Selected quad for the lemma: love_n
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A54489
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A sermon preached at St. Mary's Truro, on the second of December, 1697, being the day appointed for a public Thanksgiving for peace by Sim. Paget ...
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Paget, Simon, 1665 or 6-1716?
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1698
(1698)
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Wing P168; ESTC R5324
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15,036
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38
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turn to the Love and Favour of God Because as the wise Man tells us Eccles 9 1. No man knoweth either Love or Hatred by all that is before them The Love of God is with our doubt grounded upon unerring Foundations and constantly exerts it self in acts of Kindness and Beneficence to Mankind When once God comes to have any Love for a people all his Dispensations towards them are good and arguments of his Love But then we must consider that the same dealings of Providence may proceed from different Affections in God and the good things which he affords to some out of Love he may dispense to others out of Wrath and Hatred Hos 13.11 Thus he gives a King sometimes in his Anger and chastises an Hypocritical Nation under the Triumphs of a proud Assyrian Isa 10. who is afterwards to fall into the same Calamities himself But that we may ascribe the good events of Peace to the special Love and Favour of God will appear to us if we do but consider first what legible Characters of the divine Goodness do appear upon Peace and secondly how constantly God did bestow it upon his ancient People the Jews when at any time by turning from the evil of their ways they restored themselves to his Love and Favour 1. What legible Characters of the Divine Goodness do appear upon Peace Now the Characters of Divine Goodness are more or less legible according as the acts of Divine Providence are more or less Signal In things of a lower Nature and such as concern only private and particular persons the Tokens of Divine Goodness are not near so discernable as they are in weighty matters and such as concern whole Bodies and Communities of Men because 't is highly becoming of God to adopt his Providence in proportion to the worth and value of the thing 't is concerned about And therefore Man being of more worth and value than many Sparrows he is consequently made by our Saviour to have a more particular providence attending him Are not ye of more value than many Sparrows Now Peace being a thing of the highest worth and value that the Providence of God can be concerned about in that it frees whole Nations from the Calamities of War and restores to them their Lives and Fortunes their Liberties and Religion and all other desireable Goods which a State of War is wont to subvert and destroy therefore 't is but reasonable to conclude that the Providence of God is more especially concerned about Peace and consequently Men must be Blind if they don't discover the manifest Tokens of the Divine Goodness upon it and acknowledge it to be one of the greatest Arguments of God's Love and Favour to a People 2. How constantly God did bestow this Blessing upon his ancient people the Jews when at any time by turning from the evil of their ways they restored themselves to his Love and Favour This is a truth so well known to every one that 't will be needless to relate any particulars for the confirmation of it The whole History of that people being but one continued Series and Narrative of the Divine Dispensations towards them either in causing the Sword to devour them for their Sins or in giving them Peace within their Borders upon their sincere Repentance And though God does not govern the World now by such immediate Providences as he did then neither can we behold such direct Strokes of his hand in rewarding and blessing a beloved people yet considering that God still keeps the Government of the world in his own hands and governs by the same unalterable methods of Wisdom and Goodness and Justice to the end of the World Considering that as the Goodness of God extends it self to all Creatures in general so the special Love and Favour of God extends it self to Men and Kingdoms in particular according as they approach nearer to him in Truth and Holiness and that this special Love and Favour of God is always exerting it self in the greatest acts of Kindness and Beneficence to Mankind amongst which Peace is the greatest nay the only Blessing he can bestow upon Nations and Kingdoms it being impossible for a Nation to subsist in any tolerable degree of Happiness without Peace considering this I say 't is but reasonable to conclude That as God did love his ancient people the Jews when they observed his Statutes and Judgments which he gave them and did bless and multiply them and give them Peace because he loved them so does he continue to do the same now to all the Nations and Kingdoms of the Earth And that although his Blessings do come about in a larger Circuit and after a more abstruse and intricate Manner now to what they did then sometimes carrying the visible marks of deep humane Counsels and Contrivances so that we may be apt to think them the works of Mens own hands and sometimes proceeding from a long Train and Series of unforeseen and unexpected Accidents so that Men may be apt to ascribe them to Fortune or Chance yet if we believe any thing of a super-intending Providence we must run all these remarkable Occurrences up to their Fountain-head and derive them all in their various turnings and windings from God their Author They do all of them proceed from him who governs the World now by the same Rules of Wisdom Goodness and Justice as he ever did and ever will do notwithstanding the Executions of his Government are not neither is it necessary they should be so immediate and visible now as they were formerly III. I observe concerning Peace how highly conducive it is to the advancement of God's Glory The Glory of God is properly an Excellence of the Divine Nature whereby God as we may express it for the help of our own Apprehensions does infinitely transcend all created Beings in the vastness of his perfections The Scriptures in condescention to our Capacities do set it forth under the resemblance of a King with all his Glory and Majesty about him The Lord is King Ps 93.1 Ps 104.1 and hath put on glorious Apparel Thou art become exceeding glorious thou art cloathed with Majesty and Honour And because it is not for such Creatures as we are to appear before the Throne of God and there to behold him in those vast Effluviums of Glory which proceed from the immense perfections of his Nature therefore does God condescend to become visible to us in the remoter works of his hands and to let us see the back-parts of his essential Brightness and Lustre in some wonderfull Works either of Wisdom or Power or Goodness or Justice or Mercy Now when we say that Peace conduces to the advancement of God's Glory we are not to understand as if Peace could make any real addition to the infinite Glories of God for certainly God would have been infinitely Glorious in himself whether ever he had made this World or Man or any thing belonging to
advanced the Principle of self-Preservation to the offensive part and improved the Cruelties of War to such vast Destructions of Mankind even here we find the Voice of Nature to cry against the alarms of War though it cannot cry them down and to proclaim an universal Peace as most agreeable to our Natures though it cannot establish one Which plainly shews that Men must in some measure put off their Natures before they can ingage in War and become Wolves and Tygers before they can herd into Armies to prey upon one another And this shews the great Excellency and Desireableness of Peace to the more civilized part of Mankind especially who always esteem that to be most excellent and desireable which is most agreeable to the innocent Principles of uncorrupted Nature 'T is true indeed since we have lost our Innocency we have made War necessary and God allows of it we find as a necessary Determination of Right between one Nation and another But this is no argument for its agreeableness to our Natures no more than it argues that Physick sha'nt make the Patient sick because he takes it out of necessity for the recovery of his Health 'T is true again that not only particular Persons as Nero Domitian and others but likewise whole Nations of People have been naturally addicted to a State of Immanity and War as the Achaeans and Heniochs about the Pontian Sea who were wont to slaughter one another for Food as we do beasts and to serve up their Children as Dainties to be eaten at their Banquets But to this it may be answered that the universal Nature of Man ought not to be concluded from a few instances Shall we say that it is natural for all Mankind not to see because some few persons are born blind And besides such a Nature as this is not so much original as acquired 't is an improvement made by Education and Custom upon the Stock of corrupted Nature And sometimes without doubt 't is owing to the just Vengeance of God who for their great Abominations does give over a people to a rebrobate Mind and to do those things which are not convenient 2. What dreadful Calamities do usually attend the drawn Sword Thucidides discoursing of War calls it the Idea of all Evil as if the whole Posse of Evils was then rendevouzed and followed the Camp in a body And certainly of all temporal Calamities there are none greater none of more general Influence upon the quiet and prosperity of Mankind than those are which proceed from War And therefore the Scriptures do represent War to us under the Similitude of such things as are most dreadfull to humane Nature and most destructive of the whole Composition of this world's Happiness Thus Jer. 13.24 't is compared to a Wind of the Wilderness scattering and destroying all before it Jer. 12.12 't is said to be Sword devouring from one end of the land to the other Joel 2.3 't is set off by a dreadfull Fire running through a land as rich as Eden and leaving nothing behind it but a desolate Wilderness And Jer. 4.19 they that live in the times of War and behold and feel the dreadfull Calamites of it are represented there as lying under the greatest Consternations and Perplexities imaginable My Bowels my Bowels I am pained at my very heart my heart maketh a noise in me I cannot hold my Peace because thou hast heard O my Soul the sound of the Trumpet the alarm of War And if from these faint Resemblances of Scripture we proceed to the Thing it self and consider the various miseries of War in the lamentable Experience of all Men whether in a private publick or religious Capacity we shall want a Mind to conceive and a Tongue to express even the half of their Dreadfulness First In a private Capacity Wherein as God threatens by his Prophet Zephany Zeph. 113. Mens Goods do become a Booty and their Houses as Desolation they build Houses and not inhabit them they plant Vineyards and drink not the Wine thereof Wherein the tender Infant is snatched from its Mother's Breast Nahum 3.10 and dashed in Pieces at the top of all the Streets Wives do become Widows to be made a Prey off and Children are left Fatherless to be robbed and beg their Bread 2. In a publick Capacity And here we may behold the honourable Men of a Nation to be cast lots for Nahum 3 10. and the great ones to be bound in Chains and led about in Triumph through the Crowds of insulting Enemies Here we may behold men of great Trust and Employment in Publick Matters falling to the great Loss and Danger of the Common-wealth and even Kings themselves dying in Battel and quenching the light of Israel For War as it knows no Laws so it reverences no Magistrate the Higher Power is he that carries the longest Sword and the Best Man he that can do the greatest Mischief 3. In a Religious Capacity But alas what a frightfull Scene must we open here What a world of wickedness and impiety must we bring upon the Stage to represent the Sufferings of Religion in the time of VVar Here Malice and Revenge Cursing and Swearing Riot and Debauchery do Reign and Triumph over prostrate Vertue There false Christs and false Prophets do arise endeavouring to undermine Christianity it self and if it were possible to deceive the very Elect. There again we may behold either the Doors of the Temple shut against us or the Temples themselves rased to the ground or which is worse made a Stable for Horses the Treasures of the Temple made a Spoil of and the Ministers of God mourning because the meat-offering and drink-offering is cut off from the House of the Lord. I dare but just Name these things to you for fear I should strike a damp upon the cheerfull devotion of this Day and instead of Raising your Joy Depress you into Heaviness But why must we represent War in such a Ghastly Visage to set off the Beauties of Peace Why must we go into the Heat of the Battel into the Throng of Calamities that attend upon War to look for the Excellencies of a peaceable Habitation Alas Peace wants no such Foil she 's of a more Divine Complexion than to acquire any Addition to her Beauty from the Fire and Smoak of Hell Let War appear as Lovely as 't is possible for her to do either in her Morning Dress of a Good Cause or in the Evening Train of Success and Triumph yet compared to Peace she 's an horrible Monster and all Lustre if she has any like that which the Moon borrows is derived from the Glories of a designed and succeeding Peace Minor est victoria Pace Atque aliquid pejus Pace triumphus habet II. I am to shew what an Argument of God's Love and Favour the Blessing of Peace is to a People I must confess we ought to be very carefull in ascribing good events at every