Sect. 59.--Again, I am confident, and fully persuaded,
yet dare not take my oath, of my salvation. I am, as it
were, sure, and do believe without all doubt, that there
is such a city as Constantinople; yet, for me to take
my oath thereon were a kind of perjury, because I hold
no infallible warrant from my own sense to confirm
me in the certainty thereof. And truly, though many
pretend to an absolute certainty of their salvation, yet
when an humble soul shall contemplate our own un-
worthiness, she shall meet with many doubts, and sud-
denly find how little we stand in need of the precept of
St Paul, "work out your salvation
with fear and trem-
bling." That which is the cause of my election, I hold to
be the cause of my salvation, which was the mercy and
beneplacit of God, before I was, or the foundation of the
world. "Before Abraham was, I am," is the saying of
Christ, yet is it true in some sense if I say it of myself;
for I was not only before myself but Adam, that is, in
the idea of God, and the decree of that synod held from
all eternity.
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