Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	aaron_n	authority_n	moses_n	125	4	7.6542	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A53265	New-England pleaded with, and pressed to consider the things which concern her peace at least in this her day, or, A seasonable and serious word of faithful advice to the churches and people of God, primarily those in the Massachusets Colony, musingly to ponder, and bethink themselves, what is the tendency, and what will cetainly be the sad issue, of sundry unchristian and crooked wayes which too too [sic] many have been turning aside unto, if persisted and gone on in delivered in a sermon preached at Boston in New-England, May 7, 1673, being the day of election there / by Urian Oakes ...	Oakes, Urian, 1631-1681.	1673 (1673)	Wing O21; ESTC W23179	65,078	72

weak and despicable and obnoxious to great Danger they make us hang loose one from another and from the general interest of Religion and civil Liberty and render us like● Fig trees with the first ripe Figs which if they be shaken will even fall into the mouth of the eater Nah. 3.12 Yea they do as it were Arm our Adversaries against us and in a manner tempt them to set upon us A Mutinous Army and a Divided People are easily made a prey to their Enemies Scripture Reason and Experience attest unto the truth of what I say Again well it is if whilest we are contending about the preservation of the purity of Churches and Church-Administrations we are not laying a foundation for the corruption of them and that our Contentions and Divisions which naturally lead men in policie to endeavour the enlarging of their respective interests do not make more Church-members then the conviction or evidence of their fitness for such a priviledge May not that be the issue of these differences that Adherence to a party or to be a Darling of the Faction will become as p●ssant a Qualification with this or that party or Faction for admission into the Church of God as visible Saint-ship hath been among us And that Who are you for will be in reality the only Test and Tou●h stone of the sufficiency of persons for Communion with us in Church ordinances Nay further as I remember it hath been said of Lawyers and too much verified in the men of that profession that Contention maintains them and they maintain Contention so may it not be truly said of many men in Churches that have few commendable Qualities in them whether you consider them as men or Christians that Contention maintains them in Credit and Reputation with their party and they maintain Contention in heart and vigour among us This is the way whereby some men that are men of no remark for the practice of Piety or real Worth and Abilities in any respect do signalize themselves with their Brethren in Con●ention even by floating upon the top of these waters of strife and appearing with the foremost in the Defence of the Divided narrow Interest of this or that party amongst us Moreover it is a very great provocation to the God of peace that you should strive and contend judge and despise one another and fall out so unreasonably about lesser matters and such things as are forreign to the Bond of Christian-Communion When you should be blessing God that you agree so far you are wrangling because that you disagree a little when you should thank God that you agree so much you quarrel because you agree no more Certainly God is displeased Christ dishonoured Religion as to the Course and Race Reputation or Glory of it 2 Thess. 3.1 Disadvantaged Malicious Enemies Encouraged the World Offended the Rising Generation and your own Souls unspeakably prejudiced by these Divisions And what will the End be It is commonly observed by those that are conversant in Ecclesiastical Histories that in the Primitive times when the Churches had Peace and Rest and Respiration from the heat of Persecution they soon grew Quarrelsome and Contentious And the● God in a little time raised up some Persecutor or other to chastise them for their faults in that kind and whip them together again and then SEE could their Enemies say how these Christians love one another the contentions of Gods people in times of liberty make way for Persecution or some dismal Catastrophe The Divisions among us some whereof seem to admit no Help or Healing but are rather heightened and exasperated by the best Applications are in my eye like any Comet or Blazing-star or Prodigious Apparicion direfully portending woful Calamities What the Latter End will be our Saviour hath told us Mat. 12.25 Every Kingdome divided against it self is brought to Desolation and every City or House divided against it self shall not stand Divisions are sad presages of misery and lead the way to dreadful Desolations 6 Consider what will be the latter end of your unreasonable Iealousies abusive calu●●nie● or other ill Vsage of persons of great worth use and Interest among you Consider I beseech you in the fear of God what will be the end of the ill entertainment of the best men among you Who sees not that is not wofully blind that no men are more suspected and taken up in the lips of talkers Ezek. 36.3 calumniated and-abused then pious and faithful Magistrates and Min●sters Moses and Aaron of old as Meek and Humble and Faithful and Innocent as they were yet were suspected and traduced by many Male-Contents in Israel You take too much upon you Numb 16 3 Good Moses must still bear the murmurings of that discontented unruly people If the Lord cross them in denying them any thing they wanted or lusted after Moses presently must pay for it If they wanted flesh or water then presently they fly out against Moses We may thank you Moses for this would God we had stayed by the flesh-Pots in Egypt and dyed there have you brought us into this wilderness to starve us to death and kill us wi●h hunger Exod. 16 3. And if the Lord vindicate the cause of Moses and Aaron against any Rebels among them and destroy them in such a miraculous and extraordinary manner that one would have thought it should have for ever silenced all their murmurings and taught the survivers submission to the Authority of God vested in Moses and Aaron yet soon after the very next morning in cold blood as it were they are making head against them again and charging them with the murthe● of their Brethren Ye have killed the people of the Lord. Numb 16.41 It is the hard condition of Magistrates and Ministers that they must bear all the murmurings of discontented people and belo●d●d with all the obloquies and injurious reproaches that can be They had need be men of great meekne●s and patience able to bear much that are Pillars in the Church and Common-wealth But great is the sin and unworthiness of those that put them to such an exercise of meekness and patience And are not many among us guilty in this respect It is a sad time when a lying Spirit is gone forth into the mouths of many Professors when lyes are invented to the disparagement of Rulers and Ministers and calumnies and base Reproaches are vended and put off and dispersed through the Countrey with much subtlety and industry as if there were some Lying Office set up in New England It hath been my observation since I came among you that almost all the 〈◊〉 in this poor Countrey is made and carryed on by Lying Tale-bearer or Slanderer in the Hebrew RACHIL hath its Origination from ROCHEL a word which signifies a Merchant quasi fame as honoris p●oximi nu●●●ator Buxt●● one that sets to ●a●e the name and honour of other men We have many such Merchants or Pedlars rather that go