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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
work_n	evil_a	good_a	tree_n	33,809	5	11.7409	5	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A58795	The Christian life. Part II wherein the fundamental principles of Christian duty are assigned, explained, and proved : volume I / by John Scott ...; Christian life. Part 2	Scott, John, 1639-1695.	1685 (1685)	Wing S2050; ESTC R20527	226,080	542

doth not necessarily determine us to good but leaves it to our own free Choice to determine our selves which way we please that as he acts upon necessary Agents by a necessary Influx and Causality which they cannot resist and determines those things to act by his Will which have no Will of their own to determine them so he acts upon free Agents by a free and unconstraining Influence i. e. by suggesting Arguments to their Minds to incline and perswade them but leaves it to their own Liberty to consider those Arguments or not and to comply with those Perswasions or reject them and that tho as he hath sometimes suspended the Powers of necessary Agents and interrupted the natural Course of their Motion as when he forbad the Sun to move and the Fire to burn so he hath at other times restrained the natural Liberty of free Agents and determined them by an over-ruling Necessity yet both the one and the other are extraordinary and miraculous but that in the ordinary Course of his Government he doth as well leave free Agents to that natural Freedom with which he first created them as necessary ones to those Necessities which he first impressed upon their Natures For his Providence is succedaneous to his Creation and did at first begin where that ended and doth still proceed as it began ordering and governing all things according to the several Frames and Models in which he first cast and created them Nor can he order and govern them otherwise without unraveling his own Creation and making things to be otherwise than he first made them For how can he ordinarily necessitate those Agents whom he first made free without changing their Natures from free to necessary and making them a different kind of Being than he made them So that tho in the Course of his Government God doth powerfully importune and perswade us yet he lays no Necessity on our Wills but leaves us free to choose or refuse and as the Temptations of Sin incline us one way so the Grace of God inclines us another but both leave us to our own Liberty to go which way we please And this the Scripture plainly asserts where it makes mention of Mens resisting the Holy Ghost Acts 7.51 and grieving and quenching the Spirit of God Eph. 4.30 1 Thes. 5.19 and refusing to hear when God calls and to regard when he stretches forth his Hand and of their setting his Counsel at naught and rejecting his Reproofs Prov. 1.24 25. and in a word where it makes mention of some Mens baffling and defeating that very Grace which would have conquered and perswaded others Mat. 11.21 Which plainly imply that all that Assistance to do our Duty that God ordinarily vouchsafes us in the Course of his Government is such as no way determins or necessitates us THE Belief of which is highly necessary to engage us in the Service of Religion For while Men imagine that their Duty is such as they cannot heartily comply with without being compelled to it by an irresistible Grace and that no Assistance of God can be sufficient to this End but that which suspends their Liberty to Evil and fatally determins them to Good what should move them to exert their own Endeavour Why should they watch and pray and strive and contend against a corrupt Nature For if God will make them good irresistibly their Endeavour is needless but if he will not it is Labour in vain To what End should they ply the Oar to stem the Tide of a degenerate Nature since without an irresistible Gale from Heaven they shall never succeed and with it they shall whether they ply or no So that while Men live in Expectance of an irresistible Grace to make them good they quit themselves of all their Obligations to a pious and virtuous Endeavour but so long as they believe that Gods Grace is such as supposes and leaves them free such as they may defeat or prosper by the good or ill use of their Liberty they cannot but discern themselves infinitely obliged to co-operate with it to listen and consent to its blessed Motions and Perswasions and constantly to endeavour to comply with them in their Actions or at least not to resist them and harden and fortifie themselves against them by acting counter to and flying in the face of their own Convictions For since the Grace of God doth not determin us to good but leaves us to our own Freedom we can never expect to be determined to good without our free Concurrence which if we refuse we shall certainly perish in our Sin and have not only the Blood of our own Souls to answer for but all that Grace too which we have baffled and defeated VI. To oblige us to be truly Religious it is necessary that we should believe that God takes particular Cognisance of the good and ill Use we make of our natural Freedom that he doth not merely gaze upon our Actions as an indifferent and unconcerned Spectator but beholds them with the highest Concern and Regard with infinite Complacency or Detestation and treasures them up in his all-comprehending Mind to be produced for or against us in the day of fearful Reckonings and Accounts that he doth not inspect our Actions with a passant and cursory View as things of little or no Moment but lays them up in everlasting Remembrance so that every good or ill thing we do stands upon Record in the Mind of God in order to our final Acquittal or Condemnation For so the Scripture tells us not only that Gods Eyes are upon the Ways of Man and that he seeth all his goings Job 34.21 and that his Eyes run to and fro throughout the Earth and are in every Place beholding the good and Evil 2 Chron. 16.9 and Prov. 15.3 but that he sees good Actions tho done in secret and will reward them openly Matth. 6.6 and that he will bring every work into Judgment with every secret thing whether it be good or evil Eccles. 12.14 THE Belief of which is absolutely necessary to found the Obligations of Religion For if we suppose either that God sees not our Actions or looks upon them with an indifferent Eye without taking any Notice or Cognisance of them there is no religious Consideration can oblige us For upon this Supposal our Actions must all be indifferent to him and if they are indifferent to him what reason have we to make any difference between them 'T is true good Actions are in themselves beneficial and evil ones prejudicial to us and therefore for our own Interest-sake we ought to choose the one and refuse the other but this abstracted from all Respects to God is only a Prudential and not a religious Obligation but why should we do any good or avoid any evil upon Gods account if Good and Evil are alike to him But if we firmly believe that God not only sees whatsoever we do but takes particular Notice of all our good and evil

proposed by God to perswade us to cleanse our selves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit and to perfect holiness in the fear of God 2. Cor. 7.1 So also the Doctrine of our future Punishment is levell'd against all unrighteousness and ungodliness of men Rom. 1.18 And as for those Doctrines which concern the Transactions of our Saviour they are all proposed to us as Arguments to perswade us to Piety and Vertue For 't was for this cause that Christ was manifested to destroy the works of the Devil 1 John 3.8 't was for this purpose that he bore our sins in his own body on the tree that we being dead to sin should live to Righteousness 1 Pet. 2.24 't was for this end that he rose from the dead that thereby he might prevail with us to walk in newness of life Rom. 6.4 and 't is for this end that he intercedes for us at the right hand of God that thereby he might encourage us to come to God by him Heb. 7.2 and in a word for this cause he hath told us he will come to Judgment to reward every man according to his works that thereby he might stir us up to Sobriety and Vigilance and to all holy conversation and Godliness Mat. 24.42 compared with 2 Pet. 3. verse 11. Thus you see all the Doctrines of Religion are only so many Topics of divine Perswasion whereby God addresses himself to our Hope and Fear and every other Affection in us that is capable of Perswasion to excite us to comply with the eternal Obligations of Morality and there is no one Article in all our Religion that is matter of mere Speculation or that entertains our Minds with dry and empty Notions that have no Influence on our Wills and Affections For since the Design of Religion in General is to bind and fasten our Souls to God we may be sure that there is no Part of it but what doth in some measure contribute hereunto Since therefore 't is moral Goodness that God chiefly recommends to us by the Perswasions of Religion we may be sure that what his Arguments do chiefly perswade us to that his Commands do chiefly oblige us to II. FROM Scripture it is also evident that the main Drift and Scope of all the positive Duties of Religion is to improve and perfect men in moral Goodness We find the Jewish Religion exceedingly abounded with positive Precepts for such were all those sacred Rites and Solemnities of which the Bark and Outside of that Religion consisted of all which 't is true what the Psalmist saith of Sacrifices in particular thou desirest not Sacrifices thou delightest not in burnt Offerings Psal. 51.16 that is thou takest no delight in them upon the score of any internal Goodness that is in them but desirest them merely as they are instituted means and Instruments of Moral Goodness For so many of the Rites of the Mosaic Law were instituted in opposition to the Magical Vnclean and Idolatrous Rites of the Eastern Heathen As particularly that Prohibition of sowing their Fields with mingled Seed Lev. 19.19 in Opposition to that Magical Rite which the Heathens used as a Charm for Fructification So also that Command of sprinkling the Blood of their Sacrifices upon the Ground like Water and covering it with Dust in Opposition to that Idolatrous Rite of gathering the Blood into a Trench or Vessel and then sitting round it in a Circle whilst they imagined their gods to be licking it up And to name no more of this kind the Prohibition of seething a Kid in his Mothers Milk Exod. 23.19 was in Opposition to a Custom of the Ancient Heathen who at the Ingathering of their Fruits were wont to take a Kid and seeth it in the milk of its Dam and then in a Magical Procession to sprinkle all their Trees and Fields and Gardens with it thereby to render them more fruitful the following Year Besides all which you may find a World of other Instances in Maimonides More-Nevoch lib. 3. who tells us that the Knowledg of the Opinions and Customs of these Eastern Heathens was porta magna ad reddendas praeceptorum causas the great Rationale of the Mosaic Precepts and that multarum legum rationes causae mihi innotuerint ex cognitione fidei rituum Cultus Zabiorum i. e. that by being acquainted with the opinions and customs of those Eastern Heathens he understood the grounds and reasons of many of the Laws of Moses More-Nevoch lib. 3. cap. 29. So that tho these Precepts were not Moral yet were they set up as so many Fences by God to keep his People from stragling into those Heathen Immoralities AGAIN there are other Rites of their Religion which were instituted to shadow out the Holy Mysteries of the Gospel the great Design of which Mysteries was to invite and perswade men to comply with the eternal Laws of Morality Thus their Laws of Sacrifice were instituted to represent to them the great Transactions of their future Messias his Incarnation and immaculate Life his Death and Resurrection Ascension and Intercession at the right hand of God So also their Festival Laws and particularly their Laws of Jubilee were made to shadow out the Doctrines of our Redemption and eternal Life and their powring out Water in their Sacrifices and their Ritual Purgations from uncleanness were intended for obscure Intimations of the Effusion of the holy Spirit and the Doctrine of Remission of Sins all which Doctrines carry with them the most pregnant Invitations to Piety and Vertue Lastly THERE are other Rites of that Law which were appointed to instruct them in Moral Duties For God finding them not only a perverse but a dull and sottish People as those generally are that have been born and bred in Slavery apprehended that the most effectual way to instruct them would be by Signs and material Representations even as Parents do their Children by Pictures And accordingly in Isaiah 28.10 he tells us that he gave them line upon line and precept upon precept here a little and there a little with a stammering tongue i. e. he look'd upon them as Children and so condescended to their Weakness and spake to them in their own Dialect And this way of instructing them by outward and visible Signs being much in use in the Eastern Countries and more especially in Egypt whose manners they were infinitely fond of was of all others the most probable and taking And accordingly a great part of the Jewish Rites consisted of Hieroglyphics or visible Signs by which their minds were instructed in the Precepts of Morality Thus by Circumcision God signified to them the necessity of mortifying their unchast Desires by their Legal Washings he intimated to them their Obligation to cleanse themselves from all Impurities of Flesh and Spirit yea this as St. Barnabas in his Epistle tells us was the Intent of all that Difference of Meats in the Jewish Law which pronounced Swines flesh unclean to instruct them