Selected quad for the lemma: heart_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
heart_n	bear_v	law_n	write_v	3,223	5	6.4540	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A27004	The reasons of the Christian religion the first part, of godliness, proving by natural evidence the being of God ... : the second part, of Christianity, proving by evidence supernatural and natural, the certain truth of the Christian belief ... / by Richard Baxter ... ; also an appendix defending the soul's immortality against the Somatists or Epicureans and other pseudo-philosophers.	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1667 (1667)	Wing B1367; ESTC R5892	599,557	672

be to our benefit only and his hurt yea though it be in going to the slaughter if he did so by us could do us no wrong nor give us any just excuse for our disobedience For as sweet as life is to us it is not so much Ours in right as His and therefore should be at his disposal § 9. The breaking of Gods Laws must needs deserve a greater penalty than the breaking of any Man's Laws as such The difference of the Rulers and their Authority puts this past all controversie of which yet I shall say more anon § 10. What is said of the subjection of Individuals to God is true of all just Societies as such the Kingdoms of the world being all under God the universal King as small parcels of his Kingdom as particular Corporations are under a humane King Therefore Kings and Kingdoms owe their absolute obedience to God and may not intend any ultimate end but the pleasing of their universal Soveraign nor set up any interest against him or above him or in coordination with him nor manage any way of Government but in dependance on him as the Principle and the End of it nor make any Laws but such as stand in due subordination to his Laws nor command any duty but what hath in its order a true subserviency and conducibility to his pleasure CHAP. X. Of GOD's particular Laws as known in Nature THe true nature of a Law I have opened before It is not necessary that it be written nor spoken but that it be in general any apt signification of the Will of the Rector to his subjects instituting what shall be due from them and to them for the ends of Government Therefore whatsoever is a signification of Gods will to man appointing us our duty and telling us what benefit shall be ours upon the performance and what loss or hurt shall befall us if we sin is a Law of God § 1. A Law being the Rectors Instrument of Governing there can be no Law where there is no Government And therefore that which some call The eternal Law is indeed no Law at all But it is the Principle of all just Laws The Eternal Wisdom and Goodness of God that is the Perfection of his Nature and Will as related to a Possible or future Kingdom is denominated Justice And this Justice some call the Eternal Law But it is truly no Law because it is the will of God in himself and not as Rector nor is it any signification of that Will nor doth it suppose any governed subjects in being from Eternity nor doth it make any duty to any from Eternity But all the Laws which God maketh in time and consequently which men make which are just and good are but the Products of this Eternal Will and Justice And whereas some say that there is an eternall truth in such Axiomes as these Thou shalt love God above all and do as thou would'st be done by and the good should be incouraged and the bad punished c. I answer God formeth not Propositions And therefore there were no such Propositions from Eternity Nor was there any Creature to love God or to do Good or Evil and be the subject of such Propositions That Proposition therefore which was not from Eternity was neither true nor false from Eternity for non entis non sunt accidentia vel modi But this is true that from Eternity there were the grounds of the verity of such Propositions when they should after be And that if there had been subjects from Eternity for such Propositions and Intellects to frame them they would have been of Eternal truth § 2. At the same time of his Creation that God made Man his subject he also made him some Laws to govern him For subjection being a general obligation to obedience would signifie nothing if there were no particular duties to be the matter of that obedience Else Man should owe God no obedience from the beginning but be Lawless for where there is no Law there is no Obedience Taking a Law in the true comprehensive sense as I here do § 3. All the objective significations in natura rerum within us or without us of the Will of God concerning our Duty reward or punishment are the True Law of Nature in the primary proper sense § 4. Therefore it is falsly defined by all Writers who make it consist in certain axioms as some say born in us or written on our hearts from our birth as others say dispositively there It is true that there is in the nature of Mans Soul a certain aptitude to understand certain Truths as soon as they are revealed that is as soon as the very Natura rerum is observed And it is true that this disposition is brought to actual knowledge as soon as the minde comes to actual consideration of the things But it is not true that there is any actual knowledge of any Principles born in Man Nor is it true that the said Disposition to know is truly a Law nor yet that the actual knowledge following it is a Law But the disposition may be called a Law Metonymically as being the aptitude of the faculties to receive and obey a Law as the Light of the Eye which is the potentia dispositio videndi may be called the Light of the Sun but unhansomly And the subsequent actual knowledge of Principles may be called the Law of Nature metonymically as being the perception of it and an effect of it as actual sight may be called the Light of the Sun and as actual knowledge of the Kings Laws may be called His Laws within us that is the effect of them or the Reception of them But this is far from propriety of speech That the inward axiomes as known are not Laws is evident 1. Because a Law is in genere objectivo and this is in genere actionum A Law is in genere signorum but this is the discerning of the sign A Law is the will of the Rector signified this is his will known A Law is Obligatory this is the perception of an Obligation A Law maketh duty but this is the knowledge of a duty made 2. The Law is not in our power to change or abrogate But a mans inward dispositions and perceptions are much in his power to encrease or diminish or obliterate Every man that is wilfully sensual and wicked may do much to blot out the Law of Nature which is said to be written on his heart But wickedness cannot alter or obliterare the Law of God If this were Gods Law which is upon the heart when a sinner hath blotted it out he is disobliged from duty and punishment For where there is no Law there is no duty or transgression But no sinner can so disoblige himself by altering his Makers Laws 3. Else there would be as many Laws of Nature not only as there are men but as there are diversity of perceptions But Gods Law is

Via and manifold mercies helps and means do generally perswade the Consciences of men that there are certain Duties required of them and certain Means to be used by them in order to procure their recovery and salvation and to scape the misery deserved He that shall deny this will turn the Earth into a Hell he will teach men to forbear all means and duties which tend to their conversion pardon and salvation and to justifie themselves in it and desperately give over all Religion and begin the horrours and language of the damned § 9. The very command of God to use his appointed means for mens recovery doth imply that it shall not be in vain and doth not only shew a possibility but so great a hopefulness of the success to the obedient as may encourage them cheerfully to undertake it and carry it through No man that is wise and merciful will appoint his subject a course of means to be used for a thing impossible to be got or will say Labour thus all thy life for it but thou shalt be never the nearer it if thou do If such an Omniscient Physician do but bid me use such means for my cure and health I may take his command for half a promise if I obey § 10. Conscience doth bear witness against impenitent sinners that the cause of their sin and the hinderance of their recovery is in themselves and that God is not unwilling to forgive and save them if they were but meet for forgiveness and salvation Even now mens consciences take God's part against themselves and tell them that the Infinite Good that communicateth all the Goodness to the creature which it hath is not so likely to be the cause of so odious a thing as sin nor of mans destruction as he himself If I see a Sheep lie torn in the high-way I will sooner suspect the Wolf than a Lamb to be the cause if I see them both stand by and if I see a Child drown'd in scalding water I will sooner suspect that he fell in by folly and heedlesness himself than that his Mother wilfully cast him in Is not silly naughty man much liker to be the cause of sin and misery than the wise and gracious God Much more hereafter will the sinners conscience justifie God § 11. God hath planted in the common nature of mankind an inseparable inclination to Truth as Truth and to Good as Good and a Love to themselves and a desire to be happy and a lothness to be miserable together with some reverence and honour of God till they have extinguished the belief of his being and a hatred and horrour of the Devil while they believe he is All which are a fit Stock to plant Reforming-truths in and Principles fit to be improved for mens conversion and the excitation and improvement of them is much of that recovering work § 12. Frequent and deep consideration being a great means of mans recovery by improving the truth which he considereth and restoring Reason to the Throne it is a great advantage to man that he is naturally a Reasoning and Thoughtful creature his Intellect being propense to activity and knowledge § 13. And it is his great advantage that his frequent and great afflictions have a great tendency to awake his Reason to consideration and to bring it to the heart and make it effectual And consequently that God casteth us into such a Sea and wilderness of troubles that we should have these quickening Monitors still at hand § 14. And it is man's great advantage for his recovery that Vanity and Vexation are so legibly written on all things here below and that frustrated expectations and unsatisfied minds and the fore-knowledge of the end of all and bodily pains which find no ease with multitudes of bitter experiences do so abundantly help him to escape the snare the love of present things For all men that perish are condemned for loving the creature above the Creator and therefore such a world which appeareth so evidently to be vain and empty and deceitful and vexatious and which all men know will turn them off at last with as little comfort as if they had never seen a day of pleasure in it I say such a world one would think should give us an antidote against its own deceit and sufficiently wean us from its inordinate love At least this is a very great advantage § 15. It is also a common and great advantage for man's recovery that his life here is so short and his death so certain as that reason must needs tell him that the pleasures of sin are also short and that he should always live as parting with this world and ready to enter into another The nearness of things maketh them to work on the mind of man the more powerfully distant things though sure and great do hardly awaken the mind to their reception and due consideration If men lived 600 or 1000 years in the world it were no wonder if covetousness and carnality and security made them like Devils and worse than wild beasts to one another But when men cannot chuse but know that they must certainly and shortly see the end of all that ever this world will do for them and are never sure of another hour this is so great a help to sober consideration and conversion that it must be monstrous stupidity and brutishness that must overcome it § 16. It is also a great advantage for man's conversion that all the world revealeth God to him and every thing telleth him of the Power and Wisdom and Goodness and Love of God and of his constant Presence and so sheweth him an object which should as easily over-power all sensual objects which would seduce his soul as a mountain will weigh down a feather Though we see not God which would sure put an end to the controversie whether we should be sensual or holy yet while we have a glass as big as all the world which doth continually represent him to us one would think that no reasonable creature should so much over-look him as to be carried from him with the trifles of this world § 17. Men that have not only the foresaid obligations to Holiness Justice and Sobriety in their natures but also all these Hopes and Helps and Means of their recovery from sin to God and yet frustrate all and continue in ungodliness unrighteousness or intemperance impenitently to the end are utterly destitute of all just excuse why God should not punish them with endless misery which is the case of all that perish § 18. All men shall be judged by the Law which was given them of God to live by For it is the same Law which is Regula Officii Judicii God will not condemn men for not believing a truth which mediately or immediately was never revealed to them and which they had no means to know nor for not obeying a Law which was never promulgated to them