Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	age_n	old_a	zion_n	20	3	8.6632	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A34898	A cabinet of spirituall iewells wherein man's misery, God's mercy, Christ's treasury, truth's prevalency, errour's ignominy, grace's excellency, a Christian's duty, the saint's glory, is set forth in eight sermons : with a brief appendix, of the nature, equity, and obligation of tithes under the Gospell, and expediency of marriage to be solemnized onely by a lawfull minister ... / by John Cragge, M.A. ...	Cragge, John, M.A.	1657 (1657)	Wing C6783; ESTC R4552	116,039	199

which are two the one young Samuel revealing who by this occasion received primam tonsuram his first unction to prophecy the other is old Eli who like Sexagenarius de ponte as his bodily so his spirituall eyes grew dim for 1 Sam. 3. 1. The word of the Lord was pretious in those daies there was no open vision Secondly we have the thing revealed which is either the sin or the punishment of sin sin either the father Eli's for not correcting and chastising his sons or the sin of his sons Hophni and Phinehas who being Priests of the Lord 1 Sam. 2. 12. were sons of Beliall knew not the Lord by their rapine made men abhor the daily sacrifice 17. lay with the women that assembled at the dore of the Tabernacle of the Congregation 22. The punishment of sin either threatned first by a man of God not otherwise named 1 Sam. 2. 27. secondly by Samuel himselfe that the Lord would cut off the whole family of Eli from the priesthood and that the iniquity of his house should not be purged with sacrifice nor offering for ever 1 Sam. 3. 14. Or executed in the fourth Chapter for thirty thousand of the Israelites were put to the sword the whole Camp scattered Hophni and Phinehas the Priests slain the Ark of God taken captive by the Philistims the Wife of Phinehas hearing of it fell into the pangs of childbirth and was delivered of a Son calling his name Ichobod the glory is departed from Israel and so expired and at the relation of the messenger Eli being ninty eight years old fell back from his chair and brake his neck Thus the whole Family was dysastered rarò antecedentem scelestum deseruit pede poena claudo Seneca Punishment and shame like a blood-hound alwaies pursues sin at the heeles the Ark was taken the Army routed the Priests slain Phinehas his Wife perished in the after-pangs Eli brake his neck Hence observe that sin is the deserving cause procuring the ruine and calamity of Church and State Cities and Families Sin it is that infects our purest aire that damps our richest mines that poysons our sweetest dainties that laies thornes in our softest beds of down that undermines Palaces pulls down Crowns shakes Thrones and ruinates Kingdomes that sets all mortall Wights at opposition heat against cold cold against heat winter and summer light and darknesse moysture and drought in arms one against another That the whole world is become a boyling furnace of contradictions where man is the mettall the body is the drosse which must first be burned by the refining fire of death before the soul can become pure gold fit for the heavenly Sanctuary For the proof of this hear Jeremie's lamentation Lam. 3. 39. Wherefore is the living man sorrowfull Heaven and earth answers his Interrogatory with a soul 's sad Eccho Man suffereth for his sins Come on further and see all Creatures Angells Men Beasts Plants Elements Heavens in sorrowes discord sighing out the sad Epitaphium of mans mortality 42. We have sinned and rebelled therefore thou hast not spared thou hast covered us with wrath and persecuted us thou hast slain and not spared Rom. 6. 23. The wages of sin is death As tooth for tooth eye for eye hand for hand one talent for another so death is a deserved reward for sin death first seizing upon the body while we live by the canker of corruption and mortality bringing at the length death of the body by dissolution and all this hatched and brooded under the Cocatrice sin Come on and travail with St. Paul to Corinth 1 Cor. 11. 3. For this cause saies he many are weak amongst you and sick and many sleep For this cause that is for the poyson of sin the canker of corruption in generall for spilling of our Saviour's blood piercing his side nailing his feet unworthy receiving of the holy Sacrament in particular Are sick that is feavours boyle you consumptions waste you plague and pestilence devour you And many sleep sleep in an everlasting Lethargy and apoplexie of death never to be awaked before the last doom Many that Biers are become restlesse Peripateticks the Spade and Mattock tyred the Sextons still digging the Graves still gaping passing-Bells without any stop or period confounding the language one of another the Church-yards more peopled then the Theaters Mista senum ac juvenum densantur funera no sex nor age nor young nor old are spared but are made a subject for death to read mortalitie's lecture upon This made David complain that his bones waxed old and that his moysture was turned into the drought of summer Psal 32. made him houle and cry that his daies were consumed like smoak his bones were burned as hearth withered like grasse he was become like a Pelican in the wildernesse or a sparrow on the house top Ps 102. This made Job complain that his griefe was heavier then the sand of the sea that the arrowes of the Almighty were within him that the poyson had drunk up his spirit the terrours of God had set themselves in array against him Job 6. This makes all Mankinde rot as a Pomgranate shiver as a Potsheard splinter as a Venice Glasse corrupt as a standing Pool and vanish into ashes like Sodom's Apples And the reason of all this is because the justice of God requires it sin is daily in the view of his all-piercing eye sends up cries aloud into his holy ear piercing through the clouds for revenge importuning his vindicative hand to whet his glittering sword to feather his arrowes to make sharp the point of his spear to wash his footsteps in blood And then shall not he that hath called his footstool the Earth and his throne the Heavens to witnesse and hath sworn by himselfe the greatest that sin shall not passe without revenge shall not he be just Besides this consider all Creatures as daily Oratours that miserably complaining put up their petitions to him The higher House the suburbs of Heaven sits drooping the Sun is turned into blood and eclipsed the Stars unsnuffed burn dim within the socket of their sphears their naturall force abated their influence impaired all waxes old as does a garment and saies that sin is the cause The aire is stifled with the poysoned breath of meteors and insteed of comforting the inhabitants of the earth is become a stage of prodigies and terrours flying Dragons amaze blazing Stars as Beacons of astonishment affright Thunder with her loud Canon-shot makes roaring the impetuous fury of the Bolts brings death the Clouds in time of need are barren in time of harvest intoxicate the earth with deluges no dew sometimes but mildew no light but lightning no blast nor gale of winde but blasting and saies that sin is the cause The sea roules the windes blow unmercifully the waves rage impetuously all things are troubled unnaturally which makes the Leviathans roar and the fishes die and saies that sin is the cause The earth quakes

Banner Matth. 16. 24. If any man wil follow me let him forsake himself and take up his crosse and follow me Saint Paul saies to Timothy All that will live godly in Christ Iesus must suffer persecution We are Christians and our lives begins baptismate fluminis consecrated in the waters of affliction goes on baptismate flaminis confirmed in the fire of affliction and oftentimes ends baptismate sanguinis waft on Rivers of blood covers our Hearse with a scarlet die towards Heaven and that for these causes First thereby God proves us whether we be constant and true and manifests to others our sincerity they are a touchstone of tryall to examine whether we be pure or reprobate gold The Eagle tries her young ones whether they be bastards by making them look at the Sun so God tries us by the heat of tribulation As Gideon's Souldiers were proved at the water so we at the waters of affliction Faith that before was but fained will then vanish into smoak like Sodom's apples guilded hypocrisie into vapours but true Faith set upon the file will be more resplendent Hope more certain Zeal more blazing Charity more perfect Secondly afflictions are a means to wean us from the world and win us unto God as Mirrhe and Aloes to lay on the paps of worldly pleasures to make us flie to Christ a Pharaoh to pursue us out of Egypt unto Canaan they are a rod of God to turn our Rivers of delight when we are bewitched with them into blood they are a worm to make our Manna stink when we lust after it This brought the prodigall Son to his Father the Israelites from Captivity the diseased unto Christ Is the Arke taken and the glory of Israel departed then the House of Ely will begin to think upon God Is David banished unto Gath then happy are they that are but dore-keepers in the house of God or the sparrowes that may build their nests there Is Israel led into captivity then will the daughters of Jerusalem hang up their Harps upon the willowes when they remember thee O Sion Is any afflicted then surely they will pray Thirdly afflictions are medicinall restoratives by which sinners may be awaked to recover their health by repentance they are the launcing knife in the Phlebotomie of the soul to wound us that neither the Plethora or ranknesse of blood honour riches preferment pleasure choak and stifle the spirit nor the Cacochymia or pestilent humours of sin as covetousnesse pride intemperance bring us into the Hectick feavour or incurable disease of hardnesse of heart rebellion or sin against the holy Ghost They are a rod to scourge us in a Lethargy As Physicians in a Lethargy use to burn the hair of the patient and smoak it into his nostrills so afflictions burn vanities and darling pleasures which are but as excrements and casts them as dung into our nostrills They are preparative potions to repentance pills of contrition purgations of naturall corruptions vomits of sin tents to search our wounds scarrifications to draw out ill humours And though no afflictions be pleasant for the present yet afterwards they are cordialls of comfort restauratives of grace Thus God taught Miriam by leprosy to leave her murmuring he awakened Jonah out of sleep by casting him into the Sea he cured Zacharie of his infidelity by striking him with dumbnesse delivered Saul from his evill course by blindnesse David from pride by the plague cured him of adultery by killing the child Blessed is the man whom the Lord thus correcteth Fourthly as afflictions are restauratives for maladies by-past so they are preservatives and antidores to prevent the evill to come As a man whose blood is consumed in a lingring feavour is not so apt to take the pestilence so neither a man afflicted to be puffed up with pride or burn with lust he need not fear the swelling of that Carbuncle They are salt to hinder us from putrefaction a stormie winde to save our standing pools from corruption a fiery Cherubim to keep us out of the forbidden paradise of sin As the golden hair was to Nisus a safeguard from his enemies so the crosse of affliction armes from the flesh the world and the devill As is said in the Fable of Achilles so far as he was dipped in the water so far he was unpiercible by any weapon so far as we are plunged in the waters of Marah our spirituall enemies have lesse power over us God sent an Angell of Satan to buffet Paul not so much for any evill he had done as to prevent sin for the time to come lest through the abundance of revelations he should be exalted above measure If God inflict upon us malum poenae the evill of punishment it is to prevent malum culpae the evill of sin Fiftly by afflictions we are prepared and polished for Heaven that as the one scale of tribulation presses us down the other of grace may mount us up Our Oyle of grace is a quintessence that must be extracted by fire our cordiall waters of comfort by distillation our Grapes squeazed in the Wine-presse of sorrow our Wheat flayled in the threshing-floor of tribulation our Flowre grinded between the milstones of pressure We are Gold that must be purified seven times in the Furnace before we be carryed into the Sanctuary Trees that must be pruned before they bring forth any fruit living Stones that must be polished and hammered before they be brought into the heavenly Ierusalem So that to a Christian all his whole life is as it were a threshing death is the fan to winnow the pure wheat from the chaffe that we may be gathered into the heavenly Granary where no unclean thing shall enter Well then if every Christian must feel the sting of these fiery Serpents before he come at Canaan learn we to make account of them not murmur mutter wonder at them In this vale of tears we must look to be fed with the bread of affliction to drink the bitter water gall wormwood and eat the soure grape of sorrow Shall the heavens mourn the clouds shed their tears the earth tremble the fruits be blasted the sea rage the creatures groan for our sins and we not sympathize with them Shall the Prophets and Apostles go through the fire the Martyrs have their robes dyed in scarlet our Saviour sweat water and blood conflict with hell Satan death and we go to heaven in a bed of roses tread on carpets ride still in triumph upon the wings of pleasure True it is in former times we enjoyed Halcyon daies of peace sitting under our own Vines and Fig-trees singing the song of Sion and tuning our own harps in a melodious harmony having no Townes but Salems no men but friends if we had gone into the fields we should have seen no spears but standing corn have heard no drums but tabrets no out-cries but harvest-homes had no years but of Jubilee no daies but of rejoycing But now of a long

yet it holds proportion to the Ministry of the Gospell according to their dignity and necessity and being devoted unto God by our fore-fathers famous in their Generations for piety are as obligatory as what God himselfe immediately consecrated Fourthly God calls it a robbing of him in tithes and offerings Mal. 3. 8. and for that pronounces the whole Nation cursed with a curse that is a signall curse which the Spirit of God does not use to do for violating Lawes that are purely judiciall or ceremoniall Fifthly Christ confirms them under the Gospell Matth. 23. 23. telling the Pharisees they pay tithes of Annise Mint and Cummin these things ought to be done And if they could not enter into heaven unlesse their righteousnesse exceeded the righteousnesse of the Scribes and Pharisees what shall become of those that come short of them The Pharisees payed cheerfully things hallowed unto God Christians do not Sixtly the Apostle of the Gentiles makes sacriledge which consists in detaining of tithes and holy things worse than Idolatry Rom. 2. 32. Thou that abhorrest Idolls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dost thou commit sacri'edge To rob God of his due is a greater sin then through mistake to ascribe that to a false God which is not his due Seventhly it seemes by the Law of Nature or a Positive Law of God to be derived from Noah to all Nations Plutarch saies in Camillus that they did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pay tithes to Jupiter Herodotus saies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they offered unto Hercules the tenth part of their wealth so did the Hetrurians calling it the Herculian part as Plautus hath it in his Truculentus Xenophon saies the Grecians did offer their tithes at the Temple of Apollo at Delphos Aristotle lib. 2. Oeconomicks saies that the Babylonians payed tithes Hence it was that Princes when they came like Caligula to challenge Deity to themselves usurped the tithes Appian records that the Sicilians and other conquered Nations payed the tenth part to the Roman Emperours therefore the Publicans as Cicero hath it are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tithe-gatherers Eighthly that tithes should be payed was the judgment of the Antients that lived in Primitive times St. Chrysostom saies that Abraham in paying of tithes was our Instructor teaching us what we should do St. Jerom saies Quod qui non fecerit deum defrandare supplantare convincitur that he that paies not tithes defraudes and undermines God St. Austin saies Nolumus partiri cum Deo decimas mod● autem totum tollitur We have been unwilling to pay God his tithes therefore it is just he should take all from us Ninthly many Councills have confirmed the paying of tithes the first Aurelian chap. 17. the second of Matiscone chap. 5. the Forojulium in the last Chapter at Ments in the time of Charls the Great chap. 38. at Mentz under Rabanus chap. 10. at Mentz in the time of the Emperour Arnulph chap. 17. where it was decreed that those that neglected to pay tithes should be excommunicated At Rhemes chap. 38. in the time of Charles the Great at Valence in the time of Lotharius chap. 10. the fourth at Arles chap. 9. with many more besides Panormitan Hostiensis and the Canonists of all Ages Tenthly the Heathens by the glimmering light of reason punished those that were sacrilegious Plato ordained in his Lawes that if a servant or stranger should detain holy things they should be branded in the hands and forehead but if a free-man he should be put to death This was one of the twelve Tables of the ancient Romans Sacrum sacrove commodatum qui rapsit parricida esto Let him that steales any holy thing or dedicated to a holy use be punished as a parricide that is as one that murders his father or mother and that was to be sowen in a sack of Leather with a Serpent in it and throwne into the Sea Amongst the Aethiopians if any was convinced of that crime a potion was given him to drink of divers kinds of poyson which was no sooner taken but it so wrought upon the fancy that they conceived themselves to be stung with all kindes of Serpents and to be rid of that pain they made away themselves Eleventhly Histories tells us that imbezilling or alienating of tithes hath been the Prodrome and Harbinger of ruine to severall Nations Churches and Families In Hezekiah's raigne tithes began to be neglected that he appointed Overseers to look to the payment thereof 2 Chron. 31. 11. for which cause God suspended the judgment for his time but his successours growing carelesse they were given up to a Babylonish captivity and their temple destroyed About one hundred and thirty years before our Saviour's Incarnation corruption so prevailed that it began to be questionable whether tithes were to be payed or no whence their high Court of Sanhedrim decreed that instead of the tenth as Moses Cotsensis hath it they should pay one part of an hundred and shortly after God took from them their Rulers their Temple their Land and all O what a sad thing is it when men will be wiser than God It was one of Julian the Apostata's projects to supplant Christianity by taking away the livelyhood of the Ministry The Eastern and African Churches acted their parts in this Scene before they were delivered up to the dolefull Catastrophe of Mahometan blindnesse and slavery What successe Henry the Eighth had in pillaging of the Church the dysasters in his Family and the sad tragedies of Cardinall Wolsey the Vicar-generall with the rest of his Agents and many of those Tribes that were enriched by them can signally witnesse Lastly Sacriledge hath been inevitably attended with remarkable judgments in all ages Xerxes and Brennus sent their Souldiers to violate the Temple at Delphos the one was destroyed with all his Army by lightning the other lost forty thousand of his Foot by fire from heaven The Souldiers that Cambyses sent to spoyl the Temple of Ammon were buried quick under heaps of sands and he slain with his own sword Pyrrhus having pillaged the Lucresian Proserpina was wracked with his whole Navy and left to the mercy of the waves Alsimus high Priest of the Jewes attempting the overthrow of the Temple was struck with a dead Palsie and dyed miserably Heliodorus sent by Seleucus to ransack the Temple at Jerusalem felt the revenging hand of God till Onias the high Priest interceded for him out of which Temple when Crassus the Roman Generall had taken two thousand talents of gold he was no sooner passed over the River Euphrates then his whole Army was rooted by the Parthians and part of the gold he had taken melted and poured into his mouth with these words Now surfeit on gold after thy death which thou couldst not be satisfied with all thy life long Herod sending his men to dig into the Sepulchers of David and Solomon where Church-Treasures were laid up for security there brake out thence a fire that burned the