Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	common_a	deal_n	great_a	143	3	2.1542	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A27065	The vain religion of the formal hypocrite, and the mischief of an unbridled tongue (as against religion, rulers, or dissenters) described, in several sermons, preached at the Abby in Westminster, before many members of the Honourable House of Commons, 1660 ; and The fools prosperity, the occasion of his destruction : a sermon preached at Covent-Garden / by Richard Baxter.	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.; Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691. Fools prosperity.	1660 (1660)	Wing B1448; ESTC R13757	102,825	412

we can be saved but by Jesus Christ the only Mediator between sinful man and the offended Majesty and yet what is there in all the world that is more abused to the deceiving of mens souls then the Name Grace of Jesus Christ Men that might be saved by an effectual Faith are cheated and destroyed by false Faith and presumption The merciful nature of God is the ground-work of all the comforts of the godly and yet there is nothing that is more abused to the deceiving of mens souls that will profess that they trust in the mercies of God while they are labouring to be miserable by the refusing and resisting the mercy that would save them The free promises of the Gospel do support true believers but are abused to the deceiving of the presumptuous world And so the Apostle telleth us that many do by their Religion They will have a Religion to deceive themselves but not to save them It is the Hypocrite that is the subject in my text who is described by this double property 1. That he seemeth to be Religious 2. That his obedience answereth not this seeming or profession the instance is given in the bridling of his tongue because that was the point that the Apostle had some special reason to insist on with those to whom he immediately directed his Epistle Though its plain in ver 22 23 c. that it is the whole work of obedience that he implyeth where he instanceth in this particular The sin of the tongue which he specially intendeth to reprove was the bitter reproaching of their brethren upon the account of their differences in matters of Religion and the vilifying of others and uncharitable passionate contendings and censures upon pretence of knowing more then others as appeareth in the third Chapter throughout The Predicate is double one by way of supposition viz. that this hypocrite doth but deceive his own heart The other by way of assertion viz. that his Religion is vain Whether 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be fetcht as far as from Orpheus the Thracian as Erasmus and many others imagine is of no great moment to our understanding of the text it being evident that it is the worshipping of God that is here meant by Religion and it is men addicted to his worship that are called Religious The seeming here spoken of refers both to himself and others he that seemeth to himself to be Religious or is judged so by other men By bridling the tongue is meant restraining it from evil speech By deceiving himself is meant the mistake of his judgement concerning the sincerity and acceptableness and reward of his Religion and the frustrating of his own expectations hereupon His Religion is said to be in Vain in that it shall not attain the ends of an unfeigned true Religion of which more anon The sence of the Text then is contained in these two Propositions 1. There is a seeming Religiousness which is but self-deceiving and will prove in Vain 2. Where sincere obedience doth not accompany the profession of Religion and in particular when such men bridle not their tongues their Religion is but Vain and self-deceiving These two being contained in the text the former comprized in the latter I shall handle them together and shew you 1. What this seeming Religion is and how it differeth from true Religion 2. Wherein this self-deceiving by a seeming Religion doth consist 3. Whence it is that men are so prone to this self-deceit 4. In what respects this Religion is Vain and why 5. And then we shall consider how to improve these truths by a due application 1. Concerning the first I must shew you 1. What this seeming Religion is made up of 2. And what it wants which maketh it delusory and vain In general This Vain Religion is made up sometimes of all that 1. A laudable nature or temperature of body 2. And good education and excellent means 3. Assisted by the common workings of the Spirit can produce More particularly 1. A Vain Religiousness may have a great deal of superficial opinionative knowledge and so may have the truest Religion for its object the true doctrines of Faith may be believed by a Faith that is not true the hypocrite as to the 〈…〉 Creed may be 〈…〉 ignorance a bound●● 〈…〉 be a knowing man and 〈…〉 ignorance of others when errors abound he may be of the right opinion in Religion and speak much against the errors of the times as one that is wiser then the giddy heretical sort of people He may Know the will of God and approve the things that are more excellent being instructed out of the Law and be confident that he himself is a guide of the blind a light of them which are in darkness an instructer of the foolish a teacher of babes which hath the form of knowledge and of the truth in the Law Rom. 2. 18 19 20. He may know as much materially as the upright may and be able to convince gainsayers and be a notable Champion for the defending of the truth against the many adversaries that oppose it and so may be eminently usefull in his generation 2. He that is but Religious in Vain may be frequent in the worshipping of God and may seek him daily and delight to know his wayes and to approach him and ask of him the Ordinances of justice as if he were one of the people that did righteousness and forsook not the Ordinances of their God Isa 58. 1 2. He may be oft in fasting and punctual in keeping holy dayes and ceremonies as verse 3. Isa 1. 12 13 14 15. Luke 18. 11 12 13. and exercise much severity on himself after the commandments and doctrines of men in things that have a shew of wisdom in Will-worship and Humility and neglecting of the body not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh Col. 2. 20 21 22 23. Though he be slow paced in the right way he is swift in his mistaken paths Though he liketh not preciseness zeal and forwardness in the spiritual works that God prescribeth yet when it comes to his own or other mens inventions he will be religious and righteous overmuch Eccles 7. 16. and forward to offer the sacrifice of a fool that considereth not that he is but doing evil while he thinks to please God with the sacrifice of his services though he turn away his ear from an obedient hearing the word that should direct him Eccles 5. 1 2. Prov. 28. 9. 3. He that is but Religious in Vain may see the evil of discord and divisions and inveigh much against schismaticks and see the excellency of unity and peace and therefore may joyn himself with the visible Catholick Church and with the Christians and Congregations that are most for unity There have alwayes been Hypocrites in the most orderly peaceable societies of believers and still will be 4. The self-deceiving Hypocrite is oft-times very sensible of

God and therefore proveth him to be his son and that he shall have his good things in the world to come because he had his evils here If he suffer any thing for a good cause or a cause that he taketh to be good he taketh himself to be a Confessor and marked out for life eternal If he give any considerable alms he applyeth all the promises to himself that are made to those that are truly charitable though he giveth but the leavings of the flesh and giveth but on common compassions or for applause or for some common end and not as to Christ whom he honoureth in his members as one that hath resigned all unto him If he pray from the lips only or only for pardon and such other mercies as flesh it self would be glad to have without the unexpressable groans of the spirit for spiritual mercies Rom. 8. 26 he presently applyeth all the promises to himself that are made to the upright that call upon God And thus Love Mercy and Christ himself are abused by him to this damning work of self-deceit 6. Moreover he makes use of all the ordinances of God to the deceiving of his own heart The outward part of Baptism perswades him that he is inwardly regenerate He receiveth the Lords supper that he may confirm his presumption and increase his self-deceit as the godly receive it to confirm and increase their saving faith He joyneth with the Church in those prayers and praises that are fitted to the true believers state that he may thence more confidently deceive his own heart with the conceit that he is a true believer And thus he turneth the bread of life and all the helps and means of grace to the strengthening of his sin and the furthering of his perdition 7. Moreover this miserable self-deceiver doth usually get into such company as may further his self-deceit and maketh use of them to that end If he get into any holy well-ordered Church of Christians it is that by his outward communion with the Saints he may seem to himself to have inward communion with them If he get among able godly Ministers and other judicious Christians and finds that he is well esteemed of by them he is confirmed hereby in his presumption and self-deceit when alas we must in charity judge of men as they profess and seem and leave the infallible judgement of the heart to God Vsually this self-deceiving hypocrite doth associate with some carnal or factious men with whom he makes himself a party and such will smooth him up and make a Saint of him either because they are as bad themselves and dare not condemn him lest they condemn themselves or because they are flatterers and dawbers or men that were never themselves acquainted with those saving operations of the Spirit which he wants or because they are partial to one of their own faction And thus a formal hypocrite may be stroaked by Formalists and a Schismatical Hypocrite may be soothed up by those of his own Sect as lamentable experience telleth us that such do to the increase of their pernicious self-deceit Yea more then so if these hypocrites fall in company with the notoriously prophane from them they will fetch some confirmation of their self-deceit when they hear them swear and curse and rant and see them drunk they secretly with the Pharisee rejoyce and say I thank thee Lord that I am not as this Publican And this is one reason why such hypoorites are well content to have some servants in their families or some neighbours or company about them that are notoriously prophane that their deluded consciences considering that they are more civil and religious themselves may hence gather comfort that they are the servants of God and in a state of grace Hence also it is that those of them that go on the Schismatical side do purposely go into separated societies that by withdrawing from so many and as they speak coming out from among them they may seem to themselves to be fellow-Citizens with the Saints and to be of the little flock that shall have the Kingdom This is the use that self-deceivers make of their companions 8. Moreover the Hypocrite confirmeth his self-deceit by observing the great numbers of ungodly persons worse then he that are in the world This makes him think that God should be unmerciful and heaven be empty if all such as he should be shut out the damnation of so many seemeth so incredible to him that it much increaseth his confidence and self-deceit 9. And he deceiveth himself also by a misobserving and misapplying the falls and infirmities of the servants of the Lord and the scandalous lives of many Hypocrites like himself When he readeth of Noahs drunkenness and Lots drunkenness and incest and Davids adultery and murder and Peters denyal of his Master with cursing and swearing he considereth not how much these singular actions were contrary to the scope of their lives nor by what serious repentance they did rise and do so no more but he hence concludeth that sure he is in a state of grace that hath no such heinous sins as these though indeed he hath more heinous continually within him even a love of the world and pleasure above God a secret root of unbelief a servitude to the flesh c. when he seeth any about him that profess the fear of God prove Hypocrites or Apostates or fall into any scandalous sin he strengtheneth his presumption by it and concludeth that this profession of greater holiness then he himself hath is but Hypocrisie and that he is as good as those that seem more devout though he make not so much ado with his religion or at least that such as he shall be saved when those are so bad that are accounted better If there be but a Cham in the Ark and Family of Noah an Ishmael in Abrahams house an Esau in Jacobs an Absalom in Davids a Judas among the Disciples of Christ these self-deceivers will thence fetch matter for their own delusion and perdition as if the rest were all as bad or sanctification were not necessary to salvation 10. The self-deceiver also is confirmed in his presumption by taking to himself the comforts that Ministers hold forth for truly humbled upright souls that are apt to be too much disquieted and cast down Our Congregations are mixt of godly and ungodly and broken-hearted and hard-hearted dejected and self-confident sinners besides all those that are well setled in their spiritual peace And as we cannot tell how to tell the wicked of their misery nor open the Hypocrites self-deceit but the self-suspecting humbled souls will misapply it to themselves and be more dejected by it and say It is thus with me so we cannot tell how to comfort the distressed and clear up the evidences of a drooping soul but the presumptuous Hypocrite will lay hold upon it and think that it belongs to him Every comfortable Book or Scripture that he readeth

think you will not If you are such as you profess you are all Saints and shall be saved If any of your be not such they can be nothing else but Hypocrites Seeing therefore that you are all either Saints or Hypocrites come now to the bar and refuse not a tryal that may prevent the errors of another kind of tryal that you cannot refuse And here let me set before you your Profession and then try your selves Whether you are such as you profess your selves to be or not And I think I may take it for granted that the Articles of the Creed and the B●ptismal Covenant is the least that every one of you do profess and that the desires implyed in the Petitions of the Lords Prayer you all profess to be your own desires and that you take the 〈◊〉 Command●ments for part of the rule of your obedience Let us peruse them briefly in the several parts 1. Do you not all say that you Believe in God the Father Almighty Maker of Heaven and earth and that you will have no other gods but him and are you not accordingly engaged in Covenant with him you will not deny it And what is the meaning of this much of your profession It is no less then to take God for the only infinite good to be loved with the chiefest love and to take him for your absolute Lord and Governour the Owner of you and all you have to whom you owe universal absolute obedience and that you are truly willing to love him above all and fear him and trust him and obey him accordingly though your flesh and all the world should be against it He that meaneth not all this doth dissemble or lye when he saith he taketh God to be his God For to be God is to be this much to us And really is it thus with you as you profess speak but as men that dare not lye before the Lord that knows your hearts Do you indeed Love God as God with your superlative love Are your hearts set upon him Do you make it your principal care to please him Is it your delight to do his will Is it sweeter to you to think and speak of him then of the world Doth it grieve you most to offend him In a word you are not such strangers to Nature but you know what love is And you are not such strangers to your own hearts but you know what it is to love your pleasure your profit your honour and your friend can conscience say before the Lord that you love him better then all these if not more passionately yet more deeply effectually and resolvedly with a love that will cause you to deny and part with all for him If you thus truly love him as God and above all how comes it to pass that you seek the world more carefully and eagerly then him and that you are more pleased with worldly thoughts and speeches and employments then with divine were not the Hypocrite justly blinded and a willfull stranger to himself he could not but know that he loveth not God as God and above all And to love him in subordination to your flesh and its contents is not at all to love him as God As it is no degree of conjugal love to love a wife but as a servant nor no degree of the love due to your Soveraign to love him as an equal or as a slave And if really you take God for your absolute Lord and Governour why is it then that you take no pleasure in his Laws but count them too strict and had rather be at your own dispose why is it that you obey your fleshly desires before and against the God whom you acknowledge why will you not be perswaded to that holiness justice and charity which you know his Law commandeth you why do you willfully continue in those sins which conscience tells you God forbids will you live in willfull disobedience and love your sins and loath your duty and obstinately continue thus and yet profess that you take God for your God and consequently for your Lord and Governour and yet will you not confess that you are dissembling Hypocrites 2. Do you not all profess that you believe in Jesus Christ and have you not in Covenant taken him for your Saviour and Lord And do you so indeed or do you not play the Hypocrites If you believe in Christ and take him for your Saviour you then take your sins for the disease and misery of your souls and you are so grieved for them and weary of them and humbled in the apprehension of your lost estate that you fly to Christ as your only refuge from the wrath and curse of the offended Majesty and value his justifying and healing grace before all the riches of the world and you are willing to take his bitterest medicines and use the means appointed by him for the destruction of your sin and the perfecting of his graces And is it thus with you that have unhumbled hearts that never felt the need of Christ as condemned miserable men must do and that love the sin that he would cure and are unwilling to be mortified and sanctified by his grace Unless a carkass be a man such Hypocrites as these are no true Christians and have but a seeing self-deceiving faith 3. Do you not all profess to believe in the Holy Ghost and are you not engaged to him in Covenant as your Sanctifier And do you not grosly play the Hypocrites here If not how comes it to pass that you stick in your natural state as if you had no need of sanctification and live as quietly without any acquaintance with true Regeneration and the Spirit to dwell and rule within you as it you needed no such change Or else that you take up with a Formal an affected or a forced kind of Religion in stead of Sanctification and spiritual devotion And how comes it to pass that you distaste the highest degrees of holiness and that you will not be brought to the mortification self-denyal and unreserved obedience which are the essence of sanctification As for the more deboist prophane sort of Hypocrites that make a common mock of godliness and scorn at the very name of Holiness and Sanctification and deride at all that pretend to have the Spirit I had rather tremble at the thought of their misery then now stand to reprove that notorious hypocrisie which professeth to believe in the Holy Spirit which they deride and Covenanteth with the Sanctifier while they hate and mock or at least do obstinately refuse sanctification When God himself tells us Rom. 8. 9. That if any man have not the Spirit of Christ the same is none of his And therefore to deride a man for professing that he hath the Spirit is to deride him for professing to be a Christian 4. Do you not all profess to Believe the Holy Catholick Church that is that Christ hath a people dispersed through the