Selected quad for the lemma: city_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
city_n	king_n	london_n	time_n	5,435	4	3.5799	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A94934	The true and most miraculous narrative, of a child born with two tongues, at the lower end of East-Smithfeild [sic] in the suburbs of London, &c. who three dayes after his birth, was heard plainly, and expresly [sic] to cry out, A king, a king, a king ...		1659 (1659)	Wing T2511A; ESTC R185551	4,134	11

THE True and most miraculous Narrative of a Child born WITH TWO TONGVES At the lower end of East-Smithfeild in the Suburbs of London c. Who three dayes after his Birth was heard plainly and expresly to cry out A King a King a King Which it hath ever since continued to the admiration of all that hear it As also its being sent for by divers Personages of the Greatest Dignity and many Honorable Ladies in the Cities of London and Westminster who not contented to behold and but one time to hear it have sent their Coaches for it again and again Together with the many various Interpretations and Constructions that every where are made of it Horat. Serm. Lib. 1. Nec si quid miri fecit Natura Deos id Tristes ex alto coeli dimitere tecto Printed for R. Harper neer the Hospital Gate in Smithfield 1659. The True and most Miraculous Narrative of a Childe born with Two Tongues At the lower End of East-Smithfield in the Subburbs of London c. Who Three Dayes after his Birth was heard plainly and expressly to cry out a King a King a King Which it hath ever since continued to the Admiration of all that hear it TO have two Tongues is commonly the property of a Dissembler that is to say to have two Hearts and one Tongue for though the transgression of the Heart be layed to the dissimulation of the Tongue the Tongue is not so much guilty of it as is the Heart that doth sign and dictate to it It is the property of a Wise man to have his Tongue in his Heart saith the wisest of men but if every man should have as many Tongues to expresse his thoughts as he hath a heart that conspires with his head to contrive them how many Monsters would there be in Nature But though the Tongue be oftentimes a Dissembler yet Truth it self for the honour of the Tongue will not have it to be dissembled that the Tongue is a most Necessary Instrument and attended with as much wonder and prophecy when God peculiarly doth please to move it as it is with lyes and vanities when God doth leave it to it self We will descend by degrees to the observation of this Truth and we will indevour to be as plain as possibly we can for we know to whom we write The first double Tongue that ever was in the World was the Tongue of the Devil when in the form of a Serpent he courted Adam and Eve to transgresse the Commandement of the Almighty Adam before was as entire in his Tongue as he was in his Innocence There was then in the World but one Language and there needed but one tongue to express that Language Deceit was not known in Nature unlesse it was only in the Nature of the Serpent into which Nature the Devil did transform himself and having tempted Man to sin by a secret tincture and an Infection of as much Ambit●on as crawling Corruption he hath ever since made Man almost as serpentine as himself Man being thus infected with a double Tongue from the Devil behold a punishment proportioned to the Nature of his Offence It was the double or the forked Tongue of the Serpent that tempted Man to sin and God will revenge it with his forked Thunderbolts which indeed had sunk mankind into the Pit of eternal darknesse had he not in this wildernesse of affliction been releived with the Sight of a better Serpent who after the immortal honour of his ignominious Death by the wonder of cloven Tongues which appeared like Fire did testifie unto him the wonder of his Resurrection so saving unto Mankind that whosoever calleth on his Name shall be saved The Israelites heretofore for their murmuring had been bitten with fiery Serpents the sins of their Tongues being punished with the Teeth of the Serpents their murmuring Tongues being like fiery Serpents by which their sins were chastised and expounded And as the Brazen Serpent was lifted up in the Wildernesse so was the Son of Man lifted upon the Crosse and conferred the gift of Cloven Tongues on those that loved him that all Nations might partake as well of the blessing as they heard of the wonder of his Resurrection In the Contemplation of this I stand amazed I find a Wheel turned in a Wheele a Sphere wrapt in a Sphere especially when after this guift of a Cloven Tongue I do read That it shall come to passe in the last dayes that the Lord will poure out his Spirit on all flesh and their Sons and their Daughters shall prophecy And on my Servants and on my Hand-maids saith the Lord I will poure out of my Spirit in those days and they shall prophecy The Beasts who had cloven Feet were accounted clean in the Old Law and we find the Cloven Tongues to be the mystical Tokens of much happinesse to come in the new They were the Interpreters of the Sheet which St. Peter saw and what it contained before the four corners of it were knit together They were the Prophets that foretold the Gospel of Salvation which should be preached now as well unto the Gentiles as to the Jews This is inserted to take off the Imputation which the World doth commonly fasten on double Tongues not that they are guiltlesse for a double Tongue and a double Heart go oftentimes together A double Tongue for the most part is a false Tongue and the Devil is the Father of lyes and may have a Cloven Tongue as well as a Cloven Foot But the Child of whom we come now to speak hath not as it seems a double Tongue nor a cloven or a divided Tongue but two Tongues one lapped over the other and is as wonderful in his Language both in the earlinesse and the Sense of it as he is in the Supernumerary Member Michael Scotus in his Book De secretis Naturae discourseth why some Men have six Fingers and why many men have one Thumb joyned to another which is not of the same length and bignesse but subservient to the other In this he gives you uncontrouled Reasons to satissie the exuberance of Nature The great Schollar Fracanstorfius who wrote many yeers after him is more full and cleer in his disquisitions on this Subject If I do remember my self rightly it is in the very same place or very neer unto it where he gives you his Reasons why David being an old Man was advised by a Counsel of his Physicians to take a young Maid into his Bed But I have yet never heard of any Phylosopher that showeth Reasons why a man hath two Tongues nor of any Historian who declareth that ever any one hath had them True it is I have heard many a man to say that his own Wife or his next Neighbours VVife hath a thousand Tongues which modestly I conceive is not so much by reason of the Number of so many Tongues as by the perpetual motion of one Tongue And this indeed is the

noyse and the complaints of every day and every wind doth blow them over the face of the VVorld that now they are no sooner heard then disregarded but for an Infant to be born with two Tongues and to speak almost as soon as it was born is a wonder in earnest a wonder as well to be seen as heard and the great wonder which I come now to declare unto you In the Subburbs of London in the lower end of East-smithfield at a place called Knockfergus a young woman was brought to bed with a Child that was born with two Tongues the one in some measure covering the other but the lower Tongue appearing to be the more natural for it seemeth to be more firme and longer than the other The father of it is a poor man and of a poor trade but such a one that the best Lady in the Land when she is plagued with Corns would be glad of his Assistance Having a sharp Knife and a good dexterity in this he doth get a reasonable Subsistence to live in a hard world and being a good Corn-cutter he doth make his harvest and thriftily brings it home as well in Winter as in Summer His Name is John Clarke and he liveth at the next door to the Sign of the Soldier and Trumpet at Knockfergus His Wife is a great Pains-taker and well beloved amongst her neighbours who were many of them with her at the time of her delivery and did assist her in her Childing throwes Three dayes after she was brought to bed many of her neighbours came to give her a visit and some of them were witnesses at the Christning of her Child whose Name was John after the Name of his Father looking stedfastly on the Child and kissing it the Child did open its mouth and they plainly discerned that it had two Tongues which they were loath to discover to the mother who for all she gave it suck had not then the least knowledge of it Mrs. Nicholls her next Neighbour whispering to the Midwife whose name is Mrs. Silk concerning it and the other Neighbours marvelling at it and desired that for the present it might be kept in private amongst themselves because they were loath to disquiet the mother who began to take a little rest after her hard Travail with such melancholy News the Child began to wayle and to cry out A King A King A King If they were surprised with wonder to see two Tongues how may we think they were now transported to hear one of them to speak and to speak such a word so unexpectedly and distinctly In a silence full of amazement they did now look on one another the speaking Child had made the Women dumb which more then all the Bels in the Town ringing at once or the ratling of the brazen pans can doe when the Moon is in labour Being all of them for a little respit of time thus husht as midnight the Child began to speak again and to repeat those-Words it did express before which the Mother hearing did call for the Child and did partake of the Wonder with them they entred into Councel and concluded that in regard the Name and Authority of a King had been abolished by the Parliament it was not fit it should be divulged the Mother therefore did desire them that they would not make any mention of it which they pronsised to perform but what muzzle can silence the tongue of a woman From whispers at the first it began to grow into open Reports and the more they did promise to suppress it the more it was divulged howsoever the Mother as she saith her self did tamper with the Child and as much as she could to make it sensible of her she did forbid it to speak in that Name which neither she nor others that did attempt it could ever effect In a short time the Child with two tongues and the words in the mouth of it were famous in the City and divers Gentlewomen of the City did send their Coaches for the mother and the Child who ever now and anon would cry out A King a King a King and if there were any company about it that it did not like it will put forth its hand and cry Away away This being rumour'd in the City great Ladies and many personages of honour at Clerken-well have sent for the Mother and Child who not knowing what to make of it have nevertheless been beneficial to the poor Mother of it It is observeable that whereas other Children go forward this Child do what they can goes backward The Age of the Child being three quarters of a yeer FINIS