Selected quad for the lemma: christian_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
christian_n	day_n	lord_n	observe_v	4,947	5	7.7227	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A56715	Two sermons : one against murmuring, the other against censuring preached at St. Paul's Covent-Garden / by S. Patrick ...	Patrick, Simon, 1626-1707.; Patrick, Simon, 1626-1707. Sermon against murmuring.; Patrick, Simon, 1626-1707. Sermon against censuring.	1689 (1689)	Wing P863; ESTC R5051	36,605	72

information I shall shew First what judgment is not here forbidden Secondly what is First With respect to the former of these I shall only put you in Mind of these three things 1. That publick Judgments and judicial Censures are not here condemned for they have the Divine Authority to warrant them and Humane Societies cannot subsist without them Therefore let none imagine there is any thing in these Words either forbidding a Christian to be a Magistrate or forbidding a Magistrate to judge and condemn evil things and evil-doers For as Magistracy is God's Ordinance for the good of Mankind so it is the Duty of every Magistrate to condemn and punish such as do evil being sent or commissioned by God for the punishment of evil-doers and for the praise of them that do well 1 Pet. II. 14. They do ill then that censure and condemn this Office or those that execute it for it is that which all Men do in their own Families where having Authority as Parents or Masters they correct what is done amiss 2. And as there is nothing in these Words forbidding Magistrates to exercise their Office so they contain no prohibition unto private Persons either to form an Opinion concerning others in their Mind upon the serious observation of the course of their Actions or to reprove and rebuke each other for their sin according to the Rules of Truth and Charity For it is necessary to form a Judgment concerning others in our Minds that we may avoid the Company of evil Men and preserve our selves from the danger of their Contagion And Charity being the sum of all our Duty to our Neighbour prudent and seasonable reproof is often the greatest Charity we can bestow upon them Let the righteous smite me saith David and it shall be a kindness and let him reprove me it shall be an excellent oil which shall not break my head Psal CXLI 5. 3. And as we may thus judge Men to be worthy of reproof and take upon us to tell them of their Faults so there is nothing in these Words forbidding us to speak of them unto others in their absence especially when they are not amended by private reproof provided first that we sincerely design the good of those to whom we declare our mind concerning them and secondly that we say no more than is necessary to forewarn their Neighbours left they be misled and infected by them We must not blacken them more than needs much less make them worse than they are but only give such a just Character of them as may serve for a Caution to those who otherwise may be in danger to be enveigled by them into their evil Courses Thus our Lord bids his Disciples beware of the Scribes who look'd demurely and behav'd themselves gravely and made a shew of great Piety in their long Prayers that they might be the less suspected of bad Designs and the more securely deceive such as trusted to their Honesty Luke XX. 46 47. And thus St. Paul bids the Ephesians Ch. V. 11. have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness but rather reprove them that is detect them and declare against them II. These things therefore being not forbidden in these Words let us now consider what Judgment or Censure is forbidden 1. And this is certain That we ought not to judge such things to be sin nor censure and condemn others upon the account of such things as the Law of God doth not condemn For to censure those things as unlawful which the Law of God hath not forbidden is in truth to judge and condemn the Law it self as an imperfect and defective Rule of our Actions Which is the Censure St. James passes upon this practice in those known words of his James IV. 11. He that speaketh evil of his brother and judgeth his brother speaketh evil of the law and judgeth the law Which cannot be meant of any other evil-speaking and judging but this When a Man censures and condemns his Brother where the Law doth not censure and condemn what he doth Whosoever thus judges his Brother doth really and truly argue the Law of Christ to be wanting in something which ought to have been prescribed by it Instead of conforming himself to it he takes upon him to be a Corrector of it and to make supplements to it as if it were an insufficient Direction to us without his Additions Which is the meaning of the next Words But if thou judge the law thou art not a doer of the law but a judge Let such Men consider that there is but one Law-giver as it follows v. 12. who is able to save or destroy Who art thou that judgest another for such things that is as the Law of Christ doth not condemn Who gave thee Authority to pronounce first peremtory Sentences upon thy Brethren when thou art not appointed by God to be either a Lawgiver or a Judge of others especially of such as do not break any Law of Christ 2. As we ought not to judge that is condemn Men for such things as the Law doth not condemn so in matters of Dispute and Controversie where the Law is doubtful or not clear to many good Men we ought to forbear judging those who are not of our Mind or act not as we do if otherwise they do well This was a famous Case in the Apostles days when there arose a Question Whether the Law of Moses should be observed by the Disciples of Christ The Apostles said No because our Lord had abolish'd it and left Men at liberty to eat for instance any Meat whatsoever if they were but thankful and temperate But the Jewish Christians generally maintained it was still in force and therefore judged all those to be impious who did not observe his Rites and Ceremonies This was a high Charge for which St. Paul in many places reproves them as going about ignorantly to abolish the Law of Christ whilst they endeavoured to establish that of Moses Particularly in Rom. XIV 3. he tells them it became such as were weak in the faith to be so humble as not to judge those who made no difference of Meats which Christ they stedfastly believed had made common Though their ignorance made them scrupulous it ought not to have made them censorious especially in such a case where Men followed Christ rather than Moses Which some think is the meaning of St. James whose Epistle is written to the Jewish Christians in the place before-nam'd Ch. IV. 11 12. He that judgeth his brother about such matters as I now mentioned judgeth the law i. e. the Gospel of Christ call'd in that Epistle The Royal Law the Law of Liberty and the perfect Law of Liberty Ch. II. 8 12. I. 25. which absolv'd them from such Obligations And if thou judgest the law thou art not a doer of the law but a judge that is takest upon thee the Office of Christ to enact those things again into a Law which he