Kaina kai palaia Things new and old, or, A store-house of similies, sentences, allegories, apophthegms, adagies, apologues, divine, morall, politicall, &c. : with their severall applications / collected and observed from the writings and sayings of the learned in all ages to this present by John Spencer ...

[ 1202] True Christians are fruitfull Christians.

LOok where you will in Gods Book,* 1.1 you shall never find any lively member of Gods Church, any true Christian compared to any but a fruitfull Tree; Not to a tall Cypress, the Emblem of unprofitable honour; nor to the smooth Ash, the Emblem of unprofitable Prelacy, that doth nothing but bear keyes; nor to a dou∣ble-coloured Poplar, the Emblem of Dissimulation; nor to a well-shaded Plain, that hath nothing else but forme; nor to a hollow Maple, nor to a trembling Asp; nor to a prickly Thorn; nor to the scratching Bramble, nor to any plant whatsoever, whose fruit is not usefull and beneficiall; but to the fruitfull Vine, the fat Olive, the seasonable Sapling planted by the Rivers of waters.* 1.2 Yet it is most true, that the goodly Cedars, strong Elms, fast-growing Willows, sappy Sycamores, and all the rest of the fruitfull Trees of the Earth. i. all fashionable and barren Professors

whatsoever,* 1.3 they may shoot up in heighth, spread ••ar, shew fair, but what are they good for? Yes, they may be fit for the forrest, the ditches, the hedge-rowes of the world; not for the true saving soil of Gods Israel, that's a soyl of use and fruit, that's a place for none but Vines, for trees of righteousnesse, fruitfull trees, fruitfull Chri∣stians. He that abideth in me, bringeth forth much fruit, saith our Saviour, Ioh. 15. 5.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Io••. Hall Ex∣on. Serm. at Westm. 1634.
• * 1.2

  Psalm. 82. 8. & 1. 1.
• * 1.3

  Arbores sylve ad fructi••••can∣dum steriles, &c Ad fructum ve∣lut ad ultimum finem omnes ••o∣nae arboris par∣tes ordinantur. Pet. Berchor.