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	true_a	2,848	5	3.8360	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A47484	Pillulæ pestilentiales, or, A spiritual receipt for cure of the plague delivered in a sermon preach'd in St. Paul's Church London, in the mid'st of our late sore visitation / by Rich. Kingston ...	Kingston, Richard, b. 1635?	1665 (1665)	Wing K614; ESTC R4398	31,246	136

The Cause of the Disease Sin implyed in these words and turn from their wicked ways Thirdly The Medicine to be used which is Compounded of three Ingredients 1. Humility 2. Prayer 3. Repentance Fourthly The Physician prescribing this Medicine God I will hear from heaven c. I begin with the Disease of which I need say but little since it speaks so much for it self But something I must say lest I seem to pass that over that passeth by few in a house or City where it comes The word is sometimes rendred Pestilence and sometimes Plague from the Latine word Plaga which signifies a Stroke but by reason of the Streightness of our English Tongue they are promiscuously taken The Plague in other Languages extends further and notes any extraordinary Stroke that comes from God the Prophets under that Word contain these four Famine Pestilence Wild Beasts and the Sword which per eminentiam are called the four plagues of God 'T is true God creates every thing both light and darkness Isa 45.7 good and evil as the Prophet speaks but because Strokes if they be private particular or ordinary have no great operation on us we observe their second and not their first causes and so we neither reverence God's Justice nor discern his hand nor fear his power Upon this Score when mens sins cry aloud and peircing the Heavens mount to the very throne of God it is fit likewise that God's loud Justice should peirce the heavens Heb. 1.21 descend upon man and like the voice of Sinai make poor mortals quake and fear The plague is a Stroke able to extort from any man the confession of Pharaoh's Enchanters Ex. 8.19 This is the Finger of God It 's an Arrow of his own shooting 2 Sam. 24.15 and may better be called Morbus Sacer then the Falling Sickness And therefore in our Language we style the Pestilence the Visitation of God and the Tokens thereof God's Marks and upon our Dores write LORD HAVE MERCY VPON VS By which we clearly confess whilest the Angel executeth divine wrath we all stand at God's Mercy And thus I come from the Disease it self to the Cause of it which is God's anger enflamed by Sin I know there are some that following the Sentiments of Physicians will needs ascribe it to the Infection of the Aire to gross and unwholsome Diet or to the predominancy of corrupt humours But Physicians may be excused if they say something when they see an Angel As I will not deny but in all Diseases there may be something of natural so I may likewise affirm there is in this something divine and above nature 1. For the natural part First The Infected Aire may contribute very much and therefore we read that by casting the Ashes of the Furnace towards heaven Ex. 9.8 the Aire became Infected and the plague of Botches and Blains spread it self over Aegypt Secondly Corrupt humours may do the like for to them doth King David ascribe the cause of his Malady when he complains that his Moisture in him was corrupt Psal 32.4 dryed up and turned into the drought of Summer Thirdly The contagion comeing from the Sick Thus we see by the Jewish Law the Leprous person for fear of Infecting others was commanded to cry aloud Vnclean Lev. 13.45 46 52. Vnclean by which he gave the Sound warning they should not approch nigh for fear of Contagion He was besides to have his dwelling alone and the garments he wore were to be washed and if the plague was spread in them the Priest was to burn them Yea the very house walls in which the Leper dwelt were to be scraped and in some cases the house it self to be pulled down The Learned Fernelius more judiciously confesses this Disease hath a hidden beginning some secret principle that occultly wounds and we may assure our selves that though things ab extrâ contribute to its progression yet the real cause is the latent Corruption within us Sir Tho. More Epigr. Nugamur mortemque procul procul esse putamus At mediis latet haec abdita visceribus But let us come to the supernatural Cause of this Disease and that will not require a Physician so much as a Divine And I suppose many of them think it a difficult point that they go into the Country to study it and by their absence expound S. Paul's words thus We preach not our selves i. e. our Curates or who else will preach for us But to the supernatural Cause the Scripture observes it as a crime in King Asa that in the time of his Sickness he look'd more after the Physician than after God He did not consider the Infirmity of his Soul was to be healed as well as that of his body and therefore look'd for natural remedies only But if we would avoid his fault we must acknowledge the hand of God in this Sickness and something above nature For if we observe the way of inflicting it we shall find it oftentimes done by Spirits Thus we see an Angel a destroying Angel in the plague of Aegypt Exod. 12.13 Another in the plague that destroyed the host of the Assyrians under Senacherib We find a third in the plague at Jerusalem under King David and St. John in the Revelations brings in a fourth pouring his Vial upon Earth Rev. 16.2 and there fell a noisome plague upon Man and Beast So that God is the great Agent in this Calamity But how Not willingly his anger must first be enkindled by our Sin for as the Psalmist saith Psal 106. They provoked him to anger with their Inventions and then the plague brake in amongst them Thus Deut. 28.21 God says Because of the wickedness of thy doing whereby thou hast forsaken me the Lord shall make the Pestilence cleave unto thee And Hosea cries Hos 14.6 O Israel return unto the Lord thy God for thou hast fallen by thine Iniquity The perdidit te in the Prophet doth not proceed from neighbours become Enemies or from the Locust Caterpiller Mildews and such other things as cause Famine and Pestilence but from the corruption and Sin hatch'd in these Israelites and therefore in the second verse he counsels them as the only way to recover their former happiness to Take with them words and turn to the Lord and say unto him take away all Iniquity and receive us graciously So that sin which is the plague of the Soul begets the Plague of the Body This viperous Mother brings forth a child so like it self that it 's hard to know the one for the other I shall shew you in a few particulars their Similitude and Agreement First They are alike in Nature The Corporeal Pestilence aims not at the more ignoble parts of the body but at the very Source of Life the vital Spirits and by its contagious quality oppresses them The like doth Sin by its secret Malignancy to the Soul It blinds the understanding

an Oke and had learn'd the Art of Submission But proud men make it their business to withstand Thunderbolts and had rather perish then not attempt Had they fully known what the meaning of that passage is God resisteth the proud and giveth grace unto the humble they would easily have understood that the only way to avoid the fury of the Lyon of the Tribe of Judah is to lay prostrate before him not to contend but yield the buckler to him that never kills persons disarmed of their Sins and humbly begging quarter The Royal Prophet saith A broken heart and a contrite Spirit oh God! thou wilt not despise The Ninivites found the Truth of this upon the pronouncing of that fatal Sentence against them Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be destroyed What did they fortifie their City did they frame of their old men a Councel of War and of their youth raise a puissant Army did they send for the help of their Allies and provide for a long Siege No they understood a better method of disarming divine wrath they clothed themselvs with Sackcloth and sat in Ashes they humbled themselves before the Lord and by this holy policy brought the Lord to repent of the Evil he intended against them Here it is worth observing that humble Submission is more prevalent with God than our fellow Creature Niniveh humbles it self and God repents of the designed ruine But Jonah grows angry and thinks he doth well to be so This humility must not be like that which the Prophet complains of a holding down our head like a hulrush We must have a deep sense of our unworthiness that has caused this fire to go out against us and having truly considered the greatness of that Majesty we have offended cry out in confusion of face that we are but dust and cannot endure everlasting burnings And that we may the better do thus let us first consider the Justness of the Act. If we have offended a temporal Prince we spare no labour leave no stone unturned to find out this Courtier that Favourite yea at the very expence of our Estates to mediate with him our reconciliation when many times it is to no purpose And shall we be less sedulous in appeasing the King of Kings and Lord of Lords by a due acknowledging our own vileness and the enormity of our Actions that have provoked his just displeasure Had he demanded the fruit of our body our Estates or our Lives by way of Expiation and after all this left us in an uncertainty whether he would pardon whether he would heal us or no the Case had been hard but when he that is Truth it self assures us our humble Submission shall make amends surely we must be the most wretched people in the World if we want a heart and a knee to appease his fury Secondly It is the most advantagious Act to our selves and this will appear three ways First It prevents Substraction of Grace and falling into grievous Sins Without this gracious frame of Spirit even the greatest Saints have fallen into horrid sins We may observe this in St. Peter himself in a vain glorious humour he began to tell Christ Master though all the world forsake thee I will not yet when his Lord and Master was seized by the Jews upon the accusation of a silly Damosell he was the first that not only denied his Master but forsware him too Had he been as low and humble in his own Conceit when the Maid said unto him Thou also wast with Jesus of Galilee Mat. 26.69 as he was immediately after his denial when he went out and wept bitterly his Lord would not have suffered him so foully to fall And therefore his fellow Apostle St. Paul tells us of a Thorn in his flesh or a buffetting Sathan to keep him humble and in a due sense of his nothingness lest says he I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of Revelations Sup. Cant. Serm. 52. St. Bernard observes that sometimes grace is substracted not for Pride which already is but which would be if it were not substracted Here St. Augustine in his Book de Civitate Dei C. 14. c. 13 Audio dicere superbis utile esse cadere in aliquod apertum manifestumque peccatum unde sibi displiceant qui jam sibi placendo ceciderunt i. e. I dare boldly affirm That it is requisite for the Proud to fall into some open and hainous Sin that so at last they may fall out of Conceit with themselves that fell by standing in their own Conceit It is humility then that shuts up all the passages to Sin and is as St. Bazil speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Magazine of Virtues Secondly It is the characteristical note of our Christianity it is a virtue peculiar to it Learn of me for I am meek and lowly is a Doctrine which Christ first taught and Doctor humilitatis in St. Augustin's opinion is his proper Stile His whole Life and Actions were the great Examples of it Humility is a piece of that Celestial Philosophy the Gentiles never knew it is much above their Ethicks for though amongst them a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Moderation to know and keep our measures be commended for virtue yet that this should be performed in humble dependance on God by Grace derived from him in our Redeemer was above their Learning And therefore Clemens of Alexandria said well That Natural men may do the same good that a good Christian 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. But not from the same cause nor with the same Intention for they make not God in Christ either their beginning or end So that the acting Virtues in a supernatural power and referring them primarily to his honor in Christ which is the Quintessence of humility is above the reach of Philosophical Speculation Thirdly It is the readiest way to saving knowledge The humble thou wilt teach thy way says the royal Prophet Proud persons will never make good Scholars in Christ's School he will never put the new wine of his Grace into their old musty bottles the reason is they are so full with their own airy Conceptions with the bubbles of their own blowing that there is no room for solid and real Truths with which the Holy Ghost ever fills humble Souls On the contrary the humble person that considers the vileness of his natural condition and how poor and naked he is places all his hopes of strength and knowledge only in God and by that resignation of himself eafiler receives those divine examinations of Truth that can make him wise to Salvation The great end of Christianity to use the Words of Hierocles concerning the Pythagorean discipline is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 · That we may be made all wing for the pursuit of Divine things but Pride puts weights of Lead upon the Soul that She cannot soar into the Region of Divine Truth and so muffles her with self-conceit that like