Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	evil_a	good_a	sin_n	3,208	5	4.9732	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A26958	A moral prognostication I. what shall befall the churches on Earth, till their concord, by the restitution of their primitive purity, simplicity, and charity, II. how that restitution is like to be made, (if ever) and what shall befall them thence-forth unto the end, in that golden-age of love / written by Richard Baxter ...	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1680 (1680)	Wing B1311; ESTC R5743	36,590	70

Wordly Ends. 90. And the young and indifferent sort of People in all Countrys that were engaged in neither part being but strangers to Religion and to the differences will be ready to judge of the Cause by the Persons and seeing so many of the Dignified Advanced Clergy and the more sensual sort of the People on one side and so many Men of strict lives on the other that suffer also for their Religion and hearing too that it is some Name of Preciseness that they are Reproached by will think them to be the better side And so the title of the Godly will grow by degrees to be almost Appropriated to their Party and the Title of Prophane and Persecuters to the other 91. All this while the Nonconforming Ministers will be somewhat differently affected according to the different degrees of their Judiciousness Experience and Self-denyal Some of them will think these Passions of the People needful to check the Fierceness of the Afflicters which doth but Exasperate it And therefore will let them alone though they will not encourage them Some of the younger or more injudicious hot-brain'd sort will put them on and make them believe that all Communion with any Conforming Ministers or their Parish-Churches is unlawful and their forms of Worship are Sinful and Anti-christian and that they are all Temporizers and Betrayers of Truth and Purity that Communicate or Assemble with them The judicious and experienced and most patient and self-denying sort will themselves abstain from all that is Sin and as far as it is in their choice and power will joyn with the Churches that Worship God most agreeably to his Word and Will But so as that they will not be loud in their Complaints nor busy to draw Men to their Opinions in Controvertible Points nor will unchurch and condemn all the Churches that have something which they dislike as Sinful nor will Renounce the Communion of all faulty Churches lest they Renounce the Communion of all in the World and Teach all others to Renounce theirs But they will sometimes Communicate with the more faulty Churches to shew that they unchurch them not so they be not forced in it to any Sin Though usually they will prefer the purest yea ordinarily they will joyn with the more faulty when they can have no better or when the publike good requireth it They will never prefer the Interest of their Nonconforming Party before the Interest of Christianity or the Publike good They will so defend lesser Truths as not to neglect or disadvantage the greater which all are agreed in They will so preserve their own Innocency as not to stir up other Mens Passions nor to make factions or divisions by their difference They will so dislike the pride and worldliness of others and their injuries against God and Godliness as not to speak Evil of Dignities nor to Cherish in the Peoples Minds any Dishonourable injurious thoughts of their Kings or any in Authority over them They will Labour to allay the passions of the people and to rebuke their censorious and too sharp Language and to keep up all due Charity to those by whom they Suffer but especially Loyalty to their Kings and Rulers and Peaceableness as to their Countrys They will teach them to distinguish between the Cruel that are Masters of the Game and all the rest that have no hand in it and at least not to separate from all the rest for the sake of a few If they will go as far as Martin in Sulpitius Severus to avoid all Communion with Ithacius and Idacius and the Councils of Bishops that Prosecuted the Priscillianists to the scandal of Godliness it self yet not for their sakes to avoid all others that never consented to it nor with Gildas to say of all the bad Ministers that he was not Eximius Christianus that would call them Ministers or Pastors rather than Traitors They will perswade the People to discern between Good and Evil and not to run into Extreams nor to dislike all that their Afflicters hold or use nor to call things lawful by the name of Sin and Anti-christianity nor to suffer their Passions to blind their Judgments to make superstitiously New Sin and Duties in opposition to their Adversaries Nor to disgrace their Understandings and the Truth by Errours Factions Revilings or Miscarriages nor to run into Sects nor to divide Christs House and Kingdom while they pretend to be his Zealous Servants They will perswade the People to Patience and Moderation and Peace and to Speak Evil of no Man nor by Word or Deed to Revenge themselves Much less to resist the Authority that is set over them by God but to imitate their Saviour and quietly Suffer and being reviled not to revile again but to Love their Enemies and Bless their Cursers 92. The soberer sort of the People will be Ruled by these Counsels and will do much to quiet the rest But the Heretical part with their own Passions will Exasperate many Novices and Injudicious Persons to account this Course and Counsel aforesaid to be but the effect of Luke-wa●mness and Carnal Compliance with Sin and a halting between two Opinions and a Participation in the Sin of Persecutors and Malignant Enemies of Godliness And they will believe that whoever joyneth with the Parish Churches in their way is guilty of Encouraging them in Sin and of false Worship 93. Hereupon they will defame the Non conforming Ministers last described as Men of no Zeal neither Flesh nor Fish and perhaps as Men that would Save their Skin and shift themselves out of Sufferings and betray the Truth And when such Ministers acquaint them with their unsound Principles and Passions they will say of them that they speak bitterly of the Godly and joyn with the Persecutors in reproaching them 94. And they will carry about among themselves many false Reports and Slanders against them Partly because Passion taketh off Charity and Tenderness of Conscience and partly because an Opinionative Modal and Siding Religiousness hath ever more Followers and a quicker Zeal than true Holiness And partly because they will think that humane converse obligeth them to believe the Reports which those that are accounted good Men utter And partly because that they will think that the upholding of their Cause which they think is Gods doth need the Suppression of these Mens Credit and Reputation that are against it 95. But the greater part of the honest Non-conformist Ministers will dislike the headiness and rashness of the Novices and the Sectaries and will approve of the aforesaid moderate Wayes But their opportunities and dispositions of Expressing it will be various Some of them will do it freely whatever be thought of it And some of them that have impatient Auditors will think that it is no duty to attempt that which will not be endured and that it is better to do what good they can than none And some will think that seeing the Worldly Clergy forbid them to

Preach the Gospel of Salvation they are not bound to keep up any of their Reputation or Interest as long as they have themselves no hand in the Extreams and Passions of the People And some that have Wives and Children and nothing but the Peoples Charity to find them Food and Rayment being turned out of all publike Maintenance by their Afflicters and Prosecuted still with continued violence will think that it is not their duty to beg their Bread from door to door nor to turn their Families to be kept on the Almes of the Parish by losing the Affection of those People whose Charity only they can expect Relief from And therefore they will think that Necessity and Preservation of their Families Lives and Health will better excuse their silence when they Defend not those that would Destroy them against the overmuch Opposition of the People than the Command of their Afflicters will excuse their silence if they neglect to Preach the Christian Faith And some will think that finding themselves hated and hunted by one party if they lose the Affection of the other also they shall have none to do their Office with nor to do any good to and that they shall but leave the People whom they displease to follow those passionate Leaders that will tempt them to more dangerous Extremities against the Peace of Christian Societies But the most judicious and resolved Ministers that Live not on the Favour or Maintenanee of the People or are quite above all Worldly Interest will behave themselves wisely moderately and yet resolvedly and will do nothing that shall distaste sober and wise Men nor yet despise the Souls of the most Impotent or Indiscreet but by solid Principles endeavour to build them upon solid Grounds and to use them with the Tenderness as Nurses should do their crying Children But yet they will not cherish their Sin under the Pretence of profiting their Souls nor by Silence be guilty of their Blood nor so much as connive at those dangerous Extreams that seem to serve some present Exigence and Jobb but threaten future Ruine to the Churches and Dishonour to the Christian Cause And therefore they resolve not to neglect the Duties of Charity to the Bitterest of their Persecutors And the rather because that it will prove in the end a Charity to the Church and to the Souls of the Passionate whose Charity they labour to keep alive And Silence at Sin is contrary to their Trust and Office And they will not be Guilty of that Carnal Wisdom which would do Evil that Good may come by it or that dare not seek to cure the Principles of Uncharitableness Divisions or Extremities in the People for fear of losing Advantages of doing them Good or that dare not disown unlawful Schisms and Separations for fear of encouraging those Malignants that call lawful Practices by that Name They will do God's Work though with Prudence and not destructive Rashness yet with Fidelity and Self-Denyal And they will lay at Christ's Feet not only their Interest in the Favour of Superiors and their Peace and Safety and Liberty and Estates and Lives which are exposed to Malignant Cruelty among the Cainites of the World but also all the Good Thoughts and Words and Favour of the Religious sort of People yea and Pastors too And they will look more to the Interest of the Whole Church than of a Narrow Party and of Posterity than of the Present Time As knowing that at long-running its only Truth that will stand upper-most when Malignant Violence and Sectarian Passions are both run out of Breath And therefore in Simplicity and Godly Sincerity they will have their Conversations in the World and not in Fleshly Wisdom or Selfish-blinding-Passions or Factions Let all Men use them how they will or judge or call them what they will they will not therefore be false to God and to their Consciences And seeing it is their Office to Govern and Teach the People they will not be Governed by the Favour of the most Censorious Ignorant or Proud but will Guide them as Faithful Teachers till they are deserted by them and disabled But the Sober Antient Wise and Experienced will alwayes cleave to them and forsake the Giddy and Sectarian way 96. In the Heat of these Extremities the most Peaceable and sober Part both of the Conformists and Non-conformists will be in best Esteem with the grave and sober People but in the gratest Streight with both the Extreams 97. The Godly and Peaceable Conformists will get the Love of the Sober by their Holy Doctrine and Lives But they will be despised by the Sectaries because they Conform and they will be suspected by the Proud and Persecuting Clergy as leaning to the Dissenters and strengthening them by their Favour because these Ministers will in all their Parishes more love and honour the Godly Non-conformists than the Irreligious Ignorant Wordly Dead-hearted Multitude or the Malignant Enemies of Godlyness 98. Hereupon these Conformists being taken for the chief Upholders of the Non-conformists will be under continual Jealousies and Rebukes And perhaps new Points of Conformity shall be devised to be imposed on them which it is known their Consciences are against that so they may be forced also to be Non-conformists Because Secret Enemies are more dangerous than Open Foes 99. These Conformists being thus troubled will seel also the stirring of Passion in themselves and by the Injury will be tempted to think more hardly of their Afflicters than before And so will Part of them turn down-right Non-conformists and the other Part will live in Displeasure till they see an Opportunity to shew it And these are the likest to cross and weaken the Worldly Persecuting Clergy of any Men. 100. And as for the Moderate Nonconformists that understand what they do and why and seek the Reconciling of all Dissenters they will also be Loved and Honoured by the Sober Grave and Experienced Christians But both Extreams will be against them The Sectaries will say as before That they are Luke-warm and Carnal Selfish Complying Men The proud imposing-Clergy will say That it is they that have drawn the People into these Extreams and then complain of them that they cannot Rule them And they will tell them That till they Conform themselves their Moderation doth but. strengthen the Non-conformists and keep up the Reputation of Sobriety among them And the nearer they come to Conformity the more dangerous they are as being more able to supplant it And thus the Moderate and Reconcilers will be as the Wedge that is prest by both Sides in the Cleft of Church-Divisions And no Side liketh them because they are not given up to the Factious Passions or Interest of Either 101. Only those will in all these Extremities and Divisions keep their Integrity who are 1. Wise 2. Humble and Self-denying 3. Charitable and principled with a Spirit of Love 4. And do take the Favour of God and Heaven alone for their