Selected quad for the lemma: knowledge_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
knowledge_n	gift_n	spirit_n	word_n	4,611	5	5.5728	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A25315	A discourse concerning the divine dreams mention'd in Scripture together with the marks and characters by which they might be distinguish'd from vain delusions : in a letter to Monsieur Gaches / by Moses Amyraldus ; translated out of French by Ja. Lowde ...; Discours sur les songes divins dont il est parlé dans l'Escriture. English	Amyraut, Moïse, 1596-1664.; Lowde, James.; Gaches, Raymond, d. 1668.	1676 (1676)	Wing A3034; ESTC R16142	63,942	221

and see if ever any thing like unto it did enter into a humane understanding Certainly the Idea of such an Image is so fair the variety of the Metals and Materials that composed it so remarkable the continued series of them so admirably succeeding each other the stone which broke and dash'd it in pieces and the manner of its coming so extraordinary and surprising its increase so miraculous and in general the whole series of this representation so majestick that it could never enter into the imagination of man if it had not been sent from above for certainly humane understanding was too little to serve for a mould where so great and magnificent a work should be framed And the effect which it produced in the Spirit of Nabuchodonosor is very considerable he was a Prince and those of that birth and dignity are not easily mov'd by extraordinary things He was a great Monarch and Conquerour and such Princes have commonly more elevated thoughts then others and of Monarchs and Conquerours he was one who was puffed up with the opinion of his own grandeur and this would be apt to make him in all conditions either sleeping or waking to think most things either Ordinary or Common and further when he awakened he did not at all remember his vision Now when our dreams are vanish'd from our minds the motion and impression which they then made upon us do usually cease and vanish with them and though there did not remain the least footstep of his dream in his memory but only thus far to remember that he had dreamed yet when he came to acquaint his Soothsayers Astrologers and Magicians herewith he told them that his Spirit did remain astonish'd and the passion which he had to retrieve what was fled from him that so he might have the interpretation of it caused him to denounce threatnings and terrible punishments to them in case they did not acquaint him with it so that it must necessarily be that he was inwardly sensible of something of divinity in the dream that produc'd in him such a passionate desire to know the interpretation I shall not here speak any thing of Iacob's vision for that speaks enough of it self for certainly the words he there heard did promise such great things so far above either the power or knowledge of humane understanding the voice of the speaker was so Majestick the image of a Ladder which reach'd from earth to heaven upon which the Angels did ascend and descend upon the top whereof God himself did seem to sit in a visible and humane shape and figure as a presage of the future Incarnation of Christ all this I say had so great so glorious an aspect and Iacob himself was so struck with Reverence Admiration and Amazement that he was forc'd to cry out that the very place was terrible and that in seeing this vision he was set as it were in the threshold of the house God and in the very porch of heaven And this shows that this dream had made an impression in him quite different from those which proceed from natural causes I suppose I have already sufficiently discuss'd this question it only now remains to resolve the last CHAP. V. Whether God doth make use of this kind of Revelation by Dreams now under the Dispensation of the Gospel JOel hath thus prophesy'd concerning the time of the coming of the Messias It shall come to pass in those days saith God that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy your young men shall see visions and your old men shall dream dreams And in those days I will surely pour out of my spirit upon my servants and upon my handmaids so that they shall prophesy And I will do wonders in heaven above and signs on earth beneath blood and vapour of smoke the Sun shall be turned into darkness and the Moon into blood before that great and notable day of the Lord come It is clear from these very words of the Prophet without any need of producing others that at the coming of the Messias God would pour out a great abundance of his Spirit upon his Church which should render the extraordinary and miraculous gifts of prophesy of visions and of dreams almost common to all the faithful which God before did but sparingly communicate to some particular persons and indeed the Apostles have apply'd this passage to the sending of the holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost and the experience of things at that time did very authentically testify the truth of this Prophesy for the abundance and variety of gifts which God poured upon Christians at the first establishment of Christianity is a thing much to be wondered at in as much as he did not only inspire the Apostles and Prophets Evangelists the Pastors Doctors and Deacons and generally all those who had any publick Office or charge in the Chruch but also many particular persons without any difference of Age Sex or Condition And the History of the Acts of the Apostles with that which we have yet remaining of the succeeding Age doth give us a very sufficient testimony hereof But here are yet further two things very remarkable the first that the fulfilling of this prophesy if we regard the Emphasis of the terms wherein it is express'd is not limited to the Infancy of the Church or an hundred or sixscore years after but extends to all the ages of Christianity even to the end of the world For here is an opposition of the times of the Gospel to the times of the Law and by consequence of all the duration of the one dispensation to all the duration of the other The second that notwithstanding this we see by experience that those miraculous gifts of the Spirit of God are ceased long ago so that it is now many Ages since we saw the least footsteps of them in the Christian Church for all that hath been either spoke or written these twelve hundred years concerning those miraculous gifts is either very much suspected or altogether false and supposititious and full of vanity and imposture how then shall we reconcile our experience with this Prophesy In Order to do it and to clear the way for the solution of the present question I think it convenient to lay down certain previous considerations First It is certain That which God promised by his Prophets to give a great measure of his Spirit in the time of the Revelation of the Messias must have its accomplishment from the first coming of Christ even unto his second but in what manner it shall be done is a thing that deserves a more attentive consideration for though the words of Ioel seem only to design the extraordinary and miraculous gifts of the Spirit yet under them are also compris'd those more ordinary ones which consist in the illumination of the understanding of the faithful in knowledge of the Divine truth in consolation

in sanctification in hope in patience under temptations and afflictions and in all Christian vertues for it would have been a small thing for God to have promis'd abundance of those gifts which are truly miraculous but such as of themselves are not effectual for the procurement of Salvation and have kept back those which only are necessary and sufficient thereunto And indeed we ought to understand that Prophesy of Isaiah in the same manner Your God shall come himself and shall deliver you then the eyes of the blind shall be opened and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped then shall the lame leap as the Hart and the tongue of the dumb shall sing in triumph for the waters shall spring in the desart and torrents in solitary places It is very true that those words have a proper and literal sense which was accomplished at the coming of our Saviour but they have also an Allegorical and Figurative one which respects the saving graces of the Spirit which have their accomplishment all along in all Ages of the Church Secondly It is further certain that the reason for which these miraculous gifts are expresly mention'd in this prophesy and not the more ordinary and saving ones is because these promises are conceiv'd in terms more accommodated to the legal dispensation for under that oeconomy the faithful very well knew that all the good that was in them did come from God and accordingly return'd him thanks Moses himself hath thus taught and the Psalms of David are full of such acknowledgments yet nevertheless they did not distinctly know that it came from a particular operation of the third Person in the Deity the Spirit of Faith the Spirit of Consolation the Spirit of Adoption the Spirit of Sanctification being terms unknown to the Faithful of the Ancient Church So that until David who began to speak something of the Spirit of God in matters relating to Sanctification no one before spake any thing of it and after him these Expressions were very rare Whereas there is nothing more ordinary in the Books of the Old Testament then to attribute the Visions and Revelations of the Prophets their extraordinary and miraculous gifts which did both enlighten and astonish the World to the Spirit of God in so much that the particular skill which was bestowed on Bezaleel and Aholiab to work in all manner of carved work for the building of the Tabernacle of the Congregation is particularly attributed to the Efficacy of the Spirit of God in the Books of Moses It is true the ordinary gifts of the Spirit of God are much less resplendent and cause less of admiration then the extraordinary for those are so internal that they do not show themselves but in Actions of Piety Charity and Sanctification which are commonly very Moderate and Regular and which unless we take a more close and exact view of them do not seem to proceed from any other Principle then that of right reason Whereas the other do so dazle the eyes of all beholders with their lustre that no one who sees their effects can judge them to proceed from any thing less then a Divine and Supernatural Cause And this difference was so much greater under the Law as the ordinary gifts were there less liberally bestow'd and the vertues which they produc'd were more obscure and less frequent then they are now and on the contrary the extraordinary and miraculous gifts were then more common and agreed better with the genius of that Dispensation in that it did prevail upon the minds of men not so much by the knowledge of the truth as this doth now as by the admiration of the power of God and by the astonishment which those surprising and prodigious passages did produce From hence for a third consideration results the knowledge of the manner how this promise of Ioel and such like were to be fulfill'd for it was very agreeable to the truth that at the beginning of Christianity our Saviour should plentifully bestow upon his Church those miraculous gifts which were there especially design'd And two reasons among others invited him thereunto The one that the expressions which the Prophets had made use of had fill'd the minds of men with expectation of these gifts with expectation of theirs if it had been frustrated in this respect it would have given an occasion of scandal therefore that men might not have any thing to object about the accomplishment of those promises God was willing to signalize the beginning of the Preaching of the Gospel by those marvellous instances The other which is the Principal is that the first establishment of the Gospel had need of such a manifestation of the Spirit by the gift of miracles because otherwise it could never have destroy'd the dominion of Satan as it did and have vanquish'd the resistance it met with in the Roman Empire and in all other nations of the earth for the Preaching of the Gospel the working of miracles the distribution of the miraculous gifts of the Spirit have been the wings upon which the Church hath been carried through all the Nations of the World Therefore the Apostle joyns these two together in the Epistle to the Hebrews when he says That salvation being first begun to be Preach'd by our Lord it hath been confirmed to us by those who heard it God besides bearing witness by signs and miracles and divers powers and distributions of the spirit according to his pleasure But when the Gospel was once well planted in the world so that the Preaching thereof alone was sufficient to preserve and continue it the necessity of miracles being now ceased the use of them ceased likewise and these extraordinary gifts of the Spirit therefore disappear'd because they were no longer necessary thus the performance of this promise of Ioel as far as it was to be extended to all the times of the Christian Church even to the consummation of the world hath been restrain'd to the ordinary gifts of the Spirit of Faith of Consolation of Sanctification which are indeed much more plentifully poured out under this dispensation of the Gospel then ever they were under that of the Law To come therefore to a particular solution of this question I think we ought carefully to distinguish betwixt Divine Angelical and Natural Dreams for as for those Divine Dreams which are design'd to foretel things to come under the Emblem of an Allegorical Representation or to convey some new commands to men in order to some great and extraordinary design for which there is need of Divine Authority for the undertaking and executing of it I conceive that time is now wholly expir'd and those who pretend to and boast of any such they are either impostors who would abuse the world by their feigned visions to serve their own private interest or else fools who have their brains disturb'd by Hypocondriack vapours for we are no longer now under the legal dispensation which was as it were