Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	day_n	like_a	sabbath_n	1,189	5	10.2088	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A75017	The lively oracles given to us. Or the Christians birth-right and duty, in the custody and use of the Holy Scripture. By the author of the Whole duty of man, &c.	Allestree, Richard, 1619-1681.; Pakington, Dorothy Coventry, Lady, d. 1679, attributed name.; Sterne, Richard, 1596?-1683, attributed name.; Fell, John, 1625-1686, attributed name.; Henchman, Humphrey, 1592-1675, attributed name.; Burghers, M., engraver.	1678 (1678)	Wing A1151B; ESTC R3556	108,574	250

describing the offices in the public Assemblies We feed our faith with the sacred Words we raise our hopes and establish our reliance 15. AND as the Jews thought it indecent for persons professing piety to let three daies pass without the offices thereof in the congregation and therefore met in their Synagogues upon every Tuesday and Thursday in the week and there perform'd the duties of fasting praier and hearing the holy Scriptures concerning which is the boast of the Pharisee Luk. 18.12 in conformity hereto the Christians also their Sabbath being brought forward from the Saturday to the day following that the like number of daies might not pass them without performing the aforesaid duties in the congregation met together on the Wednesdaies and Fridaies which were the daies of Station so frequently mention'd in Tertullian and others the first writers of the Church Tertullian expresly saies that the Christians dedicated to the offices of Piety the fourth and sixth day of the week and Clemens Alex. saies of the Christians that they understood the secret reasons of their weekly fasts to wit those of the fourth day of the week and that of preparation before the Sabbath commonly call'd Wednesday and Friday Where by the way we may take notice what ground there is for the observation of the Wednesday and Friday in our Church and the Litanies then appointed so much neglected in this profligate Age. 16. BUT secondly as the Jews were diligent in the privat reading of the Scripture being taught it from their infancy which custom Saint Paul refers to 1 Tim. 3.15 whereof Josephus against Appion saies That if a man ask any Jew concerning the Laws he will tell every thing readier then his name for learning them from the first time they have sense of any thing they retain them imprinted in their minds So were the first Christians equally industrious in improving their knowledg of divine Truth The whole life of a Christian saies Clem. Alex. Strom. l. 7. is a holy solemnity there his sacrifices are praiers and praises before every meal he has the readings of the holy Scriptures and Psalms and Hymns at the time of his meals Which Tertullian also describes in his Apol. and Saint Cyprian in the end of the Epist to Donatus 17. AND this is farther evidenc'd by the early and numerous versions of the Scriptures into all vulgar Languages concerning which Theodoret speaks in his Book of the Cure of the Affections of the Greeks Serm. 5. We Christians saies he are enabled to shew the power of Apostolic and prophetic doctrins which have fill'd all Countries under Heaven For that which was formerly utter'd in Hebrew is not only translated into the Language of the Grecians but also the Romans Egyptians Persians Indians Armenians Scythians Samaritans and in a word to all the Languages that are us'd by any Nation The same is said by Saint Chrysostom in his first Homily upon Saint Iohn 18. NOR was this don by the blind zeal of inconsiderable men but the most eminent Doctors of the Church were concern'd herein such as Origen who with infinit labor contriv'd the Hexapla Saint Chrysostom who translated the New Testament Psalms and som part of the Old Testament into the Armenian Tongue as witnesses Geor. Alex. in the life of Chrysost So Vlphilas the first Bishop of the Goths translated the holy Scripture into the Gothic as Socrat. Eccl. Hist l. 4. cap. 33. and others testify Saint Jerom who translated them not only into Latin from the Hebrew the Old Italic version having bin from the Greek but also into his native vulgar Dalmatic which he saies himself in his Epistle to Sophronius 19. BUT the peoples having them for their privat and constant use appears farther by the Heathens making the extorting of them a part of their persecution and when diverse did faint in that trial and basely surrender'd them we find the Church level'd her severity only against the offending persons did not according to the Romish equity punish the innocent by depriving them of that sacred Book because the others had so unworthily prostituted it tho the prevention of such a profanation for the future had bin as fair a plea for it as the Romanists do now make but on the contrary the primitive Fathers are frequent nay indeed importunat in their exhortations to the privat study of holy Scripture which they recommend to Christians of all Ranks Ages and Sexes 20. AS an instance hereof let us hear Clemens of Alex. in his Exhort The Word saies he is not hid from any it is a common light that shineth to all men there is no obscurity in it hear it you that be far off and hear it you that are nigh 21. TO this purpose St. Jerom speaks in his Epistle to Leta whom he directs in the education of her young daughter and advises that instead of gems and silk she be enamour'd with the holy Scripture wherein not gold or skins or Babylonian embroideries but a correct and beautiful variety producing faith will recommend its self Let her first learn the Psalter and be entertain'd with those songs then be instructed unto life by the Proverbs of Solomon let her learn from Ecclesiastes to despise worldly things transcribe from Job the practice of patience and vertue let her pass then to the Gospels and never let them be out of her hands and then imbibe with all the faculties of the mind the Acts of the Apostles and Epistles When she has enrich'd the store-house of her breast with these tresures let her learn the Prophets the Heptateuch or books of Moses Joshua and Judges the books of Kings and Chronicles the volumes of Ezra and Esther and lastly the Canticles And indeed this Father is so concern'd to have the unletter'd female sex skilful in the Scriptures that tho he sharply rebukes their pride and over-wening he not only frequently resolves their doubts concerning difficult places in the said Scriptures but dedicates several of his Commentaries to them 22. THE same is to be said of Saint Austin who in his Epistles to unletter'd Laics encourages their enquiries concerning the Scripture assuring Volusianus Ep. 3. that it speaks those things that are plain to the heart of the learned and unlearned as a familiar friend in the mysterious mounts not up into high phrases which might deter a slow and unlearned mind as the poor are in their addresses to the rich but invites all with lowly speech feeding with manifest truth and exercising with secret And Ep. 1.21 tells the devout Proba that in this world where we are absent from the Lord and walk by faith and not by sight the soul is to think it self desolate and never cease from praier and the words of divine and holy Scripture c. 23. SAINT Chrysostom in his third Homily of Lazarus thus addresses himself to married persons house-holders and people engag'd in trades and secular professions telling them that the reading of the Scripture is a

1.3 with the Stork and the Crane and the Swallow by Jeremiah chap. 8.7 Nay the constancy of the Heathen to their false gods is instanc'd to reproch their revolt from the true Hath a Nation changed their gods which yet are no gods but my people have changed their glory for that which doth not profit Jer. 2.11 What awful what majestic representations do we find of Gods power to awake their dread Fear ye not me saith the Lord will ye not tremble at my presence who have placed the sand for the bounds of the sea by a perpetual decree that it cannot pass over and tho the waves thereof toss themselves yet can they not prevail tho they roar yet can they not pass over it Jer. 22. And again Thus saith the high and lofty one that inhabiteth eternity whose name is holy I dwell in the high and holy place Is 57.15 So we find him describ'd as a God glorious in holiness fearful in praises doing wonders Ex. 15.11 These and many other the like heights of divine eloquence we meet with in the prophetic Writings which cannot but strike us with an awful reverence of the divine Power 15. NOR are they less pathetic in the gentler strains What instance is there of the greatest tenderness and love which God has not adopted to express his by He personates all the nearest and most endearing relations that of a Husband I will marry thee to my self Hos 2.19 of a Father I am a Father to Israel and Ephraim is my first born nay he vies bowels with the tender sex and makes it more possible for a mother to renounce her compassions towards the son of her womb then for him to withdraw his Isa 49.15 By all these endearments these cords of a man these bands of love as himself stiles them Hos 11.4 endeavoring to draw his people to their duty and their happiness And when their perverseness frustrates all this his holy Artifice how passionately do's he expostulate with them how solemnly protest his aversness to their ruin Why will ye die O house of Israel for I have no plesure in the death of him that dieth saith the Lord God Ezek. 18.31 32. with what regrets and relentings do's he think of abandoning them How shall I give thee up Ephraim how shall I deliver thee Israel how shall I make thee as Admah how shall I set thee as Zeboim my heart is turn'd within me my repentings are kindled together Hos 11.8 In short 't were endless to cite the places in these prophetic Books wherein God do's thus condescend to solicit even the sensitive part of man and that with such moving Rhetoric that I cannot but wonder at the exception som of our late Critics make against the Bible for its defect in that particular for Oratory is nothing but a dextrous application to the affections and passions of men And certainly we find not that don with greater advantage any where then in sacred Writ 16. YET it was not the design of the Prophets no more then of the Apostle to take men with guile 2 Cor. 12.16 to inveigle their affections unawares to their understandings but they address as well to their reasons make solemn appeals to their judicative faculties And now judg I pray between me and my vineyard saies Isa 5.3 Nay God by the Prophet Ezekiel solemnly pleads his own cause before them vindicates the equity of his proceedings from the aspersions they had cast on them and by most irrefragable Arguments refutes that injurious proverb which went currant among them and in the close appeals to themselves O house of Israel are not my waies equal are not your waies unequal Ezek. 18. the evidences were so clear that he remits the matter to their own determination And generally we shall find that among all the Topics of disswasion from sin there is none more closely prest then that of the folly of it Idolatry was a sin to which Israel had a great propension and against which most of the Prophets admonitions were directed And certainly it can never be more expos'd and the sottish unreasonableness of it better displaied then we find it in the 44. chap. of Isaiah In like manner we may read the Prophet Jeremy disswading from the same sin by Arguments of the most irrefragable conviction Jer. 10. 17. AND as the Prophets omitted nothing as to the manner of their address to render their exhortations effectual the matter of them was likewise so considerable as to command attention It was commonly either the recalling them from their revolts and Apostacies from God by Idolatry or else to convince them of the insignificancy of all those legal ceremonial performances they so much confided in when taken up as a supersedeas to moral duties Upon this account it is that they often depreciate and in a manner prohibit the solemnest of their worships To what purpose are the multitude of your sacrifices unto me bring no more vain oblations incense is an abomination to me the new moons and sabbaths the calling of assemblies I cannot away with it is iniquity even your solemn meetings c. Is 1.11.13 Not that these things were in themselves reprovable for they were all commanded by God but because the Jews depended so much on these external observances that they thought by them to commute for the weightier matters of the Law as our Savior after stiles them judgment mercy and faith Mat. 23.23 lookt on these rites which discriminated them from other Nations as dispensations from the universal obligations of nature and common justice 18. THIS deceit of theirs is sharply upbraided to them by the Prophet Jeremy where he calls their boasts of the Temple of the Lord the Temple of the Lord lying words and on the contrary laies the whole stress of their obedience and expectation of their happiness on the justice and innocence of their conversation ch 7.4 And after do's smartly reproch their insolence in boldly resorting to that house which by bringing their sins along with them they made but an Asylum and Sanctuary for those crimes Will ye steal murder and commit adultery and swear falsely and burn incense to Baal and walk after other gods whom ye know not and come and stand before me in this house Is this house which is called by my name become a den of robbers in your eies chap. 7.9 10 11. Indeed all the Prophets seem to conspire in this one design of making them look thro shadows and ceremonies to that inward purity Justice and Honesty which they were design'd to inculcate not to supplant And this design as it is in it self most excellent most worthy the command of God and the nature of man so we have seen that it has bin pursued by all the most apt and most powerful mediums that the thing or persons addrest to were capable of and so that the Prophets are no less eminent for the discharge of this exhortatory part of their office then they