Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	law_n	sin_n	word_n	8,031	5	4.9306	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A33371	The right devil discovered in his descent, form, education, qualification, place and nature of torment : with many other divine secrets, never as yet extant : published for confutation of the learned, instructing the wise, and undeceiving of the simple / written by Laur. Claxton.	Claxton, Laurence, 1615-1667.	1659 (1659)	Wing C4583; ESTC R32623	54,824	149

devil in that saith thou the devil can transform himself into any form and appear how where and when he pleaseth Answer If this were true as it is not it were nothing advantagious unto thee in that I can in truth and reality instance one remarkable Devil-man now living whose name is John Robins that did more devilish exployts then any conceited devil without thee Sometimes he did present the form of his person riding upon the wings of the winde like unto a flame of fire also he did present unto some in their beds a great light like unto a flame of fire over all the room that they have been compelled to hide their faces in their beds fearing they should be burned but when they hid their faces in their beds the light did appear more brighter then before also he would present unto them Half-moons and Stars and sometimes thick Darkness darker then any natural darkness whatsoever also he did present in the day time his head onely without a body to a Gentlewoman in her chamber presenting unto her to deceive her the forms of strange beasts as namely dragons and such like much more might be spoken of his deceits in this kind how many great lying signs and wonders this prince of devils was acted forthfar beyond all his cursed seed though a great many more hath assumed to raise various appearances yet notwithstanding all this the fundamental was in themselves as thus A real devil within them but an imagined devil without them and thus their consciences being seared they seek to make others in faith with them that they can raise a devil without them which at the great day they shall finde it to be a cheat that shall burn in their souls and bodies more hotter then any fire and brimstone Again thou sayest The devil is in hell tormented and torments all that he can captivate in his bounds but we are on the earth not tormented c. Answ This thy plea thou hast received from others as wise as thy self that knows no more of a hell without man then of a heaven within man for alas poor deceived soul thou apprehendst a devil thou knows not what and a hell thou knows not where for the learned or the proudest of his seed little think or can believe that their body shall be their hell and their spirit or soul shall be their devil shut up close prisoners on this earth tormented to all eternity neither shall you the seed of Cain believe that your cheats oppression adultery swearing drunkenness and persecuting this infallible truth with all other of your filthiness shall be that fuel that shall burn more hotter then any natural fire in this world And as touching that whereas thou saith We are upon the earth not tormented Alas pititous soul though all the seed of Cain are not tormented alike by reason of long habit and custom through which thy conscience is seared that no small sin will torment thee but there are thousands of thy brood that have an earnest peny of that they shall be hereafter otherwise what causeth the hideous doleful sighs groans and cries of many of your seed in health but much more on thy bed of sickness concluding in thy self I am damned I am damned to all eternity finding in thy self no peace in that thou knows not the God of peace neither hast thou walked uprightly in doing to others as thou would they should do to thee but have either publickly or privately transgressed the Law by which thy sin is strengthened for the strength of sin is the law and so death which is the sting of sin arraigns thee at the bar of thy own conscience reading within thy own soul all thy private evils against God and man nay from my seed-spring I speak it many of this cursed seed are seemingly Saints and do live as a people that doth righteous things and in gifts of nature heaven-like praying and preaching to the admiration of all that hears them and yet they find in themselves if they would speak the truth what sad torments they undergo while they live on this earth yea so great in some that their torment cannot cease till the soul make away it self As touching this I shall remind you of one remarkable accident which many in London this day can witness the truth of what I write Thomas Gun by name was the man who for gifts and parts in the Ministry as also for a civil life did equalize all the teachers of the Baptists if not excell them and yet at that very same instant was guilty of adultery and that for a long time deceived his own soul and the poor woman his torment for which could not be satisfied till he took a Pistol and shot himself to death thus it was with him and so with many more little or much are in hell yea on this earth tormented though nothing comparable to what thou shalt be at the day of Christs next appearance Again thou sayest The devil is a wicked cursed blasphemer against God and all that is good yea the devil is a lying murthering persecutor of the people of God therefore man is not the devil because he is a true worshipper of God c. Ans If thou understoodst what thou sayest I could set to my seal that whosoever is a true worshipper of God is no devil for indeed none can worship him or be reverent of his name but those that are of the seed of Faith those that are eternally preserved in peace here and glory hereafter for it is life eternal to know thee the onely true God without which knowledge none can worship him or be reverent of his name thus far I agree and set to my seal that this man is no devil but alas how many of these are in this perishing world though millions of thousand thousands make a show and a talk of a God yet very few there are that knows him as he is a glorious personal God so that true was that saying from the Lord in Isaiah 10. 22. For though my people be as the sand of the sea yet a remnant of them shal be saved Fear not my little flock it is your fathers pleasure to give you a Kingdom One of a tribe two of a City so few are those that knows the true God that they are but a handful to them that knows him not But now to the Query in hand The devil saith thou is a wicked cursed blasphemer against God and all that is good from whence thou concludes man cannot be this devil in that man is not so wicked as to curse and blaspheme God what if I can find out such men that hath and at this day will curse God to his face is not this sufficient to convince thee there is no other devil but what is in man for I 'le assure thee there is some this day in London and Country also that in my hearing hath said God is a devil and

produce for to satisfie their devilish lust perswading themselves that God is an infinite formless Spirit an infinite Nothing or an infinite All in this their beastly reason so that well comes in that saying of David Psal 50. 21. These things hast thou done and kept silence thou thoughtest I was altogether such a one as thy self as if he should have said Thou thoughtest it was I that committed adultery that did cozen and lye with the innocent thou thoughtest it was I in thee that moved thee to swear whore and cheat thy fellow mortals but thou shalt know that I am a God that is not an infinite nothing for out of nothing comes nothing as also thou shalt know that I am not an infinite All in thy filthiness for the day is at hand that I will reprove thee and that god in thee as in Romans 1. thou hast changed the truth of God into a lye in supposing there is no other God but what is in thee and so worship me as a God filled with all unrighteousness fornication wickedness covetousness maliciousness envy murther debate deceit an inventer of all evil things Thus in part you have heard how this ranting devil is qualified and acted forth and that not onely to all maner of women but man burning in lust with man and women with women as before related and the more it is to be observed that what they do in this nature they affirm it to be just yea to do as they would be done unto for you that knows them as much as I shall finde their tongues tipt with these and such like words but in their actions as you have heard they have sold themselves to commit wickedness and that with greediness never finding themselves more happy then when they are a whoring or drinking which to them is a pure truth as any sentence in Holy Writ for they do not esteem that sin which the Scripture records for sin in that they do not know what to make of that glorious personal God nor his writing looking upon it as a History of mans invention for say they the Scripture is a meer Map of Contradiction so that such devils of this kinde in their hearts do not believe it no more then another writing onely for fear of the Law they will say as you say for what do they affirm A lye and a truth is all one to us and so whatsoever we do is righteous just and good and when we die we shall be swallowed up into the infinite Spirit as a drop into the Ocean and so be as we were and if ever we be raised again we shall rise a horse a cow a root a flower and such like and so turn the world round as before as for hell or damnation it is all here so if they can but escape prison sickness and want of money they fear no other hell or torment hereafter whatsoever Now let any sober man consider the devils quality that acts forth this sort of this cursed seed and as for their language if there were a devil without man that had any dealings with man if possible they would curse and swear that devil out of his name and wits for some of this sort when they are in company with their cursed tribe what oath or oathes was ever heard by the ear of man but they have it and that with authority from their father Cain they maintain it and that seemingly from Scripture and so will take oath against any one they have a revenge to if their false oath will prevail they will do it Thus much of the white light ranting devil 2. The next sort of this cursed feed are qualited and acted forth in most wickedness like unto the first onely the difference is the white ranting devil doth approve of all his wickedness to be righteousness when this black ranting devil doth judge it a sin and yet though his tongue will rayl on the white ranting devil and in what company soever he comes he will speak against these cursed actions and that because he doth not onely know them to be evil but he is afraid his wife husband children or parents should know of it and not onely that but he is afraid the Law will take hold of him and so punish him if not put him to death for it these and such like are the motives inducing him to speak against that with his tongue which his heart burneth and lusteth after but however all these outward fears attend him yet this lust or devil is so desiring after a beautiful maid or another mans wife that though he will say it is a sin and hath read the wrath of God due for it yet he will hazard not onely his credit in this world but the loss of his soul in the world to come and the ground of this his dangerous attempt ariseth from these and such like thoughts I may escape as well as others and I will be sure that none shall see me lye with any woman neither doth any of my neighbors suspect me so that before I will lose the society of such a rare creature in whom my soul is wholly ravisht with the thoughts of what pleasures and delights I shall have with her I will hazard both soul and body for what saith such a sort of devil as this as for the world I will play my cards so wisely that none shall hear or know of it and though it be a sin it is not the greatest neither am I the first or shall be the last and therefore I shall make as good shift as another and besides that I know that God is a merciful God and though in my strength and youth of my body I do now and then break forth a little I hope the Lord if I do but on my death-bed cry him mercy he will forgive me Ah poor dark deluded soul dost thou think that when the righteous just upright heart hath much ado to finde mercy and yet thou wicked ungodly man thinkest it is easie for such as thou no no thou shalt finde that as in the strength of nature and health of body thou hast spent thy time in satisfaction of thy lust when all that thy pleasure is at an end then in a small measure shall be presented unto thee what thou shalt be at the day of resurrection for alas poor heart thou thinkest the God of Truth is like thee a man of lies and by thy corrupt petition to turn the will of God as with a petition thou canst turn the will of man but then to thy cost thou shalt finde he is a God that changes not which in the last Chapter I shall shew thee at large Now to the matter in hand as touching thy quality and acting forth in thy Carriage and Language that from my Seed-spring I speak it if there were a devil without man as there is not that devil would tremble to behold thy carriage and hear thy expressions for pride doth

though they might proceed from his loins according to the flesh through mixtures of seeds in marriages the sons of God saw the daughters of men to be fair and they took of them to be their wives Again though the blessed Israelites and cursed Canaanites are mixed together by carnal copulation since the prince of devils became flesh yet you that are spiritual may know that the Lord Iesus that made them both knew how to separate them for all their close union and to call them by names answerable to their own natures As consider did not the glorious Creator and blessed Redeemer himself make a clear distinction between two worlds or generations when he said I pray not for the world but for them that thou hast given me out of the world can you therefore that are sober imagine or think that there is any spiritual salvation for these men or women which the Saviour of the world excludes in his petition Moreover it is wtitten that the Apostles said We know that we are of God and the whole world lyeth in wickedness Behold ye redeemed ones of the most high God is it not as clear as the light it self that there is two distinct whole worlds according to that saying Then all Israel shall be saved a redeemed world of elect Israelites and an unredeemed world of reprobate Canaanites that were never truly lost in themselves and therefore never capable of being found in Christ accordding to that in the Epistle of Jude where it is thus written For there are certain men crept in which were of old ordained to this condemnation ungodly men which turn the grace of God into wantonness and denying Christ the onely Lord wo unto them for they have followed the way of Cain and are cast away by the deceit of Balaams wages and perish in the gainsaying of Core Thus is it not clear unto all such that have in them any faith in the truth of the Scripture that there is two distinct whole worlds to distinguish between the divine glory of Election and everlasting shame of Rejection a cursed Cain a blessed Abel a subtile serpent and a simple Saint a scoffing carnal Ishmael and a spiritual Isaac a bloody minded Esau and a merciful minded Jacob a persecuting Saul and a prophetical David a treacherous Judas and a gracious and glorious Jesus from the beginning of the world unto the end thereof yea and a blessed Seth born in the stead of righteous Abel to bring forth the generation of the just that the Lord of eternal glory might according to the flesh as well as the spirit spring from a spiritual line of his own light of life eternal and not from a rational or carnal line of eternal death in chains of utter darkness which if it had power according to its cursed desire it would destroy God elect men and angels heaven and earth and all in them and it self also rather then be subject to any or might not onely it self bear rule over all But now to the matter in hand and withal consider what you read for it highly concerns you to look about you that if there should be any evil angels or devils living in the air and a devil amongst them called Beelzebub the prince of devils then I say what need any man trouble himself with the least fear of eternal death what wickedness soever is committed by thee why because if a man is tempted by any devil but what is in his own nature onely that evil spirit is to be eternally damned and the man set free nay moreover if sin or evil issued not from mans unclean reason or lying imagination within him is it possible think you that any man should be tormented as some men are with an inward burning through a secret fear of eternal sufferings rising in them from the guilt of former evils committed against the light of their own consciences furthermore seeing all men which live after the flesh must die or perish and that mans own lust is that imaginary devil from whence proceeds all sin or evil Without controversie though men or angels should gainsay it there are no other evil spirits angels or devils but unmerciful men and women onely Again if envy pride covetousness hypocrisie lust and such like be the devil in man then are not men and women those devils that are under the power of those evils I would fain know from the learned men of this world whether there are any other evil angels or devils besides mankinde that lust after women or silver or honor or revenge or any kinde of evil whatsoever truly if those supposed wise men that talk so much of the sublilty of the prince of the air that rules in the children of disobedience could possibly know that their own imaginary Reason was that evill spirit or prince of all their airy disputes concerning God angels devils Heaven hell eternal glory or shame to come which they know not of according to truth then in stead of their reioycing in the approbation of many men in relation unto their natural gifts their own spirits would immediately become the principle of all those howling groaning serpent-devils spoken of in Holy Writ even in the sight of elect men and angels in this mortal life Again is it not against all spiritual or rational sense that any man angel or devil should suffer eternal damnation for the sin of another or for anothers tempting him to sin or evil Moreover doth it stand to very good sense that yea that creature that is left to himself to be tempted unto sin or evil and overcome thereby and remains under the power of it to their lives end its requisite at the great day he should suffer for his own sin and not for anothers iniquity wherefore judge you is it not one of the vainest things in the world for any man to think that there is any other evil spirit angel or devil that tempts him to any motion imagination thought desire word or action of rebellion against God or man but the proud lying envious devil living in his whole man as aforesaid Therefore let no man that professeth spiritual light or life in him for very shame say that God can be tempted or tempt any man unto sin or evil neither let him say that any evil spirit angel or devil in the air or earth or in the water or in the fire tempts him to commit any sin or evil but that airy watery fiery lustful fleshly devil dwelling in his own body I say let him know that yea that is the prince of the air which thorow the absenting vertue of the holy Spirit begets those legions of devils or lusts in the soul of man and it is the true light of the Lord Jesus Christ in all his new born babes that crusheth the Cockatrice eggs before they become serpent-devils to sting the whole man with fear of eternal death So that understand what I say those devils which by the

powerful word of the Lord Jesus were cast out of Mary Magdalene or any other creature spoken of in Holy Writ were onely all maner of filthy diseases or violent fiery distempers in man that hurried him about any desperate wickedness whatsoever oftentimes increasing so powerfully as you may read in Mark the fifth that it did not onely occasion him to rend his own body and break iron chains but also he is ready to tear any one in pieces until the Lord of Glory shined into his distempered soul with that golden Grace of true Faith through which that imaginary devil is chained up whereby all his fleshly goods were spoiled of ever having power in him as formerly and being now in his right minde at the glorious feet of Christ Jesus through his own pure light leading him into heavenly raptures in reference unto his eternal glory at his visible appearing in the clouds with all his mighty Angels Therefore seriously consider that if Cain or Abel were both begotten by Adam upon the body of Eve as for the most part all men vainly imagine from one bare Scripture-record which they understand not I would know of that man that is offended with me concerning this point why Cain was nominated in Holy Writ to be of that wicked one aforesaid and branded as an out-cast fugitive vagabond and cursed from the divine presence of the Creator and cast out of the natural presence of his parents for ever and condemned with Balaam and Core as a perishing cast-away This I am sure of that no spiritual rational man that is sober dare say that either Adam or Eve was that wicked one from whence the cursed spirit of Cain sprang why because there is no such opprobrious names attributed unto them through the sacred Scriptures Moreover you may know that yea that wicked one from whence Cains spirit proceeded could not possibly have any relation to Adam or Eve though Cain was conceived in her womb and born of her body and that because there was an absolute curse denounced upon the Angelical Serpent and his seed in her womb as aforesaid without any after-promise in Holy Writ for ever being redeemed by the Creator but on the contrary you know there was a gracious promise by the Creator himself of the Redemption of Adam and Eve after their fallen estate with their whole generation of righteous Abels Seths or Abrahams in that glorious hidden saying The Seed of the woman shall break the serpents head Now one Scripture more which shall be against all gainsayers interpreted which is this Matthew the fourth beginning at the first verse Then was Jesus led up of the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil and when he had fasted forty days and forty nights he was afterward an hungred and when the tempter came to him he said If thou be the Son of God command that these stones be made bread then he answered Man shall not live by bread onely but by every word of God or that word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God then the devil taketh him up into the holy City and setteth him on a pinacle of the temple and saith unto him If thou be the Son of God cast thy self down for it is written He hath given his angels charge concerning thee c. Again the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world and the glory thereof and saith unto him All these things will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me c. In that these hidden sayings hath their dependence on the precedent Chapter I must from thence make way to this divine Secret As if thou couldst but understand what thou readest thou shalt finde that as soon as ever Christ was baptized by John the Holy Ghost fell upon him that did impower him to encounter with the devil in which Dispute we must observe these two particulars 1. Who this tempter or devil was 2. The nature of this temptation First take notice that this tempter was one of the wisest and soberest yet subtilest Disputant amongst the Pharisees and Sadduces and therefore appointed by them to have conference with Christ as by and by you shall read for if you cast your eyes on John the third the fifth sixth and seventh verses you shall finde there went out to him Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region round about Jordan and were baptized of him in Jordan confefsing their sins as touching these John used no words of reproof or dislike in the least but when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadduces come to his baptism he forthwith upbraided them with a sad yet just sentence saying O generation of vipers who hath forewarned you to flee from the wrath to come c. as if he should have said Ye are the children of that wicked one that onely comes to dispute and to cavel therefore John cuts them short with these words Bring forth fruits meet for repentance and think not to say within your selves we have Abraham to our father Then John proceeds further and tells them I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance but he that cometh after me is mightier then I whose shoes I am not worthy to bare he shall baptize you with the holy Ghost and with fire Now when the Pharisees and Sadduces heard this they forthwith commissionated one of the wisest and subtilest devil amongst them which by experience they found was best versed in Scripture to see if this man-devil could perswade the Lord Jesus to baptize them with the Holy Ghost and with fire Now that you may no longer doubt but that this tempter or devil was onely a man as aforesaid cast thy eye into Deuteronomy 6. and the sixth verse where it is thus written Ye shall not tempt the Lord your God as ye tempted him in Massah so read Heb. 3. 9. Now tell me friend who those were that tempted the Lord were they not the people of Israel men and women So this tempter or devil that I am now treating of was onely a wise subtile man as you have already heard and will in this temptation be made more apparent 2. To the nature of the temptation beginning at these words Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil First minde the Spirit that led Iesus up into the wilderness was the Holy Ghost which came upon him at the baptism of John a little before the tempter came as you may read in the last verse of the third of Matthew I have found it true by experience that whosoever hath received the Holy Spirit cannot be free from the temptation of the devil that is the cavelling contentious disputes of unreasonable and unmerciful men But Secondly in the next place I shall give you to understand that this wilderness here spoken of was not a wilderness yielding fruit for the supporting of life where nothing