Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
religion_n	false_a	true_a	worship_n	4,780	5	7.8086	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A39675	Pneumatologia, a treatise of the soul of man wherein the divine original, excellent and immortal nature of the soul are opened, its love and inclination to the body, with the necessity of its separation from it, considered and improved, the existence, operations, and states of separated souls, both in Heaven and Hell, immediately after death, asserted, discussed, and variously applyed, divers knotty and difficult questions about departed souls, both philosophical, and theological, stated and determined, the invaluable preciousness of humane souls, and the various artifices of Satan (their professed enemy) to destroy them, discovered, and the great duty and interest of all men, seasonable and heartily to comply with the most great and gracious design of the Father, Son, and Spirit, for the salvation of their souls, argued and pressed / by John Flavel ...	Flavel, John, 1630?-1691.	1685 (1685)	Wing F1176; ESTC R5953	379,180	504

most dangerous instruments the Devil can imploy to the ruine and extirpation of true Godliness Such a Zealot was Paul in his unregenerate state 3. Nothing is more common than to find men hot and zealous against false Worship whilst their hearts are as cold as a stone in the Vitals and Essentials of true Religion Many can dispute warmly against Adoration of Images praying to Angels and Saints departed who all the while are like those dead Images which others worship Iehu was a Zealot against Idolatry and yet the vital power of true Godliness was a stranger to his Soul 2 Kings 10.15 16. The Pharisees spared no pains to make a Proselyte yet all the while were the Children of the Devil themselves Matt. 23.15 This is a sad case yet what more common The Lord open the eyes of these men and convince them in season that their Zeal runs in the wrong Chanel and spends it self upon things which shall never profit them O if they were but as much concerned to promote the love to God and life of Godliness in themselves and others as they are about some external accidents and appendages of Religion what blessings would they be to the World and what evidence would they have of their own sincerity The twelfth way to Hell opened XII The twelfth way to Hell in which many Souls are carried on smoothly and securely to their own destruction is the way of meer Civility and moral Honesty wherein men rest as in a safe state never doubting but a civil life will produce and issue into an happy death Moral honesty is a lovely thing and greatly tends to the peace and order of the World but it is not saving Grace nor gives any man a good Title to Christ and Salvation Indeed there can be no Grace in that Soul in which Civility and moral Honesty is not found but this may be found in thousands that have no Grace That which ruines mens Souls is not the exercise of moral Vertues but their reliance upon them they use their Morality as a shield to secure their Consciences from the convictions of the Word which would shew them their sinful and miserable state by Nature Thus the Pharisee Luke 18.11 12. God I thank thee that I am not as other men are extortioners unjust adulterers or even as this Publican he blesseth himself in the conceits of his own safety and happiness Let debauched and prophane persons look to it I am well enough though alas poor man his being less evil at best could but procure him a cooler Hell or a milder flame This was the case of the young Man Matt. 19.20 and like a young man indeed he reasons He summs up all the stock of his civil life and thinks it strange if that be not enough to make a purchace of eternal life What lack I yet Alas poor Soul every thing necessary to Salvation the very first stone was not laid when he thought the building was finished and this is the case of multitudes both young and old and that which greatly confirms and settles them in this their dangerous security is the general indistinct Doctrine of some who pretend to be Guides to the Souls of others the scope of whose Ministry aims at no higher mark than to civilize the people and press moral Duties upon them as if this were all that were necessary to Salvation nay 't is well if some do not industriously pull down the pale of distinction betwixt Morality and Regeneration and tell the world in plain English That there is no reason to put a difference betwixt men that are baptized and live morally honest and those that have saving Grace and they that do so are only a few men who are highly conceited of themselves and censorious of all others whom they please to vote formal and moral This indeed is the way to fix them where they are if Christ had not taken another method with Nicodemus and his Ministers had not pressed the necessity of Regeneration and the insufficiency of moral honesty to Salvation how thin had the number of true Converts been though at most they are but an handful in comparison of the unregenerate O that God would bless what follows to undeceive and save some poor Soul out of this dangerous snare of the Devil The twelfth way to Damnation barred by three Considerations 1. Blind not your selves with the lustre of your own moral Vertues a life smoothly drawn with Civility through the World for though it must be acknowledged there is a loveliness and attracting sweetness in Morality and Civility yet these things rather respect Earth than Heaven and are designed for the conservation of the order and peace of this World not for your Salvation and Title to the World to come Without Justice and Truth Kingdoms and Common-wealths would become Mountains of prey and Dens of robbery Where there is no trust there can be no traffick and where there is no truth there can be no trust Civility is the very Basis of humane Society a world of good accrues to men by it and abundance of mischief is prevented by it but it never gave any man an interest in Christ or a title to Salvation The Romans and Lacedemonians who perished in the darkness of Heathenism excelled in Morality there is nothing of Christ or Regeneration in these things how much of excellency soever be ascribed to them Paul the Pharisee was a blameless person touching the Law and yet at the same time not only utterly ignorant of Christ but a bitter Enemy to him and all that were his Till you can find another way to Heaven than by Regeneration Repentance and Faith never lean upon such a deceitful and rotten prop as meer Civility is 2. Civilized Nature is unsanctified Nature still and without Sanctification there is no Salvation Heb. 12.14 Civility adorneth Nature but doth not change it Moral Vertues are so many sweet flowers strawed over a dead Corps which hide the loathsomness of it but inspire not life into it Morality hides and covers Abscondit non abscindit vitia Lactant. but never mortifies nor cures the corruptions of Nature and mortified they must be or you cannot be saved Take the best Nature in the world and let it be adorned with all the ornaments of Morality which they call Homilitical Vertues and add to these all the common gifts of the Spirit which are for assistance and ministry yet all this cannot secure that Soul from Hell or be the ground-work for a just claim to any promise of Salvation all this is but Nature improved not regenerated Morality is neither produced as saving Grace is nor works such effects as Grace worketh There are no pangs of Repentance introducing it it may cost many an aking head but no asking heart for sin no such distressed out-cries as that Acts 2.37 Men and Brethren what shall we do Nor doth it produce such humility self-abasement heavenly tempers and tendencies of Soul

in point of knowledg concerning that great Question What is God Thus no man hath seen or can see God in this World Even Moses himself could not so see God Exod. 33.18 19 20. But the Spirits of the just made perfect have satisfying apprehensions though no perfect comprehensions of the Divine Essence 2. In this light they clearly discern those deep mysteries which they here rackt their thoughts upon but could not penetrate in this life There they will know what is to be known of the Union of the two Natures in the wonderful person of our Emmanuel and the manner of the subsistence of each person in the most glorious and undivided God-head Iohn 14.20 The several Attributes of God will then be unfolded to our understandings for his Essence and Attributes are not two things Rev. 4.8 9 10 11. O what ravishing sight will this be The mysteries of the Scriptures and providences of God will be no mysteries then Curiosity it self will be there satisfied 3. This immediate knowledge and sight of God face to face will be infinitely more sweet and ravishingly plasant than any or all the views we had of him here by Faith ever were or possibly could be There is a joy unspeakable in the visions of Faith 1 Pet. 1.8 But it comes far short of the facial vision Who can tell the full importance of that one Text Rev. 22.4 The Throne of the Lamb shall be in it and they shall see his face O for such a Heaven said one as but to look through the key-hole and get one glimpse of that lovely face Earth cannot bear such sights This light overwhelms and confounds the inadequate faculties of imperfect and embodied Souls But there it is lumen confortans a chearing strengthening pleasant light as the light of the Morning star Rev. 2.28 4. This sight of God will be appropriative and applicative We there see him as our own God and portion Without a clear interest in him the sight of him could never be beatifical and satisfying Sight without interest is like the light of a gloworm light without heat All doubts and objections are solv'd and answer'd in the first sight of this blessed face 5. To conclude This perfect and most comfortable knowledge is attained without labour by the separate Soul Here every degree of knowledge was with the price of much pains How many weary hours and aking heads did the acquisition of a little knowledg stand us in But then it flows in upon the Soul easily It was the Saying of a great Vsurer I once took much pains to get a little meaning the first stock but now I get much without any pains at all O lovely state of separation That Body which interposed clog'd and clouded the willing and capable Spirit being drawn aside as a Curtain by death the light of glory now shines upon it and round about it without any in●erception or lett PROP. XI The separated Souls of the Iust do live in a more high and excellent way of Communion with God in his Temple-worship in Heaven than ever they did in the sweetest Gospel-Ordinances and most Spiritual Duties in which they conversed with him here on Earth THAT Saints on earth have real Communion with God and that this Communion is the joy of their hearts the life of their life and their relief under all pressures and troubles in this life is a truth so firmly sealed upon their hearts by experience as well as clearly revealed in the Word that there can remain no doubt about it among those that have any saving acquaintance with the life and power of Religion This Communion with God is of that precious value with Believers that it unspeakably endears all those Duties and Ordinances to them which as means and instruments are useful to maintain it At death the people of God part with all those precious Ordinances and Duties they being only designed for and fitted to the present state of imperfection Eph. 4.12 13. but not at all to their loss no more than it is to his that loses the light of his candle by the rising of the Sun A Candle a Star is comfortable in the Night but useless when the Sun is up and in it's meridian Glory Christian Pray much hear much and drive as profitable a trade as thou canst among the Ordinances of God and duties of Religion For the time is at hand that you shall serve and wait on God no more this way But yet think not your Souls shall be discharged from all Worship and Service of God when you dye No you will find Heaven to be a Temple built for worship and the worship there to be much transcendent to all that in which you were here employ'd The Sanctuary was a pattern of Heaven in this very respect Heb. 9.23 And on this very account it is called Sion in my Text and the heavenly Ierusalem as denoting a Church-state and the spiritual Worship there performed by the Spirits of just men made perfect Some help we may have to understand the nature thereof by comparing it with that Worship and Service which we perform to God here in this state of imperfection and by considering the agreements and disagreements betwixt them In this they agree that the worship above and below are both addressed and directed to one and the same Object Father Son and Spirit all centers and terminates in God They also agree in the general quality and common Nature they are both spiritual Worship But there are divers remarkable differences betwixt the one and other as will be manifest in the following collation 1. All our Worship on Earth is performed and transacted by Faith as the instrument and mean thereof Heb. 11.6 He that cometh to God must believe c. In Heaven Faith ceaseth and sight takes place of it 1 Cor. 5.7 There we see what here we only believe There are now before us Ordinances Scriptures Ministers and the Assemblies of Saints in the places of worship but if we have any communion with God by or among these we must set our selves to believe those things we see not By realizing and applying invisible things we here get sometimes and with no small pains a taste of Heaven and a transient glance of that glory In this service our Faith is put hard to it it must work and fight at once Resolutely act whilst sense and reason stand by contradicting and quarrelling with it And if with much ado we get but one sensible touch of Heaven upon our Spirits if we get a little spiritual warmth and melting of our affections towards God we call that day a good day and it is so indeed But in Heaven all things are carried at an higher rate the joy of the Lord overflows us without any labour or pains of ours to procure it We may say of it there as the Prophet speaks of the dew and showres upon the grass Which tarrieth not for man nor waiteth for the Sons of men

Sin Heaven and Hell Soul and Eternity have lost their awful sound and efficacy with you But it is a question only to be decided by the event whether ever yo● shall attain to the years of your Fathers it is not the sprightly vigour of your youth that can secure you from death What a madness then is it to put your So●ls and eternal happiness upon such a blind adventure What if your presumption of so many fair and proper opportunities hereafter fail you as it hath failed millions who had as rational and hopeful a prospect of them as you can have where are you then And if you should have more time and means than you do presume upon are you sure your hearts will be as flexible and impressive as now they are O beware of this sin of vain presumption to which the generality of the damned owe their everlasting ruine The eighth way of losing the Soul opened VIII The eighth way of ruining the precious Soul is by drinking in the Principles of Atheism and living without God in the World Atheism stabs the Soul to death at one stroke and puts it quite out of the way of Salvation Other Sinners are worse than Beasts but Atheists are worse than Devils for they believe and tremble these banish God out of their thoughts and what they can out of the world living as without God in the world Eph. 2.12 It is a sin that quencheth all Religion in the Soul he that knows not his Landlord cannot pay his Rent he that assents not to the Being of a God destroys the foundation of all religious Worship he cannot fear love or obey him whose Being be believes not this sin strikes at the Life of God and destroys the life of the Soul Some are Atheists in opinion but multitudes are so in practice The fool hath said in his heart there is no God Psal. 14.1 Though he hath engraven his N●me upon every Creature and written it upon the Table of their own Hearts yet they will not read it or if they have a slight fluctua●●●g notion or a secret suspicion of a Deity yet they neither acknowledge his Presence nor his Providence Fingunt Deum talem qui nec videt nec punit They say How doth God know can he judge through the dark clouds thick clouds are a covering to him that he seeth not Job 22.14 Others profess to believe his Being but their lives daily give their lips the lye for they give no evidence in practice of his fear love or dependence on him If they believe his Being they plainly shew they value not his favour delight not in his presence love not his ways or people but lye down and rise eat and drink live and die without the worship or acknowledgment of him except so much as the Law of the Country or Custom of the place extorts from them These dregs of time produce abundance of Atheists of both sorts many ridicule and hiss Religion out of all Companies into which they come and others live down all sense of Relion they customarily attend indeed upon the external Duties of it hear the Word but when the greatest and most important Duties are urged upon them their inward thought is this is the Preachers Calling and the man must say something to fill up his hour and get his living If they dare not put their thoughts into words and call the Gospel Fabula Christi the Fable of Christ as a wicked Pope once did or say of Hell and the dreadful Sufferings of the Damned as Calderinus the Jesuit did tunc credam cum illuc venero I will believe it when I see it yet their hearts and lives are of the same complexion with these mens words They do not heartily assent to the Truth of the Gospel which they hear and though bare assent would not save them yet their dissent or non-assent will certainly damn them except the Lord heal their understandings and hearts by the light and life of Religion To this last sort I shall offer a few things The eighth way to Hell shut up by six weighty Considerations 1. You that attend upon the Ordinances but believe them no more than so many dev●●●d Fables nor heartily assent to the Truth of what you hear know assuredly that the Word shall new 〈…〉 do your Souls good it can never come to your hearts and affections in its regenerating and sanctifying efficacy whilst it is stopt and obstructed in your understandings in the act of assent And thus you may sit under the best Ordinances all your lives and be no more the better for them than the Rocks are for all the showres of rain that fall upon them Heb. 4.2 The word preached did not profit them not being mixed with faith in them that heard it This is Satans chief strength and fastness wherein he trusteth he fears no Argument whilst he can maintain this Post the Devil hath no surer Prisoner than the Atheist there 's no escaping out of his possession and power whilst this bolt of Unbelief is shut home in the Mind or Understanding An unbelieved Truth never converted or saved one Soul from the beginning of the world nor never shall to the end of it Those bodies that have the Boulema or Dog-appetite whatever they eat it affords them no nourishment or satisfaction they thrive not with the best fare just so it is with your Souls no Duties no Ordinances can possibly do them good as in Argumentation no Conclusion be it never so regularly drawn and strongly inferred is of any force to him that denies Principles 2. If you assent not to the Truth of the Gospel you not only make God speak to your Souls in vain which is fatal to them but you also make God a lyar which is the greatest affront a Creature can put upon his Maker 1 Ioh. 5.10 He that believeth not God hath made him a lyar Vile dust darest thou rise up against the God that made thee and give him the lye An affront which thy fellow-Creature cannot put up or bear at thy hands Darest thou at once stab his Honour and thy own Soul Are not the things which thou lookest on as Romances and golden Dreams a meer Artifice neatly contrived to cheat and awe the world Are they not all built upon the Veracity of God which is the firmest foundation and greatest security in the world Hath he not intermingled for our satisfaction not only frequent assertions but his asseverations and Oath to put all beyond doubt And yet dare any of you lift up your ignorant blind Understandings against all this and give him the lye Surely the wrath of God shall smoke against every Soul of man that doth so and his own bitter lamentable doleful experience shall be his conviction shortly except he repent 3. Dare any of you give the thoughts of your hearts as certain conclusions under your hand and stand by them to the last and venture all upon them Wretched

their miscarriages but you see not their humiliations and self-condemnations before God for them Foo● and fearful saith a grave Divine was the scandal of David Ier. Dyke of Scandal p. 33. and what was the issue Presently the Enemies of God and Godliness began to lift their heads and fall foul upon Davids Religion 2 Sam. 12. they blasphemed the Name of God O this is he that was so grand a Zealot that the zeal of Gods house did eat him up This is the man that out of his transcendent zeal danced before the Ark. This is he that prayed thrice a day at morning noon and night This is he that was so precise and strict in his family that a wicked person should not dwell in his house This your great precise Zealot hath defiled the Wife and murdered the Husband Now you see what his Religion is now you see what comes of this profession of so much Holiness and Godliness O that men would seriously consider their evil in such censures as these What is all this to Religion Doth Religion any way countenance or patronize such practices Nay doth it not impartially and severely condemn them It is the glory of the Christian Religion that it is pure and undefiled Iam. 1.27 These practices flow from no Principle of Religion nor are chargeable upon it for it teacheth men the very contrary Tit. 2.11 12. If I see a Papist sin boldly or an Arminian slight Grace I justly condemn their Principles in and with their practices because Popery sets Pardons to Sale and Arminianism exalts Nature into the place of Grace but doth the Doctrine of the Gospel lead to any immoralities Charge it if you can Fourthly And as sensless a thing it is to condemn all for the miscarriages and faults of some which yet is the common practice of the world Are all that profess Godliness loose and careless No no many are an ornament to their holy Profession and the glory of Christianity And why must the innocent be condemned for the guilty What is your reason and ground for that Why might not the Enemies of Christianity have condemned the Eleven Apostles upon the fall of Iudas had they not as good Warrant for it as you have for this To conclude You little know what a snare of the Devil is laid for your Souls in all those prejudices and offences you take at the ways and Professors of Godliness and what a wo you bring upon your own Souls by them You speak evil of persons and things you know not and prejudice is like still to keep you in ignorance of them Wo to the world saith Christ because of offences and Blessed is he that is not offended at me The eleventh way of ruining the precious Soul opened XI The eleventh way wherein abundance of precious Souls perish in the Christianized and professing World is the way of formal Hypocrisie in Religion and Zeal about the Externals of Worship Such a generation of men have in all Ages mingled themselves with the sincere Worshippers of God and the inducement to it is obvious the form of Godliness is an honour but the power of it a burden By the former earthly interests are accommodated by the latter they are frequently exposed and hazarded We find in the Jewish Church abundance of such chaff intermixed with the wheat which the Doctrine of Christ discovered and purged out of the floor Matth. 3.9 12. Such were the Pharisees who were exceeding zealous for Traditions and the external Rites and Ceremonies of the Law but inwardly full of all filthiness Matth. 15.7 8 9. men that honoured the dead and persecuted the living Saints that reverenced the material Temple and destroyed the living Temples that strain'd at Gnats of Ceremonies and swallowed down the grossest immoralities And well had it been if this generation had ended with that state and time of the Church but we find a Prophecy of the increase of these men in the later days 2 Tim. 3.5 which is every where sadly verified Religion runs into stalk and blade into leaves and suckers which should be concocted into pith and fruit Yea it is of sad consideration that amongst many high Pretenders to Reformation their Zeal which should nourish the vitals of Religion and maintain their daily work of Mortification and Communion with God spends it self in some by opinion whilst practical Godliness visibly languisheth in their Conversations How many are there that hate doctrinal errours who yet perish by practical ones who hate a false Doctrine but mean time perish by a false heart 'T is very difficult to reclaim this sort of men from the errour of their way and thereby save their Souls from Hell However let the means be used and the success left with God The way to Hell by Formality barred up 1. No sin intangles the Souls of men faster or damns them with more certainty and aggravation than the sin of formal Hypocrisie It holds the Soul fastest on Earth and sinks it deepest into Hell There was no sort of men upon whom the Doctrine of Christ and the Apostles had so little success and effect as the Scribes and Pharisees they derided him when Publicans and sinners trembled and believed Luke 16.14 15. the form of Godliness wards off all convictions their zeal for the Externals of Religion secures them against the fears of damnation whilst in the mean while their Hypocrisie plunges them deeper into Hell than others that never made such shews of Sanctimony and Devotion He shall appoint him his portion with hypocrites Matt. 24.51 that is he shall be punished in Hell as Hypocrites are punished viz. with the greatest and forest punishment Hypocrisie is a double iniquity and will be punished with double destruction their ungrounded hopes of Heaven serve but to pully up their wretched Souls to a greater height of vain confidence which gives them the more dreadful jerk in their lamentable and eternal disappointment 2. Blind superstitious Zeal which spends it self only about the Externals of Religion usually prepares and ingageth men in a more violent persecution of those that are really godly and conscientious The Lord opened a great door of opportunity at Antioch to Paul the whole City came together to attend the discoveries of Christ in the first publication of the Gospel and the poor Gentiles began to taste the sweetness of the Gospel but the Devil perceiving his Kingdom begin to totter immediately stirred up his instruments to persecute the Apostles and drive them out of the Country and who more fit for that work than the devout and honourable women Acts 13.15 these stirred up their Husbands and all they had influence upon Satan per costam tanquam per scalam ad c●r ascendit Gregor under a fair pretence of zeal for the Law to obstruct the progress of the Gospel No Bird saith one like the living Bird to draw others into the net Men of greatest names and pretensions to Religion if graceless are the