Selected quad for the lemma: ground_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
ground_n	apostle_n	doctrine_n	faith_n	1,496	5	5.4771	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52290	The advantage of a learned education being a sermon preached at the cathedral Church of St. Paul on St. Paul's day 1697/8, before the gentlemen educated at that school, upon the reviving their antient anniversary meeting / by W. Nicholls, D.D.	Nicholls, William, 1664-1712.	1697 (1697)	Wing N1090; ESTC R19888	10,752	30

bred to more generous Employs which afford them more frequent conversation with the best and most learned Men and more opportunities of Reading and Devotion they have usually such a Knowledge in the Holy Scriptures and in all points of their Duty that they themselves are able to settle in their own thoughts the boundaries of Vertue and Vice and upon this account are not so liable to commit Sin through Ignorance or Mistake 2. Because such Men are not so liable to be led away by ill Examples The uneducated part of Mankind live only by example and like Cattle unthinkingly follow after those that go before them and because the Generality of the World have little regard to Religion or are lewd and debauched they are so too But Men of a literate Education do better consider matters and look into the Reasons of things they see it is unreasonable and foolish to loose their Religion for a Fashion or to forfeit their Interest with God to imitate the Vices of some admired Great Man These Mens Reasons are too strong and their Souls too brave to be guilty of such sordid and foolish Compliances 3. Because such Men have a more Rational and noble sense of Religion The Vulgar for the most part take up their Religion upon Trust as a certain Property belonging to their Country or their Family which they have a veneration for because those Persons they have a great Opinion of have the like and which they must in some measure comply with or they shall appear singular or give offence to those they are not willing to disoblige And others that are better instructed practice the Rules of Christianity as unquestionable Truths delivered to them by their Parents and inculcated to them by their Pastors And I doubt not but Men may be saved if they be sincerely Religious and fulfill our Saviours Commands upon these Grounds But then no one can deny but that they have a more rational Ground of their Faith and a nobler sense of Religion who having leasure and learning have examined all the Foundations of Christianity who are fully satisfied that our Saviour and his Apostles Preached all those Doctrines and did all those Miracles they are reported to have done in confirmation of them and are sure that Christianity can be no Dream or Imposture of Designing or Enthusiastical Men but that it is the most Heavenly and the Wisest Institution which ever was in the World The former do obey our Saviours Laws only as necessary Duties but these readily comply with them as a reasonable service They are brought to their Duties by the compulsion of Hopes and Fears by the Command or Example of Superiors or by warm and affectionate Discourses whilst These Embrace our Saviours Doctrines because they so admirably fall in with the Dictates of right Reason and are worthy of God the Author of them and because they have all the reason in the World to think that God Almighty commanded them The first breeds for the Generality only an Awful Fear of God but the other makes Men approach him with a hearty and generous Love They may be true Believers but then they are often liable to be shock'd by every captious Atheistical Objection whilst These have scand over all the specious Exceptions of the Infidels against our Religion and notwithstanding this they do adore and hope in Crucified Jesus in the midst of all the loud Blasphemies of an Incredulous Age. These are the advantages which we have by a Learned Education in our several Capacities as we are Men in a Society or Governors or Christians to which we may add another advantage viz. the Inward Satisfaction to our selves the pleasure of reading so many noble and ravishing Authors and to spend our time so agreeably whilst that of others hangs so uncomfortably upon their Hands the inexpressible Delight of having our knowledge daily improved by being let into so many useful and entertaining Truths to dive into the hidden secrets of Nature by Philosophy to run back and converse with all the former Ages by History to understand the Difficulties and to reconcile the Differences in God's Word by Theology and to determine the measures of Right and Wrong and exactly to lay out the Lines of Justice and Equity by a Knowledge in the Laws these are such delightsome qualifications as when they are not soured accidentally by Pride or Discontent but possessed together with Modesty and a Peaceable Disposition if there be any happiness in this World this is certainly one of the greatest on this side Heaven I now come to the third and last things III. To urge some Christian Exhortations upon the present Occasion 1. And first my Christian Brethren you my Dearest Companions of my tender Years You with whom I had the happiness to lay the Foundation of my Studies in the Neighbouring School where we have gain'd the advantage of such an Education as has improved our Minds beyond the generality of those who have unhappily been destitute of the like noble Assistances let me exhort you all to pay your hearty thanks to God the Giver of every good Gift for the great advantage of this Education and when in your Praises to God you recount the many great Benefits he conferred upon you to remember this as one of the most considerable And now we have a happy opportunity of doing it together in Publick especially at this time in this place which bear a particular relation to our School and Founder Methinks I see darting through all our Soulr a secret and unexpressible pleasure to think that we should so luckily renew this our Antient Love Feast upon the first Anniversary of this blessed Saint after the Rebuilding of his Temple and now we are grown Men that we can devoutly meet together and Praise God in this Glorious Edifice where we remember to have play'd our Childish Pastimes among its desolate Ruins 2. Let us pay our utmost gratitude towards the Place and Preceptors of our Education Let us do our utmost to encourage and befriend this Foundation and to make it Flourish as much as we can that it may be as advantageous to Thousands more in future Times as it has been to us Let us always bear the greatest Respect and Veneration to those Worthy Persons by whose Care and Learning we had our Instruction To be Bred under a good School-master is a lasting Blessing as long as we live as an Education under a bad one is a lamentable and unretrievable Misfortune and though a Man may notwithstanding this Disadvantage be somewhat considerable yet he is like a House built upon a false Foundation always weak and tottering Therefore Great Publick Schools where Grammatical Learning is in its highest Perfection can never enough be esteemed and encouraged and the Masters honoured and rever'd by their Scholars who have received such an inestimable advantage from them From them who have been so kind to us to afford us all the pleasures and satisfactions of that Learning they have implasted in us and to be content with the Toil and Drudgery of it themselves who have been pleas'd to forego the more agreeable Employments to do a more Publick Good and to spend their time in a laborious and what is worse a thankless Calling when the Injustice and the Ingratitude of the Age is such that they are constantly blamed for every Miscarriage and hardly thanked for any Success 2. Let us all unite together in a strict Bond of Love and Friendship to each other Let us remember those mutual Endearments which passed between us in those early Years and again let us renew our Affections in a maturer Age if absence and discontinuance from one another has abated them These early Friendships of all others are the best and the strongest The familiarities which Men fall into afterwards are generally but the forming of Designs or courting an Interest and if these fail so does their Friendship too But in that tender Age pure natural Simplicity and Love without dissimulation governs the Affections and we enter then into the choicest familiarity only with them whose Souls we find more tuneable and agreeable with ours And why should we not maintain the same Friendships still which we proved at a time when Nature lay open and undisguised rather than to maintain a familiarity chiefly with those whom it may be only Craft or Design obliges to be faithful Besides a mutual Friendship among our selves has a Thousand advantages attending it wherein we may be serviceable to one another the Profession of one may be beneficial to that of another and the application of many of such a Society may obtain a Kindness for a single Person which he could not procure himself 4. Let us all endeavour that our good Lives may be answerable to the Education which has been given us Let us always bear in mind that of our Saviour He that knoweth his Masters Will and doth it not shall be beaten with many Stripes God expects we should live better than the illiterate Vulgar who have less Knowledge and that our good Lives should be an example to them to copy from But if we allow our selves in shameful and beastly Vices not only the Rules of our Holy Religion but the very Verses and Sentences of our Heathen Classicks will make our Consciences and fly in our Faces But I hope we shall all make that good improvement of our Time and Education as to work out our Salvation with fear and trembling and to let our light shine before Men that they may glorifie our Father which is in Heaven that we shall live in the fear of God in Christian Charity with all Men and a hearty Friendship among our selves as long as God shall be pleased to continue us in this World and that we may all of us be happy in the next and that at the Resurrection of the Just we may all meet again at the Great Marriage Supper of the Lamb when we shall be join'd to the blessed Community of the Saints and we shall live and enjoy and Love for ever Which God c. FINIS

with the Love of God 4. Nor was he less remarkable for his Courage and Sincerity Vertues which are particular Qualifications in doubtful and perilous times What an instance of his Christian Bravery and Resolution was it to Preach the Gospel so publickly at Jerusalem where he had so many enraged Enemies when his Friends told him and he himself could not but expect to be sacrificed for it And when the Great St. Peter was afraid to disoblige the Judaizing Faction and was contriving for their sakes an odd sort of Comprehension or Medly betwixt Judaism and Christianity our brave Apostle withstood him to the Face and defended the simplicity of our Saviour's Religion against all the opposition of so great an Adversary 5. But besides all this the indefatigable Labours of his Preaching and the large Conversions to Christianity he effected in all Parts almost of the Gentile World is enough to raise the Honour of him far above the rest of his Apostolick Brethren whose Conversions were in no ways comparable to his Most of the Churches of Asia Minor those in the Islands and Provinces of Greece those in Thrace and Dalmatia in Spain and Italy were founded by this same St. Paul And the most Learned Bishop Stillingfleet in his Origines Britannicae has made it very probable that we of this Nation did receive Christianity likewise from this Apostle for the Story of Joseph of Arimathea is too Modern and too Monkish to be credited And now what a vast Tract of Ground is this for this one Apostle to spread the Gospel over How incredible almost is it that so many different Nations should enjoy the blessed Effects of his Ministry for give me leave to say that the Roman Arms themselves were hardly more victorious or farther extended than the Plantation of the Gospel by this one Apostle I come now in the second place to shew II. That the Reason of this Eminency of St. Paul was because of his Learned Education And to make out this I shall not tye my self strictly to shew how his Learning was the cause of those particular Qualifications I have already made appear he was Excellent in but shall shew that which will equally prove the same viz. That a Learned Education does best qualifie a Man for discharging all the Duties which are incumbent on him throughout all the Progress of Humane Life or in any Trust whatsoever Now the many and different Characters which belong to Mankind in their diverse Capacities may all be reduced to these Three 1. As they are Private Men or Members of Society 2. As they are Magistrates or in publick Capacity 3. As they are Christians or Members of God's Church Now I shall shew that a Learned Education does best qualifie a Man to discharge his Duty in all these several Capacities I. A Learned Education does best qualifie a Man to discharge his Duty as a private Person or Member of Society 1. It renders a Man more agreeable in Neighbourhood and Conversation Most of your little Animosities and Quarrels are to be found chiefly amongst uneducated People and tho' we find too much of them among Men who have been better bred yet they are seldom guilty of that roughness and hard Language which is common among others Nay the obliging and endearing Airs of Conversation are in the greatest Heigth and Perfection to he seen only in those Gentlemen who have had the advantage of the most Learned Education For as for all the other little Arts of Popular Talk and Refin'd Address they lie but thin spread over a Man like Varnish and every untoward Accident makes him lyable to discover his inward Imperfections I will not say that an Education perfectly Bookish where Genius and the Life and Brightness of Nature and a competent knowledge of the World are deficient I will not say this does render a Man more agreeable in Conversation but if Men would take care to talk as they ought to do and would be improving their Minds upon all occasions they would find more Satisfaction in the useful tho' unpolish'd Discourse of such a Person than in all the Circle of fine Jests and Tales that are requisite to furnish out an empty Wit 2. A Learned Education does commonly endow Men with more than ordinary Principles of Generosity The Company which they are Educated among are Persons who are generally Men of Honour and who value their Reputation and scorn a base thing and therefore if they fall into such Actions they must sort out to themselves a new Acquaintance for they will be abandon'd by all their former Friends who are Lovers of Honour and Vertue Besides their Minds have been habituated to such generous Vertues during their whole Series of Education that they cannot without a great force upon their Inclinations stoop to sordid Vices and a base Covetousness dishonest Dealing or Treacherousness and such other shameful Vices and rarely incident to Men of such an Education Their very Reading in Philosophy and History affords them such excellent Rules and Examples which so tinctures their Souls with these noble Ideas as makes it no easie matter for them to be tempted to do an unworthy thing The vulgar and illiterate have very little Sense of Fame and Honour and do many scandalous things when they may be advantageous but Men of a Liberal Education have for the most part such a spark of Honour within their Breasts as is a guard to them against the Commission of any enormous Crimes at least and oftentimes is the last stake of Vertue within them when all true Piety and Religion have taken their flight A spark which sometimes by God's Grace kindles again into a bright flame of Piety and true Religion when others live on senseless and stupid Sinnners to the last 3. A Learned Education does render a Man more Eminent in his particular Calling A Previous knowledge in any part of Literature does qualifie a Man for the understanding of any kind of Business far better than one who is destitute of all It opens and clears one's Head for a ready preception of whatever shall be proposed to us for the more the Mind is used to thinking and contemplation the more quick and perceptive it is and is discernable even in those that have been very little used to it A Lad that has but gone thro' a Form or two in a Grammar-School that has had Thoughts but a small matter exercised about the propriety of Speech and the congruity of Terms with one another only in the Grammatical way of Concord shall have a far greater facility in Learning any Art than one taken from the Plough or any other who all his time has liv'd by pure Sense without any manner of abstracted Thought or Meditation But a farther progress in a well managed course of Studies gives a kind of new Genius to the Soul and oftentimes quickens the slowest Natures so that when Learning and a noble stock of natural Parts meet together they