Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	world_n	worship_n	year_n	167	4	4.8065	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A76021	Unum necessarium, or, The great duty of a Christian in two tracts : the one, Of adhering to God, written in Latin, by Albertus Magnus, the other, Of the love of God, written in high- Dutch, by John Staupitz / both faithfully translated into English for the promoting of primitive Christianity.; De adhaerendo Deo. English. 1692	Albertus, Magnus, Saint, 1193?-1280.; Johannes von Kastl, 15th cent.; Staupitz, Johann von, d. 1524.	1692 (1692)	Wing A878; ESTC R42992	62,774	183

to something that is better For as all good things are done by his Operation so by his Permission all Evil things are made good And by this means are manifested his Power Wisdom and Clemency through our Saviour Christ his Mercy and Justice the Virtue and Strength of his Grace and the weakness and failure of Nature the Beauty of the Universe which springs from the contraposition of opposites the Praise of the Good and the Wickedness and Punishment of Reprobates So likewise in a Sinner converted are manifested Contrition Confession and Repentance as well as the Meekness and long Suffering of God his Kindness and Charity his Praise and Goodness Not that it always tends to their Good that do Wickedly for most commonly indeed It doth precipitate them into great Danger and the worst of Evils viz. the loss of Grace and Glory and obnoxiousness to Guilt and Punishment and sometimes of that which is Eternal from which the Lord Jesus Christ of his Mercy preserve us Amen Two ancient Spiritual Treatises OF Dr. John of Staupitz Abbot of St. Peters at Saltsburg in Germany CONCERNING The Sweet Love of God And our Holy Christian Faith Faithfully Translated out of High-Dutch into English LONDON Printed for R. Baldwin near the Oxford-Arms-Inn in Warwick-Lane 1692. CHAP. I. God is Lovely above all Things IF any one enquire how it can be made out that God is Lovely above all Things He may answer himself by considering that God is God and consequently not only full of all Perfections but Perfection it self in whom by whom and from whom all Perfection consists flows and proceeds As likewise that he is Love it self than which nothing can be found or imagin'd more Lovely as being that very Love which makes all things Lovely it lights upon if it lights on an hateful Enemy it changeth him into a Lovely Friend if it lights on horrid Darkness it becomes immediately changed into pleasant Light if it falls upon nothing the nothing immediately is made something and something that is good too For it is impossible but that all whatsoever God Loves must needs be Lovely And every one easily conceives that without or besides this Love nothing is or can be Lovely and that nothing that is unlovely can flow from it because it is the self-subsisting essential Love whose goodness is in and of it self Our Love receives the measure or proportion of its goodness from the goodness of the beloved Object and is then only good when it Loves some thing that is good and better when it Loves something that is better and best of all when it Loves the highest good and on the other hand becomes evil when it Loves that which is not good Nay whatsoever Object it lights upon whether Good or Evil yet to Love is always sweet and lovely in it self Wherefore also it makes all things not only tolerable but easie and delightful which without it would be difficult to endure if not altogether intollerable How then is it possible that the highest best unalterable constant Faithfulness and eternal Love which is God himself should be loveless harsh or unpleasant CHAP. II. God must be Loved above all things THou shalt Love the Lord thy God saith Moses and our Lord Jesus Christ with all thy heart with all thy Soul Matth. 22.37 Deut. 6.5 with all thy Mind and with all Strength above things This is what all of us are bound to do by Vertue of his Command and the Obedience we we owe him and this because he is our God to whom out of Love we are to return and give up again all that we are and all that we have our Heart Soul Mind Strength and Power House ad Goods Lands and Possessions Wife and Children Brothers and Sisters Father and Mother and in a word nothing excepted even our selves also to be disposed of as he pleases for Death or for Life for Heaven or for Hell These are indeed very hard works which notwithstanding a superlative lovely Love is able to make Light sweet and easy Forasmuch then as God will have all this Performed by us and will not accept of it as it proceeds from a sorrowful but chearful Mind therefore it is that he worketh in us his Love above all things that we may be able to perform his will herein CHAP. III. Where God is not loved above all Things there he is not Glorified as God ALL Men are Created to this end That they might praise and honor God and magnifie and glorifie him in themselves with Hearts Words and Works Now there is no other way whereby the Heart and Will may give to God his peculiar and highest Honour than by resting in his Love and by loving him only for himself with all the Heart Soul and Mind being altogether satiated and satisfied with his Divine Perfections and wholly emptied of all other Love beside For whosoever loves God for his own advantage or any thing that is Outward or Temporal he prefers the Creature before the Creator and Robs God of his Glory and highest Honour and makes that to be his God which is not God For that which the Heart loves most the same it Honours as God whatsoever the Mouth may say to the contrary Who knows not that if a Christian should now a days say that his Wife was his God or his Children or his Goods he would be condemn'd for a Blasphemer if he persisted therein and yet who is there of us who doth not see in the daily practice and Actions of Men that Temporal Goods Pleasure and Honour are preferred before God and his Love to that degree that it is matter of just Lamentation We will by no means endure the reproach of being Idolaters tho indeed we are so really and in Truth no less than others were of Old At this very day O gracious God! Many in Christendome Worship Cows Horses Gold Silver Wood and the Goods of this World as the Heathens did thousand years ago notwithstanding they say with their Mouths Our Father which art in Heaven for true Adoration consists in Loving and not in Speaking He prays well who loves much and he who loves not neither does nor can pray tho he should repeat a thousand Psalms or Prayers He who loves God serves him but he who doth not love him neither doth nor can serve him how great Works soever he may outwardly perform Wherefore nothing can be more useful and advantageous to Men than to excite draw and perswade them to the love of God especially in this miserable state we are in where we are oft hindred from loving by want of necessaries which we cannot be without by outward profit which we can hardly deny our selves in and by our inborn infirmity which no body of himself can rid himself of to which we may likewise add the Pomp Luxury and Vanity of this World and the Cunning Malice and Tyranny of our grand Enemy the Devil CHAP. IV. To love God above all

by the parting with all that we have which being preferred before all in the Strength of the Spirit is to be sought for with humble Confidence most instant Endeavours and quiet Silence even to the loss of all outward Conveniencies and Advantages of Praise or Honour in the Strength of the Spirit For what Advantage will it be to one that hath dedicated himself to God if he gain the whole World but at the same time suffer loss in his Soul Or of what profit is the highest Profession of Religion or a seeming Holy Conversation without living in the Spirit of Truth and Humility wherein Christ dwells through Faith wrought and formed by Love wherefore we are told that the Kingdom of God is within us Luke 17.21 which is no other than Jesus Christ himself CHAP. III. Wherein the Perfection of Man in this Life doth consist SUre it is that the more sollicitously busie the mind is in thinking and managing these Inferiour and Humane Affairs at the greater distance it puts it self from Superiour and Heavenly Objects and true inward Devotion and on the contrary the more fervently she recollects her self from the Memory Affection and Understanding of things here below and betakes her self to those above the more perfect will her Prayer be and the more pure her Contemplation because it is impossible she should be perfectly intent on both these together they being as opposite as Light and Darkness For he that cleaves to God is and walks in the Light but he that sticks to the World gropes in the Dark Whence the most sublime Perfection of Man in this Life is this to be so far united to God that his whole Soul with all its Powers and Faculties be to that degree gathered up into the Lord his God that he may become one Spirit with him so as to Remember nothing but God to feel or Understand nothing but God and that all his Affections being united and centred in the Joys of Love may sweetly repose in the sole Fruition of their Creator For the Image of God impress'd on the Soul consists in these three Faculties viz. Reason Memory and Will And as long as these do not wholly receive their Stamp and Impress from God the Soul is not Deiform according to the intent and scope of its first Creation For God is the form of the Soul by whom the Soul must be impress'd as the Wax is by the Seal Now this can never be fully performed until Reason be according to its capacity perfectly illuminated with the knowledge of God who is the Soveraign Truth and the Will be perfectly bent and taken up in loving the Supreme Good and the Memory be wholly employ'd in the beholding and enjoying of Eternal Happiness and in a sweet and delightful Repose and Acquiescence in the same And forasmuch as in the Consummate Possession of these consists the Glory of the Bliss of Heaven it is evident that the true beginning and anticipation of these is the Perfection of this Life CHAP. IV. How the Activity of Man ought to be in the Intellect alone and not in the Senses HAppy therefore is the Man who by a continual effacing of all Phantasms and imaginary Representations and by Introversion and the lifting up his mind into God doth at last in a manner forget and leave behind him all I mages and by this means consequently operating inwardly with a Naked Simple and pure Intellect and Affection about the most Pure and Simple Object God Wherefore thou must reject and cast out of thy mind all Phantasms Representations and Images and the forms of all things besides God to the end that thy whole Exercise about God within thee may depend only of thy naked Intellect Affection and Will For indeed the true End of all thy holy Exercises is this that thou do intend and repose in the Lord God within thee by the purest Act of Intellection and the devoutest Affection without all Representations or Intanglements whatsoever Now this Exercise cannot be discharged by any corporal Organs or the external Senses but by that part in Man by which he is Man Now that which constitutes a Man is Understanding and Love And therefore as long as Man sports it with his Imagination and Senses and fixeth there he is not yet got beyond the Motions and Bounds of his Bestial Nature that is of that part within him which he hath common with Brute Beasts forasmuch as they do perceive and are affected with such sensible Representations and no other because the power of their Soul reacheth no higher But the case is otherwise with Man who is Created in the Image of God according to his Intellect Affection and Free-will which must be immediately purely and nakedly imprest by God and become united and firmly cleave unto him Wherefore also the Devil doth with all possible diligence endeavour to hinder and disturb this Exercise as far as in him lies forasmuch as he knows it to be an Entrance and Anticipation of Eternal Life which makes him to envy so great a Happiness to Man For which reason he always endeavours to estrange and alienate the mind of Man from his Lord God sometimes by one Temptation sometimes by another sometimes by one Passion and sometimes by another sometimes by superfluous solicitousness and indiscreet carking sometimes by Disturbance dissolute Conversation and unreasonable Curiosity sometimes by the study of curious and subtile Writings impertinent Discourses Reports and News sometimes by Adversity and sometimes by Prosperity Which though sometimes they may seem to us to be very light and in a manner no Sins at all are nevertheless great lets and hindrances to this holy Exercise and Work And therefore however they may represent themselves to us as profitable and necessary yet are immediately to be rejected and disowned as hurtful and pernicious whether they be small or great and to be wholly expelled and cast out of our Senses Accordingly it is highly necessary that all things heard seen done or spoken and other such like be received by us without any Phantasms Images or dwelling upon them and that neither afterwards nor before nor at the perceiving of them we do form of feed any Representations and when thus a Phantasm does not enter the Memory and the Mind then can it neither hinder a Man in his Prayer Meditation and singing of Psalms or in any other Spiritual Operation or Exercise whatsoever neither will it ever again obviate and disturb him Thus do thou readily and securely commit thy whole self and all and every one of thy Concerns in silence and rest to the infallible and most certain Providence and wise disposal of the Divine Majesty who himself will appear for thee in this Combate and fight for thee and will with more Honour and Sweetness deliver and comfort thee than if thou should'st continually night and day hammer upon the Anvil of thy thoughts and Imagination about it and with a vain vagabond and yet captiv'd