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	reason_n	see_v	3,316	5	3.1434	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45324	Three tractates by Jos. Hall, D.D. and B.N.; Selections. 1646	Hall, Joseph, 1574-1656.	1646 (1646)	Wing H422; ESTC R14217	80,207	295

therefore graciously tempers our dishes with the tart sauces of afiliction The mother of the two sons of Zebedee and her ambitious children are all for the chiefe P●●rage in the Temporall kingdome of Christ but he cals them to a bitter Cup and a bloody baptisme rather and this was a far greater honour then that they sued for There is no earthly estate absolutely good for all persons like as no gale can serve for all passengers In Africk they say the North winde brings Clouds and the South winde clears up That plant which was starved in one soile in another prospers Yea that which in some climate is poyson proves wholsome in another Some one man if he had anothers blessings would run wilde and if he had some other mans crosses would be desperate The infinite wisdome of the great Governour of the world allots every one his due proportion The Fitches are not threshed with a threshing instrument neither is a Cartwheele turned about upon the Cummin but the Fitches are beaten out with a staffe and the Cummin with a rod saith Esay And no otherwise in matter of prosperity Josephs Coat may be party-coloured and Benjamins messe may be five times so much as any of his brethren It is marvell if they who did so much envie Joseph for his dream of superiority did not also envie Benjamin for so large a service and so rich gifts at his parting this it seems gave occasion for the good Patriarchs fear when he charged them See that you fall not out by the way But there had been no reason for so impotent an envie whiles the gift is free and each speeds above his desert who can have cause to repine It is enough that Joseph knew a just reason of so unequall a distribution though it were hidden from themselves The elder brother may grudge the fat Calfe and the prime Robe to the returned Unthrift but the Father knowes reason to make that difference God is infinitely just and infinitely mercifull in dispensing both his favours and punishment In both kinds every man hath that which is fittest for him because it is that which Gods will hath designed to him and that will is the most absolute rule of justice now if we can so frame our will to his as to think so too how can wee bee other then contented Do we suffer There is more intended to us then our smart It was a good speech of Seneca though an Heathen what pity it is that he was so I give thanks to my infirmity which forces me not to be able to do that which I ought not will to do If we lose without so as we gain within if in the perishing of the outward man the inward man be renued we have no cause to complain much to rejoyce Do I live in a mean estate If it were better I should be worse more proud more carelesse and what a wofull improvement were this What a strange creature would man be if he were what he would wish himselfe Surely he would be wickedly pleasant carelesly prophane vainely proud proudly oppressive dissolutely wanton impetuously selfe-willed and shortly his own Idoll and his own Idolater His Maker knowes how to frame him better it is our ignorance and unthankfulnesse if we submit not to his good pleasure To conclude we pray every day Thy will be done What hypocrites are we if we pray one thing and act another If we murmure at what we wish All is well between Heaven and us if we can think our selvs happy to be what God will have us SECT XXIII 2. Resolution to abate of our desires SEcondly we must resolve to abate of our desires for it is the illimitednesse of our ambitious and covetous thoughts that is guilty of our unquietnesse Every man would be and have more then he is and is therefore sick of what he is not It was a true word of Democritus If we desire not much we shall think a little much and it is sutable to one of the rules of S. Augustine it is better to need lesse then to have more Paul the richest poor man as Ambrose well could say As having all things yet possessing nothing It is not for a Christian to be of the Dragons temper which they say is so ever thirsty that no water will quench his drought and therefore never hath his mouth shut nor with the daughters of the Horseleach to cry alwayes Give give He must confine his desires and that to no overlarge compasse and must say to them as God doth to the Sea Hitherto shalt thou come and no further and here shall thy proud waves be stayed What a cumber it is for a man to have too much to be in the case of Surena the Parthian Lord that could never remove his family with lesse then a thousand Camels What is this but Tortoise-like to be clogg'd with a weighty shell which we cannot drag after us but with pain Or like the Ostrich to be so held down with an heavie body that we can have no use of our wings Whereas the nimble Lark rises and mounts with ease and sings chearfully in her flight How many have we known that have found too much flesh a burden and when they have found their blood too rank have been glad to pay for the letting it out It was the word of that old and famous Lord Keeper Bacon the eminent Head of a noble and witty family Mediocria firma There is neither safety nor true pleasure in exces it was a wise and just answer of Zeno the Philosopher who reproving the superstuity of a feast and hearing by way of defence that the Maker of it was a rich man and might well spare it said If thy Cook shall oversalt thy broth and when he is chid for it shall say I have store enough of salt lying by mee wouldst thou take this for a fair answer My Son eat thou honey saith Solomon because it is good but to be sure for the preveating all immoderation he addes soon after Hast thou found honey eat so much as is sufficient for thee lest thou be filled therewith if our appetite carry us too far we may easily surfeit this which is the embleme of pleasure must be tasted as Dionysius the Sophist said of old on the tip of the finger not be supt up in the hollow of the hand It is with our desires as it is with weak stomachs the quantity offends even where the food is not unwholsome and if heed be not taken one bit draws on another till nature be overlaid Both pleasures and profits if way be given to them have too much power to debauch the minde and to work it to a kinde of insatiablenesse there is a thirst that is caused with drunkennes and the wanton appetite like as they said of Messalina may be wearied but cannot be satisfied It is good therefore to give austere repulses to the first

who is infinitly mercifull yet will not have his favours otherwise conveighed to us then by our supplications the style of his dear ones is His people that prayeth and his own style is The God that heareth prayers To him therfore doth the devout heart pour out all his requests with all true humility with all fervour of spirit as knowing that God will hear neither proud prayers nor heartlesse wherein his holy desires are regulated by a just method First suing for spirituall favours as most worthy then for temporall as the appendences of better and in both ayming at the glory of our good God more then our own advantage And in the order of spirituall things first and most for those that are most necessary and essentiall for our souls health then for secondary graces that concern the prosperity and comfort of our spirituall life Absolutely craving those graces that accompany salvation all others conditionally and with reference to the good pleasure of the munificent Giver Wherein heed must be taken that our thoughts be not so much taken up with our expressions as with our desires and that we doe not suffer our selves to languish into an unfeeling length and repetition of our suits Even the hands of a Moses may in time grow heavy so therefore must we husband our spirituall strength that our devotion may not flagge with overtyring but may be most vigorous at the last And as we must enter into our prayers not without preparatory elevations so must we be carefull to take a meet leave of God at their shutting up following our supplications with the pause of a faithfull and most lowly adoration and as it were sending up our hearts into heaven to see how our prayers are taken and raising them to a joyfull expectation of a gracious and successefull answer frō the father of mercies SECT XX. VPon the comfortable feeling of a gracious condescent follows an happy fruition of God in all his favours so as we have not them so much as God in them which advanceth their worth a thousand fold and as it were brings down heaven unto us whereas therefore the sensuall man rests onely in the meer use of any blessing as health peace prosperity knowledge and reacheth no higher the devout soul in and through all these sees and feels a God that sanctifies them to him and enjoys therein his favour that is better then life Even we men are wont out of our good nature to esteem a benefit not so much for its own worth as for the love and respect of the giver Small legacies for this cause finde dear acceptation how much more is it so betwixt God and the devout soul It is the sweet apprehension of this love that makes all his gifts blessings Doe we not see some vain churl though cryed down by the multitude herein secretly applauding himself that he hath bags at home how much more shall the godly man finde comfort against all the crosses of the world that he is possessed of him that possesseth all things even God Al-sufficient the pledges of whose infinite love he feels in all the whole course of Gods dealing with him SECT XXI OUt of the true sense of this inward fruition of God the devout soul breaks forth into cheerfull thanksgivings to the God of all comfort praising him for every evill that it is free from for every good thing it enjoyeth For as it keeps a just Inventory of all Gods favours so it often spreads them thankfully before him and layes them forth so near as it may in the full dimensions that so God may be no loser by him in any act of his beneficence Here therefore every of Gods benefits must come into account whether eternall or temporall spirituall or bodily outward or inward publique or private positive or privative past or present upon our selves or others In all which he shall humbly acknowledge both Gods free mercy and his own shamefull unworthinesse setting off the favours of his good God the more with the foyle of his own confessed wretchednesse and unanswerablenesse to the least of his mercies Now as there is infinite variety of blessings from the liberall hand of the Almighty so there is great difference in their degrees For whereas there are three subjects of all the good we are capable of The Estate Body Soul and each of these doe far surpasse other in value the soul being infinitely more worth then the body and the body far more precious then the outward estate so the blessings that appertain to them in severall differ in their true estimation accordingly If either we doe not highly magnifie Gods mercy for the least or shall set as high a price upon the blessings that concern our estate as those that pertain to the body or upon bodily favours as upon those that belong to the soul we shall shew our selves very unworthy and unequall partakers of the Divine bounty But it will savour too much of earth if we be more affected with temporall blessings then with spirituall and eternall By how much nearer relation then any favour hath to the Fountain of goodness and by how much more it conduceth to the glory of God and ours in him so much higher place should it possesse in our affection and gratitude No marvell therefore if the Devout Heart be raised above it self and transported with heavenly raptures when with Stephens eyes it beholds the Lord Jesus standing at the right hand of God fixing it self upon the consideration of the infinite Merits of his Life Death Resurrection Ascension Intercession and finding it self swallowed up in the depth of that Divine Love from whence all mercies flow into the Soul so as that it runs over with passionate thankfulnesse and is therefore deeply affected with all other his mercies because they are derived from that boundlesse Ocean of Divine goodnesse Unspeakable is the advantage that the soul raises to it self by this continuall exercise of thanksgiving for the gratefull acknowledgement of favours is the way to more even amongst men whose hands are short and strait this is the means to pull on further beneficence how much more from the God of all Consolation whose largest bounty diminisheth nothing of his store And herein the Devout Soul enters into its Heavenly Task beginning upon earth those Hallelujahs which it shall perfect above in the blessed Chore of Saints and Angels ever praising God and saying Blessing and Glory and Wisdome and Thankesgiving and Honour and Power and Might be unto our God for ever and ever Amen SECT XXII NOne of all the services of God can be acceptably no not unsinfully performed without due devotion as therefore in our prayers thanksgivings so in the other exercises of Divine Worship especially in the reading and hearing of Gods Word and in our receipt of the blessed Sacrament it is so necessary that without it we offer to God a meer carcass of religious duty and profane that Sacred Name we would