Selected quad for the lemma: law_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
law_n	good_a	sin_n	transgression_n	4,384	5	10.5404	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A49398	Practical Christianity, or, An account of the holinesse which the Gospel enjoyns with the motives to it and the remedies it proposes against temptations, with a prayer concluding each distinct head.	Lucas, Richard, 1648-1715.	1677 (1677)	Wing L3408; ESTC R26162	116,693	322

thou hast done in all Meekness and Charity and Faith and Hope that I may be fitted for those Mansions thou art gone before to prepare for me Amen Amen SECT IV. Cantaining the fourth Motive to Holiness i. e. the Consideration of the vanity of all those things which tempt us to sin A Man who should have seriously laid to heart the strength and importance of these Motives to Holiness which I have considered would be apt to think that nothing less than some unimaginable temptation or some unavoidable necessity in the contrivance of our natures could provoke men to cast off all these Obligations and break thorough all these obstructions that he might sin and die but on the quite contraty which doth strangely reproach the folly of the sinner 1. Those things which are the allurements to fin have little or no temptation in them 2. Sin it self is a silly base thing And 3. Man hath strength enough offer'd to enable him to avoid it 1. The first I shall have occasion to consider fully in the third part of this Treatise and thither I refer the Reader only by the way we must take notice there is no more sttess to be laid upon this Argument than it will bear and that this Argument hath still respect to the joys and punishments of another life the sensual satisfactions of Man are very little and trifling compar'd with the pleasures of Heaven and it can never be worth a mans while to be damn'd for them yet sure if there were no life to come it would behove every man to be content with and make the most of this nor do I at all doubt but that men may manage their lusts so as that they may not be able to infer Reason enough to relinquish them from any influence they have upon their interest or if any one should think it necessary to purchase a pleasure by the shortning of his life or the lessening of his Estate I cannot see why he may not have reason on his side for a short life and a merry one and my mind to me a Kingdom is would upon the former supposition be a wise Proverb for upon this supposition the pleasure of the mind would be very narrow and faint and the checks of Conscience would be none or insignificant But as the case stands now though there be pleasure in sin and deceitfulness in lust granted in Scripture to abandon the hopes of Heaven for some carnal pleasures upon Earth is like Esau to sell his Birth-right for a Mess of Pottage and on the other hand to renounce all present enjoyments for the sake of Heaven is like Peter to forsake a worn Fisher-boat and broken Nets a troubled Lake and uncertain Hopes for the assurance of a Crown and Kingdom which is surely very reasonable And now I pass on to the second thing and fifth Section SECT V. Containing a fifth Motive to Holiness from the Nature of Vertue and Vice IN 1 Ep. Jo. 1. this is set down as the great Message which Christ came to acquaint the world with that God is light and in him is no darkness at all and therefore they who walk in the light have fellowship with him and they that walk in darkness have none where it is plain that S. John founded the necessity of Holiness in the Divine Nature because God is holy therefore he must first renounce his own Nature e're he can establish any other contrary Laws or love or hate on any other condition than Holiness and sin This being so I think the best way to discover the Nature of Vertue and Vice is to consider how the one renders us like God and the other unlike him The Account we have of the Nature of God is that he is a Spirit of Eternal Life Infinite Power Wisdom Goodness Justice and Truth these are the chief of his Attributes and such as Reason it self acknowledges to be the highest perfections and excellencies imaginable If Holiness therefore tend to implant and improve some resemblances of them in men and Vice to efface and extinguish them it will easily appear how the one makes us like God and the other unlike him 1 God is a Spirit it is true that Vertue and Vice do not change the substances of things and make Spirit Flesh or Flesh Spirit yet because they do so wonderfully transform things by instilling new qualities and so altering the operations of beings they are in Scripture said to do so Thus because Vertue raises and refines the Soul frees it from those Fogs which a sensual dotage casts about it scatters a new light upon it and mortifies those affections which reign in the body and render it more obedient to the mind so that the man lives the life of Faith as becomes a wise and an immortal being therefore it is said in the Language of the Holy Ghost to have render'd him a spiritual man and on the other side because sin doth stupifie and sensualize the mind imbolden and pamper the body so that the soul seems to have chang'd its nature into flesh and relishes nothing of those pleasures which are properly spiritual but is wholly taken up with those enjoyments which are the proper and natural entertainments of flesh and blood not a Spirit therefore sin is said to have rendred the man a natural man 2. Eternal Life is the second Attribute of God Life in man is either of the Body or Soul as to the former Temperance Imployment and a chearful spirit are the great Preservatives of Health and the best supports of such crazy beings as our bodies are Religion injoyns the two former for no man can be holy without being temperate and imploid at least in doing good and it contributes very effectually to the later i. e. chearfulness of spirit by begetting in us a peaceful Conscience a resign'd mind and glorious hopes but sin shortens our hasty days by exposing us to diseases violence the Law and by the ill influence which a distemper'd mind hath upon the body as to the Soul Righteousness is the life of it it is the nourishment and pleasure the freedom and the security of it but sin is the death and plague of it non est vivere sed valere vita it is not the meer existing but the welfare and happiness of a being which is its life and if so how can a soul which is sick of passions daily tortur'd and distracted by an ill Conscience be said to live Besides sin doth impair the faculties o'recast the light and fetter the powers of the mind so that it neither understands nor wills nor commands as it ought to do it is rendred a poor sickly despicable being and therefore the sinner is said to be dead in trespasses and sins or at least because the Metaphor is not to be press'd too far as appears from the Text following if it hath any life it is as imperfect as that of a Lethargick drowsie body all 's a thick night

fatal nature of sin the blood of Bulls and of Goats purified the flesh indeed but to purge the Conscience another kind of Sacrifice was needful even the Blood of the Son of God I can easily read in these sufferings of my Saviour that the wages of sin is death and sin is not grown less ugly or less hateful to God since the Death of his Son before the strength of i. e. that which gives the fatality to sin was the Law but now much more the Gospel I mean not as the one was a Covenant of Works and the other is of Grace but as the one i. e. the Law had the Majesty of God stamp'd upon it and so each transgression was an affront to the Divine Glory this other i. e. the Gospel arms its Laws with a double Obligation of infinite Glory and inexpressible goodness so that the death of the Son of God doth exceedingly enhance the guilt and aggravation of sin and makes sin become exceeding sinful For 2. To lay down his life thus for our sakes to expiate our sins by his blood was an act of such amazing love as should transport us into a chearful and ready obedience The love of Christ should constrain us to live not to our selves but to him who died for us and rose again That the belief of his bitter passion for our sakes should beget in us no tenderness nor affection towards him at all is unnatural and unpardonable or that we should love him and not obey him is as unnatural but that we should be so far from loving him that we should hate and persecute him is a baseness I want words to express and yet not only Apostacy but any course of sin doth crucifie him afresh and put him to an open shame for whoever is an Enemy to Holiness and Goodness is so to him too If we look upon his Death as an Act of Obedience to his God then we learn from it the indispensable necessity of parting with life it self for the sake of those truths we profess that nothing ought to be so dear to us as obedience to God We learn the great Lesson of Mortification call'd in Scripture being crucified with him made conformable to his Death in the subduing all our carnal affections it being highly unreasonable that we should expect an entrance into Glory by any other path than that of suffering and unreasonable to expect a share in the Resurrection to Glory if we do not first die with him 3. His Glory is the third and last part of our Saviours History which is a powerful inducement to Holiness this begins in his Resurrection Now the Resurrection of Christ from the Dead is a very clear proof of our Resurrection as S. Paul argues 1 Cor. 15. and so the great Argument to a good Life i.e. a Resurrection being demonstrated to the very senses of Mankind leaves no excuse for sin the wicked cannot flatter their Consciences into confidence by denying it nor can the hopes of good men droop and languish thorough doubting of it No if Christ be risen then there is a Resurrection from the Dead and the same power which rais'd him will raise us too at his coming and they who have done well shall enter into that glory which Christ now enjoys at the right hand of God as a reward of his obedience unto death Phil. 2. and all who imitate his Life shall in their several degrees and proportions partake of a reward of the same nature for we shall reign with him we shall sit with him in his Throne And surely this example of the reward of goodness cannot but commit a kind of pleasing violence upon the affections of man and transport him above temptations this was that Prospect which ravish'd the first Martyr into an Extasie though on the brink of dangers and death Act. 7.56 Behold I see the Heavens open'd and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God And if we could often lift up our eyes and fasten them upon this pleasing sight it would unavoidably raise us above this present world we should not be discourag'd at the poverty or reproach of our Saviours Life at the pain or the anguish of his death if we did but often contemplate the peace and the glory and the happiness which now Crowns his Conquests It is very true that a life led in Prayers and Meditation and Sacraments and an Abstinence from sensual pleasures doth not appear very gaudy or taking to a carnal man but if the same man could but behold one who had liv'd thus translated into Heaven how would he adore the wisdom and happiness of the Saints and how devout and holy how pure and mortified would be his life afterwards It is said of the Disciples who saw our Saviour carried up into Heaven that they return'd to Hierusalem with great joy and were continually in the Temple praising and blessing God a clear proof that there would be no painfulness in the industry and fervency of a spiritual life if we did often reflect upon the joys such a life prepares us for there would be nothing harsh unpleasant or dishonorable in the modesty and mortification of a Christian state if we did but look forward to the Crown and Kingdom it doth gain for us who that had seen our Blessed Lord received up with glory into Heaven would not have wish'd it had been his turn too that he had liv'd and died suffer'd and conquer'd with him and had been to ascend with him out of a troublesome sinful World with joy and triumph into Heaven And thus now it evidently appears that every part of our Saviours History is full of very powerful Motives to Holiness that all he did and suffer'd tended to destroy the works of the Devil and to implant goodness and Holiness in the world and we must not think that a Design carried on by God in such a wonderful manner can be otherwise than strangely dear to him and that we must not think that if we through our obstinacy and unnatural disobedience defeat this Design we can ever escape utter Damnation a Damnation more unsufferable than that of sinful Heathens c. Therefore The Prayer O Blessed and holy Jesus grant me thy holy Spirit that I may lay to heart the instruction of thy Doctrine and thy Life and may not only know but do thy will when I look up on thy Crucified Body on the Cross may I tremble at the guilt and weight of my sins which stood in need of so bloody a Sacrifice and may thy bitter Agonies for me melt me into love and passion for thee and this love constrain me to obey thee O may I be willing to sacrifice all my pleasures to thy Commands who hast laid down thy Life for me and being made conformable to thy Death then I may look up with pleasure on thy Glory and Lord grant that the hope of partaking in it may make me purifie my self and walk as