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	soul_n	7,525	5	4.8126	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29156	A sermon preached before the King & Queen, at White-Hall, the 23d day of October, 1692 by Nicholas Brady ...	Brady, Nicholas, 1659-1726.	1692 (1692)	Wing B4175; ESTC R19588	10,770	34

one of those great and formidable Enemies with which we are to wrestle in our Christian Warfare and so much the more dangerous because it endeavours to disguise its Enmity under a false pretence of Friendship it offers us indeed Riches and Honours Pleasure and Profit but all these guilded Baits have a fatal Hook beneath them Timeo Danaos dona ferentes The Gifts of an Enemy ought to be suspitious to us And if we know him to be such his Presents ought to be rejected thô truly valuable in themselves But if we consider farther that they are but Bells and Baubles Trifles fit only to please Fools and Children with which it would bribe us to our own Destruction it should raise a just Anger and Indignation in us against one that hopes so meanly to impose upon us yet such at best they will appear to any serious Considerer especially if compared to these inestimable Advantages which they are designed to deprive us of Let us consider also in relation to this World that we made a solemn Vow and Protestation in our Baptism to enter into a State of Hostility against it and therefore every degree of intimacy and familiarity with it is a downright Perjury and Breach of Covenant our Baptismal Vow was that Military Sacrament by which we listed ourselves under Christ's Banner and it is the meanest Baseness and Treachery imaginable to profess ourselves his Followers and Souldiers and contract at the same time a League of Friendship with his avowed and profest Enemy This Consideration therefore of the meanness of those Things which the World can offer to seduce us of the evil Intentions wherewith they are presented and the strong Obligation which lies upon us to entertain no sort of Commerce with it is a forcible means to secure us from being misled by it and from losing our own Souls for the gaining of this World But 2dly Let us endeavour to understand truly the considerable Value of our own Souls which he that does will never barter them for all that the World can proffer in exchange Nor can we better imprint in our Minds the vast worth of them than by considering how great a Price the Son of God was contented to pay in order to rescue them from Ruine and Perdition God who made them best knew their value and when they were forfeited to his offended Justice he would accept no less a Compensation than the Blood of his only his beloved Son each drop of which would out-buy Ten thousand Worlds And shall that seem trivial or contemptible in our eyes which was so very precious in the sight of God Shall that be looked upon as a thing of little moment which cost the Son of God so very dear Would not any Man blush to call himself a Christian and yet sell his Saviour's Blood for to gain the whole World And why do we then so lightly part with that which he looked upon as equivalent to it But farther can any thing be baser than to rob our Benefactor and drive Bargains with that which is not properly our own Our Souls are not so much ours as Christ's he has bought them with a Price and we rob him of his Due when we pretend to the Right of disposing of them If we have a mind to traffick with them elsewhere let us first repay what Christ has lent upon them which since it is impossible for us ever to do it is as well a piece of injustice as imprudence to endeavour to alienate them from his possession But if we reflect upon our own proper Interest it will loudly disswade us from such a proceeding our Souls are they by and in which we must to all Eternity be happy or miserable they are capable of the greatest height of Joy and Blessedness or the lowest depth of Grief and Misery nor is there any Condition whereof they partake but what will be common to us with them it therefore highly stands us upon to consult the Everlasting Advantage of so Noble a Being and with which we are so intimately united The Things of this World may perhaps minister some short-liv'd Satisfaction but we must consult an Interest that is Eternal and since this World is finite and all the Enjoyments of it we can never provide sufficiently for an Immortal Soul by the purchase of such Joys as are transitory and fading This reflection therefore of the valuableness of our Souls both upon the account of the mighty Price paid for them and their Capacity of tasting everlasting Entertainments should teach us to esteem them according to their deserts and should hinder us from losing them to gain the whole World But 3dly In order to this end Let us mortifie our members which are upon the earth fornication uncleanness and such-like for there is so firm a League and such a friendly Commerce and Correspondence between the World and the Flesh that it will be impossible to secure our selves from the Attempts of the one unless we subdue and keep under the other and these fleshly Allurements are so much the more dangerous because they endeavour to betray us within as fast as the World assaults us from without but if these are once conquered and made obedient to the Spirit we are then secure not only against them but against the World too For by what means can that pretend to assault or to allure us when all the Senses by which only it is able to attempt upon the Soul are enter'd into the Service or bound under the Dominion of that which it would offer to seduce by them How shall it be able to bribe the Soul or tempt it to give up itself in exchange for Trifles when those Eyes which were used to behold its Vanities and to convey the flattering Image of them to the Mind are now drowned in Penitential Tears When those Ears that were used to listen to the Syren's Voice are as deaf to his Call as the Adder to the Charms of the Charmer When all its Friends Auxiliaries and Abetters are rendred uncapable to give it any assistance If the Flesh be not able to joyn Forces with it the World can have but little power over us and by compleating a Conquest over that we put our selves out of all manner of danger of losing our own souls to gain the whole world But 4thly Let us have our Conversation above and fix our Thoughts upon Heavenly Things let our Souls mount thither upon the Wings of Prayer and Contemplation and the Things of this World will then appear to us so little and inconsiderable will shrink so duly to their narrow Dimensions that we shall easily keep our selves from driving such bad Bargains we shall then look down with Scorn and Contempt upon all that this little Speck of Earth can offer to seduce us we shall there discover such precious Advantages to which the Devil's Offer to our Saviour vast as it appears All these things will I give unto thee will seem infinitely mean and disproportionable we shall then look upon our selves as already naturalized into the heavenly Canaan and made free Denizens of the New Jerusalem and shall consequently endeavour to conform all our Actions to the Customs and Constitutions of that our Country all the Wiles of Satan will then be lost upon us all the Temptations of the World will be insignificant and all the Allurements of Flesh as little powerful as if we were already got out of the Body If we thus endeavour to seek those things which are above we shall most assuredly find them and having once found them we shall never consent to part with them we shall then live in this World as if we were not of it and thus utterly estranging ourselves from any Commerce with it we shall run no hazard of losing our own souls to gain the whole world But 5thly and Lastly Let us always reflect and continually be meditating upon the miserable Consequences of having lost our Souls whatsoever Exchange we may be offered for them Let us ask our selves Whether we can endure to dwell with everlasting burnings Whether we are able to support such Torments as are infinite in degree as well as in continuance Whether Eternal Damnation be a thing to be trifled with Or Whether Threescore Years of Luxury and Intemperance are not too dearly paid for by an Eternity of Misery How sad will the Condition of that Man be whose worldly Jollity is passed away as a Dream or a Shadow and has left nothing behind it but its dismal Consequences and those to remain to all Eternity How soon will the Sence of everlasting Misery extinguish the remembrance of those momentary Enjoyments And how little inviting would their Allurements be even now if we would propose to our Consideration the Afflictions that attend them Let us then in the Name of God consider seriously the great Value of our Souls the just Interest that Christ has in them who has bought them with a Price and such a one as shews how very precious they are in his eyes let us give them up entirely into his possession and resign them into his hands as into those of a faithful Creator then will they be out of the reach of the World and no longer liable to the danger of such pernicious Exchanges let us look upon the World with an Eye of Contempt as knowing that the Lot is fallen to us in a fairer ground and that we have a more goodly heritage thus shall we come to prize it at no more than it is and that is but Vanity and vexation of spirit and having possessed our souls in patience without exchanging them for Dross and Corruption we shall give them up pure and undefiled into the Arms of our Redeemer and commit the keeping of our Souls to him To whom with the Father and the Holy Spirit be ascribed all Honour Power and Dominion henceforth and forevermore Amen LAVS DEO

the deplorable Condition of him who has lost his Soul in relation to the Advantages of which he is deprived Man was designed for everlasting Happiness to supply the room of the rebellious Angels for the Conversation of the blessed Spirits and for an intimate Fruition of God himself but he who is so unhappy as to lose his Soul has with it lost all other Advantages he has lost the Favour and Protection of his God the Quiet of his Mind and the Peace of his Conscience the Hopes of Happiness and the joyful Assurance of a blessed Immortality he has lost the Presence of God in which is fulness of joy and a Place on his Right hand where pleasures are for evermore the Fellowship of Angels and the comfortable Society of Just Men made perfect he has lost ineffable Delights and unutterable Ravishments of the Soul such Joys as Sense cannot relish nor Imagination figure in a word he has lost God who is all in all and having lost Him has lost all Things with Him And what now can the flattering World pretend to give him that shall bear any proportion to the Advantages he is deprived of How dearly does the Drunkard pay for his intemperate Draughts that must forgo for them the Waters of the River of Life How dearly does the Miser buy his perishing Wealth who must thereby forfeit a Treasure in heaven where neither rust nor moth doth corrupt and where thieves do not break thorough nor steal How dearly does the ambitious Man purchase an earthly Preferment who must thereby lose a Place upon upon the Right hand of the Almighty How dearly does the licentious Wanton pay for his carnal Pleasures who must thereby be excluded from the Society of those Virgins which follow the Lamb whithersoever he goes How dearly will his Oaths and Blasphemies cost the prophane Person who is thereby made incapable of bearing any part in heavenly Hymns and Hallelujahs In a word How hardly shall they fare for their wretched Carelesness who had no fear of God before their eyes when they shall thereby be shut out from the Divine Presence and be utterly included from the Beatifick Vision All the Things of this World are but transient and deceitful and the Advantages which they deprive us of are substantial and immortal and therefore these light satisfactions which are but for a moment can make no tolerable compensation for the loss of an eternal weight of glory 2dly Let us consider the deplorable Condition of him who has lost his Soul in respect of the Miseries to which he is exposed It were happy for those miserable Wretches who have reduced themselves to this sad Condition if they were only to be deprived of the foregoing Advantages and that their Sufferings were to be barely negative the not enjoying of Bliss and Happiness but alas the Soul is an eternal Being and if it is not qualified for a blessed Immortality it is unavoidably liable to a miserable Eternity And who is able to express or conceive the Anguish and Horrour which shall then possess and environ it Vtter darkness the never-dying worm and fire unquenchable do but faintly shadow forth the unexpressible Torments of that dismal State to have the wicked Spirits continually torturing and insulting the Conscience and Fellow-Sinners perpetually upbraiding the Rivers of Brimstone eternally surrounding and the Breath of an incensed God still fanning of the Flames to be always racked with Envy and with Anger with Malice and Dispair to hate their own selves with a perfect hatred and not to have the meanest satisfaction which self-love inspires to be their own cruel Tormenters and to have a Sting within them more sharp and pungent than all outward Inflictions however insupportable to be the Objects of Divine Vengeance without any interposition of Mercy and Compassion and to bear all that infinite Power and Justice can inflict to find a Destroyer and Confounder instead of a Creator and Preserver a Judge and an Avenger instead of a Saviour and Redeemer an Impeacher and Accuser instead of a Comforter and a Sanctifier to be always dying and yet never dead to be constantly in the Pangs and Agonies of Death and yet never to come to a total dissolution in a word to be destitute of Hope that only Succour of the Miserable and to have no prospect of an end either of themselves or of their Miseries O consider this all ye that forget God lest he snatch you away and there be none to deliver you And what now can the World be able to produce that may any way countervail such intolerable Extremities Will the bare remembrance of those loose Pleasures which they formerly took in their carnal Enjoyments mitigate those Pains which are sensible and present Will it not rather give fresh Fuel to their Flames and add a Lash of Consciscience to their other Torments Will all the Wealth which they have left behind them purchase one drop of water to cool their Tongues or bribe the Divine Vengeance to suspend its Inflictions Would they not then give Ten thousand Worlds if they had them to redeem that Soul which before they squander'd away for a small portion of one How will they then curse their Carelesness and Incogitancy which for the sake of such Pleasures as were trivial and momentary has betray'd them into Torments endless and insupportable Can the World deliver them out of those Miseries into which it has cast them or snatch them out of the hand of an offended God Can it extinguish these everlasting Burnings or break the Bars of their eternal Prison If it cannot it is the greatest folly and madness imaginable to expose ourselves to such miserable Circumstances for the sake of that which can neither release us from them nor give us any support and comfort under them Since therefore the Advantages are so great of which they are deprived and the Miseries so intolerable to which they are exposed and since nothing in this World can in the least measure equal those Advantages or countervail those Miseries we may justly joyn with our Saviour in this his passionate expostulation What is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul Thus have I endeavoured to convince you how truly valuable your immortal Souls are and how little the Pomps and Vanities of this World are able to stand in competition with them give me leave now by way of application to lay down some such Rules and Methods as may hinder us from losing our souls for the gaining of this world and so I shall conclude I. Then in order to this Great End let us endeavour to have a true Notion of this World which he that has will never care how little he converses with it or how small an Interest he gets in it We foolishly mistake it for our familiar Friend and think ourselves to be a piece of it but this is a wrong Notion and must be rooted out the World is