Goodwin - BV4500 G66 1650

a Chrif cans Growth. and (he then kiífeth him, and makes much of him. Children when they are young, they Bate often, and doe little, and we alllow them to doe fo ; afterwards you fet them towork, and to fchoole, and reduce them to two good meals, and they thrive as well with it. 55 CH AP. IV. What it is to bringforthmorefruit, explicated pofitively, whereinmany dìrett tryalls o fGrowtharegiven. THus I have fhewne you negatively, what this growth is not to he meafured by, and fo by way of intimation wherein it confiíts ; I will fecondly do it more pofitively, and directly, and affirmatively. Firth, we grow, when we are led on to execife new graces, and fo to acide onegrace to another, as the Apoflle Peter exhorts ; as when in our knowledge we are led into new truths, and have anfwerable affections running along with thole difcoveries to- wards the things revealed, At firft a Chri(lian doth not exercife all graces, though all are radically in him : But as a man lives firlt the lifeof a plant, then of fenfe, then of reafon, fo is it in Graces. There aremanyformes Chriltians go through, as fcho- Jars at fchooledoe,wherein their thoughtsare in a more efpeciall manner takenup about divine objects of an higher or inferiour nature. The fitti forme Iis to teach them to know their fin. fulneffeofheart and life more ; and fo they goe to fchoole to theLaw, and are fet to {lady it, even oftentimes a good while after converfion , and faith begun : and then after they have learned that letfon throughly, they are led up higher to have their faith drawn out, and to beexercifed about free grace more, and towards Chrilt his perfon, union with him, and about the art and way ofdrawing vertue from him, and doing all in him. And herein it falls out with particular Chriftians, as with the Church in eenerall ; that as although the molt infant dayes of the Churchfrom Adams time in the old world had the know- ledge ofall Fundamentals, neceffary to falvation, yet God went H 2 over T. T'ryall.

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