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	know_v	life_n	2,879	5	4.5653	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A74671	The bar, against free admission to the Lords Supper, fixed. Or, An answer to Mr. Humphrey his Rejoynder, or, reply. By Roger Drake minister of Peters Cheap, London.	R. D. (Roger Drake), 1608-1669.	1656 (1656)	Wing D2128; Thomason E1593_1; ESTC R208860	271,720	506

for illustration is lame since even in Civil society a Feast is not the principal no nor feeding upon the Feast but the nourishment and confirmation of love between the Feast-maker and the Guests and between the Guests mutually else a dinner of green herbs is better than a stalled oxe Prov. 13. 17. But how can he that is destitute of faith and love either feed upon Christ or bear love to him or his members as such True the preparation of the Sacramental elements is but accessory to the feeding upon them but right preparation for the Sacrament is better I hope than a bare receiving of the outward elements and therefore cannot be accessory to that receiving but the principal If Mr. H. judge otherwise the Lord give me the accessory of right preparation though without the principal of the bare elements supposing I must be denied one of them I shall not envy Mr. H. or any that principal of the bare elements but shall rather pity them For his charging me here to cast up mire and dirt let but the Reader peruse my words p. 122. of my Bar and then judge whether Mr. H. his phansie be not foul and turbid and so mis-represents seasonable and sutable reproof as mire and dirt A black sight makes white objects shew black like it self Mr. H. ib. A Church-member is as absolutely bound to come to the Sacrament understand here by coming receiving as to pray and hear Answ A person jure excommunicate is a Church-member till actually cut off Is such a one as much bound to receive as to pray and hear Yea a person actually excommunicated I hope is bound to pray nor will Mr. H. deny it Is it not evident then that the duty of prayer is more obligatory than the duty of receiving Mr. H. p. 246. Where doth the Scripture say any where Let a man not eat or not drink Answ 1. Where doth the Scripture say expresly Let not an heathen or excommunicated person eat or drink 2. By just consequence 1 Cor. 5. 11. and 10 21. say Let a man not eat or not drink But of this formerly I am glad that in this page Mr. H. with some caution agrees with me That unpreparedness will excuse a man from receiving I cannot but like his caution well for its substance and I pray let the world here take notice that as wide as we seem to differ yet we agree in this That as unpreparedness may excuse a man from receiving at present so this abstinence must humble him and put him upon greater care to prepare for next Sacrament Let me adde This is the very end of suspension be it negative or positive were passion and prejudice laid aside we should soon agree The Lord cast these devils out of us all for man cannot M. H. p. 247. If Mr. D. cannot really sever hearing and unworthy hearing c. How can he make it a means of grace Answ Just as he can make unworthy preaching a means of grace who knows how many Judas converted yet he preached unworthily The evil doing of that work as to spiritual rectitude which is materially good may be a cause of death to me when the matter of the duty performed may be a cause of life to another as is evident in that Minister who preaches orthodoxly plainly and powerfully all which he may do by a common gift yet is acted by and under the dominion of pride and self-seeking c. For his five Premises and three Inferences page 247. and 248. whereby he would make the world beleeve That I press men to do evil or to sin that good may come of it Answ 1. I abhor such damnable doctrine nor hath Mr. H. the least solid ground to infer it from my principles 2. It being a received Scripture-maxim which M. H. cannot deny that all the actions of a natural man have not onely sin in them but also are sins being as the Father notes well but splendida peccata I shall make bold to retort M. H. his Conclusion against me upon himself Thus A wicked mans prayer is sin A wicked man is bound to pray ergo He is bound to sin Absurd and abominable You may well say he is necessitated to sin hypothetically in every action considering his state c. but he is bound to pray and graciously too which yet he cannot do in statu quo and for which he must thank himself but cannot blame God or his Law much less the Gospel True all duties of a natural man are sins in him yet it s a greater sin for him caeter is paribus to neglect or reject his duty You will say then a natural man must receive as well as pray for that 's his duty Answ 1. Let Mr. H. prove that receiving is a natural mans duty in statu quo and then I shall easily grant he is bound to receive as well as to pray though both praying and receiving be sin in him This for his first Query For the second Query Mr. D. Unworthy receiving is otherwise damnable than unworthy praying or hearing 1. Because it s not on universal duty 2. Because not converting Mr. H. p. 248. The first is vain and inconsequent for there are some duties belong onely to men in such and such relations is the neglect hereof ever the less damnable because they are not universal Answ Sir Let me crave leave to tell you that here you are clean besides the Cushion we are not now speaking of the neglect of a duty but of presuming to act out of my place and relation Unworthy receiving is not simply an omission but a commission and a presumptuous act of him that will venture to receive when prohibited upon which account it is more damnable than unworthy praying c. since no man in what estate soever is prohibited to pray Mr. H. ib. Again a natural man cannot convert himself by his moral works are his sins therefore ever the less sinful Answ They are or are not according to the nature of the moral work He that doth a work naturally moral yet unworthily caeteris paribus sins less than he that doth a work moral by institution unworthily though he can convert himself by neither The reason is because all men are commanded works really moral and therefore in doing them a wicked man sins only in the manner but divers persons are prohibited some parts of instituted worship who therefore by venturing upon them sin both for matter and manner Of this nature was the Passeover and now is the Lords Supper as received And for a person to venture upon a prohibited work which in statu quo cannot convert but hurt him I think is an aggravation And so unworthy receiving is more damnable than unworthy praying or hearing 3. Query Whether an unregenerate person must never come to the Sacrament for fear of eating damnation Mr. H. his answer upon my assent was That upon the same ground he must abstain from hearing c. Mr.

this nature being but Gods Ape How did Jordan cure the Leper 2 King 5. 14. How did Peters shadow cure the sick Acts 5. 15. How did Pauls handkerchiefs both cure diseases and cast out Devils Acts 19. 12. All these were but signs and seals of Gods miraculous presence And why may not God when he pleases concur supernaturally with Baptism in order to Regeneration as he concurred with Jordan a Shadow or Handkerchief in order to cure or dis-possession I believe Divine concourse is much after this nature in every Ordinance when savingly effectual And Baptism applyed to an Infant or to a man is but as Pauls handkerchief was to an Infant or to a man The man might understand this handkerchief came from Pauls body and would be effectual to heal him this the Infant could not understand yet the effect of healing followed alike in both Nor was the handkerchief more powerful to heal the man because he was intelligent but possibly his intelligence might prove a bar he being thereby capable of an act of unbelief which might hinder the cure Matth. 13. 58. and 17. 19 20. Mark 6. 6. and 9. 23 24. Acts 14. 9. which actual unbelief Infants are not capable of Thus the word preached hath a natural aptitude to illuminate the minde with common knowledge of Christ but never of it self can work a saving understanding or regeneration this being wholly in Gods power We must therefore extend the notion of a moral instrument further than M. H. doth that being truly a moral instrument not onely which works by way of signification to my understanding but that also upon which being used an effect of another kinde follows by way of compact or otherwise whether I understand it or not Thus a Witch is the moral cause of a childes death but the Devil is the physical cause thereof he applying his natural power by Gods permission upon the Witches using of his ceremonies for that purpose to kill the childe And thus the Minister and Ordinances are the moral instruments of conversion but God is the physical or rather hyperphysical cause thereof Nor do we by this doctrine deviate to the Popish opus operatum but honor Gods Liberty Soveraignty and Grace who when he pleaseth concurs with his Ordinances supernaturally in order to Conversion and Regeneration wrought then infallibly and not otherwise And certainly if Baptism be a converting Ordinance why may not Infants thus be converted by it as well as elder persons especially when at the hour of Baptism faith and devotion are upon the wing in the Parents Friends Gods people and the Minister assembled to wrestle with God that he would please to wash the childe in the Laver of Regeneration c. whence publike Baptisms are more eligible than private Baptisms And thus upon the supposition it may also be effectual to the intelligent person baptized yet not simply because he is intelligent but because of Gods supernatural concourse in him as well as in the Infant the work of Conversion being supernatural in every subject 2. Whereas M. H. says ib. John first baptized the people and then exhorted them to repentance If his meaning be exclusive that John did not exhort to repentance before but onely after Baptism I believe he will finde little favor from the Text for such an opinion It s evident Mat. 3. 11. that John leads them from his Baptism to Christ for the Baptism of the Holy Ghost as a future thing withal that he preached to them before he baptized to me seems more than probable by comparing vers 2 5 6 7. of Mat. 3. Besides supposing the exhortation were after Baptism and that some were converted upon the place the great question will be which shews the weakness of M. H. his inference whether they were converted by Johns Baptism or by his following exhortation For his instance in the Converts Acts 2. it is more than M. H. can prove that their faith was onely historical Likely it might be so in some of them but what is this to prove that their Baptism did convert them any more than it did Simon Magus who might afterwards be converted by some of those Sermons which they heard every day or hold out in a form of Godliness to their dying day as Ananias and Saphira did The Text says they were all baptized Acts 2. 41. but it doth not say that any of them were converted by Baptism M. D. Can any man make the Seal a cause of the writing M. H. p. 212. Here is the mans error still the seal of the inward writing in mens hearts is not the Sacrament but the Spirit and that seal I hope is the cause of the writing c. Answ 1. That the Sacrament is a seal of the inward writing though not the sole or principal seal hath formerly been proved which therefore I pass 2. That one and the same thing may be both a seal and a cause as well as a sign and a cause I deny not but I hope it is not a cause as it is a seal The Spirit first works then evidences grace wrought in that it acts as a cause in this as a seal When therefore I say the seal is not the cause of the writing my meaning is that as a seal it is not a cause of the writing but under an other notion M. H. interprets it simpliciter which I propound secundum quid and so abuses both me and the Reader Page 213. M. H. would fain court me from my yielding to universal presence to yield to universal receiving But I must intreat him to excuse me since I finde none in Scripture forbid to be present but I finde divers in Scripture forbid to receive as hath formerly been proved And I hope that upon second thoughts he will be more charitable than to judge me upon this account as trifling with this holy Ordinance and with the Consciences of people His argument drawn from the seeing to the tasting of Christ Sacramental will not hold till he can prove that a sight of Christ Sacramental is effectual to convert and withal that the precept Take eat doth immediately take in all intelligent Church-members and if so then let his jure excommunicate receive also His instance of Thomas feeling and believing proves onely that feeling may draw out an act of faith from a principle of faith inherent But what is that to the producing of a principle of faith where there is no faith at all Lastly M. H. should consider not barely the application but the end of application in the Lords Supper which is evidently nutrition but no where as I know Conversion Mr. D. Taking and Eating call for acts of faith but presuppose the habit c. M. H. p. 214. When Christ and his Disciples preached Believe and Repent the command did call for faith and repentance but I hope it did not presuppose the habit in those who were to be converted so when Christ says here Take c. There