PRF.FACI.. á `them, or dishonour them. And so few that can deny themselves in their honour, or any considerable thing, for the sake of Christ, and in obedience and confor- mity to his will, And all because they never had that 'saving change that takes down self, and sets ;up Christ as sovereign in the soul. And hence also it is, that we have in this age so many dreadful instances' apostacy ; so many reproaching the Scripture, that once they thought had converted them ; and the way of holiness, that once they did profess; and denying the Lord himself that bought them ; and all because they formerly took up with .a superficial, counterfeitconver- sion. O how commonly, and how lamentably, .doth this misery appear among professors in their;unsavoury 'discourse, their strife and envy on religious pretences, their dead formality, their passionate 'divisions, or their selfish, proud, and earthly minds ! ---jai thorough con- version would have cured all this, at least as to the dominion of it. I shall therefore, in the ensuing treatise, first endea- vour to awaken careless sinners, and persuade the ob- stinate to turn and live; and secondly, speak to those that seem to be about the work ; and give them so-me .directions and persuasions, to prevent their perishing in the birth, and so to prevent that hypocrisy which else they are like to be formed into, and the deceit of their hearts, the error of their lives, and the misery at their death which is like to follow. That they live not as those that flatter God with their mouth, and lie unto him with their tongues, because their heart was not right with him, neither are they stedfast in his covenant- - Lest denying deep entertainment and rooting to the seed of life, or choaking it by the radicated predomi- .rant loves and cares of the world, they wither when the heat of persecution shall break forth ; and lest, building on the sands, they fall when the winds and storms arise, and their fall be great. And so they go out from us, that they may be made manifest that they were not of us: for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us. Look there- fore to this great, important business, and give all di-
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=