SECT. IV. How far we must have proceeded in our General repentance and emendation of our lives before we Communicate?
TO this I answer, that No man is fit to Commu∣nicate, but he that is fit to die: that is, he must be in the state of grace; and he must have trimmed his lamp: he must stand readily prepared by a state of repentance; and against the solemn time, he must make that state more actual, and his graces operative.
Now in order to this, it is to be considered; that preparation to death hath great latitude; and not only he is fit to die who hath attained to the fulness of the stature of Christ, to a perfect man in Christ Jesus; but every one who hath renounced his sin with heartinesse and sincerity, and hath begun to mortifie it. But in these cases of beginning, or of Infancy in Christ; though it be certain that every one who is a new Creature, though but newly be∣come