N01732:27
Five sermons on several subjects. I. A birth-day sermon, preached on the day when…
Five sermons on several subjects. I. A birth-day sermon, preached on the day when the author attained to the eightieth year of his age. II. A dying testimony to the sovereign grace of God in the salvation of his elect, containing three sermons. III. Believers encouraged to pray from the consideration of Christs interceding for them, and with them. / By Increase Mather, D.D ; [Six lines of quotations]
Boston: printed by B. Green for Daniel Henchman, 1719
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.
1. The Holy Scriptures declares it. Gen. 8.21. The imagination of mans heart is evil from his youth. The Heart is put for the Soul, and all the powers and faculties of it; the Imagination of the heart, is the Mould in which thoughts are formed. The heart is like a Mint in which evil thoughts are Coined continually. Thus it is with Man, not with this or that Man, but with every Man, and this from their Youth. The Hebrew word, Nagnar, is sometimes translated, a Babe, even Babes have this evil in them. The Children ⟨p. 4⟩of Men can no sooner think, no sooner set their imaginations on work but they are thinking and imagining that which is evil; and they can no sooner Speak, but they Speak that which they ought not. Psal. 58.3. They go astray as soon as they are born speaking lies. Children are apt to do so as soon as they can Speak; and they no sooner do any thing but they do that which is Evil. Isai.48.8. Thou wast called a transgressor from the Womb. Thou wast called so; that is to say, Thou wast so: as that phrase is often to be so understood in Scripture. True it is, That as Man did at his first Creation come out of Gods hands, there was no Sin in him. Eccl. 7.29. God made man upright, but they have sought out many inventions. They, our first Parents, Adam & Eve, sought out many sinful Inventions; and all their Children after them are doing as they did. When God Created Man, he was made in the Image of God. Gen.5.1. In the day that God Created Man, in the likeness of God made •e him. But then it is said in the third Verse, That Adam begat a Son in his own likeness. The likeness of Adam is set ⟨p. 5⟩in opposition to the likeness of God. Another Scripture speaks to this purpose: Job 11. 12. Man is born like the wild asses colt It is not only true that he is foolish and unteachable, but that he is born so: As it is said, Folly is bound in the heart of a Child. There is a bundle of folly in his Heart.