Selected quad for the lemma: opinion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
opinion_n	mortal_a	sin_n	venial_a	597	5	12.4318	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A28890	The light of the world a most true relation of a pilgrimess, M. Antonia Bourignon travelling towards eternity ... : divided into three parts ... / written originally in French, and faithfully translated into English ; to which is added, a preface to the English reader.; Lumiere du monde. English	Bourignon, Antoinette, 1616-1680.; Cort, Chrétien de, d. 1669.	1696 (1696)	Wing B3842; ESTC R36499	498,584	635

begun But I can assure you that it shall be here upon Earth where God with Men shall enjoy a perfect Contentment which shall be Eternal For the Presence of God made Man will unite them with such a perfect Love that they can never again depart from him though they shall still preserve their Free-will I felt in my Soul great Consolation in hearing her sperk of the Alliance that Gold would make with Man and ask'd What I should do to attain to such a Happiness She said Sir You have nothing else to do for attaining to an Alliance with God but to resign your own Will to him that he may dispose of it This is the One Thing needful So soon as you shall depend upon him in all things you shall be betroath'd in order to the promis'd Alliance and therein you shall find such Consolations as I cannot express to you You shall then be as sure of this promis'd Alliance as at least a Maid is to marry her Betroth'd or a Man her whom he has Betroth'd and much more For the Promises of Men may be diverted by divers Accidents but those of God are immutable and will never change So soon as Man resigns himself to him he receives him and treats with him as if he had never offended him how great a Sinner soever he may have been A Man must be void of Judgment and very unthankful for such a Goodness of God when he will not depend upon his Creatour from whom he has received all Things and who in requital of so many Benefits demands nothing else but to acknowledge that all he has comes from him If he did this he might lawfully enjoy all Things according to his Wish Could God do more to Man than to let him rule over all Things provided only that he would always acknowledge the Dependance that he had upon his God And on the contrary Could Man commit a greater Ingratitude than not to depend upon God who created him who preserves him and from whom alone he can expect Salvation We must have lost our Wits and become cruel to our selves if we deprive our selves of so great a Happiness only that we may enjoy our Free-will which often precipitates us into diverse kinds of Evils that are sometimes irreparable Because he who follows his own Will can never be saved and the Mischief we sustain by Damnation can never be repair'd I said to her Never any had taken notice of so precise a Necessity of depending in every thing upon God for Salvation but they thought that whosoever died not in a mortal Sin was sav'd She said Sir This Ignorance not to know that we ought to depend upon God in all Things is the Cause of the Ruine of all Men Every one imagining that nothing else is necessary for Salvation but to abstain outwardly from evil Actions This God did not declare to Adam when he created him for Salvation but he expresly testified to him that he ought always to depend upon him and acquiesce in his Will What God did to Adam he did in him to all Mankind Therefore it is much better to hold to the First Commandment of God than to amuse our selves with the Opinions of Men who with their Studies and Notions give assurance of Salvation without any Ground For all that they call Mortal or Venial Sins are nothing else but the Hindrances which we make to this Resignation to God Except this there can be no Sin For if this Resignation be not hindred we are certainly saved For Resignation in its self is Salvation This we cannot observe because so many other different Things are set before us to hinder the Knowledge of this Eternal Truth to wit That God has never demanded and never will demand in Time coming any thing else of Man but the Resignation of his Will to the Will of God And when it is said Thou shalt not kill steal nor commit fornication or other Evils it is as much as to say in one Word Thou shalt not follow thy own Will but that of God For the abstaining from all these Evils is nothing else but the leaving off to follow our own Will which incites us to do these Evils For as soon as we shall resign it to the Will of God he will lead us to all sort of Good And these Evils are particularly forbidden us that we may thereby perceive when we are not resign'd to God For this Resignation delivers us from all sorts of Evil and by following our own Will we do certainly commit them I wish all the World did comprehend this Truth That no Body can ever sin but in following his own Will and no Body can ever be saved but by resigning his Will to the Will of God I said to her It was most true That to be sav'd we must resign our Will to that of God and that it was a loss that this was not taught to all Christians She said Sir The Devil has now such Power over the Minds of Men that he leads them wholly at his Will and has razed out of their Memories the one thing needful which is to resign their own Will to that of God And that they may be insensible of this Forgetfulness he has invented so many Means of Salvation that no Body thinks of it nor believes it necessary to resign his Will to that of God imagining that it is enough for Salvation to go to Church to frequent the Sacraments and to get Indulgencies This Blindness ruines all good Men For none can any longer perceive that this Resignation is necessary and not perceiving it they do not believe it For this cause No body sets about it For we see now the best Men are addicted to follow their own Wills in every thing even in Eating and Drinking and Walking And generally all they do is regulated by their own Wills even their Vertues and Devotions are manag'd by their Self-will And in the mean time they think they are in the way of Salvation As if God had need of our Sacrifices or our Prayers while he will have nothing else but the Resignation of our Wills to his Will This no Body strives to do On the contrary every one both Small and Great of whatsoever Condition follow their own Will Christians do even train up their Children in the Habit of following their own Wills In which they bring them up to their Damnation Because being habituated from their Childhood to follow their own Wills when they are grown up they can very hardly part with them and thus every one perishes without perceiving it And he who declares these Truths is opposed by all those who are infected with this Vice who have no mind to part with it perswading themselves without ground that this Resignation is not necessary Thought it be most true that God demands nothing else of us For he has no need at all of our Works nor of our Words nor Riches nor Honour

be mov'd for this remaining always Just Good and True Whatever Man does God remains always what he is in himself without being mov'd and without hindring Man to withdraw himself from him when he will needs do it by his own Free Will God can lose nothing even tho' all the Men of the World would follow the Devil They only wrong themselves God will never take away again the Free Will that he has given them for their evil Deeds but permits them still to use it as well to their Damnation as to their Salvation All the other Creatures do the Will of God of Necessity as a Servant does the Will of his Master by force for it is necessary to the other Creatures as well animate as inanimate to do the Will of God without their being able to resist it being bounded limitted and constrain'd not to pass over the Bounds and the Limits wherein God has plac'd them But Man alone who participates of the Deity has the Liberty to resist the Will of God which he will not oppose for he cannot repent of the Liberty that he has given unto Man Thus God permits Man to abandon himself unto the Spirit of Error and to forsake that of Truth For he would act against his Goodness to take back again that great Advantage which he has given unto Man of his Free Will with which he ought to rule over the Earth as a little God independent from every other thing which is not God And if he did not permit Man to follow the Spirit of Error when he will needs follow it he would render him a limited and forc'd Creature as all the rest which serve the Will of God by Force as Servants and Slaves Which would be contrary to the Designs of God who has chosen our Souls for his Spouses in making them partake of his Power to do that which shall be most agreeable unto them The End of the First Part. THE SECOND PART OF THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD Being a Continuation of the Conferences which Antonia Bourignon had with the deceast Mr. Christian de Cort which deserves to be read understood and considered by all who desire to be saved Written originally in French S. Paul to the Romans XI 19 c. Be not high minded but fear For if God spared not the natural Branches the Jews take heed lest he also spare not thee Behold therefore the Goodness and Severity of God on them which fell Severity but towards thee Goodness if thou continue in the State wherein his Goodness has plac'd you otherwise thou also shalt be cut off and they also if they bide not still in Vnbelief shall be grafted in For God is able to graft them in again LONDON Printed in the Year MDCXCVI TO THE READER Dear Reader IT is more than twelve Years since I had the following Conferences in this second Part of the Light of the World and those also which shall follow in the third Part which you may afterwards see when it shall please God that they be publish'd and I had no Inclinations to make them publick For all these Questions were propos'd to me by the deceast Mr. Christian de Cort when he was a Priest in the Roman Church Pastor of the Church of S. John in the City of Mechlin in Brabant and Superiour of the Congregation of the Fathers of the Oratory in that City who being desirous to understand the Matters relating to his Religion propos'd to me divers Theological Questions touching the Faith and Manners of Christians who aspire to the Perfection of their Souls To which I answered according to the Wisdom and Experience that God gave me This the deceast de Cort having exactly noted and set down in Writing he design'd to have printed it in the Year 1667. But it was afterwards delayed by the Advice of many of his Friends who knowing the Partiality and Jealousie of many Divines of the Roman Church were afraid that the said de Cort and I might be put into the Inquisition for having declar'd too openly the Faults and Corruptions which are crept into the Roman Church telling us that this would be insupportable to many Zealots of that Religion But the deceast de Cort being very earnest to make the plain Truth known to the People resolved to go to Holland and to print all these Conferences there judging it very necessary that they should be communicated to sincere Persons who he thought were perishing thro' Ignorance saying often I was deceived as to Matters of Faith and Manners And thro' this Blindness I have also deceived others by teaching them Shadows for Substances and I 'll never be at rest till I have communicated to them the Truths of God that you have declared to me And so by his Persuasions and many importunate Requests I resolved to go with him to Holland to cause him to print all these Conferences that we had had together for a long time I was much averse to this because I had not yet printed any of my Writings and also the Matters contain'd in these Conferences would greatly shock many who are in the Roman Church whom I lov'd tenderly and desired not to offend them esteeming them my Brethren and I had never yet convers'd with any nor had I been in any Place or Country without the Obedience of the Roman Church And I knew not what sort of People I might meet with elsewhere For I imagined I should find there People that were monstrous or of a different Shape from those of my own Country where they represent to Children those who are not Romanists a Wolves covered with Sheeps Skins that they may imprint on the tender Hearts of the Children a mortal Enmity against those who in all things have not the same Opinions that are profess'd in the Roman Church This made me afraid to go to Holland to cause these Conferences to be printed But after I had seriously recommended it to God I resolved to go on that Errand For God made me understand That 't is not Religion that saves the Soul but the Love of God that begets true Vertue And that I ought to love all and to do good to those of every Religion and to declare the Truth of God impartially And this inward Voice planted in my Soul an Impartiality towards all sorts of Religions indifferently without caring to inform my self of what Religion Persons were or the Places and Countries to which I was to go nor with whom I was to speak This has been my Practice ever since regarding only the Disposition of the Souls with whom I was to treat without considering what Religion they profess'd or what Party they were of as to outward Worship since in Effect in all Kinds of States Professions and Religions I 've met with Persons disposed to receive the Truth that comes from God Yea some of those that are without the Roman Church are more ready to receive it than they who call themselves