continually commending his weakness unto God in the blood of our
saviour Christ Iesus.
Here shall ye see compendiously and plainly set out
the order and practice of every thing afore rehearsed.
(Adam bringeth us to bondage.)
The fall of Adam hath made us heirs of the vengeance and wrath of God,
and heirs of eternal damnation; And hath brought us into captivity and
bondage under the devil; And the devil is our lord, and our ruler, our
head, our governor, our prince, yee and our god. And our will is locked
and knit faster unto the will of the devils, then cond an hundred
thousand chains bind a man unto a post. Unto the devils' will consent
we, with all our hearts, with all our minds, with all our might, power,
strength, will and lust. With what poisoned, deadly, and venomous hate,
hateth a man his enemy; With how great malice of mind inwardly do we
slay and murder; With what violence and rage, ye and with how fervent
lust commit we advoutry, fornication, and such like uncleanness: with
what pleasure and delectation inwardly serveth a glutton his belly;
With what diligence deceive we; How busily seek we things of the world;
Whatsoever we do, think, or imagine, is abominable in the sight of God.
And we are as it were asleep in so deep blindness, that we can neither
see, nor feel in what misery, thralldom, and wretchedness we are in,
till Moses come and wake us, and publish he the law. When we hear the
law truly preached, how that we ought to love and honour God with all
our strength and might, from the low bottom of the heart: and our
neighbours (yee our enemies.) as our selves inwardly from the ground of
the heart, and to do whatsoever God biddeth, and abstain from
whatsoever God forbiddeth, with all love and meekness, with a fervent
and a burning lust, from the center of the heart, then beginneth the
conscience to rage against the law, and against God; No less (be it
never so great a tempest) is so unquiet. It is not possible for a
natural man to consent to the law, that it should be good, or that God
should be righteous, which maketh the law. Man's wit, reason, and will,
are so fast glued, yee nailed and chained unto the will of the devil.
Neither can any creature lowse the bonds, save the blood of Christ.
(( Christ letteth us at liberty ))
This is the captivity and bondage whence Christ delivered us, redeemed,
and lowsed us. His blood, his death, his patience, in suffering rebukes
and wrongs, his prayers and fastings, his meekness and fulfilling of
the utmost point of the law, appeased the wrath of God, brought the
favor of God to us again, obtained that God should love us first, and
be our father, and that a merciful father, that will consider our
infirmities and weakness, and will give us his spirit again (which was
taken away in the fall of Adam) to rule govern and strength us, and to
break the bonds of Satan, where in we were so strait bound.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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