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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	good_a	great_a	king_n	5,512	5	3.6764	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A38744	The abridgment of Eusebius Pamphilius's ecclesiastical history in two parts ... whereunto is added a catalogue of the synods and councels which were after the days of the apostles : together with a hint of what was decreed in the same / by William Caton.; Ecclesiastical history. English	Eusebius, of Caesarea, Bishop of Caesarea, ca. 260-ca. 340.; Caton, William, 1636-1665.	1698 (1698)	Wing E3420; ESTC R1923	127,007	269

their whole substance and freely to communicate thereof unto one anothers necessity even as they would have others to communicate unto them in the time of their necessity And that brotherly love which in this particular hath been manifested among the true Christian Quakers hath caused their Adversaries much to admire and wonder even as the Heathen did over that entire love which was among the Antient Christians Tertullian told the Gentiles there was cause to wonder their passion was so irregular i. e. contrary to rule that in prosecuting the Christians they made no difficulty to take away the life of men that were profitable to the Common-wealth farther he said the State received by their injustice an evident damage and important loss and yet no body looks to it said he no body weighes of what consequence the sufferings are of so many persons of good life and the punishment of so great a number of Innocent pag. 153. There hath also been cause to wonder at the rashness and imprudency of many bitter willful Antichristians whose foolish indiscreet behaviour towards the true Christians hath been not a little prejudicial to the Nation in which no great difficulty hath been made of casting thousands of them into prison and they who have done it or have been the cause of it have fought and endeavoured thereby to procure the ruine of their Families and Estates which thing certainly hath brought no honour to the King neither hath it been any profit or advantage to his Kingdom but certain external inconveniencies have been thereby procured to some of his faithful Subjects the true Christians yet few in authority seemed to lay to heart nor yet see seriously to consider of what sad consequence the undeserved sufferings of so many harmless people might be Thus have I briefly stated the suffering condition of the Antient Christians with which I have truly parallelled the true Christians state in this present age And let now the upright in heart judge how far both Papists and Protestants that are accustomed to prosecute about Religion are degenerated from the same and how disagreeing their principles and practises are to the principles and practises of the Antient Christians yet notwithstanding will they glory of their Antiquity and condemn others as New upstart Sects and unheard os Religions that differ from them and Worship God in the Spirit but by these things which I have re-capitulated in this Treatise the wise in heart may see how that the CHRISTIAN-QUAKERS have whereof to glory so well as others if not beyond many others who at this day glory so much of their Antiquity but this I know to be their resolution and determination viz. that they will glory in the Lord and in the fellowship of the sufferings of his dear Son their Lord and Saviour This knowing how that he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the spirit Thus it hath been yea thus it is and thus it will be until he Reign whose right it is A REGISTER OF THE Death Sufferings and Martyrdome of the Prophets and APOSTLES According to the Testimony of the Scripture and other Historical RECORDS ISAIAH was sawn asunder with a woodden saw Ierimiah was often persecuted and imprisoned yea he was thrown into a deep Dungeon where it is said he stood in the mire to the head and at length was stoned to death in Egypt Ezekiel was slain in Babylon by the Duke of the people Daniel was thrown among the hungry Lyons yet the Lord preserved him The three Children were thrown into the Fiery Furnace but the Fire did them no harm Micah was thrown down and his neck broken Amos was smitten with a club on the Temples of the head and so brained Zachariah was stoned to death The Life of Peter PETER was born at Bethsaida formerly an obscure and inconsiderable Village till lately re-edified and inlarger by Philip the Tetrarch Cituate it was upon the banks of Gallile and had a wilderness on the other side called the desert of Bethsada whither our Saviour used often to retire the privacies and solituds of the place advantageously Ministring to Divine Contemplation but Bethsaida was not so remarkable as it self was memorable for a worse sort of barrenness ingratitude and unprofitableness under the influence of four Sermons and Mericles thence severely upbraided by him and threatned till one of his deepest woes Woe unto the Chorarin Woe unto thee Bethsaida c. A Woe that stuck close to it for according to one who surveyed it in the last Age it was sunk again into a very mean and small Village consisting only of a few Cottages of Moors and wild Arabs and Travellers have since assured us that even these are dwindled away into one poor Cottage so fatally does sin undermine the Greatest the goodliest Places so certainly does God's Word take place and not one jot either of his Promise or Threatning fall to the ground the particular time of his Birth cannot be Recorded in General we may conclude him to be at least two years Elder than his Master his Married condition and setled course of life at his first coming to Christ and that Authority and Respect which the Gravity of his Person procured him amongst the rest of the Apostles can speak him no less the Name given him at his Circumcision was Simon or Symeon a Name common among the Iews our Saviour adds thereunto Cephas signifies a Stone or Rock was hence derived into the Greek and by Us Peter his Father was Ionah probably a Fisherman of Bethsaida for the Sacred Story take no farther notice of him than by the bare mention of of his Name and I believe there had been no great danger of mistake thought Metaphrastes had not told us that it was not Ionas the Prophet who come out of the Belly of the Whale Brother he was to Andrew the Apostle and it was as certain that he was a Fisherman by Trade a very survile course of life as besides the great pain and labour it required exposing him to all the injuries of Wind and Weather to the storm of the Sea the darkness and tempestuousness of the Night and all to make a very small return but meanness is no bar in God's way the Poor if vertuous are as dear to heaven as the wealthy and the honourable equally alike to him with whom there is no respect of persons Nay our Lord seemed to cast a peculiar honour upon this Profession when afterwards calling him and some others of the same Trade from catching of Fish to be as he told them Fishers of Men. And hear we may justly reflect upon the wise and admirable method of divine providence which in planting and propagating the Christian Religion in the world made choice of such mean and unlikely instruments that he should hid these things from the wise and prudent and reveal them unto Babes Men that had not been Educated at the Accademy and the

who could not bow to the Gods of the Heathen no more then the true Christians now can bow to the corrupt wills of Ambitious and unreasonable men and though the Innocent suffer therefore for the present yet for their sakes will the Lord shorten the days of the Wicked as he did the days of that Persecuting Emperour The Seventh Persecution IN the year 253. did the Seventh Persecution arise under the Emperour Decius who with Excessive Cruelty did Persecute the Christians In this Persecution several of the Bishops were put to death and such as were the chief among the Christians did they torture with many Torments and the Houses of the Christians they Plundred and that which the Plunderers did not esteem that they burned In this Persecution many suffered Martyrdom some being Burned some Beheaded Women so well as Men some being whipt to death and some Souldiers for Incouraging these Martyrs in their Suffering were put to death In this Terrible Persecution several departed from the Faith for fear of the Torments yet afterwards came to be restored again the Suffering of the Christians was great under this Emperour but his days were also shortened for he had not Raigned two years but was caught in a Whag of Mire where he met with a check or Reproof for his cruelty Note Thus it appears that the Christians that lived Godly in Christ-Iesus suffered Persecution according to what the Apostle hath said 2 Tim. 3 12. And many now that live Godly and Righteously do suffer not only the Imprisonment of their Bodies but also the Spoyling of their Goods which have been Spoyled both by Priests and People who have sometime as it were Plundred their Houses for their dishonest gain and they have shewed themselves in their carriage and behaviour to be liker unto the Heathen then the suffering Christians who suffered their Houses to be Plundred but we do not Read that they then Plundred the Houses of any but with patience suffered the Plundring of their Goods and in this patience and long Suffering are the Christians that are so not in Name only but in Nature found in these Perillous times Again have not some Souldiers been turned out of their places yea and brought into suffering for countenancing and favouring the Sober Innocent true Christians among whom some for fear of Suffering may in some respect desert the Truth as some faithless ones among the ancient Christians did yet we know certainly there are a Remnant that cannot bow their knee to Baall but would chuse rather to die the death which many ancient Christians suffered then they will forsake the Lords Truth or Transgress his Righteous Law by breaking his commands The Eighth Persecution IN the year 259. did the eighth Persecution arise under the Emperour Valerianus who put forth a Proclamation against the Christians wherein he forbad their Meetings and when this Proclamation or Order was not observed then did there follow a great Persecution of the Christians in which there was very many put to death and some were Banished and they converted of the Heathen in the place to which they were Banished but the Emperour under whom the Christians thus suffered did not go unreproved for his cruelty for he was taken Prisoner by the King of Persia who made use of him for a Foot-stool when he got up upon his Horse c. Note Hath it not happned so in England that by the Kings Proclamation the Meetings of the true Christians have been forbidden And when that they observed the Kings Proclamation no more then the antient Christians observed the Emperours hath not a great Persecution followed have not many of the Prisons he silled with them partly because they could not Swear and partly because they continved their Meetings when they were forbidden by the Kings Proclamation as the Religion of the Christians was forbidden by the Laws of the Heathen and therefore did the Heathen with much rigour pronounce these words unto the Christians Your Religion is forbidden by the Laws c. And did not Anti-christians the like when they abused them in their Meetings and broke them up with much Violence did they not also pronounce these words with much Rigour Your Meetings are forbidden by the Kings Proclamation c. And forasmuch as the true Christians now have chused rather to suffer Bonds and Imprisonment yea the spoyling of their Goods and what not then they would renounce the Faith deny their Religion or forsak the Assembling of themselves together it doth therefore appear that the same mind is found in them now which was heretofore in the antient Christians who chused rather to suffer the loss of their Lives then to forsake him for whose cause they suffered yet we see their Persecutors did not always go unreproved Oh! that other Kings Princes and Magistrates would take warning from that which happened to these Persecuting Emperours The Ninth Persecution IN the year 273. did the ninth Persecution arise under the Emperour Aurelianus but this Persecution was not so great as the other because he was cut off by death soon after he had determined the same yet in this Persecution was Felix the Bishop of Rome put to Death with several others here and there in divers places Note Often doth the Lord frustate the purposes and Determinations of such as conspire Mischief against his People yea have we not seen sundry Powers overturned in England and Parliments broken up and Councels if not Committees also shattered to pieces when they have been determined to do Wickedly so that sometime they have not had power to bring that forth which they had Conceived and brought to the Birth so mightily hath the Lord confounded their Conspiracies and brought their devices to nought and this the true Christians have concluded to be the Lords doing which they have beheld and which thing hath been indeed marvelous in their Eyes The Tenth Persecution IN the year 302. begun the Tenth Persecution which was so great that it exceeded all that had been before it not only in cruelty but in continuance for it continued 12 Years Eusebius who lived at that time Writes of it at large in his Eclesiastical History saying it was occasioned through the freedom of the Christians who were come into great Reputation and were put in places of Office to Rule in Countrys and Cities but through their prosperity and voluptuousness Brotherly Love came to decrease Haughtyness and Pride got up and in stead of the worship of God an insolent authority begun to get up in the Church of the Christians And at that time the Emperour Diocletianus gave forth a Proclamation wherein he commanded that all the Christian Churches should be pulled down and the Holy Scriptures Burned and that the Christians should be turned out of their places with other such like things After that there came another Order that they should cause the chief of of the Church to offer unto Idols or else they were to be put to