Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	aaron_n	brass_n	serpent_n	28	3	8.7539	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A61207	The spiritual chymist, or, Six decads of divine meditations on several subjects by William Spurstow ...	Spurstowe, William, 1605?-1666.	1666 (1666)	Wing S5097; ESTC R22598	119,345	208

and Aaron the Saint of the Lord and yet how strangly differing are their two Images they are unlike in the Matter the one being of Gold and the other of Brass unlike in the Figure the one a Calfe the other a Serpent but most unlike in their Effects the one Killing and the other Healing Vi●●lus aureus occidit Serpens Aeneus sanat The Golden Calfe that kills and the Brazen Serpent that saves alive One would think that the same Fountain should as soon send forth Salt Water and Fresh as either of these to do any thing that should terminate in such contrary effects by whose harmonious Conduct Israel had been led as a Flock of Sheep through the Wilderness But what if their Actions did Jarr yet who could readily conceive that Aarons Calfe should be as a destroying poyson or that Moses his Serpent should be as an effectuall Antidote to save alive did he not flee from his Rod when turned into a Serpent as fearing to be hurt by it And was not this Brazen Serpent in shape and figure like to those fiery Serpents that had stung many Israelites to death from whence then comes this strange difference between the one and the other is it not from hence Aarons Calfe though made of Gold was without yea against a command of God but Moses his Serpent though of Brass was by his special appointment Let the Institutions of God be never so mean and despicable to the eye of sense yet they shall obtain their designed end and let the Inventions of Men be never so rich and costly yet they will be found to be no other then hurtful vanities Who is of so small an Insight in the Mystery of Idolatry and Superstition as not to observe how they affect a Pomp and Splendor in their Religion as if when they had made it Gay they had made it Good and how greatly they despise the simplicity of that Worship which is not clothed and decked with an external Grandure But will a Clove in the Mouth cure the unsavory breathings of corrupt Lungs or will the Leper● making of himself brave with the finest Garments cause the Priest to pronounce him clean when he comes to behold his Sore then may such arts and palliations of men wedded to Idolatrous practises vindicare the evil of their doings and justifie them to be such as God will not condemne But as Religion is not a thing left to any mans choice to pick out from that diversity with which the World abounds what best pleaseth himself so neither are the wayes and Mediums of the Exercise of it at all in his power As God is the object of Worship so the meanes by which he is honoured and his servants benefited that use them must be appointed by himself His will and not mans must be the sole and ad●quate Rule For all Ordinances do not work necessarily as the Fire burns or as the Sun enlightens the Air nor do they work Physically as having an inherent power to produce their effects but they are operative by way of Institution and receive their vertue from God who therefore appoints weak and insufficient things to the eye of Reason that himself may be the more acknowledged in all What could be more unlikely to heal the bitings of a fiery Serpent then the looking up onely to a Brazen Serpent or to restore to the blind Man his ●ight then the anointing of his eyes with Clay and Spittle And yet these things God and Christ are pleased to make use of not from indigency as if they could not work without meanes but from Wisdom and Councel to shew that they can work by any Let no Man then fondly make it his Work or count it his duty to honour God with his Inventions though specious and beautiful in his own eyes but let him value and prize Gods Institutions though to outward appearance they be contemptible The Blew-Bottles and other Weeds in the Field are more gaudy and delightful to the Eye than the Corn amongst which they grow but yet the one are worthless and the other is full of strength and nourishment Meditation XXII Vpon the Circulation of the bloud THough it be no confessed Maxime yet it is an opinion which many Physicians do confidently assert that the motion of the bloud is Circular and that the bloud which is in the feet hath a reflux back into the heart But it is not for me if there be a difference between those who are of the secrets of nature to undertake the decision of it least it be said to me as i● was to Moses when he mediated between the two Israelites that strove Quis te constituit Judicem Who made you a Judge over us I shall therefore turn my thoughts from it unto the circulation which is in the civil body of Society wherein the affections habits manners as a kind of spiritual bloud may be truly affirmed both to flow upward from the inferiour parts of it to the superiour and to descend again from the superiour parts of it to the inferiour But yet this disproportion is to be observed that the Efluxes both of good and evil which move downwards are more quick and operative than those which ascend from below upwards Great persons by their manners and carriage do sooner make impressions upon persons of a meaner rank than they are able to reflect back upon them again This Moral Circulation therefore may teach those who are as the noble and Architectonical parts of the civil body full of power and influence to be exact and circumspect in their converse and living that others upon whom their influences fall may be drawn by them to a love of holiness and not seduced to lusts and intemperancies by their example If he who was rightly surnamed Copronimus have a fancy to the smell of horse-dung as to besmear himself with it all his Courtiers in a servile compliance unto him will qualifie themselves for his company by using no other perfumes Yea if greater Beastialities be used by other Princes they are not likely to want followers The whole Court will be soon like Jacobs Cattel spotted and speckled as being apt to conceive with some tincture of the Colours which they see in those waters whereof they dayly drink It being an hard thing to be an Obadiah that fears God greatly in Ahabs Court or a Saint in Neroes Houshold But though evil in those who are in high places be more infectious and the good more powerful than it is in others yet the vices of those who are in a lower Station have a tendency to corrupt the greatest as the head in the body natural is oft distempered by the feet And so the vertues that are in them are also operative to influence those that are in dignity above them to the making of themselves evil if not more good The lustre of St. Johns Sanctity though cloathed with Camels hair extorts reverence from Herod in his Robes and Pauls