Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	call_v	gospel_n	law_n	6,005	5	5.3501	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A59578	Separation convicted of profanation, oppression, persecution, [brace] rebellion, self-destruction, and antichristianism being a further evidence of the mischief of separation, as asserted by the most learned and pious Dr. Edw. Stillingfleet, Dean of St. Pauls / by Lewes Sharpe, rector of Moreton-Hampstead in Devon.	Sharpe, Lewes.	1681 (1681)	Wing S3006A; ESTC R37382	32,652	45

the publick Worship and Service of God are for a Blessing to the whole Country and Land where they are Psal 84.3 Sect. 8. But that which I designe principally to commend to your consideration from the Supposition is this That a People professing the Lord to be their God from a mistake and misperswasion of the nature of things I mean from a conceit that things are unholy and unclean which are not so may separate themselves from a publick religious Commerce and Communion and from the holy things of God This the whole Congregation of the Children of Israel supposed the case of the Reubenites c. to be And this is really the case of many now they are more led by Opinion than Truth more under the power of Imagination and affection than Reason and Religion What is it which buildeth their Church chuseth their Teacher prescribeth their Discipline measureth their Devotion formeth their Prayers composeth their Gestures and ordereth all their significations of Reverence to God but their Conceits and Phantasies Although it be not in the power of any mans judgement and conscience to change the natural condition of things to render things essentially good evil or essentially evil good but every thing will retain its proper nature and condition be a good or evil of the same quality and degree it naturally is whatsoever mens Judgments and Perswasions of it are yet mens Judgments and Conseiences have such power and influence upon themselves that they may render a thing good and clean in its own nature evil and defiling in its use to themselves This the Apostle plainly asserteth That there is nothing unclean of it self that is no kind of meats prohibited by the Mosaical Law to which it refers but to him that esteemeth any thing unclean to him it is unclean Rom. 14.14 the reason of which you have in the last clause of the last verse for whatsoever is not of Faith is sin because by the constitution of God and Nature mens Wills and Actions are to be guided and governed by their mental Perswasions and Consciences so that if they counteract them they rebel against their immediate Overseer and Ruler Sect. 9. And such is the power and prevalency of mens Opinions and Perswasions that they build as strong a Resolution upon them when they are erroneous and corrupt as when they are right and sound for Errour is not entertain'd as Errour but as Truth and a man is as firmly bound by it in his own perswasion as if it were Truth and is as much prejudiced against the contrary Truth as if it were a very bad Errour Hence the Devil hath had his Martyrs as well as God for Mr. Smith in his Remarks of the Manners and Religion of the Turks gives us an instance in a Mahometan that suffered death rather than he would acknowledge That there was a God And Mahometans have been as zealous for their Mahomet as Christians for their Christ Hereticks and Schismaticks have been as zealous for their Fictions as the Orthodox for their Faith The false Prophets under the Law would as confidently call their Dreams and Imaginations The Word of the Lord as the true Prophets their divine Visions and Revelations Hence Zedekiah the false Prophet struck Micaiah the true Prophet saying to him Which way went the Spirit of the Lord from me to thee 2 Chron. 18.23 Bloody Saul was as much concern'd for the Reputation of the Law as St. Paul for that of the Gospel I verily thought said he that I ought to do many things against the Name of Christ Act. 26.9 He did what he did against Christ from clear convictions of Judgment and Conscience and he testifieth of the Jews That they had a zeal of God were hearty and affectionate in their Piety and Devotion though it were not according to knowledge Rom. 10.2 and so to no advantage And our Saviour tells his Disciples That their Enemies would think they should do God good service to kill them John 16.2 And accordingly Tertullian tells us That Maximinian who sometimes offered humane Sacrifices accounted the blood of Christians the most acceptable sort for the atonement of his angry Deities So that men may be as confident that they are in a right mind when they wickedly separate from the publick Worship of God and the Communion of his Church as they are who confidently persist in their faithful adherence to it Sect. 10. Secondly Let us consider the Concession made upon this Supposition Then pass ye over into the Land of the possession of the Lord wherein the Lords Tabernacle dwelleth and take possession among us A Proposition full of Love Compassion and Indulgence and a convictive Evidence that their hearts were more inclined to Peace than War and were rather disposed to receive Satisfaction than to inslict Punishment And in truth whatever the Provocation be Treating should go before Fighting for War must always be used as strong Physick in desperate Diseases as the last Remedy and can never be just but when 't is necessary and unavoidable Indeed the persons here offended were really the Offenders and afterwards being better informed justified the fact they now condemned which was designed to prevent for ever the very thing they so severely blamed at present but they thought themselves the wronged Party and answerably acted the parts of men provoked by factious and rebellious Brethren declare the iniquity and mischievous malignity of the Fact and the tender resentments they have of it and yet rather than they will run the hazards and endure the calamities of an Intestine War dash one against another and turn their Swords as it were against their own Bowels they sue for Peace offer terms of Accommodation give the Law into their Brethrens hands will lose something for a quiet life buy a Peace rather than fight for it and so suffer a second wrong rather than revenge a former Sect. 11. I will briefly open the sence and scope of the words themselves and then offer an Observation or two to your considerations Canaan is not here called The Land of the possession of the Lord oppositely and in a way of discrimination from the Land of the Reubenites c. as if that were not so too but eminently and in a way of peculiarity from the Tabernacle of God which was there in which was the Shecinah the special presence of God And therefore the Tabernacle was called the Tabernacle of Meeting not because the whole Congregation of Israel was to meet there but because it was the place where God did in a most special manner meet with his People Exod. 29.42 Numb 17.4 Exod. 32.3 shewing by many special Evidences of Grace and Glory that he was there to instruct protect and bless them Lev. 1.1 9.23 and to receive Homage and Worship from them Psal 48.1 2. From whence by Analogy and from the consideration of the nature and general reason of the thing we may infer That God is in a most

do not judge and execute them before tryal and conviction But the Separatists from our Church at least many of them are so heady and fierce against those Christian Societies from which they separate that they have no regard to such measures of proceedings but assume and exercise a power to reform before they have or indeed ever can prove any thing to be amiss and go about to heal the Churches distempers by cutting her throat and stabbing her to the heart without telling her that she is sick herein doing that to others which they would questionless in no case have done to themselves nor perhaps to no particular person else in the world as if Justice Charity and common Honesty were not concern'd mens behaviours towards whole Churches or Congregations of Christians as well as towards particular persons and that were justifiable towards a National Provincial or Parochial Community of men which by the common sence of mankind hath been condemned for cruelty towards a single man Certainly to condemn and reject a Society of Christians for the greatest Guilts without tryal and conviction is one of the greatest Outrages that humane Nature is capable of and a thing I am confident the most barbarous Nations abhor And yet is not this the common practice of Separatists yea when did they otherwise What Congregation in England did they ever endeavour to convict and reform before they forsook it So that the Separatists have no more reason to glory in their Separation than they have to glory in the vilest Oppression and most cruel Persecution Sect. 30. And here is an Answer ready for them who ask Why we are so angry with them that separate from us Even because they heavily oppress and grievously persecute us without a cause They break the staff of our Beauty and the bands of our Perfectness that is violate our Unity and quench our Charity defame and expose us to Contempt abhor us and passionately pursue our Ruine and yet confidently ask What aileth us and why we complain as if they could not wrong or hurt us unless contrary to the common Laws of the Land they would not suffer us to live quietly in our houses and did beat and slay us where ever they met us And yet some of us can remember when such forbearances were accounted great favours from some very neer akin to them You may as easily conceive that a man may be torn into pieces without pain and smart groans and lamentations as a Church-society of Christians divided and broken asunder without grief and exasperation When any of the Separatists for affronting lawful Authority and trampling on the known Laws of the Land endure a confiscation of goods imprisonment or banishment then your Ears shall be filled with Sighs and Groans with Exclamations and biting Reflections and all the world shall ring of it and yet there is nothing in these Sufferings but what hath relation to a temporal concern But when they censure and reject us from the Kingdom of Christ deal with us as intolerable prophane and ungodly wretches proclaim to all the world that we are Apostates and incorrigible evil doers and as much as in them lieth disfranchise us of all our spiritual Rights and Priviledges which ought to be dearer to us than life it self if we take on as hurt and injured we are peevish and cholerick and have as little Reason to conduct us as they judge we have of Religion But this language of theirs becomes no mans mouth but such an one as he was who said He had rather have a part in Paris than in Paradise They who are Christians indeed prefer their God before their goods and are more for the Communion of Saints than for great Possessions And this brings me to the last branch of my Text. Sect. 31. Thirdly The Limitation of the Concession But rebel not against the Lord nor rebel against us in building you an Altar beside the Altar of the Lord our God The exceptive particle But is very emphatical and seems to suggest That no indulgence is to be shewed to our separating Brethren but upon condition of their penitence and return to our Communion The Children of Israel's condescension here was founded on a presumption of the Reubenites Reformation If the Reubenites c. will yield and submit themselves to God and his Church then they will stoop to them and gratifie them not else So here if the Separatists continue impenitent and obstinate set up Altar against Altar and Church against Church we are under no Obligation to remit any of our Rights or to give away any thing we justly possess to them to live in amity peace with them We need not be at any trouble or cost to purchase patterns of stubbornness and disobedience we shall have more than a good many thrust upon us against our Wills Church-peace is such a valuable Blessing that we should readily purchase it at any rate of disadvantage to our Worldly Interests and we should gratifie them that have separated themselves from us into opposite Parties to us in any thing consistent with Truth Goodness and Charity to our religious Church-communion But if we cannot bring these Offenders into the Church without bringing in their Offences too we had better give away what we have to keep them out than to be at any cost or trouble to make room to receive them in If we cannot have some reasonable security that their joyning with us will do us more good than hurt let them alone Hos 4.17 To stretch our selves by comprehensive acts to take into the bosom of the Church as the Trojans did with the wooden horse a company of men armed with designes to undermine and betray her power and to disgrace and disturb her Order will adde to her calamities as well as to her numbers Though they leave off their Separations yet if they retain their unpeaceable and ungovernable spirits and principles continue more apt to finde faults in others than to amend them in themselves will check at every feather raise quarrels and divisions from their own mistakes and misperswasions will not be made conformable to Laws but will have Laws made conformable to them or will live at large without the precincts of any Government at all but what they themselves call the government of Christ and will have the Wall within which we are inclosed broken and trodden down Cant. 4.2 Isai 5.2 i. e. have it left indifferent how Congregations of Christians and their respective Worships and Disciplines be modelled our Congregations may be much the greater but our Offences and Sorrows will be never the less and I think 't will be more for our comfort and safety too to go to Heaven though without their company in the good old way Sect. 32. A Ceremony or two may not be much stood upon though we are not to make matters of decencie so cheap as to alter them to please every unmannerly Humourist but Faith and Order fixed