Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	apostle_n	young_a	youth_n	14	3	7.6372	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A38823	The Gospel treasury opened, or, The holiest of all unvailing discovering yet more the riches of grace and glory to the vessels of mercy unto whom onely it is given to know the mysteries of that kingdom and the excellency of spirit, power, truth above letter, forms, shadows / in several sermons preached at Kensington & elswhere by John Everard ; whereunto is added the mystical divinity of Dionysius the Areopagite spoken of Acts 17:34 with collections out of other divine authors translated by Dr. Everard, never before printed in English.	Everard, John, 1575?-1650?; Brooks, Thomas, 1608-1680.; Barker, Matthew, 1619-1698.	1657 (1657)	Wing E3531; ESTC R29421	513,595	936

the shell of the Letter except we go further and Iesus Christ opens the seals and shews us the life the marrow That which except it be given to us we cannot understand And therefore the Apostle flatly denies all other knowledge 2 Cor. 5. 14 15 16. for saith he the love of Christ constraineth us because we thus judge that if one died for all then were all dead and he dyed for all that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves but unto him that dyed for them Wherefore saith he in the 16. verse henceforth know we no man after the flesh yea though we had known Christ after the flesh yet henceforth know we him no more What may be the meaning of this blessed Apostle thus seemingly to sleight the very body of Jesus Christ In all probability he never saw the body of Jesus Christ upon earth in that 33 years he lived here except he had a vision of him as he marched to Damascus when he was smitten from his horse His meaning therefore must needs be If we know Christ after the Letter never so exactly the whole history of him what avails it Our knowledge of Jesus Christ must be internal spiritual experimental to live unto him that dyed for them if a man be not as the Apostle saith in the succeeding verses made a new creature altered and changed according to Christ in the inward man so that he lives no longer to himself but to him that dyed for him so that all old things are past away and all things are become new so that there is by the mighty power of Jesus Christ a new man begotten in us as the Apostle saith My beloved of whom I travel in birth till Christ be formed in yo● This is indeed that Christ that died for us else Christ dyed not for us his cross is of no effect he dyed in vain to us T is not all the knowledge and believing that ever thou canst attain to of an external Christ will do thee any good without a Christ begotten within thee a Christ in experience Hath any man gotten or attained though by much pains and industry any taste any knowledge of Christ otherwise it is but old things old knowledge old learning attained by the power of the old man fot self-ends And all old things must pass away saith the Apostle That knowledge that was conveyed to us by our parents or by our School-masters let it be what it will or by whom it will by all the Catechisms and Books that can be made and that we are able to apply them to our lives according to the Letter t is all but old things old knowledge as the young man in the Gospel he knew the law and had kept all those things from his youth but he failed in point of self-denial he obeyed from old powers and to old ends And although we had all knowledge and all power and all conformity in this regard before Christ be created in the heart it must all pass away This is that knowledge that we cannot depend on This is that knowledge that the Apostle regards not he esteems it Nothing let it be never so glorious and splendent and though all the world hath received it and in their words own it though in practise they renounce it he counts it all dross and dung Why St. Paul what manner of knowledge then is it that thou wilt know nothing besides it And that is the second thing he answers it himself in this chapter Lo if ye are able to understand saith he so that the god of this world hath not blinded your eyes we do speak wisdom even the hidden wisdom of God yet in a mystery not the wisdom of this world nor of the Princes of this world which comes to nought indeed this wisdom it tends not to outward pomp not to riches nor honour nor the setting up of men and parts but we speak wisdom to those that are perfect to those whom Jesus Christ hath pulled off the scales from their eyes What mystery is it to know Jesus Christ his death and resurrection outwardly and all the circumstances Will this faith save you No but to those that know no more we are very fools and they can see no wisdom in our words The carnal man knoweth not the Profound the Deep things of God neither indeed can he because they are spiritually discerned But he that can divide these waters shall have dry and firm ground to walk on and over Iordan safely He that can crack the shell those can rellish and digest these precious mysteries And to those they are the preciousest dainties in heaven and earth they are the sweetest excellencies wherein their souls can live and die these are the souls which delight themselves in Fatness undervaluing the world and all things therein as seeing them lean and empty things But to the carnal man and he that will go no farther then the Letter these truths we now speak of are the unrelishablest the tasteless est the sapless est meat you can give them we pour but water in their shoes ye cannot please them worse then when you talk of these things or preach of these things because ye are out of their element t is as unwelcome and as Nauseous as a c●p of cold water they are sick of such doctrine To tell them that they must be killed and slain their own knowledge their own lives must be crucified they must no longer have their own desires their own wils their own affections but must be content to cross themselves in every thing and to take up their cross dayly and follow Christ else they cannot be his Disciples oh here is vinegar and gall ye are the unwelcomest men to them in the world they cry with the Jews Our soul is weary of this light meat give us somewhat that we can feel give us some ponderous thing some comfortable thing somewhat that our senses may see and feel good Alas this is not the Heaven we look for Can we think it a happiness to be destroyed to be killed and crucified Give us such a Christ and such a Heaven as is good to our outward man who will let us have credit and honour and riches such a Christ that we may believe in who died so many years ago that will save us outwardly such a Christ that will be good to my eyes to my hands and to my feet to my back and to my belly such a Christ as will save us if we do but externally and litterally believe in him and will let us have our own wils and speak our own words and please our affections and save our souls at last I marry Sir Here is a Christ indeed this is such a Christ as all the world would have But give me leave to tell you This is a Christ of thine own making this Christ which thou speakest of

obtain this meeting and several times procured two but never could get three of them together to confer with and to give an account of whatever had been delivered by him which That he might vindicate Truth much hungred and thirsted for what the cause may be of such backwardness in them we leave to others to judge of But it may be if they would have met they might have learned that which they never knew For as truth is strongest so God had wonderfully come into him and declared himself by him in his late years and made him as it were a Sampson against the numerous Philistims and a David against the huge and mighty Goliahs of those times for even then in his dayes some of his acquaintance and followers who indeed were very knowing men and pretended High things as indeed they were but abused by them to great lie●nciousness making even those precious 〈◊〉 an occasion to the flesh insomuch that he 〈…〉 to threaten prosecution of them to 〈◊〉 for their vile words and actions if they so persisted after so often Admonition and he forb●d their following or hearing of him except they came with affection to truth and with desire to be built up in the most holy faith yet as he was a man of presence and Princely behaviour and deportment and fit to accompany such so he was also familiar even with the meanest and if willing to be taught he was as willing to instruct and teach them and they were upon this account more welcome to him then Lords or Princes imitating the humble carriage of his Lord and Master he not thinking it any disparagement to accompany with the worst and lowest of men so he might do them good for he knew he was not sent to call the righteous but the sinners nor to heal the whole but the sick not the Iustic●●ries and those who though they may be large in confession of sin yet really see but little in themselves and less to repent of Insomuch that those who were about him either in sickness or health would often say they gat more good instruction from him in discourse then by many Sermons of other mens he being still forward if they were backward to take occasions to communicate some Divine truths so that he won their attention to hearken to him as Christ did Maries who chose that better part which should never be taken from her And when they were backward to enquire of him he would move them to ask him questions if they had any doubts or questions to propound then for saith he when I am gone many will miss me therefore I desire you would make use of me and get what you can by me while I am here and the more you so do the more welcome but Christ I know will be a Teacher to those that are his He was also a man of a choise couragious and discerning spirit endowed with skill and depth of learniag judgement and experience to mannage what God had though but of late revealed to him as he often would say affirming he was now ashamed of his former knowledge expressions and preachings even since he commenced Dr. in Divinity although he was known to be a very great Scholar and as good a Philosopher few or none exceeding him yet when he came to know himself and his own heart and also to know Jesus Christ the Scriptures more then Grammatically literally or Academically viz. experimentally he then counted all those things even all his acquired parts and humane abilities loss and dung for the excellency of the knowledge of Iesus Christ and him c●ucified not onely externally but particularly buried and risen again in himself and for that blessed sight to see how the Scriptures were daily ful●illing in himself and others they concerning as much all times all men and all ages as those of whom they were the history wherein lies as in these Sermons he sheweth the chief excellency fatness and marrow of the Scriptures and without which the word is of so little use to us that to us it is not the word of God which the Apostle saith Heb. 4. is quick and powerful and mighty in operation sharper then a two edged sword and peircing between even the joynts and marrow as he also largely in several parts of this Book shewe●h And this was the alone knowledge whereby he was crucified to the world and to himself And thereby his depth in learning and Philosophy being sanctified they so much the more confirmed and centred his spirit they brought him to his heaven home and rest even into that ever blessed union and communion with God which before was but skin-deep learning and Philosophy as he termed it And the couragiousness of his Spirit was such when he was but a bare literal University Preacher as he afterward still called himself that he was the onely man that opposed preached against and held it out to the utmost against the late Kings matching with the Infanta of Spain when others durst but whisper their consciences and thoughts he chose Texts on purpose to shew the unlawfulness and the great sin of matching with Idolaters being often committed to prison for it when he was Preacher at Martins in the Fields and then by the next Sabbath day one Lord or other would beg his liberty of the King and presently no sooner out but he would go on and mannage the same thing more fully notwithstanding all the power of the Bishops being committed again and again being as I heard him say six or seven times in Prison insomuch they coming so oft t● King Iames about him he began to take more notice of him asking What is this Dr. Ever-out his name saith he shall be Dr. Never-out Then began the Bishops for this to be his 〈◊〉 adversaries fetching him up into their High-Commission and never left prosecu●ing him until they had took from him his Benefice being four hundred pounds a year And at his second convening thither spoken of before 〈◊〉 threatned him he would bring him to a morsel of ●read and all because he could not have his will of him to make him stoop and bow to him And where is the man that hath adventured for all their forward and great professions so far as he hath done in discharge of duty and conscienc● because he thought he was bound thereto by command from God! And yet for all this as he said of himself ●his he did by a meer power of self from natural abilities and from the power of the old man suggesting and working in him and carrying it out with much boldness m●gnanimity and true zeal as to mans judgement Oh! what great things may men do this way externally and have no principle of grace or true fear of God! yea not onely to the loss of Means and Liberty but to the loss of their heads and lives and meerly out of Vain-glory or some such Self-interest and herein truly is little

and hath dispensed withal but Never did nor Never will dispence with the Spiritual part He gave Abraham a Command to kill his son and had not he Really intended it h● had sinned And God commanded the Israelite to rob the Egyptians to borrow their Jewels of silver and gold and raiment and to spoil the Egyptians but never did he dispence with any man Nor never will To rob His God to rob God of his honour and his praise Will Any man Rob His God Mal. 3. 8. And therefore in all the Commandments Content not thy self with the letter of the Command Because for all that thou mayest go to hell But if God shall bring thee to ob●erve the marrow the inside of the Commandment This is done by the power of God himself in thee And he that can keep that I dare assure him He shall never perish neither in this world nor in the world to come For the Spirit is All in All And I may in brief touch at the spirituality of the ninth Commandment For the time is so far spent and my own ability to speak that I must leave the tenth to some other time And But that I made haste I would have spoken more largely to some of the former but according to that impulse of the spirit within at this present you have had my thoughts Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour The letter of it is against thy neighbour which I say still must not be neglected yet not rested in The spirit of it is That we should not bear false witness of God Thou professest thy self to be a Christian and a servant A child to God and that he is Thy Lord Thy master Thy father Thy God Thou being one of his houshold thou shouldst labour To Credit and Honour Him to whom thou belongest To report to the world in our lives and conversation the Holiness and Purity of our God and our father Because He is Holy and Pure And loveth righteousness and Hateth iniquity And so all his servants ought to do Thereby to bear True witness to the world of our God for else they will say as the proverb is Like servant like Master like Child like Father If you live otherwise you break this Ninth Command And bear false witness to the world of thy Holy and Pure God In all these I have taken the more pains that so you may see that when you have learned a Catechism or the Bible by Heart or that you are able to answer or speak to any point in Divinity acording to the Letter and the Grammatical Sense and have got The letter of it without Book Nay have gotten the external part in your practise and conversation yet you have not gotten The Substance The Life and the Marrow you have but attained onely The Shell and the Husk and not the Meat nor the Kernel So then by this time I hope you are come to see How this letter must be struck How this City Kiriathsepher must be smitten and taken if we mean to marry Achsah and then that is the way to make it unto us Debir that is The Word for it is never The word unto Us before As you may see in the Verse before my Text. This City before it was smitten it was called Kiriathsepher The City of the Letter but when it was smitten and taken then it was no longer Kiriathsepher The City of the Letter but i● was called Debir The Word for then it was the word and never before For this Book of the Bible As it consists of Words Syllables and Letters Is not the Word of God It is not nor cannot be the Word of God without the Mind and Meaning till it be smitten till the shell be crackt For the Word is A Spring shut up a Fountain sealed for as it is in my reading it that reading it makes it not the Word of God onely the reading makes them words and they are not words as they are written o● p●inted till one read them and make them words and syllables for in no Book whatsoever is there One word or syllable till they be read and that makes them words And if a Book be written or printed in English Hebrew or French c. It is the knowledge of him that reads makes them words For if an ignorant man look on them they are nothing So the Scriptures when they are read they are made words yet still the mind and the mysterie lies hid though the external sense be understood And The Acquired Natural parts will Reach This sense but the true and Hidden Sense the Natural man cannot come at As the Apostle saith The natural man perceiveth not the things of God for they are foolishness unto him neither indeed can he because they are spiritually discerned And besides if the natural man should perceive the things of God they are riddles they are foolishness to him they are wisdom onely to those that are perfect to those onely that are immediately taught of God so then it is clear this book of the Letter must not onely be read but Smitten by Othniel before you can find Gods Word For Gods Word as it is his Word is not for every eye to read but onely for those to whom it is Given as our Saviour sayes in another case To you it is given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of God but to them it is not given because in seeing they see not and in hearing hear not neither do they understand They have not received power from on high to smite it as Moses the rock to get out the pure water of life clear as chrystal proceeding from the Throne of God and of the Lamb Rev. 22. 1. T is not that Water or that sense that proceeds from the Universities or any the acquired parts or powers of Man but it must be freely given out by God himself and seldome to the learned Scribes and Pharisees or to the great Princes of the World but to the despised to the Off-scourings to poor Fishermen and the like that the Creature might be convinced that the power is of God and not in the wisdom of Men as the Apostle expresseth 1 Cor. 2. For this book of the Bible is But the Letter to the eye and to the ear But Gods Word that lies hid There must be a word to the heart And the Heart of stone must be removed and a Heart of flesh given We must buy of him eye-salve that we may see before we can be acquainted with Gods Word Gods Word is not Inke and Paper written or printed but Gods Word is as the Apostle saith Heb. 4. 12. Quick and powerfull sharper then a two-edged sword It is not the dull and dead letter That giveth Life which we see by experience in most even those that think themselves Doctors and Teachers and think they know all things And so indeed to them instead of