Selected quad for the lemma: knowledge_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
knowledge_n	brotherly_a	diligence_n	kindness_n	1,298	5	9.3074	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A44524	The great law of consideration: or a discourse, wherein the nature, usefulness, and absolute necessity of consideration, in order to a truly serious and religious life, is laid open: By Anthony Horneck, preacher at the Savoy.	Horneck, Anthony, 1641-1697.	1677 (1677)	Wing H2833; ESTC R220111	198,374	451

Go into houses where mad men are kept and see whether thy deportment and practice be not as like theirs as one thing can be like another it 's the character of mad men to choose means altogether unsutable to the end they design if they offer to kindle a fire with shining brass or attempt to build a house without materials or think that a Net will secure them against the bitterest Frost or hope to be Masters of a Trade without learning of it or talk of being acquainted with such a language when they have neither Books nor Men to converse withall we justly look up on them as distracted and would not one think thou art besides thy wits that hears thee hope for Heaven without taking the way that leads to it And talk of being saved when thy actions savor only of preparation for eternal misery To hope to be saved by following the dictates of thy flesh is as wise an act as to hope to be warm by sitting upon Ice or by surrounding thy self with Snow-balls Thou wouldst take that man to be besides himself that should choose to lie all night in mire and dirt when there is a convenient Bed provided for him or that should-prefer sleeping on a Dunghil before reposing himself upon a cleanly Couch And dost not thou act the same madness when thou preferrest lying in the Arms of an Enemy before resting in the bosome of a gracious Redeemer And hadst rather rest in sin more odious and loathsome to God than any Dunghil than delight thy self in him whose service is perfect freedom Can there be greater madness than to prefer Stone before Bread and a Serpent before a Fish And is not thy Distraction as great to esteem a sinful pleasure more than the favour of God And set by the Dross and Dung of this World more than by the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Is this thy wisdom to neglect thy weightiest Concerns and spend thy time in admiring Bubbles Is this thy wisdom to prefer a few drops before an immense Ocean of blessedness an Atom before an Infinite and the small dust upon the balance before Mount Zion which can never be mov'd Is this thy wisdom to thrust away salvation with both Arms and to oppose the endeavours of that God that would even compel thee to come to the Supper of the Lamb Is this thy wisdom to lie in a Dungeon when a Palace is prepared for thy reception And to be enamor'd with deformity it self when thou art courted by him who is altogether lovely Is this thy wisdom to relie on broken Reeds rather than on the Rock of Ages And to trust more to Castles in the Air than to him who is the Ancient of dayes and hath promis'd neither to leave nor to forsake those that call upon him faithfully And when the case stands thus with thee when thou art as mad as thou canst well be sure thou needest not be afraid that Consideration of thy wayes will make thee so Consideration Why this would make thee sober This would bring thee to thy right senses again This would make thee live like a rational man again This would restore thee to thy Wits again This would cure the Distempers of thy Brain This would be so far from promoting that it would chase away all madness and distraction This would clear thy Understanding and rectifie thy Will and Affections and make all thy faculties move more orderly Consideration would let thee see what madness it is to despise him whom thou standest most in need of and to neglect that now which upon thy Death-bed thou wilt wish thou hadst minded day and night This would shew thee what a folly it is to slight the Fountain of living waters and to hunt after broken Cisterns which can hold no water and to esteem a Wilderness a Land of Desarts and of Pits a Land of drought and of the shadow of death a Land which no man passes through and where no man dwells infinitely more than a plentiful Countrey Jer. 2.6 This would shew thee what a folly it is to forfeit the favour of him that must be thy Judge one day and to make him thy Foe without whose mercy thou must fall a prey to Hellish furies to scorn that Provision now the crums whereof thou wilt be glad to gather one day and to mock his kindness now when one day thou wouldst rejoyce at the least smile of his countenance if thou couldst but have it This would shew thee what a folly it is to be ravish'd more with a painted Coronet than with the real glories of a Kingdom and to rejoyce more in the present pomp and adoration of a Stage than in thy right to the reversion of a Crown and what distraction it is to think that the great God who changes not will make those blessed who renounce his bliss and quench Hell-fire for men because they are resolved to run into it to make those like unto the Angels of God that will live like Beasts here and prefer those to this Throne that would not have him to reign over them This would shew thee what a folly it is to make merry at the brow of a Pit and to sing Care away when thy sins call for mourning and lamentation Consideration sinner would let thee see That there is no Wisdom like that Wisdom which makes men wise unto salvation and that those who deny all ungodliness and worldly lusts living soberly righteously and godly in this present world looking for that blessed hope and that glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ are the only men that are in their Wits and that the rest who forget their calling and walk not worthy of the vocation wherewith they are call'd do really unman themselves and live below their reason This would let thee see that those who give all diligence to add to their faith virtue and to virtue knowledge and to knowledge temperance and to temperance patience and to patience godliness and to godliness brotherly kindness and to brotherly kindness charity and are not barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ are the men that choose the fittest means for the greatest end and that he that works to day in Gods Vineyard and so numbers his dayes that he may apply his heart unto Wisdom and lives like a person that remembers he hath a Soul to be saved is the man who governs his Affairs with discretion This would let thee see that men do pretend to Learning in vain while they are ignorant of mortification of their members which are upon the earth and of that spiritual life which is every mans greatest interest That the Logician who resolves all knotty Arguments is but a Fool while he knows not how to keep himself from the snares of the Devil and that the Grammarian who rectifies the errors of Speech is but a mad man while he takes no care to rectifie the errors

and be healed But what is worse than all this the death of the Son of God which thus instead of mortifying makes sin reign in your mortal bodies will be the greatest witness against you in the last day The stone shall cry out of the wall and the beam out of the timber shall answer against the oppressor saith the Prophet Hab. 2.11 And then sure blood hath a louder voice the blood of a crucified Saviour Hebr. 12.24 will be one day the greatest evidence against you This like oyl will increase your flames and prove the brimstone that shall make the fire blaze the more That Jesus whose Cross thou despisest now will be thy Accuser then and woe to that man that hath the Judge himself for his enemy That dreadful spectacle the Crucifixion of the Lord of Life which cannot engage thy Soul to consider and look upon him whom thou hast pierc'd will be the great Argument then that shall cover thy face with everlasting confusion When thou shalt see in that day the spirits of men made perfect the men in white who have wash'd their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb when thou shalt reflect on their happiness a happiness which thou mightst have had as well as they if that blood could have persuaded thee to cleanse thy self from all filthiness both of flesh and spirit how will thine eyes flow with tears to think what strong delusions thou hast lay'n under in thinking that this blood was only spilt that thou mightest wallow more freely in the mire The Lamb which was slain from the foundation of the world and came to take away thy sins as well as thy Neighbors only thou wouldst not be clean That Lamb I say as harmless as its looks are now will then change his aspect and thou that now thinkst a Lamb can be nothing but kind wilt then find by woful experience that there is such a thing as the indignation and wrath of the Lamb. CHAP. V Of the various Mischief's arising from Neglect of Consideration The want of it prov'd to be the Cause of most Sins Some Instances are giuen in Atheism Vnbelief Swearing Pride Carelesness in Gods Service Lukewarmness Couetousness c. FRom what hath been said we may safely draw this Conclusion That want of Consideration is the unhappy spring from which most of the miseries and calamities of Mankind flow Indeed God Isa. 5.12 13. makes this the great reason Why his people were gone into Captiuity why their honourable men were famish'd and their multitude dryed up with thirst why Hell had enlarged herself and open'd her mouth without measure and their glory and their multitude and their pomp descended into it It 's the want of it which in all Ages hath procur'd Gods judgments which by Consideration might have been stopt and prevented Had Adam improv'd his solitariness in the Garden of Eden into serious Consideration of the Nature of the Precept his Master gave him and reflected on the wisdom of the Supreme Law-giver that made it on the immense bounty his great Benefactor had crown'd him withall on the abominable ingratitude he would make himself guilty of by breaking so reasonable an Injunction Had he but recollected himself when tempted to eat of the dangerous fruit under a pretence that it would open his eyes and make him wise as God and thought that the Creator of Heaven and Earth knew best what degree of wisdom and knowledge became a creature of his quality and condition and that he that was all love and beauty and kindness would not have interdicted him that fruit if the food might have any way advanc'd his happiness and that therefore there must be some cheat in the Temptation That the Angels which were lately thrown down from their glory could not but envy the felicity he enjoyed and for that reason would appear in all manner of shapes and try a thousand wayes to weaken the favor of God towards him and that it was without all peradventure the safest way to prefer an express command before an uncertain suggestion Had his mind taken a view of such Arguments as these of the uninterrupted prosperity and immortality he was promis'd upon his obedience it 's not the Charms or Rhetorick or soft language of a Wife nor the subtilty of a Serpent nor the pretended Omniscience the Devil flatter'd him withall would have made him leave that happy state which the infinite goodness of Heaven had plac'd him in But while he suffers the pleasure of a Garden to transport his Soul and to blind it fears no ill no mischief no danger among the Roses and Flowers of Paradice embraces the deceitful suggestion without examining the cause the manner or the end of it swallows the fatal bait without chewing believes a Wife and a Beast without considering the consequence of the fact and inquires not how God may resent his curiosity he falls into death and misery and drags all his Posterity after him Had the Inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah reflected like rational Men on the Reproofs and Admonitions of righteous Lot consider'd the kindness of the Almighty in sending them such a Preacher and thought with themselves That sure it could not be the Preachers interest to set himself against their Vices That except Conscience and a Divine Commission had prompted him to attempt their Reformation it was not probable he would enrage a debauched City against himself and make himself obnoxious to the fury of the People That the righteous Man spake nothing but reason and sought nothing but their good That Gods patience would certainly be tired ere long and his long-suffering turn into vengeance That the fire of their Lust would shortly pull down other fire and the heat of their unclean desires break into more consuming flames That God would not alwayes put up affronts nor suffer his methods to reclaim them to be baffled everlastingly That they could not hope to escape Gods indignation no more than the men of the first world and when their sins were equal Gods judgments would overtake them as well as they did their Brethren That God could intend them no harm by calling them to Repentance and being the great Preserver of Men could not but design their interest and happiness Had they suffered their thoughts to dwell on such truths as these made such Considerations familiar to their Souls they would have melted and humbled themselves and kept back that fire and brimstone which afterwards consumed them Want of Consideration made them secure in sin and that security prepared for their devastation Indeed there is no sin almost but is committed for want of Consideration Men consider not what sin is nor how loathsom it is to that God who carries them on his wings as the Eagle doth her young nor what injury they do to their own Souls nor what the dreadful effects and consequences of it are and that makes them supine and negligent of their duty To