Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	person_n	young_a	youth_n	72	3	7.9060	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A70554	Early piety, exemplified in the life and death of Mr. Nathanael Mather, who ... changed earth for heaven, Oct. 17. 1688 whereto are added some discourses on the true nature, the great reward, and the best season of such a walk with God as he left a pattern of.	Mather, Cotton, 1663-1728.; Mather, Samuel, 1651-1728.	1689 (1689)	Wing M1097A; ESTC R20873	63,808	161

Heb. 10. 31. It is a fearful thing to fall into the Hands of the living God. What what shall now be done by us in short let us be Walking with God and we shall be taken by God. Say now every Soul as in Mic. 4. 5. We will walk in the Name of our God for ever and ever Elijah was taken as he was walking Let us Walk thus and God will take us Be sure God will take us if we take Him. Let us take him as our Lord take him as our End take him as our exceeding great Reward Thus take Him in our Walk and He will take us from our Walk to our Crown VSE II. Consolation Let it be our Joy that when we are not we shall be taken by the Lord. Behold a Cordial here against three sorts of Exercises First Against all the Troubles of this Life We are apt to be discouraged at the Difficulties of this Evil World But the Voice of our God unto us is that in Luke 21. 28. Lift up your Heads for your Redemption draweth nigh E're long you shall not be and then your Afflictions too they shall not be God will take you from them all And what says Paul's Calculation in Rom. 8. 18. For I reckon he speaks like an Arithmetician or an Accomptant that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the Glory which shall be Revealed When two English Protestants one that was Blind another that was Lame were leading to be Burned they so cheared one another Well fare we we shall need our Crutches and our Guides no more after this Thus let us in all our Trials think When I am beyond the Stars I never shall be under the Clouds any more Have you any Sorrows hard to bear Are you afflicted in your Friends Hast thou like David a Son that makes thee say My life is spent with Grief Hast thou like Jephtah a Daughter that makes thee say Alas thou hast brought me very low thou art one of them that trouble me Hast thou Job's or Abigail's Yoke upon thee O think I shall shortly be gone from the Light and Sense of such things as these Are you afflicted in your Names Are you like Elijah counted a Troubler of Israel or like Jeremiah a Man of Contention or like Paul a Pestilent Fellow and a mover of Sedition O think I shall meet with none of these Reproaches where I am going Are you afflicted in your Bodies or your Estates Are you like Timothy cruciated with often Infirmities Or like Naomi going out full and coming home empty of Temporal Goods O think I shall quickly be where a Spital or an Alms-house tbere never was any occasion for Are there any snares that you are too often trepan'd into O think of the Time when all this Earth shall be to you as an Invisible point think The Dy'd and see how they Covenanted and Walked and Lived with the Lord. Methinks these do now call unto us as in Luk. 23. 28. Weep not for me but weep for your selves Does Jacob say Joseph is not Does Rachel say My Children are not Why has God taken them they belo●●ed unto Him. 'T is said in Joh. 11. 〈◊〉 Jesus wept over Lazarus One of the Ancients affirms it was not because he was Dead but because he was about to be made Alive again I do not justifie the Gloss but I am sure our departed Ones as it were call unto us from the lofty Battlements of Heaven We would not be with you again for all the World. Let us then rise and wash and change our Apparel and say I will go to them they shall not return unto me THE DUTY AND INTEREST OF YOUTH OR The Thought of an Elder on the Death of a Younger Brother Uttered Octob. 28. 1688. Eccl. XII 1. Remember Now thy Creator in the dayes of thy Youth THE great Emperor Augustus making an Oration to his mutinous Army began it with that surprizing Expression Audite senem Juvenes quem Juvenem senes audierunt when I was a young Man old Men counted me worthy to speak unto them now I am an old Man methinks young Men should not refuse to mind what I say Truly such might the Speech of our Solomon be by way of Preface to the Text now read unto us surely this old Preacher deserves the attention of every young Person among us all It is a Passage uttered by this matchless and inspired Prince in Prov. 22. 20. Have not I written to thee excellent things It is by some rendred so Have not I three times written for thee He hath indeed so we have three Books composed by that Royal and Renowned Pen one of which wears the Title of Ecclesiastes because that such was the Author of it We are told of some in 2 Chron. 11. 17. They walked in the way of David and of Solomon What way is that It was the way of David that he sinn'd he fell he dishonoured God exceedingly but he soon Repented and recovered and then by writing the fifty first Psalm he gave an Evidence of his doing so This was the way of Solomon too he departed from God with a wonderful Apostacy but being reclaimed and reduced from his Wanderings he now Publishes a Testimony of it unto all the World. This Book is a sacred and solemn Treatise concerning the chief good of Man It contains the Holy and Humble Retractations of a famous Monarch who had sought where he could not find the satisfaction of an Immortal Soul he had got up to the top of all sublunary Felicity and from thence beholding poor Men toil and sweat unreasonably to get up the rocky ragged Hill after him with a loud Voice he now calls unto them all You are mistaken there is nothing but Vanity and Vexation here Upon this the wise Man assures us all That in the Acquaintance and the Enjoyment of God alone is all our Happiness and in the inculcation of it Young Men are particularly apply'd unto We have a Dehortation given to them in the conclusion of the former Chapter and an Exhortation in the beginning of this In the former is a sharp Sarcasm but a grave Counsel in the latter Two things make up the Exhortation First A Duty enjoyned Remember thy Creator in the Hebrew 't is Thy Creators which notes a plurality of Persons in the adorable Godhead Secondly A Season advised In the dayes of thy Youth It intimates not that Persons past their Youth are exempted from this Command but that Persons in their Youth are peculiarly engaged herein wherefore the Doctrine before us is Doctrine It is the Duty of All Men and peculiarly of Young Men to Remember their Creator so as to acknowledge Him. Prop. I. The Blessed God who is Father and Son and Spirit is the Creator of Men Unto Man about God it may be said He is thy Creators Indeed in God there are more Persons than one In the New Testament that Mystery of a

O my God my Soul is cast down within me therefore will I remember thee Are there Distresses on us that cause Dejections in us We should then Remember that God who can do what he will then Remember that God who has bid us hope in him And when we Remember him we should still joyfully say My help is in the Name of the Lord. Finally Such a Remembrance of God as will procure an Interest in God such a Remembrance of God as will maintain a Communion with God This is the Remembrance that we are to endeavour for Prop. III. To Remember their Creator is a thing that Young Men are very particularly oblig'd unto Indeed Young Men are apt to reckon this the most improper and unpleasant Address that can be made unto them Do thou Remember thy Creator They judge it fitter only for elder Men to hear of such a serious thing But the Voice of God is even to Thee and Thee O Young Man Do thou Remember me There are two Arguments here set before us evincing this to be a most reasonable thing Argument 1. 'T is thy Creator certainly The Young Man be he never so young has cause to Remember him It was but a rational Proposal in Psal 95. 6. O come let us worship and bow down let us kneel before the Lord our Maker If God be thy Maker it becomes thee to be his Servant Thou art wholly beholden to God for all the Powers of thy Spirit for all the Members of thy Body Whom shouldest thou then first use them for but the Lord alone It was a sharp Rebuke to Belshazzar in Dan. 5. 22. The God in whose hands thy breath is him thou hast not glorified Even so thy Breath and Being is from the Lord and shall it be said of thee Him thou hast not Remembred this were a very vile thing indeed It is a similitude used if I mistake not by some of the Ancients If any Man could be so ingenious as to make an Engine able to think or speak he might justly expect the first work of that Engine should be to acknowledge the maker of it Thus Young Man it was but lately that thou camost out of the Hands of God the first rational Action of such an one surely should be a Religious Action It cannot be too soon for thee to Remember him in whom thy living and thy moving and thy very being is Argument 2. The Evil Dayes are coming of which thou shalt say I have no pleasure in them Old-Age is not a Time for the Service of God to be begun in or to be delayed unto Youth Youth is the only Time. First Old-Age is not a proper Time for us to defer the Remembring of God unto It is an unworthy thing to deal with the God of Heaven so It is an absurd as well as a wicked thing The Lord complained of this in Mal. 1. 13. Ye brought that which was torn and the lame and the sick thus ye brought an Offering should I accept this of your hands saith the Lord In like sort Young Man is it suitable that the Devil should have the Prime of thy Strength And that God should be put off with a few lame and sick Devotions after all Is it suitable that thou should'st wast all thy very Marrow and Spirit upon thy cursed Idols but bring unto God a few Torn crazy Howlings at the last Should I accept this of your hands saith the Lord There is a Story of one who did attempt to Repent in Old-Age after a Dissolute and ungodly Youth but heard such a Voice from Heaven as that Des illi Furfurem cui dedisti Farinam The Devil had thy Flower and dost thou think to bring thy Bran to me In thy Youth wilt thou continue a Traitor and a Rebel against the God of Heaven And wilt thou imagine to be received and protected by him in the Age when perhaps thou hast none else to go unto When thou art scarce able to sin at thy usual rate shall that be the only Time for thee to leave it off Hear O Heavens and give ear O Earth was there ever any thing so Disingenious Secondly Old-Age is not an easie Time for us to defer the Remembring of God unto Young Man wilt thou not look unto the Lord that thou may'st be saved Until thine Eyes are almost out Until those that look out of the Windows be darkned Wilt thou not lay hold on Eternal Life until thy Hands are shaking with a Palsie until the Keepers of the House do tremble Wilt thou not Run the Race that is set before thee until thy Feet call for a Staff until the strong men do bow themselves Alas these things will not be easie then Know that thy Sin will then be stronger If it be hard for thee to part with a Lust now what will it be then An old Tree and an old Lust are not easily pulled up by the Roots It is said in Jer. 13. 23. Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the Leopard his spots then may you also do good that are accustomed to do evil An old Custom and an old Disease are not easily cured We read of a Devil dispossessed with a wonderful Difficulty in Mark 9. 25 26. The Spirit cry'd and rent him sore and he was as one Dead What was the cause of those terrible convulsions We are told the foul Spirit had been in that Person of a Child An unclean Spirit a drunken Spirit a profane Spirit that has dwelt in a Man from his Childhood unto Old-Age O 't is not easily driven away It is said in Heb. 3. 12. Exhort one another to day lest any of you be hardned through the deceitfulness of sin Deceitful Sin tells the Young Man To morrow to morrow will be soon enough to leave thy evil wayes But the Heart grows harder and harder still To morrow than it was to day Know likewise that thy strength will then be smaller The Philosopher truly called Old-Age the Winter of life We commonly say of Old-Age It is it self a Disease and attended with a thousand more Then it is that Pallor in Ore sedet Macies in Corpore toto A pale a lean and a feeble State of Body comes upon us and then also the Mind grows more heavy and listless It is as much as the Old Man can well do to encounter the manifold Infirmities of his Age And wilt thou never obey the Lord until thou canst not enjoy thy self When David said unto Old Barzillai Come thou over with me The Old Man answering in 2 Sam. 19. 34. How long have I to live can I discern between good and evil Can I taste what I eat or drink No let Chimham go Thus our David our Jesus when he says to an Old Man Come over to me the reply may be Alas I have but a little while to live the Force of all my senses is abated let the Young man go over to the Lord. Thirdly Old-Age is no

safe Time for us to adjourn our Piety unto The Young Man allots upon Old-Age as that which he may very seasonably grow sober in But Young Man what if thou should'st never arrive to Old-Age at all That is the Hap of multitudes multitudes every day The Sons of Job were all of them Young Men but they died suddenly seven of them at once We have that Warning often repeated unto us in Job 21. 23. One dyeth in his full strength Young Persons of both Sexes are liable to the Stroke of Death We read in Luke about the Funeral of a Young Man the Son of a Widdow We read in the same Evangelist about a young Woman which lay a dying when she was but about Twelve years of Age. The Arrest of Death likewise falls upon young Persons of all Estates The Son of Jeroboam was a Gracious Youth but he dyes The Sons of Eli were Vicious Youths and they dye too So does the young man Absalom after his Brother Amnon As young as thou art and as lively and as lusty too 't is possible thou may'st like Eutichus fall down dead before the Congregation be dismissed Hast thou a lewd Dream of an Old-Age to reserve all Virtue for Alas there are more die before Twenty than after Sixty Years of Age. A Child once being observed to become a very prayerful and pensive Child gave that Account of it I was in the Burying-place t'other day and there I saw a Grave shorter than my self Let the youngest of us all go to such a place and see whether there be not Graves of our Dimensions there And what if now thy Death find thee before thy Peace be made with God What if thy Death find thee a poor Unconverted Unregenerate Creature before the Lord It may be written on thy doleful Grave It had been good for that Person that he had never been Born. Infinitely more than a thousand Ages of Woes and Plagues must be the Portion of such a miserable Soul. Fourthly The young Man has many Conveniencies to excite and assist his Remembrance of the Lord. There seems to be a sort of Correspondence between Youth and Grace Youth seems mightily adapted and agreeable to the Exercise of that lovely thing A quick Wit is one Prerogative of the young Man Well how can he lay it out better than by doing like that young Man in Psal 119. 9. Taking heed unto the Word of God The Young man has a Tenacious Memory What can he do better with it than fill it with Divine Treasures Warm Affections are stirring in the young man where should he set them but upon the things which are above The Spirits of young men are mettlesome why should they not be fervent serving the Lord The Bodies of young men are vigorous why should they not be a living Sacrifice unto God There is a brave Courage in Youth how can it better show it self than by overcoming the Wicked One Youth is a merry Age let it then rejoyce in the Lord. O nothing is more comely or natural than that young Men should remember God. Prop. IV. All the three Persons in God are to be distinctly considered by us when we remember him Not only our Creator but also our Creators is to be remembred First We are to remember God the Father Him we are to remember under that consideration in Eph. 1. 3. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Remember Him as the Fountain from whence all does proceed and to which all must Return Remember Him as the first cause and so the last end of all things Remember Him as the Father of thy Lord and go to Him for a Fathers Blessing in His Name O remember Him and let the outery of thy Soul be Let this Father be my Father for evermore Secondly We are to remember God the Son Him we are to remember under that Consideration in Act. 5. 31. A Prince and a Saviour to give Repentance unto Israel and Remission of sins Remember Him as the Saviour in whom all fulness dwells Remember Him as the Jesus who delivers from Wrath to come Remember Him as a Redeemer able to save unto the uttermost and go to Him for that Salvation entreat Him to be thy Prophet and thy Priest and thy King for ever Thirdly We are to Remember God the Spirit Him we are to Remember under that Consideration in Psal 143. 10. The good Spirit that leads into the land of Vprightness Remember Him as the Quickner of them that were dead in Trespnsses and Sins Remember Him as the Comforter of all that mourn Remember Him as the Inhabitant of the Contrite and the Humble Heart and seek to be led by Him World without end Thus are we to Remember our Creator in the dayes of our Youth VSE I. Let them that have not Remembred their Creator in the days of their Youth now in the days of their Age be ashamed of it and afflicted for it There are two sorts of Aged People to be now treated with There are some that are Converted unto God but late They squandered away most of all their Youth before they turned their feet unto the Testimonies of the Lord. It becomes these Persons now as they Remember their God so likewise to Remember their Sin You make that your daily Prayer in Psal 25. 7. Remember not against me the sins of my youth Be assured that God's dealing with you will in many regards be quite contrary to your dealing with your Sins If you love them he will hate you If you slay them he will save you If you would have God not Remember them O then do you remember them your selves 'T is said in 1 Cor. 11. 3. If we would judge our selves we should not be judged of the Lord. Well then every one of you like Pharaoh's Butler now say I remember my faults this day O Remember all the lying all the idleness all the profuseness and profaneness of thy Youth When Paul was a young Man he had an hand in Abusing and Murdering an Eminent Minister of God but he Remembred it with sorrow all his dayes O! said he many Years after When the Blood of Stephen was shed I was consenting to it Come now and sit down in the Dust this day before the Lord come and lament it and bewail it that you so long lay out from God and that you so long did the things for which the Wrath of God comes upon the Children of Disobedience Be able to say My Soul has this in remembrance and is humbled in me But perhaps there are some of you that never yet were Converted unto God at all As they said in Jer. 8. 20. The Harvest is past the Summer is ended and we are not saved thus may too many confess Our youth is past and we are not Renewed Surely 't is Time 't is high Time for you to Remember your God yet at last before you go hence and be no more Let this encourage you That

God will take us where they shall be our intimate Companions We shall move and live among those morning Stars The First-born they are our Familiars here we covet their being so notwithstanding all the Folly and Error and Ill humour that is often in them God will take us vvhere we shall associate our selves with all that ever feared God and not one breach of Charity shall ever disturb our Conversation there Fourthly The State which God will take the Believers into the Comforts of will be an Eternal State. God will take us to an House but what a one We read in 2 Cor. 5. 1. It will be an eternal House God will take us to a Glory But of what sort is it We read in 1 Pet. 5. 10. It is an eternal glory God will take us to an Inheritance But how long shall it last We read in Heb. 9. 15. It is an Eternal Inheritance Truly it is a Life Eternal which our God will take us to We shall be in it as many Millions of Ages as there are Drops in the Ocean or Atoms in the Universe yet Believer thou shalt say My Heaven will infinitely outlast as many Ages more Prop. III. There is a variety of Dispensation used by God in his thus taking of them that Walk with him The Lords taking of Men is in general by his changing of them it is by making that they shall not be Not an Annihilation but a vast Alteration happens to Believers when it shall be said of them They are not And then they are taken by the Lord And in particular it is managed three such ways as these First It is by Dying when we Dye then we are not The Dying Man may say as in Psal 39. 13. I go hence I am no more The Dead Man is not a Man in such a place he is not a Man of such a Thought he is not acting upon such Objects as he was before When a Man is ready to Dye we perceive it by Changing as we call it of the Man much more when a Man is dead he is a changed Man. Then it is that we are taken by the Lord Thus it is said in Isa 57. 1. The Righteous is taken away The Spirit is then taken to all the Delights and Pleasures that a separate Soul can feed upon Secondly It is by Rising When vve Rise at the last day then vve are not vve are not such feeble vvretched things as we are this day The Resurrection will bring a marvellous Change on the Subjects of it It is the Speech of Job in Ch. 14. 14. If a man dye shall he live again He seems to refute vvhat he did recite just before as the Opinion of too many Men and say now Yes that he shall find And hence it is added I will wait all the Dayes of my appointed time until my Change come What Change is that I will not exclude or oppose the common sense of it yet I would humbly suggest vvhy may it not be the Change which the next Words referr unto Thou shalt call and I will answer thee thou wilt have a desire to the work of thine Hands At the Resurrection it will be so God will then have a Desire to see our once Curious but novv Rotten Body set in order again he shall then call Arise ye Dead where are you Arise And we shall start out of the Dust as it were ansvvering Lord I come This the Departed Soul is to keep waiting for It seems more than a Moment it may seem a long while to the Soul 'till this be accomplished Then it is also that we are taken by the Lord with some respect unto this our Lord said unto his Disciples in Joh. 14. 3. I will come again and take you unto my self The Body is then also taken to be an Incorruptible a Spiritual and a Powerful Instrument of the Soul in all the motions of it Thirdly There is another Taking that some have Experience of and that is by Translation There are some Persons in whom the Vnion between their spirits and their bodies never is dissolved by the Ministry of Angels they are both in spirit and in body too made capable of a present entrance into the Kingdom of God and so those vvinged Messengers of Heaven carry them avvay vvithout any more ado This vvas the Prerogative of Enoch before the Law and of Elijah under it I believe this would have been the Case of all Men if Adam had not sinned vvhen he did and there are many thousands of Pious People vvith vvhom it will yet be so At the second Coming of our Lord there will be multitudes of Christians in the World vvhat vvill become of them vvhen the Fire of God shall be flaming and raging as far as Noah's Flood did extend of old How shall they get out of the vvay of that horrible Fire that shall consume and carry all before be Hear Davids Answer to that Question in 1 Chron. 28. 15. Our days on Earth are as a Shadow and there is none abiding Let James answer it in Jam. 4. 14. What is your Life it is even a Vapour that appeareth for a little time and vanishes away Let Jo● answer it in Job 9. 25. My dayes are swifter than a Post they are passed away as the swift Ships as an Eagle that hastens to the Prey Our Age is now contracted into Seventy Years and how few reach to Seventy in comparison of them that never see Twenty of them Besides a big part of our few dayes are already past and gone with many of us How many may sadly sit and sigh and say this day I have been here but a little while yet I cannot now be so long more as I have already been Consider 2. If God then take us not who will I have read of a profane Monster who on one side of his Sword had the Picture of Christ on the other side the Picture of the Devil with this Motto under it Si tu non vis iste rogitat If He won't Take me here 's One that will. Horrid Creature But that Frenzy is almost equalled among us by those that wish the Devil to take them every day Alas that that will be the horrible Destruction of them that shall not be taken by the Lord. It is a fearful Curse upon the wicked Man in Psal 109. 6. Let Satan stand at his right hand Thus O thus it will be When the Soul of a wicked Man is going away a Devil a Dragon stands by his Bed-side and will take and hold and wound that miserable Soul. Yea there is a more astonishing Vengeance to come upon such a Man. If a Man be not taken by the saving Hands he will be taken by the damning Hands of God himself The Hands of the Great and Terrible God will for ever take those that fall thereinto and smite them and slay them with immediate Impressions of his Fiery Wrath. But what sayes the Apostle in