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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	day_n	lord_n	sabbath_n	2,994	5	10.1532	5	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45340	Samaria's downfall, or, A commentary (by way of supplement) on the five last verses of the thirteenth chapter of Hosea wherein is set forth, Ephraim's dignity, duty, impenitency, and downfall : very suitable to, and seasonable for, these present times, where you have the text explained, sundry cases of conscience cleared, many practical observations raised (with references to such authors as clear any point more fully) : and a synopsis or brief character of the twenty kings of Israel, with some useful inferences from them / by Thomas Hall ...	Hall, Thomas, 1610-1665.	1660 (1660)	Wing H440; ESTC R18060	150,640	184

are great self-seekers c. Oh this cursed Hypocrisie Hypocrisie Hypocrisie ruines all It is that leven that sowers all our services that Coloquintida that makes our duties deadly If any sin destroy England it is this God may bear with other sins but this provokes him to his face and is such a horrid mocking of him that his soul abhors Against Hypocrisie see Mr. Torshel his Trea●ise against it and Mr. Crook and Mr. Sheffeild Mr. William Shepherd Mr. Ant. Burges Spi. Refin 2. P. Mr. Rob. Bolton on Psal. 1. p. 24. Mr. Fenner on Isa. 58. 4. p. 407. 7 The Israelites were great self-seekers They brought forth fruit but it was to themselves They were all for present profit and present pay like the Heifer that loves to tread out the corn where shee may eat as shee goes but shee loves not plowing that is hard and hungry work Hos. 10. 1 11. They were all for liberty and ease they could not abide Gods yoak and therefore the Lord tells them that since they loved liberty so well they should have enough of it but to their ruine Israel was a wanton Heifer the whole pasture could not contain nor content her and therefore the Lord threatens to give her the liberty of the Lamb in the wilderness where it should bee exposed to a thousand dangers and miseries Hos. 4. 16. And is not this the great sin of England Was there everless self-denial and more self-seeking in the Land where shall wee finde a plain simple single-hearted Iacob that prefers Gods glory before his own interest and can bee content to perish so that Gods Name may flourish Shew mee Oh shew mee that man that I may give thanks unto God for him Most men in our daies are squint-eyed they pray hear repent fast give Alms but still they have an eye to themselves in all they do Zach. 7. 5. Matth. 6. 2. And as Ephraim so England is all for Liberty Liberty in Church and Liberty in State Liberty in Spirituals and Liberty in Temporals We have those that like Sons of Belial can bear no yoak none must reign over them They must have Liberty Liberty Liberty and I will proclaim a Liberty to you saith the Lord A Liberty to the Sword a Liberty to the Famine and a Liberty to the Pestilence This is the portion of such Libertines Ier. 34. 17. 8 Witchcraft and Inchantments This also was a sin that helpt to ruine Ephraim They had familiarity with the Devil and by his aid they could divine and inchant 2 King 17. 17. And was there ever more Witchcraft in England than at this day Oh this sinning sin grows rife amongst us Those seducing deluding quaking sots and sectaries that go up and down the Land with their inchanting Ribbons and other Diabolical practices plainly shew that too many of them are in league with the Devil They talk much of the spirits moving and the spirits leading them their bastards their railing and blasphemy shews that it is an evil spirit that leads them This sin helpt to ruine the Jews Because they had forsaken the Lord and were south-sayers like the Philistims Isa. 2. 6. And if England bee guilty of the like sin it must also look for the like punishment 9 Barrenness under the means of Grace God was not wanting in any means of Grace to Ephraim but Ephraim was an empty Vine and wanting to himself Hos. 10. 7. This also is the great sin of England wee are dead under lively Oracles and fruitless under fruitful Ordinances and lean under soul-enriching means Like Pharaohs lean kine that devoured the fat ones yet themselves were still lean Gen. 41. 20 21. Wee dishonour the Lords Pastures and discredit his Ordinances by our unfruitfulness and open the mouths of the wicked to cry Ecce quales sunt qui Christum colunt Behold how dead and dull how base and barren how unholy and unrighteous these Christians are such barren ground is nigh to cursing Heb. 6. 8. Which of us will plow the Rocks or sow the Sands or bestow cost upon ground which will bring forth nothing but briars and thorns The barren figg-tree was cut down because it cumbred the Earth and made the ground about it the worse Luk. 13. 6 to 10. The figg-tree that had no●hing but bare leaves of profession was cursed for want of fruit Mark 11. 13 14. God will lay his Axe to the root of those trees that bring not forth good fruit Matth. 3. 10. and lay waste his Vineyard and command the clouds to Rain no more upon it when after all his cost and care it brings forth nothing but wild grapes Isa. 5. 2 to 8. when the Lord comes to walk in the beautiful Vineyard of his Church and findes a tree that grows not in so fruitful a soil hee will cut it down it shall no longer cumber the ground Our great unfruitfulness under the rich means that wee enjoy should deeply affect us If Han●ah wept for the barrenness of her body how should wee lament the barrenness of our souls and cry as Rachel Give mee children or I dye So give mee Grace or I am undone make mee fruitful or I perish for ever Complain to God against it the best and most fruitful Christians have made the saddest complaints against themselves Holy Bradford how oft did hee lament that deadness unfruitfulness unthankfulness that cleaved to his nature David how oft doth hee begg for quickning Grace Do by your barren hearts as men do by their barren grounds they will digg dung drain them and use all means to make them fruitful So do you pray re●d meditate hear confer and use all means to get your dead hearts bettered and your graces quickned Yet le●t any should deceive themselves thinking that they grow in grace when they do but deceive themselves you must therefore know that there may bee a growing in gifts ●hen there is no growing in grace Many a man knows more and can pray longer than formerly and yet no growth in grace True growth is principally internal in the Root in Humiliation Sanctification Faith Obedience It is a growing up not onely in some things but in all things Ephes. 4. 15. True growth is universal it is not onely a growing in the head as some that have the Rickets do but in heart head and every part True growth saith Aristotle is a diffusing of nourishment to all the parts uniformiter difformiter The Understanding Will Memory Affections Body Soul all is bettered 2 It may bee you do grow but do you grow answerable to all the means and mercies which God hath bestowed upon you They that have much of them shall bee much required Where the Husbandman bestows extraordinary cost there hee expects an extraordinary crop and herein the best of us all have great cause to bee humbled in the dust Who can say hee hath answered the Lords cost and care and grown answerably to all those Sermon● Sabbaths

of all creature-comforts Pigeons when they fare best are most fearful In the highest prosperity remember that a change will come Hence it is that when ever the Lord gave Israel a mercy hee presently adds a caution that they forget not him the giver of it Deut. 4. 1 2 6 9. 8. 11 13 13 14. Hee hath made a good progress in the School of Christ who hath learnt to use prosperity as well as adversity aright Paul had learnt both these lessons hee could bee abased and hee could abound Phil. 4. 12. Object Wee have arms and ammunition and therefore wee need not fear Answ. The Lord takes off that Hos. 1. 4 5. Yet a little while and I will cause the Kingdome of Israel to cease i. e. I will put an end to that Kingdome and utterly destroy it But how doth that appear Why I will break the bow of Israel The bow is here put for all war-like Instruments q. d. I will destroy their ammunition and bring all the strength of their war-like power to nought 2 That God can make use of wicked Instruments for the saving of his people Ieroboam here a wicked man yet becomes a Saviour to Israel though hee intended self yet God makes him a deliverer of his people If God will help his Church hee cannot want Instruments The very Earth shall help the Woman Rev. 12. 16. i. e. Wicked men who are as vile as the Earth shall yet bee assistant to the Church of God 3 When a people have the best Preaching they may bee nearest ruine Israel now had three extraordinary Prophets sent unto them viz. Ionah Amos Hosea three eminently holy bold men that spared not to tell them of their sins as appears by their Prophecies yet Prince and people contemning their warnings and persisting in their sins about thirty years after they were rooted up and lead into captivity by the proud Assyrian So it was with Ierusalem it had the best Preachers not long before its ruine There was Christ and his Apostles but they contemning the Gospel crucifying the Lord of glory stoning his Prophets and abusing his messengers about forty years after it was sackt by Titus and Vespatian and laid in the dust London was never so richly stored with pious painful learned Ministers of the Gospel nor the Nation so richly furnisht with able and industrions Preachers as at this day But if City and Country go on to sleight and vilifie the faithful Ministers of Christ as they have done of late and instead of the power of Religion rest content with a formal hypocritical profession of it a man that is no Prophet nor Prophets Son may easily fore-see judgement approaching When the Sun shines hot test harvest is at hand The glorious sun-shine of the Gospel ripens men apace either for Heaven or Hell God will not bear so long with sinners now as hee did in times of Ignorance Act. 17. 30. 4 When Gods Messengers are not prized hee removes them If Israel regard not Ionah's Ministery God will send him from them to Niniveh that populous City When people are dead under lively Oracles and barren under fruitful means God will either remove that people from the Ministery or the Ministery from them Hee will not alwaies plow the Rocks and sow the Sands nor take pains with a people that shall bring forth nothing but briars and thorns when a people bee rebellious God either takes away his Prophets or makes them dumb Ezek. 3. 26. Many blame Ministers in our daies for removing from place to place and if they do it without just cause so do I. But people must know that there are many just causes of a Ministers removal from one place to another some of which I shall set down As 1 In case of Persecution 2 In case of Corporal Weakness and Sickness 3 Upon Improvement of Gifts 4 When the Maintenance is Incompetent 1 In case of Persecution especially if it bee personal and the Minister bee specially aimed at then our Saviour tells us that being persecuted in one City they may fly to another and reserve themselves for better times This is granted by all sober men and therefore I shall refer the Reader to the Margin for fuller satisfaction Thus when a Minister desires to spend himself for the good of a people but they cannot endure sound Doctrine 2. Tim. 4. 3. But lay snares for their Minister and make a man an offender for a word Isa. 29. 21. And think him too hot too plain too precise and shall unanimously for the opposition of one or two malicious wretches should settle us rather desire us to depart out of their coasts then the case is clear and wee may shake off the dust of our feet against such wilful contemners of the Gospel Mat. 10. 14. Though a peoples present barrenness under his Ministery bee no just cause of his removal yet when a people shall set themselves maliciously against a mans Ministery it varies the case God removed Lot from the Sodomites when from day to day they vexed his righteous soul with their malicious wickedness 2 In case of Sickness Some constitutions will not away with some Climats a Minister may love a people and they him and yet for want of health and strength to go thorow with the work of his Ministery hee may lawfully change places with one of a stronger constitution The like may bee said for those who preach to a great Congregation but by reason of weakness their voice is so low that half the people cannot hear them in this case they may remove to a lesser Congregation where they may bee better heard 3 Upon Improvement of Abilities A young man begins to exercise his gifts in some obscure Chapel or little place but by study and exercise his parts are improved and hee fitted for some more eminent and publick place In this case also a man may lawfully and without offence remove The Apostle would have him that used the office of a Deacon we●l promoted to the Ministery 1 Tim. 3. 13. A diligent man staies not long in a low place Wee see it is thus in all callings upon Improvement of Abilities The Barrester is made a Reader the Reader a Serjeant the Serjeant a Judge the Judge a chief Justice c. And why will not men allow of that in the Ministery which is approved of in all other professions It is a very safe way to have young mens gifts and lives tried and exercised in lesser Congregations at first and being found faithful in a little then to make them Rulers over greater Congregations It is a temptation to put a green head into a great place when hee hath neither grace gifts nor gravity fit for the place It either puffs them up or makes them idle if the means bee great or else they are discouraged and sink under the burden being unable to grapple with the oppositions and contradictions of sinners which are incident to

Sacraments good books corrections and all other rich means which God hath afforded us in these latter daies Oh what Gyants might wee have been in waies of grace and goodness if every Ordinance had been effectual upon our hearts hee that is weak amongst us might have been as strong as David and hee that is strong as David might have been as an Angel of the Lord for wisdome and purity Zach. 12. 8. Like Saul we might have been taller by the head and shoulders in the waies of Grace than other men Our leanness and our lewdness our barrenness and unfruitfulness our unanswerable walking to the rich means of Grace that wee enjoy doth certainly fore-tell a storm approaching 10 Ingratitude and abuse of Gods mercies to the promoting of Idolatry The more God did for them the less they did for him their fulness bred forgetfulness and the more they were increased the more they sinned Hence the Lord so oft complains of this sin as provoking him more than all the rest Hos. 2. 8. 4. 7. 10. 1. 11. 3 4. 13. 5 6. It was this sin especially that brought the sword upon them Hos. 2. 9. 13. 7. The Prophet Amos also who was contemporary with Hosea doth notably set forth the great Ingratitude of this people in abusing Gods mercies Amos 2. 9 10 11. And is not this that crying sin of England Do wee not●fight against God with his own blessings abusing our health wealth wit peace plenty corn wine gold silver Scriptures Ordinances yea all our comforts and creatures to the dishonour of the giver of them His mercies make us proud his riches covetous his peace secure his food intemperate and all his benefits serve us but as weapons to rebel against him And do wee thus require the Lord O foolish and unwise is this the thanks wee give him for all his patience preservations success and deliverances Will not the Lord visit for these things and shall not his soul bee avenged on such a Nation as this Had England no more sins to answer for but this even this were sufficient to make it a desolation as it did Samaria 11 Covenant-breaking God had betrothed them to himself and chosen them from the rest of the world to become his people But they like men transgressed the Covenant there did they deal treacherously against him Hos. 6. 7. 10. 4. Like Sons of Adam they walkt in his steps though they were abundantly blest by God yet they revolted from him and transgrest the Covenant there even th●re it is put emphatically where they should have been most faithful viz. in the Covenant there they dealt most falsly and perfidiously with him And is not this one of the crying sins of England Never was there a wiser and better composed Covenant in the Nation and never any worse performed wee have lifted up our hands to the most High that wee will in our places and callings extirpate heresies and yet many walk as if they had taken a Covenant to propagate them many amongst us make no more of their Covenants than an Ape doth of his coller which hee can put off or on at his own pleasure Let any man but read all the branches of the Covenant and then compare our contrary walking to it and hee cannot but admire the infinite patience of the Lord that hee hath not long since sent a sword to avenge the quarrel of his Covenant upon us Levit. 26. 25. wee must not think to do such things and escape or to break our Covenants with God and then bee delivered Ezek. 17. 15 to 20. If the Lord so sadly avenged the breach of Covenant with a man yea with a Heathen and Idolater what shall bee done to him who breaks his Covenant made with the great God of Heaven and Earth and if a good man will perform the Covenant which hee made though it bee to his disadvantage how great is their sin then who perform not the conditions of such Covenants as tend to their everlasting welfare Psal. 15. 4. The Jews have a saying That there is no punishment that befalls them but there is a dram of the golden Calf in it so there is no misery that befalls England but there it a dram of Covenant-breaking in it 12 Security Though strangers had devoured his strength yet hee knew it not the Syrian and Assyrian had consumed him and made a prey of him yet such was his stupidity that hee knew it not viz. with a practical saving knowledge so as to repent and make a right use of it Yea gray hairs were sprinkled here and there upon him which were a sign of weakness and old age and death approaching yet they laid it not to heart Hos. 7. 9. but they were at ease in Sion and trusted in the Mountain of Samaria putting the evil day far from them and therefore a woe is denounced against them Amos 6. 1 3. 9. 10. And was there ever more security and sensless stupidity in England than at this day Do not the Ministers of Christ generally complain that they see not that life zeal activity tenderness compunction c. in their people as formerly Many applaud and flatter themselves with their gifts and external profession of sanctity but the power of it is very much wanting amongst us A great calm oft times is a fore-runner of a storm and great security is a great fore-runner of some great judgement When the old world was eating drinking buying building marrying and thought not of a flood then it came and swept them all away when men cry peace peace then comes sudden and swift destruction 1 Thes. 5. 3. 13 Anarchy They devoured all their Iudges all their Kings were fallen Hos. 7. 7. They discovered their rage in their seditious and frequent conspiracies to the devouring and destroying of their Judges and Magistrates as appears in the frequent murders of their Kings What Anarchy and confusion is amongst us hee is a great stranger in our English Israel that knows not 14 Lukewarmness This is another sin that helpt to ruine Ephraim Hos. 7. 8. Ephraim is a cake not turned and so but half-baked or dough-baked neque crudus neque coctus neither hot nor cold neither fish nor flesh but of a middle mongrel Religion halting between two partly for God and partly for the Devil partly for Christ and partly for Baal but God hates such halting 〈◊〉 doings and therefore spues them out of his mouth and sends them packing into captivity And is not this the sin of England Are wee not a luke-warm generation neither hot nor cold that halt not between two but two hundred opinions Wee have a knee for God and a knee for Baal a tongue for Christ and a tongue for Antichrist a tongue for Truth and a tongue for Falshood Like the harlot wee are all for dividing But God will bee served truly and totally without halting or halving hee hath made our whole