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	just_a	law_n	2,761	5	4.7834	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A85381	Anti-Cavalierisme, or, Truth pleading as well the necessity, as the lawfulness of this present vvar, for the suppressing of that butcherly brood of cavaliering incendiaries, who are now hammering England, to make an Ireland of it: wherein all the materiall objections against the lawfulness of this undertaking, are fully cleered and answered, and all men that either love God, themselves, or good men, exhorted to contribute all manner of assistance hereunto. By Jo: Goodwin.	Goodwin, John, 1594?-1665.	1642 (1642)	Wing G1146; Thomason E123_25; ESTC R3123	51,456	53

is or ought to be deare and precious unto us and in our miseries and ruines to render our posterities more miserable then we and have advanced their designe this way to that maturity and heighth which we all know and tremble to think of Give me leave in that which remaines to excite and stir you up from the greatest to the least both young and old rich and poore men and women to quit your selves like men yea and if it be possible above the line of men in this great exigency and stresse of imminent danger that hangs over your heads and threatens you every houre Oh let it be as abomination unto us as the very shadow of death to every man woman and child of us not to be active not to lie out and straine our selves to the utmost of our strength and power in every kinde as far as the Law of God and nature will suffer us to resist that high hand of iniquity and blood that is stretched out against us to make our lives and our liberties and our Religion good against that accursed Generation that now magnifieth themselves to make a prey and spoyle of them to make havock and desolation of them all at once if the Lord shall yet please to deliver us out of their hands Let not our Lives our Liberties our Estates be at all precious or deare unto us in this behalfe to expose them be it unto the greatest danger to prevent the certaine and most unquestionable ruine of them otherwise Let us resolve to put all into the hands of God to prevent the falling of all or any thing into the hands of these men There is neither man nor woman of us neither young nor old but hath somewhat or other more or lesse a Mite or two at least to cast into the Treasury of the Publike safety Men that have strength of body for the War and fingers that know how to fight let them to the Battell and not feare to look the enemy in the face Men and women that have only Purses and Estates let them turne them into men and swords for the Battell Men that have heads but want armes and hands for outward execution let these study and contrive methods and wayes of proceedings Head-worke is every whit as necessary in such a time and exigent as hand-work is They that have neither hands nor heads nor estates let them finde hearts to keep the Mountain of God to pray the enemies downe and the Armies of the Lord up Let them finde tongues to whet up the courage and resolutions of others This is a service wherein women also may quit themselves like men whose prayers commonly are as masculine and doe as great and severe execution as the prayers of men As for little Children that know not the right hand from the left and so are uncapable of exhortation or putting on this way by their weaknesse and innocency innocency I meane as concerning the enemies and giving them the least cause or colour of their bloody intendments as likewise in respect of the crying sins and horrid provocations of other men they doe every whit as much towards the furtherance of the service as men doe by their strength by their wisdome by their estates or otherwise as we see in the case of Gods sparing Niniveh The sixscore thousand Children that knew not their right hand from the left were the great intercessors and chiefe mediators in the behalfe of the City with him Yea the bruit beasts themselves the Cattell their case and condition working upon the goodnesse and graciousnesse of God were contributors too in their nature towards this service As is to be seen in the last clause of the place cited from the Prophet Jonah And should not I spare Niniveh c. and also much Cattell Therefore now I beseech you that are capable of the great evils and dangers that threaten you and are even at your doore be not you wanting and backward in any thing that is in your hand to doe if it be possible and as far as in you lyeth redeeme your lives with your lives your estates with your estates your Religion with your Religion out of the hands of those men set them all to work for their own maintenance and preservation yea if you know how to create more strength then you have or to improve your selves seventy times seven fold above the proportion of any your present abilities I beseech you doe it at least be willing as the Apostle beares the Corinthians witnesse they were in a case not altogether unlike above that you are able that so you may be sure to give out your selves to the utmost of your ability the more freely Give me leave to set an edge upon you to quicken and encourage you to strengthen your hand to the worke by the tender only of two motives or considerations unto you 1. Consider that the cause wherein you are desired and exhorted to appeare and to engage your selves to the utmost is like unto the Law of God it selfe in those excellent qualifications of it it is just and holy and good there is nothing in it that should make you ashamed either before God or justly-judging men nothing that needs make you tender or holding off in point of conscience You are to stand up in the defence of your Lives your Liberties your Estates your Houses your Wives your Children your Brethren and that not of this Nation only but of those two other Nations likewise united under the same government with this in the defence of those Religious and faithfull Governours that Honourable Assembly of Parliament whose power and priviledges you stand bound by your solemn Vow and Protestation unto God besides many bands of conscience otherwise to defend and maintaine with your lives power and estates Yea in defence of his Majesties royall person honour and estate all which are now in eminent danger to suffer by that accursed retinue of vile persons that are gathered about him as Ivie about an Oake which never suffers it to thrive or prosper till it be torne off from it This men that have their eyes open may easily see and discerne though others make a mock and a scorn of such an assertion as ridiculous But so did Lots sons in Sodome by that saying of his unto them That the Lord would destroy the place and City where they were Gen. 19. 14. which yet was a serious and solemne truth Yea and further you are exhorted to stand up in defence of the true Protestant Religion for the name and honour of your God your Ordinances and which ought to be of very deare and precious consideration to you for the safe conveyance of that great treasure of the Gospel over unto your posterities that are yet unborne Here is nothing in all this but what the manifest Law of God and the common light of nature not only warranteth and alloweth in all men but even leadeth perswadeth yea urgeth

make their party good against the Emperour his wicked instruments nor yet because these Christians did not stand up in their owne defence having sufficiency of strength to have done it Thus we see there is nothing at all in the patience or submission of the primitive Christians so much urged and insisted upon to discountenance that cause and service wherein your best concurrence hath been desired of any consideration or concernment that way To rise up in your owne defence in the defence of your lives your estates your liberties your wives your children your friends your lawes your religion against those who without any lawfull Authority or Warrant either of God or men are risen up with all their might and all their power to make havock and spoile and ruine of all is no wayes offensive either in the sight of God or reasonable men And to conclude if any man be afraid that Martyrdome should suffer by this as either that the glory hereof should be eclipsed or that all opportunities of expressing our selves unto God and Jesus Christ in such a service should be cut off and taken away by such an opinion I answer No The glory and praise of Martyrdome will remaine as entire with this Doctrine as without it and the opportunities of shewing our selves in our love and faithfulnesse unto Christ in such a service will no wayes be diminished hereby For first the glory and praise of Martyrdome or suffering for Christ doth not consist in lying down and suffering proud and wicked men to ride over our heads in sitting still whilest our estates liberties wives children friends are ruined and destroyed before our faces when God puts an opportunity into our hand to defend them the name and Gospell of Jesus Christ would rather suffer losse by such a patience as this then any wayes gaine it were more Infidell-like then Christian not to make the best provision we can for the safety of those that are so neare to us in such a case But the grace and glory of Martyrdome lyeth in this First when a man is resolved to professe the name and faith of Christ what danger soever hee incurs what losse soever he sustaines or is like to sustaine by it Secondly When it comes to the necessity of suffering that he baulkes not nor saulters with Christ that he is not any wayes ashamed of him or any of his words or wayes Thirdly When a man disdeignes deliverance upon any base termes or by unworthy meanes that scornes to fly away for the enjoyment of any rest except it be with the wings of a Dove the Scripture Embleme of innocency which is covered with silver wings as David speakes and her feathers like yellow gold It is ever honourable to fly with such wings as these Fourthly and lastly when God doth not open a doore of lawfull escape unto him either by flight or otherwise but hedgeth him up as it were with thornes into the hand of the persecutor that he patiently and with meeknesse and composednesse of spirit without any breakings out in one kinde or other without any expression of discontent either against God or man submitteth himselfe unto the stroke in what kinde soever it falls upon him And secodly for opportunities of Martyrdome of suffering for Christ and that in numbers more then we desire they will not be wanting though we shall not-suffer every base Cavalier that saith he is for the King to cut our throats or to plunder our Cities Townes or Houses to commit outrages and insolencies upon Wives Children Friends c. 1. It is a suffering for Christ and so a degree or kinde of Martyrdome to suffer those things which we doe in feares in dangers in distractions in runnings or removings up and downe in disappointments of our affaires in the losse expence or forbearance of our estates by those men of Belial that are as thornes in our eyes and scourges in our sides only or chiefly because we will be that in open and constant profession which by the grace of God we are inwardly and in the truth of our soules because we will not prostitute our consciences to the lusts of their Father the devill we will not give the right hand of fellowship to them in those desperate courses of wickednesse and prophannesse wherein they are engaged and wherein it seemes they meane to weary yea and weare themselves out before they will give over 2. We lie open to the hatred and malice to the mockings and scoffings to the rayling and revilings to the slanders and lyings of the whole malignant party round about us and that because we hold forth the Lord Jesus Christ in his holinesse and purity in his power and authority over the world in his truth and faithfulnesse in his mercy and goodnesse in his glory and Majesty in our lives and conversations And this is a Martyrdome too or suffering for Christ 3. And lastly we know not how soon or suddenly we may be called out by God to suffer even a perfect and compleate Martyrdome indeed to lay downe our lives for Christ when God will hedge up every way of escape against us with thornes and leave us in Peters streights To stretch forth our hands and have another to gird us and to lead us whither we would not John 21. 18. So that we shall leave occasions and opportunities enough even as many as God himselfe ever made for the expressing of our love and faithfulnesse unto Christ and his Gospell in wayes of suffering though we stand up like men and quit our selves with all our might and all our strength against those assacinates and sworne Sword-men of the devill who have conspired the death and ruine of all that feareth God in the Land Only for a close of all that I have to say in this point let me adde this one thing by way of caution that opportunities of suffering Martyrdome will not alwayes continue in the Church for the servants of God yea the time draweth neare when they shall cease and be no more The sad retinue of the first things as they are called Rev. 20. 4 which hath been a long time in passing by even for many Generations is now almost quite passed God is now bringing up the reere of this host of sorrowes and when this is passed he will turne the wheele of his providence and dispensations between his own Church and the Synagogue of Sathan That side which hath been down hitherto shall be upward and that which hath been above shall be below Now the devils Saints and the Children of the Whore even all fearefull and unbeleeving ones and abominable and murtherers and Whoremongers and Sorcerers and all lyars they shall be called to their Martyrdome and the Saints of the most high shall give them double of their owne cup * They that led into captivity hitherto shall now goe into captivity themselves and they that killed with the sword hitherto shall now be killed with the sword