Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	bear_v	lord_n	zion_n	72	3	9.6463	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A63192	The tryal of Sir Henry Vane, Kt. at the Kings Bench, Westminster, June the 2d. and 6th, 1662 together with what he intended to have spoken the day of his sentence (June 11) for arrest of judgment (had he not been interrupted and over-ruled by the court) and his bill of exceptions : with other occasional speeches, &c. : also his speech and prayer, &c. on the scaffold.	Vane, Henry, Sir, 1612?-1662, defendant.; England and Wales. Court of King's Bench.	1662 (1662)	Wing T2216; ESTC R21850	115,834	133

to have dissolv'd all the bands of service and confidence between his Majesty and his Parliament of whom the Law sayes a dishonourable thing ought not to be imagined This Conclusion then is a clear Result from what hath been argued That in all Cases of such difficulty and unusualness happening by the over-ruling Providence of God as render it impossible for the Subject to know his duty by any known Law or certain Rule extant his relying then upon the Judgment and Reason of the whole Realm declared by their Representative Body in Parliament then sitting and adhering thereto and pursuing thereof though the same afterwards be by succeeding Parliaments judged erroneous factious and unjust is most agreeable to right Reason and good Conscience and in so doing all persons are to be free and secure from all Account and Penalties not only upon the ground and equity of that Statute 11 Hen. 7. but according to all Rules of Justice natural or moral The day of Arraignment being Monday June 2. 1662. Reader The best account thou canst yet be furnished with as to this dayes proceedings in Court is as followeth SIR Henry Vane was the last Term indicted of High Treason before the Middlesex Grand Jury and the Bill being found by them he was upon Monday the second of June this Term arraigned to this effect That you as a false Traitor against his most excellent Majesty King Charles the second your supream and natural Lord not having the fear of God before your eyes and withdrawing that your duty and allegiance which a true Subject ought to have and bear to our said Leige and sovereign Lord thirteenth of May in the eleventh year of our said sovereign Lord the King at the Parish of St. Martins in the fields in the Country of Middlesex did compass and imagine the Death of our said sovereign Lord the King and the ancient frame of Government of this Realm totally to subvert and keep out our said sovereign Lord from the exercise of his Regal Government and the same the better to effect the said Sir Henry Vane the said thirteenth day of May in the said eleventh your c. at St. Martins aforesaid together with other false Traitors to the Jurors unknown did traiterously and maliciously assemble and sit together and then and there consulted to bring the King unto destruction and to hold him out from the exercise of his Regal Authority and then and there usurped the Government and appointed Officers to wit Colonels and Captains of a certain Army raised against the King against the Peace of our sovereign Lord the King his Crown and Dignity and contrary to the form of the Statute in that case made and provided And the better to effect this the twentieth of December in the said eleventh year with a multitude to the number of a thousand persons to the Jurors unknown in warlike manner assembled and arrayed with Guns Trumpets Drums c. did levy War against the Peace c. and contrary to the form of a Statute Which being read he prayed to have it read a second time which was granted him He then prayed to have it read in Latine which all the Court denyed and Keeling the King's Serjeant said That though all Pleas and Entries are set down on Record in Latine yet the agitations of Causes in Court ought to be in English The Prisoner moved several Exceptions to the Indictment as that the 25. Ed. 3. is not pursued that he had levied no such force as amounted to a levying of War Also the place in which persons with whom are both uncertain and the particular acts of levying War being not set forth he thought therefore the Indictment was insufficient Also he said here is a long time of Action for which I am charged and I may be concern'd for what I acted as a Member in that sovereign Court of Parliament and if any thing concerns the Jurisdiction of that Court I ought not to be judged here at which the Court and King's Counsel took great offence He said also There hath been an Act of General Pardon since that time whereby all Treasons are put in utter oblivion and though Sir Henry Vane were excepted yet none consent that he was that Sir Henry Vane But the King's Counsel said If he would plead that Plea they would joyn that Issue with him if he pleased which if it should be found against him it would be too late to plead not guilty But the Court said in favour of life a man may plead a double Plea and give in his Exception and plead over to the Felony or Treason not guilty But as to the Exceptions taken to the Indictment they gave little heed to them but pressed him to plead or confess Whereupon he pleaded Not guilty and had four dayes to wit till Friday next for his Tryal From another hand take as followeth The Prisoner did much press for Counsel to be allowed him to advise with about any further Exceptions to the Indictment besides those by him exhibited and to put all into form according to the customary proceedings and language of the Law as also to speak to them at the Bar on his behalf he not being vers'd in the punctilio's of Law-writings and Pleas. He further said That the Indictment which so nearly concern'd his Life being long and his memory short it could not well be imagined that he should upon the bare hearing it read be able in an instant to find out every material Exception against it in form or matter He pleaded a good while on this account but Counsel was finally denied him till he should plead guilty or not guilty unto which being a third time urged he pleaded Not guilty The Court having assured him beforehand that after pleading Counsel should be assigned him which yet never was performed Here followeth a Transcript of the Prisoners own Papers containing certain Memorandums pleadable upon his Arraignment Memorandums for and towards my Defence Upon hearing the Indictment read and before pleading FIrst To lay before the Court the impossibility that he humbly conceives is already in view as to the having any such indifferent and equal Tryal as the Law intends him and doth require and command on the behalf of all the free-People of England The Rise for this Conception he takes from what hath been already done in relation to the Prisoner himself unheard unexamined and yet kept close Prisoner for near two whole years This he shall leave to the Judgment of the Court after he hath made known the particulars thereof unto them as necessary to precede the thing demanded of him in pleading guilty or not guilty Secondly What is the indifferency which the Law requires and appoints throughout as well in matters that go before the Tryal as in the proceedings at the Tryal if it self Before the Tryal and in the first step to it which is the keeping and securing his person Magna Charta is clear and gives this

whom we are made capable being chosen in him before the foundation of the world and he hath set us in heavenly places in Christ Jesus The hope of this Glory sweetens all our Sufferings I know a day of deliverance for Sion will come Some may think the manner of it may be as before with confused noise of the Warriour and garments rolled in Blood but I rathe think it will be with burning and fewel of fire The Lord will send a fire that shall burn in the Consciences of his Enemies a worm that shall not die and a fire that shall not go out Men they may fight against but this they cannot fight against It being told him by a Friend that he had delivered him up unto God as a Sacrifice though said he I have day and night prayed that this cup might pass from you He replied That he blessed God he had offered himself up first to God and it was a rejoycing to him that others had given him up also And why said he speaking before all the company should we be frighted with Death I bless the Lord I am so far from being affrighted with Death that I find it rather shrink from me than I from it His Children being then present to take their leave of him he said I bless God by the eye of Faith I can see through all my Relations to Mount Sion and there I shall need none of them I have better Acquaintance in Heaven These Relations are nothing to those I shall meet with there Then kissing his Children he said The Lord bless you he will be a better Father to you I must now forget that ever I knew you I can willingly leave this place and outward enjoyments for those I shall meet with hereafter in a better Country I have made it my business to acquaint my self with the society of Heaven Be not you troubled for I am going home to my Father I die in the certain faith and forefight That this Cause shall have its Resurrection in my Death My Blood will be the Seed sown by which this glorious Cause will spring up which God will speedily raise The laying down this earthly tabernacle is no more but throwing down the mantle by which a double portion of the Spirit will fall on the rest of Gods People And if by my being offered up the Faith of many be confirmed and others convinced and brought to the knowledge of the Truth how can I desire greater honour and matter of rejoycing As for that glorious Cause which God hath owned in these Nations and will own in which so many Righteous souls have lost their lives and so many have been engaged by my countenance and encouragement shall I now give it up and so declare them all Rebels and Murderers No I will never do it That precious Blood shall never lie at my door As a Testimony and Seal to the Justness of that Quarrel I leave now my Life upon it as a Legacy to all the honest Interest in these three Nations Ten thousand Deaths rather than defile my Conscience the chastity and purity of which I value beyond all this world and God is not a little concern'd on my behalf He will certainly judge my Case wherein is the bowels of this good Cause and in the bowels of that the Kingdom of Jesus Christ which will speedily be set on foot in these Nations I would not for ten thousand Lives part-with this Peace and Satisfaction I have in my own heart both in holding to the Purity of my Principle and to the Righteousness of this good Cause and the assurance I have that God is now fulfilling all these great and precious Promises in order to what he is bringing forth Although I see it not yet I die in the faith and assured expectation of it Hebr. 11. 13. And the eternal blessedness God hath prepared for me and is ready now to receive me into will abundantly make up all other things Through the power and goodness of God I have had in this Tryal of mine such a proof of the integrity of my own heart as hath been no small joy to me The expressions of grief from his Friends he said were but so many lets and hindrances to him in the view he had of that Glory he was going to possess that heavenly City and Commonwealth where he should behold the face of God and of his Son in a society of Angels and the Spirits of Just men made perfect Some few dayes before his Suffering his thoughts were much fixed upon Psal 118. 27. where are these words God is the Lord which hath shewed us light bind the Sacrifice with cords even unto the horns of the Altar From this he said that God gives light and is light to his People under their darkest circumstances and sufferings and when he calls them forth to suffer he binds them as Sacrifices with cords in three respects First by the Cord of his Love to us for he loved us first Secondly by the Cruelty of our Enemies Thirdly by our Resignation-duty and love to him These three Cords have bound me so fast I cannot stir Upon Friends perswading him to make some submission to the King and to endeavour the obtaining of his Life he said If the King did not think himself more concern'd for his Honour and word than he did for his Life he was very willing they should take it Nay I declare said he that I value my Life less in a good Cause than the King can do his Promise And when some others were speaking to him of giving some thousands of pounds for his Life he said If a thousand farthings would gain it he would not give it And if any should attempt to make such a bargain he would spoil their market For I think the King himself is so sufficiently obliged to spare my Life that it is fitter for him to do it than my self to seek it He rejoyced exceedingly that God assisted him so eminently in bearing his Testimony with faithfulness even unto Death and that he as willingly laid down his Life and with as much satisfaction as ever he went to bed For in a natural sickness Death seized on the body without any consent of the mind but this was a free action of his mind without any constraint upon his body Mention being made to him of the cruel proceedings against him Alas said he what ado they keep to make a poor creature like his Saviour In discourse he said If the shedding of my Blood may prove an occasion of gathering together in one the dispersed Interests and Remnant of the Adherers to this Cause of whatever differing perswasions I should think ten thousand Lives if I had them well spent in such a service He was much pleased in this consideration That he was hastening to a place where God nor none of his would be ashamed to own and receive him Here is nothing in this world saith he but reproaching and

of being prejudiced thereby against him unless they were as willing to abuse him as the Counsel But here were many things said at random against all Sense Law and Reason as if Tully had been charactering a treacherous Catil●ne and the innocent Prisoner must be mute and suffer the Jury to be dismissed and sent to pass their Verdict on his Life without the least possibility of Remedy Put this and all the rest together to wit that the Jury themselves were of the opposit party to him in the late Wars and whole Cause in question depending before them and it had been far better for the Prisoner to have cast lots on a Drum-head for his Life as a Prisoner of War than to be so tryed in a time of Peace unless it can be reasonably presumed that they that would have killed him any time this twenty year in the field should now be like to spare his Life at the Bar. Occasional Speeches before his Tryal HE said there was something in this Cause that could never be conquered and that he blessed the Lord it had never been betrayed by him or conquered in him And before this in a Letter from Silly to a Friend he said God's Arm is not shortned doubtless great and precious Promises are yet in store to be accomplished in and upon Believers here on Earth to the making of Christ admired in them And if we cannot live in the power and actual fruition of them yet if we die in the certain foresight and imbracing of them by Faith it will be our great blessing This dark night and black shade which God hath drawn over his work in the midst of us may be for ought we know the ground-colour to some beautiful Piece that he is now exposing to the light When he came from his Tryal he told a Friend he was as much overjoyed as a chast Virgin that had escaped a Rape for said he neither flatteries before nor threatnings now could prevail upon me and I bless God that enabled me to make a stand for this Cause for I saw the Court resolved to run it down and through the assistance of God I resolved they should run over my Life and blood first June 13. being Friday the day before his Execution On this day liberty being given to Friends to visit him in the Tower he received them with very great chearfulness and with a composed frame of spirit having wholly given up himself to the will of God He did occasionally let fall many gracious expressions to the very great refreshing and strengthning of the hearts of the hearers To wit That he had for any time these two years made Death familiar to him and being shut up from the World he said he had been shut up with God and that he did know what was the mind of God to him in this great matter but that he had not the least recoyl in his heart as to matter or manner of what was done by him And though he might have had an opportunity of escaping or by policy might have avoided his Charge yet he did not make use of it nor could decline that which was come upon him It being told him by a Friend that his Death would be a loss to the People of God He answered that God would raise up other Instruments to serve him and his People And being desired to say something to take off that charge of Jesuitism that was cast upon him He said That he thought it not worth the taking notice of for if it were so he should never have been brought to this A Friend said Sir the Lord hath said Be thou faithful unto Death and I will give thee a Crown of Life The Lord enable you to be faithful He replied I bless the Lord I have not had any discomposure of spirit these two years but I do wait upon the Lord till he be pleased to put an end to these dayes of mine knowing that I shall change for the better For in Heaven there is an innumerable company of Angels the Spirits of Just men made perfect and JESUS the blessed Mediator of the New Covenant There are holy and just Laws a pure Government blessed and good Company every one doing their duty herr we want all these This is that City spoken of Psal 48. 1 2. That strong City that cannot be moved Isa 26. Why therefore should we be unwilling to leave this estate to go that And although I be taken from hence yet know assuredly God will raise up unto you Instruments out of the dust Another said to him Sir There is nothing will stand you in stead but justifying Faith in the Blood of Jesus To which he said There are some that through Faith in the Blood of Christ do escape the pollutions of the world yet afterwards are entangled therein again others there be that are carried through the greatest sufferings by a more excellent spiritual sort of Faith in the Blood of Jesus and endure them with the greatest joy He further said We were lately preaching a Funeral Sermon to our selves out of Heb. 11. 13 16. where those blessed Witnesses do declare themselves to be pilgrims and strangers on the Earth and do desire a better Country that is a heavenly Wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God for he hath prepared for them a City And if God said he be not ashamed to be called my God I hope I shall not be ashamed to endure his Cross and to bear his Reproach even whatsoever it be that man can impose upon me for his sake Yea he will enable me not to be ashamed I have not the least reluctancy or strugling in my spirit against Death I desire not to live but my will is resigned up to God in all Why are you troubled I am not You have need of Faith and Patience to follow the Lord's Call This ought chiefly to be in our eye the bringing Glory to our heavenly Father Surely God hath a glorious Design to carry on in the world even the building up of David's Throne to all Generations For he is compleating all his precious Stones making them Heaven-proof and then laying them together in the Heavenly Mansions with the Spirits of the Just till it be a compleat City When the Top-stone thereof is laid then will he come in all his Glory This day is a day wherein Christ appears in the Clouds Oh that every one of our eyes may see him and consider how we-have pierced him in his Members that we may mourn Our Lord Jesus said Father I have finished the work that thou gavest me to do and now Father glorifie me with the same Glory I had with thee before the world was Our Lord was capable of his Glory beforehand and although we be not so capable as he yet this we know he wills the same to us that where he is we may be also that we may behold his Glory And he is our Head in

or to be born In flying Death thou flyest thy self thy essence is equally parted into these two Life and Death It is the condition and Law of thy Creation Men are not sent into the World by God but with purpose to go forth again which he that is not willing to do should not come in The first day of thy birth bindeth thee and sets thee in the way as well to Death as to Life To be unwilling therefore to die is to be unwilling to be a Man since to be a Man is to be Mortal It being therefore so serviceable to Nature and the institution of it why should it be feared or shunned Besides it is necessary and inevitable we must do our best endeavour in things that are not Remediless but ought to grow resolute in things past Remedy It is most just reasonable and desirable to arive at that place towards which we are alwayes walking Why fearest thou to go whither all the World goes It is the part of a valiant and generous Mind to prefer some things before Life as things for which a man should not doubt nor fear to die In such a case however matters go a man must more account thereof than of his Life He must run his race with resolution that he may perform things profitable and exemplary The contempt of Death is that which produceth the boldest and most honourable exploits He that fears not to die fears nothing From hence have proceeded the commendable Resolutions and free Speeches of Vertue uttered by men of whom the world hath not been worthy A gallant Romane commanded by Vespasian not to come to the Senate answered He was a Senator therefore sit to be at the Senate and being there if required to give his advice he would do it as his Conscience commanded him Hereupon being threatned by the Emperor he replyed Did I ever tell you that I was immortal Do you what you will and I will do what I ought It is in your power to put me unjustly to death and in mine to die constantly What hard dealing cannot he suffer that fears not to die Other designments may be hindred by our enemies but they cannot hinder us from dying The means whereby to live free is to contemn Death It is no great thing to live slaves and beasts can do that but it is a great matter to live freely and die honestly wisely constantly Emori nolo saith one sed me esse mortuum nihil estimo I would not die but to be dead I look upon as nothing But no man can be said resolute to die that is afraid to confront it and suffer with his eyes open as Socrates did without passion or alteration In a miserable estate of a Life which a man cannot remedy Death is lawfully desirable as our best retreat and onely haven from the storms of this Life and as the Soveraign good of nature the onely stay and pillar of Liberty It is a good time to die when to live is rather a burthen than a blessing and there is more ill in Life than good There are many things in Life far worse than Death in respect whereof we should rather die than live The more voluntary our Death is the more honourable Life may be taken away from every man by every man but not Death It is no smal reproach to a Christian whose faith is in immortality and the blessedness of another Life to fear Death much which is the necessary passage thereunto He ought rather to desire and thirst after death as great gain Vitam habere in patientiâ mortem in desiderio to endure Life and desire Death But it is greater constancy well to use the chain wherewith we are bound than to break it A man is not to abandon his charge in Life without the express command of him that gave it him Sylvanus and Proximus being pardoned by Nero chose Death rather than to Live upon those terms Nerva a great Lawyer Cato of Urica and others died as not able to bear the sight of the Weal-publick in that bad and declining state into which by Gods Providence it was brought in their times but they should have considered Multa dies variusque labor mutabilis Aevi Retulit in melius A man ought to carry himself blamlesly and with a steddy courage in his place and calling against his assailants and consider that it is better to continue firme and constant to the end then fearfully to fly or dye It is not a less evil to quit the place and fly than obstinately to be taken and perish It is a great point of wisdom to know the right hour and fit season to Die Many men have survived their own Glory That is the best Death which is well recollected in it self quiet solitary and attendeth wholly to what at that time is fittest But let us more particularly and upon truly and purely Christian Principles weigh and consider Death They that live by Faith die daily The Life which Faith teaches works Death It leads up the mind to things not seen which are eternal and takes it off with its affections and desires from things seen which are temporary It acquaints the soul experimentally with that heavenly way of converse and intercourse which is not expressed by sensible signes but by the demonstration proper to spirits whether angels souls separate or souls yet in the body as they live by faith not by sense In which respect the use of voice and mouth is attributed to God to Christ to Angels who have that with them and in them whereby they outwardly manifest what they inwardly conceive although they express not the inward word of their mental conception by any outward voice hand eye or other external sign but by the way of its own self evidencing brightness and essential demonstration Such a way of living and shining forth in man's naked essential beams he then arrives unto when the thick vail and wall of his flesh is dissolved and his earthly tabernacle put off The knowledge sight and experience of such a kind of subsisting and heavenly manner of Life that man is capable of is the best preparative and most powerful motive to leave the body and surcease the use of our earthly organs This in effect is all that bodily death rightly known and understood doth impart a lawful surceasing the use and exercise of our earthly organs and our willing and chearful resorting to the use and exercise of that Life without the Body which man is capable to subsist in when made perfect in spirit an equal and associate with angels under the power and order of expressing what he inwardly conceives as they do This made Paul look upon Life in the Body and Life out of it with no indifferent eye but as accounting the being at home in the body an absence from the Lord and such a kind of absence from the body as death causes to be that which makes us most present with