Selected quad for the lemma: church_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
church_n	earth_n	heaven_n	militant_a	4,766	5	11.7120	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A57597	Shlohavot, or, The burning of London in the year 1666 commemorated and improved in a CX discourses, meditations, and contemplations, divided into four parts treating of I. The sins, or spiritual causes procuring that judgment, II. The natural causes of fire, morally applied, III. The most remarkable passages and circumstances of that dreadful fire, IV. Councels and comfort unto such as are sufferers by the said judgment / by Samuel Rolle ...	Rolle, Samuel, fl. 1657-1678.; Rolle, Samuel, fl. 1657-1678. Preliminary discourses.; Rolle, Samuel, fl. 1657-1678. Physical contemplations.; Rolle, Samuel, fl. 1657-1678. Sixty one meditations.; Rolle, Samuel, fl. 1657-1678. Twenty seven meditations.	1667 (1667)	Wing R1877; Wing R1882_PARTIAL; Wing R1884_PARTIAL; ESTC R21820	301,379	534

when he called him to it Are we better than Moses then Aaron the Saint of the Lord than David than Hezekiah than Job yea than Christ himself who had all learn'd to stoop to God in very difficult cases Can we be too good to do it if they were not When God told Moses he should go up to Pisgah and take a view of Canaan but that he should never enter into it Deut. 3.27 We finde not one word that he replyed after he had once made his request and God had said speak no more of this matter When God had by fire consumed Nadab and Abihu the two Sons of Aaron Moses did but say to him The Lord will be sanctified in them that come nigh to him and be glorified before all the people and Aaron held his peace Levit. 10.3 When old Eli had received a dreadfull message from God by a Child for so Samuel then was 1 Sam. 3.18 How meekly did he resent it saying It is the Lord let him do as seemeth him good When David was flying from the face of his rebellious Son Absalom and taking leave of the Ark of God 2 Sam. 15.26 If the Lord say I have no delight in thee behold here am I let him do to me what seemeth him good At another time when David was even consumed by the blow of Gods hand Psal 39.10 he saith I was dumb and opened not my mouth because thou didst it vers 9. And as for Hezekiah though a King also as well as David yet see how his spirit buckled to God when the Prophet brought him word that God had taken away the fee-simple of all he had from his children who should be Eunuches to the King of Babylon Isa 39.7 And left him but his life in it Good is the Word of the Lord saith he which thou hast spoken vers 8. As for Job who had been the greatest of all the Men of the East when he had lost all but a vexatious Wife prompting him to curse God vet cried he out Blessed be the Name of the Lord Job 1.21 Behold a greater instance of patience and submission than any of these both for that his person was more excellent and his sufferings far greater having been a Man of sorrowes all his time Isa 53.7 He was oppressed and he was afflicted yet he opened not his mouth brought as a Lamb to the slaughter and as a Sheep before the Shearer is dumb so he opened not his mouth When he was reviled he reviled not again when he suffered he threatned not but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously 1 Pet. 2.23 Was not this written for our imitation vers 21. Christ also suffered for us leaving us an example Did he who is God equal with the father submit even to the painfull and shamefull and cursed death of the cross and shall we think our selves too good to stoop to lesser sufferings and humiliations he that can submit to God may be happy in any condition he that cannot will be happy in no condition this World can afford him in which all our roses are full of prickles and all our wayes strowed and hedged up with thornes more or less Yea not only the Church militant upon Earth but even the Church triumphant in heaven could not be free from misery if the will of glorious Saints were not melted into the will of God Abraham would be ever and anon grieving to think of Dives and others in his case if his will were not perfectly conformed to the will of God Many things fall out in this life which we would not for a World should be if we could and might prevent them but when the pleasure of God is once declared by events even in those cases ought we to sit down satisfied Abraham would not have sacrificed Isaac for the whole World but that God made as if he would have him so to do and then he yielded presently If blinde fortune did govern the World whose heart would it not break to think of so famous a City in a few dayes laid in ashes but sith it was the will of God it should be so who ordereth all things according to the counsel of his will let all the Earth be silent before him let us be still and know that he is God Who should rule the World but he that made it and that upholds it by the Word of his Power He can do us no wrong if he would such is his essential holiness which also makes it impossible for him to lie he would do us no wrong if he could such is his infinite justice He can do nothing but what is consistent with infinite wisdome patience goodness mercy and every perfection and how unreasonable is it not to submit to that which is consistent with all of these so doubtless was the burning of our renowned City as ghastly a spectacle as it is to behold else it had never come to pass O Lord I am sensible that I have need of line upon line precept upon precept and example upon example to teach me this hard lesson of submission to thee though the object of that submission seem to be only my condition in this life for I no where finde that thou requirest me and others to be willing to perish everlastingly Thou knowest how much thy glory and the comfort of thy poor Creatures are concerned in it that we should know how to resign up our selves to thee inable us to be contented with whatsoever thy will hath been or shall be concerning us and then be pleased to do with us as to this World what thou wilt DISCOURSE XXIV Of taking occasion by this to study the vanity and uncertainty of all earthly things IF a glorious City turned into a ruinous heap in four dayes time when no visible enemy was at hand to do it if the reducing hundreds of Families to almost beggery that liv'd in good fashion in less than one week before by an unexpected meanes and in a way not possible to be foreseen if knocking a Nation out of joynt all of a sudden like a body that had been tortured upon a Rack be not loud Sermons of the vanity and uncertainty of all earthly things surely there will be none such till that time shall come that St. Peter speaks of 2 Pet. 3.10 When the Heavens shall pass away with a great noise and the Elements shall melt with servent heat the Earth also and the works that are therein shall be burnt up What a Comment was this providence upon that Text Psal 39.5 Verily every Man at his best state is altogether vanity How did it evince the Psalmist to speak right Psal 62.9 Not only when he saith Men of low degree are vanity which most people do believe but also when he saith Men of high degree are a lie to be laid in the ballance they are altogether lighter than vanity which few assent unto If things are called vanity as most properly they are from

true that coppy of them which is within his own breast may be lost or missing at leastwise for a time but then there is a counter-part of them kept in heaven which can never be lost for The foundation of God stands sure and he knoweth who are his It is happy for us that uncertain things are those of less value but that those things which are most valuable though indeed only they may be ascertained and insured in heavenly things Sad was the loss of Writings as they were Evidences of mens Estates but methinks more sad as they were the Vouchers of mens honesty or if by this meanes either honest men become suspected or those that have been otherwise cannot be detected and discovered But methinks where alwayes heretofore found faithful it is but equal to admit no jealousie of them upon this occasion No doubt but he that was faithful till the fire will be faithfull after it and not be worse for that Purgatory if I may so call it O Lord Art not thou he that didst find out a way to acquit those chast Women that were suspected of Adultery Numb 5.28 Art not thou he who didst furnish Solomon with wisdom to know which was the true Mother of the living child to which two Women laid an equal claim 1 Kings 3 Art not thou he that didst direct Queen Emma and others to passe the hot plow-shares bare-foot and blind-fold without hurting her self when by that ardent fire proof was to be made of her unspotted chastity Clear up I beseech thee the integrity of thy innocent servants whose Accompts and Acquittances this fire hath destroyed but as for others search out their wickedness till thou find none or as thou saidst thou wouldst search Jerusalem with candles Zeph. 1.12 What work hath this burning of Writings made for greedy Lawyers What a barvest are they like to have by that means One sire I doubt will beget another viz. that of endless contention and Law-suits Now the sire hath gotten mens Vintage I wish unjust Claimers on one hand and Lawyers on the other do not sweep awar their Gleanings They are newly leapt out of the fire and Most they presently come into the frying-pan Can the wisdom of our Governors find out no way whereby to prevent vexations Suits that will otherwise arise upon this occasion to preserve the rights of honest men now their Writings are gone and to prevent the unjust claims of those that are dishonest If ever Magistrates needed a Priest one or more to ask Counsel for them after the Judgment of Urim before the Lord Num● ●7 20 as Eleazar did for Joshu● now is the time Howsoever thou O Lord who girdest up the wrath of men or so much of it as will not turn to thy praise vouchsafe to put such a restraint upon the spirits of men that those who were half-undone by the fire may not be utterly so either by merciless Lawyers or by unrighteous Adversaries and unjust Claimers MEDITATION XV. Upon the Burning of Saint Pauls Church the unconsumed Body of Bishop Brabrook HOw long was this goodly Cathedral in building How leasurely did it proceed Insomuch that it became a Proverb when men did any thing slowly That they made Pauls-work of it But so did not the fire when it came to destroy it but consumed it presently as if it had been but Jonas his gourd which sprang up in a night Dying Persons are oft-times very restless they shift from one side of their beds to the other and talk much of removing to other places So have I observed this noble Structure not long before its fatal period to have shifted often First it was a Church then a Stable as some were pleased to make it within these few years but the argument was far fetcht if they think that because Christ himself did sometimes lie in a Stable and in a Manger that therefore one and the same place might well serve both for brutish and for sacred uses Otherwhile if not at the very same time it was made a Court of Guard without any intention as I believe to make it an Emblem of the Church Militant or to exhibit any other religious mystery And then of late it wheel'd about again to its Primitive use to be a place appropriated to Divine Worship Few expected it would continue long a Stable or a Court of Guard for great alienations like strong sticks that are much bent do quickly start back again but when it became once more a Church they that considered it had stood above five hundred years from its first Erection yea and Conflagration which latter was in 1087. after which it was soon built again and did observe it to bear its years well as if it were at most but of a middle age saw no cause to doubt but it might last as much longer But alas How were they deceived and How was its destruction at the very door Surely Papists are deceived in thinking Crucifixes to carry a safeguard and protection with them considering that this Cathedral was built in the figure of a Cross and yet when Fire did appreach had no relief by it It had been a comfortable sight to have beheld the first erection of that stately Church considering the Scituation and Dedication of it that whereas before in the same place stood a Temple Dedicated to Diama and as is supposed a Wood and Grove about it devoted to her use there was then another in the room of it the name whereof might speak the place alienated from heathenism to Christianity from the service of a false goddesse to the service of the true God and of his Son Jesus Christ Twice hath that famous Structure been fired before at leastwise part of it both times by lightning and thereunto exposed by the transcendent height of its Steeple One of those times it burnt a great part of the City of London if I mistake not and now the City by a kind of unintended retaliation hath helpt to burn it Great pity it is to see so noble a building in the dust and yet it is likely some will but little pity it if not rejoyce in the ruins of it especially it s disaffected neighbours whose houses that had wont to lean to the sides of it like Vines climbing upon a wall had at leastwise received sentence to be pulled down But should not men regard the honor of their Nation whatsoever became of private interests One strange and remarkable passage that did relate to this Cathedral I cannot but reflect upon viz. The unheard of continuance of a certain dead Body viz. the Body of one Dr. B●aybro●k sometimes Bishop of London and Lord Chancellor of England which was there interred above two hundred years ago and as several that have seen it do inform was taken up since this fire and found to retain much of it's manly shape and most of it's external parts to the amazement of such as beheld it and did withall believe it