Selected quad for the lemma: law_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A87543
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The liberty of prayer asserted, and garded [sic] from licentiousness by a minister of the Church of England.
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Jenks, Benjamin, 1646-1724.
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1696
(1696)
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Wing J619A; ESTC R43659
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107,332
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222
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that are about Him And none of his Kindness to us must ever tempt us to forget our Distance and Grow upon Him as if he were but Such a one as our selves Ignorant people think basely of God in the form of an Old man sitting in his Chair to which Bungling Conceit the Popish Painters have lent their Help daring so to Picture Him that is Invisible and Incomprehensible And answerable to the Opinion conceived of God uses to be the Worship paid to him When men think Low and Slightly of God they can be as Rude and Saucy with him and divulge their Inward Contempt in their Carriage Abroad Presenting no Oblations but what more Affront than Honour him As if they came not to Adore and Pray but to Vaunt and Huff to Shew or Divert themselves to Scandalize their Neighbours and Sadden the hearts of some and make a Game for others To cast their Dirt and Scorn upon Holy things in their Yawning or Sleeping over them or Laughing the while and Playing with them And by their Countenance and Gesture and Actions shewing no more Concern in the Worship of God than if it were an idle Gambol or the most Trivial business They will observe and Revere a frail man that shall Dye but make even nothing of the Almighty Everliving God who Awes the World with a Look and will make his Despisers discern to their eternal Cost between them that Honoured and them that so Vilified Him Christians that behave themselves Rude and Vnmannerly in their Worship shall be condemned in Judgment by the Turks who are said to be so Curious in this point they think it will Spoil all their Prayers if they but Scratch the head with a Finger while they are upon them The dreadful Judge of Quick and Dead is not to be treated after the rate of an ordinary man They that have such a Clownish Familiarity have never the more but the less Friendship with God The Prayer that Puffs up serves but to do us hurt When we are Proud of our Prayers which are indeed but Acknowledgments of Indigence and Guilt and Offices of Humiliation and Repentance we quite mistake their Design and shall as much fail too of their Success And instead of Drawing nigh to God He will See us afar off 'T is his Grace to take even our Best in good part at our hands which is but a mean Present for the most High and to imploy sinful Worms in his Service who Humbles himself to Behold even the things that are in Heaven and hath the highest Angels ambitious to Attend upon His Throne And if we use to Applaud ourselves Principibus placuisse viris to fit the Humour of Great men How much more should we rejoyce to be Acceptable to Him in whose Favour is Life Who unless we hold Back what is in our Power to Give will not Despise us that it is no Better when he sees we Have no Better But he will not endure that Proud Scorners and rude Lubbers should come to his Face only to Pollute his Ordinances but will cast their wretched Offerings as Dirt in their Faces especially when they are called by his Name and pretend to be a People Nigh to Him And yet he could not be worse Served by any that are Afar off but his Name is more Dreadful among the Heathen Tho Religion then is not to be Gawdy yet we must not strip it so Naked under pretence of Spirituality that it appear in no Decent Garb Nor make Irreverence and a Worship without any Becoming Circumstances the distinguishing Note of a Godly man For that is the way to bring all our Religion under a just Suspicion when we carry towards the great Adorable Object of it as if we had no Awe of Him nor Regard or Love to Him Cursed is he that doth the Work of the Lord so Negligently At his Peril it is who meddles not with the Worship of God but to Expose and Blaspheme it and Wo be to that man whose very Oblations are the highest Provocations SECT IV. Of Praying without taking care of our Living THE Blessed God who Lacketh nothing stands not in such Need of men's Services as to accept the Present that is all Soiled with Filthy Hands When he accepts nothing indeed from us but only to do us a Kindness and makes us much more Beholden to Him to take Notice of our Offering than ever we can Oblige Him with the Service He will Abhor even our Holy things if we Abhor his Holy Ways Therefore when we are off our Knees the Apostle cautions us to take heed how we Walk 1 Pet. 1.17 If ye Call upon the Father who without respect of persons judgeth according to every man's work Pass the time of your Sojourning here in Fear All the Religion of wicked men is upon their Knees without looking to their Steps They may sometimes shew Devout in their Prayers who yet are most Profligate in their Lives and use their Offices only as a Cloak for their Sins and to Compound with the Divine Justice for Going on still in their Trespasses Depositing their Pageant-like Piety in the Church Pref. to Caus of Decay of Christ Pi. only to make a Shew with on Holidays But such as are so Rotten and corrupt at Heart and quite out in the very Drift and tenour of their Life must not think to put off the Holy Jealous God with a parcel of Good Words and Demure Looks and fine Postures He will scorn all the Prayers of such as cast off his Fear and disregard his Holy Word They shall cry in vain for his Help that neglect their honest Endeavors to Help themselves They that Trust in the Lord and do no Good but presume that Christ will Save them against his own Gospel are a sort of Worshippers that are like to find as little Success in their Praying as God finds Integrity and Piety in their Walking Their Carnal Living spoils all their Spiritual Worshipping They shall find small Wellcome with Him when they love to be most Vnlike Him When they cannot abide his Friends And love none so well as the Worst of his Enemies Nay can Blasphemously Swear elsewhere as fast by the Name of their Maker as they Bow mannerly at Church to the Name of their Saviour And when they take on them to Pray the Lord to have Mercy upon them for Taking his Name in Vain and to Incline their Hearts to keep that Law and yet are so far from Minding what they Say that presently after in the accustomed manner they fall Foul upon Him and make nothing of it to Play with that tremendous Name as their Bable O how Vain are their Oblations What Abomination is their Incense Yea what Iniquity even their Solemn Meeting As good they Slew a Man as Kill'd an Ox or Cut off a Dogs neck as Sacrific'd a Lamb. Isa 66.3 If any man be a Worshipper of God and do his Will him he Heareth Joh. 9.31 The only
against the Excess I mean not the Excess of Praying against which I see no need to give Warning For I know no Euchitae now to Capitulate with and convince them that Prayer is not to swallow up all other Offices To think we must do nothing but Pray is not to Overstretch the Liberty of Prayer but to pinch and Grind upon it Whereas it will admit of Pauses and yet be Incessant too in the Apostle's Sense As the Natural Heart is in perpetual Motion thô it has its Systole as well as Diastole and the Contraction doth but help the Dilatation So Prayer is as the Pulse of the Pious Heart and still the Circulation goes on nor are the little Breaks and Interruptions any Hindrance but only a gathering of fresh Strength for the work that it may go on more Lively and the Heart throw out what it hath been Gathering in more Vigorously But there is little danger of Praying too Much or too Often A small stock of Prudence with a great Sense of Want and Love of Prayer will teach any well-disposed Christian to be his own Casuist in this matter All the danger lies in another Extream of flying out into the Wide ways which I have been endeavouring to Bar up No fear least Prayer should be laid too Common for every one freely to use it But least the Liberty should be Abused by the Wild Beasts of the People whom no Inclosure can hold but they must break thrô all Fences and will not accept of any Liberty as room enough for them unless the Extension be in Infinitum Unreasonable Creatures that cannot be contented with a fair Open Way to go in nay and a Large and Wide Field wherein to Expatiate but they must be absolutely Lawless and Sui Juris Let such complain they have not More Liberty No matter as long as they that know Better things see cause to Rejoyce and give Thanks that they have so Much. The Priviledge of such Freedom in Prayer as I have laid open is a Blessing and Favour indeed that we cannot enough Acknowledge and Value O that ever any should be Listless to it or Weary of it And what Enemies to Souls and a Mischief to the World are they that say or do any thing to Disgrace or Hinder it to take men off it to put them out of conceit with it and turn them against it Let who will Exaggerate the Mischiefs of this Liberty and with never so keen Invectives Declaim against the Vindicators of it as the Authors of Confusion and Ruin to the Church We are not by this means to be Scar'd and Ruffled out of the dear Purchase of our great Redeemer's Blood We can as easy cry Slavery as they do Anarchy But I hope it will never spoil and undo us to have Liberty to Say our Prayers yea and to Pray them too God be thanked we belong not to a Church that supports it self by Tyranny and Vsurpation but by the Gospel-Doctrine and Moderation Wisely taking in the Advantages both of a Liturgy and of Conceived Prayers and so avoiding the Inconveniencies to which the Sole use of either might be liable However some of her Sons Degenerate into a much worse Temper and grow so Fierce and Stern to catch their Fellow-servants by the Throat if they do not Say just as they do and Move not exactly Like themselves And thô they would bring an Odium upon their Mother and make her taken for an Imperious cruel Step dame Where does she give them any such Instructions and what little cause has she to thank them for being so Officious in helping to make a Servile Brood of Ingenuous Children 'T is not indeed our Church but some that so Over-stretch things in it who would Invade our Liberty And so we must be in Bondage to a Set of men that have early Imbib'd Principles of Slavery themselves and can never be quiet till they have Clubb'd all into their Mind and Way But let such Overdoers take heed they prove not in the end worse Vndoers of the Church than any of those they so much declare their deadly Fears of To Vindicate the Liberty of the Gospel will never Hurt any Church of Christ None but the Antichristian Church and such as Symbolize therewith can be against it But 't is equally Rebellion against the Lord of the Church To offer to Retrench that Liberty which we have in Christ Jesus and to take the Lawless Liberty of the Servants of Sin who are free from Righteousness Or to make that Liberty an Occasion to the Flesh which is not indeed a Liberty to Sin but from it Deliver'd we are but not to commit Abominations And the Son of God has made us Free indeed Tho not to walk in the ways of our Hearts and the sight of our Eyes But to Serve him Spontaneously as a Willing people We are not under the Law but under Grace It 's true Yet must we not therefore turn the Grace of God into Wantonness nor continue in Sin that Grace may abound God forbid he should so Lose his Glory by granting us Liberty Tho where the Spirit of the Lord is there is Liberty Yet if it be the Spiritual Liberty such as our Blessed Saviour has Bought us Be sure it will never be turn'd against Piety Loyalty Sobriety Honesty or Charity However we may use or forbear our Liberty in things Indifferent thereafter as we are like to do Good or Hurt with the use and yet still have it all one to ourselves as if we did put it in continual Exercise As to the Inner man indeed we must not be made Servants to any But for the Outer we should make ourselves Servants even to all I say then as the Apostle does of Faith Hast thou Liberty have it to thy self before God And that is enough to preserve it fair and Entire in his Sight And as long as thou art well aware That no Traditions of Men can bind thy Conscience so as the Laws of God Tho thou Submittest to every Ordinance of man it being for the Lord's Sake Thou dost not Give up any Freedom which Christ thy Lord would have thee to Hold fast But tho thou art not to Say and to Do every where just as thy List thou must dread to be such a Libertine so left Loose to Vndo thy self Yet still thou enjoyest that Liberty of Prayer which I Plead for as long as thou canst but go with Hope and Comfort to God as a Child Notwithstanding that in many things thou hast fail'd and offended and so Misbehaved thy self thou canst not chuse but be Conscious how unworthy thou art to be owned in that Relation Forget not then how Vile and Sinful how Diminutive and Contemptible how even Nothing and worse than Nothing thou art Be as apprehensive as thou wilt or canst be of thy own Demerits that thou maist ever approach the Majesty of Heaven with a becomming Awe and serve thy God who is a Consuming Fire