4. The Pure In Heart
“Blessed are the pure in heart.”—Matthew 5:8
There may be some poor soul here to-night who is exclaiming, “Ah! That text cuts me up, root and branch; for, so far from my heart being pure, it seems to be the abode of every evil, rising up continually, causing me to groan and sigh, and cry to be delivered from it; but the more I groan and cry, the more those evils seem to rise up, until I am almost smothered.” Why, now, poor soul, you are just the character whose heart is pure. Every man’s heart is vile by nature, and it is only when there is a pure heart that that vileness is really felt. Suppose I use a figure to illustrate my meaning’. Let us take two sheets of paper, one black and the other white, and let us suppose that they can speak. Let us take them and put them down in one of the narrow, dirty streets of Coventry. The dirt soon begins to bespatter them, and the blacks from the chimneys of the silk-mills begin to fall upon them. The black sheet remains unmoved. It was black before, and it remains black; nor ‘is it made any blacker. But the white sheet, being smeared with the dirt and blacks, soon begins to feel very uneasy, and lustily calls out, “O take me away! take me away! or I shall be smothered!” Now this is just the difference between a pure, or new, heart, and a heart ,of our old unrenewed nature.—Longford, near Coventry.
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[A good man, who stood on the stairs, having been afraid to go in on account of his wretchedness, feeling himself to be exactly the character pointed out, stated that he was obliged to put his handkerchief into his mouth to prevent his calling out for joy, when he heard the above.]
William Gadsby (1773-1844) was a Strict and Particular Baptist preacher, writer and philanthropist. For thirty-nine years served as pastor for the church meeting at Black Lane, Manchester.
William Gadsby Sermons (Complete)
William Gadsby Hymns
William Gadsby, Perfect Law Of Liberty (Complete)
William Gadsby's Catechism (Complete)
William Gadsby's Dialogues
William Gadsby's Fragments (Complete)
William Gadsby's Letters (Complete)
