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	will_n	work_n	3,406	5	5.9618	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A26869	The arrogancy of reason against divine revelations, repressed, or, Proud ignorance the cause of infidelity, and of mens quarrelling with the word of God	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1655 (1655)	Wing B1192; ESTC R17483	41,470	78

not begin with a particular proof of each part It seems you would argue thus This and that text of Scripture are true therefore they are Gods word but reason telleth you you should argue thus This is Gods word therfore it is true If you set a boy at school to learn his Grammar will you allow him to be so foolish as to stay till he can reconcile every seeming contradiction in it before he believe it to be a Grammar or submit to learn and use its Rules Or will you not ●pect that he first know it to be a Grammar ●● then make it his business to learn to understa●● it and therein to learn to reconcile all s●em 〈…〉 contradictions And should he not in modes● and reason think that his Master can recon●● that which may seem unreconcileable to him a● such unlearned Novices as he is For my part I am fully resolved That if 〈…〉 Reason could reach to none of the matters ●●vealed in Scriptures so as to see them in the ev●dence of the thing yet if I once see the eviden●● of Divine Revelation I may well be assured th●● it i● wholly true how far soever it m●y transcen●● my Reason For I have Reason to believe all the God revealeth and assert●th and I have re●so● to acknowledge the imbe●illity of my Reaso● and its incompetency to censure the Wisdom o● God And thus I abhor both the doctrine of then that say We have no Reason to be Christians and that the truth of Scripture is an indemonstrable principle that must be believed without Reasons and not proved by them And also the Arrogant infidelity of them that will believe nothing to be a Divine Revelation unless their Reason can comprehend the thing it self or at least if there be any thing in it that seems contradictory to their Reason and so will begin at the wrong end and examine the particular matters by the test of their blinde Reason when they should first examine the attestations of the whole where the evidences are more fitted for the Reason even of the yonger Christians to discern I easily confess that no man should ground●esly believe any thing to be a Divine Testimony or believe any man that saith he speaks from God But when God hath given them sufficient Reason to believe that the Testimony and Revelation is indeed from himself if after that men will still be doubting because their Reason is stalled about the Manner and the Causes and Ends and will believe no more then is within the reach of their Reason in these respects nor confess that it is Gods Word unless they can vindicate it from all Objections and know why and how it is as well as that it is this is a meer unreasonable unbelief It is ordinary with Princes and other Law-givers in wisdom to conceal the Reason of their Laws Shall Subjects therefore presume to censure them as defective in Wisdom or Justice because that they know not the Reason of them I say again If there were nothing in Scripture but what the Reason of man could comprehend it were not so like to be the product of the infinite Wisdom of God Let Reason therefore stoop to the Wisdom of our Maker and when he hath let us know that it is he that speaketh let us humbly learn and not proudly expostulate with him about the rest Though I shall not undertake to set upon the resolution of all the Questions of incredulous men which they commonly raise against the Word of God for that would take up many large Volumns of it self yet as I have disswaded them from this Arrogancy of wit so I sh 〈…〉 make tryal of a few of their commonest a 〈…〉 greatest Objections to shew them that their I●fidelity is capable of a Confutation as well 〈…〉 of a Dehortation Object 1. You tell us out of Scripture that ther● are Devils most wicked malicious spirits addict 〈…〉 to do evil Who made these Devils or how can they to be so bad Certainly God is good and therefore made nothing but what was good and ever● thing must have a first cause If they made themselves evil then they were the first cause of thei● own evil And then you deifie the will of the Devil in making it to be absolutely a first cause ●● you say as some That sin is but a privation and therefore hath no efficient cause but a deficient 〈…〉 then either that deficiency must be first from Go● and then he should be the first cause of all sin or from the will of the Devil and then either he wa● before bound non-deficere or not If not it was no sin if he were then first he could primo deficere though God did all that belonged to him to prevent it secondly and he could have stood without any more help then he had when he fell and so quoad determinationem propriae voluntatis should have been the first determining cause of his own perseverance or non-deficiency For if he could not stand it was no sin to fall being before innocent Moreover their sin was not a meer privation but materially an act whether velle or nolle and formally a relation of disconformity to the Law Answ. 1 The Devil himself was the first cause of his own pravity God made him not evil but he made himself so God gave him free-wil to be a self-determining principle by this he was enabled to stand or fall and left in the hands of his own counsel By a sinful act he averted himself from the chiefest good and became disposed to a further aversion which might quickly habituate him to all evil Nor is it any deifying of the Creatures will to say it is such a self-determining principle and so far a first cause while it had the power of self-determination from God and so absolutely is no first cause It was the excellency of the Creature as being to be governed to have freewil or a self-determining power to good or evil Though it be a higher perfection to be determined or determinable onely to good which in Patriâ may be enjoyed yet in viâ for one under Government in the use of means in order to the end it is most suitable to their condition to have a liberty of self-determination And therefore this was part of the beauty of the frame of Nature and therefore not derogatory from the workman As God intended sapientially or per potentiam sapientiae to govern the rational Creature by Laws and Objects So did he sapientially frame him in a capacity for such a Sapiential Government and that was by giving ●im a free that is a self-determining will Indeed the Angelical Nature and Soul of Man is so exquisit and subtile and sublime a ●hing that no man can exactly perceive and com●rehend the manner of its self-determination ●ut the thing it self is not to be doubted of though the manner of it be yet past our reach We may certainly conclu●e therefore That

have eyes and sight For he that hath not eyes and eye-sight can see nothing at all so the intellective Soul was not made directly to understand it self and it● own intellection but to understand other things and thereby to know that we have an intellectual Soul For he that understandeth doth understand something and thereby he understandeth that he doth understand and so that he hath an intellectual faculty For he that hath not an intellectual Soul can understand nothing at all yet I will not presume to determine the controversie Whether the Intellect do know its own and the Wills elicit acts by direct intuition of the act it self It s as unreasonable a thing then to doubt whether we have such intellectual Souls because they know not themselves directly o● fully as long as they know other things as it i● to doubt whether we have eyes because they s●● not themselves as long as they see external Objects 2. Moreover this corruption doth often di●cover it self in that men will not believe the tru●● of the thing revealed because they cannot rea●● to understand the causes of it so many w 〈…〉 question Gods decrees of Predestination and P 〈…〉 terition because they cannot reach the cau 〈…〉 And many will deny the very work of Creatio 〈…〉 because they cannot know the way of Creatio 〈…〉 They will question whether they have immor 〈…〉 Souls because they cannot tell how they ●●● caused whether by seminal traduction and p 〈…〉 pagation or by immediate Creation They 〈◊〉 deny the work of Gods differencing effect 〈…〉 Grace because they know not how it is given o 〈…〉 or wrought in the Soul And as well might they deny that they have flesh or bones till they better know how they were caused in the Womb And they may as well deny that they have any blood in their bodies any nutrition or augmentation till they better know the mystery of Sanguification and other n●tri●ive works And as well may they say That the Sun doth not shine or warm us till they know how it is that these are caused by the Sun They know not how the Plants are animated and specified nor how they suck their nutriment from the Earth and yet they know that such things are They know not how the silly Snail doth form her Shell or Nature for her nor how the Fe●thers of the Peacock are so beautified and the several sorts of Birds Beasts Plants Fruits are so diversified and adorned and yet they know that such things are Or as Christ telleth Nicodemus here The wind bloweth where it listeth and you hear the sound thereof but know not whence it cometh c. And do we therefore say That there is no win● because we know not whence it cometh or what is the inferior cause of it Will you say That the Sea doth not ebbe and flow or there are no Earthquake Thunder and Lightning because men do so little know the causes of them Faelix qui potuit c. It is not every mans lot to reach such causes nor any mans on Earth to know the causes of all things which he knoweth to be nor fully the causes of any one 3. Moreover This folly of mans heart doth discover it self thus In that men will not believe the truths revealed by God because they cannot see Gods Ends and Reasons and the use of the things Many an evident Truth is rejected by the proud wit of foolish man because God hath not told them why he hath so determined and ordered the business or if he have told it yet they understand it not So many Infidels and Socinians do deny Christs Satisfaction as a Ransom and Sacrifice for sin because they cannot see any reason for it or necessity of it They cannot see but God may pardon sin without satisfaction And then what need of all this ado or what likelihood that God would lay so much on his Son or make so great a business of this work for our good and his glory if all was needless And thus many deny the Universal extent of his satisfaction as being for all mankinde because they are not able to see the reason and use of it They thrust in their dead quorsum as a sufficient answer to the most express words of God And ask what good will it do men to be ransomed and not saved They fear not to say That this is a thing unbeseeming God and such a weakness as men would not be guilty of So that if we can prove that such a thing there is they will not fear to charge it on God as his unreasonable weakness The like we might shew in many other points And must God unlock to us the Reasons Ends and Uses of his Truths and Works before we will believe that such things are We will allo● Parents to conceal the Reasons and Ends of many precepts from their Children and a Prince to conceal the Reasons of many Laws and to kee● to himself the A●cana Imperii the mysteries of State and must God open all before he can be believed Is not the Wisdom and the Will of God the most satisfying Reason in the World Must you have proper Reasonings and Intentions in God or will you have a cause of the first cause or an end of the ultimate end of all Al●s how little do the wisest men know of the use and ends of many a Creature over their heads and under their feet which their eyes behold yea how little know they of the use and ends of many a part of their own bodies And yet they know that such things there are What abundance of why's hath an Arrogant Infidel upon the reading of Scripture from the beginning of Gene●●s to the end of the Revelation which must all be satisfied before he will believe Of all which God will one day satisfie them but not in the manner as they would have prescribed him 4. Another expression of this Arrogant Ignorance is When men will not believe the several truths of God because they are not able to reconcile them and place each one in its own order and see the Method and Body of Truth in its true Locations and Proportion Nay perhaps they will believe none because they cannot discern the harmony What abundance of seeming contradictions in Scripture do rise up in the eyes of an Ignorant Infidel as strange apparitions do to a distracted man or as many colours do before the inflamed or distempered eye These self-conceited ignorant S●uls do imagine all to be impossible which exceedeth their knowledge and because they cannot s●e the sweet consent of Scripture and how those places do suit and fortifie ●●ch other which to them seemed to contradict each other therefore they think that no one ●ls● can see it no not ●od himself They are like an ignor●nt fellow in ● Watch-makers sh●p that thinks no body can ●●● all the loose ●eeces together and make a Wat●h of them because he cannot When