'There must be great trouble and contrition of spirit': a Tillotson sermon for Ash Wednesday

Confession must be always accompanied with great sorrow for our sins, considering the great dishonour we have brought to God, and the danger into which we have brought our selves; I will declare mine iniquity, (says David,) and I will be sorry for my sin.

And this Sorrow must be proportionable to the degree of our Sin. If we have been very wicked, and have sinned greatly against the Lord, and have multiplied our transgressions, and continued long in an evil course, have neglected God, and forgotten him days without number, the measure of our sorrow, must bear some proportion to the degree of our Sins; if they have been as Scarlet and Crimson, (as the Prophet expresseth it) that is, of a deeper dye than ordinary, our Sorrow must be as deep as our Guilt; for it is not a slight trouble and a few tears that will wash out such stains.

Not that tears are absolutely necessary, tho' they do very well become, and most commonly accompany a sincere Repentance. All tempers are not in this alike; some cannot express their sorrow by tears, even then when they are most inwardly and sensibly grieved. But if we can easily shed tears upon other occasions; certainly rivers of tears ought to run down our eyes, because we have broken God's Laws, the Reasonable, and Righteous, and good Laws of so good a God, of so Gracious a Sovereign, of so mighty a Benefactor, of the Founder of our Being, and the perpetual Patron and Protector of our lives: but if we cannot command our tears, there must however be great trouble and contrition of Spirit, especially for great sins.

From 'A Sermon preached on Ash Wednesday, of Confessing and Forsaking Sin in order to Pardon', by John Tillotson.

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