Selected quad for the lemma: sense_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
sense_n	place_n	scripture_n	word_n	9,705	5	4.5641	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52424	Letters concerning the love of God between the author of the Proposal to the ladies and Mr. John Norris, wherein his late discourse, shewing that it ought to be intire and exclusive of all other loves, is further cleared and justified / published by J. Norris.	Norris, John, 1657-1711.; Astell, Mary, 1668-1731.	1695 (1695)	Wing N1254; ESTC R17696	100,744	365

require the same kind of Love from Men to one another But there needs no Argument from without to prove this to be his meaning The Text you refer to Iohn 13. 34. sufficiently speaks its own Sense A new Commandment I give unto you that ye love one another As I have loved you that ye also love one another Wherein 't is plain that our Saviour refers to that signal Instance of his Benevolence in his undertaking the Work of our Redemption and in Proportion requires the same sort of Love from his Disciples that if Occasion were they should be ready to lay down their Lives for the Salvation of their Brethren as he had done for them which is the natural Sense of the Words and made to be so by the best Expositors that I know of upon the Place But besides does not the Scripture always express our Love towards our Neighbour as a Love of Benevolence only Love says the Apostle Rom. 13. 10. worketh no ill to his Neighbour that is does not hurt or injure him but do him all good Which Character shews it to be truly meant of Love of Benevolence I say truly And that 't is meant of that only as being of it self intirely commensurate to the full Extent of Charity is evident from the Words that follow therefore Love is the fulfilling of the Law Of what Law Not to be sure of the first Table For our Love to our Neighbour though never so perfect cannot satisfie our Obligation to GOD. It must be therefore of the second Table which being thus fulfilled by Benevolence can require no other Love than that This is Demonstration Again when the same Apostle reckons up the Fruits of Charity does he make any mention of Desire does he not describe them all by the Expressions of Benevolence He says it suffers long and is kind that it envies not vaunts not it self is not puffed up does not behave it self unseemly seeks not her own is not easily provoked thinks no evil rejoyces not in Iniquity but in the Truth that it bears all things believes all things hopes all things and indures all things but it seems the Apostle had forgot to put in Desire or else he thought it no Part of Christian Charity And I must confess that I am of the latter Opinion And as the Scripture always speaks of Brotherly Love and Charity in Terms importing Benevolence so whenever it speaks of the opposite Vice does it not always describe it by contrary Characters Does it ever describe it by want of Desire No but by want of good Will by Anger Wrath Envy Bitterness Malice and such like Terms And by what Measure of Love it is that Christ will proceed in his Judgment of the World whether by Love of Benevolence or by Love of Desire I shall leave to be determined by what he says himself concerning that matter in the 25th Chapter of St. Matthew From all which put together I think nothing can be more clear and certain than that the Love intended and required in the second great Commandment of the Law is not Love of Desire but only Love of Benevolence And I cannot imagine what besides the Equivocation of the Word Love should make the World run so generally upon a contrary Notion unless it be that Clause in the Commandment And the second is like unto it whence perhaps it has been concluded that because the first is meant of Love of Desire therefore the second must be so too But he must be either much prejudiced or very dull-sighted that does not see that by like unto it is only meant of equal Authority and Obligation in Opposition to the Pharisaic Partiality towards the Precepts of the Law Well then the Result of the present Considerations is this since that most intire Love of GOD I stand for in the first Commandment does not at all interfere with the Love of our Neighbour in the second supposing that by Love there we are not to understand Love of Desire but only Love of Benevolence and since as I have shewn Love of Benevolence is the Love there solely intended I may now with Assurance conclude that the Account I have given of the first Commandment as high as it is is no way injurious to the second the thing that is generally laid to my Charge But you go further undertaking to show that my Account of the Love of GOD is so far from being prejudicial to that of our Neighbour that it is the only true solid Foundation it can rest upon I thoroughly approve what you say upon this Part but shall not offer to add any thing to it because indeed you have said all I promised in my last that in my next I would add something to the Reason of our loving GOD so intirely but having fallen upon a Vein of other Thoughts and those of no slight Importance must beg you to let me be in your Debt for this untill another Opportunity as also for what you further desire concerning Pleasure In the mean time I leave you to that of your own Meditations more of which upon this great Subject will be highly grateful to Madam Your very humble Servant J. NORRIS Bemerton March 23. LETTER IX To Mr. Norris SIR YOU have so clearly removed the Objection made against the intire Love of GOD on account of its being prejudicial to the Love of our Neighbour that I hope we shall hear no more of that matter And truly when our Objectors have once felt as they will for certain sooner or later the Disquiet and Uneasiness we may well refer them to their own Experience for a full Conviction of the Unreasonableness of such Desires As far as I can perceive the Objection is founded upon Supposition That all Human Love is a Love of Desire a Love that arises from and terminates in that insatiable Desire we have of our own Happiness Which methinks is a very great Reproach to Humane Nature which as bad as it is is not uncapable of a pure and disinteressed Benevolence Had they duly attended to what you have writ in you Theory of Love Part 1. Sect. 5. They would have discerned the Falseness of their Supposition But though all other Arguments should fail my own Experience would assure me that there is such a thing as unmixed Benevolence for there are some Persons in the World to whom I could perform the highest Services without any the least Intuition of Reward or Prospect of bettering my own Being And now to proceed in our most excellent Subject though I am very sensible how much I depretiate it by my unkilful Management yet that I may give occasion to your better Meditations and because of the just Deference I pay you I am contented in Compliance with your Desire rather to discover my Ignorance than be wanting in my Respect I will therefore first declare what I think may be added to the Unreasonableness of loving the Creature and secondly what to the Reasonableness

purely and intirely from our selves The former Part of this I absolutely allow and contend for concerning the latter I distinguish when you say that all our Evil is purely and intirely from our selves if you mean of moral Evil I grant it but if you mean of natural Evils then I must distinguish again upon the Words from our selves which may signifie either a physical or moral or if you will an efficient or a meritorious Causality We are certainly the meritorious Causes of all our natural Evils as bringing them upon us by our Sins but that we are the efficient Causes of any of them I deny As all our good is wholly from GOD so in this Sense is also our evil We have not the Power to modifie our own Souls and can no more raise the Sensation of Pain in them than that of Pleasure GOD is the true Author of both as I have elsewhere shewn You say again that Afflictions are not evil but good to which I return that they are both in different Respects They are certainly evil in their own formal Nature and simply in themselves considered and can be good only occasionally or consequentially as they may serve as Means to some greater Good And this I think may serve to reconcile the Goodness of Pain to that Assertion of mine that nothing does us good but what causes Pleasure that is either formally and directly or occasionally and consequentially some Way or other whatever does us good must be supposed to cause Pleasure to us Now though Pain cannot cause Pleasure formally as being a Sensation formally distinct from it yet it may occasionally and consequentially and so may come within the Inclosure of those things that do us good You think fit to confine my Sense of the Word Pleasure to such only as are truly agreeable to the Nature of Man by which I suppose you mean those Pleasures which are called rational and Intellectual To this I reply that it seems to me very evident and I think I have elsewhere made it so that GOD is the true Cause of all the Pleasure that is resented by Man But you say you know not how it can consist with the Purity of the most holy GOD that he should be the Author of those pleasing Sensations which wicked Men feel in what we call sinful Pleasures But 't is your Mistake to suppose that sensual Pleasures as such are evil or that there is any such thing as a sinful Pleasure properly speaking As Sin cannot be formally pleasant so neither can Pleasure be formally sinful All Pleasure in it self is simply good as being a real Modification of the Soul 't is the circumstantiating of it that is the Evil. And of this GOD is not the Cause but the Sinner who rather than forego such an agreeable Sensation will enjoy it in such a Manner and in such Circumstances as are not for his own or for the common Good and therefore unlawful But concerning this matter you may further satisfie your self out of the Letters between Dr. More and Me and by reading the first and second Illustration M. Malebranch makes upon his De la Recharche de la Verite Where he shews you that GOD does all that is real in the Motions of the Mind and in the Determinations of those Motions without being the Author of Sin There are two other Passages in your Letter which I know not how to assent to till I better comprehend them One is that mental Pain is the same with Sin the other is that Sin is the only true Evil of Man I cannot stay long upon these but as to the first besides that Sin is an Act and Pain a Passion of the Soul and that Pain is a real Modification of our Spirit whereas Sin in its Formality is not any thing positive but a mere Privation I say besides this if mental Pain be the same with Sin how shall we distinguish Sin from the Punishment of it And how shall a Man repent for his Sin For if mental Pain be the same with Sin then to be sorry for one Sin will be to commit another Then as to the other Part that Sin is the only evil of Man I grant it is the greatest but I cannot think it the only one for besides that mental Pain is as I have shewn an Evil distinct from it there is also a thing call'd Bodily Pain which I have also shewn to be an Evil. Now Madam as to what you request of me in the Conclusion of your Letter if you think that distinction of mine of seeking Creatures for our good but not loving them as our good too nice I further illustrate it thus you are to distinguish between the Movements of the Soul and those of the Body the Movements of the Soul ought not to tend but towards him who only is above her and only able to act in her But the Movements of the Body may be determined by those Objects which environ it and so by those Movements we may unite our selves to those things which are the natural or occasional Causes of our Pleasure Thus because we find Pleasure from the Fire this is Warrant enough to approach it by a Bodily Movement but we must not therefore love it For Love is a Movement of the Soul and that we are to reserve for him who is the true Cause of that Pleasure which we resent by Occasion of the Fire who as I have proved is no other than GOD. By which you may plainly perceive what 't is I mean by saying that Creatures may be sought for our good but not loved as our Good But after all I must needs acknowledge that this as all our other Duties is more intelligible than practicable though to render it so I know no other Way than by long and constant Meditation to free our Minds of that early Prejudice that sensible Objects do act upon our Spirits and are the Causes of our Sensations carefully to distinguish between an efficient Cause strictly so called and an Occasion to attribute to GOD and the Creature their proper Parts in the Production of our Pleasures to bring our selves to a clear Perception and habitual Remembrance of this grand Truth the Foundation of all Morality that GOD only is the true Cause of all our Good which when fully convinced of we shall no longer question whether he ought to be the only Object of our Love I am Madam With great Respect Your humble Servant J. NORRIS Bemerton Nov. 13. 1693. If you are satisfied thus far I would desire you to go on to communicate what other Thoughts you have concerning the Love of GOD for 't is a Subject I like and would willingly pursue to the utmost LETTER V. To Mr. Norris SIR SO candid and condiscending a Treatment of a Stranger a Woman and so inconsiderable an one as my self shews you to be as much above the Generality of the World in your Practice as you are in your Theory and