Selected quad for the lemma: love_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
love_n	john_n	love_v	true_a	4,911	5	5.7716	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52431	Reason and religion, or, The grounds and measures of devotion, consider'd from the nature of God, and the nature of man in several contemplations : with exercises of devotion applied to every contemplation / by John Norris ...	Norris, John, 1657-1711.	1689 (1689)	Wing N1265; ESTC R19865	86,428	282

than what Reason will conclude necessary For God being the very Essence of Being or Being it self and therefore indeterminate in Being and therefore also in Perfection it follows that he has not only all Kinds of Perfection but that every Kind of Perfection which he has must needs be as excellent as is possible in that Kind Thus for instance The Beauty that is in God must be as perfect as 't is possible for Beauty to be and so the Harmony that is in God must be as perfect as 't is possible for Harmony to be That is in other words The Beauty which is in God must be Beauty it self and the Harmony which is in God must be Harmony it self IX But now 't is impossible that things should exist in the Creature after such a rate as this As they are not Being it self but Particular Beings so every Perfection that is in them is not that Perfection it self in the Abstract but only Particular Derivative and Concrete They are Beautiful and Harmonical but not Beauty it self not Harmony it self Beauty it self can no more be Communicated to the Creature than Being it self can All the Essences and Abstract Natures of things are in God or rather the very same with God as I shall shew when I consider the Omniscience of God and they are but One they cannot be Communicated or Multiplied Their Images indeed may but they themselves cannot for they are the same with God. There may be many Beautifuls or Particular Beauties but there can be but one Beauty it self X. The Beauty therefore that is in the Creature is only a slender Shadow or Reflection of that Beauty it self which is in God who is the Idea or Essence of Beauty And as it is Derivative from it so it exists continually by it and in it and is every way as much depending upon it as the Reflexion in the Glass is upon the Face whose Reflexion it is And as Beauty has a more excellent way of existence in the Face it self than in the Glass so has it a far more perfect way of subsisting in God than in any Face or thing whatsoever For all things are Reflections from him and the whole Creation is but as 't were one great Mirrour or Glass of the Divinity XI I end this Contemplation with a very remarkable passage to this purpose out of St. Austin Tu ergo Domine fecisti ea qui pulcher es pulchra sunt enim Qui bonus es bona sunt enim Qui es sunt enim Nec ita pulchra sunt nec ita bona sunt nec ita sunt sicut tu Conditor eorum cui Comparata nec pulchra sunt nec bona sunt nec sunt Thou therefore O Lord hast made these things who art fair for they are fair Who art good for they are good Who Art for they are But neither are they so fair neither are they so good neither are they so as Thou their Maker in Comparison of whom they are neither fair nor good nor are they at all The Vse of this to Devotion THis may be very much improv'd to the advantage of Devotion For the great Let to Devotion is our Love of Particular and Sensible good 'T is a Charge that may be fasten'd upon the best of us all more or less that we are Lovers of Pleasure more than Lovers of God. And the Love of Pleasure Naturally alienates us from the Love of God. And therefore says St. Iohn Love not the world neither the things that are in the world And to shew the great inconsistency that is between the Love of the World and the Love of God he further tells us If any man love the world the love of the Father is not in him But now if we could be but once perswaded that all the Perfections of Particular Beings exist in God and not only so but after a more excellent manner than they do in Particular Beings themselves we should certainly be very much taken off from the love of Particular and Sensible good we should not be such gross Idolaters as we are in adoring Created Beauty but should adhere to God with more Unity and intireness of Affection Sure I am that there is great Reason we should do so when we consider that let the good of the Creature be never so Charming the very same we may find in God with greater Perfection We can propose nothing to our selves in the Creature but what God has more perfectly and more abundantly To what purpose then should we go off from him since Change it self can give us no variety and we can only Court a New Object not find a New Happiness The Aspiration NO My Fair Delight I will never be drawn off from the Love of thee by the Charms of any of thy Creatures Thou art not only infinitely more excellent than they but hast their very excellencies in a more perfect manner than they have or can have What Temptation then can I have to leave thee No O my Fairest I want Temptation to recommend my Love to thee 'T is too easie and too cheap a fidelity to adhere to thee My first Love when by Changing I can gain no more Thou O Soveraign Fair hast adorn'd thy Creation with a Tincture of thy Brightness thou hast shin'd upon it with the light of thy Divine Glory and hast pour'd forth thy Beauty upon all thy Works But they are not Fair as Thou art Fair their Beauty is not as Thy Beauty Thou art Fairer O my God than the Children of Men or the Orders of Angels and the Arrows of thy Love are Sharper than theirs They are indeed My God thy Arrows are very Sharp and were we not too securely fenc'd about with our thick Houses of Clay would wound us deeper than the Keenest Charms of any Created Beauties But these every day Wound us while we stand proof against thy Divine Artillery because these are Sensible and thine only Intelligible these are visible to our Eyes thine only to our Minds which we seldome convert to the Contemplation of thy Beauties But O thou Infinite Fair did we but once taste and see did we but Contemplate thy Original Beauty as we do those faint Images of it that are reflected up and down among our fellow Creatures as thy Charms infinitely exceed theirs so would our Love to thee be Wonderful passing the Love of Women Contemplation IV. Of the Attributes of God in general particularly of the Vnity of God which is proved from his Idea I. COncerning the Attributes of God in general I have no more to offer than what is commonly taught in the Schools from which I find no reason to vary and of which this I think is the summ and substance first That the Essence of God is in it self one only general simple and intire Perfection and that therefore the Divine Attributes are not to be consider'd as Accidents really distinct from the Divine Essence and if

would derive an Obligation of gratitude upon Children toward their Parents from their receiving their Being from them because there is no kindness here design'd to those Persons who in the Event perhaps are profited but before were not so much as known yet our case is quite otherwise as to our receiving our Being from the Father of Spirits For he both knew whom he was to oblige when he gave us Being and intended it as a kindness to us having no Interest of his own to promote by it Which are the two Qualifications required by Seneca in his Book De Beneficiis to make up the Nature of such a Benefit as shall lay an Obligation upon the Receiver XIII Now both these Requisites being eminently found in God it follows that his Kindness in giving us Being receives its Estimate from the value and excellency of the thing bestow'd which cannot appear little if we consider that such was the Dignity and Excellency of Humane Nature that it occasion'd deliberation in Heaven and was thought worthy of the Council of the Trinity If we consider that Man is the most Noble part of all the visible Creation the Abstract and Compendium of the Universe That he is a Creature form'd after the Image of the Great God endow'd with an excellent and immortal Spirit and resembling his Maker as in other respects so in some measure in this that he can and must needs be happy both in the direct Operations of his Nature and in the reflexive acts of Contemplation upon the dignity of his Essence To give therefore Being to such an accomplish'd Creature as this is ipso facto without Consideration of any further design a very signal act of Love and Beneficence XIV Another very signal instance of the Divine Goodness to Man is our Preservation whether we consider it in the more Metaphysical way of the Schools as that uninterrupted Influx which they call Continued Creation whereon we depend as Essentially as the Image in the Glass does upon the Object or whether we consider it after the more popular acceptation as it denotes the Conduct and Superintendency of God's Providence whereby he so disposes of the Events and Issues of things as either to keep off from us what would incommode our welfare or to work out a more important good from those evils which he suffers to befal us XV. And here it would be matter of wonderful curiosity and pleasing astonishment could we but discern from end to end those manifold turns and fetches those Stratagems and Intrigues that Plot of Providence which is engaged for our preservation through the various Occurencies of Life Could we but see what a Labyrinth what a Maze we tread and what reason there is for every turning were but our Eyes open'd as the Young mans were at the Prayer of Elisha to see the Bright Host of Auxiliary Spirits that incamp about us to see with what care and concern the good Angels contest on our behalf against the Powers of Darkness as the Guardian Angel of the Jews did against the Prince of Persia and how many dangers both Gostly and Bodily we escape through their Protection could we I say see all this But we may be content to want the curiosity so long as we enjoy the Benefit and rest satisfi'd with what the Psalmist assures us of in general that the Angel of the Lord tarrieth about them that fear him and delivereth them XVI Another considerable instance of the Divine Goodness to Man is seen in the Provision made by Providence for the necessaries and Conveniences of Life such as Food and Raiment and the like This was first exemplifi'd in the Order of the Creation wherein 't is to be observed that the Creation of Man was reserved for the work of the Sixth day till the World was both Created and Furnish'd for his reception till the Heavenly bodys were prepared to guide him by their Light and the Earth to feed him with her Fruits and then God brings in Man into the World like a Noble guest to a Table richly spread and set out with Delicacys XVII I dare not heighten this consideration so far as some do who affirm all things to have been made meerly for the use of Man. For although as 't is well noted by the French Philosopher upon a moral account it be of good use to say that God made all things for our sakes it being a consideration that would serve to excite in us a greater Love and Gratitude towards him and although in some corrected Sense it be true in as much as we may make use of all things to some good purpose or other either as Objects to employ our Philosophy upon or as Occasions to Magnifie the goodness and Power of our Creator yet to say that all things were so precisely made for us as to exclude all other purposes besides that 't is too boldly to determin concerning the Ends of God and to indulge a fond opinion of our selves 't is also plainly absurd and unphilosophical there being questionless many things in the World so far from affording any real use to Man that they never have been or shall be so much as seen or understood by him XVIII However thus far we may venture to determin and more we need not require that God had a special regard to Man in the Creation of the World whom he has constituted Lord of the inferiour part of it that as the Psalmist says he cover'd the Heavens with Clouds and prepared Rain for the Earth and made the Grass to grow upon the Mountains and Herbs for the use of Man. XIX But besides this general and Primary designation of things for the use of Man there is a more Particular and Seconday work of Providence to be observ'd in the so managing and Ordering of Affairs that every Man may have a tolerable Portion of the good things of this Life And this is effected not by leaving all things in Common or giving every Man a right to every thing for this would be of pernicious consequence as tending both to the perpetual disturbance of the Public Peace and to the utter neglect and Disimprovement of Nature but by the limits and inclosures of Property whereby care is taken that every Man shall either have somthing of his own or be maintain'd by the Provisions of those that have So that some way or other God provides for every member of this his great Family and though he does not always at our desire bring Quails and fill us with the Bread of Heaven yet he furnishes every one that travels in this Wilderness with a Viaticum sufficient to carry him through his Journey and though he does not grant him his own wish yet he grants him that of a Wiser Man and feeds him with food convenient for him XX. But these are but Prefatory Favours Dawnings of goodness and little Essays of the Divine Love if Compared with those