Linguistic DNA - Concept Modelling Demonstrator

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
lord_n	abide_v	power_n	zion_n	43	3	8.6170	4	false

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A03304	The preachers plea: or, A treatise in forme of a plain dialogue making known the worth and necessary vse of preaching: shewing also how a man may profit by it, both for the informing of his iudgement, and the reforming of his life. By Samuel Hieron minister of the gospell at Modbury in the countie of Deuon.	Hieron, Samuel, 1576?-1617.	1604 (1604)	STC 13419; ESTC S116029	122,151	274

his mouth and in the truth of his soule may say Not vnto me Ã´ Lord not vnto me but vnto thy name giue the glory This is the sum the reason why the Lord hath thought good to commend the hearing of a Preacher and teacher aboue other courses for the calling of vs from the power of darknesse into the kingdome of his deare sonne is because it maketh most for the setting forth of Gods glorie which is the thing chiefly respected by him and for which he made all things euen to this very end that all being of him and through him and for him to him might be glorie for euer If it were left vnto man by his owne wisedome to find out God in the wisedome of God in the pride of his heart fearing his owne disparagement he would neuer make choise of preaching for we see how the world in the wisedom thereof doth euen scorne it but he would either drowne himselfe in the puddle of ignorance as the most do or else trust to his owne iudustrie as many do vpon whom this curse iustly falleth that they become vain in their imaginations and when they professe themselues wise proue meere fooles thinking they know much but yet knowing nothing as they ought to know If this reason cannot satisfie those who wil nÃ©eds haue a reason of Gods ordinance I know not what will satisfie them Once I am sure that as many as haue learned the first lesson of Christianitie to denie themselues and to vnderstand according to sobrietie they wil yeeld to this truth and by yÃ©elding no doubt they shal haue comfort Now whereas we are thought to take too much vpon vs so often as we endeuor to make knowne the worth and excellencie of our office it is a mÃ©ere slander for I hope we haue learned to preach not our selues but Christ Iesus and to account our selues no more then the Ministers by whom ye beleeue We confesse the increase to be the Lords we leaue the purifying and opening of the heart onely to him God forbid that we should dare as it were to encroch vpon the Lords right seeing we know that he is a iealous God and wil not giue his glory to another This is our opinion of our selues herein and if any man be so suspicious or so hardly conceited of vs that he will not otherwise be perswaded let him remember that Loue thinketh not euill And yet I must nÃ©eds adde this also that so is the Lord pleased to blesse the labors of painful Ministers in his Church that he douchsafeth them the name of Gods labourers nay which is more workers together with his grace and sauers of them which heare them The Lord for the gracing and crediting of the instrument and to preserue it from contempt attributeth that to it which is in his owne onely power to effect Tel me now whether this answer doth in your opinion silence this grand obiection Nymph A man would thinke that this which you haue spoken should stop their mouthes which are otherwise minded but yet they do replie and say that you doe much streighten the grace and power of God and seeme as it were to tye the working of Gods spirit which yet bloweth where it listeth to your tongues as though without preaching there were no saluation whereby you seeme also to cut them cleane off from any hope of heauen which either heretofore haue wanted or now enioy not the common and ordinary vse of preaching Epaph. It is no wrong done vnto the grace of God to limit it to those means which God in his wisedome hath set apart for the conueyance thereof vnto vs. When Paul was in his daungerous sea-voyage in the night there stood by him the Angell of God saying Lo God hath giuen vnto thee all that sayle with thee yet notwithstanding when as afterwards the mariners were about to flie out of the ship and had let downe the boate into the sea purposely to make escape Paul said to the Centurion and the souldiers Except these abide in the ship ye cannot be safe Did Paule herein streighten the almightie power of God in saying there could be no safetie without the staying of those mariners in the shippe Was the Lords hand shortened that he could not deliuer but by the skill industrie of those men Surely no but because Paul knew that God was not pleased otherwise to giue deliuerance therefore he said that vnlesse the mariners taried the company could not be preserued The learned do thus distinguish of the power of God it is an absolute power by with he can do infinite things which he will not do so Iohn said of him that he was able of the very stones to raise vp children vnto Abraham Againe it is an actuall or a working power which he executeth in the gouerning of the world and the things therein now when we speake of the power of God in this sense it may be truly said that he cannot vs that which he will doe So touching preaching we may say without any restraint of Gods power that except there be preaching men cannot be saued not that God is tied to the voice of man that without it he cannot saue but because the Scripture hath reuealed to vs that these things are linked together with an indissoluble knot praying faith hearing preaching sending There is no praying without faith there is no faith but by hearing there is no hearing to beget faith but of a preacher sent that is furnished with gifts froÌ„ aboue for the feeding of the flock of Christ depending vpon him with knowledge and vnderstanding If it shall be vrged as me thought you also touched it that we shal by this preiudice them who haue either liued died without preaching or those who enioy it not now I answer that it is one thing what God can do where the meanes is wanting another thing what he will doe where the means is supplied When the people of Israel were in the wildernesse and were destitute of the vsual helpes of tillage the Lord gaue them bread from heauen to eate but as soone as they came into the promised land the Man ceased neither had the children of Israel Man any more Euery man was then to fall to his worke and not to hope by those extraordinary meanes to be releeued To strengthen the faith of Hezekiah the Lord sayd to him Thou shalt eate this yeare such as groweth of it selfe and the second yeare such things as grow without sowing but in the third yeare sow ye and reape and plant c. He that those two yeeres being expired had trusted to the former courses neglecting husbandry out of al doubt he might haue bene starued and yet before he that had called Gods power to furnish them with foode without sowing into question had bene worthy to be punished In the

beginning of the worlds creation God for the manifesting of his owne power and glory made light to be the earth to bud forth before the Sun which to vs is the fountaine of light and the cherisher of the vital heat which is in all things was created yet now God hauing established an orderly course we cannot hope either for light in the ayre or for life among the creatures vpon the earth without the Sun I do apply al these things thus the want of the meanes of publicke preaching in former ages could not be any hindrance vnto God in sauing those which he knew before and who were ordained vnto eternall life And I am out of doubt of it that in the dayes of Popery in this land wheÌ„ the key of knowledge was vtterly taken away and the law perished from the priest counsell from the wise and the word from the Prophet so that if a man did wander from sea to sea and did run to and fro from the North euen vnto the East to seeke the word of the Lord yet he could not find it I say I am cleere in it that many then in that great darknes did as the prouerbe is see day at a very litle hole very straÌ„gely came to the knowledge of the truth some by the sight of some parcels of scripture some by the writings of good men some by conference with others though the same were both very seldom very secret some by knowing little more then the Lords prayer in English yet had they the assurance of the truth of it felt that coÌ„fort receiued the sweetnesse by it that as the histories of the church make mention they were conteÌ„ted to sacrifice their liues to spend their best blood to beare witnes vnto it which the Lord did both that it might appeare to all ensuing ages that he â—ed a small remnant euen as the shepheard taketh out of the mouth of the lion two legs or a peece of an eare then when as the daugther of Sion was become as Sodome and not much vnlike vnto Gomorâ—hâ— and withal that at the day of Christs appâ—eâ—ng when he shal consume that man of sin with the breath of his mouth and abolish him with the brightnes of his coming he may haue witnesses against him out of all ages both of the deceiuablenesse of his superstitious doctrines of the cruelty of his tyrannous and bloody proceedings That which I say touching the times of the Egyptian darknes of Popery may be said also of many parte of the Realme which notwithstanding the long flourishing of the Gospell in this land yet I know not through whose default neuer enioyed the benefit comfort of setled preaching for though for the most part it be true that where the Lord hath much people there he is not waÌ„ting to send some who may continue with them and teach the of God among them yet as he sometimes vouchsafeth a Preacher to impudent and stif-necked children who will not heare to to that end that in the day of vengeance they may know there hath bene a Prophet among them so also it pleaseth him by secret and hidden yea and very vnlikely courses to affoord vnto some hearts the blessing of inward conuersion vppon whom he hath not bestowed the benefite of outward instruction by a Preacher But what then Yet this remaineth cercertaine that as when the good meanes is wanting and cannot by any meanes be procured the power and mercie of God must not be distrusted so when the meanes is bestowed his bountie cannot without great sin be despised It is herein as it is in the case of the Sacraments it is not simply the want of them when a man cannot though faine he would become partaker of them but the contempt which is damnable As for example if a father vnnecessarily deferre the baptisme of his child longer then the time appoynted by the order of the Church it is a sin in him if the child die without baptisme so likewise for a man vsually to turne is backe from the administration of the Lords Supper making no reckoning of the coÌ„fort offred therein it is doubtlesse a fault which God will not let to go away vnpunished The same may be said of the word preached if a man be depriued of it through a kind of vnauoydable necessitie simply there is no preiudice to a mans saluation thereby if so be these things be ioyned with it first that in this straite the soule do pant after that great benefit of which it is depriued secondly that a man do both desire require that one thing of the Lord euen to behold the beautie of the Lord namely the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ which is the image of God thirdly that he be careful to vse all such helps of reading the scripture and of other godly treatises and of conference with men of knowledge as may possibly be procured But if so be a man may by any meanes enioy the benefite and comfort of preaching though it be with some both charge and trauell if then he carelesly neglect it and trust to other meanes no doubt the Lord will curse those meanes vnto him which for all that in their owne nature are good and might profite if they were not vsed with contempt of the principal This is my iudgment touching this supposal that by pressing the worth of preaching we do confine as it were Gods grace and â—e it to our tongues do cut them short of al hope of saluation which by any occasion haue liued or do liue without it Nymp. Wel sir this kind of men for all this is not satisfied but being beaten by argument and scripture from one fond conceit they forthwith â—un to another and seek not so much how to make a direct reply as to heape vp diuersity of obiections And therfore when they haue said all they can for the pressing of those particulars the vanity whereof you haue layed open to the full then hoping to obtaine that with multitude of words which with waight of reasoÌ„ they cannot they wil needs know a reason why there may not be as much good gotten by their owne priuate reading in the bookes of the scripture and in other good sermons and treatises which are set forth as by hearing a Preacher in the Church Epaph. Touching priuate reading of the scripture I am so far from disliking it any way that with that learned Chrysostome I do alwayes exhort and will not faile in stirring vp the people that they should not onely diligently attend to matters spoken publikely but endeuour themselues also to reade and peruse the scriptures priuatly God forbid I or any other of my profession should maintaine that Popish Maxime that the common vse of the Scripture is the cause of all heresies and not rather the contrary taught by Christ and seconded by the learned in

Selected quad for the lemma: lord_n

Text snippets containing the quad