Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	body_n	effect_n	soul_n	2,030	5	5.3068	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A49606	The mirrour which flatters not concerning the contempt of the world, or the meditation of death, of Philip King of Macedon, Saladine, Adrian, and Alexander the Great / by Le Sieur de la Serre ... ; transcribed English from the French, by T. Cary.; Miroir qui ne flatte point. English	La Serre, M. de (Jean-Puget), ca. 1600-1665.; Cary, T. (Thomas), b. 1605 or 6.	1658 (1658)	Wing L458; ESTC R15761	110,353	296

in this world consists in the necessity of death but Mans reason is impaired in the course of Times Oh welcome impairement since Time ruines it but onely in an Anger knowing that it goes about to establish its Empire beyond both time and Ages In fine the Heavens may seem to wax old in their wandring course How happy is man in decaying evermore since he thus at last renders himselfe exempt from all the miseries which pursue him they yet appear the same still every day as they were a thousand yeares agon man from moment to moment differs from himselfe and every instant disrobes him somewhat of his Being Oh delightfull Inconstancy since all his changes make but so many lines which abut at the Center of his stability How mysterious is the Fable of Narcissus the Poets would perswade us that He became self-enamoured A long life is a heavy burthen to the soul since it muct ronder an account of all its moments viewing Himself in a Fountain But I am astonish't how one should become amorous of a dunghill though covered with Snow or Flowers A face cannot be formed without Eyes Nose and Mouth and yet every of these parts make but a body of Misery and Corruption as being all full of it This Fable intimates us the representment of a fairer truth since it invites a man to gaze himself in the Fountain of his tears thus to become amorous of himself If a man could contemplate the beauties of his soul in innocence he would alwais be surprized with its love If a man would often view himself in the tears of his repentance he would soon become a true self-lover not for the lineaments of dust and ashes whereof his countenance is shap's but rather of those beauties and graces wherewith his soul is ornamented and all these together make but a rivelet which leads him to the admiration of that source from whence they took their originall Oh how David was a wise Narcissus then when he made of his Tears a Mirrour so to become enamour'd of himself for he was so self-loving in his repentance that in this He spent both daies and nights with unparalled delights All the vain objects of the world are so many fountains of Narcissus wherin prying may shipwrack themselves But if Narcissus ship-wrack't himself in the fountain of his self-fondnesse This great King was upon point to Abysse himself in the Sea of his tears for their liquid Crystalline shewd him to himself so beautifull that he burned with desire thus to drown himself Ladies view your selves in this Mirrour since you are ordinatily slaves to your own self love You will be fair at what price soever see here is the means The Crystall Mirrour of your tears flatter not contemplate therein the beauty of this grace which God hath given you to bewail your vanities This is the onely ornament which can render you admirable Tears are the faithfullest Mirrours of penitents All those deceitfull Chrystals which you wear hang'd at your Girdles shew you but fained beauties whereof Art is the workmistrisse and cause rather then your visages Would ye be Idolaters of the Earth which vou tread on your bodies are but of Dirt but if you will have them endeared where shall I find tearms to expresse their Noysomnesse If Ladies would ake as much care of their souls as of their bodys they would not hazard the losse both of one and to'ther Leave to Death his Conquest and to the Worms their heritage and search your selves in that originall of Immortality from whence your souls proceed that your actions may correspond to the Noblenesse of that cause This is the most profitable counsell which I can give You It is time to end this Chapter Great Kings I serve you this Morning instead of a page to awake You and remembrance You that you are Men I mean Subjects to Death and consequently destinated to serve as a Prey to the Worms The meditation of our nothingness is a soveraign remedy against vanity a Shittle-cock to the sinds and matter for to form an object of horror and astonishment to you altogether Muze a little that your life passeth away as a Dream think a little that your thoughts are vain consider at the same time Men are so near of blood together hat all bear the same name that all that is yours passes and flies away You are great but this necessity of Dying equals you to the least of your subjects Your powers are dreadfull but a very hand-worm mocks at them your riches are without number but the most wretched of men carry as much into the grave as you In fine may all the pleasures of Life make a party in Yours yet they are but so many Roses whose prickles onely remain to you at the instant of Death The horror which environs You chaseth away your greatnesse Man hath nothing so proper to him as the misery to which he is born the weaknesse which possesseth you renders unprofitable your absolute powers and onely then in that shirt which rests upon your back are comprised all the treasures of your Coffers Are not these verities of importance enough to break your sleep I awake you then for to remembrance you this last time If the earth be our mother heaven is our father that you are Men but destined to possesse the place of those evill Angels whose Pride concaved the Abysses of Hell that you are Men but much more considerable for the government of your reason then your Kingdom That you are Men but capable to acquire all the felicities of Heaven if those of the Earth are by you disdained That you are Men but called to the inheritance of an eternall Glory if you have no pretence to any of this world Lastly Though the body and soul together make up the man there is yet as much difference between the one and the others as between the scabberd and the sword that you are Men but the living images of an infinite and omnipotent one Clear streames of immortality remount then to your eternall source fair rayes of a Sun without Eclipse rejoyn your selves then to the body of his celestiall light Perfect patterns of the divinity unite your selves then to it as to the independant cause of your Being Well may the Earth quake under your feet your wils are Keys to the gates of its abysses should the Water or'e-whelm again all Although the puissances of the soul work not but by the senses the effects in this point are more noble then the cause your hopes cannot be shipwrack'● That the Aire fils all things may be but your expectations admit of some vacuum Though the Fire devour all things the object of your hopes is above its flames let the heavens pour down in a throng their malignant influences here below your souls are under covert from their affaults Let the Sun exhaling vapours make thereof thunders for your

other created things bear the same Title but if thy bounty hath been willing to advantage our nature with many graces proper and ordinated to it alone these are so many witnesses which convince us not to have deserv'd them since our very Ingratitude is yet a Recognizing of this Truth Insomuch that as our Life is nothing but sinne and sinne is a meer privation The mest just man sinneth seven times a day it may be maintained that we are nothing else and consequently nothing at all But how Proud am I O Lord every time I think thou hast ereated me of Earth for this is a Principall which drawes me alwaies to it selfe by a right of propriety from whence I cannot defend my selfe What is it for a man to triumph hereof the world the earth expects his spoile All things seek their repose in their element O how happy am I to search mine in that of Dust and Ashes whereof thou hast formed me The Earth demands my Earth and my body as a little Gullet separated from its source speeds by little and little to the same source from whence it had its beginning And this that which impeaches me from gathering up my self to take a higher flight I should do bravely to hoyse my selfe above my Center when the assay of my Vanity Pridehoyses up onely to gives a fall and the violence of my fall are but the same thing I give still downwards upon the side of my weaknesses and the weight of my miserie overbeares upon the arrogance of my Ambition A man no doubt may misknow himselfe yet the least hit of mishap teares the vaile of his hood winknesse O happy defect and yet more happy the condition which holds me alwaies enchained to the dunghill of my Originall since the links of this easie servitude are so many Mirrours which represent me that I am nothing whensoever I imagine my self to be something Let us change our Tone without changing subject Ladies Remember that you die every houre behold here a MIRROVR WHICH FLATTERS NOT It shewes you both what you are such as you shall be But if notwithstanding you still admire your selves under an other visage full of allurements and sweets This is but Death himself A strang thing that death is still as neare us at life and yet we never thinke on it who hides him under these faire apparences to the end you may not discern him It is true you have gracefull Tresses of haire which cover your heads and his is all Bald but doe not you heed how he pulls them off from yours by little every day and makes those which he leave you to turn White to the end you may pull them out your selves It is true your eyes have a sparkling lustre Time and Deathare the onely inexorables and beauty but of his is seen onely the hideous place where Nature had seated them But do you not consider how with continual action be Dusks the glory of this beauty and in conclusion puts to Eclipse these imaginary Pety-Suns It is true your hue is of Lillies and your mouth of Roses upon his face is seen onely the stubs of these flowers but call to mind that he blasts this Lilly-teint as well as Lillies themselves and that the vermillion of this Rosie-mouth lasts but as Roses and if yet you differ to day from him in something you may resemble him to morrow in all I leave you to meditate of these truths Man is a true mirrour which represents to the natural all things which are oppos'd unto it Man is as one picture with two faces and often the most naturall is falsest If you turn it downward to the Earth we can see within nothing but objects of Dust and Ashes but if you turn him to the Heavens-ward there is to be admired in it beauties and graces purely celestiall In effect if we consider man in his mortall and perishable condition hardly can one find any stay in this consieration since he is nothing else but a Chimera whose form every moment by little and little destroies to reduce it to its first nothing And indeed not to lie to ye man is but a Puffe of wind Man is nothing in himselfe yet compreheods al things since he lives by nothing else is filled with nothing else and dies onely by Privation of it But if you turn the Medall I would say the Mirrour of his Soule towards his Creator there are seen nothing but gifts of Immortality What though man be made of earth he is more divine than mortall but graces of a Soveraigne bounty but favours of an absolute will The heavens and the Stars appear in this Crystalline mirrour not by reflection of the object but by a divine vertue proceeding from the Nature of his cause Let us to the End Me thinks This Page returnes again to day within the Chamber of Philip of Macedon The slumber of vanities is a mortall malady to the soule and drawing the Curtain cries out according to his ordinary Sir Awake and Remember that you are a Man but why rouzes he him to think of Death since sleep is its image Alexander knew himselfe mortall by his sleeping and in effect those which have said that sleep was the Brother of Death have drawn their reason of it from their reciprocall resemblance Awake then Great Kings Not to ponder that you are mortall your sleep is a trance of this but rather that you are created for immortality Remember you are Men. A man should not forget his heavenly beginning having heaven for a daily object I will not say subject to all the miseries of the Earth but rather capable of all the felicities of heaven Remember that you are men I will no say the shittle-cock of Time and the But to all the shafts of Fortune but rather victors over ages and all sorts of miseries Remember that you are men I will not say any more conceiv'd in Corruption brought forth by it and also destroyed by it But rather I say If a man should consider his worth by that which he cost he would love himselfe perfectly born for the glory of God Living for to acquire it and Dying for to possesse it Remember that you are Men I will say no more slaves of Sin the Flesh and the World but rather free for resistance to the first strong enough to vanquish the next and more powerfull yet to give a Law to the third A man may doe every good thing which he desires since in his impu● issance his will is taken for the deed Remember that you are men I will no more say the pourtraict of Inconstancy the object of every sort of ill and the pasture of Wormes But rather the Image of God the subject of every sort of good and the sole aliment of eternity as created for it alone Remember that you are men Man is sure a thing something divine