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
A69226	A confutation of atheisme by Iohn Doue Doctor of Diuinitie. The contents are to be seene in the page following	Dove, John, 1560 or 61-1618.	1605 (1605)	STC 7078; ESTC S110103	85,385	102

his wickednes to be a monster of men a very slaunder and reproch to mankinde as Nero was that slewe his Mother his Master and him selfe when he hath committed any haynous crime he doth in his conscience see that God doth behold it that God doth pursue him that God wil worke reuenge although there be no witnes to accuse him no humane power aboue him to execute iustice vpon him I will not dwell vpon many exāples neither wil I instance in Adam which as soone as euer he had eaten the Apple hid him selfe from the presence of God in the thicket in Herod which when he had beheaded Iohn the Baptist wrongfully did think y t he was haunted by Iohn the Baptist his ghost saying of Christ surely this is Iohn risen from the dead nor in Cain which but intending to murther his brother watched a time when he was in the field out of the sight of his parents I will not alleadge the authoritye of the Prophet which saith Impius fugit nemine persequente The wicked man flyeth when no man doth pursue him And of the Apostle which saith The Gentils which haue not the lawe written meaning the Bible yet haue by nature the effect of the lawe of God written in their hearts their conscience bearing witnes and their thoughts accusing or excusing one an other because they thinke the Bible to be a partiall iudge and no way competent betweene them vs and therefore I will alleadge one or two examples out of indifferent Authors tending to the same purpose Tully pleading for a man which was accused as a Parecide or one which had murthered his owne father alleageth this as an especiall proofe of his innocencie that in the whole course of his behauiour after his father was slayne nothing could be obserued in him which did sauour of a troubled conscience And for the better cleering of Sextus Roscius whose cause was then in hand he alleageth a former example of a father and his sonne which in their trauayle tooke vp their lodging and after supper lay together in one bed the morowe after the master of the house comming by chance into the chamber found the father strangled in his bed and the sonne sleping by his side when the matter was examined by the Iudges the sonne was acquitted by the equitye of the lawe as a man innocent because it was then held and by them so adiudged to be a matter impossible that he should in so short a time haue slept if so be that he had committed murther A man saith Tully which hath slayne his father shall feele a thousand vexations and furyes of hell tormenting his conscience according to that saying of the wise man A good conscience is a continuall feaste but non est pax impijs no inward peace no quietnes of conscience with such men as are notoriouslye wicked A man I say that hath committed any crying sinne shall betraye him selfe by the working of his owne conscience it will not suffer him to take his bodily rest it will alter his very face and countenance as the Poet saith Heu quam difficile est crimen non prodere vult● Oh how hard a thing is it for a man to keep his countenance not to blush which hath committed an offence The Lord said to Cain after he had committed murther Why is thy countenance cast downe such a man feareth the wagging of euery leaf and the flying of euery bird An obnox ous man watching is like to a phrensie man sleeping for the one resteth not sleeping and the other resteth not waking he cannot sit still hee cannot lye stil he cannot stand still nor abide long in any place Caligula the tyrant was afeard of euery blast Nero when he had massacred the christiās put St. Paul to the sword St. Peter to the gibbet was so terryfied by apparitions as he thought of S t Paul and St. Peter which appeared at his bedside in a dreame and after he had put his mother Agrippina to death he was so terrified in his conscience that he knewe not where to bestowe him selfe at the end for very greife of minde he ran into a priuye and there stabbed himselfe That I may come to religion Tully saith Sunt qui negant Deos procurationem habere rerum humanarum quorum sententia falsa est quoniam sic omnis religio inanis esset Religion sheweth there is a God for if there were no God then could there be no religion But euery mans soule naturally hath somtimes a feeling of religion although he dispise God and religion neuer so much This appeareth by the very heathens them selues which be they neuer so rude and barbarous and depriued of the knowledge of God yet doe make vnto themselues idols euen of their owne accorde as Mr. Caluin verye well obserueth Dei conceptionis apud Ethnicos saith he idolotria satis est argumenti quum lapidem potius quam nullum deum colant y e mansown conceit doth naturally leade him to knowe there is a God the verye idolatrie of the heathens is a sufficient proofe which chose rather to worship a stone then no God at all And as Statius saith Primus in orbe Deos fecit timor as soone as men be in danger and extremitye be they neuer so vngodly yet they erect Altars carue Images flye to thē for succour shewing that in their owne naturall iudgement which they haue by the light and instinct of nature there is one higher then them selues one whose power is aboue the power of man to whome they ought to flye vnto for help and deliuery out of trouble and who is that but God Nay witnes in this point the Atheistes them selues that there is a God for in their extremitye of greife they crye out ô God It is an olde and true Prouerb Qui nescit orare transeat mare if a man knowe not how to serue God let him sayle vpon the sea and it will make him to serue God When the Lord sent a great winde that the Ship was like to be rent the Mariners were afeard euery one cryed vnto his God they said vnto Ionas Thou sleeper arise and call vpon thy God if so be that God will think vpon vs that we perish not and as the Text saith Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly and offered sacrifices vnto him and made vowes And for this cause namely that men by the instinct of nature doe incline to religion and a man is as much distinguished from a beast by his feeling of religion as by his reasonable soule After the floud Mercurius Trismegistus and Menna prescribed lawes and rules of religion to the Aegiptians Melissus to the Cratians Ianus to the Latines Numa Pompilius to the Romanes Orpheus and Cadmus to the Grecians aswell as Moses and Aaron to the Hebrues the difference onely this that the Hebrues were in the right way al the rest

the wordes grauitye in the sentences acutenes in the arguments rare inuention and great choyce in the matter a scholler-like methode obserued in the forme of writing tropes grammer figures exornations of rhethoricke all thinges proued according to the rules of logicke and yet notwithstanding all these a vulgar and familiar kinde of speech is vsed For God him selfe the Angelles the Prophets speaking vnto men doe accommodate them selues to our capacitye to the vnderstanding of plow-men of shepherds of women of children that the conuersion of the world may not be ascribed vnto mans wisdome or humane eloquence or any other thing that is in man The holy Ghost doth not write like Demosthenes that it may be said Where is the Scribe the subtil disputer c. he hath made their wisdome foolishnes But St. Peter was able to perswade more with one Sermon then all the nations of the worlde with their Orations more in an hower then they in their life more by his simple kind of style thē they by al their eloquēce Magnus Ciprianus Orator sed maior Petrus Piscator Ille misit sagenam in mare piscatus est orbem Non per oratorem Deus lucratus est piscatorem sed per piscatorem oratorem Saith a learned Father St. Ciprian was a great Orator but St. Peter a greater Fisher He cast his nette into the sea and caught the worlde God did not conuert the Fisher-man by the Orator but he conuerted the Orator by the Fisher St. Paul when he writ to the Romans writ learnedly and profoundly because he writ to men that bore high mindes and did expect learning at his handes he writ to the Corinthians after an other manner as vnto men not of so great capacitye when he writ to the Galathians he altered his style vnto the Hebrues which had a preiudice of his person in such sort that they might not suspecte the Epistle to come from him St. Iohn writing to a Ladye writ in a lowely manner and in such sort as he might best befit a woman There is the discretion and wisdome of the holy Ghost which in men is neuer seene The fourth proofe that the Bible is the worde of God is euen God his selfe which neuer would suffer that book to be prophaned For Ptolomye marueyling why no Poets nor Historiographers writ concerning these misteryes of Faith answer was made vnto him by Demetrius Phalerius that it was the holy Scripture therefore that all prophane writers which went about to write of the same were presently plagued of God from heauen and so caused to desist and relinquish their worke which they tooke in hand that Theopompus because he went about to illustrate some parte of the Scripture in the Greeke tongue was so troubled in his minde that he could proceed no farther And that Theodorus a maker of Tragoedyes because he endeuoured to insert some parte of the Scriptures into his Tragoedye was presently stroken blind like Elymas the Sorcerer of whome we read in the story of the Gospell Fiftly the argument followeth well which Necodemus vseth to confirme the doctrine of our Sauiour Christ Master saith he I knowe thou art a teacher come from God for no man can doe these thinges which thou dost vnlesse God were with him And therefore our Sauiour saith in an other place Operibus credite Beleeue the workes And therefore against Alexander the great and Domitian the Tyrant which would haue beene accounted Gods S t Ambrose vseth this arguement Doe these and these thinges and then I will confesse that ye are Gods When Canutus the King of Danes had conquered England and sitting in his Chayre by the sea side had boasted the like of him selfe that he was a God It was said vnto him Sit in this place one houre longer and I will confesle you are a God but if you cannot sit vntill the full tyde and commaund the waters that they shall not carye you away you are no God But the Scriptures haue beene confirmed to be the worde of God by such miracles as no power of man or deuill could effecte The birth of our Sauiour Christ was confirmed by the appearing of a Starre which troubled all the Star gazers of the worlde The resurrection of our Sauiour by an Eclipse which troubled the great Astrologians of the world the healing of a blinde man with claye made of dust and spittle troubled Galen the great Phisition of the worlde But as our Sauiour confirmed his doctrine by miracles as Moses confirmed his ambassage to come from God by making Serpents So the Apostles confirmed their Sermons which they Preached and doctrine which they left behinde them in writing to be the worde of God by casting out deuils raysing vp the dead healing diseases c. Sixtly the antquitye of the Bible proueth it selfe to be Gods worde for as God is antiquus dierum the ancient of dayes because he was before all other so the bookes of Moses are more ancient then all other brokes Iosephus maketh mentiō of certaine Pillars in which some thinges were written by the sonnes of Seth before the Floud whereof one he saith remayned to be seene in Syria in his owne time But be it so these letters were but Hyeroglyphicall like to the letters of the Egiptians not Abedarye letters but shapes and Images of beastes not written in bookes but engrauen in stone But as for the Abedarye letters that is Grammaticall letters whereby we write wordes and sentences they were not deuised before Moses deliuered them to the Hebrues from whence the Phaenicians learned them and the Greekes receiued them from the Phaenicians and the Romans did learne to write of the Grecians And Moses was more ancient then Cadmus which brought letters into Greece or any other which broght them into other places as Eusebius doth plainly proue Now forasmuch as no lawes no precepts of life no Chronicles no rules cōcerning the worship of God no contract betwene man man no antiquitye can be kept in memorye but by writing Therefore it was necessary for the true knowledge worship of God that such a booke should be written wherein God might be knowne and in what sorte he would be worshiped But there is no booke of that nature besides the Bible which is of any antiquitye neither the Alcaron of the Turkes nor the Talmod of the Iewes witnes the Talmod and Alcaron them selues nor any other booke of religion but they were written long since the Bible Religion cannot be newe as God him selfe cannot be newe therefore that is onely the true religion which is the ancientest of all and it is impossible to knowe or iudge of the antiquitye of religion but by the antiquitie of the bookes and recordes wherein the precepts of Religion are deliuered and set downe and againe it is impossible to know what is religion or how God is to be worshiped but by bookes wherein are contained the rules of his