Selected quad for the lemma: heart_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
heart_n	ear_n	eye_n	fat_a	2,377	5	10.2276	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29178	A minister's counsel to the youth of his parish when arriv'd to years of discretion : recommended to the societies in and about London / by Francis Bragge ...	Bragge, Francis, 1664-1728.	1699 (1699)	Wing B4199; ESTC R32860	70,334	248

matter the greater in all Reason should be our Care to prevent it and since all proceeds from too much love of the World therefore in the first place to resolve to love that less and begin in Time to work our Hearts into a Pliant Ductile Temper such as may keep our Ears open to fair Warnings charitable Reproofs and good Advice And then if we look upon the uneasiness we feel at such Discourses as an ill Symptom and make it an Argument for our still greater attention to them and so far embrace every Conviction of our Consciences as to let it continue with us and bestow some Thoughts upon it if we do this and do it Sincerely and in Time we shall find the Cloud begin to remove from our Understandings and Spiritual Light and Knowledge will flow in apace we shall plainly discover the Cheats that were before put upon us the fatal Mistakes we were under and this will unstop our Ears and make us still more and more Attentive to the Words of sound Wisdom the faithful Counsels of those that wish our Happiness and that will make our Hearts still more and more Tender and Impressible sensible of our true Interest our Duty and our Danger which will excite our utmost Diligence to secure the one and avoid the other crying unto God for help who never Rejects that Prayer which begs his Assistance that we may serve him better and to which we add our own Sincere Endeavours Now who that 's Blind or Deaf or but in Danger of being so would refuse an easie certain Cure And when He knows how much he may contribute to it himself d' ye think He would delay to do his utmost towards it And how overjoy'd would the Blind be to be sensible of the faintest Glimmerings and open wide his be-nighted Eyes to let in more and more of chearful Light How Ravishing would the least Sound be to the Deaf Ear and excite its utmost Attention to receive still more And how much greater would be the Joy of the both Deaf and Blind to recover either Sense so far as to have tho' but the least Intimation that there was some Hopes of their enjoying both again that it lay very much in their own Power to effect it and that the blame must be their own if they did not How eagerly would they do every thing they could to make a free entrance for Light and Sounds and welcome every new Accession of either with Transports of Delight How earnest their Prayers to God for his Blessing and how unfeigned their Thanks and Praises for Success What a quick Grateful Relish would they have of the almost forgotten Pleasures of the Eye and Ear and how would they Improve the Advantages of both How feellingly sensible would they be of their former Miserable State and how would they dread and avoid every thing tho' never so remote that might lead to it again If we may suppose all this of the Naturally Blind and Deaf how much more should it be verified by the Spiritually so whose case as we have seen is infinitely more deplorable and whose Desires therefore of recovery in all Reason should be stronger far their Prayers more Importunate their Joy greater in the Hopes of it and their endeavours more earnest to bring it to Perfection And He that is so stubborn and obstinate as wilfully to continue in this sad sttate into which too he has brought Himself where should the blame of his Ruin be plac'd but upon Himself Let every Sinner therefore instead of impiously and ungratefully accusing God of Tyranny and Injustice Arbitrary Power and merciless Decrees and the like as if He first hardned their Hearts and took away their Hearing and their Sight and so sealed them up to Destruction and then resolv'd to inflict Eternal Punishments upon them because they did not do Impossibilities hear and see when He had made them Deaf and Blind and have a tender Sense of Religion when He had made their Hearts callous and past feeling Instead of such horrid Blasphemy as this let every Sinner give Glory to God by humbly acknowledging that 't is his own doing and the Consequence of his listning to the Destroyer rather than the Saviour of Mankind Whoever perishes I say it again must blame himself for it for 't is his own wilful Blindness Stubborness and Obstinacy that has depriv'd him of the means and possibilities of Salvation To save such a one God must proceed quite contrary to the Nature of Virtue and Vice and the establish'd Rules of his Word and force him to be Good and Happy notwithstanding all his Resistances and Refusals But a forc'd Virtue and a forc'd Heaven are strange new things that one shall seldom hear of When a Sinner is arriv'd to that degree of Obstinacy that nothing but extraordinary nay miraculous Grace can soften and Reform him God 's not giving him that extraordinary Grace but leaving him to the usual constant Assistances of his Holy Spirit and Methods of the Gospel which his Obstinacy has made Ineffectual to him for what Instructions and Advices can take Place upon the Deaf and Blind this seems to be the most Intelligible Account of God's hardning any Man 'T is only Permitting him still more and more to harden Himself by not using extraordinary Means to Prevent it and which is but a Just Punishment for his former Stubborness As in the Story of Pharaoh He hardened his own Heart so far as to receive no Impression either by God's Severity in inflicting or his Goodness in Removing Seven of the Ten Plagues and then God is said to harden his Heart or to give him up to his own Fatal Obstinacy So in Isaiah chap. 6.9 10. ver where God commands the Prophet to Denounce to his Rebellious People the Judgment of making their Hearts fat and their Ears heavy c. which our Lord said was fulfill'd in the Pharisees Mat. 13.14 15. The Reason of this Threatning is because they had made themselves Deaf and Blind before Ye Hear indeed but Vnderstand not or do not attend and Consider and ye See indeed but do not Perceive or take Notice therefore as by way of Punishment make this Peoples Heart fat and their 〈◊〉 heavy and shut their Eyes c. Wherefore to Conclude this Advice the way for us not to Perish is not to Destroy our selves by our incorrigible Obstinacy and He that does not make himself Blind and Deaf and insensible to Religion need never fear that God will make him so whose Solemn Protestation is that He desires not the Death of a Sinner and whose constant Call is Turn ye Turn ye from your evil ways for why will ye dye O House of Israel The Thirteenth Advice AND now having seen the Danger of Obstinate continuing in such ill Courses as Young Persons may have faln into the next Advice will be that they endeavour to Recover themselves by a sincere and speedy Repentance And here to

of who has staid so long at the Wine as to be able to think coherently of nothing and who is fitter for a Frolic or for sleep than Meditation A constant Practice of Night-Revels is upon all Accounts a most unhappy thing but upon none more so than because it unfits a Man for this great Duty whereby He becomes a Stranger to himself and his own Proceedings and that in matters of the greatest Moment and all this for a Belly-full of Liquor and empty frothy Mirth Moderate Wine and seasonable well chosen Conversation are Blessings which our Holy Religion does by no means Envy us Certainly I may enjoy my Friend without forgetting my self and have the satisfaction of others Company without making my self unfit for my own And I Question not but upon tryal any Man will find those Days spent most to his Satisfaction which are clos'd with a serious Reflection upon his ways at Night And all that I further desire of Young Persons upon this Particular is that they would immediately try the Experiment and beg the Assistance of God in those excellent Words of the 139 Ps ult Try me O God and see the ground of my Heart Prove me and examine my Thoughts look well if there be any way of wickedness in me and lead me in the way Everlasting The Twelfth Advice WHEN upon such Enquiry or by the kind Admonition of their Friends or both Young Persons begin to see their Errors let 'em above all things have a care upon any Account whatever of shutting their Eyes against such Convictions of their own Minds and of being Deaf to good Counsel and Advice That is let 'em beware of Stubborness and Obstinacy and wilful Ignorance or non-Attention to the great Obligations that Religion and their own true Interest do lay upon them None are so Deaf we say as those that will not Hear none so Provokingly Wicked and hard to be Reform'd as those who Industriously set themselves to keep out any Thought that may check them in their Carreer and incline 'em to Return whom no Calls will awaken no Arguments Persuade so much as to think of Amendment and who like the deaf Adder stop their Ears to the voice of the Charmer charm he never so wisely This sort of Men think they shall be undone if they once give ear to Persuasives to Religion that 't will Deprive them of what they esteem as their Happiness and draw 'em into the snare of a few designing Men who will Lord it over their Liberty hamper 'em with severe Impracticable Rules turn 'em into Mopes and instead of allowing them their former Pleasures be continually reading Lectures to 'em of Self-denyal Mortification and Repentance and all in Hopes of an unseen Reward no Body knows when nor where And because they can't but own however that something very powerfully moving is in such Discourses something that touches 'em in an unaccountable manner ev'n forces Approbation from them and as 't were Charms 'em into a Compliance therefore they 're Resolv'd they 'l stop their Ears and so defeat the Holy Magic of these Mercenary Charmers This is that wilful Spiritual Deafness so often mention'd in Scripture when as our Lord expresses it Hearing the Sermons of the Gospel Men hear not neither do they understand or Attend and Consider as 't is in the Original in order to their suitable Practice and therefore He so often useth this Expression He that hath ears to hear let him hear There is likewise a wilful Blindness of the Soul whereby the Scripture Represents to us Wicked Mens Disregarding all Inward Conviction of their own Minds and keeping themselves as Ignorant as they can of their Guilt and of their Duty and the necessity of a Reformation and which is very emphatically expressed Mat. 13.15 This Peoples heart is waxed gross 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 grown Callous and Insensible thro' an overcharge of the Pleasures of the World and their Ears are dull of hearing as before explain'd and their eyes have they clos'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they have wink'd hard as we shut our Eyes hastily and strongly when we fear the approach of any thing offensive to them lest at any time they should see with their Eyes and hear with their Ears and understand with their Heart and be Converted and I should heal them Now the Vnderstanding is the Eye of the Soul or that Faculty whereby the Mind receives the Light of Truth and Knowledge of which Light there is now thanks be to God abundant Plenty stream'd down from Him who is the True Light that enlightneth every Man that cometh into the World 1 John 9. and which whosoever will receive may enjoy and that according to his full capacity But as the Material Light may be intercepted by the interposition of Bodies too close for it to penetrate or as the Eye may be incapabable of receiving its Rays or wilfully shut and close it self and deny admittance to them tho' shining in full lustre round about and upon either of these Accounts the Body may remain in Darkness So the Soul may not enjoy its proper Light either thro' the Understanding's being not capable of receiving it which is unavoidable Ignorance the case of Natural Fools or else for want of a due medium thro' which it may be transmitted such as is Good and Competent Instruction which yet if by our own neglect we want we cannot plead as an Excuse or else our Minds are Ignorant and Dark because we wilfully Refuse to let in any Light or Knowledge to them will not admit or attend to any thing that would Dispel those mists of Error and Delusion which hang over them as a Dark pitchy Cloud And this is a Blindness altogether owing to a Mans self a Rebelling against the Light as Job Expresses it Job 24.13 But is it not strange that Men should so delight in this Spiritual Blindness as to force it upon themselves That a Rational Creature should be better pleas'd with the Darkness and Confusion of his Understanding as to the things of Religion tho' of all the noblest Furniture of our Souls than with a Bright Clear Godlike Mind Nay so much better pleas'd as studiously to keep out all new access of Light to stop up every Avenue every chink and cranny thro' which it unawares might steal into his Soul This is strange indeed and the more we Consider it the more we shall wonder at it but yet it is no News An Vnthinking Life guided by the false Lights of Humour and Custom every one may observe is the Life that too great numbers of Young People lead and the great Truths of Religion and the obligations they derive upon our Practice if medled with at all 't is but slightly and superficially one Glance and away and then all is well if their Hearts are but Gross enough to give them no disturbance by secret misgivings and inward gripes and twinges And what 's the Reason of all