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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	call_v	read_v	write_v	3,024	5	5.2192	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A84588	A guide to salvation, bequeathed to a person of honour, by his dying-friend the R.F. Br. Laurence Eason, Ord. S. Franc. S. Th. L.	Eason, Laurence.	1673 (1673)	Wing E99aA; ESTC R230984	39,971	127

writing to Trajan sayes that he had no Crime to object against Christians but their Superstition If he had known the Truth he would have said then their Devotion we have the same Faith the same Ceremonies the same Mysteries which the Primitive Christians had but their interiour dispositions their substantial devotions their solid virtues are so ecclipsed in our time that scarce any thing of them appears amongst us so that we seem in respect of them to be Christians only in Name When St. Hierome was called before Christ his Judg in a Vision and the Judg asking him who he was he replyed I am a Christian the Judg said unto him thou lyest Ciceronianus es non Christianus Thou art a Ciceronian not Christian thou takest more delight in reading the works of Cicero than books of Piety Devotion and the Judg commanded an Angel to scourge him severely for it the marks of which remained for a long time in his body as he writes of himself to Eustochium Are they then to be esteemed true Christians who spend most of their time in reading frivolous Romances idle Play-books and such fopperies Voluptuous Man if God should demand of thee what art thou as sure enough he will one day if thou sayest unto him thou art a Christian he will give you the lye and say you are not a Christian but an Epicurian you observe the precepts of Epicurus not of Jesus Christ you have made a God of your belly and your chiefest pleasure hath been to satisfie your bruitish passions Vindicative person if God should demand of thee who art thou darest thou say thou art a Christian God will confound thee presently in saying thou art not a Disciple of Jesus Christ but rather of Cicero or Demosthenes to repel injury with injustice to curse them who curse you to take Revenge for words spoken amiss are the maxims of Cicero or of Demosthenes or other Pagans not of Jesus Christ who taught and practised the quite contrary as to forget Injuries to pray for our Persecutors or render good for evil What will your Vain Dame answer at the hour of Death which may happen sooner than she expects when God will demand of her what she is will she have the boldness to answer she is a Christian no sure she knows too well in her Conscience that she is a Worldling that she lived according to the Laws and Mode of the World that she hath a heart plunged in vanities and that she feared more to displease a person of the world than to offend God that she thought it not tedious to spend every day three or four hours to adorn and compose her self to appear grateful I know not to whom and thought much even on a day of Communion to spend one hour to prepare her self to appear agreeable unto God In fine many persons amongst us who make profession of the true Faith will appear then to be no true Christians but rather Antichrists having lived contrary to the Evangelical Rules and Maxims delivered to us by Christ and faithfully practised by the Primitive Christians his true followers and whom we challenge for our Predecessors in Religion Habentes Igitur Hebr. 12. having such a Cloud of Witnesses put upon us let us lay aside every weight that cloggs us and sin that beset us and let us with Patience run the Race that is set before us looking unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of our Faith It is the admonition of the Apostle such a Cloud of Witnesses who shew to us by their lives how we ought to live to obtain Salvation An antient Monk called Machaire having visited the Cells of other Religious who lived in great perfection returning from thence with great Confusion humbly said vidi Monachos I have seen true Monks and Religious in comparison of whom I am not one I deserve not to carry that name When I consider the lives of the antient Christians I cannot but say vidi Christianos I have seen true Christians in respect of whom we are but such in name and appearance only not in effect in manners and life But as St. Chrysostom adviseth if that we cannot arrive to so high a perfection as the antients did yet at least let us do what we can to imitate and follow them talem nubem such a Cloud If we endeavour to imitate them to our power they will be Clouds which will distill down upon us benigne influences refreshing dews from Heaven otherwise they will be Clouds which at the day of Judgment will cast forth against us Thunder-bolts of Vengeance they will Accuse Confound and Condemn us by the opposition of their former Lives and Vertues Were they not frail as we are composed of the same matter clogged and oppressed with the same flesh as sensible and delicate as we have we not the same God the same Jesus Crucified Have we not the same Sacraments Are we not in the same Church And yet we expect the same Paradice for a little which cost them so dear Is there any reason that without a lawful Fight and Victory we should possess the same Kingdom which they Conquered by so many Combats and possessed by so holy a Violence Curramus ad propositum certamen Let us run to the Fight set before us The Apostle doth not say Ad coronam To the Crown proposed for if there were no Crown to be obtained no Sallary to be received yet it would be highly honourable for us to Combate in the cause of God How many generous Spirits are in the world who hold it glorious to be employed in the occasion of venturing their blood and lives without any other reward than to have the honour of serving their Prince and Country and can we be of so base and servile a Spirit as to be inferiour to them in order to God in whom we move and have our being Let us cast our eyes on Jesus Christ Aspicientes in Authorem fidei He is the Authour of our Faith and ought to be the Idea and Model of our life let us look upon him not only to imitate him but to implore his ayde and succours that as he is the Authour of our Faith he may be also the Finisher of our Hopes as he is the Alpha and first principle he may be also the Omega and last end as he is our liberal Saviour by grace he may be our full recompence by glory This Treatise Containing the Principal means of Preserving and Encreasing this Life of a True Christian THIRD PART CHAP. I. The first Means is the Mortificaon of the Principal Powers and Faculties of the Soul with the Passions of the sensitive Appetite THe greatest Impediment in the affair of our Salvation is interiour which consists in the disorder of the powers and faculties of the Soul and Passions Rebellion of the flesh infidelity of our Sences all which enemies seem to conspire to our Perdition to destroy all Spiritual Life in us For the