Comfort for All Those Afflicted in Conscience, Title page – To the reader
A MOST SWEETE AND assured Comfort for all those that are afflicted in Consciscience, or troubled in minde.
Written by that godly & zealous Preacher, M. Richard Greenham.
With two comfortable letters to his especiall frends that way greeued.
Psalm. 34. 18.
The Lord is nere vntounto them that are of a contrite heart, and will saue such as be afflicted in Spirit.
LONDON, Printed by Iohn Danter, for William Iones. 1595.
TO THE RIGHT Worshipfull Sir DRVE DRVRIE, Knight: W. I. wisneth continuall peace of conscience.
RIGHT Worshipfull, your zeale to Religion, and louelove of Learning; hauehave made mee bold to present you with this fatherles Orphane; which I hope the rather you will patronage, becaus it is the fruite of a godly Parent (once with your Worship familiar) who liuing, taught the Word sincerely; and being dead, hath lest some monument of his workes, necessary to instruct and edifie. This first is offred to the worlds view, containing all excellent comfort for an afflicted Conscience.
If you voutchsafe to accept it, I hauehave my desire, that boldly made choyce of you for your especiall desert. The God of merciemercy and Father of our Lorde Iesus lengthen your dayes, and make your end blessed.
Your Worships in all dutie. VV. I.
TO THE READER.
MAny are the calamities that sinne imposeth vponupon the wicked: but aboue all other plagues, the wound of Conscience is most heauie. Touching which, the holie Scripture affoords diuers examples, both of the wicked that hauehave mourned without hope, and the righteous that hauehave sorrovved & sought comfort. The svvetest of sinnes plesure is not vvithout a sharp sting, that piercing the Conscience, beginneth hell in the harts of the vngodlie, and prepareth Gods Children to seeke heauen by vnfained repentance. I can not here number all of either sort the Scripture mentioneth: I vvil onelyonly touch some, that it may appeare how sorrovv and vexation of minde, are sinnes hourelie companions. Pharaohs contempt of God, brought him to hardnesse of hart, hardnes of hart to headlong destruction: Balaam sinned thorough greedie couetousnes, and perished among the vncircumcised: the sonnes of Heli sinned, & fell before their enemies: Saul sinned and ended his life on his ovvne svvord: Antiochus and Herod blasphemed, and vvere smitten deseruedly: Iudas betrated, and died despairingly. All these vvith manie other (vvanting comfort for their woūded consciences) perished lamentablie: vvher on the other side, Iob, Dauid, Hezekiali, Peter, Zach…us, &c. confessed their faults, sought merciemercy & vvere comforted. Their conscienences bring … assured, they wer strong confident and vnremoueable, as app… in Iob, vvho so confidentlie beleeued, that for all his miserie, he crieth, Thogh the Lord kill me, yet will I trust in him. Dauid also, though his soul were powred out as water, yet hee commanded it to praise the lord. The sicke saith our Sauior, neede the Phisition: no mortall mā but hath been soule sicke, and therfore all men need comfort. It is necessarie that he which ministreth to the diseased shuld know the cause of the sicknes, that being remoued the medicine may more effectually worke: & they that minister the woord, ought to hauehave a feeling of their brethrens infirmities, that they may bee able to comfort the cast downe conscience, stirre the secure soul, and weaken the proud thought. That the Author of this treatise was such a one, appeareth (were there no other proofe) by it, containing such heauenly consolation, meeting so with al temptations, that for euill there can be no euasion. Mercies with iudgments are heere so mixed▪ that neither may he that standeth boast, nor he that is falne, be wholly discouraged. While he liued in this Citie, he was an excellent Teacher: after his death he hath left (among other heauenly labors) this comfortable doctrine; that preacheth peace to the troubled, comfort to the comfortles, fauour to the afflicted, health to the diseased, hope to the humbled, grace to the grieued Conscience. Which that it maie effect, I hauehave publisht for thy practise. Thine W. I.
In the title of the Letter against hardnes of hart, Robert is set for Richard, by the Printers error.