Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	effect_n	evil_a	good_a	4,841	5	4.5571	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A63155	The Trial and condemnation of the two false witnesses unto the late Midnight-cry published by Mr. Mason, the author of that great present assembly in Buckinghamshire who are met together under a deluding expectation of Christ's coming to judgment on Whitsunday approaching : shewing of what dangerous consequence this may prove to the present government ...		1694 (1694)	Wing T2156; ESTC R37897	23,791	34

Dreams or Visions have mad● on that poor deluded Multitude who will find their expectation frustrated in few days to their real shame and confusion of ●●ce For how can They who proceed so directly opposite unto the whol● Sense and Tenour of Scripture Threatnings in all the most severe and positive Comminations against the greatest Sinners which always intend a Condition or purpose of Revocation upon Repentance and are denounced for that great End and not to drive Men or Nations as Ward and Evans have done into the Gulph of Desperation c. I say how is it likely these Ignorant and Presumptuous false Prophets can be sent of God And whether these Brain-sick Impostors who have thus strangely Transformed the Infinite Patience and Goodness of God into false Notions Dreams or Impulses of their own head and which Three Years experience have abundantly demonstrated to be false and also dangerous even to the present Governmeut by strengthning the hands of our common Enemy who watcheth for all such Occasions ●nd weakning the minds of many who otherwise would strenuously ●nd unanimously oppose that Inundation threatning all our ruine whether these Men are likely to be the Two Silver Trumpets for Proclaiming the Great Jubilee or the Second Coming of our Blessed Saviour unto Judgment beginning his Glorious Kingdom here on Earth 〈◊〉 St. Paul had the right apprehensions of that Time 2 Tim. 4. 1. And believe it the great Midnight-Cry Mat. 24. will be of another Nature and Effect both on the True Church of Christ and the Apostate State of Christianity those Wise and Foolish Virgins who both awoke arose and Trimm'd their Lamps at this Alarm Having given this necessary Precaution to undeceive the deluded Multitude who are met together in a great Assembly in Buckingham-shire expecting The Appearance of Christ to Judgment on Witsunday now immediately approaching according to Mr. Masons limited Time in his Dream or Vision which being to expire so speedily as a Week or a Fortnights time will be soon confuted and therefore needs no other Arguments thereunto but the short Event We shall therefore leave that Fraternity to their honest meaning Mr. Mason's Apprehensions which is like to prove no other than the Embraces of Juno in a Cloud c. and cast a more stedfast Eye on the aforesaid Ward and Evans those Two deceived Witnesses c. that so we may rightly inform our selves of what Complexion they are and of what deep and ●hastly Lineaments their Proteus-like Countenance is Composed who ●o speak the Truth in one Word do seem to cast something like a ●ontempt on the Articles of the Christian Faith and also on the Spirits ●●fallible Testimony and on the Sacred Symbols of Christianity or ●●ose Seals of the Covenant of Grace by making their Whimsical ●mpulses equal thereunto if not preferring them before the ●●me That which follows on this Subject is Written in a Letter to a Friend Proving That the most Tremendous and most Positiv● Judgments of God in Scripture denounced against Persons Cities 〈◊〉 Nations do not lay them under an absolute Necessity of continuin● Impenitent or of Perishing under the same Doom exceeding useful bot● for Sinners of the greatest Obduracy as well as for such who ar● Wounded under the sense of their Guilt and tempted to Despair● who may here clearly behold the Nature of Gods most Simple and I●●fallible Decree touching the Damnation of every Self-reprobating Sin●ner and how it becomes the Antecedent unto but not the Physic●● Cause of their Damnation which Destruction is therefore possible to 〈◊〉 Prevented taken in a Simple and Physical sense and consideration 〈◊〉 Man as a Rational and free Agent whose Will was never forced 〈◊〉 Prenecessitated to do Evil meerly from Gods Decree as the Effect tha● follows its Cause although this Decree grounded on his foresigh● of Mans Self-Reprobation as also his Decree for peculiar Election whic● is grounded on no Good in Man foreseen admits of no Frustration These weighty Matters with some other considerations of grea● Moment are on this occasion here briefly and clearly handled even to the apprehension of the meanest Capacities and the Judgme●● of all such whose Education-Light or Interest or Partial and blin● Respect of Persons hath not cast a Mist on their Understandings a●● the Arguments are Solid and Orthodox agreeable to the Doctrin 〈◊〉 the Church of England and the Consent of the Universality of D●●vines beyond the Seas and above all to the whole Ten●ur of 〈◊〉 Scripture throughout all its parts A LETTER to a FRIEND On the Occasion of Mr. MASONS's Midnight-Cry AND Those Two false Prophets who most boldly Presumed to Comment thereupon from their Whimsies and Impulses being the Forerunner of and Preparative unto the said Mr. Masons late Deluding Vision which hath gathered such a great Concourse of People in Buckingham-shire to the disturbance of the World Sir SEeing you have been pleased to ask my Opinion of that Book lately published by T. W. and V. E. who call themselves the Two Witnesses to the Midnight-Cry it 's one small part of the Duty and Honour I owe you to Comply with this Request though I ●ave at present something on my hands which hinders me from gi●ing such an ample Answer as otherwise I might I was in expectation to find some extraordinary thing in that Midnight-Cry not knowing at first sight but this might be that Cry ●retold in Matth. 25. 6. which all agree is to be the Prodromus of Christ's Second Coming immediately to ensue thereon upon which Alarum the Text expresly tells us 1st That the Wise and foolish Virgins who were both asleep Awoke 2d Both these Virgins Trimmed their Lamps 3d. The Foolish go to the Wise for Oyl to furnish their Extinguished Lamps 4th Being repulsed they go to buy Oyl where it was to be sold and while they went to buy The Bridegroom came When I see such a grand effect or something like it throughout the Christian World made up of Wise and Foolish Virgins and that it receives its Life and Influence from this late Midnight Cry I shall be Induced to consider if not to conclude that this Alarum is likely to be That of which our Saviour spoke in the Text before In the mean time the Author thereof doubtless had very Pious Ends in Publishing a Warning to us all so useful and seasonable at all times That the Sins of England and particularly of this City are very great beyond all others in the World besides if we consider the heinous Aggravations we lye under with respect of that clear Sun-shine of Gospel-Light which we enjoy and the many wonderful Mercies and Deliverances God hath wrought out for us beyond what he hath done for others and the many Warnings we have had by several great Judgments both of Plague Fire Earth-quakes War c. and our great Incorrigible Frame growing rather worse and worse under All and therefore that we may have great cause to fear and expect some

his fellow Witness comes after and tells us he is sure none will ever have a Warrant from God to speak or write against these things And takes upon him very proudly and arrogantly to determine that Satan hath transformed himself into an Angel of Light in Mr. Baxter's appearing against them with a pretence to vindicate the Truth Ex Vngue Leonem c. Surely it becomes these extraordinary Prophets as they would have us take them to be to shew themselves to be Men of God by Meekness and Gentleness even to those who oppose them and in modesty to mention so great a Subject as the Immediate and irreconcilable Destruction of a Kingdom for which God hath but very lately manifested his miraculous Goodness and Power and his infinite patience and long-suffering convincing the most indocible that he is even yet exceeding unwilling to give us up a Victim to the Fury of the Adversary and a Prey unto their devouring Teeth How ought this Consideration to check if not to ●radicate the most bold presumptuous Confidence and self-Opinion ●f our Two new-raised Prophets who if they knew what a godly ●ealousie meant would fear lest they be left by God to the Judgment ●f spiritual Pride lest the Devil hath transformed himself in them act●●g by the delusory Impressions and Impulses of their own Imagina●●on and tempting them in this manner unto such dangerous and almost unparallel Presumption as they seem guilty of in sober and understanding Persons thoughts and how greatly doth it become them ●o lie prostrate in Dust and Ashes lest God in his Judicial Anger ●mite them dead for daring in such a confident manner to enter into the Secret of his Decree and with the Bethshemites to look into the Ark 1 Sam. 6. 19. Their Delusion may evidently appear to any who will please to weigh the following Considerations CONSIDERATION I. Touching God's Predeterminate Will Decree or Purpose concerning Judgment on any Person City or Nation although it be threatned most positively and expresly in Scripture yet they always carry with them a secret or tacit Condition or Limitation and are never to be understood as Irrevocable MANY famous Instances hereof we have in SCRIPTURE 1. God seemed most positive that he would drown the old World repeating his purpose many times without once expressing his Resolution to spare them if they repented at least that we read of but plainly threatning to wait no longer than One hundred and twenty Years Gen. 6. 7 15 17. compared with ch 7. 4. and at the end of that period then to destroy them Yet this had a secret Condition in it with a Resolution to have spared them upon Repentance and God's Patience and long-Suffering towards them in bearing and forbearing so long had a direct tendency unto this great End 1 Pet. 3. 20. compared with Rom. 2. 4. 2. God seems most positive for Pharaoh's Destruction and several Texts plainly tell us God hardned him Exod. 4. 21. 7. 3 13 14. 9. 12 15 16. And S. Paul sets him forth as a famous Figure of that which we call Reprobation Rom. 9. 17 c. Not that God is Active in hardning any Sinner or in tempting any unto Evil as Jam. 1. 13. but only is pleased to deny to some his sanctifying Grace for their abuse of the Strivings of the Spirit in his common Grace or in a Word for sinning unto high degrees against the Light and Conviction of their Illuminating Conscience And because this most just denyal is the Antecedent of that Infallible Consequent viz. Hardness of Heart and Impenitency and bears such an Analogical resemblance of the Cause and it's Effect therefore the Scripture so frequently expresseth it as if God was Active in it as the simple or Physical Cause of hardning wicked Men which in reality is no other than his leaving those self-hardning Sinners who resolve to persist in Sin without fear and trembling against the checks and wounds of their Enlightned Conscience unto the Lusts and Corruptions of their own Hearts which without his Sanctifying Grace will assuredly arise daily unto greater and stronger Rebellions and end in final Obduracy Unbelief and Impenitency Pharaoh was left by God to the liberty and freedom of his own Will for who questions but he had the power to let Israel go as appears plainly from Exod. 3. 19. Chap. 9. 30 34. but he first hardens his own Heart against God before God in his Just Judgment left him to himself as Ex. 5. 3. 8. 15 32. 9. 30 34. And the Heathen Philistines had learnt so much Divinity that the grand Cause of Pharaohs Destruction was to be layd at his own Door and not at Gods in that Famous Text of 1 Sam. 6. 6. God really desir'd Pharaoh should Obey him and had rather he should have Turned and Lived for ever in his Favour then to have perished in his Sin if we dare credit the Scripture and take it in its own express words without Mens Glosses and Coments Exod. 4. 5 8 9. 6. 13 29. 7. 1 2 8. 10. 9. 20. And Chap. 10. 3. puts it yet more clearly out of doubt How long wilt thou yet refuse to humble thy self before me And to make it yet more evident we are to consider that the First Threatning God sent him was The Death of the First-born throughout Aegypt and this Judgment was the same that after all made him bow by force Exod. 4. 23. compared with Ch. 11. 1 4 5. Thus Gods Patience and Long-suffering waited on this self-destroyer to bring him unto Repentance and Salvation as 2 Pet. 3 9. And thus it waiteth at this day on the great Enemies or Oppressors of his Church 3. What more positive than the Destruction of the Canaanites several times Sentenced to be all cut off Exod. 23. 24. Deut. 7. 2 16 20. and if any of them remained it 's expresly forbid to make any Covenant with them Exod. 23. 32 34. 12. 15. Deut. 7. 2. and yet repenting Rahab is preserved and the crafty Gibeonites famous League with Josuah was such a Heavenly Mystery that the Sun and Moon was made to stand still a whole Day while Josuah fought for their defence Josh 9. 15. compared with Ch. 10. 12 13 14. whereby all the World were invited to take Cognisance thereof 4. What more plainly foretold and threatned than the Destruction of the Jews Deut. 29. 28 29. and of Jerusalem by the Babylonians Ezech. 21. 7. 2 Kings 20. 17 18. Ch. 23. 26 27. The last Text telling us this should come to pass for the Sins of Manasse Nor did Hezekiah and Josia the two most Pious Kings of Judah prevail to alter Gods resolution herein notwithstanding their great zeal in Reformation And yet for all this if Zedekiah had gone forth to meet the King of Babylons Princes then he should have lived and Jerusalem had not been burnt notwithstanding all the Predictions of the Prophets from God himself threatning the same as by an Irrevocable Decree Jer.