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	sin_n	soul_n	14,242	5	5.9595	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A42553	Philadelphia, or, a treatise of brotherly-love Shewing, that we must love all men: love the wicked in general: love our enemies: that the godly must especially love another: and the reasons of each particular love. The manner of our mutual love; the dignity, necessity, excellenc, and usefulness of brotherly-love. That the want of love, where love is due, is hatred, shewed in divers particulars. The greatness of the sin of malice and hatred; with the reasons why wicked men hate the saints: together with cautions against those sins that break the bond of love. Many weighty questions discussed, and divers cases cleared. By William Gearing, minister of the word.	Gearing, William.	1670 (1670)	Wing G436C; ESTC R223669	92,727	215

entrance and may take possession and breed all bitterness of affections and bring forth in the practice all actions and fruits of malice and ill-will and this want of Love layeth open the heart unto all these So then either ye must love out of a pure heart unfeignedly or else the Lord will account you as haters of your Brethren Our Saviour made no middle-way between love and hatred in the ordering of our hearts and affections towards enemies but when he corrected the Pharisees gloss which was this Thou shalt love thy neighbour and hate thine enemy He saith But I say unto you love your enemies c. Some man might have expected that he should rather have said concerning loving or hating of enemies as Bal●k speak to Balaam of blessing or cursing of Israel neither bless them at all nor curse them at all carry thy self indifferently between me and them so some out of carnal reason might have looked that our Saviour should have pointed out a middle way and said Neither love your enemies nor hate them but carry your selves indifferently towards them But our Saviour saith expresly Love your enemies and do good unto them and that as they will approve themselves to be the children of their heavenly father So that not to love those whom we ought to love is to hate So then as we will avoid the damnable sin of hatred we must labour to be possessed of the grace of love and that principally to the Children of God and to all the Children of God high and low rich and poor of better or of meaner gifts and parts and on the other side to be possessed with hearty love towards all men in general and in particular toward those that have done us injuries and unkindnesses otherwise we are haters of them CHAP. XX. Sect. I. IN the next place I will set forth the greatness of this sin of hating the people of God or others 1. It is an argument that such persons love not God himself If a King should say of some certain men about him These men are very dear unto me and as I love them in a special manner so I will have all that love me to love them I will make this as a note by which to know a faithful subject from a traitour viz. love to these whom I dearly love he that loveth not them I will not account them loyal and true hearted to me Whether these persons deserve the love of all or not yet this would be a greater argument of the King 's extraordinary love to such men so in this case the Lord saith in effect of every child of his He that loveth not thee I will take him for none of my friends for none of my children he that looketh for love and favour from me must bear true love to thee How great then is the love of God toward his children he will not acknowledg that any love him who hate them When the unbelieving Jews told our Saviour we have one father even God he answered If God were your father ye would love me for I proceeded forth and came from God neither come I of my self but he sent me Joh. 8.41 42. So in this case it may be said to many carnal persons who think th●mselves the children and people of Cod. If God were your father ye would love them that do most of all labour to honour and please God and are most careful not to sin against him Such is God's love to his people that he taketh none for his own that do not love them There be many that say they love God and yet love not his children Well! the Lord will none of thy love unless it be such as maketh thee also to love his children If thou sayest thou lovest God and yet lovest Drunkards Swearers Worldlings more than his children who are zealous for his glory thou maist keep thy love to thy self God will not accept of it To all that live in the visible Church and come to the ordinances and take the name of God in their mouths and do hate the godly the Lord saith in effect why dost thou not love me in that thou lovest not my children thou lovest not me such tender love doth the Lord bear to his people This our Saviour expressed sweetly in that speech to St. Peter after his Resurrection from the dead when by a three-●old confession of his love to him he seemed as it were to put him to penance for his late three-fold denial of him Simon son of Jonah lovest thou me Peter answered thrice Yea Lord thou knowest that I love thee Yea but Peter if thou wilt have me tast of the fruit of thy Love to me if thou dost love me indeed and wilt have me to accept of thy love as sound and true love them whom I love love them and love me and shew it by thy care of their Souls and by thy diligence in feeding them with my word go feed my Sheep and Lambs SECT II. II HE that loveth not his brother abideth in death 1 Joh. 3.14 All by nature are in a state of death and void of Christian love but all do not abide in death some do not continue in the state of death but those that love the brethren are passed from death to life Now those who want this Christian and brotherly love these are not only dead in sins by nature but they abide in death They abide in the death of guilt the guilt of all their sins lieth upon them they abide under the dominion and power of sin they abide in a state of wrath the wrath of God abideth on them as long as they abide in the hatred of the brethren they abide in a death of condemnation As St. John saith We know we are passed from death to life because we love the brethren So also we may know that those are dead in sin lie obnoxious every moment to eternal death who hate the brethren Now I conceive that the Apostle speaketh of a brother in the same sense as he did before viz. a brother by grace a child of God Quest But how can such be brethren to those who abide in death Resp 1. That all men and women as they 〈◊〉 men and women are brethren and sisters by a natural relation all coming of one man and one woman originally viz. Adam and Eve St. Paul taught this learning to the Scholars of Athens Act 17.26 viz. that God hath made of one blood all Nations of men that dwell upon all the face of the earth The Athenians as proud as they were in despising other nations as barbarous yea other Cities of Greece in comparison of themselves yet were not of any better stock or blood originally than the meanest of them The Athenians were not of one blood and the Argives of another and the B●aetians of another c. no the very Scythians were of as good a stock originally as they even of the same

member of a Family and seest thou sin to grow there in any Person thou art faithfully to reprove and admonish Hast thou kinred or friends whom thou dearly lovest walking in evil ways then reprove and admonish Do any of thy Familiars sin in thy company then reprove and admonish them Art thou in the Company of Strangers that swear and curse and prophane the holy Name of God give a loving check to them Why do ye curse and swear Perhaps ye will say they regard it not It is no matter Thou dost thy duty Ye will reply We have done so and they do not reform Yet still reprove them God may make thy reproofs effectual one time or other God is patient and long-suffering so must we be also You will say they scoff and scorn at reproof I answer Then avoid their fellowship as much as thou canst We do express more Love to one another by reproving one another than by any thing it is a sign we desire the good of one anothers Souls True Love is mixed of sweetness and sharpness It is a kind of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a bitter-sweet it hath not only sweet meats but pills corrosives as well as healing plaisters it can wound as well as heal yea it must wound that it may heal If a Christian see seculent matter that nourisheth vice cleave to any one true love will cause him to strain a point of kindness to purge it out albeit with more rough than pleasing Physick faithful are the wounds of such a friend Prov. 27.6 Melius est cum severitate diligere quàm cum lenitate decipere Better is a severe kind of Love than a deceitful Lenity There are two reasons why we must in Love to the wicked thus behave our selves 1. Because our Love to them must principally aim at their conversion reformation and salvation As God laboureth by his goodness to draw men to repentance so must we by our Love and what better course can we take than by reproving them by telling them of the fearful danger they are in and that such courses will undoubtedly bring them to Hell When wicked men shall see we dislike their courses and grieve at them God may set it home upon them to make them the more sensible of their own sins Should we not shew our dislike of such courses we should harden and confirm them in their sins and so to be an occasion of their desperate impenitency 2. Because otherwise we shew neither Love to them nor to our selves we make our selves partakers of their sins neglect of reproof is a tacit consent to them in their sins should we any way encourage them we should be abettors of them Should we any way delight in their sins God would lay them to our score CHAP. XII Sect. 1. THE third thing I am to treat of is Love to our Enemies Here in the first place Let us consider what this Love is and wherein it consisteth 1. It is not a Love in word and in tongue but an affectionate Love a Loving in heart and in deed Rom. 12.10 be kindly affectioned one to another 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be naturally affectionate as the Dams among Creatures are naturally affectionate to their young ones Gods command Love thine enemies reacheth the heart and enjoyns thee to affect them as well as the tongue to speak loving words unto them 2 It is a Love that sets us upon the exercise of all duties of Love toward them 1. To love them with a Love of benevolence to bless th●m that curse you to wish them good when they wish you evil to speak well of them when they speak all manner of evil of you this is to love our enemies 2. To be willing to pardon their private injuries done unto us So the Parable of the two debtors teacheth us Mat. 18.25 The King pardoned one which owed him ten thousand talents and he was to pardon his fellow that owed him an hundred pence which thing because he would not do his Lord was wroth and delivered him to the Tormentors till he should pay all that was due unto him Prov. 19.11 The discretion of a man defers his anger and it is his glory to pass over a transgression Men think it but baseness and cowardliness to put up wrongs but God saith it is his wisdom his glory his discretion Suppose thine enemies have done thee great wrongs and many injuries the more is thy love manifested 3. Heartily to rejoyce in the gifts and parts of our enemies and in whatsoever is is excellent in them and to be glad of their prosperity and to lament when it is otherwise with them Thus David made Lamentation for Saul 2 Sam. 1. v. 19. The beauty of Israel is slain upon thy high places v. 24 25. Ye daughters of Israel weep over Saul who clothed you in scarlet with other delights who put on ornaments of gold upon your apparel How are the mighty fallen in the midst of the battel 4. To love them with a Love of beneficence To do them all the good we can to do all the good we can to their bodies to do them good speedily and without delay and constantly without any willing neglect when it lieth in our power Love your enemies do good to them that hate you Mat. 5.44 If thine enemy hunger feed him if he thirst give him drink for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head Rom. 12.20 either coals of conversion or co●ls of confusion 5 To love them with a religious Love Love your enemies pray for them which despitefully use you Luk. 6.28 Pray for their health when they are sick pray for their lives when they are in the gates of death pray for their deliverance when they are compassed about with dangers or oppressed with troubles pray for their Conversion Pardon and Salvation Suppose wicked men vex thy Soul as the Sodomites did Lot for righteousness sake and hate thee for thy Love yet pray for them So David did Ps●l 109.4.5 For my Love they are my adversaries but I give my self unto prayer Suppose they persecute thee even to the death yet thou art to pity them and pray for them Thus our Saviour prayed for his enemies Father forgive them they know not what they do St. Stephen also prayed heartily for all his Persecutors Lord lay not this Sin to their charge He prayed heartily for them when they were stoning him to death When Davids enemies were plotting his death he prayed for their good he humbled his Soul with fasting and cloathed himself with Sackcloth Psal 35.13 So St. Paul 1 Cor. 4.12 Being reviled we bless c. being defamed we entreat The hellish rage of enemies must move you to shew your heavenly love to them This is the Love we must shew to our enemies and this Love exceeds that of Publicans and that for these reasons 1. Because their Love is extended no farther than to their brethren their benefactors where they

alone to themselves they would never have regarded Salvation at all All our care would have been how to sin how to fulfil our Lusts we should never have prayed Lord send thy Son into the world to dye for us to save us to redeem us from Sin and Damnation therefore it was his Mercy occasioned by our Misery meerly his Love that made him to dye for us When Gods Justice was pleading hard for the damnation of sinful men What do such Rebels here on earth Why dost thou not O Lord make these wretched Sinners to smart for their Rebellion as Thou hast turned them out of Paradise so turn them out of the World into Hell Let them know what it is to taste of the Forbidden Fruit Then did Christ without suing to him plead as hard for us Father spare them and punish me bless them let me be made a Curse be at peace with them let me endure thy Wrath I will go and keep thy Law because they have broken it let the Sorrows of Hell compass me about that they may enter into thine unspeakable Joys Love therefore must be the meer Motive Had we desired Christ to have laid down his Life for us there were some extrinsical Motive yet Love still but in that Christ was found of them that sought him not and in that he is made known to them and given to them and for them that never sought after him it is meer and wonderful Love 4. Because he was very willing to dye for us Greater Love hath no man then for a man to lay down his Life for his Friend It is maximus fluxus maximum opus maximum beneficium argumentum irrefragabile dilectionis The greatest Flux of Love the greatest work the greatest benefit an irrefragable argument of Love saith Parisiensis And to shew his willingness Christ saith of his Passion desiderio desideravi with a desire have I desired it Christ did earnestly desire to drink of the Cup of his Fathers Wrath that we might not taste it would he have drunk of such a bitter Cup if he did not love us His willingness to dye for us is the commendation of his Love He laid down his Life for us it was not in the power of Pilate and all the Jews his enemies to take away his Life from him Christ did willingly dye Indeed Pilate condemned him the Jews cried out Crucifie him crucifie him they carried him to Calvary as a Malefactor with Spears yet if he had pleased they could not have put him to death Had not his own free Love opened his heart no Souldier could ever have opened his side no though Pontius Pilate should have had all the Roman Legions and the whole Power of the Empire under his charge They might as soon have plucked the Sun out of his Orb as have sundered Christs Soul from his Body As soon have brought a Sea of Waters out of a Rock as have spilt one drop of his Blood unless he had yeelded himself to death Walk in love saith the Apostle as Christ also hath loved us and given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God of a sweet smelling savour Eph. 5.2 Would ye but walk a few turns with Christ in the Garden where he felt the Agony in his Soul Would ye go up to Calvary and see what our blessed Saviour did there endure then would ye say Herein we perceive the Love of Christ in that he laid down his Life for us When the Jews saw Christ weeping over Lazarus they cried out Behold how he loved him but go ye up to Mount Calvary look through his Stripes and Wounds into his heavy and tormented heart look upon his striped back upon his buffeted Face upon his pierced side his bloody head hands and feet see what he did and suffered for us then ye cannot but say behold how he loved us Oh what manner of Love is this SECT III. NOw we must love one another even as Christ hath loved us Now if Christ of his meer Love hath laid down his Life for us then we ought also to lay down our lives for the Brethren 1 Joh. 3.16 This would have seemed an hard saying to us if it had been nakedly proposed in such terms as these we ought to lay down our lives for the Brethren but the Apostle having before laid down such a strong Argument aforehand doth in a most convincing manner infer this upon it as an undeniable conclusion which cannot with any shew of reason be gainsayed or contradicted Christ the eternal Son of God hath manifested his singular Love in laying down his Life for us we must therefore follow the Captain of our Salvation in this incomparable act of Love We were dearer to him than his blood than his Life so the Saints good must be dearer to us than our hearts blood than our pretious Life Here I will lay down this Proposition That Christians being called unto it ought to shew so much Love to their Brethren as to lay down their Lives for them In this Proposition two things are to be considered 1. The Thing required 2. The Condition supposed The Thing required is this That Christians should lay down their Lives for the Brethren The Condition supposed is this If they be called unto it For the former we must know that although Christians must not think their Lives too dear for the Brethren yet it is in this as it is in other duties of Love and Mercy towards men the first and greatest Commandment must give Life unto the second which is like unto it The first Table must have the chiefest respect in our obedience to the second That is the Love of God and our regard of his Glory commanded in the first Table which is called The first and great Commandment must have the chief sway in our hearts to encline us to the duties of Love towards man enjoyned in the second Table for we must love our Neighbour in the Lord and for the Lord and so the Love of God must have a constraining and over-ruling power over us the Love of God must first move us to lay down our Lives for the Brethren and then the Love of our Brethren being as it were comprehended in our Love of God must move us thereunto The Glory of God must be the principal end that we must aim at in doing good to others So especially in this great fruit of Love when we lay down our lives for them then the good of our Brethren must be respected in the second place in as much as God is glorified in that good which they receive by that means So then when any do in Christian Love lay down their Lives for their Brethren they do not dye for them only but for the Lord chiefly and principally This the Apostle strongly proveth to be required of Christians because Christ hath shewed such wonderful Love in laying down his Life tor us This indeed is an Argument unanswerable but holdeth strongly