Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	body_n	life_n	put_v	4,598	5	4.9968	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A90394	Light or darknesse, displaying or hiding it self, as it pleaseth, and from or to whom it pleaseth: arraigning, judging, condemning, both the shame and glory of the creature, in all its severall breakings forth from, and appearances in, the creature. / Held forth to publike view in a sermon, a letter, and severall other inward openings. Through Isaac Penington, (junior) Esq;	Penington, Isaac, 1616-1679.	1650 (1650)	Wing P1177; Thomason E602_1; ESTC R206404	25,799	39

Adam had his Law of forbearing the forbidden fruit The Jews theirs of Circumcision keeping the Passover c. Christians theirs likewise of Faith Love Spiritual Obedience Spiritual Worship a sweet meek humble heavenly Conversation c. Now so far as each of these did answer their peculiar Law they came towards that perfection towards that righteousness which they were appointed to and which was to be measured thereby So far as they deviated they came towards and into a state of sin and wickedness both which are not absolute but only under and by the force of the Law of the present administration He destroyeth Destruction is putting an end to the state When the life and being of a person is put out he is destroyed When the plagues of God light on his outward man unto the death of the body his body is destroyed When the plagues of God light on his inner man and put out the life of his Spirit his inner man is destroyed We think in every dispensation 't is only the weak the imperfect the wicked that wrath must light upon but the righteous the perfect they shall escape they shall meet with blessedness But Job tells you that they must be consumed too Doct. God hath stored up destruction both for the perfect and the wicked and they shall both be sure to meet with it God when he pleaseth falls either upon the wicked or the perfect even to destruction This is uniform saith Job What ground soever ye speak on I am certain of this I dare lay this as a bottom to build upon He destroyeth the perfect and the wicked Our God is a consuming fire saith the Apostle It may be used as an Argument to draw men on to heighten holiness in their dispensation and yet after it is heightened the same Spirit may speak to them in the very same dialect and tell them yet further that they must be consumed by this fire for all that Reas. 1. from Gods Soveraignty He is Lord of all He has the dispose of all and his Soveraignty delights to shew it self All the Excellencies of God have their seasons of putting themselves forth to the utmost His Wisdom Mercy Power Love c. So has his Soveraignty Now nothing doth so much discover his Soveraignty as his falling upon the righteous upon the perfect Ye think to secure your selves by his Faithfulness his Word his Promises to which he must be faithful and will ye not have him faithful to his Soveraignty He is Lord of all and has the dispose of all and let him make never so many deeds of gift he cannot give away any thing from himself but still he has the Power of Life and Death in his own hands and may let it out as he pleaseth And this doth wonderfully set forth his Soveraignty his exercising it upon the perfect that when he has tied it up as fast as may be by never so many Promises yet it should still have its scope and be able to deal with whom it will as it will By this means he that is Lord indeed truly Lord originally Lord vindicates and manifests his Lordship when he can subject that unto his Will which seems most exempted from it as well as that which lies most open to him in the way of clearest and most acknowledged Justice Reas. 2. Because all Dispensations are but for a season They are not everlasting Therefore Eternity delights to swallow them up Perfect and wicked are both of the same lump only differently clothed to act their several parts which when they have done their cloathes must be taken off and they turned back into the lump again There is nothing durable but the eternal state of things Now therefore hath God treasured up destructions for all dispensations because it is sutable to all dispensations It is as fit for the King to be stripped of his gorgious apparel when the Play is done as the Begar of his rags This is but a momentany Righteousness or Perfection a momentany wickedness or imperfection according to the Law of the present dispensation and the Righteousness the wickedness the Law of the Dispensation the Dispensation it self all must pass into the dust again When they have lived out their transitory life and acted their several parts they must return to death So that though there be Righteousness and Wickedness Righteous Persons and Wicked Persons Blessings to the one Woes to the other Yet all this is but under the Dispensation for the season of the Dispensation which when it comes to an end all this passes away Object Against this it will be easily and readily objected That this will destroy all Religion towards God and Righteousness amongst men What need any man care what he thinks or does How can any man desire to be Righteous to be Perfect if his end must be the same with him who is most imperfect and wicked Answ. No It will not it cannot if rightly understood It will not destroy any true Religion in any way of administration whatsoever but only that Corrupt Enmity Corrupt Hope Corrupt Desire Corrupt Selfish-interest which every Administration inclines very much to breed and nourish but Perfect Love cannot suffer always to stand which if it were once eaten out every Administration would be sweet and pleasant If we knew our selves and one another our own parts and the parts that others are to act we should with more rest and satisfaction act ours our selves and with more peace and pleasure behold others acting theirs Besides The Righteous have a double advantage One in their present life Another in their ensuing death In their present life they both enjoy themselves and their God in such a way as the wicked cannot nor are in any wise capable of in their state and practise of wickedness And in their ensuing death they have another advantage it being a more immediate step to somewhat further then the death of the wicked can be I speak not of the shadow of death but of that which is death indeed the dying of the Spirit in and to its present state Therefore there is no ground why the Righteous should be discouraged in pursuing Righteousness nor why the wicked should please himself in abounding in wickedness though ground sufficient for both to be weary of either and to long after somewhat more perfect Vse 1. Not for any to magnifie themselves much above others nor to promise to themselves any such great blessedness beyond others or to look upon others as objects of such great Misery because of some appearing-difference between them and others Indeed there is a difference at present in this Dispensation but it is no thank to them that 't is so Nor are the wicked so much to be blamed as they think They have their parts to act and they are fitted to their parts This Dispensation will have its end and then you will find no such great difference between you and them as you thought there

was Destruction will make an end of their wickedness yea and it will make an end of your Righteousness also and then ye will become both one lump of Clay without either Good or Evil Vse 2. Not to grieve over-much when you find Destruction seizing upon you If your body or spirit moulder away If God consume your Righteousness your Holiness your Perfection by the blast of his Spirit Grieve not beyond measure at it Alas it must dye This must not last for ever You thought to have been made happy by this your happiness lies in being delivered from it This is not the true treasure or at least not in its true and lasting shape and therefore must undergo death and destruction in this its present appearance The Apostle James raises it higher bids you rejoyce in it Chap. 1. 10. and he gives a strong Reason Vers 11. For the Sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat but it withereth the grass and the flower thereof falleth and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth So also shall the rich man fade away in his ways Therefore be glad at the death of that that must dye ye have undergone that sorrow which there was no avoyding This is great matter of Joy The pain of having the sap and moisture of your spirits dryed up by the scorching heat of the Sun if it be in any degree past 't is great matter of Joy Better is the Day of this Death then the Day of this Life There is greater matter of Joy in parting with in putting off this Excellency then in putting it on Now for a conclusion to all this I intend to lay down the brief sum of the whole matter even of the whole course of man under every Administration wherein he is either lifted up or thrown down or both lifted up and thrown down first lifted up and then thrown down and through which he passes to his lasting state Take it thus We were all made by him who is the great Potter or Former of all things what e're we are whether righteous or wicked under what Administration soever And this not so much for any ends we can conceave or drive at as for his own pleasure which will have its course upon us and will toss and tumble us up and down into several sorts of Deaths and Lifes as great and as often as it pleaseth till it hath quite confounded and brought us to a perfect loss in all our own Hopes Desires and Apprehensions yea till at last it hath quite swallowed us up in it self where when we are dead buried and cease to be know or desire any more that Life may at length spring up in us which till then we are uncapable of any distinct desiring or possessing And the passage to this though it be very dreadful to the flesh being even through the Gates of Hell Death and Destruction yet it is in no small measure joyful to the eye of that Spirit which discerns it to be but a passage and a necessary passage too And what brave Royal Heart would refuse to joyn issue with this request O let all shadowy Perfections all Perfections that come in and by Administrations dye and pass away be swallowed up by a Death by a Destruction more powerful then themselves that so way may be made for the discovery of true and compleat Perfection that it may come forth to swallow up both destruction and all that it hath destroyed for ever and to bring forth it self and every thing again in its Primitive Glory that they may return to that beauty wherein they were before they were stained by that Vanity Misery and Vexation whereunto all things are at present subjected A LETTER Impleading A CONVERSION whether real or pretended is not material And all such kind of Changes in the Creature backward or forward by principles either outward or inward Dear Anne I Have seen your recantation in a Letter of yours which doth wonderfully please me I like well to see the creature with its waxed wings mounting up towards Heaven and soaring aloft beyond the reach of the sight of its fellow creatures But I like it much better to see the wax melted by the heat of the Sun and the poor foolish forward creature tumbling down into the Sea or unto the Earth again What should the creature do in Heaven The light of God should not quit it self like it self if it did not at least dazle if not wholly extinguish the fleshly eye and turn it back into its fleshly principle again So let all thine enemies perish O Lord So let all the principles the creature either sucks in from others or beats out it self by its own purest searchings and reasonings come to nought be so throughly and effectually thrown down that the quite contrary may easily be reared up in their stead But where are you now Sweet Anne You see the rottenness of your former foundation are you sure you now build upon firm ground upon the inmost Rock You have seen a Light which clearly shakes that great Light which did so transport you while it appeared Light but are you sure this Light is so clear so deep of so inward perfect a Nature as it shall never be shaken What pretty sport doth Original Wisdom make with us He tosses tumbles us makes us be or not be own or not own what and when he pleases and well he may While he hides from us the true and original colour of things and that skill whereby he colours things he may cosen us as often as he pleases He may put what colour he will upon things and what eye he will into us And we in beholding the present colour with the present eye may be confident in what we see yea in both judging it and other things by it not knowing either the root of it or of that eye that judges it nor considering what changes both the colour and the eye may undergo Let me run over your Letter a little I who am unworthy of the esteem of a Servant Do you know your self that you call your self unworthy I cannot bear that the creature should either exalt or throw down it self for I am sure it does it not from true knowledg but from imagination Though by the light in them at present it is knowledg and true knowledg unto that eye that is in them yet to me or if you will to somewhat in me which searches judges and condemns both that eye and that light it is but imagination Yet again beholding how the creature acts I can bear with either or both both the creatures lifting it self up and throwing it self down according to the different eye state and principle which it has and wherein it is and acts So that though in one sence I am an utter enemy to all persons principles things and actions yet in another sence I am perfectly reconciled to them all I like none of them as such as they take themselves