all fulness with marrow What is Wines on the Lees what are all earthly royal dainties to these rich graces and Divine special favours and blessings offered and bestowed and participated of in the Sacraments At which sumptuous and delicious banquet every worthy receiver that has made due preparation by self examination is or should be much affected and ravished As the Divine Poet was who thus expresseth himself First as to the manner of Importation and submission Herb. H. Com. Not in rich Ornament or fine Aray Nor in a Wedge of Gold Thou who for me wast sold To me dost now thy self convey For so thou should'st without me stil have been Leaving within me Sin But by the way of nourishment strength Thou creepest into my Breast Making thy Way my Rest And thy small quantities my length Which spread their Forces into every part Meeting Sins force and art Yet can these not get over to my Soul Leaping the Wall that parts Our Souls and fleshly Hearts But as the out-works they may controll My Rebel-flesh and carrying thy Name Affright both sin and shame Only thy grace which with these Elements comes Knoweth the ready way And hath the Privy Key Op'ning the Souls most subtile Roomes While those to Spirits refin'd at Door attend Dispatches from their Friend Give me my Captive Soul or take My Body also thither Another life like this will make Them both to be together Before that Sin turn'd Flesh to stone And all our Lump to leaven A fervent sigh might well have blown Our innocent Earth to Heaven For sure when Adam did not know To sin or sin to smother He might to Heav'n from Paradise go As from one Room to another Thou hast restor'd us to this ease By this thy Heavenly blood Which I can go to when I please And leave the Earth to their food When he was pleased to go to this Heavenly Banquet and he was so pleased as oft as might be and so should every godly Christian hear him warbling this Divine Rapture Idem the Banquet Welcome sweet and sacred cheer Welcome deer With me in me live and dwell For thy neatness passeth sight Thy delight Passeth Tongue to taste or tell O what sweetness from the Bowl Fills my Soul Such as is and makes Divine Is some Star fled from the Sphere Melted there As we Sugar melt in Wine Or hath sweetness in the Bread Made a head To subdue the smell of Sin Flow'rs and gums and powders giving All their living Lest the Enemy should win Doubtless neither Star nor Flower Hath the Power Such a sweetness to impart Only God who gives perfumes Flesh assumes And with it perfumes my heart But as Pomanders and sweet Wood Still are good Yet being bruised are better sented God to shew how far his love Could improve Here as broken is presented c. Let the wonder of this pitty Be my ditty And take up my lines and life Hearken under pain of Death Hands and breath Strive in this and love the strife Nor found he this food beyond all degrees of comparison nourishing and strengthning but he feeleth it also most effectually healing Physick as appeares by what he speaks to his pratling Conscience which call'd every fair look sowl every sweet Dish sower If thou persist I will tell thee That I have Physick to expell thee And the Receipt shall be My Saviours Blood when ever at his board I do but taste it straight it cleanseth me And leaves thee not a Word No not a Tooth or Nail to scratch And at my actions carp or catch Here is therefore no such provision of food no such sumptuous fair in any House as this Solomon's so much admired was as Husks yea and stark hunger compared to this and each of the Houshold fares alike And they have both Dinner and Supper every Day of the same delicates that which Matthew calls a Dinner Luke calls a Supper And they are called upon to feed heartrly Eat O Friends Drink yea drink abnndantly O well-beloved Nor are there any such fellow-Commoners to Dine and Sup with any where as here These are all Noble Honourable Persons The choicest and most excellent Kings and Priests A chosen Generation a Royal Priesthood a Holy Nation a peculiar People Yea the King of Kings and Lord of Lords Dines and Sups with them Mephibosheth thought it no small honour that David set him among them that did eat at his own Table How great honour must it then be to sit at Christs Table who is David's Lord And to increase their comfort they have assurance of the same Session with him in the Kingdome of Glory I appoint you saith he a Kingdome as my Father hath appointed me that ye may eat and drink at my Table in my Kingdome Nor are there any such servitures in any House as in this to wit the Holy Angels Are they not all Ministering Spirits sent forth to Minister for them who shall he Heirs of Salvation There are that make them both Cooks and Butlers that dress and dish up and bring in the provision of this continual Feast attend at Table and Minister Cups of Consolation And moreover wait upon every Member of this Family when they go abroad about the works of their Callings and in all the changes of their life who have care of them besides this common attendance a peculiar Guardian of Angels from their new birth at least as some probably gather from sundry Scriptures Nor are there any such Vessels in any House to serve up the Meat and Drink in as are in this The Dishes Spoons Covers and Bowles belonging to the Sanctuary were all of pure Gold so were all the Vessels of the pure Table All the drinking Vessels of King Solomon were of Gold and all the Vessels of the House of the forrest of Lebanon were of pure Gold At that Royal Feast which Ahasuerus made to all his Princes and Servants That lasted an hundred and fourscore Days They gave them Drink in Vessels of Gold The Vessels of this House wherein the Saints dwell and wherein they have their Meat and Drink served up are much more precious than the Gold that perisheth which is corruptible how pure soever even great and precious promises in which are contained all the choicest Viands that Earth and Heaven can yield both for the nourishment of Soul and Body For Godliness is profitable for all things having the promise of the Life that now is and that which is to come Nor are there any such Seats to rest both Souls and Bodies on in taking repast in any House as in this Kings have had their Seats for themselves and by them for their Children and Favorites on which they sate down to eat meat they were terrestrial these coelestial places We read of the great King sitting at his Table with his Spouse
underneath you and you shall be able both to do and suffer all things through him that strengthneth you Upon all these and many more accounts Ascribe the strength unto God his excellency is over Israel and his strength is in the Heavens The God of Israel is he that giveth strength and power unto his People Blessed be God From the third property of your Habitation Viz. Largeness Learn rightly to conceive of this property holding forth the infiniteness immensness and omnipresence of God being without quantity and measure every where both within and without the World filling all places with his essence as the whole Soul is said to be in the whole Body and in every part of it so is God whole and wholly in every part of the World Behold the Heaven and Heaven of Heavens cannot contain thee His greatness is unsearchable infinite and incomprehensible The Heaven is my Throne and the Earth is my Footstool Am I a God at hand saith the Lord and not a God afar off Can any hide himself in secret Places that I shall not see him saith the Lord Do not I fill Heaven and Earth Yea and Hell too If I make my Bed in Hell behold thou art there This must teach us to banish all gross conceits of God out of our mind and to detest the making any Picture of him by which he is denyed to be incomprehensible and to see him though invisible to be present with you where ever you are his Eye beholding whatsoever you are doing This Consideration filled David's heart with shame and sorrow for his sin and made it to lye so heavy upon his Conscience I have done this evil in thy sight All my care was to be secret to hide my sin from the Eyes of Men but all this while thine Eye was upon me There is no Man but would be restrained from many sins if they knew of any body that was by them to see what they did The Murderer Adulterer are brought in by Job imboldening themselves No Eye shall see me As if he had said if they knew there was any Eye to see them they durst not do it Moreover in all their Meditations Contemplations of God take as full a view of him as you can Hear him saying behold me behold me Especially take notice of the largeness and greatness of his goodness and bounty All the dimensions of its breadth length depth and heighth with admiration O how great is thy goodness which thou hast for them that fear thee As high as the Heaven is above the Earth as the space is between the East and West I will mention the loving kindness of the Lord his great goodness the multitude of his mercies And labour for largeness of heart in some sort answerable From the rest of the properties of this your habitation and from all the furniture in it and from each of the conveniencies belonging to it I shall leave you to gather comforts and duties in abundance having this one thing only more to do Namely to acquaint you with some of the Statutes Lawes and Ordinances of the House and earnestly to press upon you the Observation of them by promises and penalties annexed The general Laws of this House binding all that live in it are partly natural and partly supernatural The natural are Ten in Number called in Scripture Ten Words and some where One Word The Divine Law teaching and commanding Moral good and forbidding evil known by the Name of Moses Law Uttered and promulgate with God's own Mouth by his immediate Voice delivered in Fire and therefore termed a Fiery Law in the hearing of all Israel Afterwards written with his own Finger by a mere and miraculous divine Operation in Two Tables of Stone to signifie the perpetual use and continuance of it to the end of the World and so published and committed to the Church for all Ages as the Moral Law for Obedience to God our Soveraign Lord and King This self same Law did God engrave in Man's heart even when he created him For that before the written Law of Moses there was an unwritten Law of Nature must needs be granted because needs must they be bound to God who had their Beeing from him Nor could they have sinned against him if they had had no Law from him For where no Law is there is no transgression Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the Law But sin Men did all this space of time and were punished with a witness Witness Cain the old World Sodom Onan and innumerable of others and they were punished for the sins forbidden in Moses Law and the Apostle expresly teacheth that the Gentiles who never had the written Law of Moses had their Natural Law even this Law though less perfect imprinted in their Souls by which they were instructed and bound to do well and debarred from doing evil which are the two properties of all Lawes And these two properties called The work of the Law written in their Hearts they shewed their Conscience bearing witness their Hearts accusing or excusing one another The Conscience being but a correspondency and relation of a Man's Spirit unto the Law to bind or unbind condemn or absolve him Moreover the good Laws the Heathen made to punish the evils forbidden and to draw People to practice the good commanded in the Law of Moses and the endeavour of many of them to act accordingly argues the Unity of both Laws The reason of which unity is the unchangeableness of God who is alway the same Qu. What need was there of the repetition and renovation of this Law Or if there was need Why was it not sooner Answ To the former Branch though Nature brought the same things yet it did it very weakly and many conclusions were obliterated and others much obscured and all Mens hearts were weakly drawn to obey this Law very strong to obey the Law of sin And although the Law of Nature could scarce never have been extinguished in Principles and Grounds yet it might and was and would have been more in Applications Men took evil for good and good for evil and grew more and more vain in their imaginations To the latter Branch Man's heart was not after his Fall throughly humbled but thought his own reason sufficient for his Guide therefore God would leave the World a while to try them and let them see their own weakness Besides sin was not come quickly to such a pitch and height as afterward it did and yet we finde that God did by peece-meal and occasionally teach them this Law presently and almost equipollently before its solemn Proclamation The Unity of these two Laws lets you see as the constancy and Immutability of your God who is not as other Law-givers who build and pull down and whom a Man knows as well how to
distress and vexation of mind call to mind such promises as are fitted to your condition For there can be no condition imagined but there are promises suited to it and a Christian wisdome must be to accommodate the remedy to the sore and malady of his heart Enquire what word there is in God's Book to still the tempests and distempers of your spirits and then make application of it Promises faithfully remembered and well digested will arm and fortifie your Souls that they shall be able to put any case of trouble inward or outward and come off victoriously and triumphantly Put case you be as poor as Job Lazarus the Prophets Widdow Call to mind the promises of temporal blessings in abundance Put case you be persecuted by the tongues or hands of wicked Men call to mind the promises that you shall be delivered your enemies confounded Put case your hearts be heavy for some great losses of Goods or Friends Call to mind the promises that you shall be gainers by your losses Put case your spirits be wounded with the sense of Divine wrath Call to mind the promises of pardon peace and rest Put case your Graces be weak and corruptions strong Call to mind the promises of sanctification and quickening Put case some great eminent danger threaten you Call to mind the promises that nothing shall hurt you that every thing that befalls you shall work together for your spiritual and eternal good 2. Provision thus brought in by the Memory the next work of Faith is to prepare and make it fit nourishment This is done by searching for and finding out that Grace or part of obedience upon which the fruition of the promise depends to which sufficient hath been spoken already nor will it be disheartned for weakness if there be truth yea if no more than a true desire Mat. 5. 3 6. Neh. 1. 11. The third and last chief work of Faith is application of the promises to your selves in particular this is feeding upon the provisions brought in and dressed Faith first does its utmost to assure the soul that what God hath promised is already done Mark 11. 24. 15. 28. Job 13. 15. Yea and it makes it good thus 1. It hath Christ and he is all 2. It hath if not the thing promised as good or better 3. When it findes much ado It goes to God and seeks help of him Mark 9. 24. 2 Chr. 20. 12. Psal 73. 23. 24. 27. and concludes with the Psalmist 60. 12. 73. 1. You will be sure to finde while you live here on Earth the Devil ever anon throwing his Fiery darts into your Souls You must take the Apostles advice to stand alwayes Armed with the whole Armour of God Above all taking the Shield of Faith whereby ye shall be able to quench all his Fiery Darts THE EIGHTH SERMON YOu have heard what the Daily Duty is of all who live and dwell in God viz. To live by Faith How faith maintains the Soul in life and the Apostle bidding you to take the Shield of Faith and to use and move and mannage it according to the place Satan casting his Darts at you aimes at and according to the kindes of his temptations I shall give you a truth and tast how faith may be mannaged and what the several acts of Faith are by which the fierceness of these Darts of Satan may be quenched There are six Fiery Darts besides many others which Sathan throwes at the Souls of those that dwell in God whereby he works them much disquiet and trouble The first and worst is concerning the forgiveness of sins He would and often doth perswade them that their sins are unpardoned and that God will damn them for their manifold transgressions and mighty sins The apprehension of this fills their Souls with horror nor can the greatness and grievousness of this affliction be expressed A second is Concerning their spiritual Estate he would make them believe they are yet in a state of Unregeneracy and that the Root of the matter is not in them but that they are but painted Hypocrites A third is Concerning Mortification of Lusts and Sanctification of Life neither of which they have attained and they are afraid they never shall A fourth is Fear of Poverty and temporal Misery what will become of them in sickness and old Age they cannot tell want coming on them like an Armed Man this Dart sets on Fire many Lusts A fifth is Concerning the right use of prosperity and adversity Satan perswades them they neither do nor ever shall use either rightly A sixth is Fear of falling away Faith rightly mannaged will blunt the piercing points of all these Darts and take away all the burning Poyson in them and so repell them that the Soul shall not be hurt at all by them though until Faith have done it suffer much affliction by each of them I shall not now undertake to shew what be the several acts of Faith that have force to overcome these several temptations but will declare very briefly what those acts are whereby Faith supports and settles the Soul and makes it victorious in any trouble or affliction whatsoever inward or outward which may be applyed to any of the cases fore-mentioned Qu. What use will this Doctrine be to those that are not under any trouble that have no manner of affliction upon them Ans There is no Christian that is at any time of his life free from all affections no Day comes so fair over any godly Man's head wherein he meets not with some matter of grief yea so much that he findes enough ado to sustain and master it Luk. 9. 23. 2. Those that are now free from affliction may they know not how soon be hem'd in compassed about and overwhelmed with variety of afflictions as Job was and therefore ought to live in continual expectation of crosses and distresses publick domestical personal and although there are great hopes of peaceable times yet hopes may be frustrate our sins are many and mighty which gives us just cause to fear God's judgments we have also Enemies many and politick and malicious and the Devil and his Instruments are busie but howsoever how calm soever the publick state may be yet afflictions and miseries may and will sure enough befall those that fear God If not outward yet inward Many are the afflictions of the righteous And manifold are their infirmities in their afflictions and therefore they are called by that name Evils will not come the sooner because expected but they will fall the lighter And faith is necessary that they may so do it cannot therefore but be necessary and profitable to acquaint you with the acts of Faith in general at least whereby a Christian Soul may be upheld in evil times against all afflictions and miseries whatsoever This grace well acted will bring
DWELLING WITH GOD THE INTEREST and DUTY OF BELIEVERS In Opposition To the Complemental Heartless and Reserved Religion of the Hypocrite Opened in Eight Sermons By JOHN BRYAN D. D. late Pastor in Coventry LONDON Printed by T. M. for James Allestry at the Sign of the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1670. To the Right Honourable ARTHUR Lord CHICHESTER Viscount CARRICKFERGUS AND Governour Earl of Donegal One of his Majesties most honourable Privy Council in the Kingdom of Ireland And to the Right Honourable and truly Religious LATITIA Countess of Donegal Right Honourable and my good Lord and Lady MAny and great are the obligations that lye upon me to your Honours as upon many other so upon the account of my yongest Son Noah many Years since Minister in Stafford since for the space of more than Seven Years your Chaplain whom while he lived in your Noble and Religious Family you loved dearly and prized highly and whose Death you take heavily So that all that my self and my two surviving Sons can do in way of thankfulness should we live Methusalem's Days will come short of what You have deserved of us And therefore we must and shall make it our Daily Prayer while we are in the Land of the living to Him who is All-sufficient to give to your Honours a full reward Mean time these poor low Meditations of mine upon the richest and highest subject I most humbly present to your Honours as a token of my gratitude beseeching your acceptance of it as that great Prince did of the poor Man's handful of Water who had no better thing at hand to offer beseeching God to bless it to You and to all into whose Hands it shall come for the furtherance of your and their spiritual and eternal good and that he will grant you according to the Riches of his Glory that as you have been and still are very great Props and Encouragements to the profession and practice of Piety Loyalty and Charity in that Kingdom where you now live and were so in this while you lived here so you may live long and long to promote both in both till you be translated into his everlasting rest Your Honours most humble bounden Servant John Bryan TO THE READER Courteous Reader IT is GOD Himself who is the substantial Object of Science and Religion Though we would not erre with them who too much dishonour and vilifie Creatures lest we reflect dishonour on the Creator and tempt Men to think basely of the Author as we do of the Work yet we must say that compared with Him they are a very little thing yea as nothing yea less than nothing and vanity Isa 40. 15 17. And what they are they are in that dependence on him and relation to him without which they would be strictly nothing Though the old Philosophers did many of them think that so fair a Structure deserved to be esteemed as Corpus Deitatis yet Christians are more wise and reverent than to approve the more modest assertion of them who call it Vestimentum numinis or Accidentia Divina yet the notion of an Accident is thus far apt to tell us that all the Creature 's being is in its dependence on the Creator and that it is nothing but what it is in him For of him and through him and to him are all things Rom 11. 36. And in him we live and move and be Act. 17. 28. To think therefore or treat of any Creatures abstractedly leaving out the knowledge of the Creator is not properly to know but to dote or erre He that does annihilate them or deny their very being doth not know it nor cannot teach it Such fooleries are all the busiest and most learned enquiries of those Formalists who separate Philosophy from Theology and think they have done fairly when they have once confest that God gave the World a being and first motion as if he had then left it to its self or made it a separate self-subsisting thing or as if they might then proceed to treat of it without any further thoughts or mention of that God who is more to it than a Soul and without whom it cannot be truly defined no more than the beams without mentioning the Sun or the Accidents without the Substance And as the true Natural Philosopher doth see GOD as all in all in Physicks so doth the true Moralist in Ethicks Well may our Religious Science be called Divinity because GOD is in it the beginning the middle and the end the life the substance of it and all in all And as this is true of the Theory it is as true of the Practice For it is one and the same Religion or Theology which is essentially in the three constitutive faculties of Man and must be defined as Scientia affectiva practica It is a very apt and instructing expression which is used Heb. 4. 13. All things are naked and opened to the Eyes of him with whom we have to do It is most intimately pertinent to our Religion to know GOD as Him with whom we have to do and to know how much we have to do with him to know that we have more to do with him than with all the Creatures in the World Yea that we have nothing to do with any Creature but as in him and with him and for him and as that which is less than an Accident of GOD That we have nothing to do with Men or Angels high or low rich or poor animate or inanimate no not our selves as separate from God or from his presence interest and will nor as co-ordinate in subsistence or intention with him but only as absolutely dependent on him and subordinate and subservient to him And that we have nothing to do in the World but his service and the fulfilling of his will And to know how Great and of what unspeakable importance our Daily and Hourly business is in which we have to do with God This will first fix us in the Positive part of our Religion which is properly called GODLINESS And then it will most effectually accomplish the Negative part in calling off our minds from every Idol and killing our bruitish and unchast affections While our hearts are seriously taken up with GOD the Creature will seem less to us comparatively than a Fly compared to a City or an Atome to a Kingdom or a Candle to the Sun Overvaluing and overloving and overdoing for the World is a certain Sign of our undervaluing and underloving and neglect of GOD. For if GOD have his due he will have all And if he had all the World and all things in it would have none unless as it is sent to GOD by them And so excellent is this converse with GOD that the nature of it may much convince us that GRACE and GLORY are but as the Seed and the Plant as infancy and manhood and that Life Eternal is begun on Earth Joh. 17. 3. One being but the work
of seeking love and the other of fullenjoying-love and both being the Dwelling of the Soul in GOD in several manners and degrees Do not wonder therefore if the Reverend Author of this Treatise my deservedly-much valued and honoured Friend and long a laborious Servant of Christ have chosen this Subject for his own delight and for his Readers benefit For however perhaps the burning of the City and the removal of many Ministers from their setled habitations might be some occasion of his choice yet the great reason no doubt was the Greatness and Necessity of this truth as suited to the greatest edification of Mens souls I foresee that there are some that will say that this running of Allegories so far doth carry away the mind from the just conceptions of the thing and hinder and delude the understanding by drawing it into the by-paths of improper notions and is the way of injudicious superficial Teachers And I confess it is so in several Cases As 1. When metaphors are chosen needlesly instead of more plain significant termes 2. And when they are chosen unaptly and are not fitted to the matter signified 3. When they are insisted on too far to the exclusion of the proper notions and tend indeed to seduce and carry away the mind 4. When they are run up so high as to infer any false conclusions or to introduce any groundless confectaries or applications But if you consider of the Allegory insisted on in this Treatise you will have better thoughts and censures of it upon these reasons following 1. It is not about a created subject where we have store of proper notions but about the Creator and our communion with Him where we must have improper thoughts and borrowed notions or none at all It is a controversie between the Thomists and the Scotists whether one syllable Ens be spoken Univocally of GOD and of the Creatures But that no other word is spoken Univocally of them they are agreed And the Scotists do not without reason maintain that Analogical Attribution is not a third member betwixt Univocal and Equivocal but is truly Equivocal as Metaphors are Talk not then against all Allegorical expressions about God till you would forbid Mortals to talk of God at all 2. Note that it is not so much the matter of our communion with GOD as the manner of it which the Allegory is used to express For the matter on our part I here tell you once for all that it is not any Fryar like fanatical notion of deification by an indwelling in GOD nor Andr. Osâ—anders conceit of Essential Righteousness nor the Platonists fancy of the Union of the Intellect with the thing understood which the Reverend Author doth assert But it is only the communion of the Three Essential faculties of the Soul with GOD the Vital and Executive Power the Intellect and Will partly receptively and partly operatively which is meant And the Allegory of Dwelling signifieth the Permanency Fixedness Constancy Familiarness c. Of these 3. And consider how apt and significant it is How fitly it expresseth the Habits of Grace the Souls fidelity the course of duty the contents and comforts of a Believer in his GOD c. as is here fully opened to you And how fitly it differenceth a Christian indeed who dwelleth habitually and devotedly in GOD from all sorts of Hypocrites who do but complement with him as a stranger or step aside out of their ordinary way to speak now and then with him either in formality or in their extremity and cast an Eye towards him sometimes on the by And that it is not a barren notion but most practical directing the thoughts of a Christian to a constant spiritual holy life yea that it is a very Consolatory notion speaking the beginning of Heaven on Earth and suited both to Grace and Glory and apt to lead up our Desires to the everlasting Mansions which we have scarce a more familiar conception of than by Dwelling with GOD And who would not be at Home that hath such a Home prepared for him when once He is prepared for it 4. And lastly consider that it is a Scripture metaphore yea frequently there used And what words of Scripture can seem more important to us than 1 John 4. 16 GOD is Love and he that dwelleth in Love dwelleth in GOD and GOD in Him And V. 15. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of GOD God dwelleth in Him and He in GOD. And V. 12. If we love one another God dwelleth in Us and his Love is perfected in Us. 1 Joh. 3. 24. He that keepeth his Commandments dwelleth in Him and He in Him 2 Cor. 6. 16. For ye are the Temple of the living GOD As GOD hath said I will dwell in them and walk in them and I will be their GOD and they shall be my People And there is another sort that I foresee will be offended because the Author hath said so much against separation from the publick Assemblies and Worship as now managed seeing he is silenced for Non-conformity Himself To these I shall only say 1. Why do they not wonder as much at the old Non-conformists Hildersham Paget Brightman Bradshaw Ball with many more who said much more against separation long ago 2. Consider that the Author is an ancient experienced Divine who hath lived to see the fruits of all extreams and in particular what the Love-killing and separating Spirit hath done in these Kingdoms these Thirty Years He hath been the Tutor and Father of more faithful Teachers in the Church than many other worthy Pastors have been of converted serious Christians And if the young unexperienced censures will but stay till they come to his age and experience and to half his Learning Wisdom and Grace and till they have done God's Church but the twentieth part of the service that he hath done it 's like they will be themselves of the same mind that he is But I could wish for their own sakes they would not do by him as they do by Mr. Tombes who having written a Book against Separation which none of them can confute with truth and reason they commonly and confidently affirm that he conformeth and then cast by his Book through prejudice and few that I hear of who most need it do read it Though he is so far from Ministerial Conformity that in the Epistle to that Book he still declareth his old opinion against Infant Baptism Partiality is a forfeiture of truth and contemptuously shuts the Door against it It will suffer Men to receive no instruction from those that differ from them And those that differ not can scarce instruct them because their Opinions are but the same which they hold already Alas then what will become of the understandings of this Generation wherein there are so few that are not in one Faction or other possest with partiality and unreasonable prejudice against the rest Reader the way to escape this Soul-perverting