Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	body_n	effect_n	nature_n	2,106	5	5.3452	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A91725	An advice against libertinism shewing the great danger thereof, and exhorting all to zeal of the truth. Written by Edward Reynell Esq.	Reynell, Edward, 1612-1663.	1659 (1659)	Wing R1216; Thomason E2106_1; ESTC R13720	30,764	115

marchings of those Jehu's who at first made way to their ambitious expectations by all designs either violent or fradulent and whose best lustures have since proved but a foil to Religion that piety languisheth Religion fainteth that charity is accounted scandalous and superstitious that blasphemy assumes the uncontroled liberty of venting and that the beauty of Churches is so disgraced and sullied by sacrilegious hands Faelices nimium bona si sua norint How happy had we been had we learn't rather to live than to dispute had the waters of strife and the floods of contention been dried up how soon had that Dove with silver wings appeared amongst us Had that charity which is onely infused into us by the spirit of God but suffocated those super-seminated Tares of contentions how soon would it have cut off the occasions of those inhumane strivings neither would that black spirit of the Abysse have drawn men even from the Altar to run to the sword which they indifferently thrust into the bosom of the nearest Relations after which followed so many cryes and lamentations with such images of death still flying before our eyes as were able to wound the heart with compassion yea to move the most unnatural rage Hence it is that the godly evaporate into sighs and the convulsed world seems to mourn with the sad sence and apprehension of approaching judgement And surely he that now revels it in greatnesse he that sits idle amidst the complaints and mourning of the Church must needs be infuscated with the sooty vapors of an insensible heart Yea hard are those ears which bow not to the sad relation of our long bleeding miseries and hirder those eyes which can behold them without the moist testimonies of sorrow The Land grieveth for many horrid sins and may we not justly feat least Providence so often provoked by our renewed trespasses will cast us out as a prey to our enemies or that the Sun of righteousness may go down in our dayes It were to enter into a vast Labyrinth of discourses and reasons to represent at this time those various blasts of pernicious doctrine exagitated by factious whirlewinds since we may behold on the stage of the Church such a horrible sphere of Monsters and Tempests bloody Cornets and Arms of fire as the mali genii of seducing spirits cherishing so formidable a growth to abate our hopes and undermine our happinesse The highest superspection and vigilancy being therefore now more then ever requisite to preserve that truth which God hath espoused to himself and which we find the devil in all Ages to have raised instruments to disparage discountenance and oppose yea if possbly to over-throw in the rooting out of the Ministry and Professors thereof as being a spiritual Engine to batter down his Kingdom Neither do the present contrivances of those who I fear have long deceived the world with a laborious Hypocrisie since under the veil of Religion are concealed such flagitious and dangerous Tenents seem to happen by humane designment but as Cockatrise eggs long since hatching by that old serpent whose kingdom drawing to an end and having but a short time to reign there 's hopes these spirits and Emissaries who resemble the wooden Dove of Archytas the Philosopher which flew by engines whilst they had their operation and soared in the air but so soon as they ceased it trailed the wing on the earth will not long infest the air with their fulliginous breath And that God who draweth light out of the bosom of darkness and oftentimes suffereth not things violent to be long lastin will after we have profited by the experience of our evils disperse those amazing tumults and prevent the growth of that Atheism which everywhere abounds and threatneth ruine to his wayes as if some hidden poison had envaded the land All humane affairs are then only seated in the best station of felicity when they rejoyce in concord piety and unity of Religion it being an ill kind of solace for one man to compute his happinesse by the encrease of anothers grief And most miserable are they of all men who cannot be happy but by the miseries of another To what purpose is it to hold flowers to the nostrils when the body is parched and wasted with a violent feaver Heat in the opinion of some doth more hurt then the North-wind and stony spirits are not alwayes the most efficacious And who sees not that our Protestant dissentions have ever been the cause of our adversaries rejoycings As the sweetest influences are those which cause the sweetest effects in total nature and not sparkling Flames but invisible heats usually melt hard metal so who seeth not that silence and peace which are the two mansions of a good conscience are of much more worth then all the questions which enkindle divisions the best doctrine being that which best knoweth how to cement up concord But it hath been our unhappinesse of late that in the great vicissitude of things evil minds have too often intervened which vitiated the Councels retarded the endeavors and diverted the intentions of such who had a righter aim towards the advancement of the truth then such as were hurried into arms by a blind violence of spirit not so much for love of justice as greediness of revenge and under the vail of Religion labored to hide flagitious and damnable excessus Caesari in Dialog Caesarius a Geeek Author saith that Mill-stones having no corn to grind strike fire one on another And hath not the want of employment with particular reflections on gain profit and preferment interpos'd dissentions not onely among the neerest friends but often times among the Religious Against the unnaturalness whereof we find an eminent example in the magnanimity of David who could scarce be induced to a just resistance of his son Absolom though forcing his way unto his Fathers Throne through blood and rapine untill Joab had dissipated that languidnesse of his gentle minde And so detestable an undertaking was it held in those who were brethren by the bonds of Nature and Religion to sorfeit all civil respects to the rage of war as that if we take a review of the old Testament we shall find though there were many and bitter discords many tumults many wars yet they were ever against those who had collapsed into foul and apparent idolatry and the worship of the Gentiles Saint Peter 1 Pet. 3.8 in whose heart God had locked up the Maximes of the best Policy in the world invires us to be all of one mind to love as brethren to be pitiful and courteous And we find our Saviour in the Prophet Isaiah Isa 11.1 to be called a Rod and a Branch to correct some and to comfort others but is never termed a sword to kill and destroy Oh that the thoughts hereof would cut off all further occasions of inhumane strivings did our Saviour after he had triumphed over death salute his disciples with the sweet and amiable name