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	act_n	act_v	38	3	7.5214	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A27606	Evangelical repentance unto salvation not to be repented of upon 2 Cor. 7, 10 ; and as most seasonable, Short considerations on that great context Hebr. 12, 26, \"Yet once more I shake not only Earth, &c.\" : upon the solemn occasion of the late dreadful earthquake in Jamaica and the later monitory motion of the earth in London, and other parts of the nation and beyond the sea ; whereunto is adjoined a discourse on death-bed repentance, on Luc. 22, 39 / by T. Beverly.	Beverley, Thomas.	1693 (1693)	Wing B2148_PARTIAL_CANCELLED; Wing B2140_CANCELLED; ESTC R17858	162,555	326

the midst of the Paradise of God and even in any of the sadnesses of the Servants of God by reason of Afflictions Temptations any Agonies of Conscience Desertions there is Light in the midst of that Darkness whereas in the false Joys of counterfeit Repentance there are such either presumptuous sensual Intermixtures or such a want of true Spiritual Light that the midst of that Joy is Heaviness But the Fruit of this Repentance is that Peace of God that passeth all understanding Phil. 4.7 guarding the Heart and Mind through Jesus Christ 5. To all these both Motives Means and Signs of Repentance must be always added Prayer even all Prayer and Supplication with Perseverance and continuance therein even to extraordinary Watchings and Fastings as occasion requires Ephes 6.18 Colos 4.2 Luke 11.9 For as the Soul in Prayer and Supplication feels the strong motions and excitations of Repentance by setting before our selves and making close Applications of our selves to the great considerations of God of Christ of Sin of Holiness of Eternal Happiness and Misery so herein is the earnestness of Supplication asking seeking and knocking for the Holy Spirit engaged and employ'd as knowing him the supreme Mover Principle and efficient of Repentance and the Divine Spirit coming down to Dwell in the Spirit of the true Penitent and shedding its efficacies and operations in it as a Spirit of Grace and Supplication seals to the Soul the truth of Repentance and becomes a spiritual visible sign and evidence of the Truth of it as Christ says of Paul upon Repentance behold he Prayeth Acts 9.11 6. Some Great and Heroick Acts and Effects of Repentance according to the Ability and Opportunity of Persons and according to the Sins persons have been guilty of before Repentance are sometimes absolutely necessary Evidences of the Truth of Repentance and sometimes Illustrious and extraordinary Signals of the mighty Power and Force and largeness of Efficacy in this grace of Repentance where it meets with Subjects whom God by outward enablements of Providence as well as inward Grace and Power hath fitted hereunto Such are in cases of great Scandal and publick Offence publick and open Confessions of sin endeavours and close Applications upon Persons that have been of the knot and fellowship of our sins or private Parties and confederates in them moving them by all the Sentiments of our Minds and the Affections of our Hearts to Repentance sollemn Fastings and Humiliations with usual Watchings not only for the Taming bringing Down and Abasing of our selves and by the acknowledgment of our own unworthiness of the least of Mercies and that we are worthy of Wrath and Judgment only and to be strip'd of all Enjoyments but because the Heart is so taken up and engag'd that it can mind nor attend nor be at leisure for the most necessary Refreshing of Bodily Nature which is made and taught and disciplin'd as heretofore to serve sin so now to cry out for Mercy and Pardon and to undergo the severities of Repentance and to be brought under to them in extraordinary Weepings according to the most Affectionate Emotions of the Soul and suitable Temper of Body And such as these are also the Acts of just Restitution to persons injured according to our utmost Abilities or great Alms-givings and acts of Mercy of which Zaccheus Luke 19. is a great Example Great Acts of Service to Jesus Christ in the Salvation of Souls either by our own personal Ministry as Paul so zealously Preaching the Faith Gal. 1.23 Psal 66.16 he once destroyed or private endeavours by Holy Discourses and Declarings what God hath done for our Souls by Exhortations and good Counsels by Holy Examples by great Liberalities for the promotion of Christianity and the Powers of it in Repentance and general Reformation and bringing in Souls to the most publick open and notorious renunciations of former sins and the very instruments of them of which we have a great example in the burning their Magical Books of so great valew Acts 19.19 Job 34.31 These are not to be bound as heavy Burdens to the entanglement and enthralment of Conscience upon All but according to the opportunities and advantages Persons have their state of Body temper of Mind freedom of Time abilities of Estate and leaving to supreme Grace the giving of various degrees of Grace and making among the Pleiades the watry Weeping Stars of Repentance one Star to differ from another in Glory But when there is a meeting and concurrence of all these or an eminency in any they who can shew forth the truth of Repentance in these Fruits Job 38.41 1 Tim. 3.13 purchase to themselves good Degrees in the Academy or School of Repentance and bring great Honour to Christ and to it and according to our Talents receiv'd sincerity in each of them is essential to the truth of our Repentance and if they are in us and abound they make us to be neither Barren nor Vnfruitful in this great Gospel Grace given from the Lord Jesus but without any trurh of them we are as a Well without Water Clouds without Rain frothy Waves driven of some Imaginary or Earthly Winds and Vapors Epist Jude v. 12. and tossed and in great danger of prooving falling Stars for whom is reserv'd the blankness of darkness for ever 4th I come now to the Fourth Head in this Head of the Doctrine of Repentance viz. The great saving benefit the blessing of this Grace and Gift of Repentance which hath the upper and the neither Spings Josh 15.19 from the neither Springs all gracious Affections and Fruits of a sollemn and serious Resipiscency or growing Wise upon sad Afflicting Remembrances and reviews of sinful ways and the upper Springs of Joy Peace Happiness and Blessedness for ever and eternal Rejoycings we have so Sorrowed so Repented Of this I will give but a very short Representation because the enlargement upon it more properly belongs to another grand principle in the Doctrine of Christ and yet what I do say I will endeavor distinguishingly to Discourse it to the Doctrine of Repentance and with a peculiarity to it 1. In that it is Repentance to Salvation wrought by a sorrow after God it is ordain'd by God as a security and preservative by his especial Grace in Christ from everlasting Weeping Wailing and gnashing of Teeth a Repentance without any Fruit or Effect but a continual Circulation of it self in Horrors and fruitless renewals without ease or remedy without possibility of Amendment of recovery to God and Holiness For in Hell there is no such Woe therefore to you that Laugh now without this true Repentance For you shall weep and weep for ever it is the state of utter Darkness extremity of Darkness and to extremity of Duration even Eternal Duration But true Repentance hath had its Proportion here 〈◊〉 this World of sorrow that God Accepts in Christ and through his Agonies for sin 2. It is not only a

of deep Tribulation and Temptation such as none ever was before to All but the Servants of God and Christ Dan. 12.1 Mat. 24.21 Rev. 3.10 c. 7.14 Now therefore It becomes him by whom are All things and for whom are All Things seeing he hath determined so great an Earthquake at last to give such Terellaes of it such little Parts Pieces and Models of it that might Inlighten Awaken and Assure the World concerning it and to have set up such a Pyramid of it by the Flood in general to all the World and to Sodom and the Cities about it in more particular in the Beginning of the World and to speak in the Eloquence of what he will do on every occasion of a greater Judgment on any Nation or People and to ioyn with it the Thunder and Lightnings of his Power and Voice that are as the Shakings of Heaven and generally fall in with the Shaking of the Earth And thus we find all along the Scripture and with great Relation to this very Earthquake ushering in the Kingdom of Christ and the Destruction of Babylon the great Symbol of his Enemies so Psal 18.7 Esay 13.13 with very many Pieces more And this is to make the Thoughts of it familiar to Men and to acquaint them throughly with God's great purpose herein for hereby a short Work will God make on Earth yet every Man Woman and Child shall be rais'd on purpose to see this great Sight and to feel it The Earth shall cast out her dead for it and no more cover them This is that Earthquake in which God arises to shake terribly the Earth Esay 2. wherein it shall be indeed as a cha●ed Roe and as a Sheep no man cares to take up tho now they are so greedy of it Then the Lord will make it empty and under the great Desolation overthrowing and turning upside down Persons and Things and all distinction of Servants Masters and Mistresses Purchasers Sellers Lenders Borrowers as is describ'd Esay 24. which shall end in the Sun 's being confounded the Moon asham'd when God comes to Reign before his Ancients in Glory And in the New Testament we find at the Death of our Lord Jesus Christ Mat. 27.50 when he gave up that mighty Breath and with that loud Voice commended that immortally blessed Spirit into the Hand of God There was a Great Earthquake and the Rocks rent and the Graves opened and after his Resurrection many Bodies of Saints came forth and appeared to many in the Holy City a most admirable Type of the Last Great Earthquake At the Resurrection of Christ there was again an Earthquake Matth. 28.2 At the Pouring out of the Spirit Acts 2.1 There was from Heaven a mighty rushing Wind that fill'd the House and so must needs shake it and as the Appearance of Fiery Tongues when the Apostles Pray'd after that solemn Conference with the Elders of the Jews the House shook c. 4. When Paul and Silas had praised God in Prison there was an Earthquake and the Foundations of the Prison were shaken the Doors opened and the Chains of every one were loosed Acts 16.25 All these were real Historical Earthquakes or Matters of Fact and they are also great Types and Emblems with Relation to what shall be at the Kingdom of Christ and even Predictions and lively Assurances thereof In the Revelation that most August Prophecy of the Kingdom of Christ we read of Four great Earthquakes that were so many Advances of the Kingdom of Christ 1. That grand Deturbation of or dismounting Paganism or the casting down the Dragon or Devil inhabiting it from Heaven who was worshipped in Paganism as a God and all his Host in the Fourth or Roman Empire were cast down with him when that Empire in Constantine became Christian And this was celebrated by those lofty Expressions concerning it as a great Shaking even of Heaven and Earth Rev. 6.12 c. 12.5 as shall be at the Kingdom of Christ. 2. The final Extirpation of Paganism or Rooting it out though with that unhappy Revolution of Antichristianism ready to come in with the Barbarous Nations into that Empire and so undermining the Kingdom of Christ. This was at the famous Victory of Theodosius And this was as Church Historians tell us with a very great Tempest of Thundring and Lightning and motion of the Earth in the Letter as well as the Prophetic Representation of the Thunder Lightnings Voices and Earthquake the great Emblems of the Kingdom of Christ 3. The Earthquake that shall be at the Rising of the Witnesses when that Great City whose Emblem is Ten or Tenth in regard of the Ten Kings who give their Kingdom to the Beast that carries it shall fall Rev. 11. cap. 17. 4. The whole Time of the Seventh Trumpet shall in regard of the mighty Effects and Events be a continual Earthquake even till the great and real Shake of Heaven and Earth the once more in the Text that what cannot be shaken may remain as hath been explained Rev. 16.18.20 compared with c. 11. Now that Earthquake nam'd last but this last viz. the Fall of the great Antichristian State I affirm to be so near as 1697. approaching wherein the Kingdom of Christ shall be in its Succession Now what arises from all this Inference but that it may both urge the Necessity and give all Invitations and Incitements to Repentance which cannot be higher express'd than in the Apostle's own Words as 't is us'd in this Context Let us have Grace or rather Take Hold lay earnest Hold of Divine Grace and Power in Christ that we may serve him with Reverence or all Holy Awes of Modesty and Shamefacedness as the Angels that cover Faces and Feet lest we give distaste and with good Heed-taking as the Israelites that kept within bounds lest God should have broken out And this Service of God with holy 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Modesty and shame of our own Unworthiness and horrid Nakedness This Good Heed-taking not to run into God as a Consuming Fire is most shewn exercis'd and practis'd in timely Repentance For all at that Day of Earthquake Thunders and Lightnings once for All All must be near for God will come near to them as a swift Witness and to All not Repenting and Reconcil'd in Christ he will be a Consuming Fire Mal. 3.5 With this Heb. 12. And to this purpose Let these very late Motions of the Earth be consider'd in all the foregoing Discourse for I cannot but be perswaded they are Pledges of that great Change that shall suddenly be in the World in the Fall of the whole Papal and Antichristian State besides their general strong Motive to Repentance as they speak God both in his Divine Power and Ability to execute Wrath as also in his Goodness Long-suffering and Patience leading to Repentance and how much more if the Approach of his Kingdom it self the greatest Motive to Repentance be by it declar'd so near That I may therefore

dependences together with earnestest Application to the Grace of God These unclean Spirits therefore that dissemble a retreat return immediately and make a Prey of the deluded Soul Acts 19.14 c. 3. Although Heaven and Hell Happiness and Misery take up the thoughts of a true Penitent yet not separated from God and Christ but as it were compounded into the Sense of God angry and the desire of Attonement with him in Jesus Christ. Happiness and Misery considered apart are not the object of the gracious Soul But God and Christ considered apart are an infinitely sufficient Reason of Repentance The clear love of God upwards the Soul as a Father in Christ without Reflections upon Happiness is though not the single yet the paramount Consideration in Repentance unfeigned But Men a Dying are generally so over-possessed with the Terrors of an Eternal Suffering and meer desires of Freedom from pain and of well-being and so in haste that they generally miss these higher Considerations which being further off not only from corrupt Nature but even from natural Conscience are not commonly espied but therefore argue greater Sincerity and truth of Heart 4. The truest Repentance lies in the bosom of Faith the apprehensions of the Love and Goodness of God in Christ melt the Soul and give it most perfect Separation from Sin the most effectual Purification of the Heart all which express the height of Repentance Upon the soft Fire of the pardoning Goodness of God the Soul most kindly distils into repentant Tears Here flows that Spirit of Grace and ingenuous Goodness which bringeth forth the clearest and holiest Affection towards God But at the time we are now speaking of It is very seldom that either Horror or Presumption do not swallow all Presumption where there is little Sense or Judgment of the Case Horror where the Judgment is clearer and the Sense quicker for evey thing disposes now rather to Fear and to the Spirit of Bondage Rom. 8.15 and a Man naturally does all he does under a servile dread of God and his Eternal Justice And though there may be much mention of Christ and desire of Mercy through him yet it is but as a Malefactor convicted beseeches the Mercy of the Judge no otherwise than as of a Judge So such call out for the Mercy of God to pardon them but still as a Judge not with the Spirit of the Son sent into the Heart the Spirit of Adoption crying Abba Father Nor with that love that casteth out unworthy Fear Gal. 4.6 And indeed how can it be otherwise there having been no acquaintance with God in the way Job 22.21 but a long Enmity and the time now too strait for a free and full Consideration of the riches of Grace such as may still an awakened Conscience Fear presses in every way and shuts out Faith What can now redeem the Soul from this hellish Terror but a light from Heaven immediately darting into it a Grace above that Grace that ordinarily saves Men For a well setled Trust and Confidence in Mercy according to the general Rule is not but after some sad debates and experimental Consultations that have passed between the sense of Sin and the affiancing Acts of the Soul upon Christ This Repentance then is in great danger of missing the Spirit of the Gospel and falling into the Rank of those Repentances of Cain Esau Judas This I have endeavoured to shew that though we suppose a Dying Man to spread his Soul and Thoughts every way and to all the parts of Repentance yet it is extremely to be suspected there will want the true and right quality of them in regard of the very disadvantageous Circumstances wherein such an one is found and the great unfitness of the Soul at that time to begin to do anything worthy to which it hath not been before inured or if it did begin it would be much more unlikely to bring forth fruit as our Saviour speaks to perfection Luke 8.14 I add nothing of the Exercises of a full and well grown Repentance whereby it is daily espying the risings of Sin and suppressing them and filling up the Defects of Holiness and Obedience because they are not to be thought possible in the point I am now speaking of and I have already given a Resolution in that Case I shall now set my self to find out the low Causes that are alway to be suspected to have the great Influence upon such a Latter-end Penitency In general therefore we must take notice that there are several vapors of misapprehension rising upon the Soul when we are a Dying that do so disguise it to it self and disfigure the true face of it that from thence arise dangerous Mistakes concerning a Mans Condition towards God We see into how many shapes upon ordinary Occurrences we change and how easily we exchange them for quite different without any good Cause what continual Ebbs and Flows there are of the Humours and how do these cast the Ballance of the Superiour Soul One Man is every hour some several sorts of Men. How much more do great Accidents and removes out of one Condition into another alter us Which yet are but the sudden and just now state of our Minds upon such Alterations which not continuing we return to our former Figure Vnstable and weak as water Gen. 49.3 we take the form of every Vessel we are put into Who knows then whether his Dying Repentance be any more than the Mould not of his Mind but of his Dying Condition approaching him big with so great a Change We know many things befal us in our Lives which put a greater sense of Religion upon us than we find at other times and yet how variable are we our goodness at such times is as the Morning Dew and as the early Dew it goeth away Hose 6.4 How often are we from the occasions of Mercies Afflictions Fears Hopes good Discourses carried into high Apprehensions of God And we lose them again we know not how Now out of doubt a Dying Condition of any thing we meet with in the World is most apt to move us upon God and a Sense of him But can we think Those fleeting Shoots of the Soul that have no certainty are accepted for Repentance How strangely doth Melancholly and Oppressions of that transform Men which when it falls upon the Motions of Conscience gives us strong Imaginations of Eternal Things which yet being nothing but the cast of that Melancholly upon the Thoughts when that is removed they are quite of another hue It is evident the Mind sees much through the Body and the Representations are coloured by its Temper As the Eye sees through yellow or green Glass differently from the things themselves So the Serenity or Cloudiness of the Humours makes a different Reflection of things upon the Mind and the liveliness or heaviness of the Spirits incline us to very varying Apprehensions Now what time is more like to be so incumber'd with

by their constant Course of the former Life the true Image of their Hearts as we see in the same Balaam who after died by the Israelites hand Num. 31.8 whose greatness he had prophesied Yet I will not deny but they may have their reward in mitigation of Punishment for any Service done to God If God did not interpose thus sometimes he might seem wanting in something that concerned him at least as a gracious Ruler of the World He therefore over-rules some who have lived so as to make a constant Argument against him and a future State so far as Wickedness could do it to retract the whole Course of their Life and give their Vote for what they had so long withstood I will yet further add another Cause of a Death-Bed Repentance that sometimes falls out to have a most powerful Influence and yet the Repentance that springs from it is very unsafe to confide in Cause 4. Dying Men are oft under the play and force of other Mens Reason and Religion For it is a general and necessary Charity of Men affected to Religion themselves to offer the sense of it to others in a time when they think it likely to be accepted and so infinitely necessary which Practice however needful and most commendable in it self yet by accident may have raised higher the opinion of a Death-Bed Repentance and is often the occasion of great Error in the thing it self For suppose a Man followed with sound and affectionate Perswasions to do all that may be done for his Soul in this exigent how conceiveable is it that Man may be so far wrought upon as to entertain a present sense of Religion and yet have no true Life no Life that arises from a true intimate Principle But as those Bodies of Air taken and moved by Angels seem to perform the Functions of living Bodies yet do but seem to do so for they have no Principle of Life natural to them but as soon as they are forsaken by the Spirits that made use of them they fly abroad and disperse themselves Thus that general sense of Conscience that lies scattered through the Soul and unable for action being gathered together and united by good and holy Applications and acted thereby may have force so long as that Union continues but that Discourse that holds it together ceasing it immediately falls asunder and loses its Efficacy The Stone that receives motion from the Hand that throws it goes on whilst that motion lasts when that is spent it falls to the ground so the force of Exhortation ceases too often when he that gives it leaves those to whom it was given The Instrument to which the Musician's Hand gives tune and voice lies dead when he deserts it Mans Soul is made by God capable of religious tune and motion and while a skillful hand plays upon it it may give that sound very distinctly and yet have no Life in it self The striking of Conscience makes the Sparks fly out yea and sometime kindle in a flame and yet it presently dies because not supplied with a continual Oyl to feed it The Mind of one Man is very apt to receive Impressions from another we see what Passions and Motions are raised by an Eloquent Speaker how the Understanding is carried captive while the Orator works upon it and yet all the Affection thus blown up falls flat again when the Breath that swell'd it lies still and is apt to be carried the contrary way by cross Perswasions equally insinuated How much more may this be in religious things Conscience being so easily stirred by such Applications as we see in Felix though it is as easily becalmed when sinful Lusts through the Efficacy of Temptation are loud and high And all this is certainly much easilier done near Death when Men are so soft that they are apt to take any stamp so melting as to be gathered into any mould It is possible for one Man's Spirit to carry another for some considerable space of time as we see in Jehoiadas influence upon Joash who was not yet all that time possessed with the things themselves 2 King 12.1 whereunto he was directed But true Repentance is a Frame set up by the Spirit of God in the Heart subsisting by that Spirit upon it self and makes use only of all Helps subordinated to it by the Wisdom of that Spirit but doth not live from that Help but from it self through that Spirit its supreme Life To draw these things therefore to a Sum It will appear after all these Causes have done what they can these great Errors following are generally found and always to be suspected in a Death-Bed Repentance 1. In a Death-Bed Repentance There is only a Judgment made of the Case of Eternity considered by it self and without a Conterpoise The Excellency of God and Eternal Things are minded as they stand out of the Air of Temptation Now though this be a good Opportunity for the first consideration yet that Consideration must grow so strong as to retain the same sense in the midst of all Pretences from the World and Sathan Else in the time of Temptation this Repentance falls away * Dr. Jackson Book 10. Chap. 23. Sect. 3. For there may be many true Apprehensions which may make deep Impression not only in the Brain and Phancy and upon our Affections whilest these are calm and unprovok'd and yet both the Apprehension and Impression quickly vanish upon the starting or provocation of contrary Fancies or Affections When the Blood cools in the Veins and the Spirits are ready to stand still when a Man is no longer to live in the World the season of the pleasures of Sin is over then to cast out his Lusts What excellent thing does he does not even nature Matth. 5.46 whether he will or no the same True Repentance encounters Temptation and resists unto Blood when those Pleasures of Sin are at the height and the tide of Corruption from within swells most As Moses chose to suffer affliction with the people of God rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season Heb. 11.25 although they were in their growing and ascending Morning Repentance will not worship that Sun in the East It is a very small thing to despise it in the West and just a setting to choose Religion when there is nothing to vie with it 2. It is not a Consideration of heavenly Things in their true worth but only as recommended by the present Necessity For who would not die the Death of the Righteous and have his latter end like his Every Man at that time would be glad to find he hath lived well and he that hath lived worst except he be outrageous in Prophaneness will wish he had lived better Eternity at hand gives value to all Holiness and sense of God in spight of the World and lessens all things else to a nothing and less than nothing imprints a Ghastliness and Horror upon all