Selected quad for the lemma: conscience_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
conscience_n	david_n	heart_n	smite_v	1,341	5	9.6931	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A44419	Golden remains of the ever memorable Mr. John Hales ... with additions from the authours own copy, viz., sermons & miscellanies, also letters and expresses concerning the Synod of Dort (not before printed), from an authentick hand.	Hales, John, 1584-1656.	1673 (1673)	Wing H271; ESTC R3621	409,693	508

c. In these words we will consider these three things 1. The Person David And David's heart smote him 2. David's Sollicitousness his care and jealousie very significantly expressed in the next words his heart smote him 3. The cause of this his care and anxiety of mind in the last words because he had cut off Saul's skirt In the first point that is in the Person we may consider his greatness he was a King in expectation and already Anointed A circumstance by so much the more considerable because that greatness is commonly taken to be a privilege to sin to be over careful and conscientious of our courses and actions are accounted virtues for private persons Kings have greater businesses then to examine every thought that comes into their hearts Pater meus obliviscitur se esse Caesarem ego vero memini me Caesaris filiam It is the answer of Iulia Augustus the Emperour's daughter when she was taxed for her too wanton and licentious living and counsel'd to conform her self to the sobriety and gravity of her father My father saith she forgets himself to be Caesar the Emperour but I remember my self to be Caesar's daughter It was the speech of Ennius the Poet Plebs in hoc Regi ante-stat loco licet lachrimari plebi Regi honeste non licet Private men in this have a privilege above Princes but thus to do becomes not Princes and if at any time these sad and heavy-hearted thoughts do surprize them they shall never want comforters to dispel them When Ahab was for sullenness fallen down upon his bed because Naboth would not yeild him his Vineyard Iezabel is presently at hand and asks him Art thou this day King of Israel When Ammon pined away in the incestuous love of his sister Thamar Ionadab his companion comes unto him and asks Why is the King's son sad every day so that as it seems great Persons can never be much or long sad Yet David forgets his greatness forgets his many occasions gives no ear to his companions about him but gives himself over to a scrupulous and serious consideration of an Action in shew and countenance but light Secondly As the Person is great so is the care and remorse conceived upon the consideration of his action exceeding great which is our Second part And therefore the holy Ghost expresses it in very significant terms His heart smote him a phrase in Scripture used by the holy Ghost when men begin to be sensible and repent them of some sin When David had committed that great sin of numbring the people and began to be apprehensive of it the Scripture tells us that David's heart smote him when he had commanded Ioab to number the people Wherefore by this smiting we may not here understand some light touch of conscience like a grain of powder presently kindled and presently gone for the most hard and flinty hearts many times yeilds such sparks as these He that is most flesh'd in sin commits it not without some remorse for sin evermore leaves some scruple some sting some loathsomeness in the hearts of those that are most inamour'd of it But as Simeon tells the Blessed Virgin in St. Luke's Gospel Gladius pertransibit animam tuam A sword shall peirce through thine heart so it seems to have been with David It was not some light touch to rase onely the surface and skin of the heart but like a sword it peirced deep into him To teach us one lesson That actions spotted though but with the least suspicion of sin ought not carelesly to be pass'd by or sleightly glanced at but we ought to be deeply apprehensive of them and bestow greatest care and consideration upon them The third part of our Text containeth the cause of David's remorse in the last words because he cut off Saul's skirt In the two former parts we had to do with greatness there was 1. a great Person and 2. great Remorse can we in this third part find out any great cause or reason of this so to make all parts proportionable Certainly he that shall attentively read and weigh these first words of my Text and know the story might think that David had committed some notable errour as some great oppression or some cruel slaughter or some such Royal sin which none but Kings and great men can commit But Beloved this my Text seems to be like the Windows in Solomon's Temple broad within but narrow without or like a Pyramide large and spatious at the Basis and ground of it but small and sharp at the top The Person and Remorse which are the ground and subject of my Text both are great and large but the Cause which is the very crown and top of all that is very small yea peradventure none at all For whether it be that my self accustomed to greater sins and now grown old in them have lost all sense of small and petty errours or whether indeed there be no errour at all in this action of David but onely some fancy some jealousie arising out of that godly and careful watch he kept over all his ways or whatsoever else it was that caused this scruple or remorse in David it is a very hard matter to discover and yet notwithstanding that we may make more open pass unto such Doctrines as I shall raise out of these words let us a little scan and consider what it was in this action that made David thus strangely scrupulous And first of all was it for that he had touch'd and taken that which was none of his own and therefore might seem to fall within compass of the Law against injury and purloining This seems not probable for when afterward in the like case he came upon Saul as he was sleeping in the Camp and took from him the Spear and the pot of water which stood at his head we do not read that his head that his heart smote him and yet he took what was none of his Or 2 ly was it that he did wrong and dishonour Saul in mangling his garment Indeed the Iews have a Tradition that this was the sin of which David was here so sensible And therefore say they whereas we read in the first of Kings that when David grew old they covered him with clothes but he gat no heat this was the punishment of his sin committed against Saul God so providing that garments should not be serviceable to him who had offended in wronging Saul's garments But this I must let go as a fable Or 3 ly was it that he had unadvisedly given way to some disloyal thought and at first resolved to revenge himself on Saul having him at the advantage though afterward he repented Indeed St. Chrysostom thinks so and therefore on those words at the latter end of the verse next before my Text And David arose he notes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 See you not saith he what a tempest of rage and anger begins to rise in him for he supposeth him