Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	believe_v	faith_n	work_n	6,717	5	5.8349	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A38609	New observations upon the decalogue: or The second of the four parts of Christian doctrine, preached upon the catechism. By John Despagne Minister of the Gospel; Novelles observations sur le decalogue. English.	Espagne, Jean d', 1591-1659.	1652 (1652)	Wing E3263A; ESTC R217341	56,517	213

is believed that they perished as well as the Ark in which they were inclosed Now from the time that they were given by Moses untill that time they ceased that is to say the destruction of the Temple pass'd nine hundred yeers and something above Certain Chronologers reckon therein nine hundred and six others nine hundred and fifteen others nine hundred twenty seven others go to nine hundred and thirty Whereupon we may note that according to the exactest supputations the durance of the Tables of the Law past not the number of Adams yeers who having first received the Law written in the tables of his heart lived the age of nine hundred and thirty yeers At the least it is certain and seems very worthy of note That neither the durance of the Tables of the Law nor the life of any man have never attained the age of a thousand yeers The Law said Whosoever fulfilled it should live for ever but for want of fulfilling it the life of man never reach'd a thousand yeers And God in like manner would not that the Tables wherein he had renewed this Law that offered life should last a thousand yeers The reason why the Scripture shews which is the greatest Commandement and never which is the least Although there be a difference of degrees weight between the Commandements and that the Law-giver hath mark'd that which is the chiefest yea and the second likewise to which all the other are referred yet would hee never say which was the least of them all in the one or other Table His will is notwithstanding the inequality which is betwixt them that we consider them all as great seeing that in the Law there is nothing that is not great in effect Besides it is necessary to know which is the greatest Commandement in each of the two Tables because all the other are as it were inchaff'd into the greater But to know which is the least is in no wise necessary How one may judge of two diverse Commandements to know which is greater then the other Those that concern God and touch him nearest or that render man most like God those are the greatest Greater for example is that Commandment which immediately respects the service of God then that which hath other ends although subordinate So Mary had chosen the better part Greater is the spirituall service of God then the externall because it hath more correspondence with God who is a Spirit Charity is greater then Faith or Hope because Love is in God yea God himself is Love but neither Faith nor Hope can be in him For what should God either beleeve or hope for Greater is his work that saves a mans life then his that buries him dead because the living bears the image of God Upon this last example I will make a Digression yet not far from the matter Why by the Law it was pollution to touch the dead corps of a godly man that had been murdered and neverthelesse it was not pollution to touch the living Murderer We know that whosoever touched a dead body even for to bury it the Law declared him defiled So a godly man being slain all that touched him after his death fell into this ceremoniall irregularity But if they touched the murtherer though his hands as yet all gored in his bloud they endangered no uncleannesse This Law is strange and it seems hard to finde a reason of it We may answer notwithstanding That as there were divers causes of pollution that of a dead mans body proceeded from that he had lost the image of God the lineaments of which consist properly in the soul Now a living man though a murtherer carries notwithstanding in regard of the substance of his reasonable soul this image which the dead man hath no longer The Preface of the Decalogue Hearken Israel c. Degrees amongst Nations in regard of the love or hate that God bare to them TWo Nations have of old been famous for two contrary reasons One as being the most beloved of God to wit Israel the other the most hated viz. Amalek Amongst the people that God held in hatred the Idumean and Egyptian were lesse hated then the Moabite and Ammonite and these lesse then the Amalekite The Idumean and Egyptian were excluded the Congregation of the Lord to the third generation the Moabite and Ammonite entered not in thither till the tenth the Amalekite was not onely shut out thence for ever but also condemned to be totally rooted out from under heaven 'T is that onely Nation against whom God hath denounced immortall War that alone that ever he commanded wholly to suppresse The causes of the difference that God put between these infidel people are touched in Deuteronomie chap. 23. v. 1. c. and 25. v. 17 c. Wherefore is Nathaneel called an Israelite or childe of Israel rather then the childe of Jacob Joh. 1.47 'T is known that Israel and Jacob was but the same man and that his Posterity are sometimes called the children of Jacob and sometime of Israel Not that it is indifferent to call them by the one or the other name For there be reasons and circumstances for which they ought to be called rather by the one then the other name But passing over what the Learned have heretofore observed therupon I have one observation to produce hence The high Prophet speaking of Nathaneel saith that hee was verily an Israelite in whom there was no guile This man then is praised as sincere and that knew not what it was to circumvent any man In this quality he was none of Jacob's childe that had supplanted his brother stealing away his blessing by a false supposition Jacob had sometime been fraudulent but Israel was always sound For being as yet but Jacob he deceives both brother and father too but after he was honoured with the name of Israel his actions were ever without deceit On good reason then the name of Israelite is rather given to Nathaneel then the name of a childe of Jacob. And here as through the whole Scripture is seen the admirable stile of the Divine Wisdom to whom only it belongs to appropriate names unto their true natures God never works a Miracle to witnesse or prove that which a man may know naturally But why then did he cause so many Miracles to intervene at the publication of the Law seeing it is naturlaly known to men God doth nothing superfluous that 's the reason he never raised up Prophet or sent Angel to foretell Eclipses or other events that may be foreseen by ordinary wayes Was it necessary then that God should come down from heaven to earth with such a miraculous demonstration of his glory to come tell men that they must honour Father and Mother to give them to understand that they must not kill nor bear false witnesse I forbear to say that this Law that was published in Sinai contains points which a man cannot understand but by supernaturall