Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n
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A23772
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The vanity of the creature by the author of The whole duty of man, &c. ; together with a letter prefix'd, sent to the bookseller, relating to the author.
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Allestree, Richard, 1619-1681.
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1684
(1684)
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Wing A1168; ESTC R19327
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37,491
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120
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about his Vineyard with Peace and Prosperity but so soon as that Hedge was broken down and erroneous yea Heretical Doctrines were let in like so many Beasts of prey to devour then how quickly did these prove Turncoats and Apostates from the Faith But as for the true Christian he is like a Rock Mediis immotus in undis That although the waves are always swelling against him yet is he the same man still in his Reformed Religion and wavers not or else like that House built upon the Rock against which the Floods came and the Winds blew but it fell not because it was built upon a Rock And such a well-built house was St. Basil who being threatned with death by Valens if he would not advise further and turn Arrian answer'd with this brave resolution I need not any further advice than I have taken already about this matter for to morrow I shall be the same man that I am to day therein and no other And here know that some things are of Necessity wherein we cannot but change as in natural civil and moral things and to change in there is only humane Others again are of Duty and these either prohibited or enjoyn'd 1. Prohibited as in evil and erroneous things and to change here is pious and divine and not to change either Weakness or Obstinacy 2. Enjoyn'd as in sacred and religious and to change here is impious and Diabolical and not to change true Christian Fortitude and Constancy Whatsoever things we see then wheeling about in the world as Governments Families and the like nay howsoever we may change our selves or be chang'd in some things of an indifferent nature by those that have dominion over our Bodies and Estates yet is there no man that hath dominion over our Faith But this is Gods peculiar and therefore in this we must not change It is not with saving Truths as it is with Clothes which alter every year as the fashion doth for the fashion of the world passes away says St. John but true Religion is ever in fashion with good men and alters not And herein we may justly take occasion to bewail the unsteadiness of some in these times who are mere Scepticks in Religion always conceiving some new Opinions in it and always in pain till they be deliver'd of their new conceptions though never so monstrous and deformed That which was truth with them yesterday is no such thing to day and what is so to day is otherwise to morrow such Changelings there be in this last Age who like the Moon do never appear the same two days together And I would to God says St. Ambrose that their change were no worse than that of the Moon for she returns again within a little time to her full light but these never And he is blind that sees not this among us namely how some turn every day to Popish Superstition but more to Anabaptistical Fancies some unto Socinian Blasphemies but most unto Atheistical Notions and all into Sensuality this being the common Sewer into which all the former run and are ultimately resolved But as St. Paul said to his Galathians so do I to such O foolish Galathians who hath bewithc'd you that you should not obey the Gospel And it is a metaphor says one from Sorcerers who use to cast a mist before the peoples eyes that so they may not take a right view of what is presented to them As if he had said Who hath cast a mist before the eyes of your understandings to make that appear unto you for truth which indeed is not What Are ye so foolish that having begun in the Spirit ye will be perfected in the Flesh So Are ye so foolish that having begun in truth ye will end in falshood or can ye be so simple as to exchange Gold for Dirt Wheat for Chaff and your pretious Faith as St. Peter calls it which is the substance of things hoped for for Errours of all sorts and mere shadows of Truth I trow not For if Errour as our Kingly Divine said well have any advantage it consists in Novelty or if Truth any it consists in Constancy Was the Doctrine then of the Reformed Churches and the Harmony of our Confessions grounded upon evident and pregnant Scriptures maintain'd by the Orthodox and Primitive Fathers and conveyed to us by the constant tradition of the Universal Church the Faith of Christ once deliver'd to the Saints and the Truth of God yesterday why so it is to day and will be to morrow also And therefore to day in our profession of it we must be as yesterday and to morrow as this day because as God is the same yesterday to day and for ever so also is the Truth of God That which was once so will be so always and cannot be otherwise Oh that we would then be exhorted in the Apostles words To stand fast in the Faith to quit our selves like men and be strong and not to be as children toss'd to and fro and carried about with every wind of Doctrine but to be as men in understanding stedfast and immoveable that so God may have cause to glory on our behalf as he did on Jobs Hast thou consider'd says God to Satan my servant Job So hast thou consider'd such a servant of mine Seest thou to how many changes I have subjected him to changes in his Children to changes in his Estate to changes in his Liberty to changes in his Friends and Acquaintance Nay seest thou how many of his Brethren are chang'd of late from a febrish distemper before now into a sleepy Lethargy Seest thou how indifferent they are for their Religion round about him and how many shaken reeds there are on every side of him And yet for all this as my servant Job did so doth he still hold his integrity But enough of this Secondly Gods end also in it is To reform our Lives and do us good by his so various dispensations towards us Hence we read Isa. 30.28 of a sieve of vanity wherein God says he will sift the Nations and shake them to and fro one after another that so he may winnow them from that chaff of sin that is within them For why was Moab at ease from his youth why setled he upon his lees and held still his corrupt tast but because he was never disquieted nor emptied from vessel to vessel Ier. 48.11 Thus a sedentary life we find very subject to Diseases and a long standing Prosperity to a Nation is like a standing Pool whose water doth soon puddle and putrifie And this is the reason of that speech of David Psal. 55.19 Because they have no Changes therefore they feare not God making by it the uncheckt prosperity of worldly men a great occasion of their continuance in sin and so an Index of Gods Wrath upon them rather than of his special Favour to them And therefore now we have seen the Angel of God moving the waters of
who prosper in the world And the Prophet Jeremy makes bold to question with God about it in these words Jer. 12.1 2. Wherefore says he doth the wicked prosper and why are all they in wealth that rebelliously transgress and he rests satisfied with this verse 3. That God did by that prosperity of theirs fatten them as sheep to the slaughter and prepare them for the day of destruction And this is that prosperity of fools that the Wise man speaks of which will destroy them Prov. 1.32 It is not then our thriving in Temporals but in Spirituals that speaks us and our Faith to be accepted of God For the truth of Grace or Religion and the goodness of a mans Cause is not measured by the Souldiers Sword but by the Word of God which is the Sword of the Spirit God Saints no man for his goodly Personage for his Riches for his politick head-piece of contriving and bringing about his own worldly and sinister ends or for his Arms and Conquests for then Saul and Croesus Ahitophel and Alexander the Great had been high in Gods book but he values Men only by their Spirituals as their graces of Faith Humility Patience Meekness Obedience and the like and where he finds these how unfurnished soever they are otherwise yet these are mine saith the Lord and in that day when I shall make up my Iewels I will spare them even as a Father doth his Son and then shall ye discern between the righteous and the wicked betwixt him that feareth God and him that feareth him not Indeed God may sometimes permit evil to prosper in the world but never approve of it for so acknowledges the Jewish Church Lament 3.35 To turn aside the right of a man before the face of the most High or to subvert a man in his cause the Lord approves it not And therefore to argue from Gods permission to his approbation is a gross Non sequitur nay more a laying our iniquity on Gods back as if he would take it well at our hands to be made a Pack-horse at every turn to bear all our execrable burdens and were as David speaks such a one as our selves to favour evil courses or else to own them as his off-spring Which made Dionysius the elder conclude Sacriledge to be no sin when he had rob'd the Temple at Locri because the Gods seem'd as it were to smile upon the action in giving them fair Winds and Weather both in their voyage thither and return back again But as it was a great Blasphemy says one for the Devil to personate God when he would be similis Altissimo so is it greater to make God personate the Devil And yet this he doth that makes God patronize his evil because he prospers in it for this brings in God saying That he will be like the Prince of Darkness and makes the Holy Ghost to leave his Dove-like shape and come only to us in the form of a greedy Raven or Vultur 2. As our prospering in worldly things swells us up too high with an opinion of our own Goodness and makes us think better of our selves than is meet so also doth it on the other side lift us up too far with thoughts of evil towards our brethren and make us think worse of them and the ways of God they walk in than we should by charging them as utterly deserted of God because we see not now the same hedge of Gods favour about them as heretofore we did but the stakes that then prop'd them up are now thrown away as useless and unserviceable Whereas Afflictions on this hand are every way as temporary and transient as Prosperity was on the other and being so must needs be as a broken reed or a reed of Egypt wherewith we cannot exactly measure Gods Temple nor the Spiritual estate of his Children It was a hard stumbling-block to the Prophet David for a time when he says that his feet were almost gone and his footsteps had well-nigh slipt upon his sight of the wickeds prosperity until he went into the Sanctuary of Gods Word where he learnt to settle his wavering and distrustful thoughts for there he saw that notwithstanding his outward afflictions that God held him up under that sore temptation with his right hand and would in opposition to transitory goods which are the proper blessings of the wicked because they have no others but these to trust unto guide him with that which should infinitely exceed them to wit his Counsel here and his Glory hereafter And it was the great question so much agitated betwixt Job and his Friends Whether those doleful changes that befel him were the cognizance of his insincerity to God and of Gods disfavour to him upon it yea or no. His Friends taking advantage upon his present weakness and distemper maintain it strongly against him in the affirmative that they were until at length God himself steps in to the rescue of the weaker side and makes the conclusion as all Logical conclusions do to follow the weaker part determining it for Job against his Opponents in the Negative and telling them that they spake not of Job nor of his proceedings towards him that which was right Job last verse 7. Seneca a Stoick Philosopher hath a set discourse to this purpose Cur bonis viris mala eveniant why the evils of this life most commonly fall out to good men and he concludes it thus That temporal evils are no sign of Gods hatred to them For dost thou think says he that the Lacedemonians hated their Children when as they experimented their disposition to virtue by stripes in publick No. So do we think Gods Children in disfavour with him because he lays here sore blows upon their Bodies and Estates by evil men as his rods and scourges in it No for we see and feel many times says an experimental patient of our own well the deep lines and strokes of Gods hand upon us when as we cannot by our skill in Palmestry decipher his meaning in it no more than the Malteses could by the viper upon Saint Pauls hand judge of his condition to God-ward For God sometimes that we may not thus judge inverts humane order and runs out his dealings towards us in the ordinary chanel of his universal Providence Justice and Equity by which he waters here all alike Indeed they may seem I grant to go counter to our apprehended rules of common right yet are they always agreeing both with Gods secret and revealed will though like the Sun in its sphere not perceptible to us because too mysterious and dazzling however many pretend to interpret them by a blaze of fire lighted at the natural pride of their own private spirits and that dimme twilight of knowledge which is in them when as they are altogether in the dark to the true light of Gods word and works herein And here take in the opinion also of Epictetus another Stoick and Heathen man which speaks