Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	call_v	natural_a	nature_n	1,762	5	5.4373	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A53283	The soveraign efficacy of divine providence ... as delivered in a sermon preached in Cambridge on Sept. 10, 1677, being the day of artillery election there, by Mr. Urian Oakes...	Oakes, Urian, 1631-1681.	1682 (1682)	Wing O23; ESTC R31763	31,659	48

alwayes to evade danger or win the Prize by Running Nor is the Battel to the Strong The Victory is not determined or the decision of the warre made alwayes on the side of the strongest and valiantest men Nor yet Bread to the Wise. Many wise men are not able to get their Bread or Livelihood in the World Nor Riches to men of Vnderstanding Many understanding men have not any success in their endeavours to gath●● R●ches and get Estates Nor Favour to men of Skill Many times the most Skillful Artists and Artificers and the best Accomplished Persons find little Favour and Acceptation among men how deserving and ingenious soever they be 2. Illustrated by the Antithesis of a different and the true Cause of the Determination of Successes and Events signified in those words But Time and Chance happeneth to them all By which we are not to understand that the Determination of Events is reduc●d and referred to meer Chance Fortune as the Epicurean Philosophers imagined but that the Counsel and Providence of God disposes and orders out all Successes or Frustrations of Second Causes casting in sometimes such unexpected Impediments and Obstructions as defeat the Labours and hopes of men of greatest Sufficiency which though they seem wholly casual and fortuitous Emergencies and are so indeed unto men themselves yet they are governed by the secret Counsel and effectual Providence of God The Summe is that no man how accomplish'd soever is Master of Events or absolute Determiner of the Issues of his own Actings and Endeavours but the soveraign Counsel and the Providence of God orders TIME and CHANCE to be an effectual Furtherance or Hindrance of the Designs of all men as seems good in His sight The Observation is Doct. That the Successes and Events of Vndertakings and Affairs are not determined infallibly by the greatest Sufficiency of Men or Second Causes but by the Counsel and Providence of God ordering and governing Time and Chance according to his own good Pleasure I have endeavoured to comprize and grasp the substance of Solomon's Intendment in this Doct●nal Conclusion and shall explicate and demonstrate the Truth of it as God shall help in the following Propositions Prop. 1. Second Causes may have a sufficiency in their Kind to produce these and those Effects an liability a congruous disposition or an aptness yea a kind of sufficiency in order to the putting forth this and that Act and the giving Existence to these and those Effects not indeed an absolute and universal Sufficiency which can be affirmed of none but Him that is All sufficient and Omnipotent but a limited sufficiency or a sufficiency in their Kind and order The Sun to shine the Fire to burn that which is combustible the Rational Creature to act or effect this or that in a way of counsel and with freedom of will the Swift to run the strong and valiant and well-instructed Souldier to fight well the wise man to get his bread to gather riches to gain acceptance among those with whom he hath to do This is no more than to say that created Agents and Second Causes may have the active power and virtue of causes all that is requisite on their parts in orde●● to the production of their peculiar and appropriate Effects all that sufficiency that dependent Beings and second Causes are capable of And indeed it belongs to the Infinite Wisdom and Goodness of God to furnish his Creatures with sufficient Ability for the opperations and effects He hath made them for and so He did at first when He made every thing good in its Kind and whatever Defect there is now in this respect it is the fruit punishment of Sin Though God is able to give Being to things in an immediate way yet it is his pleasure in the course of his Providence to use Means and to produce many things by the mediation and Agency of second Causes and so gives causal virtue and ability to these and those things in order to the producing of such and such Effects It is a good observation that the Lord is pleased not through any defect of power in Himself but out of the abundance of his goodness to communic●te causal power and virtue to his Creatures to honour them with that Dignity that they may be his Instruments by which He will produce these and those Effects whereby He takes them as it were into partnership fellowship with Himself in the way of his providential Efficiency that they may be Vnder-workers to yea Co-workers with Himself Hence He gives them an aptitude and sufficiency in their kind in order to their respective operations and effects though some have a greater aptitude sufficiency than others But without some degree of such suffici●●cy nothing can deserve the name of a Cause the very essence whereof consists in its power virtue ability to produce an Effect A cause cannot be a cause without an active power or sufficiency to give being to this or that Effect Prop. 2. The Successes and Events of Affairs and Vndertakings do ordinarily depend in some respects upon the Sufficiency of Second Causes I do not say in the Observation nor is it the meaning of Solomon that Successes and Events of Affairs and Undertakings do not depend at all in an ordinary course on the sufficiency of Second Causes For this were to deny and destroy their causality and to make nothing of their efficiency Second causes have their peculiar Influence into their Effects and contribute something to their Existence and to assert the contrary were to say that Causes are no Causes and to speak a flat Contrad●ction This would be to suppose that the Lord hath set up an Order and course in Nature in vain and given to Second Causes a sufficiency in their Kind for Action to no purpose and to deny the ordinary Providence of God which is that whereby the Lord observes the Order which He hath set and that course of Nature which is originally of his own Appointment whereby one thing depends upon and receives Being from another Though the Lord is pleased sometimes upon great and important Occasions to leave the ordinary Road of Providence and act beyond and above the usual stated course of Things and not to concurre with and shine upon the endeavours of created Agents so as to crown them with that success which according to an ordinary course of Providence might be rationally expected yet it is not to be imagined that He should ordinarily dispence with the course and methods of his ordinary Providence For why then should it be called ordinary God who is the Lord of Hosts the great Leader Commander Ruler of Nature not only permits but also effectually commands and causes his whole Militia ordinarily to move and act according to their Natures and natural Properties respectively without Countermanding them or turning them out of their way For as I remember One argues He will not shew such a dislike to