Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	disease_n	part_n	symptom_n	1,651	5	11.2411	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A41536	The tryall of a Christians growth in mortification, purging out corruption, or vivification, bringing forth more fruit a treatise handling this case, how to discerne our growth in grace : affording some helps rightly to judge thereof by resolving some tentations, clearing some mistakes, answering some questions, about spiritual growth : together with other observations upon the Parable of the vine, John 15. 1, 2 verses / by Tho. Goodwin.	Goodwin, Thomas, 1600-1680.	1650 (1650)	Wing G1262; ESTC R10593	96,023	122

signe of a strong hatred when a man cannot endure to come where one he loves not is cannot endure the sight of him any thing that may put him in mind of him not so much as to parley or to speak with him Eighthly when our hearts doe not linger after such objects as may satisfie our lusts when absent but when out of sight they are out of mind this is a good degree of mortification We may find it in our selves that when objects are not presented that yet there is in our hearts oftentimes a lingring after them and this from themselves without any outward provocation that is far worse many a man when he sees meat finds he hath a stomach to it which he thought not till it was set afore him but when a man longs after meat he sees not it is a signe he is very hungry as we see against rainy weather before the raine begins to fall the stones will give as we use to say and grow danke so a man that observes his heart may find before objects are presented or actuall thoughts arise a giving of his heart to such and such a lust an inclination a darknesse a moistnesse a sympathizing with such an object that is a signe of unmortifiednesse David was as a weaned child he had no thoughts of the dug no longings after it I have no high thoughts after the Kingdome sayes he Psal 131. A child that begins to be weaned it may be at first cryes after the dug though he sees it not but afterwards though it may be when he sees it he cryes after it yet not when absent Objects present have a far greater force to draw when absent lesse therefore this is a farther degree of mortification attainable it was in Joseph when his Mistresse tempted him from day to day opportunity was ready the object present but he denyed her So in Boaz a woman lay at his feete all night So in David when he had Saul in his lurch might as easily have cut off his head as the lap of his garment and was egg'd on to doe it but he was then weaned indeed and did it not When a man can looke upon beauty and preferment and truly say they are no temptations to me It is a signe of an unsound temper when upon eating such or such meats a man is presently put into the fit of an ague a healthfull man is not so The Prophet calls them the stumbling block of their iniquity When a man is going on his way and though he did not seeke occasions of falling yet meeting with them he cannot step over them but is caught and stumbleth and falls it is a signe of unmortifiednesse CHAP. V. Some Cautions to prevent misjudging by false Rules This case resolved Whether growth in Mortification may be judged by the ordinary prevailings of corruption or actings of Grace BEsides these rules both these wayes given I will in the third place adde some cautionall considerations to prevent misjudging of our growth in Mortification by such false rules as men are apt to be deceived in judging worse or better of our selves by then the truth is or then there is cause Which considerations will also further serve as directions to us as well as the former have done First men may deceive themselves when they estimate their progresse herein by having overcome such lusts as their natures are not so prone unto the surest way is to take a judgement of it from the decay of a mans bosome sinne even as David did estimate his uprightnesse by his keeping himselfe from his iniquity Psal 18. 23. so a man of his growth in uprightnesse When Physitians would judge of a consumption of the whole they doe it not by the falling away of any part what ever as of the flesh in the face alone or any the like such a particular abatement of flesh in some one part may come from some other cause but they use to judge by the falling away of the brawne of the hands or armes and thighes c. for these are the more solid parts the like judgments doe Physitians make upon other diseases and of the abatement of them from the decrease in such symptomes as are Pathognomicall and proper and peculiar to them In like manner also the estimate of the progresse of the victories of a Conquerour in an enemies Kingdome is not taken from the taking or burning of a few villages or dorps but by taking in the Forts and strongest Holds and by what ground he hath won upon the chiefe strength and by what forces he hath cut off of the maine Army Doe the like in the decrease of and victory over your lusts Secondly you must not judge of your Mortification by extraordinary assistances or temptations As you doe not judge of the strength of a Kingdome by auxiliary forraigne forces that are at extraordinary times called in A young Christian shall for his encouragement even in the heat of the battaile when he is ready to be overcome and carryed away captive find the holy Ghost breaking in and rescuing of him as Jehoshaphat was to allude to it when he cryed to the Lord when as a Christian of much standing is left to fight it out hand to hand Now it doth not follow that the other because thus freed hath the more strength Againe on the other side a man is not to judge of himselfe by his weaknesse in some one extraordinary temptation A man that is very sick and nigh unto death and dissolution may through much heat and stirring up of all his spirits have the strength of five men in him and much greater then when he was in health And so a godly man whose corruptions are weak and more neere to dissolution yet in a fit may have all the corruption that is within him mustered up and blowne up by Satan and so it may for the present appeare to have more strength then ever in all his life and yet he may be much mortified Even as Sarah may by an extraordinary means have pleasure in her old age and bring forth a child when she had left child-bearing long and yet her womb was dead Rom. 4. 19. And as it may be true that one of small grace may have that little grace drawne out and wound up to a higher straine for one fit brunt and exercise all the strings wound up to a higher note for some one lesson then one haply of more grace ever felt to higher acts of love to God and of rejoycing in God and purer strains of selfe-denyall yet take the constant strains of ones spirit that hath more grace and the strings will ordinarily endure to stand higher and continue so So on the contrary one of much mortification may have his lusts spurred on faster and boild up higher by Satans fires then one of lesse The estimate of our growth must not therefore be taken by a step or two but by a constant course for