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	nature_n	power_n	3,155	5	5.1866	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A67569	A philosophicall essay towards an eviction of the being and attributes of God. Immortality of the souls of men. Truth and authority of Scripture. together with an index of the heads of every particular part.	Ward, Seth, 1617-1689.	1652 (1652)	Wing W823; ESTC R203999	52,284	168

Eternity we presently think of a long continuance and so call into our imagination a long continued series of these revolutions and vicissitudes whereas yet we know that where there is a vicissitude there is a priority and where there is a priority there must be a beginning and where there was a beginning that was not eternall 't is plain that if in eternity there were such parts as daies and years there must be as many millions of years as minutes and so that a minute were equall really to a thousand years and so it follows clearly that Eternity even in our notion is an infinite and undivided unsuccessive duration These examples are sufficient to shew the difference betwixt the intellectuall apprehension of things and the imagination which accompanies our superficiall thoughts our slight and cursory taking them to our mindes and to illustrate that however in our fancies we may have corporeall representations attending upon these spirituall beings yet the Idea's whereby the understanding apprehends those simple essences are incorporeall and consequently the understanding part of man is incorporeall SECT. V. From Judgement and Discourse ANd now whatsoever of perfection may be evinced to be in the souls of men from the simple apprehensions of single objects may much more strongly be concluded from those more perfect operations exercised in comparing severall things together and working out the truths striking forth the light from those collisions A judgement takes in two severall simple terms and upon them passeth the sentence of their agreement or disagreement A discourse takes into consideration two of the judgements already past and decided by the soul and from those two draws forth a third and so brings into act those truths which folded in their causes lie in the secret places of the soule concealed from it self Now as the souls of men are conscious to themselves of certain essences within themselves which neither in their being nor in their operation upon the soul are any way mixed with ought that is corporeall and so from thence the incorporeity of the soul was immediatly concluded so here in these second and third operations of the soul we have this further advantage that however the simple objects which are the terms in the matters of judgement may be bodies yet the acts of judging and discerning and reasoning they are no bodily acts nor come within the compasse of bodily motions to be performed and that even in those things which are most obvious to the outward sences or the inward the understanding part is yet carried away farre beyond the bounds and territories of the sences and raises it self into the contemplation of causes of the things it either sees or hears or otherwise perceives and frames to it self consequences and corrolaries such as are not sensible but are only discoverable by a diviner light by this diviner faculty it is that seizing upon any thing whatsoever and fixing it self steddily upon the contemplation of it it passeth from the most contemptible of creatures up to the incomprehensible creator it climbs up by degrees and passing through the continued chain of causes till it comes to that link which is fastened to the chair of God it rests not in things below but soars up steddily to immensity and eternity It is by this faculty that upon sight of the causes of things it doth foresee the effects and consequences and seeing the effects it makes to it self a conclusion of what must be the causes and by frequent exercise in these contemplations attains to a kinde of mastery over the works of nature and produceth things strange and wonderfull in operation it applies the active powers unto the passive as the Schoolmen speak and so imitates God and nature in great and marvellous conclusions He observes the properties of a despicable stone and is carried so farre in the contemplation of the consequences of those properties that he dares adventure himself vpon the huge unruly ocean under the conduct and direction of it and he findes experience to answer to his contemplation he gets the mastery of that unruly boisterous element he rides securely upon the back of the dark waters he makes a needle touched with a stone to supply the place of the stars of heaven when the eyes of heaven are veiled from him amidst the darke waters and thicke clouds of the skey he examines all the chambers of the sun and imitates him in compassing the world he goes out from the East and returns again from the West returns and that loaden with the treasures of the world with the blessings which Moses did assign to Joseph Deu. 33.13 the precious things of heaven for the dew and for the deep that coucheth beneath the precious fruits brought forth by the Sun and the precious things put forth by the Moon the chief things of the ancient mountains and the precious things of the lasting hils the precious things of the earth c. he settles a correspondency betwixt the utmost distants of the world and opens a traffique betwixt nations opposite in place in manners and affections such as had lien concealed from the knowledge of one another even almost from the time of the Ark that floted upon the waters but what do I speak of these things he displays the banner of Christ in the regions of death and hell he sheds forth the glorious light of the Gospel to the people that sate in darknesse and in the shadow of death what sensible analogy or correspondency is there betwixt the scituation or motion of a stone and the salvation of mankinde and yet by various consequences he discovers how by the means of that this likewise may be effected he discovers it and puts it in a successefull and happy execution What is there more contemptible then a stone hardly any thing that is a substance and yet it is much lesse contemptible then a shadow he observes a shadow and that carries him aloft to a contemplation and a discovery of that most glorious creature which comes forth as a Bridegroom out of his Chamber and rejoyceth as a Giant to runne his course From the shadow he riseth to the Sunne in the Firmament and to a perfect understanding of his course in the Ecliptique and then brings back again his understanding to the shadow he makes thereby an instrument that shall designe to the eye the daily circuits of its motion his eye that gave occasion to his minde to discover them in contemplation and now his minde is impregnated with the light of knowledge and returns with usury to the senses that occasionall advantage which they afforded it and gives them the pleasure of the viewing of its practise it gives the eye and hand directions for drawing of lines which by the regular application of a stick or wire stone or any other body shall discover not only the divisions of the day the hours that are past or else to come but even all the mysteries of the Sunnes

incorporeall which was to be demonstrated And if it be incorporeall then likewise it is unbounded and unlimited by place for whether place be taken for the surface of some ambient body or for a space the very essence of a place consists in relation to a body enclosed but that which is no body cannot admit of an enclosure therefore that which is incorporeall is free from the limits and terms of place so then it is euident that the first cause is free from the limits and restraints of place before we proved that it was free from any limits of duration but in the freedome from time and place consists the notion of immensity and so the immensity of God is now demonstrated or which is all one his Infinity But if the God-head be infinite then likewise it is but one and so we may demonstrate the Unity of the essence of the God-head Now that there cannot be two infinite essences we will demonstrate But first for the help of our imagination and to render that serviceable to our understandings we will imagine two bodies infinite then thus either the one of those bodies is in all the space wherein the other body is or it is not if they be both together in the self same space then that which is the longitude of the one is the longitude of the other and their latitude is the same and so likewise their profundity the same I say not only equall for as from filling equallity of spaces we must inferre equality of dimensions so from identity of space we must conclude them to have the same dimensions but the last and most abstracted notion of a body is mathematically resolved into those dimensions wherefore those which fill the self same space are the self same body and so two bodies they will be but one body which is a manifest contradiction but if we shall say that where one of these infinite bodies is the other is not then there will be some space where one of these bodies is excluded and consequently it will be limited and finite which yet we supposed to be infinite so then it will be infinite and not infinite which is a manifest contradiction We have demonstrated therefore that there cannot be two infinite bodies the truth is we ought to demonstrate that there cannot be two infinite essences but the notion of being and essence is so abstracted and high that it would strein our understanding to keep it so long intent upon its abstracted object as were required to goe through a demonstration where infinite simple being should be the subject and unity the affection to be demonstrated but if we shall proceed but to other degrees as for example of power or wisedom or the like the demonstration will run as clear to the minde as in the case of bodies it did to the fancy for either those infinite powers are the same or not the same if they by the same then it is but one power which was vainly imagined to be two but if the powers be not the same then one power is where the other power is not not meaning in ubi of place but of case and consequently a case where one of the powers is not and consequently the power is limited which yet is supposed to be infinite there can be therefore but one infinite power nor any more then one infinite essence and so we have demonstrated the Unity of the God-head It remains that we demonstrate the Omnipotence of God and his Omniscience and first for his Omnipotence That God was a God of power it was demonstrated then when we found him to be the first cause and originall mover and the creator of the world again we demonstrated that he is simple and free from all manner of Composition purely actuall and consequently doth not consist of subject and accidents his power therefore is no accident to his being but his power is his being and his being having been demonstrated to be immense and infinite his power likewise must be illimited and infinite and conseqently he is Omnipotent The same argument will prove him likewise to be Omniscient for as he is the first cause of every thing created so likewise of all the created knowledge and consequently all knowledge is derived from him wherefore it is primitively in him and then it follows that his knowledge and his essence is the same as well as his power and his being therefore as that is infinite so is this likewise and so we have evicted his Omnisciency that is an infinite knowledge which includes in it the knowledge of all particulars for if any particular in the world were excluded it were not infinite but limited so then the thoughts of the heart are open to the the view of his Omniscience And thus according to that Canon of direction which we took from the Apostle we have proceeded and that strictly and warily according to the laws of demonstration and from the visible things of this world enforcing our selves first to an acknowledgement of the creation of the world we have thence taking in only the common principles and common notions {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} of intelligence proceeded higher to a demonstration of the eternall power and God-head that is of those Attributes of the God-head which by the irreligious and Atheists have been pretended not to be and actually manifested that the invisible things of God may be discouered by those things which doe appear PART II. SECT. I. A Proposall of the Argument for the Immortality of the soul and a manifestation of the major proposition that incorporeall substances are immortall THe second thing which we pretended to demonstrate as a generall ground-work whereon to build a necessity of Religion in the generall it is the Immortality of the souls of men for if in this life only we have hope then in the judgement of the Apostle we are indeed of all men most miserable Now the truth is that we have no absolute necessity of much endeavour to clear the Immortality of the soul after so clear and demonstrative a discovery of the essence and the attributes of the God-head seeing that a bare reflexion either upon the generall way of reasoning whereby we came to those conclusions or upon those simple objects of the minde which were the subjects of every particular enquiry must necessarily prompt us with undeniable arguments of the spirituall and incorporeall nature of our minde from whence will necessarily follow the naturall incorruptibility of it that which is all that we pretend to when we say that it is immortall for it is not our meaning that in the notion of Immortality is included a necessity of being such as relating to the power of God should put it out of a capacity of Annihilation Yet considering the darknesse of our mindes and that inability towards a strict and vigorous reflection which even in those who are most practised in the