Selected quad for the lemma: virtue_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
virtue_n	draw_v	iron_n	loadstone_n	1,525	5	13.0457	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A42238	The truth of Christian religion in six books / written in Latine by Hugo Grotius ; and now translated into English, with the addition of a seventh book, by Symon Patrick ...; De veritate religionis Christianae. English	Grotius, Hugo, 1583-1645.; Patrick, Simon, 1626-1707.	1680 (1680)	Wing G2128; ESTC R7722	132,577	348

a kind of God over them SECT VII Against worshipping of things that are no substances WE find also that the Grecians Romans and others worshipped those things which have no subsistence but are meer Accidents of other things For to omit those uncouth Deities the Fever dame Impudence and the like let us name the better sort such were health which is nothing but a right temperature of the parts of the body good fortune which is an event that is correspondent to a Man's desire The affections also such as love fear anger hope and the rest which proceed from the consideration of something that is good or evil easie or difficult are certain motions or passions in that part of the mind which is united to the body by the blood especially not having any absolute power of themselves but are subordinate hand maids to the commands of the will their Mistress at least in their continuance and direction Then for Vertues whose Names are divers Prudence in chusing what is profitable for us Fortitude in undertaking dangers Justice in abstaining from that which is another Man's Temperance in the moderation of pleasures c. they are certain inclinations and propensions in the mind unto that which is right grown up by long exercise and practice Which as they may be augmented in a Man so may they by neglect be diminished nay quite lost and abolished As for Honour whereunto we read there were Temples dedicated it is other Mens judgment or good opinion concerning one whom they supposed indued with Vertue which is often bestowed upon bad men as well as good by the natural proneness there is in Men to erre in their judgment These therefore having no subsistence and therefore not to be compared in dignity and worth with things that do subsist nor having any understanding of Mens prayers or veneration it is most absurd and unreasonable to worship them as Gods when for this very thing He is to be worshipped who can both give and preserve them SECT VIII Answer to the Argument of the Gentiles taken from Miracles done among them THE Pagans for the commendation of their Religion are wont to alledge Miracles but such as in many things may be excepted against For the wisest Men among the Pagans rejected many of these as supported by no testimony of any credible witness but plainly counterfeit and fabulous Other Miracles which they said were done hapned in some secret place in the night before one or two whose eyes the craft of the Priests might easily delude by false shows and appearances of things And there are others which raised great admiration and passed for wonders meerly because they met with those who were ignorant of natural things especially of hidden properties As for instance such a thing might happen if one should draw Iron with the Loadstone among People who knew nothing of its vertue in which arts Simon Magus and Apollonius as many have recorded were very skilful I do not deny but some things greater than these were seen which by Man's power alone could not be drawn out of natural causes and yet did not need a power which was truly divine that is omnipotent but might be performed by Spirits that are placed between God and Men. Who by their celerity efficacy subtilty and diligence can easily carry things far distant from one place to another and compound things that are very different to the working of such effects as shall strike Men with astonishment But that the Spirits whereby this was effected were not good and therefore neither was the Religion good appears already from what hath been said before And from hence also that they said they were compelled to do things even against their wills by the power of certain charms when the wisest of the Pagans agree that there can be no such vertue in words but only a power of perswasion and that no other way than by their signification And it is another token of their wickedness that they undertook to allure and draw this or that body though never so backward to it into the love of such or such a Person Wherein they were injurious to them either in their vain promises or in effecting what they promised for this also is forbidden by humane Laws as a piece of Sorcery Neither need any Man wonder why God suffered some marvels to be wrought by evil Spirits among the Gentiles seeing they deserved to be cheated with such illusions who so long time had forsaken the worship of the true God Moreover this is an argument of their weakeness and impotency that their works never brought any considerable good along with them For if any seemed to be called back to life after they were dead they did not continue alive neither could they exercise the functions of living Creatures Or if it happened that any thing proceeding happily from a divine power did appear to the Pagans yet the same was not foretold should come to pass for the confirmation of their Religion and therefore there might be other causes and far different reasons which the divine efficacy propounded to it self in the doing those things As for example if it was true that Vespasian restored sight to one blind this was done that he being thereby made more venerable might the more easily obtain the Roman Empire to which he was chosen by God that he might be a Minister of his Judgments upon the Jews More such like causes there may be of other wonders which had no relation at all to their Religion SECT IX And from Oracles THE very same likewise in a manner may serve for answer to that which they object concerning Oracles especially what we have said that these Men did worthily deserve to be deluded for contempt of that knowledge which reason or ancient tradition suggested to every one of them Then again the words of the Oracles for the most part were ambiguous and might easily receive an interpretation from any event whatsoever Or if there was any thing more expresly foretold by them yet it is not necessary that it should proceed from an all-knowing mind For it was either such a thing as might be foreseen by natural causes then existing as some Physicians have foretold Diseases that are a coming or else some probable conjecture might be made by that which commonly falls out and usually comes to pass as we read of some persons well skill'd in civil affairs that have made notable guesses at future events Again suppose that amongst the Pagans God sometimes used the ministery of some Prophets to foretel those things which could have no certain cause besides the will of God yet this did not approve or confirm their heathenish Religion but rather overthew it Such for instance are those things in the fourth Eclogue of Virgil taken out of the Sibyls verses where unwittingly the Poet gives us a lively description of the coming of Christ and his benefits So in the same Books of the Sibyls it was that