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	know_v	life_n	2,879	5	4.5653	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A17476	A Saxon historie, of the admirable adventures of Clodoaldus and his three children. Translated out of French, by Sr. T.H.	N. C.; T.H., Sir (Thomas Hawkins), d. 1640.; Caussin, Nicolas, 1583-1651, attributed name.	1634 (1634)	STC 4294; ESTC S107367	57,717	118

as it seemed to promise her much facility in a project which was otherwise impossible It also happened very fortunately that the execution of offenders was put off till another day for certaine customes of antiquity and religion that are strong chaines among people and which gave her full scope to accomplish her desires Wee daily see among many occurrents of affaires that to be verified which an ancient Author said who having made a large recitall of all the naturall armes which God giveth creatures he affirmes a women eminently hath them all and that there is neither fire nor sword which yeeldeth not either to beauty or cunning wyles which with them are very frequent She is able to walke thorough a Corps-du-guard to pierce Rockes and to seat her selfe in places where nothing can penetrate but lightning Hildegardis so mannaged her businesse in a short time that a hundred iron gates were all-most ready to fly open at her command Shee having disposed so many affections to her service failed not to visite the prisoners whom she knew naturally much to desire their liberty Shee went about mid-night into the dungeon accompanied only with a trusty maid-servant and a page who bare a Torch before them The poore gentlemen extremely weary with the labours of the former day and who after so great a perplexity of thoughts began to sleep upon their sadnesse hearing the great dore to open with a confused noise they suddenly awakened but when they beheld this heavenly face which promised more day-light to their affaires then the torch could afford to their eyes it seemed unto them some Divinity favourable to their affections was descended into the dungeon to comfort them but perceiving it was the she-Priest of the Temple which had charge to attend the sacrifices they were somewhat astonished But the generous Ischyrion cried out aloud Madame what is the matter come you then to leade us out to butchery Shee desirous to sound them answered Sir trouble not your selfe but as you have fought valiantly dispose your selves to die bravely To which he replyed he was already thoroughly prepared and asked her if it were she must do the deed To which she answered That never had she learned the trade to cut mens throats but that she was onely to assist in the sacrifice and to cut off the tipps of the victimes haire to throw the first fruits into the flames I at the least render thankes to my fortune saith Faustin that we are fallen into so good a hand and that since wee must needes die our death shall be honoured with the eyes of such a beauty Vpon this Hildegardis felt her heart surprized and stood some distance of time without speaking one word casting her eyes on the yong Iacinthus kept in the same dungeon and who notwithstanding the light and voice still slept securely Behold saith Ischyrion how this child doth allie the brother to the sister that is sleepe to death Why should wee so much feare death since to speake truly it is as it were nothing else but to performe once for all what Iacinthus now doth and what wee daily doe many times Then turning himselfe with a smiling countenance to the vestall Madame saith he should wee dare to hope a favour from you we would not beg life For wee know wee are accounted in the number of the most wretched sacrifices and that the people must be appeased by our death Doe then but save this little innocent pardon the tendernesse of his age take pity on the sorrow of his father verely we may vaunt even in these dungeons hee is our deare conquest and that we have purchased him in a sharpe combat at the price of our bloud which causeth his death to afflict us more sensibly then our owne At this word Hildegardis breathed foorth a deepe sigh which shee notwithstanding sought to smoother yet turning to her companion she said Verely this heart is truly generous what could hee doe more should hee pleade his brothers cause Behold what contempt of death what resolution It is fittest for such to live since they so well know how to use life Therevpon drawing neere vnto him Sir said shee Doe me the honour to tell me your name and what you are He replyed there needed in him for sacrifice but body and soule as for his name it served for no other use That all which miserable men can doe is wisely to conceale themselves and that among disasters the most secret were ever the best for generous soules This answere more enkindled the curiosity of the Lady to enquire after that which he was willing to dissemble so that seeing himselfe pressed on all sides he said Madame I am called Ischyrion since you must needs know it and I intreat you to thinke I doe not now begin to fight with Monsters for my whole life resembleth those pieces of Tapistry where Dragons are seene among golden apples It is a perpetuall web of miseries and glories there was never any thing so various I have beene told I sprang from regall bloud but being very young and unknowne was stolne away by Pirates and then recovered againe by shepherds whereof Thoas the most eminent among them was pleased to breed mee with his owne sonne Faustin here present with whom I have vowed a most faithfull and strict amity After that I had a vehement desire to travell all the world over with him and to make enquiry into my birth which I have hitherto done nor is there any place of fame in the habitable world to which in this my youth I have not travelled and ennobled it with some conquest wee together have seene above a hundred times the gates of death wide open to receive us but still our good Genius found some way for our deliverance untill now I see no helpe at all verely in my opinion death alone must shew mee the place where my parents are He cut off these words very short unwilling to seeme either vaine-glorious in recitall of his owne adventures or suppliant to purchase life by the history of his travels But shee who considered these discourses like unto Pictures which tell more then they expresse not being able any longer to dissemble her heart which shee seemed to distill with her teares having broken some very deepe sobs said unto him Worthy sir and friend God hath not created me a rocke to be insensible of humane miseries I plainly see your atchievements very neere approach the fortunes of our house and it seemes the web of our destinies hath passed thorough the one and the same hand For my father had a sonne taken from him when he was very young a while after the death of his wife my thrice honoured Mother which drenched him into so deep a sorrow that thorough griefe he expected death Hee notwithstanding comforted himselfe in me beholding me in most innocent yeeres of a nature very cheerefull and doubted not but that I in time might bring him a

the feet of his Maiesty she said Sir I render thanks to the divine providence which governing the worlds affaires hath drawne mee from Lyons dens to die among men and to yeeld my soule at the feet of the most triumphant Monarch of the world The fame of your Maiestie hath found us out in dungeons penetrating places where the Sun enters not and made us understand the blessings Heaven hath poured on your Armes For which cause we have some reason to reioyce amongst so many obiects of sadnesse that our eyes before they be shut up to all things mortall shall be illustrated with your conquests Yet is not this the cause for which I desire my life to be prolonged for fortune having throwne me into the extremity of miseries I see nothing so prepitious to my condition as death which must entombe all my paines I onely dying deplore the losse of these two gentlemen whose innocency I lately have seene oppressed after so many testimonies of their valour and goodnesse that it is a wonder how their vertues found fetters in a place where they might expect crownes But Sir since God hath made you arbitrator of man-kind and that having given you a sword to hew Monsters hee hath likewise affoorded you a ballance to weigh vertues and crimes save these innocents make them capable to beare your standards into as many places as the Sun discovereth his rayes in If I obtaine this favour of your Majestie I shall die contented for I am unworthy to see the light of the Sun having lived in this fatall place which of necessity must be incompatible with my life The King wondred at the constancy of this virgin joyned to her charity towards these prisoners and was curious to know what she did in this Castle which seemed most of all to trouble her minde Wherevpon casting her eyes downe and colouring her face with a modest blush she besought his Majestie to dispence with her the relation of a thing which bred in her so much horror and that it was enough he saw her resolved to expiate all her crimes by fire But the King powerfully vrging and giving her all manner of assurance she professed she excrecised the function of a Priest in the sacrifices of Irminsul and that she was present at the death of men who were sacrificed and further being asked touching the causes which brought her to so hatefull a profession shee told how shee had beene taken away by a strange misfortune at seven yeeres of age and after many adventures transported into this Castle where by maine force shee had beene constrained to execute the office of a vestall of the Temple she being a virgin and of very noble extraction Clodoaldus who was there present hearing speech of the taking away of a childe of a noble house felt his wound to open a fresh remembring that at the same age shee was of his owne had beene taken from him and conferring the yeeres the feature lineaments of face hee sayd within himselfe such should my deare Hildegardis be now were she yet alive Charlemaigne continuing his discourse said unto her being stolne at this age as she sayd shee might well remember the name she then had the house of her Father and other markes of her race To which she replyed shee could well call to mind her Father was of Denmarke heretofore governour of an ample province and that hee was called Clodoaldus As for her selfe she bare still the name of Hildegardis which was given her at her birth Therevpon the father who hearing these words had beene strongly assailed with an ebbe and floud of imaginations cryed as if hee came out of an extasie Ha sir This creature is my daughter it is my lost daughter whom I have sought for the space of fourteene yeeres in so great and painefull voyages then turning himselfe towards his little Iacinthus Son this is your sister and as he spake this both ran to imbrace her But shee who during all this discourse stood immoveable as a statue seeing her Father drew neer to kisse her and doubting least there might be some practise shee stept backe and said sir excuse mee if you please I cannot without further proofe more evident acknowledge you for my Father Clodoaldus seeing this refusall asked if Araspus were not yet with her she answered he was therevpon he prayed the King hee might bee called soorth which was speedily done Araspus avowing his master received him as a man fallen from Heaven gave him many singular welcomes and said to Hildegardis Madam approach confidently it is my Lord your Father The virgin remained in a strange rapture and the father not speaking but by broken sighes which issued from his heart as from a furnace of love held her fast embraced and bedewed her with his teares All there present were amazed at this sight as men astonished or charmed the King himselfe could not abstaine from teares and calling Hildegardis tooke her by the hand and demaunded whither shee would forsake the sacrifices of Irminsul and embrace her fathers religion which was Christian She answered she had a thousand and a thousand times abhorred this superstitious imposture and that with all her heart shee desired to bee a Christian Therevpon the King turning toward Araspus asked him how this creature had beene taken he relating that shee sporting in a wood in some childish maner a troupe of wandring Griphons assailed her well discovering their aime was at this young virgin but he having kept her in this storme as a vessell wherein all the treasures of his master were enclosed defended her with all his power till such time as oppressed with wounds hee was taken with her Hee added that shee had lived in this miserable place in such languors and distresses as cannot bee imagined expecting the much desired day which should breake her fetters and wipe away these teares Well goe to then virgin sayd the King behold the day which you so long have looked for is come But why were you thrust into this miserable dungeon What meane these chaines and burning pile you spake of even now The generous Lady almost forgetting her owne happinesse faithfully to assist her deare Ischyrion related with an atractive grace all that which had passed as well in the person of Iacinthus as in the combat of Lyons and Beares extolling as much as she could the rare prowesse of these two gentlemen Then shee added the advice shee tooke to free them the accident which befell her in this difficult affaire her imprisonment her condemnation and the desperate state of her fortune Here the Father embracing her againe long time wept over her saying My poore daughter It is well you are pulled out of the pawes of Wolves and I pray what had now become of you without the Kings protection But Hildegardis amongst these notable occurrents ever bearing her dearest Ischyrion in mind vrged Charlemaigne saying Sir my father is still possessed but of the one halfe

and Fables of their fortunes Others having for a long time been hidden as those rivers which travel far under the earth present themselves to the eyes of men and make themselves renowned by incomparable acts deriving rayes of glory from their proper obscurity A matter very evident in this narration which I am now about to publish wherein you shall behold beginnings uncertaine progressions embroyled and events most happy Clodoaldus an eminent Lord and one of the noblest of the Kingdome of Denmarke wherein hee sometime governed a great Province was a Widower and Father of three Children of which two had beene taken from him to wit a sonne called first by the name of his Father and afterward Ischyrion a daughter called Hildegardis The son was stolne away by Pirats recovered againe brought up by shepherds of whom hauing understood somwhat although obscurely touching his extraction he had a desire to trauell with Faustin the shepherds sonne who bred him both which encountring many accidents wrought great wonders The Daughter being about seven yeeres of age was taken by the subtill practise of certaine Priests of Idols to serve as a vestall Virgin in the Temple of Irminsul in the Land of Saxony wherein were infinite abhominations committed for they sacrificed men to feed Lions and Beares kept purposely in that place The third childe of Clodoaldus was Iacinthus upon whom the lot fell to have beene sacrificed in the Temple of this bloody Idoll but this miserie was diverted as you shall understand by the victorious armes of the French who overthrew Idolatrie and caused in this matter unspeakable felicity to arise after a great confusion of many calamities I heere Reader request thee that as this History aimes to shew the triumph of the crosse upon the remainders of impietie which were as then in Europe thou wouldst not slightly over-runne these lines by the way of a barren delight but that thou therein admire the obligations thou owest to the Saviour of the world who hath drawne thee from the servitude of Devils I intreat thee therein to behold the precious gift hee hath conferred on France taking its Armes and Flower de Luces to make them the true instruments of his glory and in the end raising Charlemaigne a most puissant Monarch wholly to demollish Idols The wise-man hath said very well that Idolatrie was the cause the beginning and the end of all evils For from thence proceeded the furious warre of ignorance the perpetuall illusion of life the confusion of all things the neglect of God the corruption of nature and in the end an invndation of bloud sacrileges and impurities It is a wonder how this plague having begun a litle after the Deluge and over-run all parts of the world was not yet in the time of Charlemaigne wholy extinct which was Eight Hundred yeeres after the Birth of CHRIST But as the evill spirit endevoured to spred his Net from the beginning of the World so hee sought to maintaine it to the end accounting it to bee the strength and band of his Empire I am not ignorant what learned men argue touching the first Idol S. Cyril thinketh it was a statue of Iupiter consecrated by Cecrops King of the Athenians Didymus and S. Ierome attribute the invention thereof to a King of Creet named Melissus Diodorus and Eusebius to the Phrygians The Atlantes a people of Affricke boast aboue all others the antiquity of their god whom they entitle by the name of heaven Porphryrius imagineth the beginning of Pagan religion came from the Phaenicians But Ammonius esteemes it very probable that the first Idol was that of Nemrod mentioned in Scripture were it not that following the relation of Fulgentius we say that one Synoph●nes an Egyptian by Nation having lost his son first of all consecrated a statue to sorrow It were much more expedient to know the last then the first of these abhominations The most probable opinion is that it began quickly after the Tower of Babel and that the Babylonians and Egyptians were the first who were infected with it The ancient Gaules proceeded farre therein for the Devils gave them Oracles in Trees and statues and they fell into so deep a blindnesse as to sacrifice men to Taranis whose altar as Lucan the Poet observeth was bloudy and barbarous This was yet practised among the Saxons as we shall see in the progresse of this Historie For it happened that Clodoaldus this distressed Father having wandred over many Countreys perpetually in quest of his Children came to reside in Saxony where hee had some alliance and seeking there for some entertainment to sweeten the sence of his mis-hap was greatly delighted in hunting wherein he used as much fervour as dexteritie Now it chanced one day that he pursuing a Bore very eagerly entred into a huge thicke forrest which much astonished him to behold for verely it was a den of Devils where they made very many bloudy sacrifices and there was still to be seen a huge Idol of brasse dedicated to a false Divinitie vnder which this Bore casually hastned to sheltor himselfe Those I who at that time accompanied Clodoaldus fayled not to give him notice it was the Forrest and Idol of Irminsul and that hunting was forbidden in that place But hee whether neglecting the superstitions of a Country wherin hee had not yet beene naturalized or whether charmed with the pleasure of chase forbare not to passe further and slew the Bore with his owne hand whose head hee cut off and shewed it in a bravery In the meane while it being very ordinary with evil spirits to speake by Idols and to cause sterility of seasons and sicknes of bodies there was heard to proceed from this statue a voyce frightfull and menacing which protested to act strange out-rages upon the person of this poore Lord and the whole Countrey if hee endevoured not to afford a speedie satisfaction And that which made it bee thought these threats would not bee without effect was that Clodoaldus felt himselfe sodainely strooken with a dimnesse which for a time tooke from him the vse of his eyes This vigorous spirit of his was so overwhelmed with superstition that casting himselfe at the feet of a false god to begge pardon hee yeelded up humble supplications which rellished more of the servitude of his feare then the generosity of his courage The Devill seeing him in a state to yeeld to any thing required of him for the recovery of his sight made him promise to sacrifice the first thing he should chance to meet withall as hee returned to his house He quickly found by experience the temeritie of his vow in the disaster of this accident For his son Iacinthus the sole obiect of his thoughts and only support of the frailtie of his age understanding hee was gone from his house on hunting made haste to meet him with cheerefulnesse of youth and excesse of ioy