Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	anger_n	angry_a	just_a	1,601	5	7.4510	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A70263	Several sermons upon the fifth of St. Matthew .... [vol. 1] being part of Christ's Sermon on the mount / by Anthony Horneck ... ; to which is added, the life of the author, by Richard Lord Bishop of Bath and Wells.	Horneck, Anthony, 1641-1697.	1698 (1698)	Wing H2851; ESTC R40468	201,926	515

Righteousness for Tribulation works patience and Patience experience and Experience hope and Hope makes not ashamed But this is not all Behold also in this similitude the Nature of your future Joys when the Child is born the Woman for Joy forgers her anguish so when your Fruit is ripe it shall be laid up in the granary of Heaven and when you shall put off this Body of Flesh and Sin for the Joy that will crown your Temples you 'll forget all the former anguish you labour'd under God will comfort you and your Eyes shall see it the Lord Jesus will call to you and your Ears shall hear it Enter you into the Joy of your Master Heaven is the vast Store-house of all Comforts there where-ever you cast your Eye you 'll behold nothing but Comfort Comfort in the Spirits of Men made perfect Comfort in the general Assembly of the first born which are written in Heaven Comfort in the innumerable Company of Angels Comfort in the Hallelujah's of Cherubin and Seraphin Comfort above you Comfort within you Comfort round about you There your Heart will break no more there your Understandings will be clouded no more there no storms no enemies will discompose you any more there all that can make Men sad will be removed from your sight for sin will be gone and Devils will tempt no more there you will lie incircled in the everlasting Arms and Rivers of Joy will flow round about you your present April Showers will produce a glorious May and after your gloomy Night the Son of Righteousness will shine upon you with healing under his Wings and as one hour changed Joseph's Fetters into a Chain of Gold his Rags into shining Robes his Stocks into a Chariot his Prison into a Palace his Water into Wine so in that moment that your Souls shall enter into the Regions of endless Comfort your mourning will be changed into dancing your tears into laughter your sackcloth into silks your ashes into garlands your thorns into lawrels your fasts into festivals and your unutterable sighs and groans into unspeakable joys SERMON V. St. Matth. Ch. V. Ver. 5. Blessed are the Meek for they shall inherit the Earth THIS Blessedness or Beatitude in some Latin Copies of the New Testament is the second but in the Original and in the Syriack and Arabick Versions it is the third and these as the most authentick our Translation follows what is said of Meekness here is taken out of Psal. XXXVII 11. where we read as it is in the Text The Meek shall inherit the Earth Christ came not to reverse the Morals under the Law but to ratifie and confirm and to refine them into greater perfection and to enforce them with new Motives and Arguments Moral Vertue hath been the same in all Ages and being founded on the Law of Nature must needs be unalterable The encouragements for the practice of it are greater in the Christian Religion than in any other whatfoever and the lines of the Duty are here drawn in livelier Colours but the Vertue it self like the Nature of that God from whom it flows receives no changes In the explication of the Text we are to consider as in the preceding Sentences I. What Meekness is and who the Meek are and what their Character is II. Wherein their Blessedness consists III. How they shall inherit the Earth I. What Meekness is 1. To be meek is not to be mealy-mouth'd or gentle or calm when it is our Duty to be angry and it is our Duty to be so partly with our selves when we sin against Heaven and in the presence of an Omnipotent God and that is the anger or indignation spoken of 2 Cor. VII 11. partly with others when they do notoriously affront the Divine Majesty and wrong their Consciences Gall. III. 1 2. particularly 1. With those who are under our Command and Power and Jurisdiction such as Children Servants and other Relations or Persons whose Masters Governours Guardians Teachers or Tutours we are when they prove incorrigible in their sins Gen. XLIX 6 7. 2. Even with others of our Acquaintance and Persons whom we converse with when they profane the Name of God or run out into licentiousness and will not be reclaim'd by softer means Gal. V. 12. Moses though one of the meekest Men in the World yet his anger justly wax'd hot when he saw the Israelites commit Idolatry Exod. XXXII 19. And our Saviour himself tho' the Pattern of Meekness yet could not behold the profanation of the Temple without anger John II. 15 17. and St. Paul and Barnabas though Preachers of this Christian Meekness yet were obliged to break out into Passion when they saw the Priest of Jupiter bringing Oxen and Garlands to do Sacrifice to them Acts XIV 14 15. Elis Meekness to his Children prov'd his folly and his Calmness is a Cause where God was dishonour'd pulled down God's Vengeance upon his Posterity A soft Expostulation here was altogether unseasonable and instead of saying to his Sons why do you do so he should have severely punish'd them when their stubbornness baffled all the gentler means of their Reformation Meekness properly relates to injuries done to our selves where the injury is directly offer'd to God our Meekness must turn into Zeal in all sins against our Neighbours and our own Souls God is wrong'd because all sin is a Transgression and dishonouring of the Law of God but some sins are more immediately levell'd against God yet even in God's cause where the anger is just and lawfull discretion must guide the Passion in a good Cause men may be too hot and where the anger turns into fury it becomes madness and instead of advancing diminishes and darkens the glory of Religion There is a rational anger which with some warmth and heat pleads and argues for God's Honour but runs not out into unseemly Behaviour or into reviling Language And this is that anger we are to shew when God is dishonoured when we dishonour him and when others do so So that Meekness doth not exclude all anger for as all Meekness is not lawfull so all Anger is not sinfull Be ye angry and sin not saith St. Paul Eph. IV. 26. which shews that some sort of anger is innocent And it is so when it is 1. In God's cause and from a sense of his Glory which we see dishonour'd by the sin or by the wrong our Neighbours do either to God or to their fellow Christians for though it be lawfull sometimes to be angry at a fault we see in our Brethren yet the anger must be more upon the account of the indignity offer'd to God by the offence than upon the Account of the wrong or prejudice we our selves suffer by it 2. It must be kept within due bounds and limits must not turn into rage and throwing about Coals and Fire-brands and odious and offensive Names Nor 3. Must it turn into malice and hatred but must still be follow'd with Acts

abused undervalued dishonoured called ill Names when things are said and done which are against your interest opinion judgement and when you are crost by your Neighbours in your designs then to be meek then to be silent then to say nothing or to answer with Moderation and Discretion then to return nothing that may favour of revenge in word or deed that 's Meekness that 's the Tryal that 's the Vertue we speak of then to curb your Passions then to refrain then to hush and quiet your unruly Affections not out of Policy but out of Love to God and Charity of your Neighbour that 's great that 's to prepare for inheriting the land where Angels live Some are such cunning Artists that they can conceal their Passion when it is their interest not to shew it but whenever they have a fair opportunity to shew their Spleen they will not fail to let the Offender know that they have not forgot the injury offer'd them But this is Hypocrisie not Meekness Malice and Artifice not Calmness in a word a perfect Cheat. It 's a sense of God a sense of our duty a sense of the necessity of it a sense of the love of Christ a sense of the weight and importance of the Precepts of the Gospel that must plant this Meekness in our Souls and this is it that must check and over-awe our unruly Appetites Sinister ends and designs spoil all vertue whatsoever It 's not suppressing a Sin but destroying it not hiding it from men for the present but laying the Axe to the root of the Tree that makes men Favourites of Heaven Besides this Meekness must be universal exercis'd not only when Persons great and powerfull whom we fear or from whom we expect some advantages give the Provocation but when our Equals or Inferiours or Persons whom we have some command over say and do things which are apt to stir up Passions within us How far we may lawfully be angry with such Persons I have shewn in the beginning of this Discourse but for the most part in the affairs of meum and tuum in things where our Honour Profit Ease and Pleasure and Interest are touch'd that 's the Theatre on which this Meekness must be shewn II. Since such a Blessedness attends this admirable Vertue no less than inheriting the Regions of Eternal Bliss need I give you any other Arguments to make you enamour'd with it when the present and the future favour of that God in whose Power it is to make us happy or miserable for ever is promis'd and entail'd upon this qualification What strange Hearts must you have if such Motives cannot prevail with you to resolve upon the serious Study and Practice of it But I am naturally fretfull a. small thing discomposes me and I cannot help it How sinner Naturally fretfull Hath grace then done thee no Service Hath the Gospel done no good upon thee Art thou yet in a State of Nature and art not thou afraid What in the Flesh yet and a stranger to the Spirit of Christ and unconcern'd at the solemn Protestations of God that they that are in the Flesh cannot please God and that he that hath not the Spirit of Christ is none of his Is that thy excuse which ought to be thy sorrow or shall that serve as an Apology which deserves thy deep Repentance Ay But I have such provocations given me that Flesh and Blood is not able to endure them the meekest Man alive could not forbear being in a passion if he had to deal with such Men as I have Ah Christian Christian did I say thou art none till thou studiest Meekness yet I know thou art proud of that Name and be it so Christian how willing art thou to believe that none is truly meek because thou art not How willing to believe that none hath such provocations as thou hast and that none is able to bear them because thou art loath to endure them Doubt not vain Man there have been and are thousands in the World that with an admirable calmness of mind have born and do bear far more than ever thou hadst occasion to bear What Doest thou think thy God commands thee impossibilities Dost thou take him to be so hard a Master that he bids thee remove Mountains and gives thee no strength to touch them with one of thy Fingers There are means which being conscientiously used will curb thy raging Passions and turn thy Wrath and Anger into the Meekness of a Lamb and they are these following 1. Next to fervent and importunate Prayer which must ever be used in all Attainments of Vertue great Consideration must be used Consideration I mean of the Dignity and Excellency of this Vertue and the Deformity and unseemliness of its opposite Anger and Wrath and inordinate Passion What harmony what sweetness what excellent Musick doth this Meekness cause in the Soul what disorder what confusion doth anger stir up in that noble part How amiable is the one how detestable the other Behold an angry Man what a disfigured Creature is he The Picture is loathsome and the Shape abominable 2. When you find the passion of anger stirring in you be silent say nothing do nothing till that inward heat be over and then speak and do what Reason and Religion and Conscience shall dictate It was very good advice of Athenodorus to Augustus the Emperour whenever he was angry with a Man to repeat the four and twenty Letters of the Alphabet before he proceeded to the Execution of the sentence for he thought by that time his thoughts would be cooler and he would judge better 3. Think of the many peremptory Commands that press this Meekness upon you Eph. IV. 2. Col. III. 12. Matth. XI 28 29. 1 Pet. II. 21 22. 1 Pet. III. 4. Surely these Commands were not given in vain and did you reflect what the Name Christian imports not to go to Church not to profess the Gospel not to call your selves Protestants but to live up to the Commands of Christ Jesus your Lord and your God and how he protests that he will own none for his Disciple or Follower that is unwilling to do what he Commands Such serious reflections would work upon you make you venture all to arrive to this grace the rather because while you live in neglect of this Vertue you live in sin and to live in sin is a state of Enmity against God and is this the Coat of God's Children 4. The Example of Christ hath moved and perswaded others to this Vertue and can it not move you Behold that Lamb of God who endured greater reproaches injuries calumnies yet like a Sheep before his Shearers he was dumb It 's true he calls the Pharisees sometimes Fools and blind Guides and Serpents and a Generation of Vipers but these are only just Descriptions of the Nature of those Beasts not the results of a disorderly Passion In affronts offered to his Person how calm how gentle was