Selected quad for the lemma: nature_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
nature_n	humane_a	law_n	positive_a	2,470	5	10.9031	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A63903	Boaz and Ruth a disquisition upon Deut. 25, 5, concerning the brothers propagating the name and memory of his elder brother deceased : in which the antiquity, reason, and circumstances of that law are explained, the mistakes and impositions of the Jewish rabbins, in this and other matters detected ... / by John Turner ...	Turner, John, b. 1649 or 50.	1685 (1685)	Wing T3303; ESTC R10986	186,035	472

the whole Fabrick of Govenment falls to the ground But Secondly We are not only tyed to the observation of all the Lawful commands of our Prince or Country by the Authority of men but by the Oath of God by which all the Laws of our Country are tyed upon us and nothing certainly can be of more fatal consequence to a man in the other World then that the last action of his life should be a willful breach of that Oath which includes a defiance of the Divine Power and Justice in this and such a defiance as frequently gives no time at all but very rarely affords in the disconsolate anguish and perplext hurry of a wounded mind and body sufficient means opportunity and time for an hearty and a serious repentance Thirdly By the same reason that a man shall pretend it Lawful to rid himself of an uneasie World notwithstanding the Laws of his Country forbid any such practice under pretence that the reason why he entred into Society was only to receive a safe guard and protection from it and that now disclaiming all benefit from its protection he is under no obligation to its Laws by the very same reason an Highway-man or a Midnight house-breaker may excuse himself for he also by affronting and violating the Laws does disclaim all benefit and protection from them yet he is never the less guilty for all this for he does still break and violate the Oath of God and disturb the peace and welfare of mankind one of which the Laws of nature and the necessities of humane life do forbid him to do and the other is a breach of a no less sacred though a superinduced and positive obligation and this brings me to a Tenth thing to be considered For in the Tenth place Though the Laws of a Society should not peradventure forbid the practice of self-homicide yet it is sufficient that the nature of a Society does as if the Laws should not forbid Adultery or Theft yet notwithstanding they would be never the less unlawful because they tend to contention and strife to the disturbance of the publick peace and to the dissolution of Society the end of which is mutual happyness and mutual preservation and so in this case also of self-homicide in any instance though it might perhaps be justifiable or at least excusable as a single instance considered by it self and without relation to any civil Society of which he that committed it was formerly a member yet standing in this relation let the circumstances of his action be never so favourable and propitious to themselves yet it is enough that the action it self with whatever circumstances it may happen to be clothed yet it is of pernicious consequence to the publick and that it would certainly produce very bad effects if it should be drawn into president or example as if we should suppose a man otherwise of an exact or at least an unusual and extraordinary virtue labouring under some hereditary distemper of Gout or Stone or Consumption languishing for a long time under the one and afflicted with frequent and violent returns of the other against whom the above mentioned Argument does not lie that he owes an example of punishment to the World to which he is sensible he can be no longer useful but is and is like to be without any hopes of remedy a perpetual plague and torment to himself I should not much doubt the Lawfulness of this Mans action considered as a single person and without regard to Society if such a supposition can or ought to be made though he should make use of some violence upon himself rather then conflict any longer with exquisite Torments and incurable Evils to little or no purpose but if we consider this Man as a member of Community then whatever may be pleaded in excuse of his fact considered by it self though it may appear never so reasonable so necessary or so just if you respect no body but him yet in its consequence it will Patronize Fancy and Melancholy and Womanish fears or frantick despair or any thing else that shall be the occasion of the same violence acted upon themselves in others For this is certain that incurable Fancies are as real things to those that are actuated and possest by them and every whit as painful and tormenting as the most uneasie realities that the World affords or the utmost possibility of misfortune can aspire to and every man being the best judge of what he endures himself for none knoweth the thoughts of a Man but the spirit of a Man which is in him from hence it will unavoidably come to pass that that action which in another might have appeared reasonable or excusable at least will be drawn in its consequence to Patronize all the Tragedies which either Melancholy or guilt shall act and upon the same principle upon which some have killed themselves to get rid of their own fears and Fancies by which they were incessantly pursued others in a fit of Melancholy have been known to make away their Wives and Children to take them away from the evil to come or to prevent that Scene of mischiefs which Fancy had painted as hanging over their heads and ready to fall down in showers of misery and misfortune upon them now this is enough to make any action Unlawful though by it self it might possibly do no hurt if Imitated by others upon the same or like pretences it shall appear to be pernicious to the publick as I have elsewhere argued concerning the Marriage of Cosin Germans we are to consider what the consequence would be if it were frequently practised not what it is where the instances are so few for there is no doubt but publick and private good are the measure of good and evil in these cases and whatever that action is which growing fashionable and being generally practised would redound to the prejudice of the publick that action even in a single instance is Unlawful because every pattern hath a tendency to imitation and that imitation propagated wide would be of dangerous consequence to the publick So that I must here inculcate once more that if I have any where spoken favourably of the practice of self-homicide it was only in these respects that in some Cases it may appear to be an Argument of gallantry and courage and that I am very willing to entertain some Charity for those great Men especially among the Romans who have been guilty of it and who are so far from being blamed for what they did in the circumstances they were in that they are mentioned for it with Honour and Commendation by the Roman Authors not to add that they seem to have received this as well as other of their Customs from the East where it seems to have been a very common practice we have several instances of it in the Scripture of Sampson and Saul and his Armour-bearer and Achitophel and Judas all of whom whatever other personal

Food then ye shall count the Fruit thereof as uncircumcised Three Years shall it be as uncircumcised unto you it shall not be eaten of But in the fourth Year all the Fruit thereof shall be Holy to Praise the Lord withal and in the fifth Year shall ye eat of the Fruit thereof that it may yield unto you the Increase thereof I am the Lord your God Now I dare appeal to all Mankind would it not be very pleasant to say the reason why the Jews were so long before they Offered of their Fruits to God and so much longer before they partook of them themselves was to be taken from the Zabii who were used to do these things either sooner or later than the Jews are commanded to do Or would it not be every whit as excusable to say that the reason why the Jews are any Victuals at all was because the Zabii never did And yet there is no help for it but the Customs of the Zabii must explain this Law as well as any other if it be true that their Practises are to be laid down as an Hypothesis by which the reason of the Law of Moses is to be explained But not to concern our selves any further with this miserable tool of an Expedient the most foolish and ridiculous that ever was invented The Fruit was uncircumcised that is it was unhallowed or unclean or unlawful to be used for three Years because till after then their Juice was crude and unconcocted and therefore it was yet unfit to be Offered to God to whom as every thing which was used in Food was in some small proportion first to be Consecrated and Offered up that so the Primitiae might Hallow and Sanctifie the use of the rest and that by this means an acknowledgment might be made to whom they were indebted for all the Necessaries and all the Conveniencies or Delicacies of Humane Life so was the Offering to be of the best in its kind because this was a Testimony of the most profound respect and was an acknowledgment of the Excellence of his Nature And then after this it was permitted to be eaten but not before for the same reason for which it was unlawful in other Cases 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to eat of that of which no part had before hand been Sacrificed by way of Acknowledgment and Thankfulness to the giver of it and therefore of these Fruit-Trees it is said When ye shall come into the Land and shall have Planted all manner of Trees for food to intimate that of those Trees of which there was no use in Food there was no need to make any Offering neither as it was in Animals for the unclean Beasts which were not permitted in Food would not be accepted in Sacrifice neither And so in proportion those Creatures that are the soonest in a condition to be eaten are likewise the soonest fit for Sacrifice as I gather from that of Pliny l. 8. c. 51. Suis foetus Sacificio die quinto purus est pecoris die octavo For both these Animals being permitted in Food among the Romans who were used to abuse the Jews for their abstinence from Swines Flesh and among whom the Sumen was accounted so delicate a Dish the Reason why one was capable of being Sacrificed sooner than the other was without question to be derived from this that it was sooner fit for Food Farther yet as another argument besides what hath been already very largely represented upon this Subject that the Law of Moses did neither forbid nor command any thing how commodious or hurtful soever the thing forbidden or commanded might be in it self meerly because the Aegyptians or the Zabians or any other Heathen Nation did either practise or disallow it I shall instance in Circumcision it self which was the peculiar mark of the Covenant which God had entred into with Abraham and his Posterity whichr seems to have been parctised very anciently among theall Eastern Nations the Philistines only excepted who are the only Men in Scripture that are reproached with uncircumcision and by the Philistines I mean all the Inhabitants of Palestine but the Jews Herodotus and out of him Josephus in his first against Appion mentions many Nations by whom this rite hath been very anciently parctised and the Jews at this rate of arguing would have been obliged to leave it off at least when not only in the thing it self but in the manner of it they saw themselves so exactly Imitated by Barbarous and Idolatrous People for the Priests of Cybele did not only use the rite of Circumcision but they performed it with a sharp Stone in the same manner that Zipporah Circumcised her Son Juvenal Semivir obscaeno facies reverenda minori v. Etiam Selden alicubi in de Diis Syris ex Strabone Mollia qui ruptâ secuit genitalia testâ And the same may be said likewise of that Custom Exod. 21. from v. 2 to 6. in these words 2. If thou buy an Hebrew Servant six years he shall serve and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing 3. If he came in by himself he shall go out by himself if he were Married then his Wife shall go out with him 4. If his Master have given him a Wife and she have born him Sons or Daughters the Wife and her Children shall be her Masters and he shall go out by himself 5. And if the Servant shall plainly say I love my Master my Wife and my Children I will not go out free 6. Then his Master shall bring him unto the Judges he shall also bring him to the Door or unto the Door-post and his Master shall bore his Ear through with an Aul and he shall serve him for ever For this custom obtained in other places of the East as well as in Judaea as is manifest from another passage in the same Author Sed Libertinus prior est prior inquit ego adsum Quid timeam dubitemve locum defendere quamvis Natus ad Euphraten molles quod in aure fenestrae Arguerint licet ipse negem The reason of which Ceremony was that the Ear was aunciently looked upon as a Symbol of Obedience because hearing is a necessary Praerequisite in order to it from whence it is that as Ozen in Hebrew signifies an Ear so the Verb in Hiphil Heezin derived from it signifies to give an aweful and dutiful attention and so Lamech uses it Gen. 4. 23. speaking to his two Wives Adah and Zillah with the Authority of an Husband in those times which we have already shewn to be very great Shmahan Coli Neshei Lemech Haazenah Imrathi Hear my voice ye Wives of Lamech hearken unto my speech and thence in Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in Latin Obedire that is Obaudire and Auscultari signifies to Obey and as the Ear was a Symbol of Obedience in the general so the boaring of it by the Master of the Family upon the Door-past of his own House were