Selected quad for the lemma: enemy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
enemy_n	sleep_v	sow_v	tare_n	1,022	5	12.2153	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A89503	A practical commentary, or An exposition with notes on the Epistle of Jude. Delivered (for the most part) in sundry weekly lectures at Stoke-Newington in Middlesex. By Thomas Manton, B.D. and minister of Covent-Garden.	Manton, Thomas, 1620-1677.	1657 (1657)	Wing M530; Thomason E930_1; ESTC R202855	471,190	600

Pelagian Tenets wherein original sin is denyed are natural Common people think they had ever a good heart towards God All these have I kept from my youth Matth. 19. 20. Chance and Fortune in a contradiction to Gods Decrees are a mans natural opinions So the doctrine of works and merit is in every mans heart What question more rife when we begin to be serious then What shall I do A ceremonious ritual Religion is very pleasing to carnal sense Conjectural perswasions is but a more handsom word for the thoughts of ignorant persons they say they cannot be assured but they hope well Doctrines of Liberty are very suitable also to corrupt nature Cast away the coards Psal 2. and Who is Lord over us Psal 12. 4. Nay all sins are rooted in some error of judgment and therefore they are called errors Psal 19. 12. Well then for our own Caution we had need stand for the Truth because Error is so suitable to our thoughts now when it spreadeth further 't is suitable also to our interests and then we are in great danger of being overset 2. That we may not hazard the Truth When Errors go away without controul 't is a mighty prejudice both to the present and the next age The dwellers upon Earth rejoyced when Gods Witnesses were under hatches and there was none to contest with them Rev. 11. 10. Fools must be answered or else they will grow wise in their own conceit Prov. 26. 4 5. Error is of a spreading growing nature therefore 't is not good to retreat and retire into our own cells from the heat and burden of the day let us stand in the gap and make resistance as God giveth ability Two Motives will enforce this Reason 1. The Preciousness of Truth Buy the Truth and sell it not 't is a commodity that should be bought at any rate but sold by no means for the world cannot bid an answerable price for it Christ thought it worthy his Blood to purchase the Gospel by offering up himself he not only procured the comfort of the Gospel but the very publication of the Gospel therefore we should reckon it among our treasures and choicest priviledges and not easily let it go lest we seem to have cheap thoughts of Christs blood 2. The trust that is reposed in us for the next age that 's an obligation to faithfulness We are not only to look to our selves but to posterity to that Doctrine which is transmited to them One generation teacheth another and as we leave them Laws and other National Priviledges so it would be sad if we should not be as careful to leave them the Gospel Our father 's told us what thou didst in their days Ps 44. 1. Every age is to consider of the next lest we intail a prejudice upon them against the Truth What cometh from forefathers is usually received with reverence A vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers 1 Pet. 1. 18. If you be not careful you may sin after you are dead our errors and evil practises being continued and kept afoot by posterity All the World had been lost in Error and Prophaneness if God had not stirred up in every age some faithful Witnesses to keep up the memory of Truth There is in man a natural desire to do his posterity good Love is descensive Oh consider how shall the children that are yet unborn come to the knowledg of the purity of Religion without some publike monument or care on your part to leave Religion undefiled Antichrist had never prevailed so much if men had thought of after ages they slept and unwarily yeilded to incroachment after incroachment till Religion began to degenerate into a fond Superstition or bundle of pompous and idle Ceremonies and now we see how hard it is to wean men from these things because they have flown down them in the stream of succession and challenge the authority and prescription of ancient Customs Look as sometimes the Ancestors guilt is measured into the bosom of posterity because they continued in their practises Matth. 23. 35. That upon you may come all the righteous blood c. So many times the miscarriages of posterity may justly be imputed to us because they shipwracked themselves upon our example The fathers ate sowr grapes and the childrens teeth are set on edg Well then let us perform the part of faithful Trustees and keep the Doctrine of Salvation as much as in us lieth pure and unmixed It presseth us to this earnestness of contention and zeal for the truths of God We live in a frozen age and cursed indifferency hath done a great deal of mischief Christians Is Error grown less dangerous or the truth of Religion more doubtful Is there nothing certain and worth contention or are we afraid to meddle with such as shrewd themselves under the glorious name of Saints We will not oppose Saints and so let the Truth go that was given to the Saints to be kept by them Oh my Brethren Paul withstood Peter to the face when Truth was like to suffer Gal. 2. 11. So should we withstand them to the face rather then make such sad work for the next age and leave our poor babes to the danger of error and seduction What 's become of our zeal There is none valiant for the Truth upon the Earth Prejudices and interests blind men so that they cannot see what they see and are afraid to be zealous lest they should be accounted bitter We have been jangling about discipline and now doctrine it self is like to escape us In the Name of God let us look about us Are there not crafty Thieves abroad that would steal away our best treasure and in the midst of the scuffle cheat us and our posterity of the Gospel it self We have been railing at one another for lesser differences and now we begin to be ashamed of it Satan hopeth that Error and Blasphemy it self shall go scot-free Ah my Brethren 't is time to awake out of sleep whilest we have slept the Enemy hath come and sown tares What a tattered Religion shall we transmit to ages to come if there be not a timely remedy To help you I shall shew 1. What we must contend for 2. Who must contend and in what manner 1. What we must contend for for every Truth of God according to its moment and weight The dust of Gold is precious and 't is dangerous to be careless in the lesser Truths Whosoever shall break the least of the Commandments and teach men so to do c. Mat. 5. 19. There is nothing superfluous in the Canon the Spirit of God is wise and would not burthen us with things unnecessary Things comparatively little may be great in their own sphere especially in their season when they are the truths of the present age and now brought forth by God upon the stage of the World that we may study his mind in them Better Heaven and Earth

strictness Col. 2. 18. Which things have a shew of wisdom and neglect of the body rigorous observances and outward mortifications as the Papists do 2. Special meekness Ravening Wolves in sheeps clothing Mat 7. 15. as if they were all for love and kindness Absalom stole away the peoples hearts by this artifice 2 Sam. 15. 2. 3. Higher Gospel strain● therefore doth Paul speak so much against the other Gospel Gal. 1. 3. and the other Jesus 2 Cor. 11. 4. namely such an one as they had set up 4. Self-denyal as some false Teachers at Corinth would take no maintenance to disgrace Paul see 2 Cor. 11. 12 c. this was their glorying that they would preach freely and whereas they contributed to the relief of Paul to them it needed not 5. Greater learning and notions of a newer and more sublime strain Oppositions of science falsly so called 1 Tim. 6. 20. Platonick speculations ungrounded subtleties 6. Greater favour and liberty to Nature They promise liberty and allure through the lusts of the flesh 2 Pet. 2. 18. representing the faithful Ministers of Christ as envying the contentment of your natures and burdening you with exactions too rigorous therefore the Apostle saith I am afraid lest any through subtilty beguile you as the Devil did Eve 2 Cor. 11. 3. How was that I answer By insinuating a kind of envy in God as if he did begrudg them the perfection and freedom of their natures Gen. 3. 5. God knoweth that your eyes shall be opened c. So they think others are too strict and lay too many restraints upon your carnal desires and by this means allure many loose and unstable Souls 7. Many times pretending the defence of that Truth which they secretly impugn as Pelagius talked altogether of grace and Faustus Rhegiensis pretending to oppose the Pelagians did but more covertly own their Cause Uses of this Point are divers 1. For Information it sheweth us the Reason why we cannot set down the precise beginnings of Errors because they are privily brought in Mystery is written in the Whores forehead The leak is not espyed many times though the ship be ready to sink The originals of Heresie are like the Fountain of Nile obscure and hidden a man may lose himself in the Labyrinth of Antiquity before he can find them out The Roman Apostacy is a Mystery of Iniquity that stole into the Church disguised and by degrees So that the beginning of it is not so easily stated as of other heresies that are full grown at their first appearance 2. It informeth us of the odiousness of Error it dareth not appear in its own colours nor be seen in its own face therefore Satan when he would set any Error on foot he maketh choice of the most sub●il instruments that they may put a varnish upon it as when he tempted Eve he made use of the Serpent the most subtil of all the beasts of the field Gen. 3. 1. whereas the Lord chooseth the plainest instruments and hath commanded them to use all simplicity and godly conversation 2 Cor. 1. 12. for Truth is so lovely in it self that it needeth no borrowed colours 3. It informeth us what reason those that are over you in the Lord have to press you to Caution excuse their holy jealousie 2 Cor. 11. 3. all is but need we must bark when we see a Wolf though in a sheeps garment our silence and negligence doth but give them an advantage Whilest the husbandman slept the enemy came and sowed tares Mat. 13. 35. 4. It presseth you to skill and watchfulness you had need be sound in the faith that you may discern between good and evil yea to have your senses exercised Heb. 5. ult A soft credulity is soon abused Prov. 15. The simple beleeveth every word There is no reason but knowledg should cost us pains as well as gracious conversation 'T is a matter of great skill to be a through Christian there is a great deal of Sophistry and cunning abroad if you follow the cry you are in danger of engaging in a confederacy against God if you stick to received Customs there may be Error there too if you run after every Novellist on the other hand you will soon be led into the bogs of Error and Prophaneness therefore go to him for direction that hath the treasures of wisdom and knowledg But you need not only skill but care and watchfulness 'T is not good to drink too freely of suspected Fountains let not your affections surprize your judgment we admire the persons the gifts and so easily swallow the doctrine Try the spirits 1 Joh 4. 1. 1 Thes 5. 2● When there is counterfeit gold abroad we use the Touchstone Truth loseth nothing by being tryed and you lose nothing for then your affections are better grounded Prove all things no man is infallible an implicite faith begets but a fond affection Secondly These Seducers are described by their condition before God who were before of old ordained to this condemnation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of old that is from all Eternity for so the matter here spoken of imports 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we translate it before ordained but the word signifieth written as in a Book 't is usual in Scripture to compare Gods Decrees to a Book as Christ alledging Gods Decree for his mission into the World saith Psal 40. 8. In the volume of thy Book 't is written of me The meaning of the metaphor is to shew that these Decrees are as certain and determinate as if he had a Book wherein to write them Now these are said to be written before of old to shew that though they crept in unawares as to the Church yet not as to God they fell under the notice of his Decrees before ever they acted in this evil way 'T is further added that they were ordained or written down in Gods Book 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for judgment or condemnation the word is indifferent to either sence for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is often put for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thus it is to be taken here for condemnation appeareth by that place of Peter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 damnable heresies 2 Pet. 2. 1. and vers 3. Whose damnation of a long time slumbereth not as he saith here of old ordained to this judgment The meaning of the whole is that they were such as were left to themselves to bring upon themselves by their own sins and errors a just condemnation That the object of the divine Decrees are not only mens ways but mens persons He doth not only say that their condemnation was pre-ordained but they also were ordained of old to this condemnation I observe this because many say that Gods Decrees do only respect actions and the events we see they respect persons also we have no cause to mince matters when the Scriptures speak up to the point so fully and roundly Again from that ordained or