Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	law_n	life_n	sin_n	22,698	5	5.7840	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A41192	A view of an ecclesiastick in his socks & buskins, or, A just reprimand given to Mr. Alsop, for his foppish, pedantick, detractive and petulant way of writing	Ferguson, Robert, d. 1714.	1698 (1698)	Wing F764; ESTC R476	85,805	132

and adapted to do more hurt by the Temptations and Encouragements which it Administers to render people Prophane than on the supposition that the Writer were in the right in every thing that is Doctrinal all his Arguments can do good by the making and preserving men Orthodox Seeing such are the Frame and Complexion of the Minds and Spirits of the Generality that Practice and Example are more Observed and have a greater Influence upon them than bare Teaching and Instructions usually have In that there is no advantage thought to be gained by Hypocrisy in the former Whereas it may be Imagined Subservient in the latter to several peculiar Ends. And of all People Ministers of the Gospel are most liable to be Judged by that Criterion both in reference to the reality of their own Religion and as to the Opinion which they have of all Religion in general and to have it concluded from their Manners what their Inward Belief is Nor will they be held perswaded of the Being of a God or World to come the Tenor of whose Practice is such as if there were not Neither will the Preaching up of Sincerity Meekness and Charity be otherwise Esteemed than as Grimace and Pageantry while Falshood Malice Petulancy and Defamation are the whole of what is to be seen in the Morals of him that Preacheth Whence it is Both commonly and reasonably said that tho the Speculative Atheist be a Fool considering the many Convincing Means he is furnished with both within and without him in himself and whatsoever doth surround him to ascertain him of a Deity yet the Practical one is of the two pronounced to be the greatest Knave in that the latter dispiseth and affronts God while the former doth only deny him Nor can any thing be more fatally mischievous both to the Personal and Publick Ends of Religion than for those whose Office it is to inform the Minds and the Consciences and to govern the Lives of Men by the Truth and Principles of it to set them a Pattern in and by their own Practice importing that the whole which they deliver unto and press upon others they do themselves believe to be Fable and Romance But the damage of this kind done to Religion by Mr. Alsop's way of managing the Doctrinal Controversies of it being so obvious to all who will give themselves Liberty to think is therefore neither the only nor the principal Topick by and upon which I would reprimand him in reference to this matter That then wherewith I would charge and for which I would rebuke and chastise him is that in the whole Frame and Texture of his late Writings he must either thro' Malice directly design or thro Folly and Distraction occasion and promote Schism and Division among Dissenters and give Ground not only for alienation but for Bitterness of Spirit in one Party against the other The whole Tendency of what he hath published in the two Books which he hath lately emitted being not only to separate and divide the Dissenters into two distinct Parties which they already are but to Marshal and Rendevouze them into opposite Factions in order either to make both of them a Prey to such as may have a Mind to overthrow the Liberty which is at present granted and indulged them or at least to crush and subvert the Freedom of those among them that cannot come into the Terms of a Comprehension with the Dignitaries and Pastors of the Di●cesan and establish'd Form And if I durst define and conclude the Inclinations of the whole Presbyterian Body by the Overt-acts of Mr. Alsop and Mr. Williams I should be tempted to say that they of the Congregational Way were not only to have the Liberty vouchsafed them by Law withdrawn and the Act repealed but that they were to be made obnoxious to some new and penal Statute Seeing were they guilty of the Antinomian Notions they are charged with not only of Emasculating and Corrupting the whole Gospel and of turning it into a Lampoon upon the Righteousness Wisdom Holiness and Veracity of God but of perverting it into a Scandal and Reproach of our Redeemer thro' the Licentiousness which Antinomian Tenets give mental Biaz as well as Doctrinal Countenance unto they would be so far from deserving the Benefit of a Statute of Indulgence and Liberty that they ought to fall under the Severest Restraints of Law as those who Travestie the whole Christian Religion and pervert it into a Scheme that justifieth Immorality and Ungodliness For tho' I neither will nor dare pronounce of those who thro' Weakness of Thought Pre-possessions by Education or the Unhappiness of Acquaintance have imbib'd those Principles that they are practically wicked yet I will be bold to say that their Virtue and Piety are not so much to be resolv'd into the Light and Efficacy of their Principles as into the Mechanical Fabrick of their Bodies upon which both the Grave Reserv'd and Sober Temper of their Minds and the want of Incitement Food and Aliment to Scandalous Transgressions in their Lives do very much depend or rather into the Efficacious Renewing and Sanctifying Grace of God which to Souls that are sincere and upright in their Intentions tho' mistaken in their Opinions giveth a victorious Prevalency over the Errors of the Understanding as well as over the Lusts of the Heart the Law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus administring a Redemption in both from the Law of Sin and Death But it is the Happiness of you Reverend Pastors and Elders of the Congregational Way that you do not only at present live under a King who hath more Temper as well as Wisdom than to hearken to two very mean and indifferent Predicants and who upon all other Accounts save the overvaluing themselves are much less Men than they are Preachers that would upon the Ruins of the Reputation Learning and Piety of their Brethren advance themselves into two Dictatorial and Patriarchal Seats over the Body of Dissenters but that you are under the Care and Protection of a National Senate who upon preceding Specimens know by what Rules of Humanity Equity or Justice not to say of Christianity the Bigots of that Faction do govern themselves I do freely acknowledge that there is no Man of more Latitude as to Principles and Measures of Charity good Nature and Civil Manners than I desire to be yet I can no ways allow that Religion should be made a Cloak to cover Passions and Angry Resentments or turn'd into an Engine and Tool whereby to support carry on and justifie Passion and Revenge For when I judge of Persons and Things with the greatest Impartiality and Temperance I cannot but reckon that all the unjust Accusations and Calumnies which one Writer fastneth upon another must not only serve to afford Diversion and Sport to the Prophane and yield Matter of Contempt for all Religion to the Atheistical but that they will give Offence and Scandal not only to the Pious

of to such as view their Tombs and Reflect upon and Examine their Lives he hath without License or Authority carried them into his Anatomy-Office and hath there not only dissected them and defaced their shapes by Tearing them Limb from Limb and stript them of all that was Amiable and Odoriferous about them but hath wrapt them in Filth and Nastiness and then hung them up in Effigie Now it having been the Wisdom and Care of every Nation that hath been any ways Civilized to provide by Laws against all Injuries which the Brutal part of Mankind might perpetrate towards the Dead and it having pass'd into a Proverb universally received That we should tread softly upon their Graves yea it being the Interest of the Living through a Consulting what may be their own Case to Revenge the Wrongs done to the Memories of the Deceased I shall therefore take a little notice of this Inhumanity of Mr. Alsop towards Two lately departed Divines And but a little lest through Resentment of the Injury done to them I should be hurried into Excesses against Mr. Alsop which I would not willingly be Guilty of I Rejoyce saith he heartily that we have at length heard some Tydings of Faith and Repentance in order to our discharge from Punishment which were wholly lost in the Report so much do we owe to the Seasonable Deaths of Two Antinomians under whose Influence he then was and to the Lives of two Sound Divines under whose Awe he now is p. 143. of the Vindication of the Faithful Reb. In reference to which Passages I shall with all the Brevity I can observe Three Things First That the Expression of The Seasonable Deaths of Mr. Cole and Mr. Mather is Brutal and Barbarous as well as Immoral and Unchristian And that it argueth a strange Malignancy of Temper and a Secret Enmity against the Glory of God and the good of Souls to be thus in his Exaltations of Mirth for the Death of Two Faithful Labourers in the Work of the Lord and in the saving of Souls while all of true Piety or Good Judgment who knew them were afflictedly bewailing their Loss as a Wonderful Damage to the Church of God and which nothing could have brought them to a submissive and quiet Acquiescence in but the Consideration of the Will of the Great Sovereign who giveth no account of his matters besides his pleasure and a steddy Faith that there is with him the Residue of the Spirit whereby to qualifie others to replenish and fill their Posts And whosoever he be that doth thus Exalt and Triumph over the Deaths of Two Eminently Virtuous Pious and Useful Persons and that Envieth both us and them the Elegies which are made upon them I will presume to say of him That as he can never hope to dye the Death of the Righteous nor to deserve the Burial of a Man so all he can expect is to depart under the Infamy if he Escape the Horror of the Wicked and to have his Resemblance perpetuated by such an Epitaph as would be written upon a Tyger or a Bear The Second Thing which I would observe in reference to the foregoing Citation is his styling them Known Antinomians which is a Falshood that Thousands can controul and prove the Contradictory of For though upon more Experience of the Law of the Spirit of Life and greater inward Sensations of the Power of the Divine Life than God is pleased to Priviledge and Honour People of Mr. Alsop's Wanton Wit and Hanghty Petulant Humour with they might think some Terms which others stake themselves down unto to be too scanty narrow and flat by which to express their own Feelings and the Conceptions which they had thereupon yet they were as far from being Antinomians as they were from being either Socinians or Arminians Nor is it unworthy of Remark That men of the best Hearts and the Closest Communion with God have not usually the most distinct and perspicuous methods of clothing and delivering their Notions And the Reason is obvious in that while others form both their Divinity Schemes and Hunt for Language wherein to Array them from the Theologick Chairs and the Rhetorical Desks borrowing their Tenets from the Systematick Doctors and their Phrases from the Masters of Oratory the former do in Consistency with and in Subordination to Scriptural Revelation Form divers of their Theological Notions from and by their Internal Feelings And though they may thereupon sometimes differ from such as have only read and meditated but have never felt yet when they come to be ask'd and advised with concerning what they mean their Opinions are found in Effect to be the same with theirs who accuse and Reproach them only they have an Air and Meen of Spirituality which their Adversaries do deride through want of Enlightned Elevated and Qualified Faculties whereby to discern these Beauties Nor will I deny them to have been less fond of the Vnion than several of their Brethren were yet it was not from any Picque against Presbyterians in general and much less from an universal dislike of their Principles as if they were such as made them unmeet upon any Terms to be Cemented and Sodered with but it was out of a Jealousy that there were some among them of the Spirit of Diotrephes and of the Temper of Demas who would thro' the Union endeavour to usurp a Jurisdiction over all the Brethren and who would serve their own Ends and those of a Faction upon and by means of the Common Agreement And I do wish that their previous Apprehensions and Fears had not been both justified and confirmed by too many Overt-Acts and sensible Proofs since The Third Thing that I would Animadvert upon is Mr. Lobb's having been under the Awe of those Two Reverend Persons whereas I can boldly affirm That the contrary is fully known to all that are acquainted with him or who have had Experience of his Uprightness and Integrity For tho he be none of your huffing bouncing people yet he is of that Manly and Christian Fortitude as not to suffer his Understanding and Faith to be prescribed unto by any save by the Supreme Veracious Being But it is one of Mr. Alsop's Creeping and Sneaking Artifices to draw other Mens Pictures by his own Original and from his being a little pitiful Tool himself to conclude that others are also so And that because he is under the Government of no Principles unless of Pride Passion and Vanity c. to believe the same of those who have an Uprightness to let nothing sway them besides the Dictamina of Conscience founded upon and guided by Revelation and Reason And thus I have at last finished my Examen of Mr. Alsop's way of writing and though in some places it be done with some measure of Smartness through a concernedness for the Truths of God the Reputation of good men and for preserving the Churches from being infected with Errors and the being depraved by Vicious and