Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	good_a	holy_a	scripture_n	3,042	5	5.5201	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A59552	A sermon about the government of the thoughts, preach'd before the King & Queen, at White-Hall, the 4th of March being the 2d Sunday in Lent, 1693/4 / by ... John, Lord Archbishop of York.	Sharp, John, 1645-1714.	1694 (1694)	Wing S2980; ESTC R5119	13,482	36

never be at such a pass as to say I have nothing to do I do not know how to spend my next Hour But should so order the Course of his Life that all the Portions of his Time as much as is possible may be filled with some useful or at least some innocent Employment It is Idleness and having nothing to do that is the Mother of most of those vain and unprofitable and sinful Fancies in which some Men spend their days And whereas Temptations do now and then come in the way of other Men the Idle Man is forced to seek out Temptations for the shipwrack of his Vertue And therefore no Wonder if he that seeks them finds abundance of them And truly Loose and Impertinent Conversation which was the other thing I named though it looks something with a better Grace yet is not much better than Idleness For where-ever it is much used it will so emasculate a Man's Mind and take off the edge and vigour of it as to serious things that he cannot easily get it into a good Frame again Evil Communication saith St. Paul doth corrupt good Manners And therefore those People a great part of whose Life is taken up in gadding up and down in Play in merry Meetings in telling or hearing idle Stories and the like It is impossible but their Thoughts and Inclinations and the whole Frame of their Hearts will be suitable that is to say very frothy very light and foolish not to say profane and wicked and Atheistical too if the Company they much converse with be of that strain Thirdly Another thing of great moment for the keeping our Hearts is to be as attentive as is possible to the first Motions of our Minds and whenever we find that they tend toward something that is forbidden to stop them as soon as we can We cannot as I told you before often prevent irregular Desires or Passions or Inclinations from arising in our Minds upon sundry occasions But this we can do As soon as we are aware of them we can refuse our Consent to them and in that case I hope they will not be imputed to us as Sins Nay not only so but we can refuse their breaking out or shewing themselves in our Words or our Actions For the Motions of our outward Members are all at our Command though the first Motions of our Minds be not Here therefore will lie a main Point in the Art of well governing our Minds and Thoughts You cannot perhaps for instance prevent a sudden Passion of Anger from rising in your Minds upon twenty Accidents But as soon as you feel this Passion you can thus far stifle it you can seal up your Mouth so that the Passion shall not vent it self in unseemly Words And if you will withdraw that Fuel from the new-kindled Fire it will soon be extinguished and die Whereas if you suffer it to break out in bitter Speeches and Expressions it will flame beyond measure Thus again If any undecent impure Fancies or Desires should be excited in you upon any occasion It was not perhaps in your power to keep them from coming into your Minds But it is in your power to withdraw from the Temptation that caused them and to endeavour to direct your Thoughts to some other Object at least not to proceed one step in any outward Action towards the Accomplishing of those Desires If you take this Course the Disturbance of your Mind will soon cease and you will return presently to your ordinary Temper And let me tell you this further That by your being thus careful to resist and smother the first beginnings of Sin You will not only preserve in a great measure the Innocency of your Minds under the present Temptation But you will also have this farther advantage that by this means you increase your Power over your Thoughts against the next time that the Temptation returns Every check you give to the first Motions of Sin makes the next Assault of them the less furious And if you do constantly use your selves thus to Guard and Watch over your Hearts you will in time obtain such a Command over them that you will not be troubled with a quarter of those irregular desires and passions which heretofore upon several Occasions used to be kindled in you By this Method you will strengthen your Faculties and enlarge your Powers and by degrees bring your selves to that happy Temper of Soul that there will be no great War between the Law of your Member s and the Law of your Minds But the World and the Flesh will be Crucified to you as you are to them that I may use St. Paul's Expressions But then Fourthly That you may be able not only to keep bad Thoughts out of your Minds but also to have a constant Spring of good ones there are some particular Exercises very proper for this purpose to be recommended Such I mean as these Converse with discreet and pious Persons Reading good Books especially the Holy Scriptures Taking times of Meditation and Recollection And above all Fervent and Constant Prayer to God It is not to be told how every one of these things doth help to inspire us with good Thoughts and Purposes A little passage now and then though but occasionally dropt in a Conversation that is to the business of Vertue and Goodness will supply us some times with matter for good Thoughts for a considerable while after What lasting Impressions then do you think would be left upon our Minds if we made it our constant Exercise every day to read or hear something out of the Bible or some other good Book with a design to grow Better thereby But above all things we must take care to be diligent and serious in our Applications to the Throne of Grace It is Hearty Prayer and Devotion that when all is done will prove the most Effectual Means for the keeping our Hearts steady to that which is Good and securing them from the Pollutions of the sensible Earthly Objects that do surround us O therefore let us be constant in our Religious Offices Nay let us take every opportunity that our Affairs will allow us of raising our Minds to God and thanking him for his infinite Love and Goodness to us and imploring the Continual Influences of his Grace and Holy Spirit and re-inforcing our Vows and Purposes of persevering in his Service By this means we shall come to lead Spiritual Lives indeed Our Souls will be a perpetual Fountain of Good Thoughts And while we live here our Conversation will be in Heaven For God and Christ and the things above will have our Hearts though the World hath our Bodies But then in the Fifth and last place Notwithstanding what I have hitherto said concerning the Diligence with which we are to keep our Hearts Yet this is always to be remembered That with our Diligence we must be careful to join Discretion My Meaning is this We must have a care not to intend our Thoughts immoderately and more than our Tempers will bear even to the best things But we must so keep our Hearts as at the same time to preserve our Healths and keep up the Vigour of our Minds And the way to do that is Not to put them too much or too long upon the stretch at any one time But to relax them when there is occasion and to let them run out and entertain themselves upon any thing that comes next to hand so long as it is Innocent It is a vain thing to imagine that we can always be thinking of our great Business or that we can be always a Praying or Reading or Meditating or that as our Condition is in this World even the greater part of our Thoughts should be such as we call Devout and Religious Thoughts God hath provided a great deal of other Business for us to apply our Minds to so long as we live in this World And by minding that diligently and conscientiously we do serve God as acceptably as if we were Reading or Praying Nay even then when we have no urgent Business upon our hands to take up our Minds it is not necessary that we should be always thinking of Religion Nor would I call every Thought a vain or an idle or a sinful Thought that hath not God or our Spiritual Concernments for its Object Even the most Spiritually-minded among us must oftentimes be content to be entertained with such Thoughts as our Company or our Temper or the present Circumstances we are in do suggest to us And provided those Thoughts be innocent and do not intrench upon the Laws of Piety and Purity and Charity be they otherwise very trifling and impertinent I say I would not look upon them as ill Thoughts nor have any one angry at himself upon account of them The truth of it is So long as we consist of Bodies and Souls we cannot always be thinking of Serious things They indeed are the Wisest that think of them most but it is even dangerous to attempt to think of them always For as most Mens Constitutions are that is the ready way to spoil the Habit of our Bodies and by that means to render our Minds perfectly unfit for Thinking at all to any good Purposes Thus have I laid before you the Main Things wherein as I do believe the right Governing our Thoughts doth consist And I doubt not they are so safe and so effectual that whosoever will sincerely practise them as far as he can will so keep his Heart that the Issues from thence in his Life and Conversation will be Happy and Prosperous I conclude all with the Collect of this Day Almighty God who seest that we have no power of our selves to help our selves Keep us both outwardly in our Bodies and inwardly in our Souls that we may be defended from all Adversities which may happen to the Body and from all EVIL THOUGHTS which may assault and hurt the Soul through Jesus Christ our Lord. FINIS