Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	death_n	die_v	sin_n	7,620	5	5.8816	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A34944	Æternalia, or, A treatise wherein by way of explication, demonstration, confirmation, and application is shewed that the great labour and pains of every Christian ought chiefly to be imployed not about perishing, but eternal good things from John 6, 27 / by Francis Craven.	Craven, Francis.	1677 (1677)	Wing C6860; ESTC R27286	248,949	428

a great fight of afflictions A Christian hath more then one Enemy to fight and contend with that labour to hinder his passage towards the Promised Land and is ever to look for warrs and bickerings with one or other that is an enemy to his souls everlasting happiness here is a Christians warfare only in Heaven is his Crown there is no place nor state but Heaven wherein a Christian is free from either outward or inward enemies there and no where but there is he triumphant here he is alwayes militant assaulted and fought against by many adversaries that disquiet hinder his content and that would fain for ever overcome bim As Israel passing through the Wilderness towards Canaan had many warrs and resistances to hinder them in their march thither so have all the Israelites of God designed for Heaven whilst they are in the Wilderness of this world they have the Devil and other both Church and soul Enemies without them and inbread corruptions and lusts within them that fight and make warr against their Souls That as it is said of Cato that he conflicted with manners as Scipio did with Enemies so does a Christian conflict and combate with Lusts and corruption as a Souldier does with his enemies in the field these warring against his Soul so sayes the Apostle Peter 1. Pet. 2. 11. Dearly beloved I beseech you as Pilgrims and strangers abstain from fleshly Lusts which warr against the soul And the Apostle Paul saies of himself Rom. 7. 23. I see another law in my members warring against the Law of my mind The Law of his members did warr and fight against the Law of his mind by provoking him to sin the Apostle speaks it of the regenerate estate Gal. 5. 17. For the flesh lusteth against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh and these are contrary the one to the other There is a contrariety in the flesh against the spirit there is an opposite disposition in the nature of it against the spirit and this not at one time of a Christians life but all the time of his life As fire and water being put together never cease striving and fighting until either the fire be extinguished or the water consumed so a Christian finds it in his spiritual fight and combat with sin there is no ceasing of the fight or combat until one of the combatants be killed and destroyed Now 't is no little labour to fight a battel with and against a potent enemy as indeed sin is an enemy that hath overcome the stoutest warriors Quos arma equi milites machinamenta capere non potuerunt hos peccatum vinctos reddidit such as armes and horses and souldiers and engines could not overcome sin hath overcome Victorious David felt the force of sin in this respect Abraham that subdued those Kings who did plunder Sodome and carryed away Lott is yet though the eminentest man alive in his age for faith foiled by unbelief such instances as these and many more but that I love not to lay open the Saints sores would shew how potent an enemy sin is and you know when men are fighting to get a victory over a potent enemy fightting to wrest a Kingdome or a Countrey out of the hands of a potent enemy they use all the care and all the labour possible to be used and the like care and labour hath a Christian need to manifest when he considers what he fights for not for his countrey not for greatpossessions not for liberty not for wife and children though the remembrance of such things animates souldiers but he fights for that peace of conscience which passeth all understanding he fights for God and Christ whose glory lies at stake every day and suffers as often as he is overcome by sin he fights for Eternal life and for the everlasting salvation of his immortal soul Are not these things worth fighting for laboring and contending for It is in the fighting of this battel as Caesar said it was in the battel he had once in Affrica with the children and partakers of Pompey that in other Battels he was wont to fight for glory but then and there he was fain to fight for his life O Christians here let us remember that our precious Souls lye at the stake in this fight Heaven and all the Eternal good things laid up in Heaven lye at the stake in this fight this will then call for the labor and pains we use in the managing thereof Hence we read of striving against sin Heb. 12. 4. v. ye have not resisted unto blood striving against sin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Theame is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 propriè in certamine me alij oppono It is here fitly translated Striving against and is a soldier-like word which signifies opposing or fighting as an enemy to whom a man will not yield and by whom be is loath to be overcome And the opposed enemy we see here is Sin against which a Christian is to strive with all might and main as Combatants and Wrestlers were wont to do Sin being such a malitious enemy that aims at the damnation of the soul After that sin hath brought Diseases upon the body Poverty upon the estate and a Curse upon posterity it proceeds further laboring to rob and ransake the Soul of all spiritual graces a privation of mortal life contents not the malice of sin sin aims at the loss of Eternal life at the loss of our Souls of our God and Christ and the blessedness of Eternity It was observed of Julius Caesar that in his ingaging the Swisses who thought to obtain Gallia out of his hands he would alight and send away his Horses and cause all the rest to do the like To shew them that they must overcome or dye leaving them no other hopes of their safety but only in the sharpness of their Swords So in this fight a Christian must either overcome or dye the wages of Sin is Death Rom. 7. 5. Rom. 6. 21. The end of these things is death Death is but a modest word for Damnation the first and second death not only that which is temporal but that which is Eternal I have read of a people who when their armies were preparing to fight in the time of War used only this expression to put spirits into their soldiers Estote viri libertas agitur Be Men your liberty is in question Christians Heaven and Eternal glory are in question betwixt you and sin Estote viri shew your selves therefore to be Men nay to be Christians 4. It is compared to one being in an Agony Luk. 13. 24. Strive to enter in at the straight-gate The word in the Greek is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 strive till you are in an Agony as Christ was Christ was in an Agony in the Garden when he sweat drops of Blood so saith St. Luke chap. 22. 44. v. And being in an agony he prayed more carnestly and his sweat was as it

●●all arise first And then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air and so shall we ever be with the Lord Wherefore comfort one another with these words 1 Thes 4. 16 17 18. v. I have done with the two first Reasons confirming this truth That the great labor and pains of every Christian ought chiefly to be imployed not about perishing but Eternal good things First because God com●ands it and the very obeying of his commands goes not without a blessing not to name any temporal blessings we have here in hand or promised unto o●edience t is sufficient that we obtain a future happyness and glory with all those Eternal good things of Heaven And t is said of Jesus Christ Heb. 5. 9. v. He became the author of Eternal salvation unto all them that obey him Secondly because Eternal good things are the best of good things things of the greatest usefulness and necessity to us in order to our Eternal happyness It is of absolute necessity that we should be made gracious as we would be made glorious that we should be interested in God as we would be made happy with God that we should be vnited unto Christ as we would be saved by Christ that we be sanctified by the spirit as we would dwell with the Spirit that we keep a good Conscience as we would escape everlasting horror of an evil Conscience These make a man a good man and assure him of Heaven and they do a man good and chear him in his way to Heaven I now pass on to a third Reason ● Because Eternal good things are lasting good things other good things are perishing good things and this is the third Reason why our Labor and pains ought chiefly to be imployed not about perishing but Eternal good things all other good things perish in the using they are fading good things things that endure but for a season 2 Cor. 4. 18. say they should endure for a very long season what were that season to Eternity unto which they will not indure Those in the Hebrews were contented to part with any thing that indured but for a season so they might have an induring substance things that were but for a season would not content them only things that would indure to everlasting Those things only are lasting that are for everlasting It is tru● what Divine Seneca says Inter peritura vivimus The things of this world we live amongst are all perishing and decaying dayly things that never subsist but pass along with the head-long and precipitate river of time The greatest things of esteem in the world are naturally of themselves perishing and decaying and without suffering any exterior violence would of themselves soon come to an end but there are also many unthought of accidencies and extraordinary violencies which force Nature out of her course and raises storms in the Sea of this world by which such things that men dote upon below suffer Shipwrack As the fairest flower withers of it self yet it is also very oft withered by some storm or other or pluckt from the root by some hand Take the most exact and resplendent beauty that is a face never so beautyful or amiable for colour and favor a body most comly for feature and shape like that of Absolom's who from top to toe had no blemish a skin as white as the Lilly and embroidered over with purple veins yet this beauty how soon will it lose its lustre and be withered and rivelled with age and at last be turned into a rotten carcass which the worms and dust will devour Nay often before Old age or Death it is blasted by some other cause by the violence of a Fever or infection of the Small-Pox it is rendered an ugly spectacle to behold nay a little Sorrow will melt it and consume it Psal 39. 11. v. The strongest and most sumptuous Cities or Palaces will decay with continuance of time but are also ruined many times by the violence of Fire or Earthquakes To give some Instances hereof And first what was● hath been made by fire a judgment seen with your own eyes upon the Nineteenth of April 1667. besides other Forreign and Domestick Ruins caused by this furious Element which hath somtimes ridden triumph through the Streets of greatest Cities as though it disdained all resistance untill either the whole or greatest parts thereof have been turned into Ashes and laid in their Rubbish I 'le pass by that great Fire at Constantinople 1633. where t is said 7000 Houses to have been on fire at once And that Fire in Germany in the time of the late Warrs there where a Reverend Divine of this Nation accompanying of an Ambassador affirmed that his own eyes told at one time the number of Twenty and six Villages and Towns all burning at once round about one City And I will little more then hint to you what ruine Nebuzaradan caused by fire in Jerusalem when he burnt with fire Solomon's house that was thirteen years under the hands of no small company of Workmen and also the Temple there built by Solomon for the Lord being the work of Seven years and overlaid with pure Gold and all the houses of Jerusalem and all the houses of the great Men burnt he with fire Jer. 52. 13. v. Who can but even weep to remember that dreadful Fire in London September the 2. 3. 4. in the Year 1666. where there were about 13000. houses burnt what an heavy spectacle was there then seen to see the flaming of so many houses at once the consuming of so much substance the desolation of so many dwellings and to behold the labor of many a Father Grand-father and great Grand-father suddenly converted into Smoak and Rubbish Sit transit gloria Mundi How many but two hours before this fire begun possibly were promising themselves to live merrily and comfortably th●y did not many of them fear that themselves or children should ever be destitute of an habitation they then injoying convenient houses and those well furnished and themselves well stockt to make good their promis●s and to escape miseries but in a few hours saw all these Temporal good things flying away from them upon the wings of a windy Flame and flying away as an Eagle towards Heaven as Solomon hath it Pro. 23. 5. v. One little flake or sparke of fire turning all into Rubbish suddenly and making rich Men to become poor and poor men to become Beggars How many upon the first day of September were well furnished with all things but before the fifth day were spoiled of all and sent to the Fountain for their best Cellar to the ground for their bed to anothers cu●bard for their bread and to their friends wardrobe for their cloaths It would be even endless to undertake to recite how many stately Cities and sumptuous Fabricks this untameable Element hath turned into Ashes yet let