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	matter_n	plea_n	12	3	11.4759	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A62128	XXXVI sermons viz. XVI ad aulam, VI ad clerum, VI ad magistratum, VIII ad populum : with a large preface / by the right reverend father in God, Robert Sanderson, late lord bishop of Lincoln ; whereunto is now added the life of the reverend and learned author, written by Isaac Walton.	Sanderson, Robert, 1587-1663.; Walton, Izaak, 1593-1683.	1686 (1686)	Wing S638; ESTC R31805	1,064,866	813

weeping and therefore his blood warmed with an holy zeal he starteth up forthwith maketh to the Tent where these two great Personages were and as they were in the act of their filthiness speedeth them both at once and naileth them to the place with his Javelin And the next thing we hear is God well-pleased with the zeal of his Servant and the Execution of those Malefactors is appeased towards all his people and withdraweth his hand and his plague from them And of that deliverance my Text speaketh Then stood up Phinees and executed judgment and so the Plague was stayed The Person the instrument to work this deliverance for Israel was Phinees He was the Son of Eleazar who was then High-Priest in immediate succession to his father Aaron not long before deceased and did himself afterward succeed in the High-priesthood unto Eleazar his Father A wise a godly and a zealous man employed afterward by the State of Israel in the greatest affairs both of War and Embassy But it was this Heroical Act of his in doing execution upon those two great audacious Offenders which got him the first and the greatest and the lastingest Renown Of which Act more anon when we come to it In his Person we will consider only what his Calling and Condition was and what congruity there might be between what he was and what he did He was of the Tribe of Levi and that whole Tribe was set apart for the service of the Tabernacle And he was of the Sons of Aaron and so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Family and Linage of the High-Priests and the Priests Office was to offer Sacrifices and to burn Incense and to pray and make atonement for the People Neither Levite nor Priest had to intermeddle with matters of Iudicature unless in some few causes and those for the most part concerning matters either meerly or mixtly Ecclesiastical but neither to give sentence nor to do execution in matters and causes meerly Civil as by any right or virtue of his Levitical or Priestly Office The more unreasonable is the High-Priest of Rome to challenge to himself any temporal or Civil Iurisdiction as virtually annexed to his spiritual power or necessarily derived thence Templum and Praetorium the Chair and the Throne the Altar and the Bench the Sheephook and the Scepter the Keys and the Sword though they may sometimes concur upon the same person yet the Powers remain perpetually distinct and independant and such as do not of necessity infer the one the other Our Saviours Vos autem non sic hath fully decided the controversie and for ever cut off all claim of temporal Iurisdiction as by any virtue annexed to the Keys If the Bishops of Rome could have contented themselves to have enjoyed those Temporalities wherewith the bounty of Christian Emperours had endowed that See whether well or ill whether too much or no I now inquire not but if they could have been content to have holden them upon the same terms they first had them without seeking to change the old tenure and to have acknowledged them as many of their fellow-Bishops do to have issued not at all by necessary derivations from their spiritual Power but meerly and altogether from the free and voluntary indult of temporal Princes the Christian Church had not had so just cause of complaint against the unsufferable tyrannies and usurpations of the Papacy nor had the Christian world been embroyled in so many unchristian and bloody quarrels as these and former ages have brought forth Yet the Canonists and they of the Congregation of the O●●tory like downright flatterers give the Pope the Temporal Monarchy of the world absolutely and directly as adhereing inseparably to his See and as a branch of that Charter which Christ gave to Peter when he made him Head of the Church for himself and his successors for ever The Iesuites more subtil than they not daring to deny the Pope any part of that Power which any other profession of men have dared to give him and yet unable to assert such a vast power from those inconveniences which follow upon the Canonists opinion have found out a means to put into the Popes hands the exercise of as much temporal power as they bluntly and grosly give him and that to all effects and purposes as full and in as ample manner as they yet by a more learned and refined flattery as resulting from his spiritual Power not directly and per se but obliquely and indirectly and in ordine ad spiritualia The man himself though he pretend to be supreme infallible judge of all Controversies yet heareth both parties and taketh advantage of what either give him as best sorteth with his present occasions and suffereth them to fall foul each upon other these accounting them gross flatterers aud they again these wicked Politicians but dareth not for his life determine whether side is in the right lest if he should be put to make good his determination by sufficient proof both should appear to be in the wrong and he lose all which whilst they quarrel he still holdeth It is a certain thing The spiritual Power conferred in Holy Orders doth not include the Power of Temporal jurisdiction If Phinees here execute judgment upon a Prince of Isarel it is indeed a good fruit of his zeal but no proper act of his Priesthood Let it go for a non sequitur then as it is no better because Phinees a Priest or Priests son executes judgment that therefore the Priestly includeth a Iudicatory Power Yet from such an act done by such a Person at least thus much will follow that the Priesthood doth not exclude the exercise of Iudicature and that there is no such repugnancy and inconsistency between the Temporal and Spiritual Powers but that they may without incongruity concur and reside both together in the same Person When I find anciently that not only among the Heathens but even among Gods own people the same man might be a King and a Priest Rex idem hominum Phoebique Sacerdos as Melchisedec was both a Priest of the most high God and King of Salem When I see it consented by all that so long as the Church was Patriarchal the Priestly and the Iudicatory Power were both setled upon one and the same Person the Person of the first born when I read of Eli the Priest of the sons of Aaron judging Israel 40 years and of Samuel certainly a Levite though not as some have thought a Priest both going circuit as a Iudge itinerant in Israel and doing execution too with his own hands upon Agag and of Chenaniah and his sons Izharites and Hashabiah and his brethren Hebronites and others of the families of Levi appointed by King David to be Judges and Officers not only in all the business of the Lord but also

Rota in rota so represented to Ezekiel in a Vision like the motion of a Clock or other artificial Engine consisting of many Wheels one within another some bigger some lesser but all depend upon the first great Wheel which moveth all the rest and without which none of the rest can move In him we live and move and have our being and in his hands are the hearts of the greatest Kings and how much more then of meaner persons which he turneth and bendeth which way soever he pleaseth Prov. 21. 1. Be the Ax never so sharp and strong yet can it not cut any thing unless the hand of the Workman move it and then it cutteth but where he would have it and that more or less as he putteth more or less strength unto it No more can Men whatsoever strength of wit or power they are endued with bring their own devices to pass but when and where and so far forth only as the Lord thinketh fit to make use of them Pharaoh's Chariot may hurry him apace to the place of his destruction because God had so appointed it but anon God taketh off the Wheels and the Chariot can move no farther but leaveth him helpless in the midst of the channel 24. So vain are all mens devices as to the serving of their own ends and the accomplishment of their own desires Yet doth Almighty God so order these otherwise vain things by his over-ruling providence as to make them subservient to his everlasting counsels For all things serve him Psal. 119. 91. Happy thrice happy they that do him voluntary service they can say with David and in his sence Behold O Lord how that I am thy servant Psal. 116. that have devoted themselves faithfully and accordingly bend their endeavours to do him true and laudable service by obeying his revealed will But certainly whether they will or no though they think of nothing less they shall serve him to the furthering and accomplishing of his secret Will As we find My servant David often as his servant in the one kind so we sometimes meet with My servant Nebuchadnezzar as his servant in the other kind 25. Another reason of the differences aforesaid is from God's Eternity Man is but of Yesterday and his thoughts casual They go and come as it hapneth without any certain rule and order And as himself is mutable fickle and uncertain so are the things he hath to do withal and wherebouts he is conversant subject to contingencies and variations Tempora mutantur So many new unexpected accidents happen every hour which no wit of Man could foresee that may make it necessary for us many times to depart from our former most advised resolutions as the Mariner must strike sail again perhaps when he hath but newly hoyst it up if the wind and weather change Sometimes a very small inconsiderable accident in it self may yet work a very great turn in a business of the greatest moment A Smith in setting on a shooe chanceth to drive the nail a little aside the Horse is prickt the prick endangereth the Horse and the Horse the Rider upon the defeat of the Rider suppose the General or some Commander of special use the battel is lost upon the issue of that battel may depend the state of a whole Kingdom and in the state of that may the interest of so many Princes and Kingdoms be involved that a very little oversight in a very mean person may occasion very great alterations in a great part of the World So easily may mens devices be disappointed and their expectations frustrated 26. But the Counsels of God are as himself is Eternal and unchangeable Ego Deus non mutor I am God and am not changed as if he had said The Nature of the Godhead is not capable of any change nor subject to mutability All change is either for the better or for the worse but God cannot change for the better because he is already best nor for the worse for then he should cease to be best It is therefore impossible he should change at all His determinations therefore are unalterable more than the Laws of the Medes and Persians for time hath long since alter'd those Laws but his Counsels remain yesterday and to day the same and for ever Chance and if you will Fortune also may have place in the affairs of men and the things that are done under the Sun but to him that dwelleth in heaven that inhabiteth Eternity that knew from the beginning and before the beginning of the world all things that are done in heaven and earth nothing can be casual new or unexpected to cause any change of purpose in him 27. A third Reason there is from the wisdom of God There is folly in all the sons of men They know but a very smal part of the things that are in the world and those things they do know but in part Besides their natural ignorance through precipitancy mis-information prejudice partial affections and sundry other causes they are subject to very many mistakes and aberrations whereby it cometh to pass that the wisest men sometimes are fouly overseen and are fain to take up the Fools plea and to cry Non putâram 28. But as for God he and he alone is wise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the only wise God 1 Tim. 1. As we are sure he will not deceive any being of infinite goodness so we may be sure he cannot be deceived by any being of infinite wisdom There is such a fulness of wisdom in him that it hath left no room for second thoughts or after-counsels nor can there be imagined any cause why he should retract or reverse any of that he hath determined to do either in part or in whole 29. Lastly As his Wisdom so is his Power also infinite Man may devise purpose and resolve upon a course for the obtaining of his intentions and that possibly with so good advise and upon such probable and rational grounds that there appeareth no reason to the contrary why he should not persist in the same mind still and pursue that his said resolution and yet there may a thousand impediments intervene to obstruct the business so that it shall not be in the power of his hand to remove those obstacles whereby to accomplish the desires of his heart O Lord saith the Prophet Ieremy I know that the way of man is not in himself it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps And Solomon a little before in this book A man's heart deviseth his way but the Lord directeth his steps 30. But as for the Lord his Power hath no bars or bounds other than those of his own will Quicquid voluit fecit Whatsoever the Lord pleased that did he in heaven in earth in the sea in all the deep places For who hath ever resisted his will Rom. 9. Doth he mean his revealed