Selected quad for the lemma: heaven_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
heaven_n	day_n	light_n	rule_v	3,304	5	10.4231	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A95657	Pseudeleutheria. Or Lawlesse liberty. Set forth in a sermon preached before the Right Honourable the Lord Major of London, &c. in Pauls, Aug. 16. 1646. / By Edvvard Terry, Minister of the Word, and pastor of the church at Great-Greenford in the country of Middlesex. Sept. 11. 1646. Imprimatur. John Downame.	Terry, Edward, 1590-1660.	1646 (1646)	Wing T781; Thomason E356_11; ESTC R201136	37,931	42

and an inferiority a command and a subjection a mastery and a Dominion in every order of men specially designed The body Politike is very fitly compared unto a naturall body which must not be all head or hand or foot but distinguished into superior and inferior parts for every member to doe its particular office The Heart or Soule sitting in the middest of the body as a King upon his Throne and according to the dictates of the heart the tongue speakes the eyes looke the feete move the hands stir c. Now a body Politike may most fitly be resembled to this Naturall body wherein there are parts as the Apostle speakes more and lesse honourable 1. Cor. 12. yet all tending to the mutuall decency service and succour of the fame body The Aegyptians made an Eie and a Scepter the Embleme by which they figured their government a Scepter for Jurisdiction and power an Eie for watchfulnesse and discretion And certainely a Kingdome without order and government is like the body of that fayned Giant Polyphemus without an eie or rather like a body without an head or which most fitly resembles it like that confused Chaos before the Creation where heighth and depth light and darkenesse were mingled together In the beginning therefore when heaven and earth were first made God established a superiority and rule in other creatures after their kinde and afterwards in man So Gen. 1. 16. God made two great lights the greater to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night he made the starres also And one starre to differ from another in glory 1. Cor. 15. 41. And presently after when he had created man he invested him immediately with imperiall authority to subduethe earth and to rule in it v. 28. And to what other end is it called the host of Heaven Gen. 2. 1. but to shew how that Metaphor is taken from an Army where there must be superiority and subordination command and obedience without both which it cannot subsist For if the spirit and soule of obedience be taken away what can follow but Ataxie and Confusion Reason 2. Secondly there must be Government and Discipline for necessities sake to curbe and restraine all tumultuous and heady spirits all offensive and disordered persons whether in Church or Common-wealth The Lawes of God were first written in the fleshy tables of mans heart but sin did either blot or wear them out thence Then the wisedome of God thought fit to write them upon tables of stone that they might be lasting durable permanent But these Lawes of God thus written and commended and commanded unto man where slighted and neglected and forsaken by him and therefore Irenaus well observes in his first booke against heresies that therefore God appointed Kingdomes and men to rule in them because man forsaking God did wax feirce lawlesse masterlesse and being not sufficiently awed by the feare of the Lord God therefore put upon them the feare of man that fearing humane Lawes they should not devoure destroy consume one another as the fishes of the Sea and the beasts of the wildernesse and the fowles of the aire doe And for this reason there is an absolute necessity of Lawes to curbe and restraine and to keepe people under obedience for were it not for these our beds would not be suffered to lie under us our meate would be pulled out of our mouths our clothes would be torne off our backes rapine and violence would destroy us Vse Now for application this being so as it must needs be granted to be truth What just cause have all people who live under good Lawes to blesse God for them To one who asked the question why the City Sparta had no wals t was answered that the Citizens had good weapons in their hands unanimity in their hearts and to both these good Lawes to order them We want no weapons and these sad times have made almost every one amongst us a man of war And would to God that we had just cause to boast of unity and mutuall agreement amongst our selves But for good Lawes certainly we of this Nation have as great cause to be thankfull as any people under the Cope of Heaven ever had And oh that we had as just cause to prayse God for their due execution likewise But alas we have not Oh justice how faintly doest thou draw thy breath while thou sufferest so many desperate sinners and so many dangerous seducing Schismaticks to march boldly by thee and not bidst them stand Alas how doth the whole Land stinke of that beastly sin of drunkennesse that sin which robs a man of himselfe and leaves a beast in the skin of a man That sin which is like the serpent that stings two waies for it kills the body and slaies the soule too yet how doe those Tents of wickednesse those Thrones wherein Satan dwells those unnecessary tipling houses which so multiply Transgressors and transgressions amongst men increase amongst us How doe Pride and Luxury strive for the upper end of the table How doth the very breath of most desperate swearers and blasphemers even poyson the very aire of the Kingdome wherein we live And how doth the stone out of the Wall and the Beame in the Chamber cry out aloud against oppression And how hath the Error of Religion made many amongst us so wanton that they know not what to have nor what to hold Surely as the Prophet Isaiah complaines Isai. 24. 20. The transgression of the earth of this earth whereon we live lies heavy upon it And now O justice how doest thou degenerate from thy selfe while thou sufferest thy sword for want of drawing to rust or else for feare or for some other ●ie respects to be lock't up in the scabbard I am not come hither to declame against the administration of justice in this honorable City this City so renowned for exemplary government the world over though I must tell you that if I knew any just cause to invite me hereunto I should not spare But this I am sure of that there is an intollerable an unanswerable fault some where when so much wickednesse goes unpunished when so many errors schismes heresies some of which destroy as the rest doe blast the profession of Religion are suffered amongst us though we have lifted up our hands unto the most high God in a solemne League and Covenant to the contrarie Or if they meet with any rebuke from some it is but such a one as that too-too much indulgent Ely who brought up his sonnes to bring downe his house gave his sonnes 1 Sam. 2. 23. saying why doe you so or such things A strange thing in Ely to punish the Thefts Rapines Sacriledge Adulters Incests of his sonnes with why doe you so what was this but to shave that head which deserved to be cut off Doubtles as I find it excellently observed to my hand it is with sins in the soule as with humors in the body a

on without much opposition From which if that worke of Church-Government so seriously and long debated by You had beene exempted I should have joyned with those that had most questioned it But now a great and effectuall dore is opened unto you God having so blessed the way you have resolved to goe that he hath given it a free entrance into the hearts of many of his people And you have many adversaries and it cannot be otherwise so long as there are such a number amongst us who are like bad Wares which are for Darke shops or like unto Bleare-eyes that cannot endure the Light Most worthy Sirs I dare not flatter you and I shall not if I tell you that it hath been ever my thoughts as the thoughts of very many more who have best meanes to know you that you have done your parts in this great worke The advantage of whose prayers you shall never want to carry you on in it through it and then whatsoever the successe be you may wash your Hands The Lord who only can most graciously assist and abundantly recompence the unwearied paines of you All I have this only to adde in relation to your particular Selves that if my deare and tender respects unto you cannot your pardon may excuse him for this boldnesse who is Your Worships in all Christian observance Edward Terry TO THE READER Reader EVer since the world hath been planted with two different Seedes all the words and actions of men have been exposed unto severall interpretations as this following Sermon expected and found which occasioned this preface at which if they who tooke most exception could but know how tender I am of thinking amisse much more of saying or doing any thing that may justly grieve the spirits of any who truely feare God He would enter into consideration whether I in reprooving or he in meriting just reproofe deserved most blame It would trouble any one who hath not quite lost himselfe to consider how these present times have distracted a very great number amongst us by variety of opinions Many of which though they agree in the maine when a great number goe very much further and doe not so quarrell and contend about the list and fringe of Christs garment as if they meant to rend in peeces that seamelesse coate which must cover our nakednesse Alas Christ hath suffered abundantly for us already why then deale we so injuriously with him as to teare open his wounds afresh by sad oppositions as if he were now to be divided twixt Paul and Apollo and Cephas which thing the Apostle reproves and complaines of 1 Cor. 1. 12. amongst whom some were taken with St. Pauls ministry some with Apollo some with Cephas admiring one of them to the prejudice of the rest And there were some that said I am of Christ And what were these But people of severall factions in the Church of Corinth the last of which though we may parallel them all were of the very selfe same minde that many amongst us are growne such perfectists that they esteeme themselves above all ordinances and therefore shamefully neglect them So depending as they say upon Christ that they care not for any Preacher in the world they regard them not they refuse to heare or pray with them especially if they be orthodox or rightly principled God hath sent forth abundance of light and truth Psal. 43. 3. Truth sufficient to establish annd light sufficient to guide us and it would be very sad if an over curious search after new light should put us out of the way the old way the good way 〈◊〉 6. 16. and so make us to hazard the losse of old truth Alas what would we have What doe we expect A new Christ a new Passion a new Resurrection What would we be Members of a glorious Church that hath neither spot nor wrinkle nor any such thing Ephe. 5. 27. we must wait for that hereafter Why in the meane time doe so many sad quarrells sharpe contentions arise amongst us When we have said and done what we can Knowing Beleeving Doing or Faith Practise well studied that they may be known include in them a Christians whole duty here And doubtlesse a number shall one day finde if ever they returne againe unto themselves themselves most miserably deluded that have hoped to finde some other some nearer and more safe and certaine way to Heaven then that by which all the holy men of God have passed then that which hath been pointed out unto us by the lives of the Saints and enlightned for us by the flames of the Martyrs Yet it is most notoriously manifest that there are too too many amongst us that prescribe a shorter passage to Heaven then any of those worthies have sound by removing all those blocks and rubs which the Law of God casts in a Christians way thither to make it more difficult Which Doctrine if it were as true as it is plausible he were worthy to perish without party that would not close with it But this I am sure of that not any one of those holy men of God mentioned in the sacred story before the comming of Christ nor any since whose praises are in the Gospel have made it appeare unto the world that there is any such way to be discovered That blessed Apostle himselfe who was such a chosen vessell who had such abundance of Revelations 2 Cor. 12 7. was never acquainted with this if he had certainely he would never have complained so much so often of the Law which gives such a strength to sin and such a sting to death 1 Cor. 15 56 He would never have so complained of that body of sin of that body of Death which was in him And therefore Reader let me entreate thee now before thou leave me to have the patience seriously to consider of these following particulars First and in a speciall manner to take heede of spirituall Pride that great sin which banes thousands by sad and severall mistakes in entertaining a floating knowledge for true wisdome a distempered heate for true Zeale Conceits and conceivings about Religion to be true Religion indeede Oh how doth this Pride swell bladder puffe up thousands like empty vessells to make a great sound Putting low and base esteemes upon others Like the people of China who boast that themselves only have two eyes when all the people in the world beside have but one Know thou that the most excellent Christian in the world is most humble And that a good man is first in another mans last in his owne commendation Secondly know that there is a naturall aptnesse and propensity in all to set up Idols in their hearts and heads Ezek. 14. Where they are hardly discovered and whence not easily remooved which they doe not only love but dote on and therefore they hug and dandle those deformed issues of their owne braines as women doe the Children of their bodies and esteem what ever others

of this and first let me tell you for Instruction from that which springs from the bitter root of stubbornesse disobedience and refractorinesse in this Text this honey this sweet may be extracted As if it be so that wicked men can thus animate and hearten and encourage one another in the wayes of evill every one heere assembled may now prevent me say that what we have hence observed inferres and inforceth upon us a lesson for our imitation to follow those we have named in their diligence eagernes joint consent in acting as to leave them in the evill and obliquity of their actions to be as active in good as they are in evill To instance in some particulars How many Separatists goe on violently in an unwarrantable course as Cyprian wrote to Cornelius of five Schismatickes that had taken shipping and sayled to Rome with their mart of lies as if the Lord of heaven who rideth upon the Cherubims could not overtake them What stone doe these leave unturned what thing doe they leave unattempted per mare per terras per saxa per ignes as Christ spake of the Pharisees Mat. 23. 15. Compassing sea and land to make Proselites or some of their owne profession The Idolaters at Ephesus as if they had been the sonnes of Noise and Tumults cry up their baggage Diana for the space of two houres together Act. 19. Great is Diana of the Ephesians quasi vocibus cultum ejus reparaturi as Chrysostome on that place as if they meant with their loud outcries to hold up her honour and to blow up all opposition against her with her very breath And thus the Idolatrous Preists of Baal cried long from morning till noone and loud too saying Oh Baal helpe as 1 Ki. 18. And the inhabitants of Samaria feared and mourned and made much adoe for their Idol Likewise Hoses 10. 5. To the like purpose Micah complaines Judg. 18. 24. yee have stolen away my Gods and what have I more Or what have I more to lose Let me tell you in a word by the way that these were proper Gods to rely on that could not secure themselves O excellent●m insaniam as Chrysostom observes upon this passage were thy Gods such ones that a man might steale them O notable folly To rely upon such helps Gods per Antiphras●● for the workeman made them and therefore they are not God Hoses 8. 6. for if the fire spare them rust or rottennesse or time will consume them But the morall of Micah his speech is good for the losse of God is the losse of all things who never forsakes us till he be first forsaken by us so the enjoying of a sweet communion with God is the enjoyment of every good thing beside but this by the way The Prophet David makes mention of some that hasten after another God Psal. 16. 4. Festinant they hasten with speed or as Tremelius and Junius reade it from the originall Dotant they endow them with guifts or they give a dowry to them there is nothing so costly which they will not bestow which they will not willingly cast away upon their Idols which caused the Israelits being tainted with this sin to strip their Wives Sonnes and Daughters of their Ear-rings to make a molten Image Exod. 32. they thinke nothing too much too hard to doe to endure for them and therefore they did not sticke to sacrifice their Children unto them what tedious pilgrimages doe some Papists trudge barefoot and how doe they afflict their bodies with whippings watchings fastings And I have observed this among Heathens that they impose many sharpe and voluntary penances upon themselves far above all those the Romanists boast of as some of them will put massy fetters of iron upon their leggs and then as fast as they are able goe hundreds of miles barefoot upon the ground very hot and parching in those Climes to visite the Sepulchers of their deluding Saints Others will voluntarily fast till nature be almost quite decaied there be some who sequester themselves from the world and live remote upon the tops of Hills the residue of their lives sometimes many yeares after which retirement they never suffer the razor to come againe upon their heads and they let their nailes grow like birds claws as it is written of Nebuchadnezzar when he was driven from the society of men Dan. 4. 33. and further these Votaries being thus retired will sterve rather then stirre from their Cells and therefore they are releeved by some that live neerest to them Thousands there be in those parts that will rather chose to dye like the Mother and her seven Sons mentioned in the 2 Mac. and 7. Chap. then eate or drinke any thing their Law forbids them Such meate and drinke as their Law allowes them they take only to satisfie nature not appetite hating gluttony and esteeming drunkennesse as indeed it is a second madnesse and therefore use but one word in their language for a drunkard and a madman The Mahumetans what occasion soever they have either by pleasure or profit to divert them will pray five times every day And the Pharisee could tell us Lu. 18. 11. that he was no Extortioner nor unjust person nor an Adulterer c. Now let us put all this together and then let us hold up our heads if we can for blushing and heare our owne shame receive our just reproofe which is the second thing I shall infer from hence 2. Vse of reproofe I say when we consider the unity agreement accord that is in wicked men their teaching animating stirring up one another in whom there is unitar contra unitatem conspiracy agreement in error in evill and so little unity agreement amongst us for truth How dare we in matters of God so flag and faint and dissent as we doe ferventissimi in terrenis in coelestibus frigidissimi shewing nothing but heate and earnestnesse in earthly nothing lesse in heavenly things Shall Schismaticks Hereticks Pharisees Papists Turkes Infidels Idolaters of all kinds solicite bad causes with such earnestnes and we the cause of God so faintly They were wont to say of cowards in Rome that there was nothing Roman in them and may it not be as fitly applied unto many of us who professe our selves Christians There is not that Christianity in us which may bring comfort to us if there were we should be more remisse in our owne quarrels more fierce and forward in the cause and quarrell of God Oh how doe a number amongst us even shame the Religion we professe by professing of it What a sad thing is it to consider that a Pharisee should be chast and a Christian filthy That an Heathen should be temperate sober and a Christian drunken That a Mahumetan should pray five times every day and he that professeth himselfe a Christian scarce voluntarily goe to God in prayer five times in a weeke a moneth a yeare that they who professe themselves

Christians should come short of them that come short of Heaven The morality of millions of Heathens may shame us their lives condemne ours The Nations which call not upon the name of God are more righteous then we who have justified the Jewes and Turkes and Heathens Our idolatrous and ignorant fore-fathers shal rise up in judgement and condemne as for they followed what they knew but we know the will of God and follow it not Considerare pudet quantus ferver quae cura c. was the complaint sometimes of Jerom that he was ashamed to consider how solicitous many were in temporall and how sluggish we in spirituall things He was ashamed to thinke how that so many thousands should drive like Jehu furiously in the waies of evill Superstition Error Idolatry Profanenesse and the like and we in the waies of God goe a snayles pace like the Egyptians in the sea when their Chariot wheels were off Exod. 14. 25. That evill men of all sorts should have their tonguet bent like bowes for lies as the Prophet speakes Jer. 9. 3. and we not valiant for the truth shewing no courage for it as if we durst not owne the cause of God Dormis tu Petre Was an heavy check our blessed Saviour gave St. Peter Marke 14. 37. sleepest thou Peter Are the high Preists consulting Are the Souldiers ●anding themselves Is the Son of God neere his betraying And sleepest thou Peter And is there an ayming at the head of Authority now an endeavour by some to lay all even and levell Is there a striking at Religion in an endeavour after liberty therein which liberty threatens us which liberty hath already extreamly hurt us saevior armis Libertas nocuit Which liberty if it be permitted continued will undoubtedly undoe us And shall any disciple of Christ that hath beene taught of him bee now so sleepy slothfull sluggish as if the matter in hand concerned him not Let us not beleeve that any would be ever contented to die for Christ that will not speake for him that they would ever bee willing to affoord Christ their blood who will not doe so much as lend him their breath Now for a corollary or conclusion It was an excellent commendation that Quintilian sometime gave of Vespasian the Emperour that he was patientissimus veri most patient in hearing truth Let his commendation be ours The life of Preaching is application and the life of Application is the applying of truths unto our particular selves And therefore that we may be now yet more particular in bringing home the truths we have heard into our severall bosomes First do rebellious spirits cast off the Yoke aime at nothing so much as destructive liberty Let us be exhorted to submit unto it to yeeld obedience unto all the holy equall righteous just commands of Almighty God and say with the Apostle howsoever they may seeme crosse and contradictory unto us that the Law is holy and the commandement is holy and just and good Rom. 7. 12. And let us write this truth amongst those things we would most remember that Jesus Christ never was never wil be a Saviour to any unto whom he is not a Lord Further Let us submit our selves unto every ordinance of man for the Lords sake c. as before it was urged from that in the 1. Pet. 2. 13. Secondly is there such an unity an agreeing a love a liking amongst many we have named to compasse their evill ends Let us take up heere in the first place a further sad and a very just complaint of the dis-union mis-agreement censoriousnesse uncharitablenesse rash judging and condemning that so swells up the breasts of many amongst us who professe themselves Christians yet they want charity for them for whom Christ had blood who because we cannot assent unto them in all their mis-grounded opinions therefore they cast us off away as filthy ragges Oh love I thou duty and ornament of Christians thou glory of Saints thou delight of God where art thou how art thou gone how art thou departed from us where shall we seeke thee where shall we finde thee Surely in owne hearts or else woe be to us And secondly though difference in opinion hath so banished love from many amongst us that they cannot afford us a good word yet we may not deale with them as they deale with us but learne to know that if love be of God as S. John speakes 1. Jo. 4. 7. And every one that loveth is borne of God and knoweth God so he that loves not knoweth not God as it followeth in the next verse And if love be the fulfilling of the Law as the Apostle tels us Ro. 13. 10. If the whole Law be abridged in that duty of love then the want of love must needs be the violating the breaking of all the commandements of God Thirdly let us learne hence what the Prophet David exhorts us to in a like case Ps. 109. 28. Though they curse yet blesse we And though they hate yet love we Let us love their persons and any thing beside we see of God that is lovely in them whatsoever they may thinke of us though we may not we must not by any meanes close with them in their opinions In all our demeanour towards them carrying our selves as Joshua did to Achan Josh. 7. who retayned the affections of a Father while he was executing the office of a Judge Fourthly let us be exhorted to make much of that most excellent grace of the spirit Love love to God love to one another Le ts make much of love for t is love which conveyes all mercies to us Let us lay hold on it as the Patriarchs did apprehend the promises most elegantly set out by the Apostle Heb. 11. 13. by a Metaphor of saluting {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} They saluted them they kissed them they hug'd them they embraced them So let us doe this grace that findes such little such cold entertainment from many from most This grace of love which God himselfe so liketh that he calls himselfe by the name of Love 1. Ioh. 4. 8. {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Fellow after charity saith the Apostle 1. Cor. 4. 1. The originall word is very emphaticall for it signifies to pursue or follow a thing eagerly it implies in it a singular love to the thing we follow which makes us take any paines about it to follow a thing as having it in chase the Metaphor being taken from Hunters who will not leave what they pursue till they have taken it Thus must we follow after love and charity that we may Have it and Harbour it and Exercise And lastly let us labour after unity as first unity and agreement amongst our selves Secondly unity in the profession of the true Religion we professe as unity in doctrine and unity in discipline which would marvellously unite our hearts together There is but one Lord one Faith oxe Baptisme one God and