Shepard - BV4500 S53 1747

Strength of GRACE how obtained. - cured into us by the fecard "'darn, when we are united to him, without argumentation. It is only by divine operation. The Lord leave not me, nor any friend I have, to a naked Zrminian Illumination and Perfwafîon. 2. That to the increafe. of chore habits, and drawing out the as of the new creature, the Lord is pleafed to ufe moral and rational perfwa- f ons ; as in the inflance you gave, Chri t died for us, then hence the love of Chrift.conftrains : But remember withal, it is not the bare medi- tation, or firength of reafon or perfwafion, that elicits fuch divine and noble acts in the heart and alre&ion.; but it is the blood of Chriff fprinkling there ferious meditations, that makes them Work fuch graces in the foul ; which I might Thew at large : which blood is the falve, though argumen- tation is the cloth or leather to which it flicks, and by which it is applied ; but from fuch lea- ther comes nó vertue, alLof it is from the blood of Chrift, which by argumentation heals the Soul. For if it were nakedly in the argumentation to frir your heart, and to work ffrength of grace ; what fhould be the reafon that fometimcs you are no more moved by all your argumentation:, than a mountain of brats is by the winds ? why fhould the fame truth affeee you at one ,time, and not at another, when you are as fitly difpofed to be ofeaed as at the .lrrff ? Therefore confider it is not your reafon and argumentation, but Chrift's blood that doth all, by as admirable, and yet fecret operation. 3. Your union to aria on your part is begun, and

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