Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	father_n	holy_a	jesus_n	13,652	5	5.8822	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A76020	A treatise of adhering to God; written by Albert the Great, Bishop of Ratisbon. Put into English by Sir Kenelme Digby, Kt. Also a conference with a lady about choyce of religion.; De adhærendo Deo. English	Albertus, Magnus, Saint, 1193?-1280.; Digby, Kenelm, Sir, 1603-1665.	1653 (1653)	Wing A876; Thomason E1529_2; ESTC R25226	62,177	159

exercises and the top of all perfection in this life and the happinesse of the next And therefore our Saviour told his beloved and loving penitent that the share she had chosen should never bee taken from her Upon these grounds Albert recommendeth the continuall meditation of Christs passion to be alwayes joyned with the other exercise of depuring our imaginations and hearts from the images and affections of all created objects whatsoever Making thereby a ladder of his humanity to climbe up to his divinity which if we should look upon it without that veyle between us and it would strike us blind As when a medicinal simple is too strong for our stomack to bear singly in its own substance physitians use to allay and weaken it with some gentle liquor that is agreeable to our taste and then drinking what delighteth us with pleasure we swallow health But Madam I perceive I engage my selfe before I am aware in a talk I am not able to go through with Nor is it needfull for this little treatise of as great value as it is of little bulk requireth neither commentary nor apologie My sending it to your Ladyship is an action of duty and of affection The first in giving you an account of the expence of my time in this place where I have bin now a just week and intitling you to all I shall ever do or bring to passe in any kind whatsoever during my whole life And the other in communicating to you what hath afforded me so much contentment and may prove so solidly beneficial to me if it please God to give me grace to make right use of it I beseech your Ladyship pray him so to do and to be pleased to give me your blessing Calis the 6th of October the feast of the glorious Patriarke of the Carthusians who most admirably practised and instituted what this treatise recommendeth in the year 1649. Your Ladyships most humble most obedient and most dutiful Sonne K. D. To my Lady Winter the wife of Sr. John Winter late of Liddne in the County of Glocester MADAM THe worthy Author giving me the view of this Translation in Paris at my comming from thence I begged a coppie which he was pleased to bestow and as he performed the work for his private use and recreation and after dedicated it to his vertuous Mother the Lady Digby So I who have no other share then the conveying it to be printed for the publique good do offer up my little industrie therein to your La Yet not for this only but that indeed I willingly take occasion to tell the world how much my Lady Winter is esteemed and valued by her faithfull Friend and Kinsman and most humble servant W Gr A TREATISE OF Adhering to God CHAP. I. Of the utmost and highest perfection that it is possiblefor a man to arrive unto in this life I Have been casting with my selfe how I might frame for my owne use a compleat perfect draught as far forth as our nature is capable of in this lifes banishment and peregrination of what is the highest and noblest action for a man to employ himselfe about And surely this is none other then a ready vigorous constant and immediate adhesion unto God Almighty by a totall abstraction as much as is possible from all creatures whatsoever For the end of Christian perfection is Love and Charity by which a Soule cleaveth to her Creatour And unto this adhesion of Charity every man in particular is undispensably obliged under paine of loosing Heaven so far forth as concerneth the obeying Gods commands and the conforming himselfe to his Divine will which obedience shutteth out whatsoever is repugnant to the essence and habit of Charity and consequently all mortall sinnes But religious persons have a further obligation then this by having bound themselves to Evangelicall perfection and to such duties as though they be but of counsill and superogation yet by them the way is made more ready and more secure to bring the observers of them to their journeys end which is the possession and fruition of God And the observance of these shutteth out not only what is destructive to Charity but also all other obstacles that may in any wise hinder or loose the fervour and activity of Charity or that may retard or slacken the soules union with God Almighty which is in a great measure performed by an intire and efficacious abrenunciation of all creatures whatsoever even of our owne selves Now seeing that God is a spirit and that he ought to be adored in Spirit and in truth Joh. 4. that is to say by knowledge and love by understanding and affection voide of all mixture with any corporeal species or materiall imaginations hence it is that we are thus taught in the Gospel when thou shalt pray enter into thy chamber that is into the inner roome of thy heart and shutting the doore Mat. 6. to wit of thy senses there with a pure heart a good conscience and a firme faith pray to thy father in spirit and in truth in secret All which is done when a man laying aside all other affaires and thoughts withdraweth himselfe wholy into himself then shutting out and forgetting all created objects whatsoever the superiour part of his soule onely powreth out before Jesus Christ her desires to her Lord God in deepe silence and with confident security and in so doing dilateth diffuseth drowneth inflameth and resolveth herself into him through the violence of love with the whole weight of her heart and with the utmost straining of all her faculties and powers CHAP. II. How one may cleave and intend wholy to Christ despising all other things BUt he who desireth and is resolved to apply himselfe to such a state must lay downe for an absolutely necessary ground that he must shut his eyes and all his senses to all manner of outward implications and affaires that may cause any trouble and must cast from him all cares sollicitudes as being altogether unconcerned in any creature whatsoever or rather looking upon them as hurtfull and pernicious to him And then he must retire his whole life into himselfe and there have no other object to entertaine his thoughts withall but Jesus Christ wounded and crucified And that with a continuall attention and with all earnestnesse and straining himself to his utmost power he must make it his onely businesse to passe by him into him that is to say by his Manhood into his Godhead by the wounds of his humanity into his glory and Divinity and there readily and securely commit himselfe and all that concerneth him to his unwearied and al-seeing providence according to St Peters expression when he saith casting all your care and solicitude upon him 1 Pet. 5. who ruleth and disposeth all things And to St Paul when he biddeth us bee solicitous for nothing Phil. 4. And to that direction of the Psalme which adviseth us to settle all our thoughts upon the Lord

whereby to give them yet further a supernaturall assurance and infallibility which they may with an humble confidence in his unlimited goodness expect and claim at his divine hand when they are reduced to that state as is convenient for the reception of such a supernaturall gift 14. Our fourteenth conclusion therefore shall be that God hath given to his Church thus composed the holy Ghost to confirm it in the true faith and to preserve it from error and to Illuminate the understanding of it in right discerning the true sense of those Mysteries of faith that are cōmitted to the custody of it and to worke supernaturall effects of devotion and sanctifie in that Church And this I prove thus Considering that the doctrine of Christ is practical and aymeth at the working of an effect which is the reduction of mankind to beatitude and that mankinde comprehendeth not onely those that lived in that age when he preached but also all others that ever were since or shall be till the end of the world It is apparent that to accomplish that end it was necessary Christ should so effectually imprint his doctrine in their hearts whom he delivered it unto as it might upon all occasions and at all times infallibly expresse it selfe in action and in the delivery of it over from hand to hand should in vertue and strength of the first operation produce ever after like effects in all others Now to have this compleatly performed it was to bee done both by exteriour and by interiour means proportionable to the senses without and to the soule within The outward means were the miracles that hee wrought of which himselfe saith If I had not wrought those workes that no man else ever did they were not guilty of sinne but now they have no excuse or to this purpose and he promised the Apostles they should do greater then those And that miracles are the proper instruments to plant a new doctrine and faith withall the Apostle witnesseth when he saith that miracles are wrought for the unfaithfull not for the faithful and God himselfe told Moses that hee would once do some prodigy in his favour that the people might for ever after beleive what he said to them But it is manifest by the fall of the Apostles themselves that onely this exteriour means of miracles is not sufficient to engraft supernatural faith deep enough in mens hearts when as they upon Christs Passion not onely for fear through human frailty denied their master but had even the very conceit and belief of his doctrine exiled out of their hearts and understanding notwithstanding all the miracles they had seen him work in almost four years time they continually conversed with him which appeareth plainly by the discourse of the Disciples going to Emaus when they said we hoped c. and expressed their sadnesse for the contrary successe to their expectation and by saint Thomas his saying that he would not believe his resurrection unless he saw him and put his fingers into his wounds c. And by the rest of the Apostles that were so long before they would believe his resurrection as having given over the thought of his divinity and after his death considered him but as a pure man like other men Therefore it was necessary that some inward light should bee given them so clear and so strong and so powerfull as the senses should not be able to prevail against it but that it should overflowingly possesse and fill all their understandings and their souls and make them break out in exteriour actions correspondent to the spirit that steered them within And the reason is evident for while on the one side the senses discerne apparantly miracles wrought in confirmation of a doctrine and on the other side the same senses doe stifly contradict the very possibility of the doctrine which those miracles testify the soul within having no assistance beyond the natural powers shee hath belonging originally unto her is in great debate and anxiety which way to give her assent and though reason doe prevail to give it to the party of the present miracles yet it is with great timidity But if it happen that the course of those miracles be stopped then the particular seeming impossibilities of the proposed faith remaining alwaies alike lively in their apprehension and the miracles wrought to confirme it residing but in the memory and the representations of them wearing out daily more and more and the present senses and fantasy growing proportionably stronger and stronger and withall objecting continually new doubts about the reality of those miracles it cannot be expected otherwise but that the assent of the soul should range it selfe on the side of the impossibilities appearing to the present senses and renounce the doctrine formerly confirmed by miracles unlesse some inward and supernaturall light be given her to disperse all the mists that the senses raise against the truth of the doctrine Now the infusion of this light and fervour we call the giving of the holy Ghost which Christ himselfe foreknowing how necessary it was promised them assuring them that he would procure his father to send them the holy Ghost the spirit of truth that should for ever remain among them and within them and suggest unto their memory and instruct them in the right understanding of the faith he had preached unto them And this was prophesied long before of the state of the law of grace by Hieremy whose authority S. Paul bringeth to prove that the law of the Gospel was to be written by the holy Ghost in mens hearts and in their mindes and accordingly he calleth the faithful of the Corinthians The faith of Christ not written with inke but with the spirit of God nor graven in stony tables but in the fleshy ones of their hearts And in performance of this prophesy of Christs promise the history telleth us that on the tenth day after the ascension of Christ when all his disciples who were then all his Church and were to preach and deliver it to all the world were assembled together the holy Ghost was given them and that in so full a measure as they not onely were confirmed so perfectly in their faith as they never after admitted the least vacillation therein but they immediately casting away all other desires and thoughts were inflamed with admirable love of God and broke out into his prayses and into a vehement ardor of teaching and converting others and when by reason of that zeal of theirs any thing happened to them contrary to flesh and blood humane nature as persecutions ignominies corporall punishments and even death it selfe they not only shunned it as before but greedily rann to meet and imbrace it and joyed and gloryed in it all which were effects of the holy Ghost residing in them and filling their minds and governing their soules Where upon by the way we may note that in what Church soever we find not a state of

and he will nourish us Psal 54. And to the sense of the other which saith It is good for me to adhere to God Psal 74. And also of the other that telleth us how the Royall Prophet kept the Lord alwaies before his eyes Psal 15. And like the Soule in the Canticles that rejoyceth for having found him whom her soule loved Cant. 3. The end wherof will be that all goods will come along in company with that supreame good And this is that heavenly hidden treasure and that pearle of inestimable value which ought to be preferr'd before all other goods whatsoever and is to be sought with strength of Spirit and purchased with humble confidence with tranquillity of mind with carefull guard upon ones tongue with indefatigable endeavours and even with the losse of all outward conveniences and of ones very honour and reputation For otherwise what would it availe a religious man to gaine the whole world if at the same time he should suffer detriment in his soule or what profiteth him the state he hath engaged himselfe in the holinesse of his profession the habit of perfection that hee hath put on and the whole oeconomy of his outward conversation unlesse he bee enlivened with the Spirit of Humility and truth where Christ dwelleth by faith that is informed and quickned with charity To him that is in this condition it may be truely said the kingdome of God is within you which is our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ CHAP. III. In what the perfect conformity of man with God consisteth in this life IT is most certaine that by how much more a mans Soule is busied and sollicitous about inferiour and humane affaires by so much the further she is carried away from superiour and heavenly considerations in which consisteth the flower and vigour of devotion And by how much more intensely and fervently ones thoughts are recollected from remembring loving and considering of inferior objects and are fixed upon superior ones by so much their proper will bee the perfecter and their contemplation the purer For it is impossible that ones attention should at the same time be entirely and perfectly knit upon two distinct objects that are as farre distant from one another as light and darknesse are He that adhereth to God dwelleth in light but he that is glewed to the world is overwhelmed with darknesse And therfore the sublimer perfection of a man in this life is to be so united to God that his whole soule withall her powers and facultyes bee in such sort wound up and riveted in him and that he remember nothing but God and that all his affections being united in a joyfull exercise of love doe repose sweetly in the sole fruition of their Creator For the image of God expressed in the Soule consisteth in these three faculties of hers namely in the understanding the memory and the will And as long as they in any man are not entirely impressed with the stamp of God and the whole extent of them are not taken up with that his soule cannot bee said to bee Deiformed or perfectly resembling the divinity according to the state in which the first soule was created For God is the forme of the soule wherewith she ought to be impressed as waxe is with a seale and she ought to have such a relation to him as the coppy of a picture hath to its originall But this is never compleatly done but when ones reason and understanding is perfectly illuminated according to its capacity with the knowledge of God who is the supreme verity and his will is perfectly set on fire with the love of him who is the supreme good and his memory is totally absorbed in contemplating and rejoycing in his eternall happinesse and in reposing sweetly and delightfully in that thought Now seeing that the glory of heavenly blisse consisteth in the full possession of these three which will be compleated in the next life it is evident that a perfect beginning of them is the utmost perfection that our present life is capable of CHAP. IV. How our operations ought to be in the Intellectuall part of our Soule onely and not in our Senses HE therefore is happy who by continuall receiving and expunging of all species and Images from his fantasie and by reducing and turning his considerations inwards and there raising his Soule up to God groweth at length to that pass that he forgetteth all materiall imaginations and hath no other entertainment for his thoughts within him but to imploy them continually by pure and simple operations of understanding and love about the only pure and simple object elevated above all composition or materiality which is none other but God Be sure then that you banish out of your mind all imaginations pictures and formes of all things whatsoever that are not God to the end that your whole excercise and imployment within you be immediatly concerning God and be performed singly by your understanding and by your will and affections For the end of all spirituall exercises is the applying all ones thoughts to God the busying them singly about him the attending to him onely and the reposing entirely in him without any other sollicitude or occupation of the mind and this fingly in the intellectuall part of our soule by pure understanding and by vehement straine of love without any admixture of Corporeall imaginations And this exercise is of so refined and pure a nature that the fleshly organs of the body cannot reach unto it but it is performed by that part of us which maketh us to be men and reasonable creatures that is by our understanding and our will And therefore as long as a man entertaineth himselfe with his senses and with the picture and impressions that outward objects doe make in any of them and dwelleth upon them It may rightly be said of him that he hath not yet growne out the motions and limites of his brutall nature that is out of the low orbe in which he partaketh with brute beasts and is not above them For they have cognition and are wrought upon by such materiall and sensitive species and have not in them any spring of a higher straine Whereas man in regard of his reasonable soule that is endowed with the powers of understanding of loving and of the free will is created according to the image likenes of God and by them he ought to receive into his soule pure and immediate impressons from God himselfe and cleave firmly to him and become one with him And therefore the divell through his envy to mankind is most vigilant and active to hinder a man from that exercise as much as he can as being a kind of essay and beginning in this life of the eternall happinesse he shall injoy in the next And in pursuance of that designe he laboureth alwaies with his utmost power to draw our minds from almighty God sometimes by one temptation sometimes by another sometimes raising passions in