Selected quad for the lemma: love_n

Word A Word B Word C Word D Occurrence Frequency Band MI MI Band Prominent
love_n charity_n love_v true_a 2,883 5 5.1048 4 false
View all documents for the selected quad

Text snippets containing the quad

ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A42834 The way of happiness represented in its difficulties and incouragements, and cleared from many popular and dangerous mistakes / by Jos. Glanvill ... Glanvill, Joseph, 1636-1680. 1670 (1670) Wing G835; ESTC R23021 46,425 190

There are 2 snippets containing the selected quad. | View lemmatised text

earnestly of the love of Christ and express a mighty love to his name yet this may be too without any real conformity unto him in his Life and Laws The Jews spoke much of Moses in him they believed and in him they trusted Iohn v. 45 His name was a sweet sound to their ears and 't was very pleasant upon their tongues and yet they hated the Spirit of Moses and had no love to those Laws of his which condemned their wicked actions And we may see how many of those love Christ that speak often and affectionately of him by observing how they keep his Commandments John xiv 15 especially those of meekness mercy and universal love Thus imperfect strivers may imploy themselves in the external offices of Religion I have instanced only in Three the like may be said of the rest And to this I add That they may not only exercise themselves in the outward matters of duty but may arrive to some things that are accounted greater heights and are really more and spiritual and refined To instance SECT V. I. THey may have some love to God Goodness and good men The Soul naturally loves beauty and perfection and all mankind apprehend God to be of all Beings the most beautiful and perfect and therefore must needs have an intellectual love for him The reason that that love takes no hold of the passions in wicked men is partly because they are diverted from the thoughts of Him by the objects of sense but chiefly because they consider him as their enemy and therefore can have no complacency or delight in him who they think hath nothing but thoughts of enmity and displeasure against them But if once they come to be perswaded as many times by such false marks as I have recited they are that God is their Father and peculiar Friend that they are his chosen and his darlings whom he loved from eternity and to whom he hath given his Son and his Spirit and will give Himself in a way of the fullest enjoyment Then the Love that before was only an esteem in the understanding doth kindle in the affections by the help of the conceit of Gods loving them so dearly and the passion thus heated runs out even into seraphick and rapturous Devotions while yet all this is but meer animal love excited chie●ly by the love of our selves not of the Divine Perfections And it commonly goes no further then to earnest expressions of extraordinary love to God in our Prayers and Discourses while it appears not in any singular obedience to his Laws or generous and universal love to mankind which are the ways whereby the true Divine Love is exprest for This is the love of God that we keep his Commandments saith the Apostle 1 Iohn v. 3 And as to the other thus If we love one another God dwelleth in us and his love is perfected in us 1 John iv 12 And on the contrary If a man say I love God and hateth his brother he is a lyar John iv 20 Charity then and universal obedience are the true arguments and expressions of our love to God and these suppose a victory over corrupt inclinations and self-will But the other love which ariseth from the conceit of our special dearness to God upon insufficient grounds that goes no further then to some suavities and pleasant fancies within our selves and some passionate complements of the Image we have set up in our imaginations This Love will consist with Hatred and contempt of all that are not like our selves yea and it will produce it those poisonous fruits and vile affections may be incouraged and cherish'd under it So that there may be some love to God in evil men But while self-love is the only motive and the more prevalent passion it signifieth nothing to their advantage And as the imperfect striver may have some love to God so he may to piety and vertue every man loves these in Idea The vilest sinner takes part in his affections with the vertuous and religious when he seeth them described in History or Romance and hath a detestation for those who are character'd as impious and immoral Vertue is a great Beauty and the mind is taken with it while 't is consider'd at a distance and our corrupt interests and sensual affections are not concern'd 'T is These that recommend sin to our love and choice while the mind stands on the side of vertue with that we serve the Law of God but with the flesh the law of sin Rom. vii 25 So that most wicked men that are not degenerated into meer Brutes have this mental and intellectual love to goodness That is they approve and like it in their minds and would practise it also were it not for the prevalent biass of flesh and sense And hence it will follow likewise That the same may approve and respect good men They may reverence and love them for their Charity Humility Iustice and Temperance though themselves are persons of the contrary Character yet they may have a great and ardent aff●ction for those that are eminently pious and devout though they are very irreligious themselves The conscience of vertue and of the excellency of Religion may produce this in the meer natural man who is under the dominion of vile inclinations and affections and therefore this is no good mark of godliness neither Our love to God and goodness will not stead us except it be prevalent And as the love described may be natural and a meer animal man may arrive unto it So II. He may to an extraordinary zeal for the same things that are the objects of his love Hot tempers are eager where they take either kindness or displeasure The natural man that hath an animal love to Religion may be violent in speaking and acting for things appertaining to it If his temper be devotional and passionate he becomes a mighty zealot and fills all places with the fame of his godliness His natural fire moves this way and makes a mighty blaze Ahab was very zealous and 't is like 't was not only his own interest that made him so 2 Kings x. 16 The Pharis●es were zealous people and certainly their zeal was not always personated and put on but real Though they were Hypocrites yet they were such as in many things deceived themselves as well as others They were zealous for their Traditions and they believ'd 't was their duty to be so St. Paul while a persecutor was zealous against the Disciples and he thought he ought to do many things against that name And our Saviour foretells that those zealous murderers that should kill his Saints should think They did God good service in it John xvi 2 So that all the zeal of the natural man is not feigning and acting of a part nor hath it always evil objects The Pharisees were zealous against the wickedness of the Publicans and Sinners Zeal then and that in earnest for Religion may be in
the Habits or Natural Inclinations He is contented with other things that make a more glorious shew though they signifie less and perhaps despiseth these under the notion of Morality and so presuming that he is a Saint too soon he never comes to be one at all such are the seekers that shall not be able to enter Their seeking imports some striving but 't is such as though it be specious yet it is imperfect and will not succeed And hence the THIRD Proposition ariseth that I proposed to discourse CHAP. III. THE danger of mistaking in the Marks Measures of Godliness Instances of the meer Animal Religion how far it may go in Faith in Prayer and in Endeavour ● discoursed in several Particulars and therein the whole mystery of the Modern Pharisaick Godliness is discovered and shewn to be short and insufficient Objections against the severity of the Discourse answered SECT I. III. THat there is a sort of striving that will not procure an entrance implyed in these words For many will seek to enter in and shall not be able 'T is a dangerous thing to be flattered into a false peace and to take up with imperfect Godliness to reconcile the hopes of Heaven to our beloved sins and to judge our conditions safe upon insufficient grounds This multitudes do and 't is the great danger of our days Men cannot be contented without doing something in Religion but they are contented with a little And then they reckon themselves godly before they are vertuous and take themselves to be Saints upon such things as will not distinguish a good man from a bad We seek after Marks of Godliness and would be glad to know how we might try our state The thing is of great importance and if the Signs we judge by are either false or imperfect we are deceived to our undoing Meer Speculative mistakes about Opinions do no great hurt but errour in the Marks and Measures of Religion is deadly Now there are sundry things commonly taken for signs of Godliness which though they are something yet they are not enough They are hopeful for beginnings but nothing worth when they are our end and rest They are a kind of seeking and imperfect striving but not such as overcometh the difficulties of the way or will procure us an entrance at the Gate Therefore to disable the flattering insufficient marks of Godliness I shall discover in pursuance of the Third Proposition How far a man may strive in the exercises of Religion and yet● be found at last among those seekers that shall not be able to enter And though I have intimated something of this in the general before yet I shall now more particularly shew it in the Instances that follow And in these I shall discover a Religion that may be called Animal to which the Natural man may attain SECT II. 1. A Man may believe the Truths of the Gospel and assent heartily to all the Articles of the Creed and if he proc●eds not he is no further by this than the faith of Devils Jam. ii 19 2. He may go on and have a great thirst to be more acquainted with Truth He may seek it diligently in Scripture and Sermons and good Books and knowing Company And yet do this by the motion of no higher principle than an inbred curiosity and desire of knowledge and many times this earnestness after Truth proceeds from a proud affectation to be wiser than our Neighbours that we may pity their darkness or the itch of a disputing humour that we may out talk them or a design to carry on or make a party that we may be called Rabbi or serve an Interest And the zeal for Truth that is set on work by such motives is a spark of that fire that is from beneath 'T is dangerous to a mans self and to the publick weal of the Church and mankind But the man proceeds and is 3. Very much concern'd to defend and propagate his Faith and the Pharisees were so in relation to theirs Mat. xxiii 15 and so have been many Professors of all the Religions that are or ever were Men naturully love their own Tenents and are ambitious to mould others judgments according to theirs There is glory in being an instructer of other men and turning them to our ways and opinions so that here is nothing yet above Nature nothing but what may be found in many that seek and are shut out But 4. Faith works greater effects than these and Men offer themselves to Martyrdom for it This one would think should be the greatest height and an argument that all the difficulties of the way are overcome by one that is so resolved and that the Gate cannot but be opened to him And so no doubt it is when all things else are sutable But otherwise these consequences by no means follow St. Paul supposeth that a man may give his body to be burned and not have Charity without which his Martyrdom will not profit 1 Cor. xiii For one to deny his Religion or what he believes to be certain and of greatest consequence is dishonourable and base and some out of principles of meer natural bravery will die rather than they will do it and yet upon other accounts be far enough from being heroically virtuous Besides the desire of the glory of Martyrdom and Saintship after it may in some be stronger than the terrors of Death and we see frequently that men will sacrifice their lives to their honour and reputation yea to the most contemptible shaddows of it And there is no passion in us so weak no lust so impotent but hath in many instances prevail'd over the fear of dying Every Appetite hath had its Martyrs and all Religions theirs and though a man give his body to be burnt for the best and have not Charity viz. Prevalent love to God and Men it will not signifie So that Martyrdom is no infallible mark nor will it avail any thing except sincere endeavour to overcome the greater difficulties have gone before it Thus far Faith may go without effect and yet one step further 5. Men may confidently rely upon Christ for salvation and be firmly perswaded that he hath justified and will make them happy They may appropriate him to themselves and be pleased mightily in the opinion of his being theirs And yet notwithstanding this confidence may be in the number of those seekers that shall not enter For Christ is the Author of eternal life only to those that obey him Heb. v. 9 and to obey him is to strive vigorously and constantly to overcome all our sinful inclinations and habits And those that trust he will save them though they have never seriously set about this work deceive themselves by vain presumption and in effect say that he will dissolve or dispense with his Laws in their favour For he requires us to deny our selves Mar. viii 34 To mortifie the body Rom. viii 13 To love enemies Mat. v. 44