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	lord_n	week_n	2,075	5	9.7497	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A60613	Two sermons preached at the Cathedral Church of Norwich the one upon the 3d of May being Wednesday in Rogation week, the other upon the 29th day of May being the solemnization of His Majesties birth and restauration / by William Smith, D.D., Preb.	Smith, William, b. 1615 or 16.	1677 (1677)	Wing S4284; ESTC R23652	19,007	40

TWO SERMONS Preached at the Cathedral Church OF NORWICH The one upon the 3 d of May being Wednesday in Rogation Week The other upon the 29 th of May being the Solemnization of His Majesties Birth and Restauration Published at the desire of the Chief Magistrates of the City of Norwich By William Smith D. D. Preb. LONDON Printed by J. M. for Walter Kettilby at the Sign of the Bishops-head in S. Pauls Church-yard 1677. Imprimatur August 18. 1676. G. Jane 1 Thess 5. 17. Pray without ceasing IF because there appear some remarks of ancient Solemnity upon this time and because the established Liturgy doth oblige us to a religious regard to it any man should inquire after the reason and intention of both the question will be easily solved if he do but heed the name and appellation of it as it is commonly called the Rogation-week or the Week of Prayers that is a time chosen and separated by the Churches Wisdom and Authority for Fasting and Prayers the more solemnly to implore the mercy of God upon the World at a season when commonly the rage of Epidemic diseases takes its beginning the fruits of the Earth are in greatest danger to miscarry and Wars are then ordinarily commenced and Campagnes opened Now this pious custom was so early an off-spring of Primitive Devotion that it was made a Constitution of the Church from a considerable Antiquity and hath been ever since observed in most places of the Christian World and particularly in all the Lutheran Churches ever since the Reformation to this very day But how pious and reasonable how ancient and universal soever the observation hath been yet the demolishers of our Rites and Order have so prevailed with the people that there 's scarcely one of a hundred that understands their duty in it nor one of a thousand that have conscionably and duely practised and performed it And yet I don't despair but that some pious persons here before me may be so affected with this short account of their duty therein that they may in some measure answer the intention of this ancient Establishment and the Command of this present Church to observe it Which that they may the better do I have endeavoured to accommodate them with a suitable subject for their encouragement and direction and that from the words now propounded Pray without ceasing or continually Which words offer these two occasions of discourse 1. What is meant by continually praying and how far the command of God lays upon us on that account 2. The reasonableness of observing that command so represented by several instances of advantages to engage us to the constant practice and performance of it 1. What is meant by praying without ceasing or continually And for the true understanding of this according to the several ways of speaking which the best Interpreters have used it signifies such an habitual frame and continued state of mind whereby we may and do so often perform the duty of prayer as is consistent with the discharge of other duties of Religion and our necessary attendance upon the common business and affairs of the world in our lawful imployments and that may reasonably comply with our natural infirmities as men And in this we ought to have respect both to the private and publick performance of the Duty And then by praying continually as to the first I understand the well management of our Devotions as to those which we call private Prayers Whether they be those of the Closet which our Saviour mentions Mat. 6. or those between married persons which a great Divine of our Church supposed the Apostle to have intimated as a duty 1 Cor. 7. 5. or whether those of the family where every supreme in it is a kind of Priest to God to order the periods and circumstances of Gods service in his own house And that man that hath given rules to himself for the ordinary performance of those several offices such as a wise Guide of Souls may approve and the practice of other holy persons have exemplified may be believed to have performed the duty of praying without ceasing so far as concerns his private Devotion But then secondly by the performance of the duty of praying continually as to the Publick Prayers I mean a constant attendance upon them in all such appointed periods which the Governors of every Christian Church must be supposed to have determined to be performed in some publick place set apart and consecrated to that service of God whether they be in some certain seasons of the year as this week of Rogation is one or in so many days in the week as by the frequent successions of the Lords day and other Festivals and Fasts or in so many divided portions of the day and in all other contingent occasions of Christians assembling together for the service of God Which Periods being so set apart for God and appointed for our duty do so indispensably oblige the Consciences of men that no man can make a wilful omission of them especially if it be habitual but he may be interpreted to have so far departed from God and thrown himself off from his protection and blessing And because I see the neglect of this duty to be so universal and amongst them particularly that otherwise pretend themselves to be a praying people to a greater degree than others I desire but once to know from any of them what they can object against the obligation that I have affirmed to lay upon their Consciences so as may solve their omission to a consistency with any real sense of Religion or the fear of God I hope they don't imagine the personal faults of them that administer or the different manner of the administration of those Offices as with such Rites and Circumstances which they perhaps dislike because they will and God hath not forbidden them while the substantial Worship is preserved entire can acquit them for their gross disobedience to God and man and the intolerable prejudice they make and encourage against the Governors the Establishment and the obedient Sons of the constituted Church with which they are bound to hold Communion in such publick Offices Now that man that shall religiously and constantly observe all such determin'd and commanded Periods for the Service of God in publick may be said to perform all that 's obligatory in the Command of God for praying without ceasing or continually in this second respect And I think I may affirm that the Apostle did principally intend this kind of praying continually by the command in my Text and my reason is because I find the same and the like expression to be necessarily so interpreted in other places of Scripture Thus when it 's said that Hannah went not out of the Temple but served God with fastings and prayers night and day Luke 2. 37. the meaning is that she never failed to discharge her duty there at all the appointed seasons of the Jewish Church And

allay those storms and reduce his temper to the quietness and sweet easiness of a Lamb or Dove Lastly Is any man surpriz'd with the ruling passion of a sensual love let him imitate the example of that wise and excellent Virgin of whom I have read that she commanded her fond Amorist to respite his addresses to her till he and her self had compleated forty days in Fasting and Prayer by which religious expedient she cured his folly and preserved her own innocency 4. The fourth Instance of advantage by our constant attendance upon God in Prayer is because that duty is the common Scene and opportunity for the exercise and improvement of all spiritual Graces which as they were attained by the use of means so are they maintained and improved by the constant practices of vertue and the services of our God And as the exercise of every particular duty improves its proper Grace so does the duty of Prayer imploy and improve them all First as to Faith every period in our Devotions is an act of that Faith by which a just man is said to live to God and to all the purposes of a religious Conversation Then as to Hope our constant Prayers feed it and confirm it and make the expectation of a future bliss lively and prevailing There we are exercising and acting the precious Grace of Humility making our selves dust and ashes in the apprehension of our selves towards God and are tempering our hearts for all kinds of submission and condescension to men Here the Virgin ties on her girdle of Chastity and the married pair are every day renewing their first betroth and fastning the knot of their promised love and fidelity to one another Here the Subject does daily profess his Loyalty upon his knees and guards the Crown and engageth his Faith for his Princes safety Here we discipline all our inclinations to malice and revenge here we forgive every trespass and are softening our Souls for admission of terms of peace and reconciliation with all the World In a word our constant attendance on that duty will every day more and more be raising our hearts up to a pitch of heavenly Conversation with God and Angels and preparing us to be fit Companions of that blessed Society above when God shall please to call us to it 5. The fifth Instance of advantage which makes our constant attendance upon all religious offices highly reasonable is because it will make our time our precious time more accountable to God and our selves by adjusting it into fit portions for the service of God For if men were as curious of considering what accounts must be made of all the Talents with which they are intrusted in order to the securing their future Bliss they would begin to think that that of Time which God hath put in our power and left to our choice for the good or bad imployment of it were as considerable as any And if they would recount the mercy of enjoying Time or foresee the conflicts of a dying Soul when he is lamenting the loss of it they would be as advisable in this point as in any other concern of Religion Now no proposal can be offered to a mind truly pious whereby a man may better secure his time for a fair account with God than by apportioning a considerable part of it in attendance upon the offices of Prayer in the periods chosen or appointed for it At which seasons we should no more wilfully take a liberty to withdraw our selves from our duty whether when our Closets or our Families or when the set hours of Prayers at Gods House call for it than we would lay our Consciences waste by committing an enormous act of sin And as such a course of spending time will make that Talent of our lives happily accountable to God so will an habituation of our selves to perform our duty at such appointed seasons make our time easie and acceptable to our selves it's idleness and sin that makes time a burden and our lives uneasie and we should with the same pleasure think of those periods of Prayers as we do entertain the seasons of our natural refreshments of meat and sleep and as delightfully recount the hours of the day by them as by any artificial division of time and make us go as cheerfully to our devotions when the Bell tolls as when it rings us to our meals or sounds a retreat to our labours or as when the setting Sun tells the wearied Traveller that his journey is at an end 6. The sixth and last Instance by which it will appear that the constant attendance upon the offices of Prayer must needs be reasonable is because it will be a considerable part of the discharge of the command of God upon us to shew mercy and to do good to those that need our help and relief For amongst the various capacities of doing good that God hath put in our power one is that we can succour and relieve the infelicities of the World by the Charity of our Prayers By them we can get bread at Gods hand for the distressed as well as give it with our own By them we can reach the sorrows of the Widow and the heavily afflicted and pass through the Walls and Bars of Prisons to support and comfort the mourning Captive By them we can fight for the Prince and the Church when both in danger By these we can clear the infectious Air in raging Pestilences and water the dry Furrows when parched with drought and fortifie our Peace when threatned with the Alarms of War with all other the instances of doing good that hold proportion with these Now what can acquit any man to God or man that understands his indispensable obligation of doing all the good he can and can believe what God hath promised and done to assure him of the success of his Prayers I say how can any man acquit himself to God and man that shall refuse any offices or neglect any of those opportunities when Prayers are to be put up to God for either the common or the particular blessings of them that need them I wish the Consciences of men that have any designs for Religion and they are infinitely unreasonable that have none were sufficiently informed and seriously affected in this case our Assemblies would not be so thin nor so unconcerned when we are every day crying out for mercy and pleading for blessings Now it is in this last Instance of advantage by our constant attendance to this duty that we are at this time especially concerned and therefore as upon this ground the ancient Churches took their just plea for the first establishing a Week of Prayers and why our Church have continued the obligation to observe it so I shall there only fix my Application And then I say That if ever there were an Age that called for this kind of Charity and might lay claim to the benefit of a Week of Rogations and all other the constantly