows. When we see this Bow, let us then call to mind the Mercy of our God; and with a Grateful Soul acknowledge,