Linguistic DNA - Concept Modelling Demonstrator

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	great_a	sin_n	world_n	2,522	5	4.6350	4	true

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A26935	Gods goodness vindicated for the help of such (especially in melancholy) as are tempted to deny it, and think him cruel, because of the present and future misery of mankind, with respect to the doctrine of reprobation and damnation / by Richard Baxter ... ; published and prefaced by a friend at whose desire it was written, and to whom it was committed.	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1671 (1671)	Wing B1278; ESTC R5256	19,834	110

not now of the malignant Atheist But of the Melancholy tempted person Alas it is the Melancholy disease and the Devil more than he God pittyeth his Childrens frowardness especially when necessitated naturally by Diseases and he that pardoned pievish Jonas that said I do well to be angry to the death and complaining Job and excused his sleepy Disciples with The Spirit is willing but the flesh is weak will not condemn an upright soul for the effect of a feaverish deliration or a Melancholy that overcomes his natural power of resistance Quest 19. Would you thus argue or quarrel against Gods Greatness and Wisdom as you do against his Goodness You suspect him to be unmerciful because he cureth not mens sins and preventeth not their damnation And have you not the like occasion to argue against his other perfections Do you think he reasoneth soberly that saith He that maketh Asses when he might have made them men or maketh Ideots or maketh stones that know nothing He that is the Governour of such a foolish distracted confused world as mankind is is foolish himself or unskilful in Government or wanteth wisdome But God doth thus Is he not worse than a fool that will accuse his God of folly Doth not the admirable harmony of all the world and his wonderful work in every Creature prove his incomprehensible Wisdom And what would you say to him that should thus reason He that maketh impotent wormes that suffereth the Good to die that suffereth the Tyrants of the Earth to persecute his Church and cause is Impotent and not Almighty But so doth God Would you not say I have the wonderful frame of Heaven and Earth the Sun and Staars the Sea and Land to prove to me that he is Almighty This therefore is a proved foundation truth to which all doubts must be reduced And if you dare not be so impudent as to deny his Omniscience or Omnipotence when you think there is errour or impotency in his works Why will you any more deny his Goodness when you dream that there is badness in his works Do you not know that Power Wisdom and Goodness are Gods Three essential Principles of Operation Virtues or Properties And that they are none of them greater or less than other And that his Goodness though not as to be measured by humane Interest is equal to his Wisdom and his greatness And do you not know that to deny any one of the three yea to deny the perfection of any one of them is to deny that there is any God And is he sober that will argue There are Frogs and Toads there are Wormes and Asses there are fools and miserable sinners Therefore there is no God When as there could neither be any of these nor any world or being if there were no God Quest 20. Lastly now Consider whether evidently the root of all this sin be not besides Melancholy and Satan the power of selfishness and sensual or fleshly Interest Alas poor men that were made for their God to rejoyce wholly in Pleasing him and to shew forth the lustre of his Glory are fallen unto Themselves and Flesh and now they that should wholly devote and referr themselves to God do strive to make God a servant to themselves and measure his Goodness by the Standard of their fleshly sence and Interest And God shall be with them no longer Good that is no longer God than he will give them their wills and serve their flesh and keep them from crosses and losses and pains and govern the World according to their fancies And when they are committing this odious self-exalting Idolatry and abasing God even then will they Judge themselves both Wiser and more merciful than he Yea when a Melancholy man despaireth in the sense of his own sin and badness at that very time he thinketh himself more Merciful than the God of Infinite Goodness and accuseth his God for being crueller than he himself O man into what distraction and confusion art thou faln when thou departest from thy God and sinkest into that blind and wretched self And tell me what if but the wills of all the poor the pained the dying c. were but reconciled to their suffering-state would that which pleaseth the will be matter of any complaint You may see then that it is not Gods providence c. but the wills and waies of sinners that are the diseased causes of all their wranglings And if our wills were cured and reduced to Gods will we should find no fault with him If I can but be truly willing of imprisonment poverty or death how can I feel any thing in it to complain of When even sinners as aforesaid do obstinately here take their misery for their happiness and are contented with it so farr as it is voluntary By that time these twenty Questions are Answered the accusations of God as wanting Goodness will all turn to the accusers shame II. I am next briefly to detect the false opinions which do ordinarily cause these persons errours 1. It is false doctrine to affirm that God condemneth the greater part of his Intectual Creatures as I have shewed though he condemn never so many of this ungodly world 2. It is not true that God decreeth to condemn any man but for sin for sin I say as the cause of his damnation 3. God decreeth to condemn none at age which I add but to exclude foolish cavils for Adam 's sin only nor for any other sin only that is not conjoyned with an obstinate final impenitencie and rejecting offered mercy and neglecting means appointed for their salvation 4. Gods Decrees do cause no mans sin nor his damnation any further than as as supposing sin for Dr. Twisse himself still professeth 1. That Reprobation is an Immanent act and nihil ponit in objecto putteth nothing at all into the person 2. And that Reprobation inferreth no necessity of sin or misery but that which is called necessitas consequentiae and not any necessitas consequentis and Arminius and all confess that Gods bare foreknowledge causeth or inferreth a necessity consequentiae which truly is but a Logical necessity in order of argumentation when one thing is proved by another and not by Physical necessity in order of causation as one thing is caused by another And whereas they say Then man might have frustrated Gods decree I ask them whether man can frustrate Gods fore-knowledge suppose God to foreknow sin without decreeing it of which more anon is not this a good argument All that God foreknoweth will certainly come to pass But God foreknoweth e. g. Judas sin Therefore it will certainly come to pass And what of all this It doth not come to pass because God foreknoweth it no more than the Sun will rise to morrow because you foreknow it And if you say That no power can frustrate Gods foreknowledge I answer They are delusory words of one that knoweth not what he saith For it is one thing to

believe that they are not commanded to do this in vain So that Gods own Providence by a course of such mercies which cannot stand with the execution of the unremedyed violated Law of Innocency together with his obliging all men to Repentance and to the use of a certain course of means in order to their salvation is a promulgation of a Law of Grace according to the first Edition and distinguisheth man from unredeemed Devils And they that say that all the Infidel World have all this Mercy Duty Means and hope without any Redemption or Satisfaction of Christ as the procureing cause are in the way to say next that the Churches Mercies too might have been given without Christ 9. Of a truth God is no respecter of persons but in every Nation he that feareth God and worketh Righteousness is accepted with him Act. 10.34 35. For God will render to every man according to his deeds To them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory and honour and incorruptibility eternal life Rom. 2.6 7. Glory honour and peace to every man that worketh good to the Jew first and also to the Greek v. 10. For there is no respect of persons with God v. 11. For when the Gentiles which have not the Law do by nature the things conained in the Law these having not the Law are a Law unto themselves Which shew the work of the Law written in their Hearts their Consciences also bearing witness and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another v. 14 15. And they shall be Judged according to that Law which they were under Natural or Mosaical even by Jesus Christ v. 12.16 And it is the work of the spirit promised to believers to write the Law of God in their hearts 10. Though a special promise was made to Abraham as an Eminent believer and the Jewish Nation were the peculiar people of God advanced to greater priviledges than any others in the World yet were they not the whole Kingdom of God the Redeemer nor the only people that were in a Covenant of Grace or in a state of Salvation For Sem was alive after Abrahams death who was not like to be less than a King and to have a Kingdom or people Governed according to his Fidelity And Melchizedock was a King of Righteousness and Peace not like to be Sem by the Scituation of his Countrey And a Righteous King would govern in Righteousness Job and his friends are evidences of the same truth And we have no proof or probability that all Abrahams seed by Ishmael and Esau and Keturah were Apostates for they continued Circumcision And what all the rest of the World was we know not save that in general most grew Idolatrous and the Canaanites in special But that they all apostatized from the Covenant of Grace made with Adam and Noah there is no proof We have not the History of any of their Countreys fully so as to determine of such cases In Nineve God ruled by that Law of Grace which called them to repent and spared them upon their Belief and Repentance Because he was a gracious God and merciful slow to anger and of great kindness and repenteth of the Evil Jonah 4.2 And that God dealeth not with mankind now as the meer Judge of the violated Law of Innocency he declareth not only by the full testimony of his Providence or Mercies given to the sinful World but also by the very name which he proclaimeth unto Moses which signifieth his nature and his mind towards others and not what he is to the Jewes alone Exod. 34.6 7. The Lord The Lord God merciful and gracious long suffering and abundant in goodness and truth keeping mercy for Thousands forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin All which is inconsistent with the Relation of God as a Judge of a people only under the Curse of an unremedied violated Law and unredeemed though he add and that will by no means clear the guilty c. that is will neither Judge them innocent that are guilty of the Crime nor Judge them to Life that are guilty of Death according to the tenour of the Law which they are under Purificando non purificabit as the literal version that is will not Judge unjustly by acquitting him that is to be condemned or as the Chaldee Paraphrase hath it not Justifying those that are not converted It is enough for us therefore to know that the visible Chruch hath manifold priviledges above all others Rom. 3.1 2 3. c. And that salvation is more easie sure and plenteous where the Gospel cometh than with any others and that we have therefore great Cause to rejoice with thankfulness for our lot and that the poor World lyeth in wickedness and must be pittyed prayed for and helped to our power and that God is the Saviour of all men but especially of them that believe and that he is good to all and his mercies are over all his works and that he will never damn one soul that loveth him as God But what is in the Hearts of all men in the World and consequently how they shall be used at last he only that searcheth the heart can tell and it is neither our duty nor our interest nor possible to us to know it of all particulars much less to conclude that none among them have such Love who believe him to be infinitely good and to be to them a merciful pardoning God And we know withall that all they that know not Jesus Christ as this determinate person that was Born of the Virgin Mary Suffered under Pontius Pilate was Crucified Dead Buâ—ied Rose again c. do yet receive all the foresaid mercies by him and not by any other Name or Mediation nor yet without his purchasing Mediation 13. And if besides all the mercy that God sheweth to others he do antecedently and positively Elect certain persons by an absolute Decree to overcome all their resistances of his spirit and to draw them to Christ and by Christ to himself by such a power and way as shall infallibly convert and save them and not leave the success of his Mercy and his Sons preparations to the bare uncertainty of the mutable Will of depraved man What is there in this that is injurious to any others or that representeth God unmerciful to any but such whose eye is evil because he is good and as a free Benefactour may give more mercy to some than others of equal Demerits If they that hold no Grace but what is universal and left as to the success to the will of man as the determining cause do think that this is well consistent with the mercifulness of God surely they that hold as much universal Grace as the former and that indeed all have so much as bringeth and leaveth the success to mans will and deny to no man any thing which the other give do make God no less merciful thaâ— they but more if they

way of Reasoning to begin at dark and doubtful consequents thence to argue against certain clear fundamental Principles As if from some doubts about the position and motion of the Starrs or of the nature of light heat and motion men should argue that there is no Sun or Moon or Starrs at all or that they have no power of Light Heat or Motion or as if from the many difficulties in Anatomy about the circulation of the blood the oleum nervosum the Lympha and its vessels the passages and succus of the panereas and gall the transcolation through the intestines into the venae lacteae the chylie glandules and such like one should arise to a conclusion that there is no blood no chyle no veines no glandules no head no body or from the Controversie whether the Heart be a meer Muscle without any proper paronchymae one should grow to conclude that there is no heart so such persons from points beyond mans reach about Gods decrees and intentions and the mysteries of providence conclude or doubt against Gods Goodness that is whether indeed there be a God I have spoken so fully to this case in my Reasons of the Christ Rel. p. 95. and in that whole Chapter that I would desire you to peruse it I shall now only give you twenty Questions which the tempted person may challenge all the subtilty and malice of Hell to answer for it is easie to Justifie the Goodness of God Quest 1. Is it not certain that there is a world in which is abundance of Created Goodness The Earth is but a point as to all the World There is a Sun and Moon and multitudes of glorious Starrs which are many of them manifold greater than the Earth There are Angels there are men there are variety of Creatures in this low part of the Creation which have all their excellency All the men on Earth cannot by any contribution of their counsels discern the ten thousandth part of the excellency of this little parcel of Gods works And as to the whole it is next to nothing which we comprehend Every Worme every plant excelleth the highest human apprehension Is there no Physical Goodness in all this unmeasurable this harmonious this glorious frame Look about you look upwards and deny it if you can And is there no Moral goodness in holy men and Angels And is there no felicity and Glorious Goodness in all the Heavens What mind can be so black as to deny all Created Goodness Quest 2. Is not all the Goodness of the whole Creation communicated from God Did it make it self or who else made it Are not all effects from their causes And is he not the first cause see what I have said to prove this fully in the aforesaid Treatise Quest 3. Hath God made a world that is better than himself Could he give more goodness than he had to give Must not he needs be better than all his works Quest 4. Is he fit to be quarrelled with for want of Goodness who hath infinitely more Goodness than the whole world besides More than Sun and Starrs Heaven and Earth Angels and Men all set together in all their single and their united harmonious worth If he be better than all is he not most beyond accusation or exception Quest 5. Must not God necessarily excell his works must he needs make every worm a God or must he make any God or equal to himself Is not that a contradiction And is there not necessarily an Imperfection in all that is not God Nothing can be so great so wise so good so holy so immutable so self-sufficient so blessed as God Quest 6. Is not Gods Creation a harmonious Vniverse of which Individuals are but the parts Are not the Parts for the whole and their worth to be valued for the whole or for the common ends must every pin in a Watch or every stitch in your Garment or every part of your house or every member of your Body and every humour or excrement in it have that excellency which may simply dignifie it self in a compared or separated sense or rather must it not have that excellency with belongeth to it as a part of the whole for the common end of all together Is not that best that is best to the order beauty and usefulness of the universal frame Quest 7. Is it necessary to â—his end or to prove Gods Goodness that all Individuals or species of Creatures must be of the highest rank or excellency Is God wanting in Goodness if every Man be not an Angel or every Angel made unchangeable or every unlearned man a Doctor or every Star a Sun or every cloud or clod a Star or every beast a man or every Worm an Elephant or every Weed a Rose or every Member a Heart or Head or every excrement Blood and Spirits will you think that a man doth reason like a man who thus disputeth He that doth not do that which is best when he can do it is not perfectly good and thereforâ— is not God But he thaâ— maketh Toads and Serpents and maketh the guts the passage of filthy excrement when he could have madâ— them equal with the heart doth not do that which iâ— best when he can do it Therefore he is not perfectly good Therefore he is noâ— God Therefore there is no God Therefore there iâ— no Creator Therefore thâ— World hath no cause oâ— made it self and preserveth it self Therefore I made my self and must rule and preserve my self Conclude next Therefore I will never suffer nor die â—nd thus prove the wisdom of such reasoning if you can Quest 8. If God made man and all things Did he not make them for himself for the pleasure of his own will Must be not needs in reason be the end of all who is the Beginning and cause of all And is not that means the Best which is aptest to the End And doth not the proper Goodness of a means consist in its aptitude to promote the End And then is not that the Goodness of all Creatures partly to be what the Creatour efficiently maketh them and partly to fulfil his will and what Creature hath not this Goodness aâ—â€¦ to the absolute will of his Decrees which all fulfill Quest 10. Are not now both these conclusions of infallible certainty and therefore not at all contradictory 1. That God is most Good because he is the cause of all the Good in the whole Creation 2. And yet that there are Toads Serpents Darkness Death Sickness pains c. which therefore are no whit inconsistent with his Goodness neither of them being capable of a denyal or of a sober doubt Quest 10. Is not an Angel and Man endued with Reason and Free-will and left to choose or refuse his own Rectitude and Felicity or misery capable of Knowing Loving Serving and Enjoying God if he will and instructed by a Perfect holy Law with Rewards and Punishments to choose aright I say Is not

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