Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	body_n	pain_n	soul_n	8,495	5	5.3269	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A93732	Because that in the following discourse the reason is recited and answered, why my ministry is rejected and not received by this ignorant, but more especially corrupt world; therefore I thought it expedient and necessary to publish the same.	Stafford, Richard, 1663-1703.	1700 (1700)	Wing S5107G; ESTC R184555	29,991	44

beat upon this house of our Body when Dangerous and Tormenting Diseases are upon us and grim Death approaches nigh to Arrest and Carry our Souls into another place then we know and are indeed sensible that as God doth Good so he can also Punish and make the Creature really Miserable As when we are Hungry or Cold or Sick we would willingly do those things and use those means to be full and satisfied and warm and well again So we being By Nature Children of Wrath and liable unto Misery and Destruction which will at length certainly come upon us unless in God is our help in God is our Salvation Life and Happiness so that from hence the Word of Exhortation doth arise and run most forcible to actually persuade us to do those things and so to walk that we may please God that he may do these great and good Things on our behalf Namely that when Death hath done its worst and utmost upon us he may raise us up again and give us the Blessing which the Lord hath commanded even Life for evermore That he Who hath filled the Hungry with good things would fill our Hungry Souls with satisfaction I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness Psal 17. 15. There is all contained in this Word Satisfied what we can think of or desire or would have for then it will be returned to our unspeakable rejoycing Now it is as we would have it What Man is he that desireth Life and loveth many Days that he may see good Psal 34. 11. So the question may be a little reversed and altered What Man is there that doth not desire Life and many Days that he may see Good For 't is evident That if any one doth not desire many Days it is because he doth not see Good in them and all this Life and all this Good and all this Satisfaction if I should express it by more words it is all but the same still is had by Obedience Saith God to his reasonable Creatures Obey my Voice and Live As for the other Branch of this our Third Use and Application Namely That we should be of an Humble Lowly and Trembling Spirit It is a part of and comprehended under Obedience to those Commands of our God What doth the Lord require of thee but to walk humbly with thy God Micah 6. 8. Serve the Lord with fear and rejoyce with Trembling Psal 2. 11. Verily verily we poor mortal Creatures can never be in too low and humble a State neither can we have too mean an Opinion and Conceit of our selves For verily every Man at his best State is altogether vanity Selah Psal 39. 5. There is the Ratification and Confirmation of it And as every one of us at our best State are altogether Vanity even so we should know and be sensible of as much our selves as to lay it deeply to Heart Humble your selves in the sight of God and he shall lift you up James 4. 10. Confess your selves as nothing and altogether unworthy and unprofitable Then it was when David was Little in his own sight That God exalted him to be King over all Israel and what was Ten Thousand Times better he gave unto him his holy Spirit and the Spirit of God spake by him and his word was in his tongue But he giveth more Grace Wherefore he saith God resisteth the Proud and giveth grace to the Humble Here if they would be still Humble therewith and use it well he would increase even that More Grace for he would give exceeding Gifts unto Men if they would remain still Low and Little in their own sight But if once they are lifted up then he hinders or witholds or takes away the Qualifications wherein they boast or some way defeats and spoils them that no Creature should glory in his Presence My self am a sad Example and Warning of this for I speak this 〈◊〉 my shame I have perceived from within my self drawings of God upon the account of my Spiritual Pride and Affectations of gentility and such like It is my present Testimony and I declare it of mine own miserable Experience for hereby I shall lose so much of that Full Reward which I might have had for all Eternity if I had all along remained Little in mine own sight and such as a Creature should be Take heed and beware of Pride and of the least giving way unto the lifting up of Mind I mean that which no Man seeth but it is known only between God and thine own Conscience As afore said No Man can be too Low and Humble So here it is No Man can keep too far off from Pride so as not to give way unto the Thoughts and Dictates thereof in the least it being a deadly and dangerous Evil. And then for what belongs to this for fear and humility commonly go together that we should always be in a fearful and trembling State according to what Paul saith And I was with you in Weakness in Fear and in much Trembling 1 Cor. 2. 3. It is Observed That in very Cold weather how little and contracted we are within our selves When we are Cold or Hungry or in Pain or in Affliction then commonly we least stand upon and do not care for nor value the nicities of Pride But we are Humble viz such as frail and miserable Creatures should be Even so for the very same Reason we should Pass the time of our sojourning here in fear For the most Brittle Glass is not more subject and liable to be broken then we are in all times and places subject to Destruction and Misery For what is our Life It is even as a vapour that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth away It is but a puff of Breath in our Nostrils And what is more fluid and uncertain then that Suppose a Man were to tread on a Rope an Hundred Yards high from which if he should fall he would certainly break his Neck or suppose we were to pass over a wide River or deep Pit on a Bridge no broader than just the Soles of our Feet and we had nothing at all to hold by How carefully and fearfully should we walk thereon So is our Case and Condition in the Body and in this Life For though the Eye of Sence seeth it not yet the Eye of Faith and the Eyes of our Understanding being enlightened do discern and know That we are as yet it is but for a very little while kept from the dreadful Things of the invisible World only by this thin vail of Flesh which we carry about us We are but for a very short respite preserved from drowning by this tottering and ruinous Ark of the Body which will not preserve us always Now if a poor Creature was to swim for his Life he would not be without fear in the midst of his Swimming if he hath any sense or apprehension of his Danger And if he hath no sense nor apprehension of

the Object of Knowledge is present and visible Things Now Faith is the Principle and Foundation the Sum and Substance the Marrow and Kernel the very Vitals and Inwards of all Religion For first of all Faith fixes and terminates on the unseen God who made all things both visible and invisible both Things present and Things to come But then besides we are Creatures that are continually passing on we being here in a transitory Life and in a transitory State And we hast on and continually make towards those greater and more abiding Things to come Now as Faith doth discover apprehend and lay hold of all these things it thereunpon becomes to us all in all Saith Jesus Christ Have Faith in God Mark 11. 22. And it being elsewhere said The just shall live by his Faith So that I would chiefly recommend and put my Readers in mind to have Faith in God and live by Faith That as the Apostle saith Whether ye eat or drink or whatever ye do do all to the glory of God Even so do ye live by Faith and be full of Faith and of the Holy Ghost that whether ye Sleep or Wake whether ye be busy or idle whether ye be in your Shops Barns Houses or Fields whether ye be upon a Journey or sitting still Nay even whilst ye are eating your necessary Food or not eating in whatsoever Posture or Action ye are in let your Hearts be always musing and thinking and be full with expectation And looking after those things which are coming on the Earth Luke 21. 26. And shortly after that we depart hence will be manifested before us with open Face For the Divisions of Reuben there was great thought and searchsearching of heart So after the invisible and future things of God which pertain to us Men let there be continued Thought and searching of Heart To give all diligence to make our Calling and Election sure Let this be all your Labour and Care And as ye always Breath and your Pulse is continually beating so let your doings and movings be towards and in Subordination and tendency to this great end how to secure and lay hold on the better Things for your Portion Thus to have Faith in God and to Live by Faith is indeed the way to be Carried from Faith unto Salvation The Third Practical Use and Inference is To teach every one of us to be of an Obedient Humble Lowly and Trembling Spirit It hath been aforesaid that the wicked Ungodly and Disobedient would fain have the Commandments of God be fashioned according to their imaginations and Lusts and when they have indeed Sinned they would so make a shew as if they had not sinned or as if the Commandments of God were not so as they are Recorded in his Book and delivered by his faithful Ministers I have Read among the ●ayings of Luther That nothing displeaseth God more than when we Defend and Cloak our Sins and will not acknowledge that we have done wrong as did Saul For this is Adding Sin to Sin and a linking one Transgression on to another That is when such have Sinned or Transgressed In speaking oppression and revolt conceiving and uttering from the Heart words of falshood Isa 59. 13. To vindicate themselves and it is a Persisting still in their Stubbornness Disobedience and Rebellion which instead of lessening doth aggravate and increase their Guilt and it doth provoke God more and more By that manner of speech Conceiving and uttering from the Heart words of falshood Is meant and intended when People will of set purpose invent and speak lies and words of Falshood at the very same time when they know it to be so only to cloak and excuse their foregoing Sins But all this both the lying false Spirit as also the Perverse Disobedient Rebellious and Refractory Spirit is far from the Godly as we may know by the Examples of David and Hezekiah By the way though a parcel of ignorant People or Men pleasers who are Corrupted by filthy lucre do imagine or say That a King or Rich Man ought not to be Reproved Yet we learn and know the contrary from the Word of God that they both may and also they ought to be Reproved if they commit Sin or Evil all one as inferiour People We may Read in 2 Sam. 12. That when Nathan Reproved David he did not imprison Nathan for it as Amaziah and other Ungodly Kings would sometimes do unto the Prophets of the Lord but he acknowledged his Offence And David said unto Nathan I have sinned against the Lord. And so when Isaiah denounced that sad Message to Hezekiah and his Posterity What is the Return and Answer which Hezekiah made thereupon Then said Hezekiah to Isaiah Good is the Word of the Lord which thou hast spoken Isa 39. 8. Both David and Hezekiah were Servants of the Lord who were overtaken with a fault but yet they are for our Example and Instruction how we should behave our selves under the Reproof of the Word either in the publick Preaching and Ministry thereof or when we are Rebuked privately as one Man doth his Neighbour Namely not to Rankle in Spirit nor conceive Enmity and Hatred against the outward Person of him that doth it like Ahab to Micaiah I hate this Man for he Prophesieth not good concerning me but evil Not to kick against the Reproof because it pricks the Conscience in which sense notwithstanding people harden themselves now in the mean while yet hereafter it will be found true It is hard to kick against the pricks Nor yet should any one dare to Reply against God Rom 9 20. Nor yet as it is in the Marginal Reading there to Answer again for this is a sign of a Malapert and Saucy Servant But as the one is to give so the other ought to receive the Reproof In the Spirit of meekness and to acknowledge that he hath Transgressed against the Lord his God and that he hath not obeyed his voice Jer. 3. 13. But now he is heartily sorry for it and unfeigendly resolves to mend his fault and do so no more The end and Requiring of the Law is Obedience And this is the way when we have not performed that to make it up and supply it so as to render and yield it for the time to come All that God doth require of us and the only way to please and be reconciled unto him is to obey his Word to have a great fear and dread of the invisible God in our inward Parts and a care not to offend him and to express forth whatever Honour and Reverence we possibly can towards him For though when we are full and in Health Youth and Strength we are apt to despise him and say in our Heart tush God we care not for thee Yet on the other hand when we are in Hunger Want Cold Affliction or Pain and more especially when Old Age begins to creep on when the Floods come and the Winds blow and