Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A30271
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Causa Dei, or, Counsel to the rich of this world to the highest part of the dust of the earth : to which is prefixed an humble address to the King's Majesty.
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Burgess, Daniel, 1645-1713.
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1697
(1697)
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Wing B5696; ESTC R15481
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49,787
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144
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you can think the Prisoners in Bedlam to be the Sages of the City and the Merchants upon the Exchange to be the Idiots and Lunaticks Mentiuntur qi dicunt saith the Pagan Ecclesiast A Lie will not choak such as say that they think there 's no God and no Life to come Sirs Is there any where a Man but there is a Conscience Does any one act and not reflect upon his Actions Is there ever a Party but what is his own Judg too And Can there be a Conscience without a Law How come Men to make Conscience of any thing if they be under no Law or Obligation And why should they if they be accountable to no Authority Conscience without Law is of no Force And can you tell What is a Law without a Sanction Without a Confirmation by Rewards and Penalties What is a Law when disarmed of this What is it more than the Sign of a George on Horseback over a Door which neither commands any Body in or keeps any one out Law and Punishment are Relatives and mutually connote each other in the common Sense of all the World Where-ever Precepts be the Rule of Subjects Duty Sanctions are the Rules of Princes Process And doubt you but that A Sanction implies a Judg A Judg without whom Precept and Sanction were vain And might be disregarded without Loss or Hazard But say also If there be a Judg must there not be a Judgment-Day A Day of solemn Trial and final Judgment Wherein he who now rules the World with Patience will judg it in Righteousness Who can wink so close but he must see this But what if the Doctrine of this Dooms-day were of any Vncertainty What if it did admit of Question and were no more than a probable Opinion What if as one speaks there were an even lay between the Negative and Affirmative Would not Wisdom bid us stick to the safest side of the Question and make that Hypothesis the Rule of your Life Inasmuch as if no such Day do come Good Men must fare as well as Bad ones But if it doth come they must fare as much better as Rivers of Eternal Pleasure are more sweet than a Lake of unquenchable Fire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 said Euripides and it was often repeated by Pyrrhon himself Who knows but to Die is to Live To return then Religion which is the only Salt to season and sweeten this Life is the only means to be thought of for securing the next Phrenzy it self cannot imagine that Contempt of the Supream King is the way to Preferment in his Court Or that he who is only Wise will set Crowns of Glory upon Fools That he will make them happy for ever who disdain to seek his Acquaintance and Favour And do as plainly love Earth more than Heaven as they love Heaven more than Hell The Future Blessed State is a Penny which the Lord of it thinks too much for any but Labourers in his Vineyard Yea Labourers to the Death therein It is a Treasure that he gives to none but such as part with their Sins and are disposed to part with their Lives for it It is that Joy of his which no one must have but they who do faithfully improve his concredited Talents It is that Feast whereto none are admitted but such as have on them the Wedding-Garment i. e. Imputed Righteousness Inherent and Practical It is that Prize which none obtain but they who accomplish their Race It is that Crown which none must receive but they who fight and conquer Flesh World and Devil It is that House of the King wherein no Man gets a Mansion but he who enters in at the Strait-gate of Christianity It is that Inheritance which belongs to none but to new-born Children as well as Adopted ones And to such as not only are Children but do walk as Children of the Most High Wherefore in every respect Blessed are they who hear the Word of God and keep it Ask you now seriously What you shall do Or derisorily What it is that you can do And whether it be presumed in what hath been said That disordered Clocks can set themselves to rights Or dead Men recal their Lives And Men whom Satan hath bound for many Years can loose and let themselves go Sirs You shall not be set about ought that is either unnecessary or impossible It is true being corrupted in your noblest Parts you can never restore your selves In the Body no Principles of Constitution can cure a Gangrene And in the Soul when the Vnderstanding and Will are vitiated nothing of their own can restore their Rectitude Because the Mind that should direct is more than Ignorant even Erroneous And the Will that should Command is more than Impotent even Malicious Yea and Sin as deadly as it is doth not smart but stupify you whereby your Vices even the most cruel and sanguinary ones be made like Soldiers Arms not at all uneasy or any more a Burden to them than their very Limbs And more than that they be even Ornaments in their Sight Of that Mind was he who said concerning profane Swearing That it was a pity that such a good Grace of Speech should be any Offence In short if ever you are Saved you must be new Created And none but Almighty Power can produce a New-Creature Yet know ye Sirs God your Redeemer is before-hand with you He giveth you more Power to recover your selves out of the Snare of the Devil than you make use of The Schools of Calvin and Arminius do agree in this that so much Power is given unto every Man as serves to justify God's Commanding Man and to condemn Man's Disobeying God who as you know promiseth you that the Diligent Hand shall make Rich. Yea and he hath given you this abundant Encouragement to seek supernatural Grace he hath said it The Meek he will teach his Way The Meek are Men humble enough to desire the Favour to receive his Commands and the Grace to keep them To desire it with congruous Grief and Shame of their Apostacy And with entire Submission to his Gospel-way of Salvation which is by Repentance Faith and new Obedience Let it be told if it be known who did ever thus seek and not find Eternal Life Or why should it not be hoped that the Mountains of your Spirits by this time are levelled And that you are more than almost perswaded to the Holy Ambition aforesaid If so upon the Writer be the Reproach if you find it lost Labour To off with the Vipers which have fastned upon your Hands The vain and vile Companions whose Tongues are more venomous than Vipers Teeth And whose chosen Company are under God's extream Curse A Companion of Fools shall be destroyed To commence Friendships with Men of shining Faces Holy Wisdom makes the Face to shine And Wise Mens Associates have the reversion of Wisdom unto Salvation He that walks with Wise Men shall be Wise To take a
Fish than would have bought an Ox. And upon their Shooes they wore Pearls Your Tympany may not rise so high But under favour be it asked do you hate both extreams of being profuse as the Sea and of heaping up Gold as the Sand 12. Do you preach to your selves that Gospel Precept Be ye courteous Do you doubt but it binds the greatest that are born of Women You do not question but it doth and you cannot but feel that high Places do make rugged Tempers The Rich are answered roughly Do you therefore well consider wilful Morosity is extream Inhumanity Nor have Saints sufficient Grace to bear so brutish a Nature Do not spit upon this homespun Epithet For none is more true or apt The African Forests have nothing more unreasonable in them than those Churls who do brow-beat Men made in the Image of God and for no other Cause than their want of gay Clothes Who despise such Men as God hath honoured with the Righteousness of his Son with the Grace of his Spirit with the Guard of his Angels and with the Reversion of his Heavenly Kingdom And this because they have not to shew the Trophies of Moth and Rust and Thieves Can they tell us why their Eyes do not rather despise their Ears because they have not the faculty of Seeing And their Ears despise their Eyes because they have as little the faculty of Hearing Do you not see it Sirs your poor Friends hasten from you when they see lowring Faces thô you have open Hands Affability is as obliging as Money and Charity it self is odious when it is morose As Medicines tho ever so wholesome when they are bitter they are loathsome To give large Morsels and not shew sweet Manners is to give Marrowhones without the Marrow in them David thô a King who had been provoked sugared his words My People and my Brethren 1 Chron. 28.2 The greater is your shame if you treat your fellow Subjects with Language â—nhandsome And the rather because right well you know that hard Words and sowr Faces like Spanish Flies do raise Blisters 13. Do you make your Light to shine before Men Good Works must not be done to be seen of Men to fetch in their Praises But they must be done to be seen of Men to carry them forth Patterns Believe you not that you are commanded so to do them that Friends and Enemies may be compelled to see them You know your Sins are written in Letters big enough for them to read And think you that your Duties to God and your Neighbour should be drawn in a less Character Of old the Angel was a Destroyer if the Blood of the Lamb was not seen on the Door Works and not Words must convince Men that you are Christians and that you do value no Birth like the Second no Estate like the Saints Inheritance in Light no Place of Honour like Christ's right Hand no Place of Power like that of judging the World and no State like the Heavenly one in which Desires are exceeded and Fears excluded Ought you not to convince Men hereof Or think you that any Language but the language of Practice can convince them 14. Do you greatly fear the least Sin Do you keep in Mind what you well know That an everlasting Hell is the Wages of the least Sin That St. Paul cried O wretched Man for very involuntary Sin That the old Law required Sacrifice for Sin in a very Dream Lev. 15.16 That it did also require extraordinary Sacrifices for great Mens Sins Signifying your Treasons to be the higher for being yours That the least spark of Sin quickly becomes a great Flame He who was tempted to kill his Father to defile his Mother and to make himself drunk he refused the two first but promptly complied with the last And what came of it Why having glibly swallowed his one Gnat before he came to himself again he took down the two Camels also If you will let in ever so little Thieves the Pygmies will open your Doors to Anakims A vain Thought invites in the Sin against the Holy Ghost When it is indulged and favoured it doth so 15. Do you of all Sins dread the Thought of turning Grace into Wantonness Of sinning because Grace abounds Of being ready to sin because God is ready to forgive Of daring to take down sweet Poison because a powerful Antidote is prepared by your Soul's Physician It is unquestionably true the Forgiving great Sins is God's great Praise Your Unrighteousness in his way of pardoning it sets off God's Righteousness and eminently praises it But what then Of them that say Let us do evil that good may come the Herald of free Grace saith plainly Their Damnation is just This is told you by a most mistaken Man if these following particulars be not too much forgotten by Lords and Ladies There is no Alliance between Christ and Belial Imputed Righteousness thô it frees from Hell it doth not without inherent Righteousness capacitate for Heaven Lepers would be Lepers in the New Jerusalem it self 'T is not the Place that can impart Blessedness You cannot be like God in Felicity if you be not like him in Purity But there can be no greater Sin than the abuse of Grace No greater superfluity of Naughtiness than misuse of Mercy and Forgiveness Nothing can render you so unworthy of Mercy as sinning upon the Presumption of it Chrysostom says it was this that aggravated Judas his Sin and kept him from hope of Pardon 16. Do you know thorowly how to abound i. e. To perform the Duties and to avoid the Dangers of your Prosperity The great Apostle and Martyr of Christ did know this And the Prince of Pagan Philosophers and Courtiers boasted of his knowing it Telling the World that he always kept a great distance between himself and his Estate Insomuch that When he came to part with it it came off easily as a Glove from his Hand not with torture as his Skin from his Flesh Sirs do you keep this distance and greater Do you consider that you are but Men For Iron Fanes are not Gold but Iron tho they be set upon ever so high Steeples And Dwarfs are but Dwarfs tho they do stand upon ever so high Stilts Consider you that being great Men you have greater Duties incumbent on you And the greater are the Sins which are committed by you Consider you that being also new Men the Holy Ghost is extreamly grieved by your Miscarriages Unregenerate Mens Sins resist and vex but yours do also grieve him In short they must have an Vnction from the Holy one and know all things who do truly know how to use this World 's good things Tho every Abcdarian be apt to turn a Pygmalion 17. Do you owe nothing but what you hasten to pay No Respect no good Office no Money The Divine old Law is in force upon the Highest of you At his Day thou shalt give the poor Hireling his Hire