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	natural_a	reason_n	1,505	5	4.9161	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A02786	A discourse of the seuerall kinds and causes of lightnings Written by occasion of a feareful lightning which on the 17. day of this instant Nouember, anno Domini 1606. did in a very short time burne vp the spire steeple of Blechingley in Surrey, and in the same melt into infinite fragments a goodly ring of bells. By Simon Harward.	Harward, Simon, fl. 1572-1614.	1607 (1607)	STC 12918; ESTC S103922	10,214	24

the middest of iudgement there shined mercie Some do descant vpon the day because the Bells did thus perish in that seuenteenth day of Nouember wherein for so many former happie yeares they had ioyfully sounded for the raigne of good Queene Elizabeth But let such know that there needeth no other Bell but onely a noble fame to sound out the vertues of such a learned and religious Queene and that fame maugre the despite of all aduersaries must and will ring out her praises euen vnto the endes of the world If the Bells had beene cast in our late Queenes raigne then might the Papists picke occasion to take some collour of aduantage They might say that the Bels were neuer christened and hallowed as by their lawes they should haue beene and that therefore the lightning preuailed against them But the Bels were all auncient Bels the eldest man in the parish cannot remember the casting of any of them the third bell onely excepted All the rest as they were framed in time of Poperie so no doubt they had the blessing and baptizing at that time vsed and were hallowed by that praier in the Masse booke Omnipotens sempiterne Deus tu hoc tintinnabulum coelesti benedictione perfunde vt ante sonitum eius longius effugentur ignita iacula inimici percussio fulminum impetus lapidum laesio tempestatum Almightie euerlasting God besprinckle this bell with thy heauenly blessing that at the sound thereof the fierie darts of the enemie the striking of lightnings the stroke of thunderbolts and hurts of tempests may farre be put to flight The cause indeede why the lightning at this time did preuaile both against bels and steeple was because it was the good pleasure of God thus to shew his omnipotent power to stirre vp as wel the inhabitants of the said town as vs all to feare him to giue vs some taste of his iudgments to summon vs all to true repentance The Philosophers Aristole Plinie Seneca and others do point out many naturall causes of lightenings but when they consider the wonderfull effects thereof they are cōpelled to acknowledge a diuine power farre aboue the reach of all humane reasō As Seneca saith Mira sunt fulminis si intueri velis opera nec quicquam dubii relinquentia quin diuina insit illis occulta potentia The operations of lightnings if you behold them are wonderfull and do leaue no doubt but that there is in them a diuine and secret power Pontanus maketh three especiall kinds of lightnings Scinditque vritque longo serat aera hiatu One is a renting lightning another a burning and the third doth cut through the aire with a long dispersing The lightning which is scattered more generally thorough the aire is of lesse and weaker force but that which is gathered into a lesser compasse is of greater strength and according to the seuerall effects hath sundry diuers names giuen vnto it One is called fulmē scindēs a cutting or renting lightening because by the aboundance of spirits and drines it is so swift in operation that it renteth before it can inflame of that the phophet Dauid speaketh when he saith The voyce of the Lord breaketh the Cedar trees yea the Lord breaketh the Cedars of Libanus An other lightening is called penetrans a pearcing lightening because by the puritie of the flame it pearceth thorough such outward parts as haue powers of passage worketh his forces inwardly of that Pontanus speaketh hominemque bouemque exanimat nulla vt maneant vestigia mortis Of man and beast it kils hoth kind And leaues no print of death behind It pearceth thorough the outward pores of the body and slayeth the vitall parts within So it killeth the child in the mothers wombe leauing the mother safe and it melteth the siluer in the purse the purse sustaining no damage This penetrant lightening is of such force that it pearceth oftentimes bodies which can hardly be accompted transpirable as when it corrupteth wine and beare be the vessels neuer so strongly made or be the orifices thereof neuer so strongly stopped There is also a lightening infuscans which maketh blacke but by reason of the subtillitie and thinnesse it flieth away before it can burne of that Pontanus speaketh Non faciem non ora hominum non corpora noris The body from the foote to face With blacknesse it doth quite disgrace An other lightning is termed vrens a burning lightning It hath much earthly matter it breaking thorough the clouds doth fall downe and doth burne melt or spoile those bodies vpon which it descendeth Some lightnings are prodigious so surpassing the reason of man that no natural cause can be rendered therof as Eutropius sheweth a history of a maid of Rome who trauayling to Apulis was killed with lightening no haim outwardly appearing in her body and at the same instant her garments were also shaken off without any rent and her horse also killed and his bridle and girthes shaken off without any breach Of such lightenings Pontanus writeth Nunc ipsis etiam in stabulis mirabile dictu Quadripedem exoluit pedibus quoque ferrea demit Vincula intacto terram quatit vngula cornu Illaesus sonipes alta ad praecepia mandit Oft from the horse O wonder great it shaketh of the iron locke The stead still at the cratch doth eate and nothing harmed by the knocke That lightening should shake iron fetters from the the feet of horses and nothing hurt the hoofe this doth Pontan call a miraculous lightning The causes of the greiuous harmes which are often caused by lightnings are of three sorts the first iudicial the second instructtiue and the third fatidicall The iudiciall cause is when the Lord doth by it execute vengeance vpon some notable offenders as vpon blasphemers vpon sorcerers vpon ambitious men bloudsuckers drunkards adulterers and such like Olympius an Arriau Bishop when being at Carthage he blasphemed the blessed Trinity he had by the iudgment of God his body suddenly burnt with lightning So Sabellinus sheweth a history of one Prester the sonne of Hippomanes who blaspheming God was stricken with a thunderbolt and perished The thunderbolt cōmeth of the viscous sulphurous matter of the lightning for as the Gunners wildfires doe flame in the water so lightnings being much of the same nature haue beene often seene to burne Fishers nets euen vnder the water And as meale and water kneaded together and baked doe grow into a hardnesse so the drie and viscous exhalation is by force of the heate in thunder hardened into a stone Another sinne which God doth punish with lightnings is Magycke and Sorcerie As Zonaras writeth that Anastasius the Emperour in the yere of Christ 499. beeing addicted to Magycke and the Manichean heresie did persecute such Christians as reprooued his sinnes and wickednesse But at the last lightning came fearefully about his house called Tholotum he crept from