Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	good_a	great_a	people_n	3,792	5	4.4298	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A26901	The church told of Mr. Ed. Bagshaw's scandals and warned of the dangerous snares of Satan now laid for them in his love-killing principles with a farther proof that it is our common duty to keep up the interest of the Christian religion and Protestant cause in the parish churches, and not to imprison them by a confinement to tolerated meetings alone / by Richard Baxter ...	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1672 (1672)	Wing B1226; ESTC R1907	28,184	36

discharged me from speaking to them any more and God I think discharged me at present I saw nothing more to be attempted but with the other whose duty for Concord and Christian Love after many years silence I opened in a Treatise called The Cure of Church-Divisions But yet would not publish it without an Addition of the Duty of those Pastors that most complain against separation lest I should exasperate their minds against those that I instructed and should tempt them to overlook their own miscarriages But more of this then I there adjoyned it could not be expected that the Licenser should pass The only man that rose up against this Writing with furious indignation was Mr. Edw. Bagshaw a man that had before written against Bishop Morley's Letter published against me and lain in prison many years And gave the world a notable proof of one of the chief passages displeasing to them in my Book viz. That there is a marvellous affinity between the spirit of Persecution and of sinful SEPARATION though several opinions or capacities cause them to operate several wayes By this time I discerned the guilty from the innocent by the Cry which signified their smart I had seen so much of the workings of that spirit that I expected not to escape their sharpest censure And verily I expected neither preferment nor so much as Liberty to preach as a reward from the other side instead of the favour of those that I knew I was to lose Nor yet had I such a contempt of them or a desire to be bitterly censured and reviled as to invite men to it as the Circumcellians importuned men to kill them I foresaw that some interessed men would be angry as supposing that I would hinder their alienating work though they could not deny but that I spake the truth I foresaw that many that look but to the present day and place would say It was unseasonable and served the Prelates design not considering that their design is not to bad but that some things which seem their design do also seem the design of Christ and his Churches good and mens salvation I foreknew those that make uncharitable Divisions their very Religion would make it a part of their religious dutys to call me as bad as their distempers do incline them These things I prognosticated in my Preface As Tertullian saith of the Christians martyrdome It is more the choice of our own will than the effect of your power i. e. We dye because we will dye rather than not do our duty by the omission of which we could escape so I say I could easily have kept as large an interest in the favour and applause of all the parties that ever railed at me as most men of my profession as their own words have told me What did it gain me in the world to do what I have done to lose the favour of the Papists the Ithacian Prelatists the Anabaptists the Separatists the Quakers the seekers c. But I saw whither the temptations of this age did tend And this was a work that some body must do or else woe to the Ministry that in their very sufferings would be so unfaithful And I thought my reputation with the Uncurable as fit to be cast away and my self as fit to bear their slanders as most of my brethrens who had more use for an interest in them than I had And I remembred that ill-gotten goods must be restored and without restitution no remission Though I can truly say that I disliked and decryed this spirit from my beginnings yet when I preached first the favour and loud applause of some good people tainted a little with this disease did tempt me to please them too often by exclaiming too smartly against the corruptions of the Church Though I said nothing but what I was confident was true yet I think I did not well to cherish their inor●inate censoriousness in such matters And having gotten sometime a great stock of estimation with such angry persons by means which I dare not wholly justifie though it made me the more capable to do them good I did voluntarily surrender it to them again before they took it from me and I did yield to serve God at the rate of so small a part of self-denial rather than be silent at such a time as this I have long ago preached to Drunkards and other ungodly people till they openly rose against me in tumults in the streets and sought my life And shall I forbear to speak that truth to Ignorant-proud Dividers which is necessary to heal the Church and them and all for fear lest their passion and partiality should shew their guilt by their calling me what they are themselves They call out for Valiantness in suffering themselves And shall I be so cowardly as to fear their false reports They cry out against the fear of man And shall I fear their impotent revilings They will be my witnesses that it is a duty to deny our selves and to forsake all for the Cause of Christ And I am as certain that Love and Unity are his Cause as I am that he is the Christ And shall I think the good thoughts and words of some of his froward Children too great a matter to forsake and lose They themselves think that we should rather suffer a prison or death then joyn with the holiest Minister and people in the use of the Common Prayer And should I that know the difference think that LOVE and CONCORD are not matters more worthy to be suffered for When first the City and Countrey had sounded with abundance of untruths about my Book while it was yet but in the Press at last the man that openly assaulted it when it came forth did use the same instruments which himself decryed and filled his Libel with as many untruths as ever I saw heaped up in so small a room except once in such another piece that was about eight years elder And the Cause it self he shamefully slip'd over as if his spirit and interest had directed him to no other means but only to attempt to asperse the person that was against him I wondred that no soberer a man rose up to defend Dividing-Principles And I was glad that in an age of such Temptations he had no more approvers among the Ministers When I had answered that Libel he sent forth another which instead of professing repentance did double the number of his Vntruths and cast out more of his bilious excrements but pretended also to say somewhat for his Separating Principles and Cause When I had replyed to that and Admonished him to repent of his false Doctrines and Crimes and above fourscore visible Vntruths he hath vented a third Libel of which I am now to give you a more particular account CHAP. II. I Must needs again remember the Readers 1. That the design of my Book was not particular to reconcile men only to the Parish Churches but universal against

must bear with unless you will separate from your own leaders Deal but impartially Is there one Parish Minister yea or one Parish Church Member of many that was ever convict of so much sin as Mr. Bagshaw hath published and silently but impertinently lyeth down under Is there many of them that ever defended half so much sin so obstinately without confession and yet so impotently without sence Separate from no Ministers or people that are not proved as guilty as this man and I will never more write against your Separation 2. And now the world and posterity shall see in this mans writings how the cause of unlawful Separation was defended in this age I openly profess that this is a great reason that drew me to Defend my Cure of Church Divisions by three following Defences that Posterity may see what interest and passion will not now suffer some to see I look to the times to come And if there be any wiser men among them that can say more for the Separating-cause they are best set to it For if they leave it on such hands as Mr. Bagshaws it is easie to foresee that it will be shamed for ever Yet do I solemnly profess that to my utmost remembrance I never in my life did venture upon or manage one dispute by word or writing through a confidence in my own ability to make good what I undertook but in a confidence of the goodness of my Cause and of the great advantage which the evidence of plain truth doth give to any man of good reason to defend it even against the cunningest Sophister that shall oppose it Sect. 3. And now I shall add my Admonition to you as not being quite ignorant of Satans Wiles to tell you what a snare is laid for you all in Mr. Bagshaw's Writings and as one that hath no interest but Christs and the Churches to move him to it to tell you how great the danger is if you swallow the bait 1. If he prevail with you he will draw you into the guilt of all those sins of his own fore-mentioned by your approbation consent And how great an addition will that be to your load 2. It would draw you to the entertainment of all those Love-killing Malignant and Dividing Principles which I cast down and he sets up And you little know what an evil it is to have an understanding so blinded and a heart so defiled 3. By this means that true universal Love to Godly men and Christians as such will be destroyed And when you should bear Gods Image who is Love it self you will be made like Satan the enemy of God and Love And instead of loving your neighbour as your self you will take your neighbours yea Christs members for your enemies 4. And as Love is the fulfilling of the Law so your death of Love will be the death of all your true obedience and lead you to the breach of every Law You will deny all the acts of Love in word or deed to others that you owe them to you will censure you will backbite freely you will receive false reports and vend them again to others And Christ may say to you Inasmuch as you did it not to one of the least mark the least of these my brethren you did it not to me 5. You will be tempted into Treason against Christ under pretence of piety denying his interest in almost all his Churches in the world Even as if you should say that the King is King of one or two Towns only in all his Kingdoms on pretence that all the rest are not good enough to be his Subjects I profess openly that nothing in the world more moveth me to do what I do than this That there is much within me that will not suffer me without abhorrence to think of either unchurching all Churches in the world that use a set Liturgy yea that use one worse than ours or yet to hold that they should all be separated from And had I ever Vowed and Covenanted to do this as I did not it had been a sinful Vow 6. And moreover it will possess you with a degenerate and false kind of Religion consisting in sidings and partial opinions and obeying your selves instead of God 7. And it will make you Satans instruments to disturb all Churches that you joyn with if you do not want occasion and temptation For the Principles which I wrote against will let no Church be quiet where they prevail And a Kingdom or house divided cannot stand 8. You will be drawn from true spiritual worshipping of God and your worship and Church-communion will be corrupted Instead of holy and heavenly Sermons Prayers praises c. you will be infected with a contending and envying passion and puffed up with the conceit of your own judgments and grow zealous for your personal opinions and your parties and turn your preaching and praying into a strain that savoureth of this disease and defile them with unsounder passages for your errours or divided interests than any can be found in the Common Prayers which you shun 9. And if you be thus overcome it will heinously aggravate your sin that you will do all this as a part of your Religion and so will father it all on God as if such doing pleased him and proceeded from his spirit and were commanded by his word And as Matth. 12. it is made the unpardonable sin to blaspheme the Holy Ghost by ascribing his Miracles to Satan so though it be pardonable you should easily see that it cannot be small to say that those things which are pleasing to the Devil and proceed from his will and malicious suggestions are pleasing to God and proceed from his spirit and word 10. By these means Satan would make your Churches to do his work against the Lord whom they profess to worship and and to be the very Nests where PRIDE and IGNORANCE shall breed their like and shall cherish sinful Love killing principles and passions and animosities against your brethren And so your Assemblies will be acted too much by his suggestions and become his Work-houses while you think that they are serving God and mens wisdom will be earthly sensual and diabolical when they verily think it is from above Iam. 3 15 16. 11. Thus he would fain bring an odium upon your selves and cause you to go under such a character as the Munster Anabaptists and the Familists Quakers and such others do That men may say of you that while you take on you to be stricter than others it is but in abhorring other mens Prayers and extolling your own And that sin is no sin when you find it in your own party or your selves And that Lyars and most impudent Calumniators and proud Revilers c. go among your selves for Godly persons while the uprightest men that use the Common Prayer do go for Idolaters and Ungodly And if Satan can but get such an odious Character fastened on you what