Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	act_n	sin_n	will_n	1,889	5	6.7849	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A27062	Two treatises tending to awaken secure sinners viz., 1. The terror of the day of judgment, from 2 Cor. 5. 10, 2. The danger of slighting Christ and his Gospel, from Matth. 22. 5 / by Richard Baxter.	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.; Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691. Terror of the day of judgment.; Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691. Danger of slighting Christ and his gospel.	1696 (1696)	Wing B1443; ESTC R16419	109,733	266

of every Crime to the Will of Man and there to leave it Upon this all Laws and Judgments are grounded From Ignorance and intellectual Weakness Men commonly fetch Excuses for their Faults but from the Will they are aggravated If we think it strange that Man's Will should be the first Cause so much as of a sinful Mode and answer all occurring Objections it may suffice that we are certain the Holy Majesty is not the Author of Sin and he is able to make all this as plain as the Sun and easily answer all these vain Excuses though we should be unable And if we be much ignorant of the Frame and Motions of our own Souls and especially of that high self-determining Principle free-Will the great Spring of our Actions and the curious Engine by which God doth sapientially govern the World it is no wonder considering that the Soul can know it self but by Reflection and God gave us a Soul to use rather than to know it self and to know its Qualities and Operations rather than its Essence The five and twentieth Excuse No Man can be saved nor avoid any Sin nor believe in Christ but those whom God hath predestinated thereto I was under an irreversible Sentence before I was born and therefore I do nothing but what I was predestinated to do and if God decreed not to save me how could I help it Answ 1. God's Judgments are more plain but his Decrees or secret Purposes are mysterious And to darken Certainties by having recourse to Points obscure is no part of Christian Wisdom God told you your Duty in his Word and on what Terms you must be judged to Life or Death hither should you have recourse for Direction and not to the unsearchable Mysteries of his Mind 2. God decreeth not to condemn any but for Sin Sin I say is the Cause of that Condemnation though not of his Decree 3. God's Decrees are Acts Immanent in himself and make no change on you and therefore do not necessitate you to sin any more than his Fore-knowledg doth For both cause only a necessity of Consequence which is Logical as the Divines on both sides do confess And therefore this no more caused you to sin than if there had been no such Decree And it 's a Doubt whether that Decree be not negative a willing Suspending of the Divine Will as to evil or at most a Purpose to permit it The six and twentieth Excuse If it be no more yet doth it make my Perdition unavoidable for even God's Fore knowledg doth so for if he foreknow it all the World cannot hinder it from coming to pass Answ Must God either be ignorant of what you will do or else be the Cause of it If you foreknow that the Sun will rise to morrow that doth not cause it to rise If you foreknow that one Man will murder another you are not the Cause of it by foreknowing it So is it here The seven and twentieth Excuse God might have hindred my Sin and Damnation if he would Answ And will you wilfully sin and think to escape because God doth not hinder you The Prince that makes a Law against Murder could lock you up and keep you from being a Murderer But are you excusable if he do not We are certain that God could have hindered all the Sin and Death and Confusion and Misery that is in the Word and we are as certain that he doth not hinder it but by forbidding it and giving Men means against it and we are certain that he is Just and Good and Wise in all and not bound to hinder it And what his Reasons are you may better know hereafter In the mean time you had been better have looked to your own Duty The eight and twentieth Excuse How could I be saved if Christ did not die for me He died but for his Elect and none could be saved without his Death Answ He did die for you and for more than his Elect though he absolutely purposed only their Salvation Your Sins crucified him and your Debt lay upon him and he so far ransomed you that nothing but your wilful Refusal of the Benefits could have condemned you The nine and twentieth Excuse It was Adam's Sin that brought me into this Depravedness of Will which I can neither cure nor could prevent Answ 1. If Adam cast away his Holiness he could no more convey that to us which he cast away than a Nobleman that is a Traitor can convey his lost Inheritance or Honours to his Son 2. You perish not only for your Original Sin but for rejecting the recovering Mercy of the Redeemer you might have had Christ and Life in him for the accepting The thirtieth Excuse God will require no more than 〈◊〉 gives He gave me not Grace to repeat and believe 〈◊〉 without his Gift I could not have it Answ 1. God will justly require more than he giveth that is the improvement of his Gifts as Mat. 25. shews He gave Adam but a Power to persevert and not actual Perseverance Yet did he justly punish him for want of the Act even for not using by his own Wll the Power which he had given him 2. It is long of your self if God did not give you Grace to believe It was because you wilfully refused some preparatory Grace Christ found you at a great distance from him and he gave you Grace sufficient to have brought you nearer to him than you were you had Grace sufficient to have made you better than you were and restrained many Sins and brought you to the means when you turned your back on them tho this were not sufficient to cause you to believe it was sufficient to have brought you nearer to believing and through your own wilfulness became not effectual even as Adam had sufficient Grace to have stood which was not effectual So that you had not only Christ offered to you if you would but accept him but you had daily and precious Helps and Means to have cured your Wills and caused you to accept him for neglect of which and so for not believing and so for all your other Sins you justly perish The one and thirtieth Excuse Alas M●● is a Worn a dry Leaf Job 13. 25. a silly foolish Creature and therefore his Actions be not regardable nor deserve so great a Punishment Answ Though he be a Worm and as nothing to God and 〈◊〉 by Sin yet he is naturally so noble a Creatur● 〈◊〉 ●●age of God was on him Gen. 12. 26. 〈◊〉 1. James 3. 9. and the World made his Serv●●● 〈◊〉 Angels his Atten●ants Heb. 1. 14. so noble 〈◊〉 Christ died for him God takes special care of him he is capable of knowing and enjoying God 〈◊〉 Heaven is not thought too good for him if he will ●ey And he that is capable of so great Good must 〈◊〉 capable of as great Evil and his Ways not to be so ●●erlooked by that God that hath undertaken to be

Goodness and so be led up to the Consideration of him that you might fall in love with himself who was the Fountain the Life the End of all And do you overlook God in the Creature and live as without him in the World and dote upon that which should have drawn you to himself and then lay the Blame on God If he send a Sutor to speak to you in his Name and write you a Love-Letter with his own Hand will you fall in love with the Messengers or the Letter and neglect the Sender and then blame him that wrote his Letter on so fair a Paper or in so neat a Hand or that sent it by such a comely Messenger Certainly these Excuses are too gross to take with the wise and righteous God or to seem sufficient to a well informed Conscience 2. And whereas you speak of the Power of these Objects was there not much more in God in Christ ●n the promised Glory to have drawn your Heart anoter Way Why then did not these take as much with you as the other You could not choose forsooth but be enticed with such Baits as were fitted to your sensual Appetite and such things as a Dog or a Swine may enjoy as well as a Man but you could choose when Christ and Glory were offered you yea you did choose to refuse the Offer and tread them under Feet by your neglect When Satan set your Cups and your Harlots and your Profits before you on one side did not God set his Favour and everlasting Happiness on the other side And was it wise or equal Dealing to prefer your Lusts before that Glory 3. Moreover it was not in the Power of any of those Baits to force your Will or to necessitate you to choose them They could be but Baits to entice you and it was still in your own Choice whether you would yield to the Enticement and choose them or not Shall every Man be false to God that hath any Bait to entice him from him will you excuse your Child or Friend if he would be false to you upon as great Enticements as these If a Cup of Drink or a Whore or a little Gain could draw him more than all your Love and Interest I do not think you would hold him excused And whereas you speak of the nearness and continuance of these Allurements I would fain know was not God as near you continually near you to draw you to himself Faith might have seen him though Flesh and Blood cannot Did he not stand by you when you were in your Cups and lustful Pleasures Did he not tell you of the Danger and offer you far better things if you would obey him and despise those Baits But you would hearken to none of this you should have remembred that he stood over you and was looking on you and you should have said as Joseph Gen. 39. 9. How can I do this great Wickedness and 〈◊〉 against God You had also Scripture near you and Reason near you and Conscience near you as well as the Bait was near you And therefore this is a vain Excuse The twentieth Excuse It was God that let loose the Devil to tempt me and he was too subtile for me to deal with and therefore what wonder if I sinned and were overcome Answ 1. He did nor let loose the Devil to constrain you to Sin He could but entice and you might choose whether you would yield The Devil could neither make you sin against your Will nor yet necessitate you to be willing 2. You were a sure Friend to Christ that while that would forsake him as oft as you were tempted by the Devil Is that a Friend or a Servant worthy to be regarded that will disobey you or betray you as oft as he is tempted to it 3. Will you excuse your Servant if he leave your Work undone and follow Cards or Dice or the Ale-house and say I was tempted to it by one that was cunninger than I Shall every Murderer or Thief escape hanging because the Devil was too cunning for him in his Temptations Would you have the Jury or the Judg to take this for a good Excuse 4. And why did you not hearken to God that enticed you the other way You forget what Helps he afforded you to discover the Wiles of Satan and to vanquish the Temptation He told you it was an Enemy that tempted you and would you hearken to an Enemy He told you it was a Dream a Shadow a painted Pleasure a guilded Carcass a lying Promise and deceitful Vanity by which you were tempted and yet would you regard it before your God He told you that it was your God your Saviour your Hope your everlasting Happiness that the Tempter would beguile you of And yet would you be beguiled He told you and plainly and often told you that the Temper would ●ead you to eternal Fire and undo you everlastingly beore you were aware and that a fatal Hook was cover●d with that Bait And yet would you swallow it 5. It is plain by all this that it was not your natural Weakness of Faculties that caused you to be over●●me by the Subtilties of the Devil as a silly Child 〈◊〉 deceived by a crafty Fellow that overwits him But it was your Carelesness Inconsiderateness your ●ensual Inclinations and vicious Disposition that drew you to a wilful Obeying of the Tempter and rejecting the wholesom Advice of Christ This therefore is a ●rivolous Excuse of your Sin The one and twentieth Excuse But I hope you will not say that all Men have Free Will And if my Will were not free how could I choose but sin Answ 1. Your Will was not free from God's Rule and Government 2. Nor was it free from its natural Inclination to Good in general for either of these were more properly Slavery 3. Nor was it free from the Influence of a dark Understanding 4. Nor free from its own contracted vitious Inclination 5. Nor freed from the Temptations of the Flesh the World and the Devil But it was 1. Free from any natural Determination to Evil or to any thing that was doubtful 2. And free from the Coaction or Violence of any 3. And free from an irresistible Determination of any exteriour Cause at least ordinarily So that naturally as Men you have the Power or Faculty of determining your own Wills and by your Wills of ruling your inferiour Faculties in a great measure yea of ruling the S●nses and the Phantasy it self which doth so much to dispose of our Understanding And if your Wills which are naturally free are yet so habitually vitious that they encline you to do evil that is not an Excuse but an Aggravation of your Sin But of this more under the next The two and twentieth Excuse But I have not Power of my self to do any thing that is good what can the Creature do without Christ we can do nothing It is God that must give me

Ability or I can have none and if he had given it me I had not been an Vnbeliever or Impenitent I can no more believe of my self than I can fulfil the Law of my self Answ 1. These are the vain Cavils of learned Folly which God will easily answer in a Word The Word Power is taken in several Senses Sometime and most commonly and fitly for a Faculty or a Strength by which a Man can do his Duty if he will This physical Power you have and the worst of Sinners have while they are Men on Earth Were they actually willing they might acceptably perform sincere Obedience and were they dispositively willing they might actually believe and will And thus the Ungodly have Power to believe Sometime the word Power is taken for Authority or Leave for legal or civil Power And thus you have all not only Power or Liberty to believe but also a Command which makes it your Duty and a Threatning adjoined which will condemn you if you do not Sometime the Word Power is taken ethically and less properly for a Disposition Inclination Habit or Freedom from the contrary Habit or Disposition And in this Sense it 's true that none but the effectually called have a Power to believe But then observe 1. That this is but a Moral less proper and not a Physical proper Impotency And therefore Austin chuseth rather to say that all Men have power to believe but all have not a Will or Faith it self because we use to difference Power from Willingness and Willingness actuateth the Power which we had before And therefore our Divines choose rather to call Grace a Habit when they speak exactly than a Power and Dr. Twiss derides the Arminians for talking of a Power subjected in a Power 2. Note that this Impotency is but the same thing with your Unwillingness and wilful Blindness in another Word 3. Note that this Impotency is long of your selves as to the Original and much more as to the not curing and removing of it Hath God given you ●o means towards the Cure of this Disability which you have neglected 4. Note that this Impotency is not a just Excuse but an Aggravation of your Sin If you were willing to be the Servant of Christ and yet were not able either because he would not accept you or because of a want of natural Faculties or because of some other natural Difficulty which the willingest Mind could not overcome this were some Excuse But to be habitually wilful in refusing Grace is worse than to be meerly actually unwilling If a Man have so accustomed himself to Murder Drunkenness Stealing or the like Wickedness so far that he cannot leave it will you therefore forgive him or will any Judg or Jury hold him excused Or rather think him the more unfit for Mercy 5. Note also that the want of a supernatural Habit no nor the Presence of the contrary Habit do not efficiently determine the Will to particular Acts much less take away its natural Freedom 6. And that till Habits attain an utter Predominancy at least there is a Power remaining in the Will to resist them and use Means against them Though eventually the perverse Inclination may hinder the use of it The three and twentieth Excuse I have heard from learned Men that God doth determine all Actions natural and free as the first efficient physical immediate Cause or else nothing could act And then it was not long of me that I chose forbidden Objects but of him that irresistibly moved me thereto and whose Instrument I was Answ This is a trick of that Wisdom which is Foolishness with God and to be deceived by vain Philosophy 1. The very Principle it self is most likely to be false and those that tell you this do err Much more I think may be said against it than for it 2. I am sure it is either false or irreconcileable with God's Holiness and Man's Liberty and Culpability so that its a mad thing to deceive your selves with such philosophical Uncertainties when the Truth which you oppose by it is infallibly certain That God is not the Author of Sin but Man himself who is justly condemned for it is undoubtedly true and would you obscure so clear a Truth by searching into Points beyond humane Reach if not unsound as you conclude them The four and twentieth Excuse But at least those learned Divines among us that doubt of this do yet say that the Will is necessarily and infallibly determined by the practical Vnderstanding and that is as much unresistibly necessitated by Objects and therefore whatever act was done by my Vnderstanding or Will was this necessitated and I could not help it They say Liberty is but the Acting of the Faculty agreeably to its Nature And it was God as Creator that gave Adam his Faculties and God by providential Dispose that presented all Objects to him by which his Vnderstanding and so his Will were unavoidably necessitated Answ This is of the same Nature with the former uncertain if not certainly false Were this true for ought we can see it would lay all the Sin and Misery of this World on God as the unresistible necessitating Cause which because we know infallibly to be false we have no reason to take such Principles to be true which infer it The Understanding doth not by a necessary Efficiency determine the Will but morally or rather is regularly a Condition or necessary Antecedent without which it may not determine it self Yea the Will by commanding the Sense and Phantasy doth much to determine the Understanding As the Eye is not necessary to my going but to my going right so is not the Understanding's Guidance necessary to my willing there the simple Apprehension may suffice but to my right willing There are other ways of determining the Will Or if the Understanding did determine the Will efficiently and necessarily it is not every act of the Understanding that must do it If it be so when it saith This must be done and saith it importunately yet not when it only saith This may be done or you may venture on it which is the common part which it hath in Sin I am not pleased that these curious Objections fall in the Way nor do I delight to put them into vulgar Heads but finding many young Scholars and others that have conversed with them assaulted with these Temptations I thought meet to give a Touch and but a Touch to take them out of their Way As Mr. Fenner hath done more fully in the Preface to his Hidden Manna on this last point to which I refer you I only add this The Will of Man in its very Dominion doth bear God's Image It is a self-determining Power though it be biassed by Habits and needs a Guide As the Heart and Vital Spirits by which it acteth are to the rest of the Body so is it to the Soul The Light of Nature hath taught all the World to carry the Guilt