More Flowers from a Puritan’s Garden (Part 1)

In editions 157 and 158 of our small magazine, we included some portions from Spurgeon’s little book, “Flowers from a Puritan’s Garden.” Spurgeon tells us that the book came about through his reading of Thomas Manton on the 119th Psalm.

In the book, Spurgeon quotes a line or two from Manton, and then goes on to make his own comment on Manton’s comment! Some of these “Flowers ... Distilled and Dispensed by C. H. Spurgeon,” we reproduced then with profit, and thought that another “bunch” of the same would not now go amiss.

Manton:

A good hunting dog hunts by sight as long as he can see his game; but when that is lost, he hunts by scent.

Spurgeon:

We must hunt a spiritual scent when sight fails us. The odour of the promise must direct us on our way when the mercy is numbered with the “things not seen as yet.” O for a quick nostril, that we may follow after those heavenly things which the eye seeth not and the ear heareth not. These will repay the chase.

Manton:

The prescriptions of a doctor must not be altered, either by the pharmacist or the patient; so we, the preachers, must not alter God’s prescriptions, neither must you, the hearers. We must not shun to declare, nor you to receive, “the whole counsel of God.”

Spurgeon:

It is as much as a man’s soul is worth to alter a word of God’s own writing: to take away from the Book, or to add to it, is forbidden, and threatened with the heaviest penalties. It is not ours to improve the gospel, but to repeat it when we preach it, and obey it when we hear it. The gospel, the whole gospel, and nothing but the gospel must be our religion, or we are lost men. Imagine a dispenser altering the ingredients of the medicine to suit his own notions! We should soon have him on trial; and surely, he would deserve to be tried on a still higher charge should a patient die through his folly. The gospel prescription is such that an omission or an addition may soon make that which was ordained to life be unto death. Lord, in my teaching I have ever kept to what thou has said. Never may I aspire to practice a new pharmacy, but may I faithfully dispense thine own unvarying prescription of salvation by grace through faith.

Manton:

If we lived in a house of our own, and the walls became decayed, and the roof ready to drop down upon our heads, we would desire to remove and depart for a while, but we should not therefore give up the ground and the materials of the house. No, we would have it built up in a better manner.

Spurgeon:

Even thus the soul desires to leave the poor frail tenement of the body, but not that the body may be utterly destroyed: it quits it with the hope of having the house of clay rebuilt in more glorious form. “Not that we would be unclothed,” says the apostle, “but clothed upon with our house which is from heaven.” Not that we would be turned out of house and home, but that we would enter upon our better and permanent abode, which the Lord will surely provide for us. O my Lord, thou hast made me to know that this body will one day cease to be a body for me, therefore, I will not pamper it. But thou hast promised it a resurrection, therefore, I will not defile it. Teach me how, whether in the body or out of the body, to dwell in thee, and honour thy holy name.

(to be continued in next edition)