Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	ability_n	able_a	gift_n	98	3	6.7671	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A36258	Two letters of advice I. For the susception of Holy Orders, II. For studies theological, especially such as are rational : at the end of the former is inserted a catalogue of the Christian writers, and genuine works that are extant of the first three centuries.	Dodwell, Henry, 1641-1711.	1672 (1672)	Wing D1822; ESTC R16080	115,374	358

to themselves and in their Informations knowing nothing but the bare action but not the intention from whence all its morality is most properly and most securely estimable Be sure therefore that this shewing your works to others be like the Cloud in the Wilderness which on the one side enlightned the Israelites but on the other darkned the Egyptians So let their excellencies appear outwardly that they may stir up your Spectators to the praise of God and the emulation of your Example as that at the same time onely their Imperfections may appear inwardly to your self which may prostrate you to as low a Humiliation Besides it were well that besides what they knew you would reserve some greater Excellencie unknown for which you might onely have regard to God who sees in secret what he will openly reward For if you can do any Excellent action for which you can have no motive or design in this World then it will be clear that even in those whereby you may gain secular applause yet that is not your either onely or ultimate motive And in general where you find their commendations exceed your merits let it stir you up to a virtuous shame of being less worthy than you seem XXIV But that without which all these qualifications will not suffice if separated from it and without which you cannot prudently venture on such a dangerous Calling is a Resolution of persisting in them all firmly and unmoveably for the future For this is the prudent consideration of the builder so much commended by our Saviour and you must remember that the Analogie holds very well in the Clerical Calling for as himself is called an Architect 1 Cor. iii. 10. so his employment is called Edification not onely there but also Rom. xv 20. Gal. ii 18. 2 Cor. x. 8. xii 19. xiii 10. Eph. ii 20. 21. iv 11. 12. that built his house upon a Rock against which neither the rainy Torrent nor the violent Rivers nor the Tempestuous Winds were able to prevail S. Matth. vii 24. 25. For you must remember that not to maintain your building is as great an Inconsideration as not to finish it though indeed final Perseverance being the onely accomplishment of this building it cannot be finished if it be not maintained You must therefore besides the former qualifications which are requisite to this purpose remember that the Calling you are undertaking will oblige you for your life and therefore your choice if imprudently made will therefore be of worse consequence because it is irrevocable so that your chief care must be to foresee whether you be able to persevere afterwards in maintaining what you have begun and that for your whole life And for this end you must consider your qualifications themselves whether they have appeared onely in single Acts or in Habits or if in Habits whether they be newly acquired or strongly confirmed and rooted by custome for you cannot trust any other Habits for their duration for so long a time Besides you must consider whether your Temper be fickle or stable if it be fickle you can trust no Habits themselves longer than you persevere in the same humour or till they may decay gradually according to the method of their acquisition Then also you must consider the difficulties you may have occasion to conflict with which if they be less than those you have already dealt with or equal you may hope to persevers but if greater you cannot conclud● that because your Habits have bee● so confirmed as not to yield to smaller difficulties therefore they would be able to hold out in greater tryals And for those you must not onely foresee such as you are likely to encounter at your first entrance upon this holy Calling but such as you may probably meet with in the course of your whole life but still with regard to the proficiencie you may make in confirming those Habits you have against the time you may have occasion to meet them in if you be not deficient to your self Nor would I have you think that I herein make your future hopes of the grace of God a Cypher in requiring you to foresee all future difficulties and to measure them by ●roportion to your present strengths or you see I do not deny the ne●essitie of the grace of God for ●ringing you to this excellent frame ●f Spirit I have been hitherto des●ribing nor all such hopes of Grace ●or the future as may be grounded ●n Covenant-conditions your cooperation and improvement of what you have at present so that the onely Grace whose hopes I have seemed to exclude is that which is extraordinary and uncovenanted such as is all that which is necessary for overcoming those difficulties which you have voluntarily incurred your self and which were not likely to befall you in an ordinary course of Providence nor are brought upon you by an extraordinary But as for other difficulties which cannot be foreseen but are merely casual in respect of second causes you need not be so anxious but leave them confidently to that Providence which has prohibited your carefulness for them and do not fear your being disappointed in such dependences as are not rash and imprudent as long as you are otherwise careful● of performing those duties on which your title to these promises does depend XXV If you be already engaged in Orders as this discourse suppose● you not to be you may be tempted to think all that has hitherto been said digressive and unseasonable But you will find no reason to do so after a little recollection For as if you be not there will be no occasion for such a surmise so if you be yet it will be useful to you if not as a warning to shew you what you are to do yet at least as an information both what you ought to have done before and what you ought therefore to be penitent for if you hitherto have neglected it and upon what you are to lay out your whole endeavours for the future But to proceed supposing now that you are the person I have been hitherto describing you cannot stand in need of any particular Rules for if you be thus called by God you shall be taught by him in the performance of the duty to which he has called you I mean this Teaching as well as the Call in an ordinary Providential sense which is that wherein the Prophesies concerning it are verified under the Gospel for both this Prudence and other abilities will be able to guide and this Piety to suggest what is fit to be done upon all particular exigencies and as those themselves are gifts of the Spirit so their improvement will intitle you to greater so that their direction and influence is rather to be imputed to God than man though it be true that now by virtue of the Evangelical Covenant they are usually conferred in the use of ordinary means and this reaching particular circumstances must needs make all rules