Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	find_v	king_n	law_n	2,835	5	4.8368	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A30660	The bow, or, The lamentation of David over Saul and Jonathan, applyed to the royal and blessed martyr, K. Charles the I in a sermon preached the 30th of January, at the Cathedral Church of S. Peter in Exon / by Arth. Bury ...	Bury, Arthur, 1624-1713.	1662 (1662)	Wing B6189; ESTC R14782	26,212	54

The BOW OR The LAMENTATION of DAVID over SAUL and JONATHAN Applyed to the Royal and Blessed MARTYR K. Charles the I. IN A SERMON Preached the 30 th of January At the Cathedral Church of S. Peter in EXON BY ARTH. BVRY one of the Prebendaries Published to stop the mouth of Calumny LONDON Printed for Henry Brome at the Gun Ivy-lane 1662. 2 SAM 1. 18. Also he bad them teach the Children of Juda the use of the Bowe THis strange Text cannot be more impertinent to the businesse of this sad day then that which occasioned it The words immediately foregoing tell us that David lamented with this lamentation over Saul and over Jonathan his son as we do now over a greater King then Saul and a kinder man than Jonathan To beleive the Jewish interpretation that David took warning from the wounds which Saul received from the Philistian Archers to teach the children of Juda that military art were to confesse an unpardonable ignorance it was their usuall weapon The learned Grotius observing the lamentation to be musicall came so far towards the discovery of the truth as to say David would have them taught to use Musick in their Wars But what Musick with a bow Were the Jewes taught that practice which the ancient Germans used in their wars to encourage themselves with the sprightly twang of their beaten Bow-strings as we do by beat of Drum What harmony will that interpretation keep with the lamentation thus harshly interrupted The omission of the LXX and the Vulgar Latin give us a fair hint for a smooth interpretation for they omitting all mention of the Bow read the words thus And David lamented Also he bad them teach it the Children of Juda. Good sense but no good fidelity Our Tindal approving the sense but not the infidelity retaineth the word but translateth it with new infidelity Reading thus He bad them teach the Children of Juda the staves thereof a good Paraphrase but a bad translation Upon these hints our excellent Gregory cleareth all difficulties He observeth it usuall for Poets to bestow upon their Odes some Title suitable to their Subject Thus our Psalmist titleth some of his Psalms Altashith Sosannim Mahaloth And now having composed a threne in memory of Saul wounded by the Bowmen and of Jonathan that dear Archer who shot his Arrow beyond the Lad and thereby expressed a love exceeding the love of Women honored the memory of so dear a friend with a passionate threne and that threne with a name most endearing the instrument of so rare a kindnesse And now the sense is smooth and Musical David composed this epicedium in memory of Saul and Jonathan and caused them to teach it the Children of Juda calling it the Bow in memory of the fatal wounds which Saul received from the Bowmen of the enemy and the rare kindnesse which himself received from the Bow of Jonathan at that passionate parting when they kissed one another and wept one with another untill David exceeded And to this clear sense doth the Hebrew not only invite us by leaving out the word use but force us too by the necessary concord of the participle written with the substantive Bow both of them feminines The demonstration being Grammatical The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Written must marry the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bow therefore the Bow it self not the story of it was written therefore it was writable therefore a form of words therefore this very form of lamentation commanded to be taught the Children of Juda and recorded in the book of Jasher What the book of Jasher was is as needlesse to enquire as impossible to find we find but one mention more of it and that Poetical Josh 10. 13. your margins tell you the word signifieth an upright man and haply it may be an abbreviation of the word Israel and the book a Poetical register of the publick occurrences of that Nation Whatever that book were it is lost and so is the story of it But this we have found that in that book was written this Lamentation which David made and called The Bow and commanded to be taught the Children of Juda. Having thus found the Bow we shall view it a little and then exercise with it 1. Observ That under the Law it self Kings had power as they saw occasion to make additions and alterations in the form of publick Worship For David bad them to whom he directed his Odes the chief Musicians to teach the Children of Juda this Bow that they might use it with other of his Psalms in the publick service of God That this was usual witnesse the many other Psalms which are superscribed To the chief Musician and sometimes by name To Asaph which were publickly sung as occasion required as appeareth by their praising God in the words of the 136. Psalm when the ark was brought into the oracle in Solomons Temple Was it a small alteration to change the ambulatory Tabernacle to a standing Temple contrary to the pattern shewed in the Mount and without any command of God Yet God commendeth and blesseth David for that intention though he suspendeth the performance The law required thirty years of age to qualify the children of Levi for the service of the congregation Yet David commanded them to be numbred from twenty years The law forbad any unclean person to eat the passover Lev. 7. 10. and 22. yet Ezekia dispensed with it as also with the Levites performing the Priests office in killing the Sacrifices 2. Chro. 30. 17 18. Now if under the law where every punctilio was so exactly prescribed the Kings the best of the Kings made such alterations How much more under the Gospel where there is only this generally directory injoyned Let all things be done decently and in order and the particulars left to the wisdome of the governours of the Church shall it be in the power of Kings to prescribe such forms as they shall judge most decent Is it a blessing to the Church to have Kings her nursing fathers and shall it not be her duty to submit to their government Was there ever any Religion which questioned the power of their rulers in things acknowledged to be indifferent And shall the Christian onely which of all others doth most earnestly and frequently injoyn obedience shall that onely dispense with it and that without any colour of necessity but under pretence of freedome from any obligation Well but grant the Christian Kings the onely Cyphers of Religion not able to bind the conscience by any direct obligation will not that love of peace which is so earnestly recommended to us require though by accident onely to obey all their innocent injunctions Doth it become a peaceable and humble Christian thus to dispute with his King You have no power to command me and therefore I will not obey And not rather thus Though you have no power to command me yet for peace sake I will obey Because

of Israel did as constantly lament the daughter of Jeptha as they celebrated the feast of the passover And we do as solemnly observe the 30. of Jan. as the 5. of Novemb. It is considerable though perhaps incredible to some men that this publick and setled way of preaching wherein they think the whole service of God to consist deriveth from the observation of Holy dayes kept in honour of the first Martyrs at whose burying places the people solemnly assembling were entertained by the eloquent Fathers with funeral Orations in memory of those Martyrs from which use our Church-yards are still called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the word Panegyrick which grammatically signifieth any publick speech was by the frequent use of such assemblies contracted to a more patticular sense signifying such speeches only as were publickly made to the praise of some eminent person But the pious Fathers of the Church finding it more advantagous to godlinesse changed those Panegyricks to Sermons and caused Churches to be built for the greater convenience of such assemblies And this I thought necessary to observe that I might not seem to abuse this place by imploying it to a Panegyrick rather then a Sermon The business of this anniversary calling us back to that primitive practice that by embalming the memory of this royall Martyr our name may be reskued from that infamy which hath so long made us stink in the nostrils of our neighbours and his reputation from that obscurity wherein it hath so long been buried so fulfilling that his confident prophesy that His reputation should like the Sun after Owls and Bats had had the freedome of the night and darker times rise and recover it self to such a degree of splendor as those Feral birds should be grieved to behold and unable to bear For never were any Princes more glorious than those whom God hath suffered to be tried in the Furnace of afflictions by their injurious Subjects A long long night it was wherein those Feral Birds triumphed a hot Furnace was that wherein God suffered this excellent Prince to lye under a tedious trial Blessed be his name that hath restored us to a power of honouring this Martyred Prophet in a measure sutable to his sufferings For as his injurious Subjects passed all examples in the cruelty of their persecutions so do his loving subjects outvy all the honours that ever were paid to the memory of the most glorious King by this anniversary reskuing his honour from their slanderous abuses as the valiant men of Jabesh Gilead did the bodies of Saul and his sons from the Walls of Bethshan and by this Solemn lamentation which we thus practice in imitation of this Bow of David which he bad them teach the Children of Juda. Let us then pass from viewing this Bow to handling it and that in a sutable panegyrical way A sutable way No that is a task for one of our Davids him that made it or him that we celebrate with it Were my toung as the Pen of either of those ready Writers I would pierce the hardest heart among you and in this sense from the fat of the mighty from the blood of the slain this Bow of Jonathan should not return empty However I will manage it as I can upon this hope that what is wanting in my feeble Rhetorick shall be supplyed by your loyall affections It taketh up the whole remainder of the Chapter but the most material strains are contained in the three next verses upon which the rest do only descant Vers 19. The beauty of Israel is slain upon thy high places how are the mighty fallen 20. Tell it not in Gath publish it not in the streets of Askalon lest the daughters of the Philistins rejoyce lest the daughters of the uncircumcised Triumph 21. Ye mountains of Gilboa let there be no dew neither let there be any rain upon you nor fields of offerings for there the shield of the mighty is vilely cast away the shield of Saul as though he had not been anointed with oyle In these three strains doth this Psalmist expresse 3 Passions 1 Grief ver 19. 2 Shame vers 20. 3 Detestation vers 21. With these in their order shall I exercise the remainder of your patience Your patience said I No your passions your impatience He is a stock or a traitour that can be patient when such wounds are searching 1. Grief is exercised upon consideration of the person slain The onely considerable quality in Saul was his greatnesse which therefore maketh the burden of the Song How are the mighty fallen Thus is Abner lamented though no otherwise considerable Know you not that there is a Prince and a great man fallen this day in Israel Thus did Jeremy lament Zedekia who had nothing kingly but his power The breath of our Nostrils the annointed of the Lord is taken in their pits Yet I doubt whether Saul should have been honoured with lamentation if Jonathan had not fallen with him They both met in our Martyred King whose might was the least part of his praise his vertues were more glorious then his Crown Which that I may not dim by an incompetent description I shall contract all into this short Elogy Had his father bequeathed his Crown as the great Alexander did to the most worthy he had then been as clearly heir apparent by his worth as now he was by his birth If you desire a more particular and lively character you shall find it in that rare Pourtraiture drawn by his own Pen with such exactnesse of art that it appeared some considerable recompense for the multitude of his heavy afflictions which he expresseth with equal satisfaction but more modesty then that Roman Poet. It is saith he same kind of deceiving and lessening the injury of my long restraint when I find my leisure and solitude have produced something worthy of my self and usefull to you that neither you nor any other may hereafter measure my cause by the successe nor way judgement of things by my misfortunes Whoever will see a book worthy to justle the Apocrypha out of it's place let him study that piece and confesse that the Spirit of God hath not forsaken the withered world In what glory doth this second David sit there under his Crown of Thornes attended with such a stately train of graces and vertues as to make his other pompous coronation confess it self a childish May-game while he manageth his now onely weapon his Pen with such a gracefull Majesty that whoever doth not acknowledge his absolute Soveraignty in Rhetorick must be as great a Rebel in point of literature as those others were in point of duty and yet with such a splendid mixture of wisdome piety charity patience magnanimity and all other Royal and Christian graces that the elegance of the stile is the least part of the beauty of the work How is heighth of fancy married with depth of judgment Golden sentences enameled with Florid expressions and set