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	humour_n	part_n	3,532	5	4.5888	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A75307	A treatise concerning religions, in refutation of the opinion which accounts all indifferent· Wherein is also evinc'd the necessity of a particular revelation, and the verity and preeminence of the Christian religion above the pagan, Mahometan, and Jewish rationally demonstrated. / Rendred into English out of the French copy of Moyses Amyraldus late professor of divinity at Saumur in France.; Traitté des religions. English.	Amyraut, Moïse, 1596-1664.	1660 (1660)	Wing A3037; Thomason E1846_1; ESTC R207717	298,210	567

just occasion of complaint that she had strangely forgot her self in the particular we have in hand For she would have produc'd man indued with an excellent faculty of understanding without giving him any knowledge of the End or of the means destinated to lead him thereunto and consequently whereas all other things seem prudently designed to a certain end man alone should have been brought into the world inconsiderately to discharge all his actions at randome and permit his natural appetites to run unguidedly at a venture Which were unworthy of that Wisdom which we all acknowledge extremely admirable in divers things in the world of much less importance But who is there that do's not observe a lamentable irregularity in Nature Sometimes the seasons fall out preposterously and intricately Sometimes vermin devours the buds of the Trees of the field sometimes the air is vitiated in such manner that it begets fatal pestilences sometimes the Sea breaks in upon a Country and swallows it up with its inhabitants and sometimes in another place the inundation of a River drowns great and flourishing Cities What wonder is it therefore that disorder being diffus'd throughout the whole world should also be found in the condition of one of its principal pieces 'T is true will some of them reply but have not these things their natural causes Surely yes but 't is as diseases have theirs For a Fever is not without inflammation of the spirits and humors and the humors are not inflam'd except they have had some propensity to be so either by reason of their corruption or their abundance or from the impression of some violent external cause Now these causes which are here called natural had never been if there had not been a disorder in the nature of the bodies themselves But those irregularities in particular things are proceeded from the disorder of their nature in general As therefore if the nature of humane bodies had continued in its integrity a perfect and immutable healthfulness would have had its natural cause in an exquisite temperature of pure humors so in the disorder which hath befaln it diseases have their natural cause in the abundance or deficiency corruption or distemperature of the humors also Now all the world is like one Body of which all the parts had no change befallen it would have been disposed in so excellent an harmony that the accidents we mentioned could never have happened which are like diseases surprising one or other of its members And therefore as in Nature well regulated fertility an uniform succession of the seasons and a good constitution of the aer would have had their natural causes in the perfect harmony of the Whole So the disturbances which have suceeded have theirs also in its discord and discomposure But above all things whatsoever that disorder is apparent in man not only in the calamities which befall him more frequent and great then to any of the rest of the Creatures from which it may seem Providence ought to have secur'd him but chiefly in himself in his affections in the perturbations of his mind in the reluctancy and contest of his Appetites against his Understanding and in the darkness and perversity of his Understanding it self And this ha's been the subject of high complaints in all Generations Insomuch that whoso beholds the Nature of things in the estate she is in at present perceives her like a broken or unorderly Watch of which the springs are some too stiffe and others too laxe and all its Wheels displac'd Or like a Great City formerly full of magnificent dalaces and stately buildings dispos'd in a perfectly handsome order which time or the fury of some provoked Prince ●ha's by fire and sword turn'd into rubbage and desolation The Traveller for Rome in Rome inquires And not to find her in her self admires Therfore to expect that Nature should now produce the same effects in man which she would have done in her integrity is as if one should require of a blind man to walk as directly as when he had good eyes or of a mad man to have setled thoughts and agreeable to reason Indeed that which we affirm that a particular revelation for ordaining the means of serving God and for providing for the needs of man's soul is absolutely necessary is not to be referr'd to nature in its integrity who perhaps would have furnish'd us sufficiently wherewith to have performed our duty and comforted our selves Like as a man that is both healthful discreet and intelligent is capable enough to preserve himself from things which may be hurtful to him but when he is surpris'd with a disease and the vapors of a Fever perturbe his Fancy he wants the assistance of another to prescribe him Physick and rules for his recovery And the second difficulty is resolv'd with the same facility The greatest part of men imagine that the Religion of which they make profession is true and are so far from taking pains to seek out any other that on the contrary when novelties are presented to them they reject the same without further examination being possess'd with this prejudice against them that since they have for a long while been owners of the truth any other novelty cannot be but an Imposture And this is usually strengthened by the natural affection which we have towards the fashions and uses of our own country and the constitutions under which we have been educated from our infancy For not onely the mountains rivers fields of our own Country have a kind of pleasingness attraction which allures our minds but also the manners of the inhabitants and the customes practis'd amongst them And it is no great wonder if we easily deceive our selves in such things For the same imbecillity of our Understandings which hinders us from finding out the true Religion of our selves does likewise hinder us from judging so sincerely and distinctly as we ought of such things as are propounded to us Besides that the opinions wherewith We are already imbued are a greater hindrance to us in this matter then if we were ignorant of all Religions because it is requisite that we first unlearn what we conceive we already know for certain which is a very difficult thing as Wool which ha's received some tincture beforehand is less fit to be dy'd into pure and native colours then that which is altogether crude As for those whose happier Understandings have enabled them to perceive the vanity of false Religions and yet have not been instituted in the true 't was the dispair of being able to discover it which made them give over the inquiry as if a man that had experienc'd the weakness and improfitableness of the Balm of Empiricks should utterly despair of Physick and abandon the care of dressing his ulcer together with the hope of healing it And if Diagoras Euemerus two persons branded by the Ancients with the title of Atheists suffer'd themselves to be carried to a total

certainly to conjecture what the cause of death is God himself would have purposely hid it from them least not being able to discover the remedy of it despair should sink and ruine all the World All other ignorances have been prejudicial and very often pernicious to men to this alone we owe the conservation of humane Society So that we may pertinently apply to this in particular that which Horace speaks generally of the ignorance in which it hath pleased God we should live touching events to come Prudens futuri temporis exitum Caliginosa nocte premit Deus The sole Word of God which is the special revelation we are in quest of is that which accords all these differences and clears up all the difficulties and confusions We shall not dispute at present whether in his first creation the body of man was naturally so well constituted that through prudence whereby he was able to avoid all hurtful things and the use of aliments which the blessing of God rendred as efficacious for the conservation of life by the good and pure qualities which he at first indued them with as now they are often full of noxious juices since the curse of God blasted them for our offence he might without other assistance from the Deity avoid all alteration and corruption either by disease or Age. God hath in the composure of Gold and Diamonds and other like things given sufficient proof of his power and hath so exactly temper'd the contrary qualities of the Elements in the constitution of certain bodies that they seem not subject to any corruption whatsoever And the long life which the first Men liv'd even after sin and the examples of the like we meet with in several profane Histories and some also though few which may be found in the Histories of these latter times give us enough to judge how firm and durable the life of man would be were he as exactly and perfectly fram'd and the aliments that support him as good as the estate of Nature in its integrity could have promised We onely affirm that though as the Philosophers thought the body of man being composed of the Elements and consequently including contrary and repugnant qualities would have carried in its self the seeds of death yet this revelation teaches us that the Wisdom of God would have so provided therein that if no disorder had hapened in the World through sin the propensity which our bodies have to their own dissipation would have been restrain'd and hindred by his Providence For he would have repell'd all sorts of eternal accidents he would have hindred the intemperature of the humors both by preserving them in right harmony and supplying man with aliments indued with excellent faculties and void of all noxiousness and by infusing new vigor of life in time of necessity to hinder the approach of Old-age would have maintained man in a vigorous and flourishing consistence and so given him the immortality of which we have now nothing left but the desire Whence likewise the union of the Soul and Body would have continued to eternity not subject to any important change or evil accident So that admitting death to be an accident that sutes with the natural principles of the composition of their bodies yet the cause that they do dye is because it having been covenanted that the consequences of a mortal condition should be hindred upon condition that man continued in obedience sin supervening hath changed the dispensation of all that and effected that death is become in quality of a punishment and vengeance And this ought nor to be deemed strange For there are things which considered in themselves have nothing so shameful in them but that they may well endure either the presence of another or the publike day-light which yet through the disorder befallen in nature are become ignominious Nakedness which of it self is not dishonest is become unseemly through sin which hath caused rebellion in the corporeal appetites against reason So that they who affirm it indifferent to go naked or clothed shew that extreme profaness hath worn out of their foreheads that shame which causes others to express their consciousness of sin and the unseemliness of the irregularity of our sensual faculties so as to be asham'd of their impudence who are not so themselves Wherefore though death were a natural accident which yet it is not the horror of it is too great to acknowledge no more in it but pure nature and its motions For why then do Infants dye We learn from the same revelation that that so sudden separation of the soul from the Body is not for ever but that the being which is given them though at first it seem's to have been allotted for a moment onely and by consequence little better then not-being shall endure eternally when the considerations shall cease for which it suffer'd the Eclipse of the time that it was to appear in this Life For the being of man when it hath once had a beginning is of perpetual duration and the time of Death is but as an Eclipse of his course But this is not the place for this discourse and therefore we shall add but a word more and pass forward Whether we consider the justice or the goodness of God this revelation amply furnishes us what to answer in defence of both He takes away little children at their birth and notwithstanding does not incur thereby any blame of cruelty because before they were born they deserved that punishment by reason of the natural infection of sin which they drew from those that begat them And indeed as we crush the Eggs of Scorpions before they are hatcht not because they have as yet deserved to be destroy'd for any wound which we have received by them but because in growing up the seeds of venome which that brood hath by nature will infallibly be exerted to our mischief so is it sometimes expedient for God to stifle from the wombe such children as have so many seeds of vice in them that coming to years would do much more mischief then any Scorpion in the World This the Philosophers never understood and therefore could not return in answer But if there opinion were admitted it would be requisite to defer judging of the merit of Infants till they come to the age that ennables them to manifest and display their Vice Moreover God resumes some of them back to himself whom he pleases to render happy by his goodness Nor is it necessary that he should permit them a longer abode in this life that so they might be capable of happiness for their practises of Virtue because he do's not give it as a Salary deserved from his justice by our Virtues but as a beneficence purely out of his liberality which likewise the Philosophers never thought of for according to them if there remains any beatitude to be hoped after this Life it cannot be aspir'd unto but by Virtue How then can Infants obtain

devour our hopes and the rebellion of animals against us is such that we are put to defend our selves even against vermine not onely against Serpents Dragons Lyons and Tygers Whence it is come to pass that the Ancients were so inconstant in the judgement which they made of man and his nature For after having spoken so much to his advantage that the title of King and God sometimes was not sufficient for him who can but wonder at Jupiters repenting in Homer for having given Peleus horses to become partakers of humane misery where he says that man is subject to more miseries then any other animal upon the face of the Earth So some wept upon the birth of their children through compassion that they come into this Scene of troubles and laught upon the death of their Parents out of joy that they go out of it and Euripides says that we ought to do so In a word the most usual comfort which they took in death is that it puts an end to our miseries and their histories or fables affirm that it was sent as a present from the Gods to the greatest and most excellent persons in recompense of their Virtues as to Cleobis and Biton for their piety towards Juno to Agamedes and Trophonius for their pains in building the Temple of Apollo at Delphos and likewise to Pindar What therefore can we say that man is In truth considering mankind in general it cannot be better resembled then to the present estate of Rome which is but as the carkass of what it was of old There are remaining indeed some ruins and some old inscriptions not-intelligible some fragements of ancient Statues and defaced monuments and ponderous tombes since the time she was Emperess of the World But in the whole all this is of so little proportion that had we no other knowledge of her grandeur by histories it were as impossible to conjecture thereby what she was fifteen hundred years ago as it is to guess at the integrity that flourish'd in the first ages by the manners of the present times Now of the cause and origine this so deplorable ruine all the ancients both Poets and Philosophers have been ignorant all their conjectures thereof are dubious and unresolved and all their assertors false Nor is it difficult to judge how much this ignorance hath hindred them from rendring to God what belongs to him upon this account and tasting any true and solid consolations in their miseries For how could they acknowledg his justice in the punishment of mankind whilst they knew not that this disorder hapned by their own fault How could they admire his goodness in conservation of the Universe when they were ignorant that man deserv'd to be reduced to nothing from his birth How could they have recourse to God for obtaining of him a remedy against such misery seeing they knew him not or how could they beseech him to repair their ruins How could they learn not to murmure against him if they knew not that the evils they suffered were worthily inflicted on them and as due to their crimes Lastly how could they restrain themselves from suspecting the wisdom or power of him that governs the World while they were ignorant of any pertinent reason of all this disorder For as when we observe in a Commonwealth good and bad laws and commendable and unseemly customes mixed together we conclude that either the first Legislators failed in some particular things though they hapned right in others or that later Magistrates degenerated from the Wisdom and Virtue of their Ancestors so beholding order and confusion jumbled together in the World it remains onely to conjecture that either the wisdom of him that contrived it at the beginning was defective or that he could not support and maintain his ancient laws through want of power I mention not at present the natural avidity of knowledge in us which can be little satisfied without a particular revelation as in other abstruse things so in this which is of such moment and continually presented to our minds namely what should be the cause of so many evils that reign in the World In the next place the consolations which they employ against them are very strange Some comfort themselves with the consideration of necessity against which it is unprofitable to struggle And indeed I deny not but it is good counsel to give to such as are miserable that when there is no means of deliverance from calamity to indevor at least to support it with the least impatience that may be because necessity is invincible It is good I say if it could be put in practise But as he that should exhort a man that is in the paroxysm of a violent Colick to be cheerful would shew himself ridiculous and void of understanding so he that should counsel a man fallen into some great and irrecoverable distress to comfort himself because it cannot be otherwise would deservedly be accounted troublesome and almost barbarous Can any imagine that it would have been any great heartning to the poor Philoctetes when he made the Sea and rocks resound his lamentable ejulations and wish'd that some body would cast him down from the precipice of a rock into the waves beneath for one to have said to him Friend there is no remedy Destiny will have it so and to wrastle against her decree is to swim against the stream For this is the cause of his despair that there is no remedy were there any hope of it he would not cry out so loud but sustain himself with those excellent words of Epicurus If pain be great it will be but of short durance And it would be to no purpose in such a case for a man to boast of the invincible strength of his courage Hercules himself groan'd ●nd cry'd out in the midst of the flames In effect there is no constancy which the assiduous perseverance of pain do's not at length overcome Nature ha's not made us of Iron or Steel but hath given us a tender and delicate flesh and quick and lively sentiments In a word the consideration of Necessity may indeed cause a man to resolve to travel through a bad and dirty way or to swallow a bitter potion that is soon down but there is no constancy which is not undermined and worn out by a continual suffering Others have solac'd themselves with the commonness generality of the misery conceiving it both injustice and folly for any particular person to complain of his own case where all are equally involv'd As the Proverb hath it 'T is the comfort of sufferers to have companions Thus the Poet Antimachus compos'd an Elegy wherein he reckon'd up all the disasters befallen to any people that ever he knew to comfort himself upon the loss of his wife But as the Sun though he shines in common to all that have eyes yet his light ought not to be accounted less grateful and sweet and as the use of respiration is

in arms Now what is the cause of this misery but their Sins both such as are common to all men in general and particular to their own Nation For certainly God who lov'd them so tenderly and chose them out from all others to communicate his Covenants to them would not treat them so rigorously were there not some lawful cause in their extraordinary offenses And what a strange blindness and stupidity of mind is it to have so quick a resentment of evils relating to the body and not to acknowledge the cause of them What a depravity and perversity of understanding to groan under the strokes of the hand of God never to groan under the load of their own iniquity To pant incessantly after a Deliverer of the Body and never to think of the redemption of the soul They are driven out of Judaea and Heaven and Earth resound with their lamentations They are by their sins debar'd the hope of Heaven and make no matter of it They are inthralled to their corporeal enemies and murmure against God for it They themselves are sold to Satan and to Sin and do not understand the horror of this servitude They are impatient in a waiting the coming of some Person that may reassemble them from their dispersion and deliver them in reference to the body The Redeemer and Deliverer of their fouls is offer'd and preach'd to them and they reject him They flatter themselves with hope of a profound and plenteous tranquillity in all sorts of pleasures and delights of the Flesh and cheer up themselves with it They are invited to taste how good the Lord is in his compassions and they refute it Their thoughts are day and night upon gold silver silk scarlet fine linnen and jewels and their hearts leap with the fancy The Gospel tells them of riches and ornaments relating to the minde and they blaspheme it Is this the Posterity of that onely wife and intelligent people with whom God establisht his Covenants But above all the rest they do injury to the glory of that Messias who was promised to them to fancy him an earthly Prince For since themselves call his Kingdom the Kingdom of Heaven what other ought they to hope for but one spiritual and heavenly which beginning to be exercis'd here below in the souls of men which are of a spiritual nature is accomplish'd above in glory unspeakable And truly 't is to this that all the Prophets lead us from the first to the last What does that promise refer to The seed of the woman shall break the Serpents head but to the consolation of man by the hope of being deliver'd from the Curse of eternal Death into which he is fallen by the deceit of the Evil One For as he sin'd principally with his soul which is the source and principle of the actions of the body and alone capable of understanding the laws of piety and obedience so it was consentaneous that the condemnation of death should be directed to the soul in case of rebellion And that other promise In thy seed shall all the families of the Earth be blessed and I will give this Land to thee and to thy Posterity after thee wherein did it profit Abraham if it aim'd no further then that Canaan which himself never possess'd and was not given to his Posterity till above 400. years after Was it either a sufficicent consolation to him in all the Crosses that he underwent or a Promise worthy of God who establisht his Covenant with him For which of us cares what will be done a hundred years after his death As for those words of Jacob untill Shiloh come they promise a Prince of peace about whom neither fire nor sword shall glitter but he shall be the author of peace between God and men It shall come to pass saith Isaiah that the Mountain of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountaines and shall be exalted above the Hills and all Nations shall flow unto it But what to do Come shall they say and let us go up to the Mountain of the Lord and he will teach us his ways and we will walk in his paths Therefore 't is to be enrich'd in the knowledge of the Name of the Lord and not in Jewels or Pearls to learn to moderate and subdue their Passions and not to conquer Kingdomes Also in the 25. chap. 6. vers In this mountain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things a feast of Wines on the lees of fat things full of marrow of wines on the lees well refined Can they take this according to the Letter It is certain there are some so stupifi'd with the wine of ignorance that they take it so and expect to be satiated with that horrible Leviathan which is powder'd up I know not where against the manifestation of the Messias Poor people who think the Prince of the Kingdom of Heaven will come to fill their bellies But behold what follows vers 7. And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people and the veil that is spread over all Nations What is the meaning of this but that all Nations being involv'd in ignorance as in the black veil of night he will dispell all that darkness to the end they may behold the light of his knowledge that they may rejoyce I say in the light of that Sun of Righteousness who carries healing in his wings And thus through out all the Prophets which would be too long to recite there needs no more but to read them For it will be found that he is a Prince of peace upon whom the Spirit of the Lord shall rest the Spirit of Wisdom and Vnderstanding the Spirit of counsel and might the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord. That under his reign The Wolfe shall dwell with the Lamb and the Leopard lye down with the Kid and the Calfe and the young Lyon and the fatling together and a little child shall lead them c. That is He will unite the most hostile Nations together in the same society of Religion and cicurate and mollifie the fiercest people by the knowledge of the true God and render the most untractable natures gentle and sweet Which the Prophet himself expounds immediately after They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain For the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the Sea He shall not cry nor lift up nor cause his voice to be heard in the street A bruised reed shall be not break and the smoaking flaw shall he not quench So far is it that he shall batter all to pieces with Canon-shot or hew all down with the sword And as for his Glory it must needs be other then terrestrial and corporeal Since he was to be despised and rejected of men a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief Since I say he