The Foundation of Christian Religion
The source for this document is https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A09418.0001.001
Project Note
This is licensed under Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND. This license allows reusers to copy and distribute the material in any medium or format in unadapted form only, for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator.
The source of this document is the Early English Books Online (EEBO-TCP) website. Those books were transcribed in a character for character manner and can be very cumbersome to read since there was no standard spelling during that time. Many spelling variations such as "unlesse", "vnlesse", and "vnles" regularly appear.
This project was conceived to clean up those books as much as possible and make them more accessible to the interested reader, leading to the creation of a massive list of variant spellings and their corrections. This was used to clean up the text, but is of course only as complete as the list itself. Because of the nature of the original transcription, some words have missing characters or places where the original language (e.g., Greek) was not transcribed. This effort does not change that. Be aware that the original transcription can also be faulty and in some cases entire sentences may be missing.
Although this is no substitute for a properly compared, proofed, and scholarly edition, I believe that the result is a document which is far more accessible, particularly for searching for terms using standard spelling. The document has been cleaned and presented in what I hope is a pleasing and useful format for the vast majority of Christian brothers and sisters who just want access to read these spiritually nourishing works.
However, a word of warning: The Puritans were a very diverse group of people and their age was characterized with godliness, but also much upheaval, disputation and strife. They disagreed on many doctrines and some of these works contain less orthodox or Scriptural views than others. The reader is strongly advised to read with discernment, particularly if it is unknown whether author is trustworthy.
This project took a huge amount of time and skill to bring to fruition. I would particularly like to thank David Jonescue for the initial list of Puritans he found on EEBO and the concept behind this project as well as the continuous, unceasing efforts toward seeing this complete. Without his labor, this would not be available. Alex Sarrouf was invaluable in providing the initial list of over 7,000 spelling variations he had identified and corrected, as well as continuing to review more than 16,000 additions to that list for any typos.
Logan West
(with David Jonescue and Alex Sarrouf)
www.puritansearch.org
THE Foundation of Christian Religion, gathered into six Principles.
And it is to be learned of ignorant people, that they may be fit to hear Sermons with profit, and to receive the Lord's Supper with comfort.
Psal. 1.19.30.
The entrance into thy words showeth light, and giveth understanding to the simple.
Printed by Thomas Orwin, for John Porter. 1591.
〈1 page duplicate〉To all ignorant people that desire to be instructed.
P Oore people, your manner is to sooth up yourselves, as though ye wer in a most happy state: but of the matter come to a just trial, it will fall out far otherwise▪ For ye lead your lives in great ignorance, as may appear by these your common opinions which follow.
1 That faith is a man's good meaning & his good serving of God.
2 That God is served by the rehearsing of the ten commandments, the Lord's prayer, and the Creed.
3 That ye have believed in Christ ever since you could remember.
4 That it is pity that he should live which doth any whit doubt of his salvation.
5 That none can tell whether he shall be saved or not certainly: but that all men must be of a good belief.
6 That howsoever a man live, yet if he call upon God on his death bed, and say, Lord have mercy on me, & so go away like a Lamb, he is certainly saved.
7 That, if ani • be strangely visited, he is either taken with a Planet, or bewitched.
8 That a man may lawfully swear when he speaks nothing but the truth: & swears by nothing but that which is good, as by his faith or troth.
9 That a Preacher is a good man no longer than he is in the pulpet. They think all like themselves.
10 That a man may repent when he will, because the Scripture saith, At what time soever a sinner doth repent him of his sin, &c.
11 That it is an easier thing to please God than to please our neighbor.
12 That ye can keep the Commandments, as well as God will give you leave.
13 That it is the safest, to do in Religion as most do.
14 That merry ballads & books, as Scoggin, Beuis of Southampton, &c. are good to drive away time, & to remove heart quames.
15 That ye can serve God with all your hearts: and that ye would be sorry else.
16 That a man need not hear so many Sermons, except he could follow them better.
17 That a man which cometh at no Sermons, may as well believe, as he which hears all the sermons in the world.
18 That ye know all the Preacher can tell you: For he can say nothing, but that every man is a sinner, that we must love our neighbors as our selves, that every man must be saved by Christ: and all this ye can tell as well as he.
19 That it was a good world when the old Religion was, because all things were cheap.
20 That drinking and bezeling in the alehouse or tauerne is good fellowship, & shows a good kind nature.
21 That a man may swear by the Mass, because it is nothing now: and byr Lady, because she is gone out of the country.
22 That every man must be for himself, and God for us all.
23 That a man may make of his own whatsoever he can.
24 That if a man remember to say his prayers in the morning (though he never understand them) he hath blessed himself for all the day following.
25 That a man prayeth when he saith the ten Commandments.
26 That a man eats his maker in the Sacra.
27 That if a man be no adulterer, no thief, nor murderer, and do no man harm, he is a right honest man.
28 That a man need not have any knowledge of religiō, because he is not book learned.
29 That one may have a good meaning, when he saith and doth that which is evil.
These and such like sayings, what argue they but your gross ignorance? Now, where ignorance reigneth, there reigns sin: & where sin reigns, there the devil rules: and where he rules, men are in a damnable case.
Ye will reply unto me thus, that ye are not so bad as I would make you: if need be you can say the Creed, the Lord's prayer, & the 10. commandments: and therefore ye will be of God's belief say all men what they will, and you defy the devil from your hearts.
I answer again, that it is not sufficient to say all these without book, unless ye can understand the meaning of the words, and be able to make a right use of the Commandments, of the Creed, of the Lord's prayer, by applying them inwardly to your hearts and consciences, and outwardly to your lives & conversations. This is the very point in which ye fail.
And for an help in this your ignorance, to bring you to true knowledge, unfeigned faith, and sound repentance: here I have set down the principal points of Christian Religion in six plain & easy rules, even such as the simplest may easily learn: and hereunto is adjoined an exposition of them word by word. If ye do want other good directions, then use this my labor for your instruction: In reading of it first learn the six principles, & when ye have them without book, & the meaning of them withal, then learn the exposition also: which being well conceived, & in some measure felt in the heart, ye shall be able to profit by Sermons, whereas now ye cannot: and the ordinary parts of the Catechism, namely, the ten Commandments, the Creed, the Lord's prayer, and the institution of the two Sacraments, shall more easily be understood.
Thine in Christ Jesus, William Perkins.
The foundation of Christian Religion, gathered into six Principles.
Question. WHat doest thou believe concerning God.
I. There is one God creator and governor of all things, distinguished into the Father, the Son, and the holy Ghost.
Q. What doest thou believe concerning man: and concerning thine own self.
II. All men are wholly corrupted with sin through Adams fall: & so are become slaves of Satan, and guilty of eternal damnation.
Q. What means is there for thee to escape this damnable estate?
III. Jesus Christ the eternal son of God, being made man, by his death upon the Cross, and by his righteousness, hath perfectly alone by himself, accomplished all things that are needful for the salvation of mankind.
Q. But how mayest thou be made partaker of Christ & his benefits.
IIII. A man of a contrite and humble spirit by faith alone, apprehending and applying Christ with all his merits unto himself, is justified before God and sanctified.
Q. What are the ordinary means for the obtaining of faith.
V. Faith cometh only by the preaching of the word, and increaseth daily by it, as also by the administration of the Sacraments, and prayer.
Q. What is the estate of all men after death?
VI. All men shall rise again with their own bodies to the last judgment, which being ended the godly shall possess the kingdom of Heaven: but unbelievers and reprobates shall be in hell tormented with the devil and his Angels, forever.
The Exposition of the Principles.
I.
Question.
W Hat is God?
A. GOD is a spirit, or a spiritual substance, most wise, most holy, eternal, infinite.
Q How do you persuade yourself that there is such a God.
A. Besides the testimony of the Scriptures, plain reason will show it.
Q. What is one reason?
A. When I consider the wonderful frame of the world, me thinks the silly creatures y t be in it could never make it: neither could it make itself: and therefore besides all these, the maker of it must needs be God. Even as when a man comes into a strange Country, and sees fair and sumptuous buildings, and yet finds no living creatures there beside birds and Beasts, he will not imagine that either Birds or Beasts reared by those buildings, but he presently conceives that some men either were or have been there.
Q. What other reason have you?
A. A man that commits any sin, as murder, fornication, adultery, blasphemy, &c. albeit he doth so conceal the matter, that no man living know of it, yet oftentimes he hath a griping in his conscience, and feels the very flashings of hell fire: which is a strong reason, to show that there is a God, before whose judgment seat he must answer for his fact.
Q. How many God's are there?
Q How do you conceive this one God in your mind?
A. Not by framing any image of him in my mind (as ignorant folks do, that think him to be an old man sitting in heaven) but I conceive him by his properties and works.
Q. What be his chief properties?
A. First, he is most wise, understanding all things aright, and knowing the reason of them. Secondly he is most holy, which appeareth in that he is most just and merciful unto his creatures. Thirdly, he is eternal, without either beginning or ende of days. Lastly, he is infinite, both because he is present in all places, and because he is of power sufficient to do whatsoever he will.
Q. What be the works of God?
A. The creation of the world, and of everything therein, and the preservation of them being created by his special providence.
Q. How know you that God governeth every particular thing in the world by his special providence.
A. To omit the Scriptures, I see it by experience: Meat, Drink, and clothing being void of life, could not preserve the life of man, unless there were a special providence of God to give virtue unto them.
Q. How is this one God distinguished?
A. Into the Father which begetteth the Son: into the Son who is begotten of the Father: into the holy Ghost, who proceedeth from the Father and the Son.
II.
Q. Let us now come to our selves, and first tell me what is the natural estate of man?
A. Every man is by nature, dead in sin as a loathsome carrion, or as a dead corps lieth rotting and stinking in the grave.
Q. What is Sin?
A. Any breach of the Law of GOD, if it be no more but the least want of that which the Law requireth.
Q How many sortes of sin are there?
A. Sin is either the corruption of nature, or any evil actions that proceed of it as fruits thereof.
Q. In whom is this corruption of nature?
Q. In what part of man is it?
A. In every part both of body and soul, like as a Leprosy that runneth from the crown of the head, to the sole of the foot.
Q. Shew me how every parte of man is corrupted with sin?
A. First, in the mind there is nothing but ignorance and blindness concerning heavenly matters. Secondly, the conscience is defiled, being always either benumbed with sin, or else turmoiled with inward accusations and terrors. Thirdly, the will of man only willeth and lusteth after evil. Fourthly, the affections of the heart, as love, joy, hope, desire, &c. are moved & stirred to that which is evil to embrace it, and they are never stirred unto that which is good, unless it be to eschew it. Lastly, the members of the body are the instruments and tools of the mind for the execution of sin.
Q. What be those evil actions that are the fruits of this corruption?
A. Evil thoughts in the mind • which come either by a man's own conceiving, or by the suggestion of the Devil: evil motions and lusts stirring in the heart, and from thes • arise evil words and deeds, when any occasion is given.
Q. How cometh it to pass that all • men are thus defiled with sin?
A By Adams infidelity and disobedience, in eating the forbidden fruit • even as we see great personages b • treason do not only hurt themselves but also stain their blood, & disgrac • their posterity.
Q. What hurt comes to man by his sin?
A. He is continually subject to th • curse of God in his life time, in th • end of his life, and after this life.
Q What is the curse of GOD in this life?
A. In the body diseases, aches pains: in the soul, blindness, hardness of heart, horror of conscience: in goods, hindrances and losses: in name, ignominy and reproach: lastly, in the whole man, bondage under Satan the Prince of darkness.
Q. What manner of bondage is this?
A. This bondage is when a man is the slave of the Devil, and hath him to reign in his heart as his God.
Q. How may a man know whether Satan be his God or not?
A. He may know it by this, if he give obedience to him in his heart, and express it in his conversation.
Q. And how shall a man perceive this obedience?
A. If he take delight in the evil motions that Satan puts into his heart, and do fulfill the lusts of the Devil.
Q. What is the curse due to man in the end of his life?
A. Death, which is the separation of body and soul.
Q. What is the curse after this life?
A. Eternal damnation in hell fire, whereof every man is guilty, and is in as great danger of it, as the Traitor apprehended is in danger of hanging, drawing, and quartering.
III.
Q. If damnation be the reward of sin, then is a man of all creatures most miserable. A Dog or a Toade when they die, all their misery is ended: but when a man dieth, there is the beginning of his woe.
A. It were so indeed, if there were no means of deliverance. but God hath shown his mercy in giving a Savior to mankind.
Q. How is this Savior called?
Q. What is Jesus Christ?
A. The eternal Son of God made man in all things, even in his infirmities like other men, save only in sin.
Q. How was he made man void of sin?
A. He was conceived in the womb of a Virgin, and sanctified by the holy Ghost, at his conception.
Q. Why must our Savior be both God and man?
A. He must be a man: because man hath sinned, and therefore a man must die for sin to appease God's wrath: he must be God to sustain and uphold the manhood, to overcome and vanquish death.
Q. What be the offices of Christ to make him an all-sufficient Savior.
A. He is a Priest, a Prophet, a King.
Q. Why is he a Priest?
A. To work the means of salvation in the behalf of mankind.
Q. How doth he work the means of salvation?
A. First, by making satisfaction to his Father for the sin of man: secondly, by making intercession.
Q. How doth he make satisfaction ?
A. By two means: and the first is by offering a Sacrifice.
Q. What is this sacrifice?
A. Christ himself, as he is man, consisting of body and soul.
A. Christ as he is God, is the Aulter on which he sacrificed himself.
Q. Who was the Priest ?
A. None but Christ, and that as he is both God and man.
Q. How oft did he sacrifice himself?
Q. What death did he suffer when he sacrificed himself?
A. A death upon the Cross, peculiar to him alone: for besides the separation of body and soul, he felt also the pangs of hell, in that the whole wrath of God due to the sin of man, was poured forth upon him.
Q. What profit cometh by this sacrifice?
A. God's wrath is appeased for sin.
Q. Could the suffering of Christ, which was but for a short time, appease God's wrath?
A. Yea, for seeing Christ suffered GOD suffered: and that is more than if all men in the world had suffered forever.
Q. Now tell me the other means of satisfaction.
A. It is the perfect fulfilling of the Law.
Q. How did he fulfill the Law?
A. By his perfect righteousness: which consisteth of two partes, the first, the integrity and pureness of his human nature; the other, his obedience in performing all that the law required.
Q. You have shown how Christ doth make satisfaction, tell me likewise how he doth make intercession ?
A. He alone doth continually appear before his Father in Heaven, making the faithful & all their prayers acceptable unto him, through the merits of his own perfect satisfaction.
Q. Why is Christ a Prophet?
A. To reveal unto his Church the way and means of salvation, and this he doth outwardly by the Ministry of his word, and inwardly by the teaching of his holy Spirit.
Q. Why is he also a King ?
A. That he might bountifullie bestow upon us, and convey unto us all the foresaid means of salvation.
Q. How doth he show himself to be a King?
A. In that, being dead and buried, he rose from the grave, quickened his dead body, ascended into heaven, and now sitteth at the right hand of his Father, with full power and glory in heaven.
Q. How else?
A. In that he doth continually inspire and direct his servants by the divine power of his holy spirit, according to his holy word.
Q But to whom will this blessed King communicate all means of salvation?
A. He offereth them to all mankind, and they are sufficient to save all mankind: but all shall not be saved thereby, because by faith they will not receive them.
IIII.
Q. What is Faith?
A. Faith, is a wonderful grace of God, by which a man doth apprehend and apply Christ and all his benefits unto himself.
Q How doth a man apply Christ unto himself, seeing we are on earth, and Christ in heaven?
A. This applying is done by assurance, when a man is verily persuaded by the holy spirit, of God's favor towards himself particularly, & of the forgiveness of his own sins.
Q. How doth God bring men truly to believe in Christ?
A. First he prepareth their hearts, that they might be capable of faith: and then he worketh faith in them.
Q How doth God prepare mens harts?
A. By brusing them, as if one would break an hard stone to powder: and this is done by humbling them.
Q. How doth God humble a man?
A. By working in him a sight of his sins, and a sorrow for them.
Q How is the sight of sin wrought?
A. By the Moral law: the sum whereof is the ten commandments.
Q. What sins may I find in myself by them?
A. Ten.
Q. What is the first?
A. To make something thy God which is not God, by fearing it, loving it, so trusting in it more than in the true God.
Q What is the second?
A. To worship false God's or the true God in a false manner.
Q. What is the third.
A. To dishonor God in abusing his titles words, and works.
Q. What is the fourth?
A. To break the Sabaoth in doing the works of their calling and of the flesh: and in leaving undone the works of the spirit.
Q. What be the six latter?
A. To do anything that may hinder thy neighbors dignity, life, chastity, wealth, good name; though it be but in the secret thoughts and motions of thy heart, unto which thou givest no liking nor consent.
Q. What is sorrow for sin?
A. It is when a man's conscience is touched with a lively feeling of God's displeasure for any of these sins: in such wise, that he is wholly out of heart with himself, acknowledging that he hath deserved shame, and confusion eternally.
Q. How doth God work this sorrow?
A. By the terrible curse of the law.
Q. What is that?
A. He which breaks but one of the commandments of God, though it be but once in all his life time; & that only in one thought, is in danger of eternal damnation thereby.
Q. When men's hearts are thus prepared, how doth GOD ingraft faith in them?
A. By working certain inward motions in the heart, which are the seeds of faith, out of which it breedeth.
Q. What is the first of them?
A. When a man humbled under the burden of his sins, doth acknowledge and feel that he stands in great need of Christ.
Q. What is the second?
A. An hungering desire and a longing to be made partakers of Christ and all his merits.
Q. What is the third?
A. A flying to the throne of grace, from the sentence of the law, pricking the conscience.
Q. How is this done?
A. By praying, with sending up loud cries for God's favor in Christ in the pardoning of sin: and with fervent perseverance herein, till the desire of the heart be granted.
Q. What followeth after all this?
A. GOD then, according to his merciful promise, lets the poor sinner feel the assurance of his love wherewith he loveth him in Christ; which assurance is a lively faith.
Q. Are there diverse degrees and measures of true faith?
Q. What is the least measure of true faith that any man can have?
A.
Q. How do you know that such a man hath faith?
A. These desires and prayers are testimony of the spirit, whose property it is to stir up a longing and a lusting after heavenly things, with sighs and groans for God's favor and mercy in Christ. Now where the spirit of Christ is, there is Christ dwelling: and where Christ dwelleth, there is true faith how weak soever it be.
Q. What is the greatest measure of faith?
A. When a man is fully persuaded of GOD'S love in Christ towards himself particularly, and of the forgiveness of his own sins.
Q. When shall a Christian heart come to this full assurance?
A. Not at the first, but in some continuance of time, when he hath been well practiced in repentance, and hath had diverse experiences of God's love unto him in Christ: then after them will appear in his heart the fullness of persuasion: which is the ripeness and strength of faith.
Q. What benefits doth a man receive by his faith in Christ?
A. Hereby he is justified before God and sanctified.
Q. What is this to be justified before God?
A. It compreheneth two things the first, to be cleared from the guiltiness and punishment of sin: the second, to be accepted as perfectly righteous before God.
Q. How is a man cleared from the guiltiness and punishment of his sin.
A. By Christ's sufferings and death upon the Cross.
Q. Howe is he accepted righteous before God?
A. By the righteousness of Christ imputed to him.
Q. What profit comes by being thus justified?
A. Hereby and by no other means in the world, the believer shall be accepted before God's judgment seat, as worthy of eternal life by the merits of the same righteousness of Christ.
Q. Doo not good works then make us worthy of eternal life?
A. No: for GOD who is perfect righteousness it self, will find in the best works we do, more matter of damnation than of salvation: & therefore we must rather condemn our selves for our good works, than look to be justified before God thereby.
Q. How may a man know, that he is justified before God?
A. He need not ascend into heaven to search the secret counsel of God: but rather descend into his own heart to search whether he be sanctified or not.
Q. What is it to be sanctified?
A. It comprehendeth two things: the first to be purged from the corruption of his own nature: the second to be endued with inward righteousness.
Q. Howe is the corruption of sin purged?
A. By the merits and power of Christ's death, which being by faith applied, is as a corasiue to abate, cōsum, & weaken the power of all sin.
Q. Howe is a man endued with inherent righteousness?
A. Through the virtue of Christ's resurrection, which being applied by faith, is as a restorative to revive a man that is dead in sin to newness of life.
Q. In what part of man is sanctfication wrought?
A. In every part of body & soul▪
Q. In what time is it wrought?
A. It is begun in this life, in which the faithful receive only the first fruits of the spirit, and it is not finished before the end of this life.
Q. What graces of the spirit do usually show themselves in the heart of a man sanctified?
A. The hatred of sin, and the love of righteousness.
Q. What proceeds of them?
A. Repentance, which is a settled purpose in the heart, with a careful endeavor to leave all his sins, and to live a Christian life.
Q. What goeth with repentance?
A. A continual fighting and struggling against the assaults of a man's own flesh, against the motions of the Devil, and the enticements of the world,
Q. What followeth after a man hath gotten the victory in any temptation or affliction?
A. Experience of God's love in Christ and so increase of peace of conscience and joy in the holy Ghost.
Q. What follows, if in any temptation he be overcome, and through infirmity fall?
A. After a while there will arise a godly sorrow, which is, whē a man is grieved for no other cause in y e world but for this only, y t by his sin he hath displeased GOD, who hath been unto him a most merciful & loving Father.
Q. What sign is there of this sorrow?
A. The true sign of it is this, when a man can be grieved for the very disobedience to God in his evil word or deed, though he should never be punished, and though there were neither heaven nor hell.
Q. What follows after this sorrow?
A. Repentance renewed a fresh.
Q. By what signs will this repentance appear.
A. Ay seven. 1. A care to leave the sin into which he is fallen. 2. An utter condemning of himself for it, with a craving of pardon. 3. A great anger against himself for hi • carelessness 4. A fear least he should • fall into the same sin again. 5. desire ever after to please God. 6. zeal of the same. 7. Reuenge vpo • himself for his former offense.
V
Q. What outward means mus • we use to obtain faith and all blesssings of God which come by faith.
A. The preaching of God's word • and the administration of the Sacraments, and prayer.
Q. Where is the word of God to be found?
A. The whole word of God needful to salvation is set down in the holy Scriptures.
Q. How know you that the Scriptures are the word of GOD and no • men's policies?
A. I am assured of it. First, because the holy Ghost persuadeth my conscience that it is so. Secondly, I see it by experience: for the preaching of the Scriptures have the power of GOD in them to humble a man when they are preached, and to cast him down to hell: and afterward to restore and raise him up again.
Q. What is the use of the word of God preached?
A. First it breedeth and then it increaseth faith in them which are chosē to saluatiō: but unto them that perish it is by reason of their corruption an occasion of their further damnation.
Q. How must we hear God's word, y t it may be effecuall to our salvation?
A. We must come unto it with hunger-bitten hearts, having an appetite to the word; we must mark it with attention, receive it by faith, submit our selves unto it with fear and trembling, even then when our faults are reproved: lastly, we must hide it in the corners of our hearts, that we may frame our lives and conversations by it.
Q. What is a Sacrament?
A. A sign to represent, a seal to confirm, an instrument to convey Christ and all his benefits to them that do believe in him.
Q. Why must a Sacrament represent the mercies of God before our eyes?
A. Because we are dull to conceive and to remember them.
Q. Why doth the Sacrament seal unto us the mercies of God?
A. Because we are full of unbelief and doubting of them.
Q. Why is the Sacrament the instument of the spirit to convey the mercies of God into our hearts?
A. Because we are like Thomas, we will not believe till we feel them in some measure in our hearts.
Q. How many Sacraments are there?
A. Two and no more. Baptism, by which we have our admission into the true Church of God: and the Lord's supper, by which we are nourished and preserved in the Church after our admission.
Q. What is done in Baptism?
A. Solemnly in the assembly of the church a covenant is made between the Lord and the party baptized.
Q. In y e making of this covenant what doth God promise to y e party baptized?
A. Christ with all blessings that come by him.
Q. To what condition is the party baptized, bound?
A. To receive Christ, and to repent of his sin.
Q. What meaneth the sprinkling or dipping in water.
A. The covenant being solemnly made, is thereby sealed and confirmed.
Q. How cometh it to pass that many after their baptism for a long time feel not the effect and fruit of it, and some never?
A. The fault is not in GOD, who keeps his covenants; but the fault is in themselves, in that they do not keep the condition of the covenant to receive Christ by faith, and to repent of all their sins.
Q. When shall a man then see the effect of his Baptism?
A. At what time soever he doth receive Christ by faith, though it be an hundred years after, he shall then feel the power of GOD to regenerate him, & to work all things in him, which he offered in Baptism.
Q. Howe if a man never keep the condition, to which he bound himself in Baptism?
A. His damnation shall be the greater, because he breaketh his vow made to God.
Q. What is done in the L. supper?
A. The former covenant made in Baptism, is renewed in the Lord's supper, between the Lord himself & the receiver.
Q. What is the receiver?
A. Everyone that hath been baptized, and after his baptism hath truly believed in Christ: and repented of his sin from his heart.
Q. What meaneth the bread & wine, the eating of the bread, & drinking of the wine?
A. These outward actions are a second seal, set by the Lord's own hand unto his covenant. And they do give every receiver to understand, that as God doth bless the bread & wine, to preserve & strengthen the body of the receiver: so christ received by faith, shall nourish him, and preserve both body and soul unto eternal life.
Q. What shall a true receiver feel in himself after the receiving of the Sacrament?
A. The increase of his faith in Christ, the increase of sanctification, a greater measure of dying to sin, a greater care to live in newness of life.
Q. What if a man after the receiving of the Sacrament, never find any such thing in himself?
A. He may well suspect himself, whether he did ever repent or not.
Q. What is another means of increasing faith?
A. Prayer.
Q. What is prayer?
A. A familiar speech with God: in which either we crave things needful, or give thanks for things received.
Q. In asking things needful, what is required?
A. Two things, an earnest desire, and faith.
Q. What things must a Christian man's heart desire?
A. Six things especially.
Q. What are they?
A. 1. That he may glorify God: 2. That God may reign in his heart & not sin: 3. That he may do God's will, and not the lusts of his flesh: 4. That he may rely himself on God's providence for all the means of this temporal life: 5. That he may be justified, and be at peace with God: 6. That by the power of God he may be strengthened against all tēptatiōs.
Q What is faith?
A. A persuasion, that these things which we truly desire, God will grant them for Christ's sake.
VI.
Q. After that a man hath led a short life in this world, what followeth thē?
A. Death, which is the parting asunder of body and soul.
Q. Why do wicked men and unbelievers die?
A. That their bodies may go to the earth, and their souls may be cast into hell fire.
Q Why do the godly die?
A. That their bodies may rest for a while in the earth. & their souls may enter into heaven immediately.
Q. What followeth after death?
A. The day of judgment.
Q. What sign is there to know this day from other days?
A. Heaven and earth shall be consumed with fire immediately before the coming of the Judge.
Q. Who shall be the Judge?
A. Jesus Christ the son of God.
Q. What shall be the coming to judgment?
A. He shall come in the clouds in great Majesty and glory with infinite company of Angels.
Q How shall all men be cited to judgment?
A. At the sound of a trumpet, the living shall be changed in the twinkling of an eye, and the dead shall rise again everyone with his own body, and all shall be gathered together before Christ: and after this, the good shall be severed from the bad, these standing on the left hand of Christ, the other on the right.
Q. How will Christ try and examine every man's cause?
A. The books of all men's doings shall be laid open, and every man shall be tried by the works which he did in his life time, because they ar • open and manifest signs of faith o • unbelief.
Q. What sentence will he give?
A. He will give sentence of salvation to the elect and godly, but he will pronounce sentence of damnation agains • unbelievers and reprobates.
Q. What state shall the godly be in after the day of judgment?
A. They shall continue forever in the highest heaven in the presence of God having full fellowship with Christ Jesus, and reigning with him forever.
Q. What state shall the wicked be in after the day of Judgment?
A. In eternal perdition and destruction in hell fire.
Q. What is that?
A. It stands in three things especially, 1. a perpetual separation from God's comfortable presence, 2. fellowship with the devil and his angels, 3. an horrible pang and torment both of body and soul, arising of the feeling of the whole wrath of God, poured forth on the wicked, forever, world without end.