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A30278
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Eighteen directions for saving conversion unto God by Daniel Burgess ... thus published for the poor.
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Burgess, Daniel, 1645-1713.
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Wing B5705; ESTC R36045
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these H. Scriptures I resolve to Live and Die by them And I engage my self here in presence of their blessed Author that I will as daily read this his Word as I eat his Bread Joh. 5.39 Col. 3.16 Psal 119.97 D. 7. Esteem Godliness God-likeness You know little of God's Word till you do so It 's true Flesh and Blood and the World and the Lyar from the beginning do give Godliness another report Even a very black Character They represent it as a very Hell upon Earth But God's Word says the clean contrary as his Children also feel the clean contrary Godliness all agree is nothing but Imitating and Obeying of God Now to Imitate him in Wisdom Truth and Goodness can be nothing but Beauty and Pleasure and Benefit and Honour And to Obey him is no other Being He is too Great to have his service any disparagement unto Angels and too Good to let it go unrewarded unto Men. Nor puts He his Children on Earth upon any thing but what He put his Son in Heaven upon whiles he was here Will He have us Suffer as well as Labour for him Beside that we may thank our Sin for it let us consider The Natural Son of God suffered the Curse of the Law the Adopted Children of God suffer nothing but the Chastisements of Grace He was made perfect by vastly greater Sufferings Add hereto what are light Sufferings and but for a moment for an exceeding great Crown and Eternal And think too Can the Devil name any thing in Holiness so hard as we can prove all things in Sin to be And all places in Hell to be Love is all Religion and all Pleasure is Love God only is more blessed than a Man Godly Conclude thou thus Reader and say Henceforth will I seek Fish in the Air and Fowls in the Sea as soon as seek Pleasure or Honour any where but in Godliness Psal 119.92 Prov. 3.13 14 15 16 17 18. D. 8. Beware of the Mill and the Circle Of the Mill of worldly Business and of the Circle of Sensual Pleasure They be the Traps that take most Souls and are the Death of all that they take The Mill doth store Hell with you poor Tenants and the Circle stores it with your Rich Landlords You have but one Soul and can Love best but one thing if the Worlds Profits or Pleasures get the Throne of your one Soul you have no other for God and He will sit no where but on the Throne and in your BEST Love Nor have you but one Life-time for working out your Salvation If this one be eat up by the foresaid Vulturs your Salvation is lost Say then Reader if thou carest to be saved Heart and Life-Religion shall be my prime Mill and Circle my chief Business and Pleasure Worldly ones will follow me but I will follow these And of all things in the World I will keep the Throne of my Heart from Worldly Business and Pleasures The Bloodiest Tyrants and Butchers of Humane Souls 1 Joh. 2.15 16 17. 1 Cor. 7.29 30 31. D. 9. Keep out of Pest-houses Out of the Company of 1 Men falsely so called 2 Men that know not their God 3 Men that love death and wrong their own Souls 4 Men that look not into any World but this 5 Men that mind not Times End and Vse 6 Men that value Bibles no more than Plutarch 's Morals 7 Men that fancy God's Service wretched Bondany 8 Men like Bees either busie in gathering Honey or Drowned in it Wisdom hath said it Justice hath ordered it and Goodness hath warned you of it A Companion of Fools shall be destroyed Come not of choice therefore near unto their Doors The choice of Company is in a great degree the choice of your State of Sin and Misery or of Grace and Salvation I mean Say if thou art Wise or if thou ever wouldst be Wise say and hold I will henceforth chuse to associate with Frogs and Toads rather than with Gods Enemies I will have no Bosom Friend that hath not some Holiness to the Lord wrote on his Forehead 2 Chron. 19.2 2 Thes 3.6 Psal 139.21 D. 10. Have a care of your Eyes In Nature you may be Blind and Live in Grace you cannot Ignorance and Error Damn Souls as surely as Sins against Light and Knowledge Especially where there is plenty of means of Knowledge Heaven 's a far Countrey Holiness is a narrow way to it And is a Blind Man like to hit it do you think Besides Darkness is that whereof Satan is the Prince aâ—â—â—â—orance is called the Power of the Devil and Christ is said to be coming to take vengeance of all that KNOW NOT God and that do not more than Know that OBEY not the whole GOSPEL Reader go beg Gods Eye-salve say presently Grace is called Light and Glory is called Light I will no more endure this dark Heart of mine I will never be quiet until I get to understand all the Fundamental TRUTHS GRACES and DUTIES of Christianity For thy Life get understanding of the Assemblies Catechism Of the Summaries of Truths in my Three Questions resolved c. Prov. 4.5 7 8 9. Prov. 7.4 The Grand Charter Issued out and Granted by Jesus Christ for the Plantation of the Christian Faith in all Nations By George Lawson Rector of More in the County of Salop. D. 11. Highly prize Sunshine and Thunder Plain and clear Rouzing and piercing Sermons How dull are your Heads What can Benefit you that doth not Inform you And what can Inform you that is not as plain as the Sun Your Hearts be likewise cold and frozen desperately What besides Thunder-bolts can break ' em What besides Flashes of Fire can thaw them Believe it dark and dull Preachers be fearful Judgments and Curses to such as I suppose you Ignorance makes some Preachers dark Pride maketh others but Sin makes both and both do promote Sin Say thus thou that valuest thy Soul I will pray God to direct me to a Ministry both Shining and Burning Plain for my dull Mind Powerful for my rocky Heart Clear to inform my Vnderstanding and as Cutting and Searching to excite me Affection Isa 58.1 Hos 6.5 D. 12. Beg of God Golden Snuffers We do all need Reprovers And so peevish we all are that unless they be excellent ones very Compassionate and very Discreet and very Innocent themselves we cannot bear them when they reprove us We receive no good from the Snuffers except they be of pure Gold it is seldom that we ever do Great need therefore there is that thou Prayest the Over-ruler of all things to bestow upon thee some Righteous ones to smite thee Some Skilful Friends and Faithful and of excellent Holiness to tell thee ever and anon of thy Miscarriages Such as thy Minister never hears of and can but generally reprove Psal 141.5 1 Thes 5.14 Exod. 37.23 D. 13. Suppose the worst of your Selves Your own Hearts will be forward to Presume all
Eighteen Directions FOR Saving Conversion UNTO GOD. WITH Directions for Daily Holy Living And Motives with Directions unto Religious Discourse such as tends to promote Conversion and holy Conversation By Daniel Burgess Minister of the Gospel Thus Published for the Poor LONDON Printed for Tho. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns at the lower end of Cheapside near Mercers Chapel 1691. EIGHTEEN DIRECTIONS FOR Saving Conversion UNTO GOD. By Daniel Burgess Minister of the Gospel Thus Published for the Poor LONDON Printed for Tho. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns at the lower end of Cheapside near Mercers Chapel 1691. To my Friends in the Counties of Wilts Berks Somerset Glocester Oxford Southampton Middlesex Grace and Peace Sirs I thankfully remember all your old true Love And by your frequent Salutations I am comfortably assured of it's continuance Having not any thing better I Re-salute you all together with this Fragment I intreat that your Children may be exercised in Learning to Understand them and Recite them Especially those Children whom I Baptized and do with an especial Affection remember This Inscription obtains its end if it certifie you that You and Yours live in the affectionate memory of one that sticks not to go out of the common Road to fetch in one Soul unto Jesus Christ Your Fervent Lover and Oratour D. Burgess Eighteen Directions for Saving Conversion unto God c. D. 1. BE Men. Be not content to be Flies and Worms or Dogs and Swine in Men's Shape You have REASON a faculty of Understanding and Judging what is True and what is False You have a WILL a freedom of Chusing what you understand to be Good and of Refusing what you think to be Evil. You have a CONSCIENCE also obliging you always to ACT upon Choice and to CHUSE upon Judgment Be not then as if you had neither of the three Be not swayed by brutish Sense and acted by Colours Smells Sounds and Tasts as if you had been Born in the Field among Cattel and had in you no nobler Principle than they Rise presently and say each of you From this moment I will use my Powers My Nature is better than Brutes and my Life shall be better I will follow my exercised Reason and seek GRACE which is it's Perfection Till this be resolutely said you have no proper Manhood No but are Bruits and worse Morally though you are Men Naturally Psal 49.20 D. 2. Know your Maker Endure not to be Silly Children that know not their own Father You know you made not your selves Your Parents know little of your inner parts and confess that they did not form the same You believe your Maker to be one that was Himself never made But an Eternal Being and the common Father and Fountain of all Beings And by consequence of more Wisdom Power and Goodness than all And more worth Knowing than all Rise then and say every one of you What good shall my Life do me if I may not know the Father of it Give me the Knowledge of my Father or else I die I will never know rest till I understand WHO and WHAT He is Go learn the Sixteen things concerning GOD in the first of my Three Questions resolved Till He be known nothing can be rightly known 2 Thes 1.7 8. D. 3. Love your Selves Being descended from so excellent a Father LOVELINESS and LOVE it self and being so excellent a race of his as Men bearing his Image do not make light of your selves The visible Creation is not by millions of times worth one of your Souls Say then straightway in your Souls every of you I see nothing but my God better than my Soul Next to his Glory I will therefore make this Souls good my chief End and Care If this Soul be lost it shall not be for want of any thing I can do to Save it I will do and suffer work and beg Live and Die for this Soul of mine For it's Felicity in my Maker's Love and Favour and Likeness Until this be said you do but Flatter you do not Love your Selves No but interpretatively you Hate your selves And you Mischief your Selves more than Devils can do Prov. 8.36 D. 4. Visit Heaven and Hell You know there is another World none of you all pretend to be sure that there is not another If there be another confine not your Acquaintance unto this Heathens Turks and Jews themselves believe another World And say it is a Bigger than this and an Everlasting one And one whose Pleasures exceed those of this lower Worlds as much as the Light of the Sun exceedeth the Gloworm's Whose Pains and Torments also be such that the worst Torments here wou'd be very Refreshments unto the tormented there Let every one then say I will as daily think of the next World as I breath in this And Fear the torments of that World more than the pains of this And Desire and seek the Pleasures of that World more than all of this Before this Practice you do not see afar off but are blind You live in this World as Spiders in their Webs careless and thoughtless of the Beesom of destruction And as Serpents in the Dust regardless of the glory of higher Regions 2 Cor. 4.18 D. 5. Call Earth your Purgatory Your Time here is all of it given you on Tryal and for Preparation for your Eternal State Your Maker is Holy his Heaven is Pure All that enter it must be Purified their Time is allowed them for Purification As they are Purified or not Purified here on Earth they are taken into Heaven or excluded No other Place of Purifying or Time is set by God Say then Reader say often unto thy self My time is my tryal for Eternity I am here on my good behaviour as I Live here I Speed for ever After my death God will neither hold me on tryal in that World nor send me back again and try me in this If I am Glorified I must be Purified and if Purified it must be now My Motto shall be NOW or NEVER Eph. 5.15 16. 2 Cor. 5.9 10. D. 6. Believe and search God's Word Believe the H. Scripture so to be It is in a manner as plain that the Scripture is his Word as that the World is his Work Men could no more invent such a Bible than they could make such a World Read Dr. Manton Dr Bates Mr. Baxter hereof you shall say so As sure as there is a God his Will must be Revealed but if it be not Revealed in the H. Scripture where is it Revealed And what is there in the Scripture but is like Him and speaks it self His And if His it be how Continually Awfully and Affectionately should it be studied Rather than neglect it I would burn all my other Books and read the Scripture by the light of them Say thou that readest this upon due consideration say thou If I had a thousand Souls I would venture them all upon the truth of