Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	harden_v	heart_n	pharaoh_n	2,001	5	11.6391	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A36329	Man ashiv le-Yahoweh, or, A serious enquiry for a suitable return for continued life, in and after a time of great mortality, by a wasting plague (anno 1665) answered in XIII directions / by Tho. Doolitel.	Doolittle, Thomas, 1632?-1707.	1666 (1666)	Wing D1895; ESTC R35664	157,743	310

things is not easily lost VIII Then Habitual commission of sin begets contracted Hardness of heart and fearlesness of all Gods Judgements and threatnings and contracted hardness added to natural hardness is a great progress in sinning Thy Conscience is seared thy heart hard as the nether milstone past feeling When Pharaoh hardened his heart his sinning was great Exod. 8.15 Now thou stiffenest thy neck against all admonitions Act. 7.51 and hardenest thy heart against reproofs Prov. 29.1 Now thou actest as if thou wert above controul and if thou couldst wouldest shake off the very Sovereignty of God Exod 5.2 And Pharaoh who was come up to the degree of hardness said Who is the Lord that I should obey his voyce to let Israel goe I know not the Lord neither will I let Israel goe So hardened Sinners reply to Gods Ministers exhorting them to let their sins and lusts goe saying at least in their hearts Who is the Lord whose Name you use we know not the Lord neither will we let our sins goe nor our pleasures and profits goe Now thou sayest to the Lord Depart from me Job 21.14 My tongue is mine own who is Lord over me Psal 12.4 Now thou gloriest in thy wickedness that is thy shame Philip. 3.19 Thou rejoycest to doe evil Prov. 2.14 and makest a mock of Sin Prov. 14.9 and makest a sport in doing mischief Prov. 10.23 Oh if thou couldest vapour it thus at the day of judgement and make as light of torment as now thou dost of sin if thou couldest brave it out thus before Christ at his comming and Russian like bid defiance to an almighty God and angry judge thy case were not so miserable but thou canst not alas thou canst not doe it Now thou art stout against the Lord Mal. 3.13 But then thou shalt sneake and crouch before him IX Then Judiciall Hardness is added to contracted Hardness thou hast hardned thine own heart and God will harden it also Now when Naturall Contracted and Judicial all meet in one mans heart how hard must it needs be and how great a sinner is this man in the sight of God you read sometime Pharaoh hardned his heart ●●mself Exod. 8.15 and sometimes that God hardned Pharaohs heart also Exod. 10.20 So God giveth men up to their own hearts lusts which is a greater judgement unspeakably greater than all bodily Plagues Read Rom. 1.21 to the end Psal 81.11 12. Rev. 22.11 Isa 6.9.10 Hos 4.14 17. But here conceive of God aright when the Scripture saith God hardneth mens heart it is not to be understood as if God were the author of their sin no more than the Sun can be the efficient cause of darkness for how shall the chiefest good be the authour of the greatest evill For 1. God doth not infuse any wickedness into their hearts 2. Nor doth God tempt them to sin James 1.13 he may try them but not tempt them to sin 3. God commands no man to sin for Gods command would make it no sin as in the case of Abrahams Sacrificing his Son or the Israelites taking the Jewels and Ear-rings of the Egyptians except such things as are intrinsecally evill as are hating of God and blaspheming of God and these things God cannot command as he is said that he cannot lye Tit. 1.2 4. God with greatest severity forbids mens sins he chargeth you upon pain of damnation upon perill of Hell torments that you sin not but commands men to repent and mourne for sin therefore doth forbid them to be hard and stupid under sin 5. Neither doth God co-operate or concurre to the wickedness of their actions though without derogation to Gods honour we may say he doth concurre to their wicked actions For in him all live and move and have their beings Act. 17.28 The action materially considered as it is an action or motion is good and so God is the cause of it but the action formally considered is evill and so God is not the author of it as when you spur a lame Horse you are the cause that the Horse doth move but you are not the cause of his halting 6. But God doth permit and suffer men to harden themselves he doth not give them preventing grace but denieth that which he is not bound to give which would keep off this Hardness from them So God is said to give men over to their own wicked hearts to let them alone and leave them to their lusts Rom. 1.24 26. and to give them over to a Reprobate mind 2 Thes 2.10 11. 12. But if some should say bare Divine permission cannot be the reason why God should be said to harden mens hearts no more than he would be said to steal because he suffereth men so to doe Some therefore adde 7. That Hardness of heart may be considered either as a sin and so God is not the author of it or as a punishment and so it may be from God as the same thing in divers respects might be a sin and a punishment of former sin and a cause of future sinning so the same thing in divers respects might be from God and from the creature as Absaloms Rebellion against the King was an hainous sin as from him yet it was also a punishment of Davids sins 2 Sam. 16.22 But the Scripture asserts two things however 1 That with God dwels no evill and he cannot be the cause of sin and yet 2 expressely saith that the Lord hardned Pharaohs heart Exod. 10.20 Though we know not the manner that doth not lessen the dreadfullness of the judgement but when God doth judicially harden then men are almost ripe in sin and for hell X. When God hath judicially hardned them they let loose the reignes of their lusts and now are fit for any wickedness and stop not at the most abominable and loathsome practises Now they can blaspheme and mock God and deride holiness and act like incarnate Devils when the people in Act. 14.8.11 saw the wonderfull works wrought by the Apostles they said The gods are come down to us in the likeness of men but when we see the most abominable and sordid practises of wicked men might we not say the devills are come up to us in the likeness of men When men are judicially hardened they will commit sins against nature Rom. 1.24 26. c. And could wish there were no God nay now they are when they have given themselves over to work wickedness and God hath given them over too when they say we will be filthy and God say you shall be filthy eager and greedy after sin they weary themselves in committing iniquity and yet are not weary of iniquity and do even scorne at threatnings and mock at judgements 2 Pet. 3.3 4. Men walking after their own lusts say where is the Promise of his coming for since the fathers fell asleep all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation Is 5.19 That