274 on the Excellency of the Soul. thoufands have loft this their pawn , they have not brought Faith and Repentance within their time before they died,, and fo the Devil hath kept the pawn, and will keep it for ever : And it is more dangerous the laying of fuch a pawn, than the ordinary laying of pawns to Brokers. Firft, There is no fuch pawn that poffibly can bee laid as this, the foul of a man : Men and women that have any wifdonae, they will not lay pawns of thofe things that are precious to them, Oh it goes to their hearts to think, what . muff I lay this to pawn ! I thought I íhould never have lived to the day to lay fuch a thing to pawn, I but when thou comefl to lay thy foul to pawn , thou layell a more precious thing than all the world is. Secondly, When thou layeft a thing to pawn, thou doll prefix thy own time for the redeeming of it again,, per- haps two, three, four months before thou bring that that is bargained for; but when thou layeft thy foul to pawn, thou Ile 2.0 canfl not fet any time . what doff thou know, oh Fool, but that this night thy foul may bee taken away from thee? Thirdly, Yea and further, When you lay fuch a thing to paws, you make a bargainfor the bringing of fomewhat to redeem it that you have in your own power, or make ac- count that you (hall have in your own power to bring, you will not make_ the bargain to bring fuch a thing that you are fure you íhall not have in your own power : Now, when you lay your fouls to pawn, you lay them to pawn for that that you have not in your power, nor all the creatures in Heaven and Earth cannot help you to in your need , and that is Faith and Repentance : All the Angels in Heaven, nor men in theworld cannot help you to it ; it is onely in. the hands of God, of the Infinite bleffed God, againft whom. you fin, and \:\ horn you provoke, and yet how many do thus pawn their fouls ? and no marvel though men lofe their fouls, becaufe they pawn them thus foolifhly and wretched- ly; and that is the fccond way of mens.lofing of their fouls. Thirdly, Men lofe, their fouls by wounding them, they give.
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