Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	eternal_a	life_n	wage_n	6,981	5	11.0985	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A39353	Justifying faith: or, That faith by which the just do live briefly describ'd in a discourse on 1 Joh. 5.12. By the author of a late book, entitled Summum bonum, or, An explication of the divine goodness, &c. To this discourse is added, an abstract of some letters to an eminent learned person, concerning the excellency of the Book of common prayer, &c.	Elys, Edmund, ca. 1634-ca. 1707.	1679 (1679)	Wing E675C; ESTC R204257	23,218	50

JUSTIFYING FAITH OR That Faith BY WHICH The JUST do LIVE Briefly describ'd In a DISCOURSE on 1 Joh. 5. 12. By the Author of a late Book Entitled Summum Bonum or An Explication of the Divine Goodness c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 S. Basil in Psal 115. To this Discourse is added an Abstract of some Letters to an Eminent Learned Person concerning the Excellency of the Book of Common Prayer c. LONDON Printed for William Crook at the Sign of the Green Dragon without Temple-Bar 1679. ILLUSTRISSIMO Virtutum Omnium Exemplari Domino HENEAGIO FINCH BARONI DAVENTRIAE Summo ANGLIAE Cancellario AEQuum videtur ut Linguâ non Vulgari Te Alloquar Colendissime DOMINE Quem Genii Indolis adeo non Vulgaris esse Expertus sum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tuam Verè Coelestem Ego sane Naturam potius SERAPHICAM vocarem quàm HUMANITATEM Nimirùm hujusmodi in Me contulisti Beneficium ut Quale sit Solus DEUS Cognoverit nec quisquam poterit Mortalium Rem aliquam Tot tam Miris Involutam Circumstantiis Animquantumvis Perspicacissimo penit● Inspicere Hasce nostras Bonitatis Infinitae Explicationis Nostrae Vindi● as Liturgiae Anglicanae Laudes T● bi Dicatas velim namque Anim Tuo Gloriosissimum Bonitatis Infinitae seu Divinae Characterem Impressum V● disse gestio ac Tui sanè Me semper Oportebit in Precationibus Nostr● Quotidianis Meminisse utpote Q● sum ero Dum Spiritus hos r●get artus Amoris ac Reverentiae Vinculo Arctissimo Dominationi Tuae Obstrictus E. E. To the Learned and Pious READERS THE more just the Complaint is of the Excessive multitude of Books so much the greater cause there is for the Publication of such short Discourses as This by which I have contributed some assistance to Persons Virtuously dispos'd to observe that Excellent Precept 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Simplifica Teipsum viz. to draw off their Minds from the Distracting multiplicity of Imaginations concerning the Truth to the Life and Practice of the Truth it self which chiefly consists in the Efficacy of this Apprehension That the Divine Essence is Absolutely One And that Our Lord Jesus Christ with the Father and the Holy Ghost is the Onely True God He that believes This as he ought will certainly despise this present World an● love the Lord our God with all his Heart and with all his Soul and with all his Strength and with all his Mind and his Neighbour as Himself I doubt not but you will readily joyn with me in this Fervent Aspiration 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that hath the Son hath Life he that hath not the Son of GOD hath not Life 1 Joh. 5 12. THese words are such a kind of Epitome of the Gospel as that is of the Law which is given us by our Saviour Luke 10. 27. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy Heart c. For what is the Subject of the Gospel but the Good Will of God towards Men through His beloved Son Jesus Christ our Lord that to Believe in Him is the Way the onely Way to Life and Salvation which is fully implyed in these words of the Apostle He that hath the Son hath Life c. Here let us consider first what Life is as we are to understand it in this place Secondly what it is to have the Son Life I shall define thus 'T is a Principle of Acting according to the Nature of Man By the Nature of Man I do not understand his Essential Form That without which he cannot be a Man but that Course Mode or Kind of Acting which he was Made or Constituted in Now you know Moses sayes that Man was Made after the Image of GOD and Solomon sayes that GOD made Man upright to wit He appointed him to Actuate his Intellectual Faculties Chiefly and Principally upon Himself the Fountain of all Goodness Infinite Beauty Infinite Love and his Senses with his Passions or Sensitive Affections upon Objects fully Agreeable and Satisfactory to their several Capacities In a word Nature is to abhorre that which is Evil and to cleave to that which is Good 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sayes the Stoick 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Man may be said to be Alive or Dead either in respect of his Animal or Sensitive or of his Rational or Spiritual Faculties In respect of the former every Man lives till there be a Separation of the Soul and Body for all the Sensible Motions of any Mans Body in this present World that tend Directly to the Support or Conservation of the Sensitive Nature viz. to the keeping of the Soul and Body together are in some measure Pleasing or satisfactory But by reason of those manifold Pains and Diseases anguishes and dissatisfactions of our Senses External and Internal which in this present World we are subject unto the Church may well say as she doth In the midst of Life we are in Death Non est vivere sed valere Vita sayes the Epigrammatist The Rational or Spiritual Life He only Lives whose Heart is set upon God as the Principal Object of all his Love so that all his other Loves flow from and back again into the Love of God as Lesser Waters from and into the Ocean Even those who habitually love the Lord their God with all their Heart and with all their Soul when they exert any Act of the Will that is not Formally nor Virtually the Love of God they are Dead and they abide in Death 'till they are Renew'd by Repentance 'till the Course of their Souls be turn'd by an Act of Holy Love Thus a great Number of those that are truly Godly that live the Rational Divine Life by reason of their manifold Backslidings may say of themselves as St. Paul speaks in respect of his temporal Calamities that they are in Death oft 2 Corinth 11 23. The best Life Rational or Sensitive which most men Live as to this present World differs little or nothing more from Death than a Shadow from Darkness I conceive the Pen-men of the Holy Ghost have so often compar'd the Life of Man to a Shadow not only in respect of his Vanishing Perishable Condition but also of that Deficiency of Light or Life which All of us in this Mortal Body are Subject unto But that little Portion of Spiritual Life if I may so speak which He that hath the Son is Partaker of even here upon Earth is Infinitely more worth than the whole World and as for his Sensible Death or Dissatisfactions which he suffers at present they continually work together for his Good they are no other than the Instruments of the Holy Ghost working upon him to fit and prepare him for an Eternal Life of Soul and Body in Heaven This Notion of Life and Death which I have endeavour'd to Express unto you we may easily Demonstrate to be most suitable to the Sense and Import of several Texts of Scripture She that liveth in Pleasure is Dead while she liveth 1 Tim. 5. 6. What can be more plain than this that the Apostle attributes Life and

Death in divers Respects to the same Person at the same Time and whereto are those Respects but to the Animal or Sensitive And to the Rational or Spiritual Life She is Dead i. e. is Separate from God the Fountain of Life the Fountain of All true Joy and Comfort while she Liveth while her Sou● remaineth in Conjunction with her Body who liveth in Pleasure i. e. who indulgeth to her self such Pleasures as are either in their own nature unlawful or else become so being inordinately i. e. Absolutely desir'd or enjoy'd i. e. without respect to their due Subserviency to the Spiritual or Divine Life which requires them only for this End that our Bodies being Recreated Strengthen'd and Refresht by them may become more Vigorous in such Operations which the Blessed God commands us to exercise them in Let the dead bury their dead sayes our Saviour Matthew 8. 22. What can be meant by the Dead in this place but those that embrace this present World and so Despise the glorious Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ Of whom sayes St. John In Him was Life and the Life was the Light of Men. You know all sinsul Actions are in the Holy Scriptures call'd dea●● Works being the Fruits or Effects of Spiritual Death or Separation of the Soul from God Thus you see that the Scriptures plainly demonstrate that Sin the Separation or Disunion o● the Heart from God is Death And as for all Troubles or Disturbances of our Senses External or Internal as such as they are to the Wicked that is to say the Wages of Sin you know what the Apostle says of them The Wages of Sin is Death Death I but that is Everlasting Death Indeed we an● here to understand chiefly and principally Even lasting Death Indeed we are here to understand chiefly and principally Everlasting Death those horrible Gnawings of the Worm that shall never Dye the Burnings of the Fire that shall never be Quenched But that All Trouble is the Wages of Sin who can deny that considers what he sayes In what we have already deliver'd it is implyed that Godliness or a Pure and Heavenly temper of Mind is Life which we shall shew expresly and then shall proceed by Gods assistance to declare unto you what it is to have the SON In testimony of this Truth we shall produce but one Text of Scripture that one being so plainly and unquestionably Agreeable to what has been said Rom. 8 6. To be Carnally Minded is Death but to be Spiritually Minded is Life and Peace The former words of this Verse are a further Proof of what we have spoken of Death To be Carnally Minded is Death But to be Spiritually Minded is Life and Peace And what is it to be Spiritually Minded but to have our Minds set upon GOD who calls himself a SPIRIT and the Father of Spirits as the Principal Object of All our Thoughts and Inclinations But here it may be Objected that Life is the Reward of Godliness or Holiness and Death the Wages of Sin How then is Godliness Life it self and Sin Death To this I Answer First that whatsoever is properly Life of the Body in this present World is Really Distinct from Godliness and the Great and Good GOD gives unto All the Godly All those that have the SON so much of it as He in His Infinite Wisdom sees them to stand in need of for the working out of their Salvation for the preparing of their Souls for Heaven And that Glorious Life of the Body which they that have the SON shall have for ever and ever in Heaven this also is Really Distinct from Godliness of which it is the Reward But it has indeed a great Affinity therewith or Conformity thereunto which we can have but little Knowledge of at present but somewhat of it we may apprehend by that Saying of the Apostle 1 Cor. 15. 44. It is rais'd a Spiritual Body Here it is most Evident that the Bodies of the Saints after the Resurrection shall be throughly Affected with the Temper of their God-like Spirits as they are in some measure even in this present World All these several Acts of Godliness CHARITY or Divine Affection which the Elect of GOD perform in this Mortal Body have the Nature of OBEDIENCE But that One Continued Act of the most Intimate Full Perfect Adherence to the ONE INFINITE GOOD being by the Free Mercy of GOD in CHRIST made Absolutely for ever and ever Uncapable of the least Defection is the REWARD of All the Godly or Holy Actions which are Perform'd by Gods Elect whilst they are in the World Finally These Holy Performances are in Divers Respects Acts of Obedience and the Reward thereof In Respect of their Conformity to the Will of GOD they are Acts of Obedience in Respect of the Joy and Satisfaction they impart to the Soul of the Doer they are in a manner their own Reward That Poet had a Glympse of this Truth who say'd Ipsa quidem Virtus Pretiumsibi Virtue 's its own Reward But it shines forth most Gloriously in the Holy Scriptures David sayes Expresly Ps 19. 11. In keeping of them viz. the Judgments or Just Commandements of GOD there is Great Reward In the three Precedent Verses he does most Pathetically set forth the Great Joy and Satisfaction they import to the Soules of the Obedient upon which account he sayes here In keeping of them there is Great Reward The Statutes of the Lord are Right Rejoycing the Heart c. Her wayes sayes Solomon Prov. 3. 17. 18. are ways of pleasantness and all her Pathes are Peace this he speaks of the ways of Wisdome and what are her wayes but the Wayes of the Commandements of the Onely Wise GOD She is a Tree of Life to them that lay hold on her and happy is every one that retaineth her We may easily conceive how the Service of God which is the Life of a True CHRISTIAN is Perfect Freedome if we consider that a Man's Freedome is to Do What He Would Do For certainly He onely Does What he Would that is to say He onely Satisfies his Will or Intellectual Appetite who Conforms It to the Divine Will which we cannot Doe unless we have the SON Without Me sayes the Son John 15. 5. ye can Do nothing And John 8. 36. If the Son shall make you Free ye shall be Free indeed He that hath the Son sayes his Beloved Disciple hath Life c. But what is it to have the Son That we may know what it is as We Ought to Know Shine upon us O FATHER by the Influences of the HOLY GHOST in the Face of the Son JESUS CHRIST the Brightness of Thy Glory that in Thy Light we may See Light To Have the SON is to Believe in Him which is To have Him Dwelling in Our Hearts