Selected quad for the lemma: knowledge_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
knowledge_n	life_n	light_n	shine_v	1,813	5	9.0770	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A30443	A sermon preach'd before the Queen, at White-Hall, on the 11th of March, 1693/4 being the third Sunday in Lent / by the Right Reverend Father in God, Gilbert, Lord Bishop of Sarum.	Burnet, Gilbert, 1643-1715.	1694 (1694)	Wing B5900; ESTC R21582	16,903	37

that Men should be cured and freed from And this appears more evident by considering the fourth Particular which is 4. That all this belongs only to the greater part the many but that it is not constantly nor Universally true We have seen what a Powerful Biass the Orders of Men specified in the Text are under as to the Christian Religion But we are now to consider the Abatements that are to be made in this Point In Fact we find a Nicodemus and a Ioseph of Arimathea among the first who acknowledged our Saviour tho' they were both of the Sanhedrin the chief Judicature and indeed the Head of the Jewish State We see Gamaliel was not far from it besides several Rulers of Synagogues who were always Men of distinction in the Neighbourhood we find also one of the Iudges of Areopagus the most Celebrated Court in Greece and one of the Roman Deputies among the first Converts to our Faith St. Paul himself was a Master of the Jewish Learning and acquainted with the Greek Philosophers and Poets We find some of Domitian's Kindred were not only Christians but Martyrs Many of the Philosophers and the most admired Orators of Greece came afterwards to receive and defend this Faith And now in a course of a great many Ages Men in all respects eminent both for Sense and Learning Wit and Eloquence have not only made outward Profession of this Doctrine but have strenously defended it and which is yet more have conformed their own Lives to it If we will judge a little of this Matter by the Bulk we must confess that where the Light of this Gospel shines even in colder Climates less productive of Men of Genius yet there is a more general Knowledge spread among Nations that were dull and barbarous while under the Power of other Religions than is to be found in Provinces of a much vaster extent that live in a purer Air a happier Soil and under a kinder aspect of the Heavens I need not observe what a Darkness is spread over all the Pagan Nations how most of them are sunk even below Humane Nature and how little the Mahometans rise above them bating their Freedom from Idolatry Greece and Rome the two most refined Scenes of Paganism had Notions of their Gods and Religion which the wiser Men among themselves could hardly endure and which they have sufficiently exposed The good Laws under which all States are brought which acknowledge this Doctrine in its purity produce an unspeakable Change on the outward face and appearances of things which tho' it does not reform Men inwardly yet it proves a great Blessing to humane Society and the cultivation of all Arts and Sciences that accompanies this happy Light shews that it awakens Mens Faculties excites their Thoughts and quickens their Industry All other Religions feed so much Superstition that it tends to Barbarity and tho' under some happy Reigns and great Princes we find good Sense and true Knowledge sometimes in the Ascendant Yet this went soon off it is not the natural growth of such a Religion and cannot thrive long in that Soil Thus upon the whole Matter this our Doctrine is Light and it illuminates Mankind in gross And some even of the sublimest Minds that Ages and Nations have produced the Men of the liveliest Thoughts truest Judgments and most piercing Understandings that have gone the deepest into Knowledge and have seen the furthest into Humane Nature have not only undertaken and managed the Cause of Religion with great Advantages but have recommended it more by their own unblemished and exemplary Lives than can possibly be done by the most laboured Writings and the most moving Persuasions They have expressed a genuine Humility an unaffected contempt of the Pleasures and Interests of this Life They have been pure without spot grave and sober yet neither sullen nor ill-natured They have been serious without Melancholy and devout without Superstition And have shewed that Wit could be lively without being Impious and that one may be cheerful without being Prophane or Scurrilous Now I would gladly know whither any such whom you may have known and I hope you may have known many of them have not been more Beneficial to Mankind have not been greater Blessings in their Families and Neighbourhoods and if their Knowledge set off with their Modesty and Humility has not looked full as well about them as the highest Pretenders to Wit and unsanctified Vivacity The Presumption of the latter takes off from the true Value that does perhaps belong to them Whereas the former have nothing that is troublesome and offensive with all that is useful in Knowledge They can feel that they know more than others without either despising them or offering to impose upon them they can be superior to others without Insolence and Conquer without Scorn In such Persons knowledge does both shine and triumph and is equally useful and amiable None are hurt but such Mens Wit and many are the better by their means The temper that Religion inspires them with does really exalt their Capacities it fixes their attention and composes their Minds and as the Revelation of this Doctrine has brought a great deal to Light which the World could never have thought on without it so the excellent disposition under which Men are brought by it puts them in a good way to improve those Seeds and to increase them But as some of the disputers of this World the Wise and the Learned have been great Ornaments to this Religion as well as they have been much adorned by it so some Men of Power and Authority have come under the standarts of the Crosse they have owned their Power to be derived from him who is King of Kings and Lord of Lords They have not only taken on the Profession of this Faith but have established and conformed it by Laws they have imployed their Power to protect and encourage Virtue and Justice they have studyed the common good of Societies and the true Interest Mankind Some Princes and Magistrates I am sorry that I must only say some but some they have been whose Exemplary lives have been Patterns to one great part of mankind and Reproaches to the rest They have been raised above the World only to let others see to what a height of vertue and to what an exactness of Deportment to what a nobleness of Temper and purity of Morals humane Nature may be exalted and remain untainted under all the smiles of Fortune and the flateries of the obsequious Some have reckon'd it the end of their Power to promote Justice to repress Rapine to encourage Vertue and put Vice out of countenance and to pursue the common Good of the whole Society as well as the particular happiness of every deserving Person in it and have reckoned no part of their time better imployed and more to their own content than that which has been applyed to consider the miseries and to procure the happiness of their

first It is very true that the first Converts to Christianity were for the most part weak and mean Men The Arguments which did then enforce this Religion were such that the lowest Capacity could judg of them Miracles were wrought in the sight of great Multitudes and that in signal Instances of wonderful Cures done with a Word of raising some from the Dead and speaking the Language of every Country into which those Preachers came and that without any previous Preparation or time lost in acquiring it These were things that bare Observation bare Seeing or Hearing could discover to any that would look into them they required no Strength of Apprehension nor Niceness of Judging Men of a higher Form are naturally more apt to despise all such things and to shut them out by forming a previous Disbelief of them and setting that up as a Bar against all Conviction which Men of a more moderate size are more willing to ask after and enquire into So that for the great Argument then given in behalf of our Religion every Man was capable of seeing it's Truth and when these mighty Works confirmed such a Narrative concerning the Death and the Resurrection of Christ together with such a holy Rule of Life and of Morals every honest Man was capable of judging at least for himself that such a Recital with such a Scheme of Divine Morals so well attested could come from none but the great and good God It was also sutable to the miraculous Vouchers that accompanied this Doctrine that the first Bodies of Men who were converted to it should consist chiefly of such Persons that no Suspicion could be against them as if they by the Strength of their Parts and Skill by the Credit they were in or the Authority that they had might have procured to this Doctrine any part of the Reception that it met with in the World Had either the Tricks of Dispute the Charms of Eloquence or the Dexterity of Conduct appeared among the first Planters of this Faith had they been fortified with Power or supported by Dependencies then the Progress of it might have been accounted for but when Numbers both of Jews and Gentiles and those Greeks as well as Barbarians that is Learned and Unlearned forsook the Religions in which they had been bred and to which they were tied by all the Prejudices that could possibly lock them up fast in the way in which they had been brought up and when they not only embraced it upon the Credit of what they saw and heard and reformed their Lives according to it but stood to it in spite of all the ill Usage and Persecution that it brought upon them so that many of them died for it and all suffered more or less by reason of it it must be acknowledged that this was a very extraordinary and an unaccountable thing The vast Increase and Propagation of this Religion under all those Disadvantages and with no visible human Help at all was so astonishing that as all the first Apologists for Christianity appealed often to it as to one of the most sensible Arguments so it had been capable of an Answer that had taken off much from its Strength if it could have been said that the Progress it made was in some degree owing to the Abilities or Interests of those who first embraced it Therefore as the Arguments upon which its Credit at first was built were such that the meanest Capacities were capable of passing a Judgment upon them so their being without all human Supports was an evident Indication of the Divine ones that attended upon them And thus the first Branch of this Prejudice is sufficiently accounted for I go now to the second Particular to examine what Reasons there may be for the like Reflections in the present Age. Alas it is but too visible that tho now whole Nations are become Christians by the lump yet there are few very few real Christians to be found among all those Assemblies that are crowded full with those who carry that worthy Name There are few the Tenor and Thread of whose Lives speaks them to be Men that deny Ungodliness and Worldly Lusts and that live godly righteously and soberly like Pilgrims on Earth having their Hearts and Affections in Heaven that are pure and holy meek and lowly in Heart in imitation of their great Master whom the far greater part of those who are called Christians dishonour with their Lives while they offer up to him the outward Shews and Pageants of Honour and Worship Among those few few they are God knows there are not many who have great Advantages in this World either with respect to their Talents or to their Fortunes Those who have a greater compass of Knowledg more flame of Thought and elevation of Mind either turn and imploy it wholly to base and mean Purposes to the close Contrivances of Dissimulation and Falshood or to a loose and libertine Gaity valuing themselves upon some sparkling Thoughts which are directed to the questioning or laughing at the most serious and sacred Matters which by a profane Mimickry they represent as ridiculous both to themselves and others These are the too common Corruptions that hang about many of those who yet seem to be born with somewhat that is sublime in them Men of a greater Depth in Study as well as of more Gravity of Temper feeling that their Thoughts have a higher Flight and a greater Extent than others about them are perhaps capable of do swell often upon that and grow to value themselves as much beyond what they deserve as they undervalue others below what is due to them These if sullen and ill-bred shew their Pride in Scorn and insolent Behaviour or if by a due Commerce with the World their Deportment is more decent yet inwardly they are full of an Admiration of themselves and of a Contempt of all other Persons they are apt to be singular in their Thoughts and fond of their own Notions they love Novelties and delight to see whole Bodies of Men called by their Name they form to themselves Prejudices against the believing any thing upon the Testimony of others especially if the Matters proposed to them are of a pitch above their Apprehensions Men of Knowledg and Parts are subject to one or more of these ill Qualities which do so much vitiate their Understandings and corrupt their Natures that they cannot come under a Discipline whose first Elements are Humility Modesty a due Distrust of one's self and a charitable Esteem of other Men they have not treatable Understandings that can diligently observe and lay things slowly and attentively together they neither examine the first Principles nor the Connections of things So that their Hearts and Heads are not capable of that ply of Mind which is a necessary Preparation to the being a true Christian. As for the Mighty Men if they are of a lower Form their Thoughts turn much to Avarice and Corruption to