Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	dead_a	eternal_a	life_n	5,719	5	4.8899	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A95857	A charge against the Jews, and the Christian world, for not coming to Christ, who would have freely given them eternall life. Delivered in a sermon, before the Right Honorable the House of Peers, in the Abbey Church at Westminster, on May 26. 1647. being the day of their publick fast. / By Thomas Valentine, one of the Assembly of Divines, and Minister of Chalfont in the County of Bucks.	Valentine, Thomas, 1585 or 6-1665?	1647 (1647)	Wing V24; Thomason E389_6; ESTC R201520	27,808	35

and most Schoolmen that write of that subject And they amplifie it thus The noblenesse of the cause argues the nobility of the effect the Spirit of God works in us and by his grace we are what we are our actions are not ours but Christs which by his Spirit produceth them in us therefore The second viz that these actions shall be rewarded not of grace but in justice Bellarmine urgeth 2 Tim. 4.8 and quoteth the words of Paul From henceforth is laid up for me a Crown of righteousnesse which the Lord the Righteous Judge shall give to me and not onely to me but to all that love his appearing here he triumphs for here is saith he justice or righteousnesse both in the Judge that gives the reward and in the Crown that is given and Justice gives every one their due and if it be of due debt it is merited And he urgeth the like phrase If we confesse our sins God is just to forgive them 1 Ioh. 1.9 God would have wrought in Adam per generalem influentiam he works in us per sperialem inspirationem quod munus nostrum minus merit●ium of all the arguments that I have met with this seemes to be one of the strongest For answer to the first branch it must be acknowledged that the actions of a man regenerate are more noble then Adams could have been if he stood in his integritie for his obedience had come from the liberty of his will and from his own spirit but now under the Covenant of grace we have a more glorious spirit the Spirit of Christ that works in us not by a generall influence but a speciall operation quickning inspiring acting and eliciting every thing that is good in us But though our actions are more noble yet lesse meritorious because they are lesse ours then Adams would have been For the second branch that God of justice not of favour and mercie is to give the reward I answer that justice is either in sayings or in deeds The former is truth and fidelity which stands in keeping of promises of which John speaks he hath promised pardon to them that make confession of their sins and therefore if you do it he is just and faithfull saith the text one explains the other and you shall be sure to have the pardon of your sins Justice in actions is either legall rigid strict justice or else Evangelicall tempered allayed justice whereby God condescends as lowe as may be parts with as much right as possibly he can and so gives man a reward which appears by the Apostles mentioning a throne of grace a throne is a place of Justice yet this throne in which God sits is a throne of grace erected upon the merits of Christ where strict justice is moderated and tempered Iob 9.15 else it were a vain thing for Job to supplicate his Judge We may have eternall life from this justice and yet it is neither merited nor due But if it will do them any good we may say heaven is due Debetur personae non operi and yet hold it as a free gift coming from Gods bountie It is due to the person by reason of his sonship and adoption not due to him in regard of any perfection in his service and obedience to the heir The inheritance is due saith the Cardinal we grant it but how came he to be a son and heir was it not free grace that made him so yes doubtlesse It is due in regard of Gods promise for God hath made himself a debtor not by receiving any thing from us Debitorem se fecit Deus non accipiendo sed promittendo but by his own free ingagement to us and what moved him to make us such a promise It was his free grace and goodnes to us It is due in regard of the Covenant of grace whereby he hath made over Heaven to them that beleeve in his Son If the condition be kept we are sure to have it But who inables us to beleeve Is it not God And what moved him to enter into Covenant was it not his free grace But now that the Covenant is established and Christ hath tendred a ransome for us and it is accepted the justice and righteousnesse of God will not suffer him to require a second ransom or to deny that which is purchased for us But let us leave this point I suppose it is clear to them that desire to see the truth You hear there is eternall life which Christ will freely give you and herein you have a view of his bountie Vse there are divers attributes in God which neither devil nor the worst man can condemne as love mercie patience bounty they have an amiablenesse in them and cannot be hated and when Christ doth in his bounty offer life to men he doth like himself a man may give honour wealth counsell but none can give life but God and nothing can be acceptable or indeed a gift without life If you would bestow never so much gold and silver or makeover Land to one that lyes dead before you nothing is done unlesse you could give him life and then they were fruits of your love and bounty Christ will give you life and lest we should undervalue this gift because life is accompanied with many cares and griefs and crosses in the world and if it were never so pleasant yet death comes and takes all away therefore our Saviour offers eternall life and this bountifull offer doth much aggravate the sins of men that will not come unto him But what ever Atheists and unbeleevers do let those that are wise and godly come to Christ that their souls may live And if you desire this life you will often enquire about your selves as you use to do of the Physitian when a childe or friend lyes sick Is he like to live do you think he will recover is there no danger of death For direction if you remember what was said in the beginning life eternall is begun in this life you must be made alive here or else you cannot live eternally and if you live by faith and are quickned who were dead in sins I can assure you you shall live eternally Bend then your thoughts to consider whether you are alive or no which will appear First by a desire to preserve the life of grace naturall life is carefully preserved what physick what bitter potions are taken what cost are men at what will they not do to prolong life And shall men do nothing for their souls will you live any where not caring whether the Sun of righteousnesse shine there or no will you live in dark cellars or dungeons or will you endure any unwholsome air and such are the places where the Gospel is not preached Heat is a signe of life cold is a fore-runner of death warmth is a temper arising from divers graces which we must carefully keep Rom. 12.11 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the

A CHARGE AGAINST THE JEWS and the Christian WORLD for not coming to CHRIST who would have freely given them Eternall Life DELIVERED IN A ●●RMON before the Right ●●norable the House of PEERS In the Abbey Church at Westminster on May 26. 1647. Being the Day of their Publick Fast By THOMAS VALENTINE one of the Assembly of Divines and Minister of Chalfont in the County of Bucks Nullum magis pestiferum venenum quam socordia illa quam in nobis generat aut terrenae faelicitatis aut justitiae propriae falsa fallax opinio Calv. LONDON Printed by M S. for John Rothwell at the Sun and Fountain in Pauls Church-yard 1647. TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE House of LORDS Assembled in PARLIAMENT Right Honorable WHen I was called to Preach before Your Lordships there was not in our view either Adversary or evill occurrent we thought we had Peace in our hands and that all was well but since that time our Distractions did on the sudden grow great and dangerous We stand in need of the goodnesse of God to come in seasonablie to our Rescue and it will require the wisdom and diligence of your Lordships and all others to compose these Differences that they rise no higher nor end ill We may look upon them with sadnesse and sorrow of heart and fear lest Gods anger is not turned away from us We have need to second our Fasts with doing all things answerable lest if we contradict our prayers by loosenesse of life God give us an Answer contrary to our expectation It is high time to lay down our provocations against God and bitternesse of spirit one against another our contentions have been so hot that we have departed one from another let us take heed of endeavouring to root out one another and to avoid rancor and virulencie of spirit Next to the directions and examples of Scripture I could wish we had cast our eyes upon some part of the Carthaginian Story and see what was the issue of the dissention between them and the Romanes Amilchar used to say his 4. sons that he did Alere quatuor catulos leoni nos in perniciem exterminium Romani imperii but it proved contrary Hannibal primogenitus ejus aetatis c●to annorum accedens ad sacrificium juravit quod quum primum esset adultae aetatis foret atrocissimus hostis Romanorum qui dum excitasset pulveres cum pedibus ait tunc erit pax inter Carthaginenses Romanos quando altera istarum civitatum erit in pulverem redacta the Carthaginians could never be perswaded to have any peace with Rome though some of their Nobility much endeavoured it Amilcar when he went out in an expedition did offer sacrifice and Hanniball the great his eldest Son being present at the solemnity with his Father when he was but young had received in such principles of War and opposition that he vowed to second his Fathers designes and said there should be peace be●ween Carthage and Rome when one of those Cities should be as that dust which he then spurned up with his foot it proved fatall to that side which was resolved to destroy the other For though Hanniball was the bravest Commander that ever Carthage bred and had many Victories and great successe for sixteen yeers together yet shortly after Carthage was fiered by the Romanes and was upon a flame 17. dayes together and consumed into dust and ashes Let there be no such spirit in the parties that oppose one another let all sides-taking be layed aside and the names that intimate division be extinguished let there be a calm temper and a wise Accommodation lest both sides be pulled down one after the other that Your Lordships may be the happie Instruments to prevent so great an evill and effect so great a good is the Prayer of him who rests Your Lordships to be commanded in the service of the Gospel THO VALENTINE A SERMON PREACHED Before the Right Honorable House of LORDS JOH 5.40 And ye will not come to me that ye might have life JEsus Christ was so amiable in his life and admirable in all his speeches so holy in his conversation so wise in all his answers to his cavilling adversaries so meek in teaching the ignorant so ready to cure diseases and infirmities that one would have thought all men would be taken with him and have come unto him But nothing lesse they that came to him were ready to leave him and others would not come at all which makes him take it unkindly for so these words are to be understood you will not come to me Deceivers speak to you Satan and the world invite you and you go to them I call and perswade you but you will not come to me they will bring you to miserie and death I would give you happinesse and life but you will not come to me The ill carriage of men towards Christ was answered sometimes with indignation 1. As that message to Herod Go tell that Fox Behold Luk. 13.32 I cast out devils and will heal to day and to morrow and the third day I shall be perfected 2. Sometimes with detestation of their sinfulnesse Man 23.27 Wo to you Scribes Pharisees hypocrites you are like painted tombes and whited sepulchers 3. Sometimes with compassion to them and grief to himself as that in John Will you also go away And here in the text Ioh 6.67 You will not come to me This whole Chapter is a defence of Christ against the cavilling Jews which found fault with his cure done upon the impotent man that lay by the Pool of Bethesda and had an infirmitie 38. yeers and was so impotent that others prevented him and got into the pool upon the moving of the waters and thus he continued till Christ came up to the Feast at Jerusalem and finding him there takes pity upon him and cures him as you see in ver 5 6 7 8. And it being the Sabbath day they find fault with the fact and also because he took up his bed and question with the man inquiring who it was that did it from ver 10. to 13. But he not knowing who it was could make no answer till afterwards Christ finding him in the Temple makes himself known unto him and gives him an admonition to sin no more lest a worse thing befall him v. 14. Then the man told the Jews it was Jesus that made him whole which moved them to persecute him v. 15 16. Then begins our Saviour to make his defence from v. 17. to the end wherein he affirms his Divinity and his equality with his Father which made the Jews to be more enraged against him v. 18. But he goes on to shew that what he did his Father did My Father worketh hitherto and I work I can do nothing of my self The Father hath life in himself and so hath the Son and the Father hath committed all judgement to the Son And if you begin at

word signifies heat and we would have our friends hot in our cause we would not have a Counsellor that should plead coldly or indifferently and shall we be indifferent in the service of God far be it from us Breathing is a signe of life it befals many that are in swoonings and dangerous fits that it is heard to tell whether they be yet if they breath in wholsome aire and pant after God and the Scriptures and after good advice to be set and kept in the way of Religion it is an argument they live I might follow the similie of breathing in and out but I surcease Those that are alive to choose would converse with the living and not with the dead I would not have any one to think that I would insinuate any such matter or suggest any such thoughts into the heads of any that should go about to tell who are dead and who are alive but we must not deny that which Scriptures plainly affirm to choose a man that is not dead in sins would not familiarly converse with any but such as he hopes in the judgement of charity to be alive and it stands thus between the living and the dead no fellowship no commerce if you speak to a dead man you are not answered if you take him by the hand and otherwayes expresse your self yet no correspondence no sutablenesse your love is not answered again and therefore there can be no joy in such conversing Speak to a worldly man he can say little unles it be in worldly things he is out of his element And surely such as rejoyce in good things must needs cheerfully delight in the society of such as minde the like And for further enlarging of this point think what a miserie it would be for a man to marry a dead woman to have her layed in his bed carried to his board to be with her continually it would be irksome and unpleasing You see Abraham would fain bury his wife Sarah out of his fight for the face of death is irksome and uncomfortable And is it not the case of many a man that lives with a dead wife and the wife with a dead husband if it be no sorrow to you it is so much the worse with you for then you your selves are dead A woman goes with grief and is daily in sorrow if she think her child is dead in her wombe she hath no joy to think of the time of her deliverance O what is it to carry about with you a dead heart a dead soul And it is so if you be not moved in pitie to such as converse with you of whose life in Religion you have no warrantable nor well grounded hope But all you that by these or the like signes can suppose and conclude to your selves that you are now alive I dare be bold to assure you that you shall still live and live eternally in heaven many things may in this world trouble you molest the comfort of your lives but nothing shall cut it off therefore with patience wait untill you injoy a better life then you now have beare with patience sicklinesse of body troubles of minde the reproaches and crosses of this life in hope of eternall life And the consideration hereof should make us willing to undergo any difficulties because we hope to live happily and that happinesse to remain eternally And surely there is great reason why the servants of God should wait patiently and cheerfully expect the accomplishment of their hope for of all men in the world they are in the way to the greatest preferment and by faith they see already the bounty of God which shal hereafter be manifested towards them It may be of reproofe justly to tax and challenge the most part of Christians Vse 2. for not longing more after life eternall what should moove us to be in love with the world Ah do we so much esteem life that is temporall it is a wonder to see so great matters mentioned in the Scriptures and our hearts so little affected with them and it may be a matter of wonderment why our hearts make no more after things that be so pretious I take it these causes may be rendered but all of them intimate matter of reproofe First men that are not assured of a better estate are loath to leave that which they have in possession a poore man tha●●ives in a cold house and hath never a good roome yet if he knowes not whither to go he will not wil●lingly go out though it be never so cold so is it with many men that are miserable and poor they have no assurance of a better estate and therefore they are loath to leave this It may be they have some hopes and cares and that honest and religious as in David he had a promise of the Kingdom and his heart was set on the service he meant to do when he came to the Kingdome this may be in the mind and hinder the more earnest desires of heaven The maine cause is life eternall and the joyes of heaven are so high above our spirit that till the soul be fitted by an extraordinarie measure of grace and raised above an ordinarie pitch it is not made sutable to them Paul that had visions and revelations was elevated higher than ordinary he was full of heavenly desires FINIS Die Jovis 27 May. 1647. ORdered by the Lords in Parliament assembled That Mr. Valentine one of the Assembly of Divines is hereby thanked for his great pains taken in his Sermon Preached yesterday before their Lordships in the Abbey Church Westminster And he is hereby desired to cause the same to be Printed and published Which is to be done onely by Authority under his own Hand Jo Browne Cler Parl ' I Appoint Joh Rothwell to Print my Sermon Tho Valentime