Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	punishment_n	sin_n	wage_n	4,100	5	11.0461	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45200	Contemplations upon the remarkable passages in the life of the holy Jesus by Joseph Hall.	Hall, Joseph, 1574-1656.	1679 (1679)	Wing H376; ESTC R30722	360,687	516

and Spirits respites the utmost of their torment He might upon the first instant of the fall of Angels have inflicted on them the highest extremity of his vengeance he might upon the first sins of our youth yea of our nature have swept us away and given us our portion in that fiery lake He stays a time for both though with this difference of mercy to us men that here not onely is a delay but may be an utter prevention of punishment which to the evil Spirits is altogether impossible They do suffer they must suffer and though they have now deserved to suffer all they must yet they must once suffer more then they do Yet so doth this evil Spirit expostulate that he sues I beseech thee torment me not The world is well changed since Satan's first onset upon Christ Then he could say If thou be the Son of God now Jesus the Son of the Most high God then All these will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me now I beseech thee torment me not The same power when he lists can change the note of the Tempter to us How happy are we that have such a Redeemer as can command the Devils to their chains O consider this ye lawless sinners that have said Let us break his bands and cast his cords from us However the Almighty suffers you for a judgment to have free scope to evil and ye can now impotently resist the revealed will of your Creatour yet the time shall come when ye shall see the very masters whom ye have served the powers of darkness unable to avoid the revenges of God How much less shall man strive with his Maker Man whose breath is in his nostrils whose house is clay whose foundation is the dust Nature teaches every creature to wish a freedome from pain The foulest Spirits cannot but love themselves and this love must needs produce a deprecation of evil Yet what a thing is this to hear the Devil at his prayers I beseech thee torment me not Devotion is not guilty of this but fear There is no grace in the suit of Devils but nature no respect of glory to their Creatour but their own ease they cannot pray against sin but against torment for sin What news is it now to hear the profanest mouth in extremity imploring the Sacred Name of God when the Devils do so The worst of all creatures hates punishment and can say Lead me not into pain onely the good heart can say Lead me not into temptation If we can as heartily pray against sin for the avoiding of displeasure as against punishment when we have displeased there is true Grace in the soul Indeed if we could fervently pray against sin we should not need to pray against punishment which is no other then the inseparable shadow of that body but if we have not laboured against our sins in vain do we pray against punishment God must be just and the wages of sin is death It pleased our Holy Saviour not onely to let fall words of command upon this Spirit but to interchange some speeches with him All Christ's actions are not for example It was the errour of our Grandmother to hold chat with Satan That God who knows the craft of that old Serpent and our weak simplicity hath charged us not to enquire of an evil Spirit Surely if the Disciples returning to Jacob's Well wondred to see Christ talk with a woman well may we wonder to see him talking with an unclean Spirit Let it be no presumption O Saviour to ask upon what grounds thou didst this wherein we may not follow thee We know that sin was excepted in thy conformity of thy self to us we know there was no guile found in thy mouth no possibility of taint in thy nature in thine actions Neither is it hard to conceive how the same thing may be done by thee without sin which we cannot but sin in doing There is a vast difference in the Intention in the Agent For as on the one side thou didst not ask the name of the Spirit as one that knew not and would learn by enquiring but that by the confession of that mischief which thou pleasedst to suffer the grace of the cure might be the more conspicuous the more glorious so on the other God and Man might doe that safely which meer Man cannot doe without danger Thou mightest touch the leprosie and not be legally unclean because thou touchedst it to heal it didst not touch it with possibility of infection So mightest thou who by reason of the perfection of thy Divine nature wert uncapable of any stain by the interlocution with Satan safely confer with him whom corrupt Man predisposed to the danger of such a parly may not meddle with without sin because not without peril It is for none but God to hold discourse with Satan Our surest way is to have as little to doe with that Evil one as we may and if he shall offer to maintain conference with us by his secret temptations to turn our speech unto our God with the Archangel The Lord rebuke thee Satan It was the presupposition of him that knew it that not onely men but Spirits have names This then he asks not out of an ignorance or curiosity nothing could be hid from him who calleth the Stars and all the hoasts of Heaven by their names but out of a just respect to the glory of the Miracle he was working whereto the notice of the name would not a little avail For if without inquiry or confession our Saviour had ejected this evil Spirit it had passed for the single dispossession of one onely Devil whereas now it appears there was a combination and hellish champarty in these powers of darkness which were all forced to vail unto that almighty command Before the Devil had spoken singularly of himself What have I to doe with thee and I beseech thee torment me not yet our Saviour knowing that there was a multitude of Devils lurking in that breast who dissembled their presence wrests it out of the Spirit by this interrogation What is thy name Now can those wicked ones no longer hide themselves He that asked the question forced the answer My name is Legion The authour of discord hath borrowed a name of war from that military order of discipline by which the Jews were subdued doth the Devil fetch his denomination They were many yet they say My name not Our name though many they speak as one they act as one in this possession There is a marvellous accordance even betwixt evil Spirits That Kingdome is not divided for then it could not stand I wonder not that wicked men do so conspire in evil that there is such unanimity in the broachers and abetters of errours when I see those Devils which are many in substance are one in name action habitation Who can too much brag of unity when it is incident unto wicked Spirits All the

whom ye serve not he whom ye tempt onely in this shall he be approved your Master that he shall pay your wages and give you your portion with hypocrites The act of Adultery was her crime to be taken in the very act was no part of her sin but the proof of her just conviction yet her deprehension is made an aggravation of her shame Such is the corrupt judgement of the world To doe ill troubles not men but to be taken in doing it unknown filthiness passeth away with ease it is the notice that perplexes them not the guilt But O foolish sinners all your packing and secrecy cannot so contrive it but that ye shall be taken in the manner your Conscience takes you so the God of Heaven takes you so and ye shall once find that your Conscience is more then a thousand witnesses and God more then a thousand Consciences They that complain of the act urge the punishment Now Moses in the Law commanded us that such should be stoned Where did Moses bid so Surely the particularity of this execution was without the book Tradition and custome enacted it not the Law Indeed Moses commanded death to both the offenders not the manner of death to either By analogy it holds thus It is flatly commanded in the case of a Damsell betrothed to an Husband and found not to be a Virgin in the case of a Damsell betrothed who being defiled in the city cried not Tradition and custome made up the rest obtaining out of this ground that all Adulterers should be executed by lapidation The ancienter punishment was burning death always though in divers forms I shame to think that Christians should slight that sin which both Jews and Pagans held ever deadly What a mis-citation is this Moses commanded The Law was God's not Moses's If Moses were imployed to mediate betwixt God and Israel the Law is never the more his He was the hand of God to reach the Law to Israel the hand of Israel to take it from God We do not name the water from the pipes but from the spring It is not for a true Israelite to rest in the second means but to mount up to the supreme originall of justice How reverent soever an opinion was had of Moses he cannot be thus named without a shamefull undervaluing of the royall Law of his Maker There is no mortall man whose authority may not grow into contempt that of the ever-living God cannot but be ever sacred and inviolable It is now with the Gospel as it was then with the Law the word is no other then Christ's though delivered by our weakness whosoever be the Crier the Proclamation is the King 's of Heaven Whilst it goes for ours it is no marvell if it lie open to despight How captious a word is this Moses said thus what saiest thou If they be not sure that Moses said so why do they affirm it and if they be sure why do they question that which they know decided They would not have desired a better advantage then a contradiction to that received Law-giver It is their profession We are Moses's disciples and We know that God spake to Moses It had been quarrel enough to oppose so known a Prophet Still I find it the drift of the enemies of truth to set Christ and Moses together by the ears in the matter of the Sabbath of Circumcision of Marriage and Divorce of the use of the Law of Justification by the Law of the sense and extent of the Law and where not But they shall never be able to effect it they two are fast and indissoluble friends on both parts for ever each speaks for other each establishes other they are subordinate they cannot be opposite Moses faithfull as a servant Christ as a Son A faithfull servant cannot but be officious to the Son The true use we make of Moses is to be our Schoolmaster to teach us to whip us unto Christ the true use we make of Christ is to supply Moses By him all that believe are justified from all things from which they could not be justified by the law of Moses Thus must we hold in with both if we will have our part in either So shall Moses bring us to Christ and Christ to glory Had these Pharisees out of simplicity and desire of resolution in a case of doubt moved this question to our Saviour it had been no less commendable then now it is blame-worthy O Saviour whither should we have recourse but to thine Oracle Thou art the Word of the Father the Doctour of the Church Whilst we hear from others What say Fathers what say Councils let them hear from us What sayest thou But here it was far otherwise they came not to learn but to tempt and to tempt that they might accuse Like their Father the Devil who solicits to sin that he may plead against us for yieldance Fain would these colloguing adversaries draw Christ to contradict Moses that they might take advantage of his contradiction On the one side they saw his readiness to tax the false glosses which their presumptuous Doctours had put upon the Law with an I say unto you on the other they saw his inclination to mercy and commiseration in all his courses so far as to neglect even some circumstances of the Law as to touch the Leper to heal on the Sabbath to eat with known sinners to dismiss an infamous but penitent offender to select and countenance two noted Publicans and hereupon they might perhaps think that his compassion might draw him to cross this Mosaical institution What a crafty bait is here laid for our Saviour Such as he cannot bite at and not be taken It seems to them impossible he should avoid a deep prejudice either to his justice or mercy For thus they imagine Either Christ will second Moses in sentencing this woman to death or else he will cross Moses in dismissing her unpunished If he command her to be stoned he loses the honour of his clemency and Mercy if he appoint her dismission he loses the honour of his Justice Indeed strip him of either of these and he can be no Saviour O the cunning folly of vain men that hope to beguile Wisedom it self Silence and neglect shall first confound those men whom after his answer will send away convicted In stead of opening his mouth our Saviour bows his body and in stead of returning words from his lips writes characters on the ground with his finger O Saviour I had rather silently wonder at thy gesture then inquire curiously into the words thou wrotest or the mysteries of thus writing onely herein I see thou meantest to shew a disregard to these malicious and busy cavillers Sometimes taciturnity and contempt are the best answers Thou that hast bidden us Be wise as serpents givest us this noble example of thy prudence It was most safe that these tempters should be thus kept fasting with a silent disrespect that