Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	day_n	law_n	read_v	3,068	5	6.6616	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A01475	Two treatises the first, entituled, The foode of the faithfull. The second Deaths welcome.	Garey, Samuel, 1582 or 3-1646.	1605 (1605)	STC 11600; ESTC S115877	35,139	126

great is the fairenes and pleasure of Eternall light that if one might not liue there longer then one day for thys onely innumerable yeeres full of the delights of this life and aboundance of temporall goods he might rightly worthily be cōtented For in heauen we shal haue light without end brightnesse without comprehension peace without inuasion In this world our sences are benummed frozen with the extremitie of miseries coldnesse but in heauen there shal such vnexpected blisse shine vppon vs that all the parts of our body and soule shal be miraculously cherished with the lightning of selicitie In this world if the whole worthinesse of all humane creatures vvere comprised in the globe of one mans breast yet were not that one man so happy as the least Saint in Heauen In this world wee are but as it vvere ships without a Pylot tumbling vp and downe in vncertaine waues till we runne vpon the rocks of selfe deuision or bee ouerthrowne by the stormie winde of forraine inuasion In this VVorld we are but as it were tenisbals tossed by the racked of iniurious fortune but in heauen vve need not feare the tempests of aduersitie for there wee shall dwell vvith Saints vnited in perfection there we shall tast the golden fruite of blessed soules there wee shal haue Christ a guide vnto our waies and a Gardian to our persons there Christ shall be light vnto our eyes musick vnto our eares sweetnes to our tast contentment to our soules The state of the Church militant heere in this world is like the Arke floting vpon waters like a lilly growing among thornes like Christs ship in the 8 of Mathew couered vvith waues and yet not drowned But in the second worlde it shall be triumphant where it shal gloriously raigne for euermore Man in this world is but an Anatomy of misery or a spectacle of a dolorous ending tragedie but in the world to come he shall be a paragon of glory and a patterne of endlesse happinesse Therefore sith the reward of our godly endeuours shal be so well recompenced in the future life let vs abandon all vicious pleasures neuer be recalled to the vomit of carnall desires Let vs fight manfully vnder the banner of our grand captaine Christ vntill we vanquish all his enemies the denill his angels and for that good seruice performed in Christes quarrell we shall receiue at his handes a large pay namely an euerlasting life and an immortall crowne of glory Now therefore sith I haue as it were lighted a candle to the glorious sun-shine of this heauenly glorie which cannot any way be better shadowed out with the best pensil then by couering it ouer with the vaile of silence I will speake but verie little more concerning this happines but will onely compare the torments of hell to the ioyes of heauen For as beautie seemes more excellent when it is paralelled with deformitie so wil heauen show more glorious when it is compared to hell For as it is an axiome with the Logicians Of contrarie things the reason is contrarie so in this contrarietie in heauen and in hell hee which doth perceiue the ioyes in heauen may easily coniecture at the torments in hell If the ioyes in heauen cannot bee expressed by the tongues of Angells then the torments of hell cannot be declared by the best Orator For as those two places be distant in qualitie so their ioyes and paines be equall in quantitie If that the ioyes of heauen be infinite the paines of hel must consequently followe to be infinite Now then sith these two opposite places bee distinguished with such a contrarietie the ioyes of the one euery man would gladly enioy the paines of the other euery man would willingly eschewe it followeth that this is the greatest impediment for a man not willingly to welcome death because he is wonderfully afraid least he should bee punnished for his sinnes in these hellish torments these torments doe ingender such a feare in a man that hee horridly quaketh at the mention of death For when a man shall recount with himselfe that he offered the May crop of his life to the deuill that hee sacrificed his blooming yeares to the seruice of the deuill and that now the flowers of his youth are blasted the fruite perrish the body of the Tree groweth to decay then hee shall thinke with himselfe that hee being voyde of the sap of good fruites shall become fuell for hell fire When he shall lie on his departing bed burdened with the heauy loade of his trespasses and vexed with the worme of conscience and feeling the crampe of death wresting his harts strings and ready inpathed in his finally voyage and not farre from the period of his daies Oh how hee shall be distracted in his senses when he should make a free gift of his body and soule to God and by bequeathment to dispach the whole menage of all eternitie and of the treasures of heauen Oh how shall he bee mazed when he shall consider how the morning pleasures of his youth lulled him a sleepe in sinne how the violent heat of the noone of his age did prouoke and excite sinfull affections and therefore in the coole and calme of his euening how can hee hope to retire to a Christian rest and close vp the day of his life with a cleare sunset wanting the light of grace without which euery one shall abide in euerlasting darkenesse These considerations I say will make a man tremble at the mention of death for peccati stipendium mors the reward of sinne is death and these torments in hell fire therefore when hee shall thinke with himselfe that the most vertuous can scarce attaine to heauen in mountenance of yeares whose liues were died in the beautifull graine of vertue how then shall hee wretched sinner hope to obtaine heauen since all his life time hee hath perseuered in sinne that now death hauing taken away abilitie in sinning and left him to the lees of his dying daies how shall he beleiue to be infranchised in that heauenly Citty which is not so penurious of friends that it should bee made salable for the refuse and reuersion of euery sinners life A King which hath liued like an Epicure heere vppon earth and in nothing tooke delight but like a Nero to oppresse the innocent shall not inioy the heauenly happinesse For as Bernard saith It is impossible to ioyne present and future delights And as the same father in another place addeth He that is fed with earthly pleasures is counted vnworthy of eternall ioyes The shining title of worldly glory shall nothing helpe to the happines of that life they be like bladders which are puffed vp with the winde of prosperitie and only doe affect the smoke of vaine glory they doe not obserue the precept giuen by Moses vnto Princes Princes must reade the Lawe all the daies of their liues and as Iosua let not the booke of this Lawe depart out of

in store eate drinke and take thy rest VVho would endure the mocks and scornes of the world who would be rosted with Laurentius or martyred with the Apostles vnlesse they hoped that after the vessel of theyr bodies were seasoned in the wombe of the earth they should arriue at that blessed vndiscouered country where is no mediocritie of ioy no end of pleasure So then we Christians who are illuminated with the bright sunny beames of Christs Gospell wil reiect such Epicurian opinions of godlesse Atheists who belieue there is no resurrection no crowne of glorie remaining for them after theyr life is ended but S. Paul teacheth vs an other lesson For saith he if the dead be not raised then is Christ not risen if Christ be not risen thē our fayth is in vaine And in another place If in this life we haue hope onely then of all men we be most miserable So Iob saide when hee was ouerwhelmed with a sea of sorrowe I am certaine that my redeemer liueth and that I shall rise out of the earth in the latter day and that I shall be clothed againe with this skinne and see GOD in my flesh yea I my selfe shal behold him not with other but with these same eyes This poynt of religion concerning our resurrection the very Heathen VVriters haue approoued for thus Cato speaking to Scipio Laelius in Ciceros booke De senectute saith Doost thou thinke that I would haue vndertaken so great labors both by day and night both at home and at the warre if my glory should haue had the same limits which my life hath So Plato in his Booke De animae immortalit saith That the soule of man is immortall and that it shall liue in another world So Socrates when he did drinke the venemous poyson with which he should breake of the feeble thred of mortalitie said I am sure that my soule shall liue and that my body shall arise in the second neuer dying birth But why doe I spend my time in a matter so needlesse to be confirmed sith the scripture the oracles of wisdome be so plentifull of proues all VVriters doe defend this vndeniable veritie for who can denie but that there is a resurrection and a reward reserued for them which die in the Lord if that this life were the only Paradise where we should take our delights who would not desire a long life with Methusalah or store of wealth with Salomon or honor with Haman but wee that knowe this earth to bee nothing else but an element of sorrowe this world to be but a Hydra of renewing cares will not place our eternall affaires and treasures of heauen vpon the gliding streame of this vncertaine life For we are surely perswaded that after the houre glasse of this momentary life is runne out we shall be imparadized in heauen and made free Denizers in that celestiall Ierusalem whose ioyes and praises doe superabound all inhumaine inuention to comprehend for so sayth Saint Gregorie No man is able to tell how great the ioyes of the heauenly Cittie shall be Because as Saint Bernard sayth the dishes of the heauenly banquet are so great that they cannot be measured so long that they cannot be limitted so many that they cannot be numbred and so precious that they cannot bee esteemed Yet notwithstanding that those ioyes be inestimable and innumerable we shall be certaine to inioy them after this life is finished For so sayth Saint Paule when this earthly house of this Tabernacle is destroyed wee knowe wee haue a building giuen of God that is an house not made with hands but eternall in the heauens there shall wee haue ioyes without measure pleasures without end We shall sayth Saint Augustine see without wearinesse we shall loue with-measure and shall giue praises without end Then shall Dauid tast how sweete the Lord is I am sure sayth hee I shall see the goodnesse of the Lord in the land of the liuing These ioyes and the hope of the fruition of that blessed future life doth inbolden and harden a true Christian against his fatall houre willingly and ioyfully to leaue this world which is valles miseriae as Augustine sayth that hee may see the new Ierusalem that blessed companie of Angells whose glory whose praises whose blessednesse whose delights no tongue is able to expresse no heart to conceiue Yet that I might giue you a tast of those ioyes and as it were a shaddow of the Sunne shine of that glory which we shall possesse after the dissolution of our earthly bodies I will recite a few things which I haue reade in the Scriptures and in other places concerning the blessednesse of that happie life for the ioyes of heauen bee the onely causes which doe mooue and incite vs to liue godly in this present life For what doth make the laborer to worke but his hire The husbandman to toyle but the hope of a good haruest The Souldier to fight but the hope of victory and of obtaining of a Garland so in like manner what doth stirre vp mortall men to liue religiously and louingly to welcome the approach of death but only the confident hope of that hire which none of them by vertuall merrits shall deserue The hope of that good haruest wherein they shall reape all contentment of minde The hope of that wished victory and precious Garland wherewith they shall bee adorned and florish like Angelis These bee the true motiues and inducements which doe giue alacrity and bold spirits to vndergoe the pangs of death willinly and encourage and animate all timerous and fleshly minded persons to bee delighted and theyr eares tickled with musick in the daunce of death when they shall seriously consider they shal passe from death to life from mortalitie to immortality from miserie to ioy from pertill to securitie frō bondage to libertie from aduersitie to prosperitie and in fine from hell and damnation to blisle and saluation Howbeit that I may giue some kind of sauour and feeling knowledge thereof which may allure fearefull men cheerefully to expect and patiently to suffer the Iayler Death to lock vp the windowes of the prison house of theyr soules I intend heere to rehearse euen worde for worde what S. Augustine saith in one of his Meditations namelie the 22 meditation speaking of the felicitie of the future life O life sayth hee prepared by almighty God for his friends a blessed life a seeure life a quiet life a beautifull a cleane life a chast life a holy life a life that knoweth no death a life without sadnes without labour without griefe without trouble without corruption without feare without varietie without alteration a life replenished with all beautie and dignitie where there is neither enemie that can offend or delight that can annoy where loue is prefect and no feare at all where the day is euerlasting the spirit of all is one where almightie God is seene face to face who is the onely meate