Great Throughts Treasury

"As in Scripture a number of laws, particular and positive, being in force, may not by any law of man be violated, we are, in making laws, to have thereunto an especial eye."

"As the will doth now work upon that object by desire, which is motion towards the end, as yet unobtained; so likewise upon the same hereafter received, it shall work also by love."

"As our fear excludeth not that boldness which becometh saints, so if our familiarity with God do not savour of fear, it draweth too near that irreverent confidence wherewith true humility can never stand."

"Be it never so true which we teach the world to believe, yet if once their affections begin to be alienated a small thing persuadeth them to change their opinions."

"As teaching bringeth us to know that God is our supreme truth, so prayer testifieth that we acknowledge him our supreme good."

"As well for particular application to special occasions, as also in other manifold respects, infinite treasures of wisdom are abundantly to be found in the Holy Scriptures."

"Because the curiosity of man?s wit doth with peril wade farther in the search of things than were convenient, the same is thereby restrained unto such generalities as, everywhere offering themselves, are apparent to men of the weakest conceit."

"Because conscience, and the fear of swerving from that which is right, maketh them diligent observers of circumstances, the loose regard whereof is the nurse of vulgar folly."

"By a man?s authority we are to understand the force which his word hath for the assurance of another?s mind that buildeth on it."

"By ascending, after that the sharpness of death was overcome, he took the very local possession of glory, and that to the use of all that are his, even as himself before had witnessed, I go to prepare a place for you."

"By the knowledge of truth, and exercise of virtue, man, amongst the creatures of this world, aspireth to the greatest conformity with God."

"Concerning deliverance itself from all adversity we use not to say, ?Men are in adversity,? whensoever they feel any small hindrance of their welfare in this world; but when some notable affliction or? some great calamity or trouble, befalleth them."

"Concerning the blessings of God, whether they tend unto this life or the life to come, there is great cause why we should delight more in giving thanks than in making requests for them, inasmuch as the one hath pensiveness and fear, the other always joy annexed."

"Education and instruction are the means, the one by use, the other by precept, to make our natural faculty of reason both the better and the sooner to judge rightly between truth and error, good and evil."

"Dangerous it were for the feeble brain of man to wade far into the doings of the Most High; whom although to know be life, and joy to make mention of his name, yet our soundest knowledge is to know that we know him not as indeed he is, neither can know him; and out safest eloquence concerning him is our silence, when we confess without confession that his glory is inexplicable, his greatness above our capacity and reach."

"Conscience, and the fear of swerving from that which is right, maketh them diligent observers of circumstances, the loose regard of which is the nurse of vulgar folly."

"For a spur of diligence, we have a natural thirst after knowledge ingrafted in us."

"Every error is a stain to the beauty of nature, for which cause it blusheth thereat, but glorieth in the contrary."

"Every man?s heart and conscience doth in good or evil, even secretly committed, and known to none but itself, either like or disallow itself."

"Every cause admitteth not such infallible evidence of proof as leaveth no possibility of doubt or scruple behind it."

"English divine and author"

"God hath delivered a law as sharp as the two-edged sword, piercing the very closest and most unsearchable corners of the heart, which the law of nature can hardly, human laws by no means, possibly reach unto."

"For the instruction of all men to eternal life it is necessary that the sacred and saving truth of God be openly published unto them, which open publication of heavenly mysteries is by an excellency termed preaching."

"God alone excepted; who actually and everlastingly is whatsoever he may be; and which cannot hereafter be that which now he is not: all other things besides are somewhat in possibility which as yet they are not in act."

"For men to be tied, and led by authority, as it were with a kind of captivity of judgment; and though there be reason to the contrary, not to listen unto it."

"General laws are like general rules in physic: according whereunto, as no wise man will desire himself to be cured, if there be joined with his disease some special accident; in regard whereof, that whereby others (in the same infirmity but without the like accident) recover health would be to him either hurtful, or at the least unprofitable."

"God, of his great liberality, had determined, in lieu of man?s endeavors, to bestow the same by the rule of that justice which best beseemeth him."

"God hath his influence into the very essence of all things, without which influence of Deity supporting them, their utter annihilation could not choose but follow."

"Have wisdom to provide always beforehand, that those evils overtake us not which death unexpected doth use to bring upon careless men; and although it be sudden in itself, nevertheless, in regard of the prepared minds, it may not be sudden."

"Good effects may grow in each of the people towards other, in them all towards their pastor, and in their pastor towards every of them; between whom there daily and interchangeably pass, in the hearing of God himself, and in the presence of his holy angels, so many heavenly acclamations, exultations, provocations, petitions."

"Happiness is that estate whereby we attain, so far as possibly may be attained, the full possession of that which simply for itself is to be desired, and containeth in it after an eminent sort the contentation of our desires, the highest degree of all our perfection."

"Hope beginneth here with a trembling expectation of things far removed, and as yet but only heard of."

"He that exhorteth to beware of an enemy?s policy doth not give counsel to be impolitic; but rather to use all prudent foresight and circumspection lest our simplicity be over-reached by cunning slights."

"Himself not only comprehended all our necessities, but in such sort also framed every petition as might most naturally serve for many; and doth, though not always require, yet always import a multitude of speakers together."

"If so were it possible that all other ornaments of mind might be had in their full perfection, nevertheless the mind that should possess them, divorced from piety could be but a spectacle of commiseration."

"I have endeavored, throughout this discourse, that every former part might give strength unto all that follow, and every latter bring some light unto all before."

"If the course of politic affairs cannot in any good course go forward without fit instruments, and that which fitteth them be their virtues, let polity acknowledge itself indebted to religion, godliness being the chiefest top and well-spring of all true virtues, even as God is of all good things."

"If there might be added true art and learning, there would be as much difference in maturity of judgment between men therewith inured, and that which now men are, as between men that are now and innocents."

"If they which employ their labor and travail about the public administration of justice, follow it only as a trade, with unquenchable thirst of gain, being not in heart persuaded that justice is God?s own work, and themselves his agents in this business,?the sentence of right, God?s own verdict, and themselves his priests to deliver it; formalities of justice do but serve to smother right; and that which was necessarily ordained for the common good is, through shameful abuse, made the cause of common misery."

"If the passions of the mind be strong, they easily sophisticate the understanding; they make it apt to believe upon every slender warrant, and to imagine infallible truth when scarce any probable show appeareth."

"It is no more disgrace to Scripture to have left things free to be ordered by the church, than for Nature to have left it to the wit of man to devise his own attire."

"It is of things heavenly an universal declaration, working in them whose hearts God inspireth with the due consideration thereof, an habit or disposition of mind whereby they are made fit vessels both for the receipt and delivery of whatsoever spiritual perfection."

"It suiteth so fitly with that lightsome affection of joy wherein God delighteth when his saints praise him."

"Knowledge imparteth in the minds of all men, whereby both general principles for directing of human actions are comprehended, and conclusions derived from them, upon which conclusions groweth, in particularity, the choice of good and evil."

"In every grand or main public duty which God requireth of his church, there is, besides that matter and form wherein the essence thereof consisteth, a certain outward fashion, whereby the same is in decent manner administered."

"Is it not wonderful that base desires should so extinguish in men the sense of their own excellence as to make them willing that their souls should be like the souls of beasts, mortal and corruptible with their bodies?"

"It is no impossible thing for states, by an oversight in some one act or treaty between them and their potent opposites, utterly to cast away themselves forever."

"It is a kind of taking God?s name in vain to debase religion with such frivolous disputes."

"It cannot enter any man?s conceit to think it lawful that every man which listeth should take upon him charge in the church; and therefore a solemn admittance is of such necessity that without it there can be no church polity."

"It is a matter of sound consequence, that all duties are by so much the better performed by how much the men are more religious from whose habitudes the same proceed."