Selected quad for the lemma: soul_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
soul_n	bear_v	body_n	sin_n	5,827	5	4.7431	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A28278	A sermon preached before the honourable House of Commons, at St. Margaret's Westminster, January 30th,1698/9 by Ofspring Blackall ...	Blackall, Offspring, 1654-1716.	1699 (1699)	Wing B3053; ESTC R13120	15,662	33

A SERMON Preached before the HONOURABLE House of Commons AT St. Margaret's Westminster January 30 th 1698 9. By OFSPRING BLACKALL Chaplain in Ordinary to His MAJESTY LONDON Printed by J. Leake for Walter Kettilby at the Bishop's Head in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1699. Mr. BLACKALL's SERMON Preached before the HOUSE of COMMONS January 30 th 1698 9. Martis 31 die Januarij 1698. Ordered THat the Thanks of the House be given to Mr. Blackall for the Sermon by him Preached before them Yesterday at St. Margaret's Westminster and that he be Desired to Print the same And that Mr. Hare Mr. Hammond and Mr. Perry do Acquaint him therewith Paul Jodrell Cl ' Dom ' Com' St. JOHN ix 3. Jesus answered Neither hath this Man sinned nor his Parents but that the Works of God should be made manifest in him THE Occasion of these Words may be seen in the foregoing-Verses As Jesus passed by he saw a Man which was blind from his Birth And his Disciples asked him saying Master who did sin this Man or his Parents that he was born blind Jesus answered Neither hath c. For the right Understanding of which Answer of our Saviour's we must first inquire into the Ground and Meaning of the Disciples Question Master who did sin this Man or his Parents that he was born blind And the Ground and Reason of their Question seems to be an Opinion which they had entertained That the good and evil Things of this Life were by the Divine Providence always proportioned to Men according to their different Deserts And particularly that whenever God sent upon any Man any sore and extraordinary Affliction some great Offence or extraordinary Provocation was always the Reason of it And this indeed is an Opinion that is too generally received in the World and is the Occasion of those rash and uncharitable Censures which People are too apt to pass upon others from the Consideration of the evil Things which they see do befall them in this Life They can hardly forbear thinking that Man a great Sinner whom they see very sorely afflicted altho' they themselves know nothing that he has done amiss nor perhaps ever heard any thing ill of him But the Judgment of God they presume is right and they take it for granted that he would not have inflicted such Punishment upon any Man if he had not well deserved it So the Inhabitants of the Island on which St. Paul was Shipwrack'd argued with respect to him when a Viper out of the Fire had fastned on him Acts 28.4 When the Barbarians saw the venomous Beast hang on his Hand they said among themselves no doubt this Man is a Murderer whom tho' he hath escaped the Sea yet Vengeance suffereth not to live And thus also the Disciples seem to have thought viz. That such a great Calamity as Blindness would not have been sent upon any Man but for some very great Fault tho' what the Fault was or where the Fault lay they could not guess Had the Man been suddenly struck with Blindness they would have made no doubt but that it was a Judgment of God upon him for some great Crime that he himself had committed altho' they had not been able to name the particular But his Case was extraordinary for he was born Blind so that the Calamity was sent upon him before he could have done any Thing to deserve it And so what Account to give of this they could not tell But they seem to have heard of the Opinion of the Pythagoreans which was embraced also by some among the Jews who held that there is a Transmigration of Souls from one Body to another Grat. in Loc. so that consequently every Man that is born into the World had a Pre-existence in some former State And if this Opinion were true they could not tell but that this Man's Blindness from his Birth might be a Punishment sent upon him by God for his Misbehaviour in that former State which he was in Or if not so yet they remembred that it was threatned in their own Law that God would sometimes visit the Sins of the Fathers upon their Children And so they could not tell but that this Blindness of the Child was designed as a Punishment to his wicked Parents and that the Sin of the Father or Mother was hereby visited on their Son One or t'other of these they took for granted was the Cause of this Man's Blindness viz. either that it was a Judgment of God upon him for the Wickedness of his Parents or else for some great Crime committed by himself in some State that his Soul had formerly been in before it was united to this Body And therefore they came to our Saviour to be resolved which of them it was Master say they Who did sin this Man or his Parents that he was born blind In Answer to which Question our Saviour wisely avoiding to satisfie their Curiosity in a Point that it was needless for them to know viz. Whether the Soul has any Existence or is capable of contracting any Guilt before it comes into the Body tells them that they had mis-stated the Case that the Question should not have been Whether this Man's Blindness was a Judgment or Punishment inflicted on him for his own or for his Parents Sin But whether it was at all designed for a Punishment of Sin Or whether it was inflicted for some other Cause for that the temporal Evils that befall Men are not always for Punishment but are sometimes designed for quite other Purposes And that this last was the Case of the Man they had asked about Jesus answered neither hath this Man sinned nor his Parents that is it is not any extraordinary Wickedness either in this Man or his Parents that was the Reason of his Blindness but it was that the Works of God should be made manifest in him The meaning of which last Clause as spoken with a particular respect to the Blind Man I take to be this That he was therefore born blind to give Occasion to our Saviour to exert and manifest his Power in the miraculous Cure of such a Defect or Imperfection in the Body of this Man as by any natural Means or Remedies that could be used was altogether incurable and thereby to give an undeniable Proof that he was indued with a divine Power and consequently that he was the Messiah He was therefore born blind that the Power of our Saviour should be manifested in him But as the Words may be generally understood and applied to any other Case of the like Nature the Meaning is this That when any temporal Evil or Affliction befalls any Man which is not designed for a Punishment of his Sin and to make him an Example of the divine Vengeance it is not however by any Oversight or Carelesness of Providence that he is so afflicted But that there is always some other good and wise End of Providence designed to be served by it

Neither hath this Man sinned nor his Parents that is they have not either of them so sinned as that he should be born blind for a Punishment of his own or their Sin but he was therefore born blind that the Works of God should be made manifest in him From the Words thus explained I shall take Occasion very briefly to do these two Things I. To shew that the temporal Evils which befall Men are not always inflicted upon them as Punishments for Sin II. To shew what other wise Ends of Providence the temporal Evils and Afflictions that befall good Men do serve for I. I shall shew that the temporal Evils which befall Men are not always inflicted upon them as Punishments for Sin Neither hath this Man sinned nor his Parents that he should be born blind says our Saviour And what was true in his Case is undoubtedly true in a great many others And the Holy Scripture it self furnishes us with several Examples of this kind But that of Job being one of the most remarkable ones I shall at present instance only in that Where first of all we may take notice of the Character that is given of him by the Holy Spirit of God Job 1.1 That Man was perfect and upright and one that feared God and eschewed Evil. So far was he from being a greater Sinner than others that on the contrary there was none upon Earth at that time so good as he Hast thou says God himself considered my Servant Job that there is none like him in the Earth Job 1.8 Certainly then if any Man could even merit to be exempted even from the common Miseries and Calamities of Humane Life it was he And yet it pleased God to order it quite otherwise And in him that Observation of the Wise Man was strictly verified That there be Just Men unto whom it happeneth according to the Work of the Wicked Eccles 3.14 For if in the next place we take notice of the Afflictions which befell this good Man I believe we may truly say that there is no Example of any the greatest Sinner that ever lived that was so hardly dealt by as he was Sometimes indeed a mighty Oppressor is forced to disgorge his ill gotten Wealth and is on a sudden from the greatest Plenty reduced to the most Miserable Want Sometimes again a notorious Sinner who escapes in his own Person is punished very severely in his Children and has his Punishment multiplied by enduring in the Misery of every one of them whom he loves as himself as much Pain and Torment as he would do if the Calamity that befell them had befallen himself And again The Punishments that are inflicted upon Men in this Life by the divine Providence are commonly single either miserable Want and Poverty or some painful Sickness or noisom Disease or perhaps a violent or untimely Death And when any of these Evils befalls any Man we can scarcely forbear crying out A Judgment A Judgment Surely this Man was a great Sinner or else he would not have been so afflicted What then should we have thought of a Man in whom all these Miseries and Afflictions were united as they were in Job Who was one Day Job 1.3 the greatest of all the Men of the East having seven thousand Sheep and three thousand Camels and five hundred Yoke of Oxen and five hundred she Asses and a very great House-hold Job 1.21 and the next day was bereft of all his Substance Job 1 2 4 5. and left as naked as he came out of his Mothers Womb who was one Day blessed with ten hopeful Children who were very obedient to their Father and very loving to one another and the next Day was deprived of them all at once and that too by a violent Death Job 1.19 by the Fall of an House upon their Heads And it added not a little to the Greatness of these Afflictions that they came all upon him suddenly when no such Evils were foreseen or could reasonably be feared and that they happened all at the same time the Messenger of one ill piece of News having scarcely told his Tale Job 1.16 17 18. before he was succeded by another the Messenger of a worse But hitherto he had suffered only in his Estate and in his Children but it was not long before he was brought to suffer likewise in his own Person Job 2.6 and that too in the worst Manner that the Devil himself could devise in such a Manner as perhaps no other Man either before or since hath ever suffered being smitten all over with sore Boyls Job 2.6 7. from the sole of his Foot unto his Crown so that he had not one sound Part in his whole Body And who would not have thought this Evil especially when added to all the others aforementioned a sufficient indication of God's high Displeasure against him Who that had seen such a miserable Object as he then was would not have concluded as his Friends then did Job 4.7 c. 8.3 4.11.6 that all these Calamities were certain Expressions and sure Tokens of God's severest Vengeance upon him for some great and crying sins well known to God although concealed from the World 'T is true indeed all this while his own Life was spared Job 2.6 the Devil had no Permission from God to touch that and he was not as some notorious Sinners sometimes are taken off by an untimely Death But his Affliction was not the less but much the greater for this for though an untimely Death to such as live in Ease and Plenty and Prosperity and Sin may be justly reckoned a Misfortune yet most certainly to such as are good Men and yet are in extreme Want or Pain or Misery it is a great Happiness to be delivered out of their sad and wretched state tho' it be by Death And so this good Man thought it would have been to him and therefore as patient as he was Job 3.2 c. could not forbear cursing the Day wherein he was born to endure such Misery and heartily wishing for Death to put an End to it Wherefore saies he is Light given to him that is in Misery and Life unto the bitter in Soul Which long for Death but it cometh not and dig for it more than for hid Treasures Which rejoyce exceedingly and are glad when they can find the Grave Job 3.20 21 22. Thus you see that all those Miseries and Calamities of Life which when they singly befal Men are sometimes Acts and Expressions of the divine Vengeance upon them for some great and crying Sins did all together befall this good Man of whom yet in the midst of his Calamity God himself gives this excellent Character Job 2.3 And the Lord said unto Satan hast thou considered my Servant Job that there is none like him in the Earth a perfect and an upright Man one that feareth God and escheweth Evil And still he holdeth fast