Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	great_a	joy_n	sorrow_n	2,802	5	8.8668	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A93889	Catholique divinity: or, The most solid and sententious expressions of the primitive doctors of the Church. With other ecclesiastical, and civil authors: dilated upon, and fitted to the explication of the most doctrinal texts of Scripture, in a choice way both for the matter, and the language; and very useful for the pulpit, and these times. / By Dr. Stuart, dean of St. Pauls, afterwards dean of Westminster, and clerk of the closet to the late K. Charles.	Steward, Richard, 1593?-1651.; H. M.	1657 (1657)	Wing S5518; Thomason E1637_1; ESTC R203568	97,102	288

to consider Gods miraculous deliverances of other men in other cases or whether wee understand it according to the general voyce of Interpreters i. e. bee content that there remain in thy flesh matter and subject for mee to produce glory from thy weakness and matter and subject for thee to exercise thy faith and allegiance to mee still these words will carry an argument against the expedience of absolute praying against all temptations For still this gratia mea sufficit will import this amount to this I have as many Antidotes as the Devil hath poysons I have as much mercy as the Devil hath malice There must bee Scorpions in the world but the Scorpion shall cure the Scorpion there must bee temptations but temptations shall adde to mine and to thy glory And therefore is it conduceable to Gods purposes in us which is the rule of all our prayers to pray utterly against all tentations as vehemeutly as against sins God should lose by it and wee should lose by it if wee had no tentations For God is glorified in those victories which wee by his grace gain over the Devil Salvus factus ●s 〈◊〉 nihilo non de nihilo tamen Bernard THou bringest nothing for thy salvation yet something to thy salvation nothing worth it but yet something with it Thy self hath a part in those means which God useth to that purpose thy self art the instrument though not the cause of thine own salvation Thy new creation by which thou art a new creature i. e. thy regeneration is wrought as the first creation was wrought God made heaven and earth of nothing but hee produced the other creatures out of that matter which hee had made Thou hadst nothing to do in the first work of thy Regeneration thou couldst not so much as wish it but in all the rest thou art a fellow-worker with God because before that there are seeds of former grace shed in thee Nullâ ●o Deus perinde atque corporis aerumna conciliatur Nazian A Mo●●ning spirit and an afflicted body are great instruments of reconciling God to a sinner and they alwayes dwell at the gates of Atonement restitution and Bonaventure in the life of Christ reports that the holy Virgin mother said to Elizabeth that grace doth not descend into the soul of a man but by prayer and affliction Besides a delicate and prosperous life is hugely contrary to the hopes of a blessed eternity And certainly hee that sadly considers the portion of Dives and remembers that the account which Abraham gave him for the unavoidableness of his torment was because hee had his good things in this life must in all reason with trembling run from a course of banquets and faring deliciously every day as being a dangerous estate and a consignation to an evil greater than all danger the pains and torment of unhappy souls So then hee that desires to dye well and happily above all things must bee carefull that hee do not live a soft delicate and voluptuous life but a life severe holy and under the Discipline of the Gross No man wants cause of tears and daily sorrow Let every man consider what hee feels and acknowledge his misery let him confess his sin and chastise it let him long and sigh for the joyes of heaven let him tremble and fear because hee hath deserved the pains of hell let him commute his eternal fear with a temporal suffering preventing Gods judgement by passing one of his own let him groan for the labours of his pilgrimage and the dangers of his warfare and by that time hee hath summed up all these labours and duties and contingencies all the proper causes instruments and acts of sorrow hee will finde that for a secular joy and wantonness of spirit there are not left many void spaces of his life Nemo mala morte unquam moriebatur qui libenter opera charitatis exercuit St. Hieron THis the Father with all his reading and experience verifies I do not remember to have read that any charitable person ever dyed an evill death and although a long experience hath observed Gods mercies to descend upon charitable people like the dew upon Gideons fleece when all the world was dry yet for this also wee have a promise which is not onely an argument of a certain number of years but a security for eternal ages Luke 16. 9. Make yee friends of c. When faith fails and chastity is useless and temperance shall bee no more then charity shall bear you upon wings of Cherubims to the eternal Mountain of the Lord. I have been a lover of mankinde and a friend and merciful and now I expect to communicate in that great kindness which hee shews that is the great God and Father of men and mercies said Cyrus the Persian on his death-bed Now I do not mean this should onely bee a death-bed charity any more than a death-bed repentance but it ought to bee the charity of our life and healthfull years a parting of a portion of our goods then when wee can keep them when wee cannot then kindle our lights when wee are to descend into our houses of darkness or bring a glaring torch suddenly to a dark room that will amaze the eye and not delight it or instruct the body but if our rapers have in their constant course descended into their grave crowned all the way with light then l●t the death-bed charity be doubled and the light burn brightest when it is to deck our Herse Prima quae vitam dedit h●ra carpsit Seneca VVHen Adam fell then hee began to dye the same day so said God and that must needs hee true and so it must mean that upon that very day hee fell into an evill and dangerous condition a state of change and affliction then death began i. e. the man began to dye by a natural diminution and ap●ness to disease and misery his first state was and should have been so long as it lasted a happy duration his second was a daily and miserable change and this was the dying properly This appears in the great instance of damnation which in the stile of Scripture is called eternal death not because it kills of ends the duration it hath not so much good in it but because it is a perpetual infelicity change or separation of soul and body is but accidental to death Death may bee with or without either but the formality the curse and sting of death i. e. misery sorrow anguish dishonour and whatsoever is miserable and afflictive in nature that is death Death is not an action but a whole state and condition and this was first brought in upon us by the offence of one man But now though this death entred first upon us by Adams fault yet it came nearer unto us and increased upon us by the sins of more of our forefathers For Adams sin left us in strength enough to contend with humane calamities for almost a thousand years

with an over-valuing mine own knowledge at home I am so far from fulness as that vanity it self is not more empty Resurrectio à peccato cessatio à peccato non est idem Durand EVery cessation from sin is not a resurrection from sin A man may discontinue a sin intermit the practise of a sin by infirmity of the body or by satiety in the sin or by the absence of that person with whom hee hath used to communicate in that sin But resurrectio est secunda ejus quod interiit statio A resurrection is such an abstinence from the practise of the sin as is grounded upon a repentance and a detestation of the sin and then it is a setling and an establishing of the soul in that state and disposition it is not a sudden and transitive remorse nor only a reparation of that which was ruined and demolished but it is a building up of habits contrary to former habits and customes in actions contrary to that sin that wee have been accustomed to else it is but an intermission not a resurrection but a starting not a waking but an apparition not a living body but a cessation not a peace of conscience Now this resurrection is begun and well advanced in baptismate lachrymarum in the baptisme of true repentant tears But to put off this repentance to the death-bed is a dangerous delay For is any man sure to have it or sure to have a desire to it then It is never impertinent to repeat St. Augustines words in this case Etiam hac animadversione percutitur peccator ut moriens obliviscatur sui quidam viveret oblitus est Dei God begins a dying mans condemnation at this that as hee forgot God in his life so hee shall forget himself at his death Compare thy temporal and thy spiritual state together and consider how they may both stand well at that day If thou have set thy state in order and made a Will before and have nothing to do at last but to adde a Codicil this is soon dispatched at last but if thou leave all till then it may prove a heavy business So if thou have repented before and setled thy self in a religious course before and have nothing to do then but to wrestle with the power of the disease and the agonies of death God shall fight for thee in that weak estate God shall imprint in thee a Cupio dissolvi St. Pauls not only contentedness but desire to bee dissolved and God shall give thee a glorious resurrection yea an ascention into heaven before thy death and thou shalt see thy selfe in possession of his eternal Kingdome before thy bodily eyes bee shut When even thy death-bed shall bee as Elias Chariot to carry thee to heaven and as the bed of the Spouse in the Canticles which was lectus floridus a green and flourishing bed where thou maiest finde by a faithful apprehension that thy sickness hath crowned thee with a Crown of thorns by participation of the sufferings of thy Saviour and that thy patience hath crowned thee with that Crown of glory which the Lord the righteous Judge shall impart to thee that day In divinis nihil minimum Tertul. IT is a wanton thing for any Church in spiritual matters to play with small errors to tolerate or wink at small abuses as though it should bee alwayes in her power to extinguish them when shee would It is Christs counsel to his Spouse that is the Church Capite vulpes parvulas take us the little Foxes for they destroy the vine though they seem but little and able to do little harm yet they grow bigger and bigger every day and therefore stop errors before they become heresies and erroneous men before they become hereticks Capite sayes Christ take them suffer them not to go on but then it is Capite nobis take us those Foxes take them for us the bargain is between Christ and his Church For it is not Capite vobis take them to your selves and make your selves judges of such doctrinal matters as appertain not to your cognizance nor it is not Cape tibi take him to thy self spy out a recusant or a man otherwise not conformable and take him for thy labour beg him and spoyl him and for his Religion leave him as you found him neither is it Cape sibi take him for his ease that is compound with him easily and continue him in his estate and errors but Cape nobis take him for us so detect him as hee may thereby be reduced to Christ and his Church Neither only this counsel of Christ to his Church but that Commandement of God in Levitious is also appliable to this Non misereberis pauperis in judicio Thou shalt not countenance a poor man in his cause thou shalt not pity a poor man in judgement Though a new opinion may seem a poor opinion able to do little harm though it may seem a pious and profitable opinion and of good use yet in judicio if it stand in judgement and pretend to bee an Article of faith and of that holy obligation matter necessary to salvation Non misereberis thou shalt not spare thou shalt not countenance this opinion upon any collateral respect but bring it to the only trial of Doctrines the Scriptures Neither doth this Counsel of Christs Take us these little Foxes nor this Commandement of God Thou shalt not pitty the poor in judgement determine it self in the Church or in the publick only but extends it self rather contracts it self to every particular soul and conscience Capite Vulpeculas take your little Foxes watch your first inclination to sins for if you give them luck at first if you feed them with the milk and hony of the mercy of God it shall not bee in your power to wean them when you would but they will draw you from one to another extream from a former presumption to a future desparation in Gods mercy So also Non misereberis Thou shalt not pity the poor in judgement Now that thou callest thy self to judgement and thy conscience to an examination thou shalt not pity any sin because it pretends to bee a poor sin either prove so that it cannot much endanger thee nor much incumber thee or poor so as that it threatens thee with poverty with penury with disability to support thy state or maintain thy Family if thou entertain it not Many times I have seen a Suitor that comes in Forma pauperis more trouble a Court and more importune a Judge than greater causes or greater persons and so may such fins as come in Forma pauperis either way that they plead poverty that they can do little harm or threaten poverty if they bee not entertained Those sins are the most dangerous sins which pretend reason why they should bee entertained for sins which are done meerly out of infirmity or out of the surprisal of tentation are in comparison of others done as sins in our

on which wee so lean that wee yet stand our corrupt affections the bruised and broken reed on which if wee so lean wee fall If any then go onward in the true rode of Divine graces no doubt but the finger of the Almighty points out his way to true happiness but if hee wander in the by-paths of a vitious and depraved dissoluteness his own corrupt affections becken him to ruine How then can wee without sacriledge and robbing of divine honour make God the Father of so foul and unwashed a crime as obduration perditio tua ex te Israel If destruction dog thee thank thy corrupt affections not blame thy Maker for hee doth but leave thee and they harden To lay then with some depraved Libertines the weight and burthen of our sins on the shoulder of predestination and make that the womb of those foul-enormities may well pass for an infirmity not for an excuse For though God from eternity knew how to reward every man either by crown or punishment yet hee never enjoyned any man either ● necessity or a will to sin Compeseat se humana temerit as id quod non est non qu●rat ne id quod est non inveniat August MOrtal thoughts should not carry too lofty a sail but take heed how they cut the narrow streights and passages of divine Predestination A busie prying into this Ark of Gods secrets as it is accompanied with a full blown insolence so with danger Humility here is the first stair to safety and a modest knowledge stands constantly wondring whilst the proud apprehension staggers and tumble● too Here is a sea unnavigable and a gulph so scorning fathom that our Apostle himself was driven to his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O depth and in a rapture more of astonishment than contemplation hee stiles it the Sacrament and mystery of his will being so ●ull of unknown turnings and M●●nders that if a naked reason hold the clue wee are rather involved than guided in so strange a labyrinth To inquire then the cause of Gods will were an act of lunacy not of judgement For every efficient cause is greater than the effect Now there is nothing greater than the will of God and therefore no cause thereof For if there were there should something pre-occupate that will which to conceive were sinful to beleeve blasphemous If any then suggested by a vain-glorious inquiry should ask why God did elect this man and not that wee have not onely to resolve but to fore-stall so beaten an objection because hee would but why would God do it Here is a question as guilty of reproof as the author which seeks a cause of that beyond or without which there is no cause found where the apprehension wheels and reasonruns giddy in a doubtful gyre Here a sorupulous and humane rashness should bee hush●d and not search for that which is not lest it finde not that which is Let him that can discry the wonders of the Lord in this great deep but let him take heed hee sinks not down then with this aspiring thought this ambitious desire of hidden knowledge and make not curiosity the picklock of Divine secrets know that such mysteries are doubly barred up in the coffers of the Almighty which thou mayest strive to violate not open and therefore if thou wilt needs trespass upon the Diety dig not in its bosome a more humble adventure suits better with the condition of a worm scarce a man or if so exposed to frailty It is a fit task and imployment for mortality to contemplate his works not sift his mysteries and admire his goodness not blur his Justice If any therefore stagger at those unfathomed mysteries of Gods Election and Predestination and his reason and apprehension bee struck dead at the contemplation of Gods eternal but hidden projects let him season a little his amazement with adoration and at last solace his distempered thoughts with that of Gregory Qui in fact is Dei c. In the abstruse and dark mysteries of God hee that sees not a reason if hee sees his own infirmity hee sees a sufficient reason why hee should not see Mee thinks this should cloy the appetite of a greedy inquisition and satisfie the distrust of any but of too querulous a disposition which with the eye of curiosity prying too nicely into the closest of Gods secrets are no less dazeled than blinded if not with profanation heresie Divine secrets should rather transport us with wonder than prompt us to inquiry and bring us on our knees to acknowledge the infiniteness both of Gods power and will than ransack the bosome of the Almighty for the revealing of his intents Is it not blessedness enough that God hath made thee his Steward though not his Secretary Will no Mansion in heaven content thee but that which is the Throne and Chair for Omnipotency to sit on No treasury but that which is the Cabinet and Store-house of his own secrets Worm and no man take heed how thou struglest with thy Maker Expostulation with God imports no less peremptoriness than danger and if Angels fell for pride of emulation where wilt thou tumble for this pride of inquiry as in matters therefore of unusual doubt where truth hath no verdict probability finds audience So in those obstruct and narrow passages of Gods will where reason cannot inform thee beleef is thy best intelligencer and if that want a tongue make this thy interpreter so thou mayest evade with less distrust I am sure with more safety Etsi domine ego commisi unde me damnare potes ●u tamen non aml●sisti unde me salvare potes Anselm O Blessed Jesus though I have committed those transgressions for which thou mayest condemn me yet thou hast not lost those compassions by which thou mayest save mee And therefore if our souls were insuch a streight that wee saw hell opening her mouth upon us like the Red Sea before the Israelites the damned and ugly feinds pursuing us behinde like the Egyptians on the right hand and on the left death and sea ready to ingulf us yet upon a broken heart and undisguised sorrow would I speak to you in the confidence of Moses Stand still and behold the salvat●on of the Lord. Thou then which art opprest with the violence and clamor of thy sin● and wantest an Advocate either to intercede or pity hear the voyce of the Lamb cry unto th●e I will hear thee out of my holy hill Is any heavily loaden with the weight of his offences or groans under the yoak and tyranny of manifold temptations Come unto mee I will refresh thee Doth any hunger after righteousness Behold I am the bread of life take eat here is my body Doth any thirst after the wayes of grace Loe I am a living spring come drink here is my bloud my bloud that was shed for many for the remission of sins for many not for all Hath sin dominion over thee or doth it reign in

such bitter lamentation My God my God why hast thou forsaken mee What may the cause of all this bee Alas all this was for our sins It was not Judas nor the Jews nor Pilate nor the Souldiers but they were our sins thy sins my sins that put the Son of God to all this sorrow Wee wee and none but wee were the evill beasts that devoured this Joseph Our sins were so hainous and had so provoked the Justice of God that there was no way to satisfie Gods Justice to appease his wrath and to make our atonement but by the precious blood of the Son of God crucified on the Cross And shall I now see my sins lye so heavy upon him as to make him sweat blood shall I see him even squeezed under the huge weight of my sins shal I see my sins crown him with thorns nail his hands and feet to the Cross gore his side with a spear with an unpierced heart Oh the deep sorrow that our hearts should bee filled withall when wee see Christs body bruising and bleeding upon the Cross It should bee with us then as it was with them Zech. 12. 10. They shall look on him whom they have pierced And how shall that sight affect them And they shall mourn and bee in bitterness for him as one that mourns for his onely Son as one that is in bitterness for his first born How bitterly will such a man mourn so bitterly shall they mourn when they look upon Christ whom they have pierced And great reason for is it not a matter of greater sorrow to pierce the onely Son of God the first born the first begotten from the dead than to lose one onely or first begotten son So here when wee look upon Christ whom wee have pierced this sight should fill our hearts with bitterness should make our hearts full of sorrow Not onely with an Historical sorrow or a sorrow of natural compassion when wee hear or see some sad or sorrowful event this is nothing but with a practical sorrow with an unfained sorrow of heart that wee by our personal sins have had our hands imbrued in the blood of the Son of God that our sins envenomed those thorns those nails that pierced him and by their venome made them put him to such bitter torment have wee hearts conformable to Christ on the cross Thou beholdest a broken Christ thou beholdest a bleeding Christ behold him therefore with a broken heart with a bleeding heart with a pierced spirit So behold Christ on the cross as the Virgin Mary beheld him there And how was that Woman sayes Christ behold thy Son How did shee behold him Simeon tells her Luke 2. 35. That a sword should passe through her soul then did a sword pierce through her soul when shee beheld him pierced on the cross that sight was a sword through the heart of her So when we see him pierced it should bee as a dagger in our hearts Oh wretch that I am that my sins have been thorns on his head nayls in his hands and feet a spear in his side Lord saith David when hee saw the people slaughtered by the Angels sword Lo● I have sinned and I have done wickedly but these she●● what have they done So let every one say Loe I have sinned I have done wickedly but this innocent and immaculate Lamb what hath hee done It is I that have sinned and it is thou O Lord that hast smarted It is I that have sinned and it is thou O Lord that hast suffered It is I that have put thee to all these sorrows my oaths my uncleannesses my lusts my covetousness my drunkenness these were the Judass●s that betrayed thee these were the Jews that crucified thee Lord I have eaten the sowre grapes and thy teeth were set on edge Lord● I played the theef and thou restoredst the things the● tookest not Quid tam ad mortem quodnon Christi morte salvetur Bernardus HE was wounded for our transgres●ions with his stripes wee are heated Isa 53. What sweet comfort may faith retch hence Look upon the wounds of Christ on the Cross as on the Cities of Refuge where the pursued soul by the avenger of blood may flye for safety and sanctuary Indeed I am a grievous sinner I have wounded my conscience with my transgressions but behold my Saviour here wounded for my transgressions I have cause to bee troubled in my conscience for the wounds my transgressions have made therein but yet my confcience needs not sinke in a despondency of spirit whiles I look at these wounds of Christ here bee wounds for wounds healing wounds for stabbing wounds curing wounds for killing wounds Hee was wounded for our transgressions what wound so deadly that may not or cannot bee healed by his death and wounds What comfort is here for faith in the wounds of Christ crucified They pierced my hands and my feet Psal 22. They pierced his side with a spear and there came out water and blood nay there comes out of these wounds honey and oyl unto faith By these passages may our faith suck honey and oyl out of the rock and may taste and see how good and sweet the Lord is The nayls the spear the wounds all preach unto faith a reconciled God That God is in Christ reconciling the world unto himself The Lords bowels are laid open by these wounds so as through them wee may see the tender bowels of his mercy and so as through them mercy flows from those bowels unto us Oh my Dove that art in the clefts or holes of the rock Cant. 2. 14. Some of the Ancients understood those clefts of the rock the wounds of Christ in which the Dove the Church hides and shelters her self However it may bee alluded to that should bee our work of faith when it sees those clefts of the rock opened like a Dove to betake her self thereunto for shelter and security against all fears and distresses that wrath and guilt may put the conscience to Do any fears of wrath trouble thine heart Doth any conscience of guilt disquiet thee with the fears of hell Why now for thy comfort behold the holes in the rock where thou mayest bee sheltered Dwell now in the Rock and bee like the Dove that makes her Nest in the side of the holes mouth Jerem. 48. Nessel thy soul in the clefts of this Rock See and fully beleeve thy peace to bee made with God in Christs blood and look upon him wounded for thy transgressions with such a faith as may fill thy heart with an holy security against all such fears Hannibal vel victor vel victus nunquam quiescebat Augustinus THe Devil left not our Saviour at the first and second temptation this Master-flye Beelzebub though beaten away once and again yet returns to the same place Hee solicits and sets upon our Saviour again and again as Potiphars wife did upon Joseph for all his many denials and is not onely importunate but