Selected quad for the lemma: law_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
law_n	gentile_n	heart_n	write_v	7,180	5	5.8793	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A53325	The last judgment, or, A discourse shewing the reasonableness of the belief of such a thing deliver'd in a sermon, at the assizes held for the county of Denbigh, on the 18th of April, anno 1682 / by John Oliver ...	Oliver, John, d. 1730.	1682 (1682)	Wing O275; ESTC R10726	13,587	32

it 's easily answer'd that two or three such Instances can be no prejudice to the General Judgment of most men both learned and unlearned That it has been their Interest there should be no such thing as a Judgment to come and therefore they have rack'd their Brains to find out Arguments against it That the impurity of their Lives has sullied their Reasons and debauch'd their understandings and rendred them as uncapable of judging what belongs to the humane Nature as a man born blind is to read a Lecture about Colours or a Person with a distemper'd Palate to distinguish meats But now to what Cause shall we assign this universal Agreement How comes it about that the most distant People of the World that live under different Models of Government and distinct Rites of Worship that have peculiar Customs and Manners and Inclinations should all joyn in this that there is an Account to be given in another World of all our Actions done in this Besides how comes this Principle to stand so fix'd and unshaken considering the infinite changes which almost every thing else has undergone and the many attempts which have been made to alter this by a sort of men that would confound the Distinction betwixt Vertue and Vice here that there might be no such thing as either Heaven or Hell hereafter We see daily that other Opinions rise and fall according as the grounds they are built upon appear stronger or weaker and sometimes they have more sometimes fewer Defendants to own and countenance them But this Doctrine of a Judgment to come as it is of equal Antiquity and has the same extent with Mankind so is it constantly the same Tract of Time and revolution of Ages and deeper insight into the nature of things the several changes that have happened in the Laws the Religions the Customs of any People have not been able to abate any thing of its Authority but still as the World grows older and more changeable this grows more strong vigorous and constant It must then have some cause like it self it must be resolv'd into some such impressions as are common to Mankind which every man carries about him and from which he may argue himself into a belief of it I am easily induc'd to think that as the main Body of the Heathen Theology was but the old Traditional Religion corrupted by a long and tedious descent as all things are apt to lose of their native Purity the farther they go so this Account of a future Judgment amongst the Heathens might be a branch of it mixt with the fancies and inventions of men till the first Patriarchal Creed became a meer Poetical Story But yet I think it will be hard to perswade any man that a Doctrine of this kind so opposite to mens worldly Interests so apt to controul their Lusts and Passions should spread so far and prevail so generally were there not some more early impression left upon us to make room in our understandings for it some natural notions that amidst all vicissitudes of the World would be sure to uphold the truth of it I instance in these three 1. That apprehension which all men have concerning good and evil 2. That secret joy which good men find upon the doing any vertuous act And that confidence they have when they suffer upon the score of Piety and Religion 3. Those horrible Fears and Confusions which bad men find upon the doing an ill act These are natural to us as men and fair Evidences of what I have undertook to make out 1. That apprehension which all men have concerning good and evil argues a future Judgment That some actions are Vertuous and Honourable and the contrary base and vitious and that Antecedently to any humane Law or positive Custom for the making them so is the common voice of mankind To be innocent in our Conversations grateful to our Benefactors upright in our Dealings true to our Vows and Promises Oaths and Contracts these are such things as would be excellent and approved of all though there were no humane Laws to enjoyn and encourage the practice of them And on the other hand the opposite Vices are so deform'd and ugly that should all the Law-givers on earth conspire to change the Scene to make Vertue Vice and Evil Good the undertaking would be as strange as unsuccesful Such attempts could never obtain their end unless they could mould the man over again and infuse into him quite different Principles from what he has already And though men are so far willing to comply with their temporal Interests as to contradict in the Practick what they are content to own in the Speculative yet there are not many arrived to that pitch of Prophaneness but would appear in the World under another Character than what they really deserve Which argues at least in the worst of men a secret allowance that Virtue has something in it more suitable to the honour of the humane Nature and that Vice has that intrinsick ugliness in it that we blush at and are asham'd to own Now the goodness of every Action consisting in a conformity to its proper Rule and the badness of any Act in a deflection from it It will follow that there is a Rule stamp'd upon the mind of every man according to which he judges one Act good and another evil and that Judgment about good and evil being one and the same in all Parts of the World the Rule must be so too and consequently have the same Author which our very Being has the all-wise God This is that Rule the Roman Orator styl'd Non scripta lex sed nata a Law not written on Tables of Stone or Brass but engraven on the Heart and Conscience of man agreeable to St. Paul's Character of the Gentiles which having not the Law are a Law to themselves Rom. 2.14 15. and do shew the work of the Law written in their Hearts their Consciences also bearing Witness and their thoughts the mean while accusing or excusing one another 'T will also follow that the great Author of this Law must have reserv'd some Rewards and Punishments to secure mens obedience to it It being below the wisdom of any temporal Prince to send his Statutes and Decrees abroad without such Motives to enforce their observance And if these Rewards and Punishments are not immediately dispens'd as I shall after shew there must be another time set apart for that work of Justice 2. That secret joy which good men find upon the doing a vertuous Act is a kind of earnest and anticipation of a future Reward and that considence they have when they suffer upon the Score of Piety and Religion argues an expectation of it Let the good man reflect upon the frame of his mind when he has been doing his duty and hee 'l find every thing there calm and peaceable There is something within him that whispers the soft Eulogies of a well done good and

V. 31. with the great noise of a Trumpet to summon all men to their last Reckoning Would you know the Person of the Judge 'T is that Son of man to whom the Father has committed all Judgment A Person of that Wisdom Act. 17.31 that he sees into the Merits of every Cause of that Justice that he cann't determine wrongfully and of that Authority that from his Sentence there lyes no appeal Would you know the Persons that are to appear before him They are the Quick and Dead all that shall be found alive upon Earth at his coming and all that shall be cloyster'd up in the dark Regions of the Grave At the great Goal-delivery Rev. 20.13 the Sea shall render up the dead that are in it and Death and Hell shall bring their Prisoners to the Bar that they may all receive according to their doings Would you know the Proceedings of that Court They 'l be according to Law the natural Law written in our Hearts and those Positive Laws the Scripture has superadded to them Would you know the Evidence to be produc'd upon every man Rev. 20.12 'T is the Testimony of Conscience which keeps a perfect Diurnal of our several Actions from the beginning to the end of our dayes An Evidence we have no reason to except against because part of our selves and so will never give in a wrong or partial Information An Evidence the Judge will never question because 't is his Minister in every one of us one part of whose Office it is to keep a true Record of all our doings Would you know the Conclusion of all The Righteous shall go into Life Eternal Mat. 25 46. where they cann't fail of the most ravishing Delights being possess'd of him in whose presence are Joyes and at whose right hand are Pleasures and that for evermore The wicked shall go into a place of Torment provided for the Devil and his Angels where the Atheist will meet with late and sad assurances of a Divine Power and Justice the Blasphemer will find what it is to affront the Author of his Being the Prophane and Dissolute will see what an unhappy choice they made when they left the rugged wayes of Vertue and pitch'd upon the broad Paths of Sin pleasant indeed to the Eye and easie to the Traveller but ending at last in a Precipice of unavoidable ruine Knowing therefore the Terrors of the Lord let me perswade all that hear me this day so to live that they may be thought worthy to escape them Whether Persons in Authority that they remembring whose Ministers they are and to whom they are accountable for that Power entrusted to them may be careful to employ it to the Punishment of Wickedness and Vice and to the maintenance of true Religion and Vertue Or other subordinate Persons that they having alwayes before their Eyes the great Account may endeavour to live in a due Reverence to the Majesty on High and a quiet subjection to his Vicegerent on Earth and in common honesty among themselves In a word that we may all of us both in Church and State act suitable to the Rules of our holy Profession to the many weighty Obligations our Religion has laid upon us and especially to the Belief of this great Article of a Judgment to come that so we may finish our Course with joy and then receive the Fruit of our doings even a Crown of Glory God of his infinite mercy grant for his Sons sake Jesus Christ our Lord to whom with the Father and the blessed Spirit be all Honour and Glory World without end FINIS