Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	flesh_n	law_n	life_n	8,185	5	5.2684	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A43254	A call to a general reformation of manners and manifesting in several particulars the great lets and hinderances thereunto / preached at the arch-deacon of Sudbury's visitation, holden at Kentford in Suffolk in April last, 1700, by Clement Heigham, Esq., now rector of Barrow in Suffolk.	Heigham, Clement, d. 1714.	1700 (1700)	Wing H1370A; ESTC R36595	13,878	32

Maintenance and made more secure against contempt 2. The Officers of Parishes must be such as fear God and that understand the weight of an Oath and the great consequences of discharging it 3. Family Religion must be kept up 4. Children and Servants must be well instructed 5. The Spiritual Courts must give their utmost assistance to the Ministry 6. A Religious Magistracy must give their helping hand to punish Vice and encourage Goodness And when all these shall mutually conspire to promote the great ends of Religion we may then hope for a new face of things we may then hope for a new Earth wherein dwelleth Righteousness we shall then behold the Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour exalted amongst us which is the hearty desire of all Good Men. I proceed now to my third an last point which is to shew That to lead good Lives our selves and to remove all those Lets and Hinderances which keep others from doing the same is the only way to bring Glory to God Honour and Reputation to our Holy Church and true Happiness and Safety to our Church and Nation 1. Then to promote universal Goodness by our living well and discouraging Vice brings Glory to God as it doth sensibly and experimentally commend the ways of God to a poor ignorant brutish World It lets the World see that the ways of Religion are ways of Pleasantness and all her Paths are Peace A good Christian Life as it gives inward joy to the Practiser so it sweetly insinuates a good liking into the Beholders it strangely attracts the Affections of others and by a secret invisible force it charms the Passions and delights the Beholders The glorious Attire of Christian Graces such as Meekness Humility and Modesty of Mind fervent Piety to God and as fervent Charity to Man undisguised Friendship Sincerity in all our Dealings evenness and equality of Mind in all conditions and estates of our Life Conquest over Passions Contempt of the World and Sollicitousness for nothing but to keep up and maintain a joyful Entercourse betwixt God and our Souls Such a Divine Temper as this doth strangely affect and attract and must insinuate a good relish into all Beholders and it is my firm belief that were Persons that are of a good Communion but more exact in their Lives to the Reformed Copy that is before them it would mightily supercede the necessity of much writing to justify and recommend our way of Worship for were Mens inward Corruptions more subdued by the force of that Religion which they profess we should find little to do but to love God and love one another and the sweet Relish which ever attends a conscientious well-spent Life would so confirm and settle good Christians in their way that they would never doubt or stagger and many other Beholders that are unsteddy and unresolved would be more easily drawn to join with that Communion of Christians where they see a Divine Presence and Force and so much Comfort as a good Life produceth than by all other Arguments in the World And this leads to a second Consideration to enforce good Christian Practice in our selves and to discourage Vice in others 2. For it shews our Principles to be sound and good and that we firmly assent to them as such It convinceth the World that our Doctrine and way of Worship is from God This Men will be apt to believe when they see the powerful and visible Influences of it in the change of mens Manners from bad to good This satisfies men beyond all other Arguments that there is a Divine Presence amongst us and that there is a special Assistance and Blessing concurring with the means of Grace that we make use of and it doth most plainly evince that God's Grace is not bestowed upon us in vain I would to God that this most excellent Argument for so the Primitive Christians accounted it were not so much lost as it is as to its due force upon Beholders by the bad Examples of too many Christian Professors Those first and best Christians could boast of the Truth the Goodness and Excellency of their Religion and Soundness of their Doctrine from the admirable Efficacy and Power it had upon the Hearts and Lives of those that recieved it All this is plain from some memorable Passages in Lactantius's 3d Book de falsa Sapientia and also in several places of Origen too long here to be recited But 3ly It brings Glory to God and great Good to others as it demonstrates our Religion to be a practicable thing and that the hardest Duties may be performed Arguments alone will hardly invite the generality of People to serious and strict Religion where good Examples are wanting yea Examples will persuade more effectually than all the best framed Arguments in the World for men love to see whether the Ways be passable or no before they adventure themselves especially where Flesh and Blood tells them there are some Difficulties to encounter some Rocks and Uneasinesses to climb over and that they may happen to meet with much ill usage too in their Journy to Heaven even from such as pretend to be Friends and Fellow-Travellers But when men shall see by the Courage and Victory and good Examples of others that commend these ways of Religion that the worst of Difficulties may be overcome and are so by the same Flesh and Blood with themselves this animates and enlivens their Spirits and takes off all Objections arising in their Minds from the difficulty of the Attempt 4. A good Life and discouraging of Vice brings Glory to God as it declares to the World that we stedfastly believe that without a regular Piety and strict Obedience to the Laws of Christ none shall be saved This will visibly discover to the World what our Belief is and what our Opinions are This will manifest that we entertain no corrupt and dangerous Principles and we our selves might appeal to this as a Test if our Lives were but regularly pious and uniformly good for a Heresy or dangerous Error in the Judgment will for the most part appear in the Practice of him that owns it And let me tell you it will not be easy to convince any one that our Judgments in matters of Religion are sound if our Morals are bad and of this I am sure that few will be convinced that we believe a good Life to be absolutely necessary to Salvation if we do not lead good Lives our selves and shew also by our zeal our dislike of Wickedness in others 5. and lastly A thorow Reformation of Manners brings Glory to God as it gives the Almighty a free occasion to manifest himself in that great Attribute he most delights in which is in shewing mercy to a sinful Nation and disposing all things for the Happiness and Safety of it God will never look favourably upon us until our crying Sins be removed and therefore if we do believe that there is a Divine governing Providence which

they do but blot and disgrace their Copy tho otherwise never so very beautiful and comely Wherefore then to excite you all to manifest the Goodness of your Faith and Doctrine by your exemplary Lives This I shall do in the following Method 1st I shall urge those Motives to Good Life which our Common Christianity affords us 2ly And that with respect to this solemn Occasion I shall point out those several Complaints that are made of some special Lets and Hinderances to an universal good Practice amongst us and I shall shew what those Lets and Hinderances are and what must be the Cure and Remedy 3ly I shall shew that to lead good Lives our selves and to remove all those Lets and Hinderances to others is the only way to bring Glory to god Honour and Reputation to our Holy Church with Safety and Prosperity to this Nation 1st Then for the Motives to Good Life which our Common Christianity affords us and to comprize them as short as I can You all know when you were Baptized what strict Obligations that laid upon you to live well and some of you know what farther additions you have voluntarily made by receiving Confirmation at the Bishop's hands and after that often receiving the Holy Communion And who could now think that any person having passed under all these means of Grace should yet be only a Christian in Title and Name Let me persuade all such Christians if there be any such here present that they live according to their Christian Profession For it is only so doing that can assure the sincerity of their Faith it is only so doing that must inspirit and enliven their hopes of another and better Life it is only so doing that can manifest their growth in Grace it is only so doing that can assure their Victory compleat and that the Seed of God abideth prevailingly in their Hearts It is only a holy and regular Practice that can discover the efficacy of all our means of Grace and that the end of Christ's Death is answered by us and this alone will convince Beholders that we are truly the Sons of God and shall be Members of the Church Triumphant in the next Life as we are living Members of Christ here It is this alone that must dispel all our Fears and Doubts when we come to die and a good Christian Practice will do it beyond the best Confessor in the World And besides all this a sincere good Christian Life will help you to find Truth and to keep close to it when you have it for indeed it is a love to Sin that makes men uncertain in a good Religion and 't is a godly Life that will prove the excellency of your Doctrine to others beyond all the best penn'd Discourses in the World for a good Life is an Argument to sense and convinceth the eye of the Beholder Man cannot see the Heart but we may read Men in their Lives We know the Tree is alive by the Fruit. Indeed there are many external Acts of Worship and Duty which a mere Hypocrite may perform with great applause but when there is a thorow Change wrought in our Manners from all that is bad to all that is good this is a visible demonstration that the Almighty Spirit of God hath been working in us and that we are become the Children of God When from an intemperate Life we are become strictly sober when from malicious haughty and fierce and uncharitable we are come meek and humble and merciful when from the love of the World we are become heavenly-minded when from impatience under Crosses and Troubles we are become resigned and submissive to the Will of God in all things and so from all Vices to the contrary Graces and Virtues this is a visible demonstration of a mighty Change wrought in us by the Power of God This is a plain discovery that the very Body of Sin grows weak and is destroyed by a Divine Omnipotent Power and that the Grace of God is strong and lively and prevails over all our Corruptions These are the Motives that might be enlarged upon to a Volume but I can only point at those Heads which I doubt not but you can usefully improve in your own private Thoughts and Meditations which God grant you all may I now proceed to the Second thing proposed which is to point out some special great Le ts and Hinderances to an universal Reformation of Manners amongst us And these I shall set forth by way of Complaints and they are such as do require redress and the first Complaint that I shall mention is 1. Against the Guides of our Church as if some of these Lights did not burn so clear in their Conversations as they ought to do So far as this may be true there ought to be speedy Remedies applied Nam quo magis quisque eminet eo gravius nocet malo exemplo si se perverse gerit Vult ergo Christus Apostolos eo majore studio intentos esse ad piè sanctéque vivendum quam quoslibet è vulgo obscuros homines quia omnium oculi in eos quasi in lucernas conjecti sunt nec ullo modo ferendos esse nisi vitae integritas doctrinae cujus sunt ministri respondeat No doubt Ministers ought rather to the more strict than other Men because the consequence thereof is greater for it the Shepherd wanders no doubt but the Sheep will go astray And besides all this Cum Pastorum vita merito despicitur eorum doctrina verba consequenter contemnentur He that leads and idle Life may preach with Truth and Reason as did the Pharisees but not as Christ or as one having Authority Thus speaks the excellent Bishop Taylor in his Rules and Advices to the Clergy But I come not here as an Informer against Men of the same sacred Character with my self and such as generally speaking are the greatest Supporters of Religion in this Kingdom I say the greatest Supporters of Religion in this Nation for with reverence be it spoken to a higher Order it is not a Triennial Light tho shining never so clear that will dispel our Darkness but it is these lesser Lamps always burning and shining in our Villages by holy Instructions and godly charitable Lives that must dispel our Fogs of Ignorance and practical Wickedness Second Complaint Is of the want of constant catechizing of Children and Servants or rather I think there is a great want of a useful and profitable way of instructing young people It is certainly a great mistake to think that merely the asking the Questions of the Church Catechism and receiving the Answers will ever make any great improvement no nor reading an Exposition upon some Article of Faith or other matters This will not do but it is applying our selves particularly to every particular catechized Person by practical Questions and receiving their Answers confirmed by them by Proofs of Scripture that must settle firm Grounds of Religion in