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	nature_n	soul_n	2,893	5	5.2542	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A89235	Miscellanea spiritualia: or, Devout essaies: composed by the Honourable Walter Montagu Esq.; Miscellanea spiritualia. Part 1.	Montagu, Walter, 1603?-1677.; Marshall, William, fl. 1617-1650, engraver.	1648 (1648)	Wing M2473; Thomason E519_1; ESTC R202893	256,654	397

god-head she could in number have made up that losse of quality she brought in all the celest all bodies into the account of Divinity serving the Militia of Heaven instead of the maker and we may call to minde that as humane bodies grew Giants mindes seemed to shrink into dwarfs when they fell in love as I may say with the daughters of men that is the conceptions of their owne naturall Reason in this point of Divinity And we may well suppose that the Giants soules in the law of nature became so by espousing this daughter of God which we may properly call Grace whereby their heads passed the skie and touched Heaven it selfe in this beliefe of the unity of the godhead and by this conjunction with grace reason produced their issue of a rectified Religion hence is it that we finde the Patriarks frequently visited by celestiall spirits as the allies as I may say of this daughter of Heaven they had espoused and most doe conclude that all those who in the law of nature continued in a rectified belief and worship of God were maintained in that state by grace supplementall to the virtue of single Reason How far humane Reason may alone finde the way to rectified Religion is a question to exercise curiosity rather then excite piety and very commonly reason in the disquisition of faith doth rather sink the deeper into the earth by falling from her over aspiring then she doth six her selfe upward in her proper station and besides this danger me thinkes there is this difference betweene them that are working upon reason to extract Religion and those that are feeding upon sincere faith that the first are labouring the ground for that fruit which the last are feasting on or that the first are plowing while the last are gathering of Manna I shall indeavour therefore to serve in this spirituall refection ready to be tasted treating of faith already digested rather then to be provided by ratiocination for devotion is faith converted into nourishment by which the soul contracting a sound active strength needs not study the composition of that aliment it finds so healthfull §. II. Treating the best habit of mind in order to the finding a rectified Religion ME thinks Religion and Devotion may be fitly resembled to the Body and the Soule in Humanity The first of which issues from an orderly procession of nature by a continuing virtue imparted all at once to mediate causes the last is a new immediate infusion from heaven by way of a creation continually iterated and repeated So Religion at large as some homage rendred to a supreme relation flows into every mind along with the current of natural causes But Devotion is like the Soule produced by a new act of grace directed to every particular by speciall and expresse infusion and in these respects also the analogie will hold that as Religion hath the office of the body to containe Devotion so Devotion hath the function of the soule to informe and animate Religion And as the soule hath clearer or darker operations according as the body is well organized or disposed so Devotion is the more zealous or remisse proportionately to the temper and constitution of the Religion that containeth it Sutable to the Apostle Saint James his intimation to us that Pure Religion keeps us unspotted from the world I shall not take upon me the spirituall Physitian to consult the indispositions and remedies of differing Religions but relying more upon the Testimony of confessed experiments then the subtilty of that litigious art I shall prescribe one receipt to all Christian tempers which is to acquire the habit of Piety and Devotion for this in our spirituall life is like a healthfull aire and a temperate diet in our naturall the best preservative of a rectified faith and the best disposition to recover from an unsound Religion for the Almes and Prayers of the Centurion were heard and answered when they spoke not the language of the Church and the Angel was sent to translate them into that tongue in which God hath chose onely to be rightly praised that which his Eternall Word Christ Jesus hath peculiarly affected and annexed to his Church this shews the efficacie of piety and the exactnesse of Gods order who hath inclosed his eternall graces within those bounds into which he brings all that shall partake of them and so doth naturalize all such strangers as he intitleth to them doth not allot any portions to aliens but reduceth all them he will endow into that qualification he requireth which is into the rank of fellow-citizens of the Saints and of the houshold of God he leaves none with a dispensation of remaining forreiners The Angel that called the Centurion directed him to the gate of the Church Saint Peter did not bring him a protection to rest in his owne house with the exercise of his naturall pieties and so for those that are straying without the inclosure of the Catholique Church if they walk by the light of naturall charity morall piety and devotion in their religious duties this is the best disposition towards the finding of the way the truth and the life of whom the Psalmist sayes He is neere to all those that seeke him and those who are thus far advanced in morality may be said to be in atriis Templi in the Church-yard which is in a congruous disposition for farther advance into the body of the church I shall endeavour then to affect every one with the love of purity and holinesse of life for to those that are already rooted and growing in the Church this disposition will be are that fruit the Apostle soliciteth for them that their love may abound more and more in knowledge and in all judgement And in those who are yet strangers and forreiners as he calls them this reverentiall feare of God seemes to chase the wax for the seale of the holy Spirit for Prayers and Almes doe as it were retaine God for their Counsel and as his Clients open their cause to him in these tearms of the Psalmist Lord cause me to know the way wherein I should walk for I lift up my soule unto thee And such may be said to be halfe way towards their end that doe worship in a zealous spirit and are likely never left there but helped on to the other part of worshipping in truth by him that hath ordained our worship to consist of Spirit and Truth so that devotion sincerity in any Religion are the best Symptomes of our designation to the true and sincere Religion Wherefore having made this generall presentation of piety and virtue to all parties I shall not stay to wrastle in the Schooles but rather strive to set such Church-musick as all parties may agree to meet at the service and this I presume may sound in tune unto most eares that where consort and harmony in faith appeareth it is a good note of that

see Christ promiseth us in expresse termes the company of the Father and his residence in us Wherefore Now O happy man that thou art look not down upon the stage of the Serpent where he lyeth still hissing at thee to call thy thoughts to the earth since thou didst first hearken to him But raise thy lookes upward to the throne of Heaven where the splendor of thy humanity at the right Hand of God reflecteth to thee thy owne dignity for even in the mirrour of the word wherein God the Father seeth himselfe man may now see his own image there man may see not only his nature made after Gods image but God himselfe in the image of his nature Correspond with thy own worthynesse then O exalted creature and live as if thou had'st never seene thy selfe in any other glasse for here is that eminence truly conferred on thee which thou did'st at first so vainly affect of being like God and the holy Spirit is thy councellour in this claime of thy divinity and thy comforter against the disswasions of thy first projector who would now divert thee from the aspiring to the consort and participation of the divine nature which is offered to thy aspiring This premised and ponder'd man may say I rejoyce even in my infirmities that the power of Christ may rest upon me and triumph in me for my strength is made perfect in weaknesse and may consort the harp of David to the same tune of praysing mans condition professing thy friends O Lord are become exceeding honourable their principality is exceeding strengthened for when mans infirmities appear in temptations and suggestions to deface the image and Character of the holy Ghost in him then hath he the holy Spirit to second him in the defence of his own image So that by the adjunction of these helpes even all mans infirmities may be converted into his glories and man hath nothing left to undeifie him now but his owne preferrence of degeneration and flavery to the enemy of his nature before his adherence to her Author Finally upon all these representations I may justly re-extoll and magnifie the dignity of humane nature which we may consider sent down at first from Heaven as Gods image and next as a state to which God himselfe did vouchsafe to come down in person and taking it upon him will inhabit therein eternally and then that the holy Spirit of the Father and the Son abideth in it as in his Temple which he sanctifies incessantly nay more that it is designed to partake the same glory which the whole Trinity injoyeth by being promised to be made like him who hath it all the God and man Christ Jesus O then he that may hope this let him never plead his frailty or infirmity in discredit of his nature let him not in a dejection of spirit seek to cover his pusilanimity with O wretched man I finde a Law reluctant in me against all these motives and incentives of my aspiring to divinity but rather let him boldly pronounce in such a holy confidence as is prescribed him I can doe all things in him that strengthens me for since God is in so many sorts with us who shall prevaile against us Therefore in all these reluctances let us aspire to be more then conquerors by him who so much loveth us The Third Treatise Of Religion §. I. Considering it under the generall Notion of some reference to a Divine Power REligion riseth in the first dawning of the light of nature for the soul as soon as she doth but see her selfe by the reflex of any discourse discernes her own relation to some superiour cause to which she assigneth some present reverence and reason as it riseth and ascendeth breaketh the day a little further but leaveth the mind still in such a twy-light as the understanding doth hardly distinguish singularity in the supremacy discryed above it selfe for reason doth but as it were feele out her way to Divinity by a kinde of palpation and sensible touches upon materiall creatures and cannot by an immediate elevation of her faculties to immateriall notions raise her selfe up to the speculation of any spirituall substance much lesse to the supreme spirituall Essence So that by the meere light of nature the mind oftner scatters and breakes the object of Divinity then singleth it into unity This deficiency appeareth in the speculations of most of the Philosophers who all looked naturally upward for some supream reference and asscription of their being but unto most of them Heaven like a crack'd mirrour broken by their various imaginations reflected multiplyed images of the Divinity whereby we may discerne that the perception of unity in the divine Essence is not derived so much from the emission of the rayes of naturall Reason as from a reception of a supernaturall light whereby reason is rather illuminated from above it selfe then singly producing this selfe-illustration and this forrein clarity diffused upon our reason is the Grace of the Divine essence which elucidates to our minde the simplicity and indivisiblenesse of the object from whence this gracious splendour issueth upon our understanding Grace thus inspired worketh by the soule as light doth by the sense not inducing the faculty but only the exercise of sight for grace doth not conferre any new faculty to the soul but only perfecteth the capacity of naturall reason in this act of singling the notion of the Diety and settling the unity of a Creator in our beleef And this first position alwayes suggesteth some Religion taken largely as a recognition by some exteriour homage of one Supreamacy above our Nature but this estate admits of much diversity in Religious beliefs in which even the wise men of the World as Saint Paul termeth them did stray and lose themselves growing vain in their own imaginations for by a seeming pretext of piety namely of making religious addresses enough to God they made many Gods under the colour of one Supream addresse By this Errour we may perceive that naturall reason needeth still a further conduct from grace to lead it to a rectified Religion Certaine it is that the materiall and visible species of this world afford some notion of the invisible producer as in mines whereof the specificall matter is of a much meaner substance there are found some veines of Gold and Silver so out of the grosse masse of nature those that work upon it by single reason may easily extract some Spirituall ore of Religion for through the elemented body of the universe there run some veines of intimation of a spirituall nature independent on all matter which reason may discerne and so resolve some Religious acknowledgment of a Divine principle as the producer of subordinate causes and effects but how apt humane reason is to sever and disunite this principle we may easily judge when we remember how soone reason forgot her owne origine and as if having lost the unity of the