Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	good_a	great_a	read_v	3,182	5	5.8148	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A56707	A sermon preached before the Lords spiritual and temporal, in the Abby-church at Westminster, on the 5th of November, 1696 being the anniversary thanksgiving, for the happy deliverance from the gunpowder treason : and also, for the happy arrival of His Present Majesty on this day, for the deliverance of our church and nation / by ... Symon Lord Bishop of Ely.	Patrick, Simon, 1626-1707.	1696 (1696)	Wing P855; ESTC R22926	17,117	35

to appoint such Success as they please to their own Projects and Devices And the more ample we allow the Sphaere of any Creatures Liberty to be in devising and projecting the more Admirable doth the Counsel of the most High appear in directing and ordering its free Courses to such Ends as he appoints Now these Ends God accomplishes sometimes by common and ordinary Means sometimes by Means wholly Miraculous and sometimes by such as not wholly Miraculous but have something Extraordinary in them First Sometimes by common and ordinary Means as when the diligent Hand getteth Riches and Slothfulness and Negligence brings Men to Poverty When the Proud and Ambitions fall into a Snare which intangles them in Destruction and the Meek the Humble and Patient inherit the Earth These Means commonly produce such Ends yet not without Success from God who sometimes is pleased to hinder their Production for Reasons best known to himself So the Son of Sirach hath observed XI Eeclus 14. Prosperity and Adversity Life and Death Poverty and Riches come of the Lord. The last of which he thus Explains in the foregoing Verses 11. 12. There is one that laboureth and taketh pains and maketh haste and is so much the more behind Again there is another that is slow and hath need of help wanting Ability and full of Poverty yet the Eye of the Lord looketh upon him for good and setteth him up from his low estate In these common things particularly in Ploughing Sowing and Harvest c. we do not attribute to God so much as we ought to do and one reason of it is that we either are not conversant in the Holy Scriptures or do not mind them when we read them And the often repetition of the Words of Life as an excellent Man of our own long ago observed without due Reverence and Attention to them breeds an insensibility or deadness in mens Souls II. Which is so true that though God sometimes produces the Ends he designs as I observed in the second place by such Means as are wholly miraculous yet Mens Souls continue benummed and stupified unless they seriously consider and lay them to Heart For thus he often Ruled among the Stubborn Jews whom he seems to have Chosen to be a Theatre of his Providence in them to give a Demonstration unto all the Nations of the World and to all following Generations of his Power Ruling every-where Thus he delivered them out of the Hand of Pharaoh by an out-stretched Arm as Moses speaks Thus he passed them through the Red Sea thus he fed and maintained them in the Wilderness and at last brought them into Canaan by a continued Succession of Wonders wrought by his mighty Power among them that all the Ends of the Earth might fear him III. But sometimes he Works his Ends by a middle sort of Means or Causes such as are not perfectly Miraculous but yet have something extraordinary in them When second Causes are not proportionable to their Effects when they produce things unexpected and which seem altogether improbable when lesser things prevail over greater weaker overthrow the Strength of those that seemed in all humane Judgment to be far Mightier here is something that is very Extraordinary something that is Remarkable a marvellous Hand of God though nothing perhaps perfectly Miraculous Read the Story of Esther and Mordecai and observe how they prevailed against the potent Interest and dreadful Project of Haman in which the whole Empire was engaged and you will find such a Concurrence of strange things as will convince you there was a wonderful Hand of God in it Every one of those Occurrences apart may seem usual and ordinary as that King Ahasuerus could not sleep and that he called for a Book to divert him rather than Instruments of Musick and that they brought the Chronicles of the Kingdom rather than any other Book and that they read there where Mordecai's good Deeds were Recorded but had been forgotten by him and that Haman should just then come into the Court when the King inquired what had been done for Mordecai and should himself unwittingly contrive the greatest Honour to be put upon him and appointed to be the Instrument of it These and all the rest considered severally and singly alone by themselves cannot be called Extraordinary but take them all together in their intire Frame and Composure it is such as cannot be ascribed to any but his Workmanship who Created all things by an astonishing Artifice Thus are things that seem unlikely brought to pass by the secret Counsel of God against the most powerful Interest Contrivances and Combinations that can be raised upon Earth And of this sort were those two great Providences of God for which we bless him this Day and are met here together to celebrate the Remembrance of them publickly with our thankful Acknowledgments First The happy Deliverance of King JAMES the First and the Three Estaes of this Realm from the most Traiterous and Bloody intended Massacre by Gunpowder Secondly The happy Arrival of his present Majesty on this Day for the Deliverance of our Church and Nation The former of these was a Deliverance so wonderful if it be considered in all its Circumstances that it can hardly be parallel'd in any humane Story I will mention but these Two things First The Inevitableness of our Danger according to Humane Reason Secondly The Marvellous Manner of its Discovery and Prevention I. In the former of these there are two Circumstances which show the intended Destruction was Inevitable if God by an extraordinary Providence had not interposed to prevent it They are the Secrecy of its Contrivance and the Persons by whom it was Contrived and Managed 1. As to the Secrecy of the Contrivance it was so great that the Conspirators themselves boasted of it in the Letter which discovered all wherein were these Words They shall receive a terrible Blow this Parliament and yet they shall not see who Hurts them For so secret was the Design that though it had been long Working yet it lay Concealed without the least Inkling of it till within XII Hours of its intended Execution It was a Work of Darkness framed under Ground where no Eye but God's could see them They buried their Counsel in the Depth of the Earth and bound themselves likewise by the most Sacred Ties never to disclose Directly or Indirectly by Word or Circumstance the Matter propounded to them to keep Secret Nor desist from the Execution thereof unless the rest should give Leave Thus every Man Swore that entered into this Conspiracy by the Blessed Trinity and by the Sacrament which then they received 2. After this it was not likely they should either Disclose it or Desist from it if we consider Secondly The Persons ingaged in it who were Men of desperate Resolution as well as of desperate Principles They were all Inspired with a false Religious Zeal spurred on by a Fancy that they were about an Action Meritorious