Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	abide_v	able_a	keep_v	33	3	4.5059	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A57544	The disabled debtor discharged: or, Mary Magdalen pardoned Set forth in an exposition on that parable Luke 7. 40.-51. There was a certain creditor, which had two debtors, &c. By Nehemiah Rogers, minister of the gospel.; Mirrour of mercy, and that on Gods part and mans. Part I	Rogers, Nehemiah, 1593-1660.	1658 (1658)	Wing R1821A; ESTC R222102	218,172	327

it shall be a mans wisdome to eate and drinke it chearefully Reason The Reason is there rendered That shall abide with him of his labour the dayes of his life which God hath given him under the Sunne that is it shall make him to abide and continue though troubles assault him never so much or it shall abide with him and keepe him company in his labour as Arrius Montanus expounds it and make him better able to abide his labour which without chearefullnesse he will soone sinke under and his spirit become broken as Salomon shews else where Prov. 15.13 For such is our frailty that if we were not strengthened and refreshed with baits in the way our minds would grow dull and sluggish Democrit and our bodies be tired out The Heathen of old could say that the life of a man without some delight was like a long way vvithout an Inne in which all is travell and toyle but no comfort or refreshing The soule of such an one would be like a Flower that growes alwayes in the shade which is nothing so sweet Quis dabit hortulo meo hancaquā quis dabit ut tota hortuli mei facies irrigua sit laetitia et lucis rivulus nihil in eo sterile nor lovely as that vvhich grows in the sight of the Sun Hereupon one vvriting of Chearfullnesse saith thus Who will give into my little Garden this water Who will cause that the whole face or plot of my Garden may be watered with chearefullnesse so that by the Rivers of lightsomnesse sit aut quadam indevotione triste Vicina sterilitati videtur operatio tristis spirituali● gaudij carens irrigatione Gilbert Serm. 34. in Cant. there may be nothing in it either barren or els sad by a kind of indevotion For a sad working wanting the watering of a spirituall chearfullnesse seemeth to be neare unto barrennesse Vse You see hence how they are much mistaken which imagine that there is no Joy nor mirth belonging to a Christian life and that in the Kingdome of Christ there is nothing but sighing and groaning fasting and praying c. This is but an illusion of Satan wherwith he disheartens commers on from a Christian course For Religion is no enemy to honest mirth and delights nor are there any merrier people in the World then those that truly feare the Lord And God allowes them to be thus merry at meat and merry at worke even in his presence Thou shalt rejoyce before me saith God Deut. 14.26 Servants use to be most merry amongst themselves the presence of Master or Mistres damps their mirth but the servants of Christ be as merry in his presence as behind his back yea they are more merry when he is with them then when he is absent from them Mat. 9.15 And it is a great fault in any to condemne them for this Christian liberty which God gives them it being rightly used as we find by that answer which our Saviour there makes to the Pharisees in this very case Vse 2 And let Christians be rightly perswaded of their liberty and use it accordingly The counsell is passing good that is given by the Preacher Go thy way eate thy bread with Ioy and drinke thy wine with a merry heart for God now accepteth thy workes Let thy garments allwayes be white and let thine head lacke no oyntment Live joyfully with the wife which thou lovest all the dayes of the life of thy vanity which he hath given thee under the Sunne for that is thy portion in this life and in thy labour which thou takest under the Sunne Eccles 9.7 8 9. Hieron in loc Which words S. Hierom tells us are in a spirituall sense the voice of that Preacher who in the Gospell saith If any man thirst let him come unto me and drinke But whoever be the Preacher we shall doe well to consider what is said and to whom it is spoken It is not an eating to beget Ioy nor a drinking of wine to breed a merry heart that is spoken off by the Preacher for as S. Hierom well observes Non habeat veram laetitiam cor bonum qui creaturis supra moaum abutitur He hath not true Joy nor a good merry heart who by excesse abuseth the Creatures That that is here spoken of is an eating with Ioy and drinking of Wine with a merry heart so that the Joy and the mirth do as it were prepare the stomack therby to make the nourishment to do the more good and to make him that receiveth it the more forward and hearty in praising God for it Nor is this counsell given to every one the words are spoken to the righteous man to such whose workes God accepteth vade Iuste saith Lyra Go thou righteous man eat thy bread vvith Joy c. that is vive in jucunditate mentis ex testimonio bonae conscientiae procedente live in chearfullnesse of mind proceeding from the testimony of a good Conscience knowing thy selfe to be reconciled to God in Christ and having a comfortable evidence of the pardon of thy sins and that God accepteth of thy labours and indeavours be thou merry and chearfull as David speaketh Psal 32.11 and let not any thing cause thee to eat thy bread with sadnesse or drinke thy wine with heavinesse A healthfull and sound body is fittest for mirth and freest in mirth wherfore seeing God accepts thy workes there is health and soundnesse let there be also freenesse of Joy let thy Garments be white and thy head want no oyntment see thy Disposition be chearfull and let no comfortable thoughts be wanting to thy mind As for sinners they lie under the curse and guilt of sin and are like condemned Persons going to execution and a man would thinke they have little cause to be merry and if they be yet the end of that mirth will be but heavinesse Prov. 14.13 Gaudet in prima sessione saith Gregory hilarescit in primo re●ubitu inslatur in primae salutatione Sed hoc gaudium quid crit Greg. Moral l. 15 c. 2. quando irruente mortis articulo it a consumitur ac si omnino non fuerit At the first sitting downe at the Feast of sin the wicked man is pleasant at the first lying downe in the bed of sinne he is merry at the first meeting with his sinfull companions he is blowen up with Joy But what will this joy be when the point of death rushing upon him all his joy shall be destroyed as if it never had bin And to conclude this Point seeing it is easie for a man to surfeit with eating honey Pro. 25.16 and that we are never more apt to forget our selves than when we are most merry Let us in the midst of our rejoycing beware that we riot not upon his aboundance We are sullen guests if we scant our selves where he hath bin liberall and depart away from his full Table hungry We are unworthy guests if we turne his plenty

another one so is it in conferring of Temporall blessings the heads of some he annoints with the oyle of gladnesse above their fellowes and that the musick of mankind might not be marred Cytharedus ridetur Chordâ qui semper c. Horat. some must be for Trebles some for Meanes and some for Bases as well as either no Harmonie consists of Unions saith Aristotle nor any verse of one foot some must be poore and some rich some must be to borrow as well as some to lend how could that Christian grace of the Righteous mans lending shine Psal 37.26 if either all things were common or all mens estates equall How could these sacred Lawes of sweetest pittie and compassion stand if the charitable commercement of giving or lending to the poore who beg or borrow by communitie or equality wanted matter whereon to work Vse 2 Secondly Let Borrowers and Lenders Creditors and Debtors know their liberty and not abuse it It is lawfull to borrow and a practise almost as antient as the world yet let no man needlessely become a borrower nor deale unjustly with those that lend him when his necessity hath caused him to be beholding to his neighbour Some become borrowers through their Riot in wastfull spending upon their lusts Lucullus shall not outgo them in Building nor Cleopatra in Feasting nor the Assyrian King go beyond them in the newnesse of their pleasures and wanting Fewell of their owne to maintaine the wild-fire of their excesse they presently flie to the Sanctuary of Borrowing where many times they find every stick like Moses Rod turned into a Serpent and so with Iehoram too late they find themselves there wounded unto death Gen. 7.10.2 King 9 15.16 where they thought to have found some ease and remedy of their wounds As the good huswife therefore Pro. 31.16 before she bought a field did first consider it And the good husband in the Parable before he built a Tower did first sit downe and count whether he had sufficient to performe it so let Borrowers sit downe and see what ability they have to pay before they go in debt Remembring that wittie Apothegme of a wise and worthy Counsellor of State who said that he had rather eate his meat out of wooden dishes and pay silver for them then out of silver dishes and make wooden payments Debere verecundum est Lib. de Tob. c. 21. non reddere verecundius saith S. Ambrose There is a kind of basendesse in borrowing for the Borrower saith Salomon is a servant to the Lender Pro. 22.7 Deut. 15.6 and why should a man bring himselfe into servitude and need not But there is a higher degree of basenesse in not paying what is borrowed such are branded by God himselfe for wicked men Psal 37.21 And yet there are some who have broken hearts with their broken estates they would pay if they were able and it is a great griefe to them that they are not able to pay like as it was to that sonne of the Prophets who going forth in the company of Elisha to enlarge their borders as he was felling of a tree for building on the bankes of Iordan it happened that his Axe head which he had borrowed of a neighbour flew of into the river with which losse he was so grieved that he runs unto Slisha and acquaints him with it implores his help crying out Alas Master it was but borrowed q.d. Had it been mine owne my griefe had beene the lesse but through my sides my neighbour receives a blow I am not able to returne what I borrowed of him which is the greatest cause of this my griefe Into the wounds of such Charity will powre the oyle of Comfort and tell them that God accepts of Votall restitution for Totall Yet let them resolve to pay what is owing if ever God enable them 2 King 4. Antiq. lib 9. as did that Prophets widow left in debt whom Iosephus with divers others as S. Hierom Oecolampadius Lyra c. thinks was the wife of Obadiah who did and maintained a 100. Prophets in the time of Iesabels persecution by which meanes he was brought behind hand who having out of one ●arre of oyle a miraculous encrease did first sell so much a would pay the debt owing by Gods speciall command and then she and her children did live on the remainder Whilst she had nothing it was no sin to owe but when she had wherewith to discharge her Creditors she could not have beene guiltlesse if she had not payed before she had stored up And thus much from the letter of the Parable we thought good to observe S. Hierom condemneth their perversenesse who as he saith Capere nituntur veritatem concludere terrenis sensibus non recordantes quod debeamus de litera ascendere ad spiritum de terrenis ad coelestia From the letter we must ascend to the spirit and from things earthly to heavenly Otherwise in our earthly Expositions we captivate the truth and keep it prisoner in the Judgement of that Father Having with Ionathan dipt the end of our Rod into the thinnest of the honey 1 Sam. 14.27 which drops out of this waxen combe and tasted of it by the way we now come to the spiritual and more noble sense on which as the best and thickest honey wee meane to feed And so Doct. God is this Creditor he trusts us with his goods what we have we have from him to use Mat. 18.23 25. 14-31 Luke 16.5 19 12-14 2 Tim. 6.17 Reason Man hath not of his own God is absolute Lord of all 1 Chron. 29.11 12. Psal 24.1 Both the house and Furniture in it are his and he layes claime to all Isa 66.1 Psal 50.10 Hag. 2.8 Hos 2.2 His claime is sufficient evidence were there no other that all is his For he pretends no false Titles being Truth it selfe Mans need is great and that daily he cannot subsist if his wants be not howerly supplied the naturall lamp of our life will out if there be not a new supply of oyle 1 Cor. 15.31 Now no other is able to supply it but God alone who hath all therefore we are taught every day to seek bread at his hands Mat. 6.11 God would not that his Riches should lie dead His will is that they should be employed for his gaine and advantage as Mat. 25.14 Luke 19.13 14. Use 1 Learne hence to magnifie God in respect of his Riches we highly extoll the happinesse of such or such a man who drives a stock of thousands and hath much abroad in other mens hands but know we well that all the rich men in the world are no way able to compare with God neither in Lands nor in Cattell nor in Money nor in Debts owing him This will appeare if we consider First how many daily spend of Gods stocke and store Neither Man nor Beast for the use of Man but daily receive from his hand and seek