Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	best_a	folio_n	great_a	32	3	2.1265	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A42893	Miscellanea, or, Serious, useful considerations, moral, historical, theological together with The characters of a true believer, in paradoxes and seeming contradictions, an essay : also, a little box of safe, purgative, and restorative pils, to be constantly taken by Tho. Goddard, Gent.	Goddard, Thomas.	1661 (1661)	Wing G916; ESTC R7852	164,553	225

Noble Rich who have the most Talents to account for as well as the poorest and meanest would but either frequently view and seriously reflect upon their pedegree which they may find and see if they will * Job 17. 4. I have said to corruption Thou art my Father to the Worm Thou art my Mother and my Sister Job 17. 4. Or if they would but diligently hearken unto and meditate upon those Lectures and Catechisms of their own frailty and mortality which God not only reads to their ears but presenteth also to their eyes in the sicknesse and death of others certainly they would neither be proud nor profane And they would also learn rightly to know both the brevity and the uncertainty of this life which is indeed so uncertain that for ought thou canst tell how great or good soever thou art that art now looking upon this dark picture this unlively description of it death may have an Attachment against thee or an Habeas corpus to remove and carry thee out of the Land of the living before thou hast read one line nay one word more and serve it upon thee without warning respect and all possibility of being either rescued concealed bailed or protected from it We are all pilgrims and travaile towards our long home before we can go Every day is a step every week a walk every moneth a stage and every year a long Journey towards our Graves Life 't is a swift Race we are making ready for it in our conception our Birth is the starting poste the time of our so journing in this World is the Green or course over which we gallop with a winged speed and our death is the Gaole or end of it Orimur Morimur Child-hood is both the death and Tomb of infancy Child-houd lies buryed in youth Manhood interr's youth and old age is the Sepulchre of them all And when these five pages which are all the leaves that Nature or rather the God of Nature hath bound up together in the book of Life are turned over by the nimble hand of flying Time Death claspeth it up and then carryeth and layeth us all down in the University Library of the Grave where the greatest best and the most curiously with honour wealth power guilded and embellished Folio's as well as the worst least and plainest pamphlets and Decimo-sexto's high low rich poor learned ignorant good bad young old men and women are deposited and lockt up untill the Author the creator of them all God Almighty at the day of judgment shall open the door raise them all out of their graves take them up and peruse them to burn or preserve them according to the Contents of every one of them the actions of their lives good or evill How much then doth it concern us to live innocently uprightly purely piously unblameably since every letter word and line in the books of our lives and consciences all our thoughts words and actions how darkly secretly or cunningly soever they have been either conceived or committed will one day be read by all the world And since at that last great day of Judgment they e Mr. Bolton Quatuor Novis●t p. 92. will be as legible as if they were written with the brightest starrs or the most glistering Sun-beams upon a Wall of Crystall Besides an holy life is the hand that writes a Christians name in the volume of honour that hangs it on the File of Fame and that sets the best and the most glorious Crown upon his head Triasunt coronarum genera Goronalegis Corona sacerdotis Corona Regni * A good name is better then precious ointment Cant. 7. 1. sed corona bonae famae omnes superat And this Diadem all that truly fear God shall wear for ever † Psalm 112. 6. The righteous shall be had in everlasting remembrance Their names will be fresh fragrant and flourishing to all posterity f Camerarius Some of the West-indians had this custome They used to deck with Jewels of Gold and with precious stones dead bodies And we know that in England ●nd other Countries the bodies of Noble persons are usually imbalmed Let us who professe our selves to be Christians do that for our souls which these do unto dead bodies Let us carefully and speedily labour both to inrich adorn and perfume our souls and memories by getting and gathering the Gold Gemms and sweet spices of grace godlinesse vertue and honesty because if our lives be vitious and impious our souls will not only burn in Hell and our bodies yeild an unsavory stench in the Grave but our names too will * Prov. 10. 7. rot in the World Weigh and judge then which of these ought to be preferred immortal Glory or eternall misery And whether it be not b●●ter to be coffind up in silence and buried in oblivion then to live though dead everlastingly infamous Life t is an Interlude the womb is the attiring room wherein we are drest the world is the Theater whereon we act our birth is the curtain drawn to let us out upon the stage our life is the part we act death is our exit and the plaudit if we perform our part well if we live religiously and persevere in piety wil be * Matth. 25. 23 Euge Wel done good and faithfull Servant enter thou into thy masters joy Lo this honour this happinesse have all the Saints This is the portion the Crown of a Ridley not a Roscius Life 't is an hedge of thornes upon which we must not only tread but walk to our Graves 'T is a boule of Gall with a few drops of Rose-water in it 'T is a Garden full of nettles and briers not flowers Tricae et spinae haec omnis vita et falleris si quaeris in ea gaudiorum Flores To conclude since every man may truly say and ought practically to speak to live like one that both knows and believes the truth thereof with him g Lips Epist 330. Quid natus sim scio imbecillum corpus fragile morbi pabulum mortis victima Since the strongest wisest greatest richest yea the holyest of meere men is but h Aristotle imbecillitatis exemplum temporis spolium inconstantiae imago invidiae et calamitatis trutina reliqua vero pituita et bilis And since it 's better to improve then pourtray it to spend our time holily then to speak our life elegantly I shall say but this A good gracious godly life is a near sure strait way to a comfortable peacefull blissefull death And a good death is the birth-pay of a blessed glorious life that shall never end Although then the morning of a pious Christians dayes may be tempestuous and lowring yet his evening will be calm and bright whereas the life of him that is impenitently wicked though i Nun quam tristiorem sententiam Domitianus sine praefatione clementiae pronunciavit ut non aliud jam certius atr●cis exitus

chiefly or only in such dainties and delicates as are curiously cook't and served up either in the China-dishes or silver plates of wit and eloquence And some will feed liberally upon such provision as is both course and common when it is laid in the savoury sauce of truth The first of these I would not entertain if I could procul hinc procul ite for I have neither a bit nor a drop for you unlesse like spiders you will suck poyson out of sweet flowers The second I cannot though I would For I have no rare or generous wines no Rhetorical streams flowing from the pure and limpid fountain of ravishing Oratory to invite tempt or delightfully to in●briate your Lady-appetites or thirsty minds withall Nor have I the Mine of a rich invention or the necessary Magick of a lofty towring fancy either to furnish and cover my Table with sweet meats or to confine you within the circle of Approbation My pen cannot drop Nectar or life-honey nor are my lines either studded with pearl and Jewels choise and refined conceits or enamelled with elegant indearing melting phrases Only the last sort then are my yea and their own true friends They are heartily welcome to my poor dinner of green herbs If any thing please them I desire them to eat freely much good may it do them But as for them and God knows there are too many such nominall Christians in the world that like those who are surfeited sickly breeding or dying do nauseate and abhor almost every thing and usually those things most that are most nourishing necessary safe and proper for them that will scarce touch tast or sip of the best potion or Pharmacon to save their lives I do advise them either to change their minds or to forbear my table because truth and holy Counsells will like Physick either help or hurt cure or kill them I have run and rushed I confesse into that crowd which doth not only presse and oppresse the presse but surfeit it too Otherwise such filthy unsavory loathsome impostumated matter would not be vomitted up by it as we either do or may too frequently behold I know verie well also that this is a quaint a queasie a criticall a very inquisitive and a peevish Age. I shall therefore that I may not offend it more it being alreadie too apt to be angry with truth and plainesse and in order to the satisfying of such whose reason is not in their wils whose heaven is not in their Lusts whose brains are not quartered in other mens heads whose learning and religion doth not consist in opinion detraction profession temporizing or faction who do not do●e upon deformity live on poyson and idolize their very diseases Acquaint the world why I have exposed my self to the danger and run the hazard of being esteemed what it shall please the many or any to account me First then negatively It is not Reader I assure thee a tympanied ambition to be known to the world For he is certainly very strangely distempered in his head that will knowingly and deliberately make and set up himself a common But to receive all those forked and piled arrows which wit learning pride envy malice and ignorance will be sure to shoot at him Nor a desire or design to blow a gaudy Hemisphere upon a Nut●shel or to perch upon a weather-cock to hunt I mean for a vulgar applause or to sit upon the good or rather giddy opinions of the reeling multitude Nor is' t the midwifery of others importunity that Hackney bald thred-bare lean and wondrous old apology for printing and common pimp to the presse that hath delivered me of these little weak and scarce breathing children Nor is it either the wealth or beauty of these sisters unlesse you will be so kind as to account them fair and rich because they are neither deformed nor diseased that hath prevailed with me to offer them unto the love acceptance and imbraces of the world Nor is it levity of mind or a lascivious Genius that makes me prostitute them to the eys and hands of all Nor are a desire of praise from the vertuous and judicious or an opinion of any excellency in themselves the wings that have carried these call●w birds out of their warm nest into the cold unkind and dangerous world Nor is it any confidence that these helplesse infants will find either civility curtesie or charity abroad since the most are friends only to the wealthy but Momus's and Nabals to books and Authors Nor yet is it because I am perswaded that others have not done much better then my self herein For I well know and freely confesse my self to be but a dwarf to those Gyants a mole-hill to those mountains and but a little winking candle compared with those great and bright Sun● of learning by whose polished exquisite structures these my unhewen stones are set up Affirmatively or positively then my reasons and end why I suffered these doves to fly abroad are these First because as our Talents though but few or little must not be profusely wasted so neither must they be parsimoniously buried in the napkins either of idleness or silence 2. Secondly because it 's both my prayer and hope that with some of these smooth stones taken out of that crystal brook the holy Scriptures put into and thrown out of the sling of truth though by a little weak assailant that great dangerous mischievous deadly and really dreadful Gol●ath sinne through the guidance blessing and assistance of Gods omnipotent arm who can when and where it pleaseth him give both birth and successe to this design and encounter will be overcome in some of those that shall seriously and impartially peruse my papers And also that those uncircumcised Philistins honour pleasure profit which have manacled the hands and put out the eyes of so many Samsons chained corrupted yea deaded the affections and blinded the minds of so many millions of men and women will be either vanquished or weakened in them 3. Thirdly because though the thin web of my work be through an unskilful hand very course spun yet since the warp is truth and the oufe profit I do not despair but it may yea will not only invite but also delight and benefit some of my chapmen my Readers since I know that there are many both so inge●●ous and so ingenuous that I am perswaded a Cord twisted and made up of Divinity Reason Experience and History will both hold them please them and become not only an acceptable but an amiable ornament unto them although the workman want both art and elegancy 4. Fourthly because though I am very far from presuming or pretending to be fit or able either to teach those scholars that are deservedly preferred into the upper School Or to add any light of knowledg to those bright stars in the high O●bs of Learning yet I hope I may without offence yea and with some advantage to them also immind and

of such a wounded Spirit That poor wretch who was flayed alive and then laid upon a bed of Salt till he expired by the barbarous command of Solyman ●elt no pain and rested upon a soft couch-chair compared with him or her that hangeth upon the gibbet of an evill conscience Yea the greatest sharpest deadliest pangs and throws of that woman who hath the hardest labour in child-bearing are not only ease and refreshments but cordialls in respect of the horrible unavoidable insupportable tortures lashings bitings and gnawings of the whip and worm of a bad conscience An evill conscience is the outward court of Hell 'T is the earnest and foretast of those torments which are easelesse endlesse remedilesse 'T is like that * Ezck 2. 9 10. Book in Ezekiel wherein was written both within and without lamentation and mourning and wo. Weigh them seriously and hearken attentively to the God of Wisdome and truth who assureth us † Prov. 18. 14. The spirit of a man willsustain his in●irmities but a wounded spirit who can bear That a Spirit wounded with the sense of its guilt and misery is insupportable for by putting the question he puts it out of all question that it is so And also to that doleful eccho of the damned souls in Hell c See the life of Spira Francis Spira that compleat map of misery that so you may both judge impartially what it is fear it and carefully timely resolutely oppose hate decline and fly that which will bring you unto and hang your souls upon the same rack on which all his bones were broken viz. Sin against convictions covenants promises profession love light knowledg and conscience committed relapsed into and unrepented of I now feel saith he Gods heavy wrath that burns like the torments of hell-fire within me and afflicteth my soul with pangs unutterable And again the gnawing worms of an unquenchable horror confusion and which is worst of all Desperation continually torture me My pangs faith he are such that the damned wights in Hell endure not the like misery O let us then hear and fear yea let us be instructed warned and perswaded by his and * Cain Judas c. others sufferings to pray and labour to get good consciences and to keep them voyd of offence both towards God and towards men that so we may never feel and endure the exquisite the insufferable torments of a double Hell Desperation and Damnation And since unicuique liber est propria conscientia ad hunc librum discutiendum emendandum omnes alii inventi Since every mans conscience is his book and that all books are written for the reading correcting and expunging the errata's thereof It is therefore the great duty and concernment of every one vigilantly conscientiously constantly to take heed that it be neither interlined with sin nor blotted and blurred with crimes vices nor defaced with foul and filthy lusts Because if it be not kept pure fair and undefiled God will one day command it to be burned by the common hangman the Devill in the fire of Hell But if it be preserved unstained God will then love and delight in it For facies animi est c●nscientia sicut in conspectu hominum gratiosa est facies pulcra sic in conspectu Dei speciosa est conscientia munda The face of the mind is the conscience And an unspotted conscience is as beautiful in the sight of God as the most renowned and celebrated Beauty either is or ever was amiable in the eyes of men If then thou wouldest be free from the anguish agonies and miseries of an evill Conscience do thou in this case what one advised Domitian to do in another who being asked by Domitian how he might so rule as not to be hated like many of his predecessors answered him Tu fac contra do thou contrary to that they have done Do thou confesse repent hate and forsake every known sin and take heed of relapsing into wickednesse for sin is both the root and fewell of outward troubles inward terrors temporall punishments spirituall Judgments and eternall torments The Prayer O LORD thou hast not only forbidden us upon pain of High Treason Death and Damnation to commit the least sinne and acquainted yea assured us that all things are naked and opened to the eyes of that God with whom we have to do But thou hast also placed a comptrouler a Register a Notary conscience in every Child of Adam to observe record and remember all our thoughts words and actions whether good or evil And thy great design in all this is to make us afraid of acting any either open wickednesse or secret filthinesse since even all our closest iniquities impurities villanies and our midnight abominations are perpetrated upon a stage at noonday and in the sight of the Sun not only in respect of thine all-seeing eye to whom the darknesse and light are both alike but also in respect of that impartiall witnesse that all-observing Sentinel which thou hast placed within us that will most certainly reveal all those hidden hideous horrible and loathsome crimes we are guilty of which the eye or ear of Man never saw nor heard accuse us to God of them and both evidently and undenyably to the Lord and our own selves proves us conscious of them Give us therefore O Lord I beseech thee Grace care and resolutions to live walk and behave our selves to think speak and act as under thine eye and in thy presence at all times in all places in all company in all conditions in all our callings duties services recreations and imployments that so our consciences may acquit and not condemn us Let us prize seek and keep the happinesse peace and comfort of a good conscience more then pleasure plenty prosperity liberty yea then Life And let us fear the plague and torment of a bad Conscience more then Death And since O Lord thou wilt most certainly bring every work unto Judgment with every secret thing whether it be good or evill O give us Grace to fear thee and to keep thy Commandements that so we may both injoy the peace of God here and the God of peace hereafter This grant for his sake who is the Prince of peace and dyed to make our peace with thee thine only Son and our alone Saviour Amen Conscientia est index judex vindex Bona coeli est Porta primitiae Mala damnationis Prodromus Et Gehennae miseriarum principum XXIII Of Life IT is the seed-time both of Grace and Glory 'T is a short craggy thorny narrow way to a sad or joyfull to a blessed or cursed eternity 'T is a tree from which some blooms doe fall in their infancy on which some buds are blasted when but just set in their child-hood from which some green fruits are snatched off in their youth upon which some hang till Manhood and then are violently stricken down or pulled off by the hand of death