Selected quad for the lemma: knowledge_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
knowledge_n	commit_v	sin_n	sin_v	2,906	5	9.7075	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A26810	Spiritual perfection, unfolded and enforced from 2 Cor. VII, 1 having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse our selves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God / by William Bates ...	Bates, William, 1625-1699.	1699 (1699)	Wing B1128; ESTC R4307	200,199	485

Majesty I have laid the Foundations thereof on the centre of the Earth and raised its Towers to the Heavens This Pride is attended with relyance and confidence in their own direction to contrive and ability to accomplish their designs and with assuming the glory of all their success intirely to themselves The proud manage their affairs independently upon the Providence of God who is the Author of all our Faculties and the efficacy of them and totally neglect the two essential parts of Natural Religion Prayer and Praise or very slightly perform the external part without those inward Affections that are the Spirit and Life of them 'T was the wise Prayer of Agar Give me not Riches lest I be full and deny thee God strictly cautions his People against this dangerous Sin Beware thou forget not the Lord and say in thy Heart my power and the might of my Hand hath gotten me this Wealth Remember 't is he that gives the power to get Riches And 't is equally dangerous lest Men should attribute Victories or Prosperity in any kind to their own Counsel and Resolution their Prudence and Power without humble and thankful observing and acknowledging the Divine Providence the fountain and original of all our Blessings 2. Whatever the kinds of Sin be when committed against knowledge with design and deliberation they proceed from Insolence and Obstinacy The Israelites are charged with this aggravation in their sinning They dealt proudly and harden'd their necks and harken'd not to the Commandments and refused to obey Proud Sinners are introduced boasting Our Tongues are our own who is Lord over us They will endure no restraints but are lawless and loose as if they were above fear and danger 'T is true there are few so prodigiously wicked as to speak thus but Mens Actions have a language as declarative as their Words And sinning presumptuously with a high hand is constructively a denyal and despising of the Dominion and Power of the Law-giver as if he had no right to command nor strength to vindicate the Honour of his despised Deity In the last Judgment the Punishment of rebellious Sinners will be according to the Glory of God's Majesty and the extent of his Power that was contemned and vilified by them 3. When Divine Judgments are sent to correct the dissolute disorders of the World and Sinners should with tenderness and trembling hear the Voice of the Rod and who has appointed it yet they proceed in their Wickedness as if God were not always Present to see their Sins nor Pure to hate them nor Righteous to exact a severe Judgment for them nor Powerful to inflict it this argues intolerable Pride and Obstinacy God and Sinners are very unequal Enemies The effects of his Displeasure should be received with obsequiousness not with obduration Therefore the Apostle puts that confounding Question Do you provoke the Lord to jealousie are you stronger than he Can you encounter with offended Omnipotence To despise his Anger is as provoking as to despise his Love 'T is astonishing that Dust and Ashes should rise to such an incorrigible heighth of Pride as to fly in the Face of God Who ever hardned himself against him and prospered All that are careless of God's design to reform them by Afflictions that seek for relief in diverting Business or Pleasures provoke God to more severe inflictions of his Anger But those surly proud Natures that are exasperated by Sufferings and wrestle with the strongest Storms are in combination with the stubborn Spirits of Hell and shall have their portion with them Lastly When Men have a vain presumption of the goodness of their spiritual state of the degrees of their Goodness and their stability in Goodness not sensible of their continual want of renewed supplies from Heaven they are guilty of spiritual Pride Of this there are two Instances in Scripture the one in the Church of lukewarm Laodicea the other in the Pharisee mentioned by our Saviour The first said I am rich and increased in goods and have need of nothing and knowest not that thou art wretched and poor and miserable and blind and naked The Pharisee to raise the esteem of his own Goodness stands upon comparison with others whose Vices may be a foil to his seeming Graces He said I am not as other Men are Extortioners Adulterers or even as this Publican 'T is true he superficially thanks God but the air of Pride transpires through his Devotion by valuing himself above others worse than himself as if his own Vertues were the productive cause of his distinguishing Goodness If Humility be not mix'd in the exercise of every Grace 't is of no value in God's esteem The humble unjust Publican was rather justified than the proud Pharisee This spiritual Pride is very observable in the superstitious who measuring Divine Things with Humane from that mixture of imaginations introduce carnal Rites into the Worship of God and value themselves upon their opinionative Goodness They mistake the swelling of a Dropsie for substantial growth and presume themselves to be more holy than others for their proud singularity Superstition is like Ivy that twines about the Tree and is its seeming ornament but drains its vital Sap and under its verdant Leaves covers a Carcass Thus carnal Ceremonies seem to adorn Religion but really dispirit and weaken its efficacy Pharisaical Pride is fomented by a zealous observance of things uncommanded in Religion neither pleasing to God nor profitable to Men. On the contrary some Visionaries pretend to such a sublimity of Grace and eminent Sanctity that they are above the use of Divine Ordinances They pretend to live in immediate Communion with God as the Angels and dazled with specious Spiritualities they neglect Prayer hearing the Word and receiving the Sacrament the means of growing in Grace as if they were arrived at Perfection This is the effect of spiritual Pride and Delusion For the mortifying this vicious Disposition consider that Pride is in a high degree injurious and provoking to God An ordinary Malefactor breaks the King's Laws but a Rebel strikes at his Person and Crown The first and great Commandment is to honour God with the highest Esteem and Love with the most humble Adoration consequently the greatest Sin is the despising his Majesty and obscuring his Glory There is no Sin more clearly opposite to Reason and Religion For the most essential duty and character of an understanding Creature is dependance and observance of God as the first cause and last end of all things receiving with thankfulness his Benefits and referring them all to his Glory Pride contradicts natural Justice by intercep●ing the grateful affectionate ascent of the Soul to God in celebrating his Greatness and Goodness A proud Man constructively puts himself out of the number of God's Creatures and deserves to be excluded from his tender Providence The Jealousie of God his most severe and sensible Attribute is kindled for this revolture of the

most reverent observance is due 'T is revocable in its Nature but not to cease without the Will of the Legislator either expresly declar'd or vertually by the ceasing of the end of it As the Ceremonial Law is abolish'd by the same Authority that ordain'd it the end of the Institution being obtain'd But this Ordinance is by our Saviour commanded to continue till his Second Coming in Glory the end of it being the revival of the memory of his Death I will not insist upon the several Conformities between the Natural Food and the Spiritual for the principal Comparison and resemblance is in the End for which food is necessary and appointed without which there can be no subsisting Life but consider how the Life of the Soul is strengthened in this Ordinance which is not a naked sign of his Sufferings for us but the seal of the Covenant of Grace and wherein our Saviour though his bodily Presence be confin'd to Heaven yet does really and spiritually exhibit himself with all his saving Benefits to sincere Believers Consider how Repentance Faith and Love are increas'd by this Ordinance 1. Repentance is a Vital Operative Grace not only in mortifying Sin but in bringing forth many excellent Fruits suitable to it All the Terrors at Mount Sinai in giving the Law cannot make such an impression on the Conscience of the righteous and fearful Anger of God for Sin as the infliction of Wrath upon our dying Saviour He receiv'd into his Breast the Arrows of the Almighty that drank up his Blood and Spirits though in himself he was perfectly Holy Surely he has born our griefs and carried our sorrows he was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities the chastisement of our peace was upon him and with his stripes we are heal'd We read that Nathan was sent from God to David when insensible of his Guilt of Murder and Adultery to awaken him to review his Sin he for that end us'd a very moving Parable of a Rich Man that had many Flocks yet to entertain a Stranger rob'd a Poor Man of his only Lamb and drest it for him This David so resented that he threatned the severest Revenge for such an unrighteous and unmerciful action And when Nathan turned the point of the Parable against his Breast charging him Thou art the man in what Agonies and Confusion was he surpriz'd as his mournful Complaint declares When we read in the Narrative of our Saviour's Sufferings of the Treachery of Judas the Malice of the Priests the Fury of the People the Cowardise of Pilate and the Cruelty of the Soldiers how apt are we to conceive Indignation against his Murderers but when Conscience like the true Prophet shall with a piercing Reproach charge us that our Sins Condemn'd and Crucified him how will this open the Springs of Godly Sorrow and looking on him whom we have pierced cause us to Mourn as those that mourn for a first-born How will the Contemplation of him in his Sufferings excite Indignation with Zeal and Revenge against our selves for our choosing and committing those Sins that were the meritorious Cause of his Sufferings Since he bore our Sins 't is just we should simpathize in his Sorrows How instructive and exemplary was insensible Nature as if capable of Knowledge and Affection in the time of his Sufferings It was disorder'd in the Heavens and simpathiz'd in the Elements The Sun was obscur'd against all possibility of Nature for the Moon was opposite and in the Full and in the twinkling of an Eye past half the Circle of the Heavens and being empty of Light towards the Earth by its interposition hid the body of the Sun behind it The Air was as dark at mid-day as at mid-night The Earth trembled the Rocks rent Have the Rocks softer Bowels than obdurate Sinners 'T is a greater prodigy that those whose Sins made his Death necessary are unaffected with it than that Nature seemed to have changed its Principles and Properties to signifie its resentment of it God's Anger darkens the Sun and shakes the Earth and shall sinful Men be unrelenting If by Faith and Consideration we transport our selves to Mount Calvary and with the blessed Virgin stand at the foot of the Cross when our Saviour was dying we shall feel the working of her Affections when a Sword p●erc'd through her Soul Now in the Sacrament there is a representation of Christ Crucified before our Eyes which is the most powerful motive of Godly Sorrow and the inseparable consequent of it the destructive hatred of Sin and of holy Resolutions that as he dyed for Sin we will dye to it 2. Faith that is the Root from whence other Graces spring and flourish is increas'd and confirm'd by the use of this Ordinance As by the looking on the mysterious Brazen Serpent there was an Antidote conveyed to heal the Israelites stung by the Fiery Serpents so by the looking on Jesus in his Sufferings our wounded Spirits are healed The dignity of his Person the depth of his Sufferings and his voluntary yielding of himself to them are the supports of Faith The Sin-Offerings under the Law were entirely consumed in their Consecration to Divine Justice and no part was reserved to be eaten by the Offerers To signifie their Imperfection and Inefficacy to reconcile God to Sinners and to pacifie their accusing Consciences The Beasts by substitution suffer'd Death for those who offer'd them but could not purchase Life for them Our Saviour is as truly given to us to communicate Life as he was given for us in his Death When he offer'd himself the most solemn Sacrifice on the Cross he was not consum'd His Body and Blood are the Feast of Love upon his Sacrifice the clearest assuring sign of God's being reconcil'd to us The Blood of the Lamb the true Win● has rejoic'd the Heare of God and Man Our High Priest continually presents his Father in the Coelestial Sanctuary his bloody Sacrifice of which there is a Commemoration on the Holy Table If God remember our Sins we remember his anointed Priest to expiate them If the timerous Conscience be in anxiety for the number and heinousness of Sins and the number of Sinner● who must perish for ever without this Miracle of Mercy as if one Sacrifice were not sufficient to abolish their Gui●● let it be consider'd that his Death is of infinite value and what is infinite cannot be divided he was intirely offer'd for every penitent unfeigned Believer The weakest has as full an Interest and Benefit in it as if it had been offer'd solely for him and may apply and appropriate it to himself with as true solid Comfort as if he had been present at our Saviour's Crucifixion and heard him speaking the words of Life I give my self for thee His Blood cleanses from all Sin and is a propitiation for the Sins of the world These are no fictions of Fancy but the real operations of the Holy Spirit who

Peace with God And by this we may understand from whence the purifying Vertue of Faith as it justifies proceeds for it necessarily supposes us to be under the guilt of Sin and in desperate Misery that we are obnoxious to God's Tribunal who is a righteous and holy Judge angry and incens'd for our Sins and will be a revenging Judge to all that continue in their guilty state and that our Pardon and Right to Eternal Life are to be intirely ascrib'd to the soveraign Mercy of God the Original Cause and the Blood of Christ the Meritorious Cause of it Now Faith works by Love the Love of God to us apprehended by Faith and our Love to him which is the reflexion of his Beams shining in our Hearts and is the powerful Principle of Obedience to him The well-grounded Belief that God will save us and bring us to Eternal Glory does naturally and necessarily inspire the Breast of a Christian with a holy Fear of Sin that provokes him and a constant Care to please him in all things Besides God in dispensing his pardoning Mercy requires our perseverance in a holy Conversation What our Saviour said to the Man miraculously cur'd of his inveterate Disease Behold thou art made whole Sin no more least a worse thing befall thee is virtually said to every pardon'd Believer when God speaks peace to his people 't is with this Caution let them not return any more to folly I shall under another Head speak of Faith as the Effectual Means of our Sanctification and now will proceed 3. Faith in the disposal of all things by the Infallible Providence of God is one of those universal Principles those prime and great Truths rich in practical Consequences that are powerful to compose and calm our Minds and Hearts in the midst of the visible disorders and confusion of things in the present World The Heathens measur'd the Divine Perfections by the compass of their narrow Understandings They could not conceive that one God was able to order all things and form'd a vast number of Subordinate Gods to whom the care of particular things was Committed They blasphem'd him in their Imaginations thinking him to be like Mortal Kings insufficient to govern immediately several Kingdoms and Nations divers in their Customs and Languages who are constrain'd to manage their Affairs by the number variety and order of Officers Vice-Roys to divide the Government Counsellors to advise about occurrences of Moment Secretaries to give Commissions and make dispatches Judges to dispense the Laws Military Officers to prevent Tumults Others confin'd his Presence and Agency to the Heavens and sequester'd him from the lower World the mutable Sphere of the Elements and of Men and their Actions leaving them under the dominion of Fortune Others thought that he was so content with his own Felicity that all things without him were distant from his Thoughts and Care and that to regard and regulate the multitude of Emergencies in this lower World would disturb his Felicity Thus the Professors of Wisdom like the Foolish Harpaste that Seneca speaks of who insensible of her own blindness alwayes complain'd the Sun was down and the house dark thought all things were left at random in loose disorder and confusion here below Nay some of the clearest spirits and most Vertuous among the Heathen could not reconcile the Oppressions and Infelicities of Good Men and the Prosperity of the Wicked with the Rectitude and Equity of the Divine Providence and express'd their Discontents in the Stile and Accent of their Passions Of this we have two Eminent Instances Brutus who with inviolable Integrity had as a Senator managed the Publick Affairs and with undeclining Courage endeavour'd to recover his Countrey from Ignominious Bondage when Vanquisht by the Usurpers broke out into a Tragical Complaint O Virtue I worship thee as a substantial Good a Deity but thou art an empty Name an Idol The Emperor Titus who was the delight of Mankind for his goodness and benignity surpriz'd with Death in his flourishing Age accus'd Heaven that his Life was unjustly snatcht from him The ways and thoughts of God in the Government of the World are above the wayes and thoughts of men as the heavens are higher than the earth And if his Wisdom had not descended from Heaven and discover'd it self in the Sanctuary We should be foolish and like the beasts that perish But the Word of God assures us that nothing happens in this tumultuous and tempestuous World without the Knowledge the Will either approving or permissive and Efficiency of God so far as to dispose the worst Evils by his powerful Providence subordinately to his main End that is alway good Nothing is so high as to be exempted from the Dominion nor so low as to be excluded from the Care of his Providence 1. We are assur'd that all things and persons are under the Eye and Inspection of his Providence No silence no solitude nor darkness can hide the Designs and Actions of the Wicked nor the Sufferings of his People from his perfect Knowledge How many Millions of Inhabitants are in the World how different their Conditions and Circumstances ebbing or flowing but they are all actually and distinctly known to God Without his Universal and Infallible Knowledge it were impossible that God should Govern the World and Judge it Torquatus Manlius a Noble Roman though blind through Age was chosen Consul and General to Rule the State and the Army But no Arguments no Intreaties could perswade him to Consent to it he answer'd That it was absolutely absurd that the Lives and Estates of others should be Committed to his Providence and Protection who must manage all things by the Eyes of others The Perfection of God's Knowledge qualifies him to Govern the World and is the Foundation of Trust in him He tells the number of the Stars that seem innumerable Psal. 147. 41. and from hence the Psalmist encourages the Church that was then disperss'd in Captivity that he could gather the out-casts of Israel though scatter'd in strange Countries and build up Jerusalem He not onely numbers the Stars but the hairs of our Heads that are of so small Consideration All Creatures are supported in their Beings and Operations by his Power therefore 't is impossible they should be without his Knowledge and that any thing should be done by them or befall them without his disposing VVill. 2. The Providence of God is not merely Theoretical but Active and orders all things He rides upon the heavens that is regulates their Motions as easily as a skilful Rider manages a Horse The Stars that in the Language of Scripture are the Armies of Heaven for their Number Order and Actions he calls by their names that is absolutely Commands them For his Call is always effectual and exactly accomplish'd As in the Creation He spake and it was done he commanded and it stood fast So in the Conservation and