!d treatife of eonfczence, yet they go on, at sail they come to have fecret defpairs in their heart, that God now will not look towards them; whereas if yet they had a mind to (loop to Jetús Chriff, they might be forgiven. z. A fecond cattle of despairing is multitude of teinp- 4 rations. Indeed the godly fhould not be fo apt to think them- (elves forfaken of God by realon of temptations as sometimes they are : they fhould rather couxt it jey, as James fpeaketh, chap. t . z. But yet many of the wicked detpair finally by this means : Becaufe they do fò often fall into temptations, there- fore they concludethey are forfaken of God. 3. Ignorance of ! Gods word. When the guiltineffe of finne meeteth with minds not inflrueled in the dottrine of free grace and reconciliation by Chrìfl ; this is a cnufe of defpair. 4. So alto inured cuflome of finning is anothercaufe. When men are often quickned, and grow dead again; then quickned again for a fit, and then ha: dned again : in the end they fall to defpair. These and the like are ahe caufes of despairing confeiences. And thus I have flrewed alto the fecond thing propounded to be handled, name- ly. the fundry degrees of troubled consciences, III. The third thing is the difference between the troubled confcience in the godly and in the wicked. The confciences of Gods children may be troubled, and are many times ;. and the confeiences of the wicked they are troubled too : now the queftion is, How do they differ.? I anf.ser, t, That trouble in the confcience of wicked men is accom- panied with impenitency, and fometimes with blafpherny : J would I were able to ref ff-God, faith Francis Snira : like Chofe in the Revelation, who bííaf hemed God beeaufe of their tor- mexts. Sometimes it is accompanied with curfings, as Ifai,8,zt, fometimes with infinite murmuring. But in Gods children it is not fo : When theirconfeience is troubled they juftifie God, and clear God, and give him the glory ofall,and fubmit under his hand, and fubdue their hearts unto him : as David in his trouble did not fret and murnsure ag intl God but faith he, IT z Sa»r.t t. God have ne pleofure Mono, lo, here' 3 am t let bins do with 26, me what feemeth bins good. So that the trouble of eonfcience in
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