Selected quad for the lemma: world_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
world_n	deny_v	lust_n	ungodliness_n	2,308	5	11.2023	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A39678	The reasonableness of personal reformation, and the necessity of conversion; the true methods of making all men happy in this world, and in the world to come Seasonably discoursed, and earnestly pressed upon this licentious age. By J.F. a sincere lover of his native countrey, and the souls of men.	Flavel, John, 1630?-1691.	1691 (1691)	Wing F1180B; Wing F1466_CANCELLED; ESTC R214634	80,393	172

in him or in his Blood John 13. 8. He came not to save men continuing in their sins but to save his people from their sins Matt. 1. 21. His way is to lead you through Sanctification unto Salvation 2 Thess. 2. 13. If you have a mind to see whom and now he saves you have it before your eyes Tit. 2. 14. Who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purifie unto himself a peculiar people zealous of good works Those only are saved by him that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts live not only soberly and righteously but godly in this present world And this is the Change I am here pressing you to and until this change be made you cannot find your selves within the compass of any Covenant-Promise Eph. 2. 12. But if you will turn to Heb. 12. 14. You may the very next minute find your selves barr'd out of Heaven by a Scripture-threatning Let no man therefore impose so great a cheat upon his own Soul as once to imagine that any thing short of sound Conversion can ever put him out of the danger of Damnation SECT VIII Every man might do more than he doth towards his own Conversion IT is not in any man's power to convert himself but yet because every man might do more towards it than he doth do and doth it not he is justly chargeable with his own Damn●tion We are bid and bound to strive to enter in at the strait gate L●ke 13. 24. 'T is true a man in his natural state can do nothing that is spiritually or supernaturally good yet he can do and forbear to do many things the doing or forbearing of which have a true though remoter tendency to his Conversion and not doing or forbearing of them his Destruction is of and from himself You can if you will forbear to swear and blaspheme the Name of ●od who can or does compel or force your tongues to it The Devil can temp● but not compel them You can if you will stop when nature is duely refreshed Your wicked Companions can provoke but not force you You can if you please shun Lascivious Books and Company and keep your Bodies chast at least from the External Acts of Uncleanness And why cannot you if you please perform as well as neglect the external Acts of Religious Duties The same feet that carry you to a Tavern can carry you to your Closets if you please to have them do so Nor do I know any reason why you cannot compose your selves when engaged in God's publick or private Worship to a close and serious attendance to those Duties The application of the mind to what is spoken is of great concernment to you And if an unsanctified Minister can apply his thoughts to compose a Sermon and preach it I see no reason why an unsanctified Hearer may not also compose and apply his mind to hear it And I am past all doubt that something may be done beyond all this You have some power certainly to reflect upon and consider what concernment you have in the things you read or hear and how they agree or disagree with your experience Now if men would but do this which certainly they have a power to do though they cannot convert themselves yet hereby they would lie in the hopeful way of Converting Grace which is more than they could ever yet be perswaded to do And though there be no positive certainty or assurance that Conversion and Salvation shall follow these Acts yet hope and probability are engagements enough Hope sets all the World on work without Assurance The Plough-man ploughs in hope and the Merchant ventures in hope Do but as much for your Souls as these do for their Bodies SECT IX Temptations and Discouragements in the way of Conversion BUT here I expect to be encountered by all the policy and power of Hell Satan and your own Lusts are in confederacy to turn away your minds from such Counsels and Perswasions as these They will tell you this is no proper season to mind your Conversion 't is either too soon or too late You have not yet had pleasure enough in sin or so much as hath put you beyond all hope of mercy That Religion is a melancholly thing and if once you look that way you 'l never have a merry day or hour more With a thousand such damps and discouragements But pray Gentlemen do so much at least for your Souls before you turn away your ear from the instructions of life as to hear these matters examined If they be not worth that they are worth nothing I will suppose you in the flower and vigour of your Youth and this dangerous season now nick'd with a more dangerous Temptation that it is too soon to mind such serious Matters now You have not yet had your full pleasure out of sin Need I to spend a word to refute and baffle such a Temptation as this I doubt not but you your selves can easily do it Ask your selves Sirs if sentence of Death were pass'd upon you by Men as it is by God John 3. 18. He that believeth not is condemned already would you think a Pardon could come too soon Be assured every bit of Bread you eat is the Bread of the Condemned You are in hazard of Hell every day and hour There wants nothing but a Sword a Bullet a Shipwrack or Disease of which Multitudes wait on you every day to put you beyond mercy and all hopes of mercy And can you get too soon think you out of this danger and misery Oh why do you linger any longer The danger is too great and imminent to admit one hours longer delay And it is as strange and strong a delusion on the other side to fancy it is now too late The vanity and groundlesness of this hath been evinced in the Second Section to which I refer you for full satisfaction And for the loss of your Pleasures by Conversion to God that 's the thinnest and silliest Pretence of all the rest That 's the same thing as to imagine it is to a Thirsty Man's loss to leave the puddle-waters of a broken Cistern to enjoy the Cristal Streams of a flowing Fountain For the Pleasures of an Ale-house Play-house or Whore-house to be sweeter than the light of God's Countenance the Comforts of his Pardon or the lively Hopes of Glory with him in Heaven of which you read 1 Pet. 1. 8. Poor men O that you did but once know what the Life of Holiness and Dedication to God is what the Seals Earnest and first Fruits of his Spirit are how willingly and joyfully would you trample all the ●ordid Pleasures of Sin under your feet to enjoy them SECT X. Motives and Considerations perswading to Conversion THIS short Discourse shall wind up it self in Motives and Considerations to prevail with You not onely to make the first Step out of Prophaneness to Civility but the other necessary and happy

that ever I was married to such a sottish Fool as thou art who art destitute both of Wisdom and Love to Rule and Govern me I may justly resume Iob's Lamentation upon thy account and say with him Let the day perish wherein I was born and the night wherein it was said there is a man-child conceived Why died I not from the Womb Why did I not giv● up the Ghost when I came out of the Belly For now should I have lien still and been quiet I should have slept then I had been at rest I have been a perfect Slave and Drudge to thy unreasonable Lusts and Impositions I was once an active vigorous comely Body and hadst thou been Wise and Sober I had been happy But thou hast been a cruel Tyrant to me oppressing and loading me with more than I was able to stand under Thou hast plunged me many times into those puddles of Excess wherein thou hast drowned thy own Reason and my Health My well-mixed Beauty is now turned into the colour of flaming Fire my Hands and Legs shake my Tongue falters my natural Crasis and Temperament is destroyed Thou hast made me miserable in this World and intendest to make me more wretched in the World to come Sober Nature gave me my stint and measure I knew when it was enough and gave thee sufficient Items and Intimations amidst thy foolish Frolicks that I could neither with Honour or Safety bear one Glass more But thou wast deaf to all my moans and shewedst more Mercy to thy Horse than me Sick or well able or unable live or die I must take in the full number of Cups and Bottles thou enjoynedst me to take Like another Pharoah thou hast required of me the full tale whether I had strength to perform it or no. Yea like another Devil thou hast sometimes cast me into fiery Fevers and watry Dropsies and will next cast me if thou continue this course into Hell-fire it self Other Souls have set thee a better Pattern in their more sober and prudent Government of their Bodies They give their Bodies the true Pleasure of the Creature by keeping them to that happy Mediocrity in which it consists They devote their Bodies to the Service of God thou hast devoted me to the immediate Service of the Devil A Majestick Beauty sits upon their Faces Sottishness and Folly upon mine Their Knees are daily bowed in Prayer to God mine shake and tremble in the Service of the Devil They enjoy pure and sanctified Pleasures every day but I am denied the sober Pleasures of a Beast Their Bodies will be happy with their Souls in the World to come but I must suffer Eternally with thee and for thee Thou hast both consumed me and thy Estate given to support me and now I am like to suffer as much by want as I have done by excess and all this through thy misgovernment These Feet if thou hadst pleased to command them would as readily have carried thee to thy Closer or the Assemblies of God's People as to an Ale-house or Tavern These Fingers would have served to open and turn the blessed Pages which contain the Oracles of God as to Cog a Die or have Shuffled and Dealt a Pack of Cards This Tongue might have been melodiously employed in singing the Praises of God among his People as well as in Swearing Roaring and Singing among drunken Sots and Fools if thou hadst been endued with governing Wisdom Thou knowest I could do nothing without thee Thou hast a despotical Power over all my Members They are at thy beck and thou at the Devil 's Better had it been for me had I been the Body of a contemptible Worm or Fly than a Body animated and governed by such a sottish Soul as thou art And now my Soul what hast thou to say for thy self What tolerable account canst thou give to God or me of these thy vile Abuses of both SECT V. Now let us hear what the Soul of the Drunkard hath to plead in its own Excuse and Defence for all his wrongs against God mischiefs to it self ruin to his Health Name and Estate They have various Excuses tho not one sound or rational one among them all Such as they are let them be tried by the Rule of Reason if any Reason by yet left in them who daily dethrone it by this worse-than bruitish Practice That which they have to say for themselves is this 1. That their Bodies are strongly constituted more capacious to receive and able to bear greate● quantities of Wine and Strong-drink than other● are and therefore why should they not drink down and glory over those that vye with them 2. Others say They would not take that Course they do but that when they are Sober and Solitary they are so press'd with the thoughts of their Debt● and Incumbrances in the World that they are upon a perfect Rack and they find nothing like good-fellowship in a Tavern or Ale-house so effectually relieving against the Cares and Anxieties of their Minds 3. Some will tell us they are drawn into it by the snare of Pleasure nothing being so grateful to their Palate as their full load of generous Wine or Strong-drink And seeing it is so pleasant and delightsome to them why should they deny and abridge themselves of their Pleasure 4. Others will profess they had never taken this Course which they find upon many account● pernicious to them but that they are not able in Civility to deny their intimate Friends and Companions especially such with whom they have concerns in Trade and Business and they must drink as they do or suffer loss in their Trade and beside that be stigmatized for Phanaticks 5. They will also say they are obliged in point of Loyalty to pledg him that Consecrates as they Catechrestically call it the first Glass to the King or Persons of Quality and Honour 6. And lastly some will tell us They have plentiful Estates that will bear such Expences and since their Pockets are full why should not their Heads and Stomachs be for too Beside these six Apologies for Drunkenness nothing falls into my Imagination pleadable for this Sin We will weigh these that are pleaded in the common Ballance of the Reason of Mankind and try the validity of them one by one And for the Excuse I. And first to what you say of the Capacity of your Bodies Strength and Ability of your Constitutions to receive and bear greater Quantities of Wine and strong Drink than others can and therefore why should you not give a proof of it when challeng'd and get Reputation to your selves by drinking down and glorying over such as vye with you To this I reply three things which must be laid in the Counter-ballance and let the Ballance be held in the upright Hand of your own Reason 1. A strong and vigorous Constitution will be readily acknowledged to be so great an external Blessing and Mercy that no Man of sound Intellectuals

Examples of great Men have had no small hand in the spreading of this abominable and crying Sin amongst all inferior Ranks and Orders of Men. Great Mens ill Examples like a bag of Poyson in the Fountain corrupt and infect Multitudes The Vulgar think they are priviledged or at the least very much excused when they do but follow the Presidents and Examples of Great and Eminent Persons But this will be found a weak and foolish Plea for Uncleanness which will never be able to endure the test of your own Reason For the inbred Notions of a God and of a future Life of Retribution being so firmly sealed and engraven upon humane Nature that they can never be utterly eradicated your own Reason will argue from those inbred Notions in this manner and how you will be able to refel the Argument and escape Conviction and Self-condemnation quite surmounts my Imagination whatever it do yours And thus it will dispute and Dilemma you do what you can That God before whom greater and lesser honourable and baser Sinners shall appear in Judgment will be either partial or impartial in his Judgments upon them There is or there is not Respect of Persons with him If there be which both his Nature and Word utterly deny then those great and honourable Adulterers or ●ornicators whose Examples you follow may haply be excused for their Eminency and Honours sake but you that have no such Eminency and Honour in the World as they have must be condemned tho you thought to escape as well as they But if there be no Partiality or Respect of Persons with God as most assuredly there is none then both greater and lesser honourable and baser Adulterers must be condemned together to the same common and intolerable Misery So that to take any tho the least encouragement to Sin from the Presidents and Examples of Great Ones is a most senseless and irrational thing utterly unworthy of one that believes there is a just and impartial God and he is worse than a Devil that believes it not For the Devils themselves believe and tremble SECT VI. Inducement 2. But others would perswade us they are drawn into this Sin by a kind of inevitable necessity they being neither able to contain nor Marry They are not yet arrived to Estate sufficient to maintain a Family with Reputation But when they have gotten enough by Trade or by the fall of their paternal Estates to live in equal Reputation with their Neighbours then they design to alter their Course of Life and abandon these Follies But Reader if this be thy Plea for Uncleanness thou shalt have as fair a Tryal for a foul Fact as thine own heart can desire be still thine own Judg and let thine own Reason give a fair Answer to these three pertinent Questions Quest. 1. Whether Whoredom be as likely and promising a way to engage God's Blessing upon your Trades and Employments as Continence or conjugal Chastity are That is to say plainly Whether Obedience and Disobedience to the Law of God be all one and please him alike You know your success of Business is not in your own hand 't is God that giveth thee Power to get Wealth His Blessing maketh Rich. And is Sin as likely a way to engage his Blessing as Duty and Obedience is I am confident your own Reason will never give it Object If you say such Persons prosper in the World as well as others for ought you can see Sol. The contrary is evident in the common Observation of Mankind by reason of Whoredom Multitudes are brought to a piece of Bread And tho God suffer some unclean Persons to prosper in the World yet Chastity with Poverty is infinitely preferable to such accursed Prosperity Quest. 2. Whether the Course of Sin you are now driving and accustoming your selves to will not in all probability so infatuate and bewitch you that when you come into a married Estate you shall still be under the Power of this Sin and so ruin the Person you Marry as well as your self If the Word of God signify any thing with you ' it signifieth this that there is a Witchcraft in Whoredom and comparatively speaking None that go to her return again neither take they hold of the Paths of Life Prov. 2. 18 19. Object If to invalidate this Testimony you shall say That he that spake this did himself go after strange Women Sol. 'T is true he did so but when withal you must remember that he hath warned you by his own sad Experience that you never follow him in those his footsteps Eccles. 7. 26. I find saith he more bitter than death the woman whose heart is snares and nets and her hands as bands Whoso pleaseth God shall escape from her but the sin●er shall be taken by her Quest. 3. And lastly I demand of your reason whether it can or will allow any place to this Plea of necessity before you have used and tried all God's appointed Remedies which are sufficient to prevent that necessity you plead There are lawful Remedies enough sufficient with God's blessing to keep you from such a necessity to Sin such as Temperance and more abstemiousness in Meats and Drinks avoiding lascivious Books Play-houses and filthy Company laborious Diligence in your lawful Callings and fervent Prayer for mortifying and preventing Grace and if Temptations still stir amidst all these preventives then casting your selves upon the Directions and Supply of Providence in the honourable Estate of Marriage Never plead necessity whilst all these preventives might but have not been used SECT VII Inducement 3. Others plead the absence of their lawful Remedies and presence of tempting Objects This is the Case of our Soldiers and Seamen But tho this be the most colourable pretence of all the rest yet your own Reason and Consciences will even in this Case so Dilemma and Non-plus you that if you will adventure upon the Sin you shall never have their leave or consent with you For they have a special and peculiar consideration of you as Persons more eminently and immediately exposed to the Dangers of Death than other Men. And thus would you but give them a fair hearing they will expostulate and reason out the matter with you Either thou shalt escape or not escape the hazard of this Voyage or Battel If thou fall as to be sure many will will this be an honourable safe and comfortable close and winding up of thy Life What from a Whore to thy Grave God forbid From burning Lusts to everlasting Burnings Better thou hadst never been born Or if thou do escape and return again to thy Family how canst thou look her in the Face with whom thou hast so basely broken thy Marriage Vow and Covenant Whatever else thou bring home with thee to be sure thou shalt bring home Guilt with thee and a Blot never to be wiped away Object If you say you are not such Fools to publish your own Shame you 'll follow