Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	condemn_v	zeal_n	zealous_a	64	3	10.2793	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A43619	The fourth part of naked truth, or, The complaint of the church to some of her sons for breach of her articles in a friendly dialogue between Titus and Timothy, both ministers of the Church of England / by a legal son and since conformist to the Church of England, as established by law.; Naked truth. Part 4	Hickeringill, Edmund, 1631-1708.	1682 (1682)	Wing H1806; ESTC R14467	65,265	43

needs wound us to the Heart to hear the Name and Truth of God reproached for our sakes To see Men point to any of us and say There goes a covetous Priest a scandalous Preacher an open Tipler a frequent Swearer and secret Whoremonger There are they that preach for Strictness and Ho●…ess that condemn us by their Sermons and themselves by their Conversations Brethren bear with me for my Plainness and Zeal 'T is good saith the Apostle to be zealous in a good thing My Zeal for the Cause of God and Religion which lyes bleeding amongst us constrains me Whose Heart can endure to hear Men cast the Dung of our Iniquities in the Face of the Holy Ghost in the Face of the Gospel which we Preach and in the Face of all that desire to fear the Lord. For if one of us a Leader of a Flock be but once tho he continue not in it enmared in a scandalous Crime all the pious Ministers and other Godly Christians round about him suffer by it For the Wicked and Ungodly and all our Enemies cry out they are all alike Their being nothing more common with evil Men than for the Faults and Crimes of one Professor especially if a Minister to reproach the whole Party O take heed therefore Brethren in the Name of God of every Word you speak of every Step you tread of every Action you do For you bear the Ark of the Lord you are entrusted with his Honour and dare you let it fall and trample it in the Dirt If you do God can find out ways enough to wipe off all that can be cast upon him but you will not so easily remove the Shame and Sorrow you hereby bring upon your selves Remember therefore that standing Decree of Heaven Them that honour me I will honour and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed saith the Lord. And know thus much that all our Preaching and Persuasion of others will prove but dreaming and trifling Hipocresy till we be throughly wrought upon to live according to the Word our selves For he that hath not so strong a Belief of the Word of God and the Life to come as will take on his own Heart from the Vanity of this World and set it upon a resolved Diligence for Salvation it cannot be expected that he would be faithful in seeking the Salvation of other Men. Surely he that dares damn himself dares let others alone in the way to Damnation He that will let go his hopes of Heaven rather than leave his worldly and sensual Delights I think will hardly leave these for the good and saving of others In reason we may conceive he will have little pity on others that is willfully cruelly to himself and that he is not to be trusted with other Mens Souls that is unfaithful to his own and will sell it to the Devil for the short Pleasures of Sin I beseech you therefore Brethren as you tender the wellfare of your own Souls and the Souls of others as you would have the Church of God flourish the Kingdom of Satan lessened and the Gospel of our ever blested Lord run and be gloryfied in the Conversion of Sinners and in the Lives and Conversations of his Saints take heed to your ways and become exemplary in your Lives that others seeing your good Works may glorify our Father which is in Heaven Nor would I put you only to an outward sober and civil Conversation but also as the means to it to look after an inward Renovation We as well as other Men have vitious and corrupt Natures which must be sanctified and renewed or we can never be saved Prove your selves therefore whether you be in the Faith in Christ by a through Sanctification and serious Repentance or not Take heed you be not void of those Graces of God's Spirits which you offer to others and excite others to pray for and endeavour after That you preach not the Word of Conversion to others and your selves being yet unconverted should prove Castaways And know that a Gospel Conversion or work of true Grace implys not only sober and righteous Actions but sanctified and renewed Affections not only blameless Lives but clean and pure Hearts and you shall be able to judg of the one by the other For if the inner Man be renewed the outward Man will be reformed where the Heart is truly sanctified by God's Spirit there the Life will be conformable to God's Law And being satisfied about our own Spiritual State that it is safe and good let us in our respective places vigorously endeavour the Renovation and Conversion of others studying and by all means striving to fit our selves for so great a work as these that are semble of the difficulty of it O what Qualifications are necessary for us who have such a Charge upon us as we have He must not be a Babe in Knowledge that will teach Men all those mysterious things that are necessary to be known in order to Salvation How many Difficulties in Divinity to be opened How many obscure Texts of Scripture to be expounded How many Duties to be done wherein our selves or others may miscarry if in the Manner End Circumstances and Matter they be not well informed How many Sins to be avoided which without understanding and foresight cannot be done What a number of Satan's Wiles of his fly and subtile Temptations must we open to our Peoples Eyes that they may escape them How many weighty and yet intricate Cases of Conscience must we dayly resolve And can such work and so much work be done without Knowledg and other due Qualifications O what strong holds have we to batter and how many of them what subtile diligent and obstinare resistance must we expect at every Heart we deal with Prejudice hath block'd up our way we can scarce procure a patient hearing but many think ill of what we say while we are speaking We cannot make a Breach in their groundless Hopes and carnal Peace but Men have twenty Shifts and seeming Reasons to make it up again and as many Enemies that are seeming Friends ready to help them We Dispute not with them upon equal Terms but have Children to deal with that cannot understand as we have distracted Men in Spirituals to reason with that will bawl us down with rogueing Nonsence we have Atheistical Persons to encounter that deny Principles wilful and unreasonable People that when they are silenced are never the more convinced and when they can give no Reason will give you their Resolutions I will not believe you nor all the Freachers in the World in this nor change my Mind nor alter my Course say what you will Like the Man Salvian had to deal with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 4 de Gubernat p. 133. that being resolved to devour a poor Man's Estate and being entreated by Salvian to forbear told him he could not grant his Request for he had made a Vow to take it so that the Preacher ita religiosissimi sceler is ratione was fain to depart Now when I consider all this and much more incumbent upon us Ministers which is no Burden for a Child 's Back I cannot but break out with the Holy Apostle and say What manner of Persons ought we to be in all Holy Conversation and Godliness Lord What manner of Persons ought we to be in all holy Resolutions and Endeavours for our great indispensable and weighty work Let us therefore with Seriousness and holy Resolutions separate our selves from the World and devote our selves with our Might to God and the good of Souls labouring both by our foundness of Doctrine and holiness of Living to add unto the Flock of Christ the Church of God such as shall be saved And to approve our selves in the sight of all Men to be the Lights of the World the Ambassadors of Christ a Chosen Generation and a Royal Priesthood shewing forth the Practices and Vertues of him who hath called us out of Darkness into his marvelous Light Which that we may all do I conclude with that excellent Prayer of our Church pertinent to this Exhortation That it may please thee O Lord to illuminato all Bishops Priests and Deacons with true knowledg and understanding of thy Word and that both by their Preaching and Living they may set it forth and shew it accordingly And let every one that wisheth well to Zion say Amen ERRATA PAge 4. line 16. for sin read some P. 5. l. 46. f. there is r. therein is P. 7. in the Margent dele Pompin P. 10. l. 33. f. are r. is P. 10. l. 44. f. tongues r. thanks P. 13. l. 30. r. the sin of Nature P. 17. l. 19. f. this r. their P. 22. l. 58. f. the men r. these men P. 24. l. 4. f. new r. now P. 35. l. 26. dele a Commissaries P. 35. l. 42. f. proceeded r. preceeded P. 36. l. last f. examine r. ex animo P. 37. l. 27. f. there r. then P. 38. l. 39. f. lost between them r. between us FINIS