Selected quad for the lemma: love_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
love_n	affection_n	know_v	love_v	6,073	5	5.9564	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A51680	A Mystery of godlinesse and no cabala, or, A sincere account of the non-conformists conversation ... occasioned by a bitter and malitions [sic] paper called the Cabala.	Birkenhead, John, Sir, 1616-1679.	1663 (1663)	Wing M3184; ESTC R7629	26,519	43

little separations and divisions and resolvedly knit our selves together in an entire affection one to another that by this all men may know that we are Christs Disciples because we love one another and are ready to shew all mutual respects of Christian love and observance to each other upon all occasion loving as Brethren As likewise we shall in all meekness of spirit lovingly converse with and kindly affectionate to and respectful towards all our Fathers and Brethren in their places living without offence and blameless 14. We mourn but not as men without hope that our gracious God will find out a way to have mercy upon us and to chear up his countenance towards all his Chosen Ones wiping as that holy Bishop said all tears from their eyes and all spots from their faces and answering the holy desires of their hearts in shewing them Sion in perfect beauty and that not by overturning any part of the Government but by opening our hearts to see our errours and close one with another by turning the heart of the Father towards the Child and of the Child towards the Father least God come and smite the earth with dicurse 15. In the mean time we possess our Souls in patience and we keep silence before God waiting upon him that hideth his face from Jacob for his Spirit of love unity peace and concord resolving to continue thus doing till we receive an answer from heaven 16. It s true there are many of us whose bodies will not bear that austerity of fasting and humiliation which our cause may require yet they that cannot fast do pray and they that cannot spare a day in seven can spare an hour in twelve and make up the rest in frequent and servent ejaculations 17. Whereas some have pretended that we set up a Government within a Government and that we have an Authority among our selves we must let the world know we are all equal and we have no formality or Ceremony among us but a free and voluntary entrance left open for all comers into this strict course of Christian Austerity without any noyse without the required notice of any but God and their own conscience that all may well know and see that here is no design than meerly Spiritual aiming at nothing but Religious Transactions between God and our own Souls and consisting in the performance of the unquestionable exercises of Piety and holy Devotion 18. Since we have been uncapable of speaking to the people the things that are of everlasting concernment we have recommended to them the writings of good men pious and peaceable who being dead yet speak and poor men we know may read a good book when they cannot hear a good man and we our selves teach them from house to house with tears day and night as the Apostles did leaving with them such books as Mr. Baxters Call his Now or Never his Directions for Peace of Conscience his Saints Everlasting Rest Mr Bolton Dr. Sibbs Mr. Perkins Mr. Dod and Dr. Preston 19. We settle mens judgements upon most firm and solid principles leading to peace and holiness leading them through that safe and middle way that is equally distant from all the extremes men have run into in their hearts about some points of Religion as particularly in the points now in difference among us we teach our people that though we cannot conform to the Church without sin yet they cannot separate from it without sin we cannot administer according to the prescribed form but we and they can hear according to it we must joyn with the Church in our duties though we are not guilty of her infirmities we teach them that it is one thing to hold communion with a Church that is under some miscarriages and another thing to act those miscarriages what we chiefly insist on are things much comporting and agreeing with the spirit of the Scriptures and things that are most proper to build men up in their most holy Faith and to promote the power of godliness in their hearts and lives 20. It s true we desire to settle our peoples hearts upon all occasions but always offering them such things as tend to peace and quietness and godliness of living dealing as faithfully with them as those who must give an account and if therefore we have any interest with them we improve for God our Soveraign and the Church of Christ for whose distressed members we sometimes solicit them with success and find them willing above their strength and ability and we hope the Lord will not forget their work and labour of love and yet we desire not to wrong any Minister in his place for indeed we stated the point of Ministers maintenance upon such grounds that we are perswaded no sober Christian with whom we have any interest will withdraw any thing that is due from any man that labours in the Word and Doctrine and watches for their Souls And though we are otherwise represented yet our great endeavour is by a discreet interposition to allay and fix the people to a due temperament gently guiding some mens well-meaning zeal by such rules of moderation as are best to restore and preserve the health and peace of this Church and Kingdome much pleasing our selves in that good and firm understanding which would thence grow between his most Excellent Majesty and his good people all jealousies being laid aside our own and our Posterities Interest lay before us many strong obligations to seek and preserve the peace and welfare of the Land of our Nativity the offence which some mens dangerous medling and over-busie interpositions have contracted upon our profession we have resolved to expiate by such moderations for the future as might not only check the excesses of our practise but of our Opinions too no men having a greater kindness for peace and settlement preserved in truth unity and order then our selves whom it most concerns whether we consider our consciences callings or interests as knowing that nothing undermines to much in our Authority and Calling as those dangerous dissentions wherein the people learn to shake off both 21. It is true we cannot own that Episcopacy now established so as to undertake it our selves yet we would submit to it as to every Ordinance of man for the Lords sake whether to the King as Supreme or to those who are sent by him whose great charges and care is like enough to betray them to some errours and many enemies whereof they canno but contract good store while so eminent and so active they provoke that envy which improved to a popular odium is able to overcast the highest Merit and Integrity wherefore the Bishops have our prayers pity and assistance and although we cannot in our judgement approve all that they do driven it may be rather by the temper of the people and unhappiness of this age then 〈◊〉 their own disposition to any height and rigour of action yet we allow not that their persons

our weak Brethren which ofsend through ignorance and out of a well-meant zeal are in the simplicity of their hearts miscarried into erroneous wayes whether of doctrine or practise for the merciful conversion of the not-obdured and wilful opposers of the Truth for the seasonable confusion of the desperately malicious enemies of God and his Church for the settling of the Church of God in righteousnesse order and peace for the prevailence and happy successe of the Gospel against all Schism Heresie errours in Opinion and wickednesse of life for the discovery and defeat of all the devices and machinations of Satan and all his accursed Instruments against the Church of Christ in all parts of the world and especially in these disjoynted members of it wherein we are interessed for the incouragement and prosperity of all those that are faithful in the Land and that are hearty well-wishers to our Sion for the averting of those heavy and desolatory judgements which our sins have thus long and loud called for and lastly for the making up of our deplorable breaches and reuniting of all honest and faithful hearts in a firm concord and Christian love 10. That we shall every week set apart one day for this holy purpose wherein we shall humble our selves in private fasting and prayer till it shall please our God to return to us in his wonted Compassion and to put an end to these deadly distractions under which we labour 11. That we shall willingly abridge our selves of our wonted pleasure not giving our selves leave to enjoy any publick meetings of mirth and jollity nor take the liberty of those lawful Recreations which we have formerly made use of whiles the Hand of God lies thus heavily upon this Church and Nation 12. That it shall be the desire of our hearts that all which shall condescend to joyn together in the profession of this holy Fraternity be knit together in an entire affection to one another and be ready to show all mutual respects of Christian love and observance to each other upon all occasions being withall in all mecknesse of spirit charitably affected to and lovingly conversing with those their Brethren and Neighbours which are not yet so sensible of the just cause of their humiliation 13. That in the conscience of our own wants and infirmities we shall make it our care to spend our main censures upon our selves and our own enormities Not being apt to flie out upon the weaknesses and defects of our Brethren bearing with those that are otherwise minded in matters of an inferiour nature not aggravating the blame of those their Actions or Opinions which may be capable of a gentler and milder construction and reserving the edge of our zeal for those foul and grosse offences which carry open guilt in their faces making head against them by all spiritual resistence and godly endeavours of Reclamation 14. That whensoever we shall be called to deliver the Message of God to his people in publick Auditiories we shall not fail to lay open and bewail the sins of the time and to rouze up our Hearers with all zealous Exhortations to a lively sense of just sorrow for the universal overflowings of wickednesse and to a vehement and godly striving against the stream thereof by their prayers and utmost endeavours 15. That we shall heartily labour not to be found defective in the use of all good means whereby the peace and welfare of Gods Church may be procured and maintained and shall carefully avoid all such wayes and meanes which may in any sort endanger the widening of the unhappy breaches and multiplying of the many and miserable distractions thereof These are the Laws to which we have thought fit in these doleful times to bind our selves in the presence of that God who hath graciously wrought in us a feeling compassion of the publique evils beseeching him who is the Father of all mercies to inable us by the powerful operatio of his good Spirit to an effectual performance of all these our holy engagements that after the short time of our mourning in this vale of tears we may be admitted to be the blessed partakers of that eternal joy which abides for all his in Heaven Christian Brethren of what quality soever I cannot fear lest it will seem too much boldnesse in me to invite you all to take part with me in this holy Fraternity which you shall highly wrong if you look upon it as mine or any meerly humane institution No the Founder of it is in Heaven it is the charge of the Holy Ghost himself by the hand of his chosen Vessel Weep with them that weep If our tears therefore be as they are most just ye are bound to add yours to them and shall offend if ye forbear Neither can you be ignorant that the Son of God himself whiles he was visibly here upon Earth did not only own it as well-pleasing to him but encouraged it with the promise of an assured comfort and crowned it with no lesse title then Blessednesse And if ye look for a more ancient precedent even before the Lord of Life was manifested in the flesh ye do apparently find this Fraternity of singular note in old Jerusalem Ye know the Man cloathed with white Linnen which had the Writers Inkhorn by his side had this charge from the mouth of the Lord himself Go through the midst of the City through the midst of Jerusalem and set a mark upon the foreheads of the Men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof Lo here a company of Mourners marked out for Mercy even whiles the Sanctuary is contemptuously defiled and all Jerusalem is in blood Shall I now need any other motive to win you into the Brotherhood of this sacred Order Know then that they which sow in tears shall reap in joy and he that goeth sorth and weepeth bearing precious seed shall doubtlesse come again with rejoycing bringing his sheaves with him Know that they are not Tears but Pearles that thus fall from your Eyes dearly precious to the Almighty and carefully reserved in his Casket for the decking of your Souls to all Eternity Know that even the Lord of Glory was a man of sorrows and that he bedewed Jerusalem with his Teares ere he watered is with his Blood If therefore ye will be moved either with the sweet and unfailable promises of a gracious acceptation and a blessed remuneration of everlasting comfort or led by the Precept or the Example of that dear Saviour whose Name ye professe to bear refuse not delay not to enter your selves into this so holy ancient and highly priviledged Fraternity of Mourners in Sion Mourn then my Brethren mourn heartily but as the Apostle in another case Mourn not as men without hope Be not disheartened O ye faithful Mourners in Sion as if ye were hopelesly condemned to a perpetual darknesse and were doomed to dwell under a Cloud of endlesse sorrow The