Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	corruption_n	flesh_n	reap_v	5,289	5	10.9811	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A35787	A treatise concerning the right use of the Fathers, in the decision of the controversies that are this day in religion written in French by John Daille ...; Traité de l'employ des saints Pères pour le jugement des différences qui sont aujourd'hui en la religion. English	Daillé, Jean, 1594-1670.	1675 (1675)	Wing D119; ESTC R1519	305,534	382

their Words in apperance seem to carry Who hath not observed the strange Hyperboles of S. Chysostome S. Hilary S. Ambrose and the like But that I may make it plainly and evidently appear unto you how much these Ornaments do darken the clearness of the Sense of an Author I shall onely here lay before you one Instance taken from S. Hierome who writing to Eustochium giveth her an account how that for his being too much addicted to the Study of Secular Learning he was brought before the presence of our Lord and was there really with Stripes chastised for it And think not saith he that this was any of those drowsie Fancies or vain Dreams which sometimes abuse us I call to witness hereof that Tribunal before which I then lay and that sad Judgment which I was then in dread of So may I never hereafter fall into the like danger as this is true I do assure you that I found my Shoulders to be all over black and blue with the stripes I then received and which I afterwards felt when I awaked So that I have ever since had a greater affection to the reading of Divine Books than I ever before had to the study of Humane Learning Now hearing him speak thus who would not believe this to be a true Story and who would not be ready to understand this Narration in the literal sense And yet it appears plainly from what he hath elsewhere confessed that all this was but a meer Dream and a Rhetorical piece of Artifice frequently used by the Masters in this Art contrived only for the better and more powerful diverting Men from their too great affection to the Books of the Heathens For Ruffinus picking a quarrel with him for this and objecting against him That contrary to the Oath which he had before taken he did notwithstanding still apply himself to the study of Pagan Learning S. Hierome after he had alledged many things to quit himself from this Accusation Thus you see saith he what I could have urged for my self had I promised any such thing waking But now do but take notice of this new and unheard of kind of impudence He objects against me my very Dreams And then presently doth he refer him to the Words of the Prophets saying We must not take heed to Dreams for neither doth an adulterous Dream cast a Man into Hell nor that of Martyrdom bring him to Heaven And so he at last plainly says That this Promise of his was made onely in a Dream and that therefore consequently it carried no obligation with it And who knows but that the Life of Malchus which he hath so delicately and artificially described unto us and some other the like Pieces of his and of some others may be the like Essays of Wit We see he doth not stick to confess That the Life of Paulus Eremita was accounted for such by some of his back-friends and it is very probable that his 47● Epistle which is so full of Learning and Eloquence is but an Essay of the same nature he having there fancied to himself a fit Subject only whereon to shew his own Eloquence as the usual manner of Orators is Thus thou seest Reader how great darkness is cast over the Writings of the Ancients by these Figures and Flourishes of Rhetorick and other Artifices of Humane Learning which they so often and so over-licentiously use at least for our parts who to our great disadvantage find that so many Ornaments and Embelishments do rather disguise and hide from us the bottom and depth of their Conceptions Who shall assure us that they have not made use of the same Arts in their Discourses touching the Eucharist to advance the Dignity of the Divine Mysteries and to increase the Peoples Devotion as likewise touching the Power of the Prelates to procure them the greater respect and obedience from their People What probability is there that they would spare their Pencils their Colours their Shadows and their Lights in those Points where this their Art might have been imployed to so good purpose And to this place I shall refer those other Customs of theirs which are so frequent with them of denying and affirming things as it were absolutely notwithstanding the purpose and intent of their Discourse be to deny or affirm them only by way of comparison and reference to some other things Who could chuse but think that S. Hierome was tainted with the Heresie of Marcion and of the Eneratites hearing him so fiercely inveigh against Marriage as he doth in his Books against Jovinian and oftentimes in other places also insomuch that there have sometimes fallen from him such words as these Seeing that in the use of the Woman there is always some Corruption and that Incorruption properly belongeth to Chastity Marriage saith he cannot be accounted of so high esteem as Chastity And a little after My opinion is That he that hath a Wife till such time as he returneth to that pass as that Satan tempts him not that is to say so long as he makes use of her as of a Wife he sowes in the Flesh and not in the Spirit Now he that soweth in the Flesh it is not I that say it but the Apostle the same shall reap Corruption Now these words taken literally condemn Marriage and the use thereof as defiling a Man and depriving him of Blessed Immortality Yet notwithstanding in his Epistle to Pammachius he informeth us That these Passages of his and all other the like are not to be understood as spoken positively and absolutely but only by way of comparison that is he would be understood to say That the Purity and Felicity of Virgins is such as that in comparison of it that of the Marriage-Bed is not at all to be mentioned This Key is very necessary for the finding entrance into the Sense of the Ancients and the Fathers of the VII Council made very good use of it in giving the Sense of two or three Passages that were objected against them by the Iconoclasts The first was out of S. Chrysostome Through the Scriptures we enjoy the presence of the Saints having the Images not of their Bodies but of their Souls For the things there spoken by them are the Images of their Souls The second was out of Amphilochius Our care is not to draw in Colours on Tables the Natural Faces of the Saints for we have no need of any such thing but rather to imitate their Life Conversation by following the Example of their Vertue The third was out of Austerius Draw not the Portraiture of Christ on thy garments but rather bestow upon the Poor the price that these expences would amount to For as for him it is sufficient that he once humbled himself in taking upon him our flesh Would not any man that hears these words believe these three Fathers to have been Iconoclasts I