Selected quad for the lemma: act_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
act_n	believe_v	faith_n	justification_n	5,240	5	9.4416	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A60614	The unjust mans doom as examined by the several kinds of Christian justice, and their obligation : with a particular representation of the injustice & danger of partial conformity / by William Smyth.	Smith, William, b. 1615 or 16.	1670 (1670)	Wing S4285; ESTC R10096	31,702	132

by ingaging him in intemperate courses or deprive him of the second by any act of private hostility as Duelling or the like or defraud him of the third by uncivil usage or vexatibus Suits and Controversies so far as in any of them or in any other way a man is disadvantaged in the comfort of his Life or means of Livelihood there is a wrong done he that hath done it is an unjust an unrighteous person and as such stands upon the necessity of restitution or in the danger of his exclusion from the blessed Inheritance Thus having gone over the Breaches that are made upon the several Branches both of Distributive and Commutative Justice there remains two more to be considered apart because they have a mixture of both Of the first of these I would give a is the Devil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 v. 3. The Devil hath filled their hearts with the Design 5. Gods certain vengeance upon that wrong by the fatal fall both of the one and of the other I shall not controversially apply this evidence but must for shortness sake leave it to your serious reflections for the ends I mentioned it Now that portion which hath been set apart for God and the maintenance of 16000 Servants of his Worship among us are either Lands or Tithes As for the wrongs done to the first they are commonly acted per Sorices Palatii as Bish. Andrews calls them by the unhappy men about the Courts of Princes who as they thirst after them so would not stick to suck the milk of Orphans drink the tears of Widows as well as devour the Demeans of Gods Servants because as defenceless as either as Sacrifices to their pride and luxury But it is alledged by the Favourites of this Design that the supreme Judicature may when they please take them away I answer they may impunè without controul and their Authority ought not must not be resisted but whether justè righteously or whether every one that hath a vote in their alienation doth not thereby rob God and man and may justly fear Gods vengeance for doing so I leave it to the former Evidence to determine As for the wrongs done to the Church in point of Tithes Decimam meam as St. Austin supposeth God to speak there depraedations happen upon lower contrivements as when either the powerful mans heavy hand first presseth out the Vintage for himself and then leaves some few drops enough rather to upbraid I intended should reflect upon the occasion of this Assembly where the proper business is judicially to administer right to them that cannot otherwise obtain it Let every one then that hath to do this day with the tender Rights of men whether they be the Ministers of the Law of every sort Witnesses or Juries have a care what they do their Souls are at stake the Oath of God is upon them the Curse of God over them the Cries of the oppressed about them the Evidence of my Text and the Law of Christ against them if therefore any unjust Cause goes away triumphant if any mans right be impeached through any defect in the discharge of their trust they are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unrighteous persons and wheresoever it lies must either make a timely satisfaction or one day appear at the great Assizes of the world to receive for the wrong that he hath done in this and where there shall be no respect of persons Col. 3. ult Thus I have finished the whole Scheme of Christian Justice to the universal performance of which the Gospel doth so strictly oblige us And now who would think it possible that a Christian Nation possessed with so many advantages of Religion should in contradiction to the clearest Evidence of Gods Will so generally degenerate from the practice of it in every part and that not among them only that have thrown off all Concern for Religion that were no wonder but amidst the very Professors of it even among them that pretend to a greater Zeal than others in appearance for it I cannot but think that there hath been some psal 73. 6. they were exhorted to the getting the Robe of Christ's Righteousness about and imputed to them and all was well By these and the like unhappy Modes of teaching the Gospel men have been driven from their Reason and Religion and set their Consciences loose to all unrighteousness And hence it is that they are grown every where so cross and intractable to all Authority Laws and Order and the State is full of Rebels the Church of Schismaticks our Houses of undutiful Children and untrusty Servants and men are made universally false and unfaithful one to another But let them pretend what Religion they will they shall not so escape all unjust persons such as I have described are upon the Rock the severe Sentence of my Text They shall not inherit the Kingdom of God PART II. So at last I am arriv'd at the Second Part of my Text The Unjust mans Doom or Punishment They shall not inherit c. In which are two things to be observed I. The Nature of the Punishment it is a disinherison ● The Quality of the State The Kingdom of God In the first here 's a case in Law a Title supposed and a Disinherison expressed A Title these unjust persons had and heirs at Law they were and so were all that are or shall be deprived of that eternal Blessing or they could in no sence be said to be disinherited 'T is true that Adam once forfeited the Estate but it was purchased again or redeemed by Christ not with Silver and Gold but with the dear price of his precious blood 1 Pet. 1. 18. And that Redemption was made as large as the Forfeiture as St. Paul discourseth Rom. 5. 18. So that the Reason why any man is now disinherited must be upon another account not because Adam sinned or that the Covenant of Grace was renewed with any number less than all men 1 Tim. 2. 4. or that Christ died for fewer than 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for every man Heb. 2. 9. but because that universal Covenant and Redemption was made conditional and required terms to be performed on our part which whosoever should refuse to keep should forfeit his Title to that new purchased Inheritance Now the Conditions of this new Covenant made in Christ are Faith and Obedience To which Repentance is to be added as Tabula post Nausragium of which more anon The sum then is That the unjust man as such in all the particular cases I have mentioned shall not inherit the Kingdom of God because he failed in both the Condi●ions 1. Every unjust person hath failed in the first he is not a true Believer in the sense of the Gospel For the clearing of which we are to consider that Evangelical Faith when mans Salvation or Justification is wholly attributed to it as when 't is said that He that believeth shall be saved John 3. 16. and

justified by Faith Rom. 5. 1. and saved by Faith Eph. 1. 8. and the like intends not any Act or Habit of believing in any strict sense but a comprehension of all Christ's Virtues and the whole Body of Christianity of which a just life is the most considerable portion Therefore St. Paul upon the breach of distributive Justice in one particular Instance of it that is a Child 's not providing for his Parents which by Family 1 Tim. 5. 8. is undoubtedly intended affirms that such a person 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hath denied the Faith and is an unbeliever so much worse than an Infidel as a practical Atheist is a greater Prodigy than a speculative But if Faith be taken in a stricter sense as sometimes it is and particularly by St. Jame Jam 2. unless it be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gal. 5. 6. except it worketh or is consummate by Love of which Love the greatest part in the Gospel sense is Justice it avails not it cannot it is dead saith St. Jam. that is as useless to a mans Justification as the Faith of Devils Whosoever therefore is an unjust person in any of the senses I have described him whether a Rebel to his Prince or refractory to the Church 〈◊〉 its Order and Institutions as to Distributive Justice or does wrong to his Neighbour as to Commutative let him pretend to what Faith in Christ he will let it be a receiving laying hold or reliance upon him or howsoever he hath been taught to define it he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Col. 3. 6. a Child of Unbelief and upon the non-performance of the Condition of Faith in the account of the Gospel he shall be dealt withal as an Unbeliever he hath forfeited the Inheritance he shall not inherit the Kingdom of God But then 2. Faith is not the only Condition of the Convenant by which we may preserve our Title common peace and happiness of the world that all Superiors might have entire Subjection and all others Peace and right So that a Rebel a Schismatick and the unjust of the lesser Orders may not be said only to disobey but to frustrate the prime purpose and design of the Gospel and to offer the greatest affront and contradiction to the very Spirit of Christianity For wheresoever the Grace of God is predominant it will certainly and observedly as its prime and signal effect reduce the Soul to the greatest innocency and simplicity tractableness and obligation of doing right and good to all with all which the sins of Injustice in every kind are perfectly inconsistent and irreconcileable The Sum is whosoever is an habitual Offender against any part of Christian Justice whether Distributive or Commutative hath broken not only a particular but an universal Commandment of Christ and is grossely disobedient and so hath forfeited his Inheritance his Title to the Kingdom of God Thus I have shewn you the unjust mans Doom in the nature of his Punishment He shall not inherit which will appear so much the greater when we consider the quality of the Estate from which he is disinherited The Kingdom of God Which is the next thing to be discours'd The Kingdom of God is a Figurative Expression design'd to exalt our Imagination of the blessed state to come And that because we cannot now behold its unconceivable happiness but as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Cor. 13. 12. per Speculum through the dark Perspective of Sense and a clouded Intellect and therefore it must be represented to us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by little Riddles and Shadows of the best humane Felicities Here it is by a Kingdom the greatest and noblest possession this world affords and so enough to confirm us that the Design of that lofty Metaphor the future Bliss is too great a loss for so small a recompense as the most prosperous unjust man gains by his unrighteous practices But that the unjust man may be more fully upbraided for the greatness of his Loss let me improve the Metaphor by saying that first he loseth God that is the Beatifical Vision of his Blessed Countenance which is better than Life it self He loseth the Comforts of his Blessed Redeemer who shall now appear to him with the terrible Aspect of Flaming Fire taking vengeance on him and all them that obey not his Gospel 2 Thes. 1. 8. He loseth the possession to make use of the most sensible Description of the happy issues of an holy Life of the City of the Living God the New Jerusalem the Society of an innumerable company of Angels of the General Assembly of the first born of the spirits of just men made perfect Heb. 12. Lastly He loseth his own Soul that is he brings himself into such a State that praestat nunquam natum it were better for him he had never been born or that a Milstone were hanged about his neck and were drowned in a Sea of Forgetfulness and Annihilation And all this he adventures that he may add one handful of Earth more to the Turf of his worldly possessions one grain more to his accumulated heap one garnish more to the pride of his Life from all which and from whatsoever else he enjoys in this world he shall possibly within a few Minutes probably within a few Moneths certainly within a few Years be as much a stranger as he that holds up the Train of the Persian Emperor or the Infant that hangs upon his Mothers Breast These are the miserable measures of the unjust mans Doom and Punishment But is he past the utmost Confines of Hope Is his evil an irreparable loss an irrecoverable danger Certainly no For though the Gospel have drawn up the Indictment against him it is not yet come to Judgment He is in a state of damnability but not Damnation Not so shipwrack'd but that there is Tabuta post Naufragium one Raft left to land him safe one remaining condition of his recovery and that is a timely Repentance For saith God if the wicked man shall turn away from his unrighteousness his Injustice and do that which is lawful and right c. if he shall restore the Pledge and execute judgment between man and man he shall save his Soul alive Ezek. 18. 27. When first by Repentance must be understood nothing less than what is necessary for all other sins a real departure from all unrighteous Actions and engagements Whatsoever is called Repentance and brings not this change be it Sorrow Contrition or Confession ought in no reason to be accounted sufficient for Evangelical Reconciliation Much less will Lachrymula Suspirium a Tear and a Sigh at the last period of our Life by such measures of Mercy as are revealed to us expiate the guilt of the sin of Injustice or any other sins habitually and reigningly continued in to that helpless hour Therefore 2. Besides this Repentance which is common to all other sins The unjust which doth much heighten the sin of Injustice above all others