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	necessary_a	produce_v	6,956	5	9.5140	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A44932	The spirit of prophecy a treatise to prove, by the wayes formerly in use among the Jews, in the tryal of pretenders to a prophetic spirit, that Christ and his Apostles were prophets : together with the divine authority of christian religion and the Holy Scriptures, the insufficiency of human reason, and the reasonableness of the christian faith, hope, and practice, deduced therefrom, and asserted against Mr. Hobbs, and the Treatise of Hvmane Reason / by W.H.	Hughes, William, b. 1624 or 5.	1679 (1679)	Wing H3346; ESTC R19799	183,906	298

the Staff of Life and neglect their own Bodies to promote a ●iction of their own or others fancies that if such could have assured them of nothing but contradicton and gainsaying yea the worst of usage from all sorts of men that were otherwise minded yet herein to take unparallel'd pains and travails to undergo the greatest miseries and perils tortures and death it self how wonderfull was their constancy how admirable their resolution whereunto can it rationally be imputed but to the Spirit of Prophecy Which being in their hearts as a burning fire shut up in their Bones made them weary with forbearing and unable to hold speaking Of which Spirit in them we are yet farther assur'd by the Nature of the Wisdom which was peculairly Theirs for we have found it to excell not only that of the Gentiles but of the Jews also and surely 't was impossible for them without Revelation to have Taught a sort of Wisdom more excellent than that that was revealed can Man be Wiser than his Maker or his Wisdom more excellent than that of his Creator That 's impossible Or is not the Foolishness of God i● I may so call the most imperfect of his Revelations wiser than Men Yes surely that it is Why else was it made known unto them since then the Wisdom discovered by Christ and his Apostles is more excellent than that Revealed by Moses and the Prophets they could not have attained unto it but by Revelation Whence else was it possible that these Men should have this Wisdom surely 't was neither from Themselves nor any other Creatures They themselves in the Eye of the World were very unlikely to be Authors of so Excellent a Production for they were ignorant and unlearned men their Education had not raised them above the Vulgar nor their Callings distinguish't them from the common sort For to say nothing of our Saviour his Apostles were Fishers Artificers and Rus●icks or such like unlearned men and were these Men likely of themselves to bless the World with a sort of Wisdom more excellent than that both of Jews and Gentiles no surely 't is therefore evident they had it not of themselves no nor yet of other Creatures either Men or Angels good or bad not from o●her good Men or Angels for these neither would ●or could without loss of their goodness devise a Religion and impose it on the World for Divine so Fathering their Lies on God himself much less could they have it from bad Men or yet from the Fiends of darkness it is utterly inconsistent with their Lusts and Interests to be Authors of so much Glory to God and Good to Men or of such Destruction to themselves and their Impiety as we find designed and effected by the Gospel of Christ and his Apostles If then these men had not this Wisdom from any Creatures we must conclude with St. Paul that God revealed it to them by his Spirit But that Christ and his Apostles were prophets we have yet greater evidence than that of the Antecedents or concomitant Attendants on the Spirit of Prophecy Namely that of their Predictions and Miracles That the exact accomplishment of Predictions concerniug future Contingencies were looked on as Infallible Proofs of a Prophetick Spirit and that Christ and his Apostles were Authors of such Predictions we have already seen All therefore that now remains will be to shew the reason of the Consequence viz. Why from thence we conclude them to be Prophets what strength or force is there in the accomplishment of such Predictions to shew that the Authors of them were Divinely inspired What cause or reason is there on that account to conclude that they were Prophets Hereto I Answer the reason is Because thereby it appears they were intrusted with some knowledge of Gods Secret purpose concerning future Contingents To discover the force of this Reason it will be needful to observe that Contingents are twofold viz. either such as happen as we call it by Chance Namely such as have their Being from the concourse of diverse natural causes in some sort hindering as well as helping one another or else such as come to pass according to the purpose and intention of some free Agent There is no natural n●●●ssity of their Production in such a manner the Ability of their cause might otherwise have produced its effect there is no necessary connection between them and the Series of natural causes their Being depends wholly as to their Contingency on the will either of God himself or of his reasonable Creatures These things are most properly contingent and if so then evident it is that the fore knowledge of them cannot come within the compas● of any art or Science whatever because all Arts and Sciences being habits of doing or demonstrating from things natural and necessary they neither do nor can reach those that have no necesary connection with them or dependance on them Yet by the Predictions concerning them evident it is that God foreknows them If not how could he foretell them I may therefore say with Tertullian that Gods foreknowledge hath as many and great Witnesses as he hath made Prophets Now this his foreknowledge must needs be though not the efficient yet the directive cause of all future contingents otherwise there would some things come to pass which neither of themselves nor yet by any superintendence of Providence would have any subservience to the Supream end of all things viz. The Glory of their Maker But this is absurd and unworthy of God For t is not credible that the infinitely Wise and Almighty Creator who at first made and still upholds all things in their Being and vertues for his own glory should suffer any thing to come to pass that neither of it self nor by his direction is subservient thereunto For Providence being the reason of the Order of things as well as the actual gubernation of them in reference to their end especially the last it must needs belong to the perfection of it to dir●ct all things as well contingents as others to the glory of God and for this cause 't is necessary that of all the contingencies within the vast Circuit of Possibility those that come to pass should be if not predefined i. e. absolutely willed yet as I may say pre-permitted i. e. in the prescience and eternal Order of all things in the Divine Intellect allowed to come to pass in their respective seasons Which 't is evident they cannot be without some secret purpose concerning them of which secret purpose it is as evident by the exact accomplishment of Predictions that the Prophets had some fore-knowledge but whence I pray had these men this knowledge Were their souls themselves without Revelation able to attain unto it No surely for though the mind of man walks in all the Paths of Arts and Sciences as well those that lye d●ep in reason as those that are usual and beaten and though it compasseth

Argument into this form and the strength of it will be evident Those whom God employes to prophesie are Fellow servants But you and your brethren the Apostles as well as I God employes to prophesie therefore we are Fellow-servants St. John could make a doubt of nothing in this Argument but the Assumption whether he and the rest of the Apostles were sent to prophesie Yes sayes the Angel that you are for the Testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of Prophecy Hereby to me it seems apparent that the Testimony of Jesus here signifies that which the Apostles gave unto him and would you know why this is called the Testimony of Jesus not of the Apostle● concerning him then observe that this Testimony of Jesus may be considered two wayes viz. Strictly or Largely if abstractly or strictly in it self then it is little or nothing else but the Record they gave of Christ or the Doctrine they taught concerning him and this is said to be the Testimony of Jesus because he is the principal thing it treats of but if it be considered largely it comprehends not only the Doctrine of the Apostles concerning Christ but also the Strength Power and Authority whereby they taught it Thus considered it is the Testimony of Jesus not only because they gave it to him but also because they received it from him For he gave them not only Command to bear this witness of him i. e. to go into all the World and to preach the Gospel to every creature but also Strength and Power so to do for he first opened their Vnderstandings that they should understand the Scriptures and afterwards he e●dued them with Power from on high by sending the Promise of the Father i. e. the Spirit upon them to lead them into all Truth and enable them to speak it to all Nations whatsoever and this was done so eff●ctually as that men of every Nation under Heaven heard them speak in their own Language and this surely in it self considered was no small matter of Testimony to our Jesus The Apostles we know were ignorant and unlearned men that understood but little of Scripture less of Foreign Languages yet hereby on a sudden they were enabled exquisitely to understand the one and to speak the other of all sorts and doth it not surpass the Power of Nature to make so stupendious a change as this was What Creatures can make Men Wise Holy and Learned in an instant It is a work of Wonder that falls within the compass of little less than Omnipotent Power and Wisdom Surely therefore the Author of it was God and if so then Jesus to whom the Apostles were thereby enabled to give Testimony was at least a Man approved of him On that account therefore their Doctrine or rather their Preaching or Promulgation of the Gospel by it may well be called the Testimony of Jesus And this Testimony of Jesus my Text tells us is the Spirit of Prophecy The truth and Essence of Prophecy saith Maimonides is nothing else but an Influence from God by the Mediation of the active Intellect operating first upon the Rational afterwards on the Imaginable Faculty This Definition is thought somewhat too scanty and obscure to express the nature of Prophecy in its full Latitude it is therefore conceived that by a little alteration of its Definition by another Rabbi we may have a more adequate and clear conception of its nature viz. that it is an Influence from God upon the Rational Faculty either by the Mediation of the Fancy or otherwise and by this Influence whether by the Ministry of an Angel or otherwise a man attains to such knowledge as by his Natural Abilities would be unattainable In these Definitions of Prophecy we have nothing at present to observe but that wherein they both do agree namely the general Nature of it which they make to consist in Influence from God Prophecy is not an Ignis fatuus of a disturbed Fancy but an Impression of Divine Light thence perhaps it was that in old time the Prophets were called Seers not because or at least not so Properly because of their Fore-sight of things Future as of their Visions those Images or Appearances of things as Visible which by Divine Influence were represented on the stage of their Fancy to the sight of their Understandings And afterwards the Prophets were called Men of God because God was pleased immediately to reveal himself unto them and so the word rendred Prophet denotes one that receives what he saith from God It seems then that all Prophecy truly so called hath its descent from Above it is not of any Private interpretation or rather of a mans own starting or suggestion for it comes not by the Will of Man but Holy Men of God did thereby speak as they were moved by the Holy Ghost We Christians therefore believe the Holy Ghost spake by the Prophets and that Prophecy is a Gift of the Spirit For which cause no doubt it was that Justin Martyr intitles him the Spirit of Prophecy But when we consider that the Spirit of Prophecy as in my Text is affirmed of the Testimony of Jesus it seems most probable that it therein signifies not his Person but his Gift not his Essence or Subsistence but an Effect produced by him which is here called by his Name Thus the Spirit of a sound Mind the Spirit of Wisdom and Meckness the Spirit of Knowledge the Spirit of Grace and the Spirit of Prayer signifie Effects Works or Gifts which the Spirit of God produceth in the Souls of Men. So here in my Text the Spirit of Prophecy by an ordinary Metonymy of the Cause for the Effect is put for the Gift or Ability to prophesie which the Holy Ghost wrought in some of Gods Ministers This Gift the Angel had when he spake to St. John and so saith he had St. John too and the rest of the Apostles in their Testimony of Jesus i. e. in the Record they gave of Christ or in the promulgation of the Doctrine they taught concerning him from whence it apparently follows that the Angel here speaking and they were Fellow-servants But it is not this their Association with Angels which I now intend to discourse of but the Reason and Cause of it viz. their Gift of Prophecy It is we see here avouched by an Angel that the Apostles in the Promulgation of the Gospel were indued with the Gift of Prophecy or in short that they were Prophets and if they in their Testimony of Jesus were Prophets much more was He himself by whose Spirit they gave it to him a Prophet all then that remains for me to do will be to prove that Christ and his Apostles were Prophets Hereof methinks none can doubt but those that are slow of heart to believe the Holy Scriptures for therein we first find it fore-told to the Jews that God would raise them up a Prophet from among their Brethren like unto

yet there may be great reason to take it and since the Command of a Superiour much more of God may equal it in goodness there certainly may be some reason to obey it besides the Power it hath of obliging to Obedience and this was Saul's case his Duty undoubtedly it was to desist from Persecution to induce or perswade him hereunto our Blessed Saviour told him It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks i. e. thou wilt expose thy self to danger by persisting in thy way therefore desist from it But the Assertion now under consideration being a deduction from another Position sends us back to the fifth Article where we find it affirmed that God hath a Right to rule and to punish those who break his Laws from his sole irresistable Power and that God Almighty derives his Right of Sovereignty from the Power it self To say that the Right of Sovereignty in the Sovereign of all Sovereigns is derived is certainly somewhat incongruous but letting that pass it is plain his meaning is that God is our Sovereign Lord because his Power is irresistable so that his Dominion ariseth from his Power For proof hereof he alledgeth a place or two out of Job but how much they are to the purpose will best be seen by abridging the Analysis of the Disputation between Job and his Friends occasioned by his afflictions The Question discussed was Whether the right●ousness or unrighteousn●ss the sincerity or hypocrisie of a person pretending to serve God may be judged of by Gods outward Dispensations of prosperity or adversity unto him This Question is s●iffly affirmed by Eliphaz Bildad and Zophar the Opponents and as vehemently denyed by Job the Respondent and so they joyn Issue in the management of this Dispute although Job was in the right yet it must be confessed that sometimes being chafed into Passion either by the sharpness of his Sufferings ●or the bitterness of his Opponents invectives he spake unadvisedly and rashly even of God himself whom he daringly challenged either to call and he would answer or to let him speak and God should answer h●reupon God having heard both him and them for the vindication of his own Honour and for the satisfaction and humiliation of his servant Job was pleased to answer him out of the Whirlwind and said Where wast thou when I laid the foundation of the Earth c. Hereupon Job was so far convinced of the folly and evil the irreverence and rashness of his Challenge and expostulations with God as that he confessed his own vileness and laid his hand up●n his mouth After this it pleased God to ●nlarge his Answer so far as that Job abhorred himself and did r●pent in dust and Ashes the Lord then ceasing to speak any more unto Job was pleased directly to determine the Question disputed on between him and his Opponents This he did by saying unto ●●●phaz My wrath is kindled against thee and ag●●nst ●hy two Friends for ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right as my Servant Job bath How these Texts do prove that God hath his Right of Sovereignty from his sole irresistable Power He must have other Eyes than I that can see Agreeable to this is his arguing from that speech of our Saviour in the man's case who was born blind when his Disciples asking him whether he or his Parents had sinned that he was born blind he answered Neither hath this man sinned nor his Parents but that the Works of God should be manifest in him For though it be said that Death entred into the World by sin it followes not but that God by his Right might have made men subject unto Diseases and Death although they had never sinned even as he hath made the oeher Animals mortal and sickly although they cannot sin But what of all this be it true or false how I wonder doth it prove that God hath Right to rule from his sole irresistable Power If it hath any relation at all to it or connection with it it seems rather to conclude the contrary viz. that Gods irresistable Power ariseth from his Right of Sovereignty or at l●ast is as I may say warranted thereby for all that this argument amounts to is but this that God might have done otherwise than he did or he may do whatsoever he will do To say that he hath this power from his Sovereignty or Dominion is good sense and agreeable to reason but to say that he hath this Power from his sole irresistable Power is to say it is so because it is so This Argument therefore as well as the other I look on as so far fetched and unworthy of a Philosopher as that a modest man may blush to have made use of it but this Authour either knowing or conceiting himself to be thought some body seems to have presumed that from him it would pass as perhaps it doth among his credulous Disciples for a Demonstration although therein be scarce so much as the shadow of a probability for it is very hard if not impossible to discern wherein the force of it lyes and since there can no other estimate be made of things that appear not than there is of those that are no● the Laws of Civility will scarce forbid us to say it is a piece either of mysterious Non-sense or of grave Impertinence to prove his incongruous Assertion That God Almighty derives his ●ight of Sovereignty from his sole irresistable Power The truth or falshood of which Position will best appear by a few Observations manifest almost by their own light as First that Sovereignty Dominion or Lordship is an essential Attribute of the Deity for a Being infinitely perfect it is evident there cannot be without it the prime Basis o● Foundation therefore of this as of all the other Attributes is laid in the Divine Essence it self Yet manifest it is Secondly that this Sovereignty cannot be brought into Act or Exercise without the existence of something else besides God for he is not a Sovereign over himself but over or unto other Things or Persons It must therefore be concluded Thirdly that this Attribute is relative i. e. it includes a relation or reference which God hath to the Persons or Things whereof he is the Sovereign and forasmuch as Parties related have not their Being as such the one before the other but both together it follows that in this Relation between God and us we are as old as he and for this cause the next and immediate Right of his Sovereignty cannot arise from his sole irresistable Power because that is positive and eternal it was long before us and is no emanative cause of a Relation to us but it must arise from something else by the intervention whereof God stands related to us and we to him That Act therefore or those Acts of God whereby this relation is produced I ●ake to be his next and