Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	action_n	good_a	will_n	1,601	5	6.4879	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A26209	Digitus dei or God appearing in his wonderfull works For the conuiction of nullifidians.	Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo.; Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo. De civitate Dei. Book 22. Chapter 8. English. aut	1676 (1676)	Wing A4208; ESTC R213574	43,921	115

half so confident of his cause as he is pleased at the liberality of his Client Affection Willfullness and Interest are the true Premises and Proofs in such Causes and conclusions Many an odd argument is alleaged not so much proving the thing in question as evidencing our good will for it But I expect better things from rationall men and pretended lovers of truth First then they may perchance say St. Augustine was a man and might consequently both deceive and be deceived That he was a man and no Angel is without question but withall you may take notice that he is held by the whole world to have been an honest and a holy man therefore he did not go about to deceive he was ever esteemed a learned and a discreet man he had the testimonies of unsuspected disinteressed persons of whole Communities of whole Cities nay of his own eyes in many remarkable particulars Ergo he was not deceived If this be not a better consequence then any your Might be can afford to your purpose I must needs confess we are to seek for new Principles of arguing For to affirm positively upon so remote a possibility that he was either deceiv'd or design'd to deceive would be a ready way indeed but it must needs be a very rash one For never was a meer Possibility yet admitted amongst rational men for a positive proof of either side of a contradiction which does admit of a contingency Much less can it have place indifferently where one side is fortifyed with such proofs as greater cannot be required by any unbiassed judgement to a determination in the subject matter of inquiry And if this be not allow'd as exactly rational then cannot I imagine upon what Principles we can be induced to apositive crediting any thing of this nature in any age of the world before us For they all being Contingencies and the positive and negative not being possible to coexist no Might be or May be can determine the judgement any further then to a meer suspension which is not only prudent but necessary where proofs come equal on both sides And as this is necessary upon equality so certainly is it most rational to incline to some one side upon the prevalency of motives or even absolutely to assent where they arrive to that degree that no wise man can find or hope to find greater in matters of this nature Demonstratiuely no May be or Might be can be thought to be upon equall terms with it But that which I suspect may make you so backward in giving assent to this Relation of St. Augustine may be the generall prejudice you have against all things of this nature And this haply has been bred and nourish't in you by your aversion from those many Legends stuff't up as you imagin with such kind of old-wives tales which to you appear not only improbable by their number but also very lyable to exceptions by reason of Circumstances what if I should freely grant as I shall not make much difficulty to do what you seem here resolved to suppose that there have been mistakes and perchance abuses in this kind what if I frankly own that some ignorant person has taken that for a miracle which some more understanding man knowes very well to be within the compass of nature or some strong-fancied creature has taken her devout dream for a Vision Will your inference hold Ergo all are such Ergo these related by St. Augustine are such Is there no true gold because some upon the touch has been found false Are there no true Diamonds because the skillfull eye of a Lapidary or the wheel has discovered some to be counterfeit Then I pray call to mind whom you deal with whose reputation you so severely call in question It is that of St. Agustine out of whom I did purposely select these passages not that I doubt but there are a thousand as unquestionable things of this nature in other grave Authors but because I did suppose and I imagined I had reason for it that the great esteeme and respect the world generally has for this great man would gain him some credit with you also 'T is He that tells you here of many cures such as whole Consults of Physicians esteemed incurable wrought suddenly and permanently 'T is He that tells you of Devills cast out by the force of Prayer and Exorcismes 'T is He that tells you of many dead persons rays'd suddenly to life and health 'T is he that tells you he saw many of these things when they happened with his own eyes 'T is he that tells you of the Testimonies of whole Communities whole Towns and Cities in proof of many particulars 'T is he that tells you of Memorialls given in and read publiquely and kept carefully that they might be confirmed or contradicted if any thing occurr to any one of those thousands who saw or heard them 'T is he that tells you that there were so many other Miracles wrought in the places he mentions and known by his brethren then living to have been wrought that he thought himself obliged to put down his excuse for not specifying them also as well as others which he happens to mention 'T is he who writ these Things in a time when he could not but know that there were enemies enough both at home and abroad Heathens and Heretiques Manicheans and Pelagians c. who would have been very glad of the opportunity of diminishing his credit and authority by disproving what he had writt with so much advantage to his own cause and so much prejudice of theirs This certainly must needs have obliged so discreet and sober a person to have used more care then ordinary in the examination of those Things which he intended for publique view in proof of those great mysteries of our faith The Resurrection and glorious Ascension of Christ our Saviour in Body into heaven And here by the way give me leave to tell you that this ever has been and to this hour is the constant endeavour of Prelates in the Church and it is their high obligation that nothing of this kind be taken or divulged as miraculous but upon very strict examination authentique proofs and depositions of sworn witnesses c. So that it cannot in reason be thought other then willfull rashness in any man positively to deny them all upon no better ground then meere prejudice or suspicion I pray taken notice of what I said last to deny them all For to come a little home to you I must take the liberty to tell you that if any one of these hundred Miracles related here by Saint Augustine or any one of those thousands related examined and attested by others proves true your business is done You will be compelled to own something beyond the reach of your eyes or perchance understandings which has a beeing and a power above the force of nature manifesting it self abundantly in such admirable and Supernaturall operations But

in the general clause But to do it and hold it lawfull to lie for a good or bad cause is a thing for which I am pretty sure none of their Authors can be quoted whom the Doctour is so civilly pleased to father it upon I confess it is a pretty odd passage especially with those pleasant Comments upon it which the Doctour upon the back of this his unexpected Caution fetches as farr as Persia But I find the Doctour himself is pleased to furnish Hierom Xavier with several Authors good or bad I am not now in humour to dispute for so much as his talent of inventing untruths is concern'd for part of which this one very possibly indiscreet Jesuit did utter the Doctour himself making up the rest of the story with several interpolations from others whom we take to be none of Xavier's tribe But yet we do not find that he was either so impious as to promulge this by way of a new Gospel or so insolent as to insert many things taking them even from the Doctours own relation which notwithstanding I begg his leave with time and opportunity to examin a little further before I enter it into my Creed so maliciously false as to ground so general a supposal that those of his calling think it lawfull to lie for a good cause But it is remarkably the fortune of this great Doctour to be alwaies undertaking and endeavouring at great and extraordinary things such as indeed many have soberly questioned whether himself did in reality hold to be such Truths as he seems to set them out for Sure we are most or many of his own pretended Party do not think themselves obliged to maintain or believe them as such Qui nimium probat nihil probat is an Axiome which every fresh man is soon acquainted with and knowes by the very light of nature what such Proofs amount to But now as to this particular of the Jesuits holding it lawfull to lie for a good cause the thing appearing to me to be matter of Fact to be made good either out of their Books Lessons Sermons c. or notorious general practice me thinks I have reason to expect something more home and positive then has hitherto been alleaged or brought to light Till this be effectually done I must believe I am obliged to confirm my judgment to that of the generality of knowing men who have heard them so often teach much better things in their Schools and Pulpits and who have found them more civil in their conversation then either to practise any such thing themselves or brand a large community with it in which there be many who by their quality in the world as Gentlemen deserve more civil treatment from those who know what Breeding is Amongst others of them I find the forementioned Marcello Mastrilli upon whom was wrought that remarkable cure described so lately and which happened so few years ago This good man was and is owned by the chief nobility of Naples to have been a near relation of theirs and one who by his actions brought no stain upon his family And yet he also must fall under the general censure of our kind Doctour and be reckoned among those who make no scruple to lie for a good cause c. But could the Doctour make this action good of his being a lier I should not stick to enter that other of his being a fool For that a man should stretch a little too farr in hopes of some profit or preferment is that which perchance may pass for wit as the world goes now a dayes But that a man should invent a story which should oblige him to leave his native country where he was in good esteem both for his birth and parts which in probability had been attended with a fortune answerable before he abandoned it as many more are known to have done upon better motives as may well be imagined then to take up a trade of lying That he should I say in this manner oblige himself to quit all these advantages and expose his person to a long and dangerous Journey and to the cruelty of a savage people from whom he could expect nothing but what he found barbarous usage and a cruel death is beyond any maxims of modern wit or discretion But the piercing Doctour will perhaps tell us that the honour of his society was the good cause which put him upon the contrivance and obliged him to the execution accordingly If this could be made out I should confess it were something to be admired indeed that a man in this age for such meer human respects should become so great a self denier But I doubt would hardly be imitated by any but some of his own party who by his example have been moved to abandon likewise their native countries and comforts and venture their lives through sea and land upon the only score of relieving the spiritual necessities of those poor desolate Nations Could we once see an example of this kind in some of those who pretend so much Zeale for the Gospel we might perchance be moved to think better of their Principles But though their merchants and factours venture indeeed yearly into those Eastern and Western parts to fetch us home gold and silver and silks and spices and Jewels c. Yet I never heard of any of the good Doctours Partizans who ventur'd without or with a Viaticum to go to those remote parts upon the bare hopes of encreasing the flock of Christ and improving their stock no otherwise then by suffering all manner of evil usages dangers wants and many times death it self But not to wrong the good Doctour nor put more incivility upon him then some perchance may apprehend he deserves I must own that I find him sometimes inclined as pag. 684. of his Second discourse to suppose this passage of Mastrilli's miraculous cure to have something of truth in it and I am apt to think he has some reason for it there being such irrefragable testimonies of many who were not Jesuits for the positive verity of it and so little to be said for the negative For which notwithstanding could it have been done I believe he might have found some curious wel-willers of the Jesuits who would have been industrious and ready enough to have furnished materials But then he comes off again with E. W. And asks him what this or the like would make to the proof of Pope Pius the fourth's Creed As to that I shall leave him to E. W. and others who I make no question will do him reason But I must entreat him in the mean time that out of his animosity against E. W. he will not deprive us of such grounds as make against Atheism for Christianity the supporting of which was my only design whilest I mention this and some few other late passages some of which I hope the kind Doctour will not be two earnest against but think well of and allow at