Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	death_n	eternal_a	life_n	3,513	5	5.2991	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A48839	A sermon preached at the funeral of the Right Reverend Father in God John late Lord Bishop of Chester, at the Guildhal Chappel London, on Thursday the 12 of December, 1672 by William Lloyd ...	Lloyd, William, 1627-1717.	1672 (1672)	Wing L2703; ESTC R20363	15,451	37

shall remember them and he commands that we should do it especially for good Bishops departed this life Our remembrance of them doth not differ in kind but in degree from what we ow to the memory of others 'T is a duty we are to pay them above others In our Thoughts In our Affections In our Words and In our Actions and Lives First in our Thoughts 't is not a simple Remembrance that God requires for that being an act of the sensitive soul as I conceive doth not directly fall under precept For it is not in our power to remember or forget either what or when we please But it is in our power to do those acts which conduce to the exciting or to the helping of our memory This is that which God requires at our hands that we should endeavour to turn our minds towards such objects and contemplate in them the gifts and graces of God that as oft as we think of them we should acknowledge that good which was in them and which we have received by their means That we should pay them that honorable esteem which we ow to our spiritual Parents and Benefactors If we think of them heartily in this manner it will work something upon our Affections We cannot but be sensible of the want of such men and therefore grieved for our loss when they are taken from us as the Asian Bishops were at those words of S. Paul when he said they should see his face no more Though God intend it for their gain whom he takes to himself and he takes them in that time which suits best with their Circumstances Yet even then we have cause to grieve for our selves and for the Church who are deprived of the presence and use of such men How much more when for ought we know they are taken away for our sins When for ought we know it was because the age was not worthy of them For ought we know 't is in order to some judgement of God which will come the sooner when they are gone when we have filled up the measure of our Iniquities When Elijah was taken away in a very evil age Elisha cryed out O my Father my Father the Chariots and horse-men of Israel What will become of Israel now thou art gone We dare not think so highly of any one man We have no such cause to despond of our Nation When it is bad we are to do our parts to make it better to pray that God would send more Labourers into his Harvest that he would double his gifts and blessings on those that are Left And for those we have Lost we must Resign them to God both acknowledging his bounty in giving them to us and submitting to his will in taking them to himself So S. Bernard on the death of his Brother Gerard Lord says he thou hast given and thou hast taken away though we grieve that thou hast taken away yet we cannot forget that thou didst give him Yea we ow not only submission to God but Thankfulness too for their sakes who are delivered by this means from so great and such manifold evils as continually hover about us in this life From sickness and pain from labour and danger from sorrow and fear and care and what not being delivered from Sin which is the Cause and from that Flesh which is the Center of all this They are past all evils else that have overcome Death They leave sorrow to us who call our selves the living their life the only true life is Immutable Joy eternal Rest Peace and Felicity Which if we seriously believe if we desire to be with them we cannot Sorrow for our loss without Joy for their gain and thanksgiving on their behalf to that good God who hath given them the Victory through our Lord Iesus Christ. But thus much we ow upon the death of every true Christian though of never so mean a rank and condition We are to be Thankful to God for his mercies and to profess it as we are taught in the Offices of our Church which have the same words of burial for the meanest of our communion as for those that are highest in their Graces and Gifts But there is a Remembrance in Words that is due to these and not to the other namely the due praise of those their excellent Graces and Gifts which though they have not of themselves but through the bounty and liberality of God who is therefore to be chiefly respected and glorified in all the praise that we give to his creatures Yet since he is pleased to do them this honour above others and to make choice of them whom he so dignifies We are bound to allow it them we are to follow Gods choice to give them praise whom he hath so qualified for it Only with this care that we do it truly not to flatter the dead and profitably for the example and imitation of the living We have so much reason to do this that they who had only reason to guide them the Gentiles upon the death of any eminent persons had Orations made publickly in their praise The Jews without any particular Law for it had honour done to the Memory of Worthy persons at their Funerals 2 Chron. 32. ult The Rites of it are partly described 2 Chron. 16. 14. They laid their dead in a bed full of the richest perfumes which also were publickly burnt at the Interment To which I conceive the Preacher alludes Eccles. 7. 1. where he says A good name is better than precious oyntment and the day of ones death than the day of ones birth When one cometh into the World none knows how he may prove if he do well in it he goes out with this Publick testimony After which the Jews never mentioned such persons without a blessing on their memory But above all others the Primitive Christians were very observant this way They saw it was the will of their Lord and Master that the good work which was done upon him by Mary should be kept in perpetual memory and is therefore recorded in the Gospel They saw how the works of Dorcas were shewn at her death the Coats and Garments which she made for the poor They saw what need there was of great Incentives in those days when Christianity was a most dangerous Profession It is of no small force to make men love a Religion when they see it infuses excellent Principles that it excites so suitable practises that it is proof against suffering and death And the experience of that power it hath in some provokes and animates others to the same Upon these and the like considerations and perhaps with allusion to that Text where S. John is said to have seen the souls of the Martyrs under the Altar They had their Memorias Martyrum their places of Worship where they placed the Altars over the bodies of their Martyrs What with any intention to worship the Martyrs It was so suggested by the