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A64376 A sermon preached at the anniversary meeting of the clergy-mens sons in the church of St. Mary-le-Bow, December 3, 1691 by Thomas Tenison. Tenison, Thomas, 1636-1715. 1691 (1691) Wing T718; ESTC R23739 10,892 33

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living at such distance from the first Fountain of Evangelical Tradition and many find a way to their worldly Profit through the breaches of Unity It is in the few that Reason and Grace rule and what Equity can be expected where the Passions of Men give the Law Daily experience shews how narrow-minded how unjust how biassed Men are how they judge by their Affections and that instead of doing nothing by Partiality they scarce do any thing otherwise in such sort that where there are many Competitors for any Place every one of them finds his Friend and perhaps the most unqualifi'd Person does at length prevail 3. But Thirdly every Christian should walk by a straighter Rule considering 1 st What is the corrupt Original And 2 dly What are the sad effects of siding and partiality 1 st For the Cause of it It has its Original in the brutal Part of Man which ought not to give Law but to be mortifi'd and subdu'd St. Paul numbers fierce Zeal and Seditions amongst the works of the Flesh and expostulates with those who rais'd the foremention'd difference about the Persons and Gifts of Paul Apollos and Cephas saying Are ye not carnal and walk as Men Do ye not proceed after the common fashion of the Men of this World who have scarce a grain of the Salt of Wisdom in their Bodies whose Imaginations are false Glasses distorting the Images of Truth and Goodness whose Eyes are the Windows of Vanity and whose Ears let in delusive Report and are charm'd with Flattery whose Anger is a short madness whose Lusts are blind and impetuous whose very Stomach is such an Enemy and yet such a God to the rest of the Members and whose Heart is full of haughty Thoughts and earthly Desires Of these evils Partiality is made up but especially of the latter Pride and Covetousness Partial men resolve all into their own private Humour and Inclination They move about their own Center and wind in all they can as if they were a World by themselves so that in all they design and in all they do they have an eye to that recompence of Reward which may accrue to themselves in the gratifying of some peculiar Fancy Appetite or Passion 2. The Effects of Partiality answer the Cause of it And 1 st Hereby Men are alienated from God who governs the World by the Rules of Equity who is no respecter of Persons who accepts of no Man whose Cause is Evil who punishes and rewards every Man according to his works who gives this Command in Exod. 23. 2. Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil neither shalt thou speak in a Cause to decline after many to wrest Judgment or to pass Sentence merely upon a popular motive The same Just God in Psal. 50. 16 17 18. reproves those wicked and partial men who would take upon them to declare his Statutes judicially and to do it in favour of Offenders When thou sawest a Thief thou consentedst with him didst judge in favour of him and hast been partaker with Adulterers or become guilty of their Crime by not punishing of it Nor did he out of Arbitrary will accept of Abel and reject Cain but had regard to the Principles of their Hearts and according to them their Sacrifices were pleasing or displeasing to him This is the Spirit of that God that made us whom we ought to imitate but it dwells not in the heart of the selfish who are govern'd by Favour and Affection by Sides and partial Friendships and yet presume oftentimes to entitle the Righteous Lord to their own interested Declensions from the merit of Persons and Causes So the Congregation of the Children of Israel call'd those who were in a wicked Confederacy with Corah The People of the Lord. And Persons of like Temper fall into the like presumptuous Expressions and when they kill others out of Revenge they pretend they do God good service or offer a Sacrifice which needs not Frankincense to make it grateful to him Tho every offering that is good in it self is to him an Abomination when it comes from an unsound and blemished Heart And 2 dly as Partialists are not followers but dishonourers of God so are they injurious to the World 1. To the Justice And 2. To that which is the consequence of Justice the Peace and Order of it 1. They are Enemies to common Justice passing Sentence and proceeding according to the Affection that is predominant in them What Antinomians ascribe rashly to God is true of Partialists in their Actings They can see no Sin in their own People though one would think the dearer the Child were the more offensive would be the disobedience But Partiality blinds them and with such to be among them is merit From the Injustice of this Principle it was that S. Austin was so ill treated by the followers of Donatus They made the Division and then charg'd him with it and revil'd him saith Posidonius as a Wolf who ought to be kill'd in defence of the Flock In the mean time he was a holy and humble Man and stood on the just defensive part but they were fierce and factious and would not allow a Man to be a Christian if he said I am baptiz'd I embrace the Catholick Faith unless he added I am of the Party of Donatus The Partial likewise construe the Sufferings of others as perversly as they do their Lives They would perswade themselves or at least the World that Heaven it self testifies against the Persons whom they affect not by every misfortune which befalls them If Men of another way live piously and fall into some great affliction or die a sudden death they rashly call this a Judgment If some of their own way live immorally and either suffer in the World or in a moment are taken out of it they will say God by chastening them dealeth with them as the Children of his Love and his Bosom or that as Righteous they are taken away from the evil to come God hath forsaken him said the Enemies of David when he had but afflicted him for a Season The Heathens imputed all the Plagues which befel the Empire to the guilt of the Christians as Innovators not calling to mind the provocation of their own real Superstition and Idolatry And the Christians who were against Theodorit Ibas and Theodorus imputed all the Wars Famines and Pestilences in Italy to the favour shew'd to them in the Fifth Synod And the Miseries under which the Greek Church groaneth to this day are by the Friends of the Papacy ascrib'd to the distance it has kept from their Usurpation Good God! That Partial Men should pervert God's Judgments as well as their own and thereby oppose the Justice And 2. That which would otherwise have been the Fruit of it the Peace and Order of the World None are oftner complaining of the times than Partial Men and none occasion greater evil in them than they