Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	deed_n	flesh_n	mortify_v	5,880	5	10.8136	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A27053	A treatise of self-denial. By Richard Baxter, pastor of the church at Kederminster	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1675 (1675)	Wing B1431; ESTC R218685	325,551	530

reason and drawn you to excess in meats and drinks for matter or manner for quality or quantity or both Many a groan those sins have cost you and many a smarting day they have caused you and a sad uncomfortable life you have had by reason of them in comparison of what you might have had And this flesh hath been the Mother or the Nurse of all You were engaged by your Baptismal Covenant to fight against it when you entred into the Church and if you are Christians this combate hath been your daily work and much of the business of your lives And yet are you loth to have the victory see your enemy under feet Do you fight against it as for the life of your souls yet are you afraid lest death should hurt it or break it down Have you fought your selves friends with it that you are so tender of it when you are the greatest friends to it it will be the most dangerous enemy to you And do not think that it is only sin and not the body that is the flesh that is called your enemy in Scripture For though it be not the body as such or as obedient to the soul yet is it the Body as inclining to creatures from which the sinful soul cannot restrain it it is the body as having an inordinate sensitive appetite and imagination and so distempered as that it rebels against the Spirit and casteth off the rule of Reason and would not be curbed of its desires but have the rule of all it self Was it not the very flesh it self that Paul saith he fought against and kept under and brought into subjection lest he should be a cast a-way 1 Cor. 9. 26 27. Why should sin be called Flesh and Body but that it is the Body of Flesh that is the principal-seat of those sins that are so called If ye live after the flesh ye shall die but if ye through the Spirit do mortifie the deeds of the Body ye shall live Rom. 8. 13. If ye sow to the flesh of the flesh ye shall reap corruption Gal. 6. 8. That which is first in Being is first in sin But it is the Flesh or Embryo endued with sense that is first in being Be not therefore too tender of that which corruption hath made your prison and your enemy Many a time you have been put to resist it and watch and strive against it and when you have been at the best it hath been hindring you to be better and when the spirit was willing the flesh was weak And quickly hath it caused your cooling declension Many a blessed hours communion between God your souls that flesh hath deprived you of And therfore though still you must love it yet you should the less grieve or be troubled at its sufferings seeing they are but the fruits of its sin and a holy contentedness shold possess your minds that God should thus castigatorily revenge his own quarrel yours upon it 10. But yet consider that were you never so tender of the body it self yet faith and reason should perswade you to be content For God is but preparing even for its felicity His undoing it but to make it up again As in the new birth he broke your hearts and false hopes that he might heal your hearts and give you sounder hopes instead of them so at death he breaketh your flesh and worldly hopes not to undo you and leave it in corruption but to raise it again another manner of body than now it is and give it a part in the blessedness which you hoped for If in good sadness you believe the Resurrection what cause is there for so much fear of death You can be content that your Roses die and your sweetest Flowers fall and perish and the green and beauteous complexion of the earth be turned into a bleak and withered hue because you expect a kind of Resurrection in the Spring You can boldly lie down at night to sleep though sleep be a kind of death to the body and more to the soul and all because you shall rise again in the morning And if every nights sleep or one at least were a gentle death if you were sure to rise again the next morning you would make no great matter of it Were it as common to men to die every night and rise again in the morning as it is to sleep every night and rise in the morning death would not seem such a dreadful thing Those poor men that have the falling-sickness do once in a day or in a few days lie as dead men and have as much pain as many that die And yet because they use to be up and well again in a little time they can go merrily about their business the rest of the day and little fear their approaching fall How much more should the belief of a Resurrection unto life confirm us against the fears of death And why should we not as quietly commit our bodies to the dust when we have the promise of the God of heaven that the Earth shall deliver up her dead and that this body that is sown in corruption shall be raisedin incorruption It is sown in dishonour it is raised in glory it is sown in weakness it is raised in power it is sown a natural body it is raised a spiritual body So great and wonderful the change will be as now is unconceivable we have now a drossie l●mp of flesh an aggravation of the Elements to a seed of life which out of them forms it self a body by the Divine influx Like the Silk-worm which in the Winter is but a seed which in the Summer doth move attract that matter from which it gets a larger body by a kind of Resurrection But it is another manner of body I will not say of flesh which at the Resurrection we shall have Not flesh and blood nor a natural body but of a nature so spiritual sublime and pure that it shall be indeed a spiritual body And think not that this is a contradiction and that spirituality and corporeity are inconsistent For There is a Natural Body and there is a Spiritual body The root of the fleshly Natural body was the first man Adam who was made a living soul to be the Root of living souls The root of the spiritual Body is Christ who being a quickning Spirit doth quicken all his members by his Spirit which Spirit of Grace is the seed of Glory as from an holy and gracious Saviour we receive an holy and gracious nature so from a Glorified Saviour we shall receive a glorious nature we are now changed from glory to Glory in the beginning as by the spirit of the Lord But it is another kind of Glory that this doth tend to Howbeit that is not first which is spiritual but the natural and afterwards the spiritual The first man was of the Earth Earthy The second man is the Lord from heaven

were in Gods hands than his own and would not undertake the charge if it were offered him Alas thinks he I am almost below a man and am I fit to make a God of I come off so lamely in the duty of a Creature as deserves damnation and am I fit to arrogate the work of the Creator 8. Moreover it is the high Prerogative of God to be the Soveraign Ruler of the world to make Laws for them which must be obeyed and to reward the obedient and punish the disobedient God is King of all the earth even King of Kings and Lord of Lords and all shall obey him or be judged by him for their disobedience But sin turned man into a Rebel against Heaven and a Traitor to his Maker so that now the selfish unsanctified man disliketh Gods Government at least in the particulars and would Govern himself The Law of God contained in his Word and Works he murmurs at as too obscure or too precise and strict for him He finds that it crosseth his Carnal interest and speaks not good of him but evil and therefore he is against it as supposing it to be against him and his pleasure profit and honour in the world If men had but the Government of themselves what a difference would there be between their way and Gods If corrupt unsanctified selfish man might make a Law for himself in stead of the Word of God what a Law would it be and how much of the Law of God should be repealed If sinners might make a Scripture you should find in it no such passages as these Except a man be Converted or born again he cannot enter into the Kingdom of heaven without Holiness none shall see God If self might make Laws you should not read in them If ye live after the flesh ye shall die but if by the Spirit ye mortifie the deeds of the body ye shall live Nor should you there find that the Gate is strait and the way is narrow that leads to life and few there be that find it or that the righteous are scarcely saved As all the Scripture is now for Holiness and against Prophaneness Ungodliness and Sensuality if self had the framing of it it should all be changed and it should at least speak peace to fleshly-minded men All those true and dreadful passages that speak fire and brimstone against the unsanctified and threatned everlasting torments should be razed out and you shall find no talk of damnation in the Scripture for such as they no talk of the worm that never dyeth or the fire that is never quenched or of Depart from me all ye workers of iniquity I know you not or that the way of the ungodly shall perish or that God doth laugh at them because he seeth that their day is coming Abundance of the Bible would be wiped out if Carnal self had but the altering of it Nay it would be quite made new and made a contrary thing the Articles of our Creed would be changed the Petitions of our Rule for Prayer would be most altered every one of the ten Commandments would be altered as I shall after shew Idolatry should be no sin but the principal Law for self would be set up as the Idol of the world will-worship would be no sin men would he held guiltless that take the name of God in vain The Lords day should be a day of mirth and carnal pleasure every Subject would be the Soveraign and every Inferiour the Superior Revenge would be made lawful for themselves though not for others Fornication and Adultery would be no mortal sin Stealing would be made tolerable to themselves it should be lawful to them to do any wrong to the name and reputation of another in a word every man would do what he list and his will should be his Law and himself should be his own Judge a gentle tender Judge no doubt Thus would self Rule But sanctification brings men to Deny this self and to lay down the Arms of Rebellion against God and to see how unfit we are to Rule our selves that we are too foolish and sinful and partial to make Laws and too partial also and tender to execute them and that as we were made to obey so obey we must and come again into our ranks and willingly subject our selves to the Soveraign of the world Self denyal teacheth a man to have his own Carnal wisdom and reasonings that rise up against the Laws of God and to Love them the worse because they are thus his own and to love the Laws of God the better because they are God's and because they are against his Carnal self The stamps of God on them doth make them currant with him when if they had but the private stamps of self he would disown them as counterfeit or treasonable He hath indeed a flesh that is restrained by Gods Laws and striveth against them but he thinks never the worse of the Law for that but approveth and liketh it in the inner man and if he might have his choice he would not blot out one Commandment nor one Direction nor one Article of Faith nor a tittle of the Law because that self is not the Chooser in him but he hath learned to submit to the will and wisdom of the Lord. And though he love himself and have a nature that is unwilling of suffering and feareth the displeasure of God and the threatnings of his holy Law yet doth he unfeignedly justifie the Law and acknowledge it to be holy and just and good and would not have the very threatnings of it to be repealed and blotted out if he had his choice for he knows that the Determinations of God are the best and that none but he is fit to govern and therefore he desires that he himself may be taught better to obey and not that he may rule and wisheth that he were more conformed to the Law and not that the Law were conformed to him and fain he would have his own will brought up to Gods but wisheth not Gods will to be crookened and brought down to his As far as men have self-denyal this is so 9. Moreover as it is Gods Prerogative to be the Soveraign Ruler of our selves so also of all others as well as us But when sin had set up self man would not only Rule himself but would rule all others An eager desire there is in the unsanctified selfish heart that he might be Ruler of Town and Country and all might be brought to do his will And hence it is that there is such resisting and grudging at good Governors and that men are so ambitious and fain would be highest because they would have their own wills fulfilled by all and therefore would have power to force men to it Hence it is that there is such a stir in the world for Crowns and Kingdoms and few men have ever been heard of that have refused a Scepter when it was offered