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	soul_n	unite_v	4,194	5	9.8657	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A47258	Some remarks on the life, death, and burial of Mr. Henry Cornish, B.D., an eminent dissenting teacher who died on Sunday, Dec. 18, and was interr'd on Thursday, Dec. 22, 1698, in the church of Bisiter in the county of Oxford as received in a letter from a friend.	Kennett, White, 1660-1728.	1699 (1699)	Wing K304; ESTC R3388	10,035	15

Christian Church were none of them so lost to God and Goodness but that they said and did some things Praise-worthy and of good Report And therefore I am by no means angry that this grave ancient Man was publickly treated with so much Respect and Honour The Funeral Orations were always heard with some allowance to Grief and Affection And Sermons on the like occasion ought to be interpreted with Candour and Concession especially when He who performs that last Office lies under particular Obligations to the Party deceased As it was in this Case where the Speaker is said to be possess'd of a very plentiful Benefice chiefly by the Interest and Recommendation of Mr. Cornish in whose Opinion He was a moderate and peaceable Man And therefore He did well to intimate his great Engagements to Him and to call Him expresly his Father his Friend and his Patron This was ingenuous and proper but then He should have temper'd his Gratitude with Discretion and Truth He should first have considered his own Character which was by no means to be an Advocate for Indifference in Communion nor cowardly to betray that Altar to the Service whereof He had been legally ordain'd He should have consider'd the Place wherein he stood upon Courtesie and Sufferance and should in good manners have said nothing offensive to the Person by whose leave He came there He should have considered that the greatest part of the Audience were already prejudiced against the Church and the ordinary means of Salvation in it and to be now taught to have Men's Persons in greater Admiration would but seal up the Obstinate and confirm them in the Error of their ways He should too have considered that in the mixt Multitude there were some regular and conscientious Members of the Church of England who must needs be offended to hear their Church in effect delivered up by a professing Disciple of it And to find a Leader of misguided Separatists to be as it were Sainted in that Place where Unity and Conformity are yet established by Law And above all He should have considered how he can answer it to God or Man to countenance Disorders and Divisions to Daub with untemper''d Mortar to speak smooth things and to prophesie Deceits however the People may love to have it so Most certainly the Preacher on this solemn Occasion had been more true to the Rights of his own Function if He had took this fair Opportunity first to commemorate the great Charity of the Church of England which like a natural and indulgent Mother has always open Arms to receive even her Froward and Rebellious Sons And tho' like the other true Parent she had rather have the Living Child than the Dead yet in pity she allows her Offices of Christian Burial to those who despise her other Ordinances Why should not this Tenderness and Compassion of Hers work upon the hearts of the Disobedient Why should it not make them sensible there be some returns due of silial Respect and Love for her Bowels of Affection to them Did she imitate the dire Severities of the Church of Rome Did she curse and exclude from Salvation all that forsook the Pale of her Communion Did she cast out their Bodies to the Fowls of the Air or rake into their Graves and condemn their very Bones to be burnt as is known to be the frequent Practice abroad Why then these unmerciful Doings might well create Aversion and Abhorrence in All that differ'd from Hor But when she patiently waits their Submission while they live and affords them the last Offices of Piety when they come to die this sure might win upon all ingenuous Spirits to oblige Her with Conformity and Obedience in all reasonable Service He might then have took an Opportunity to infer that our dissenting Brethren do not die so much out of Charity with the Church as is commonly imputed to them When there has been any variance between Friends or Relations if the deceasing Party bequeath a Legacy to Him or Her that survives This is justly thought a Sign and Seal of Reconciliation and and perfect Love Why do we not in this Case make the same reasonable Inference We see those Brethren live many Years as Strangers and Aliens to the Church yet when they come to depart out of this World they leave their Bodies as a Legacy to be there deposited in Peace Tho' by strength of Prejudice and force of ill Example they chose to serve God in a common and unhallowed Barn rather than in the Place solemnly devoted to be his House of Prayer Yet on Death-bed Thoughts they cannot will their Bodies to be committed to the Threshing-Floor but make it their last Option to be buried with their forefathers and let their Sepulchres at least be on the good old Consecrated Ground We ought to put the kindest Sense on this their dying Disposition We know it was a prevailing Error in the Primitive Church for the Novices and Catechumens in the Faith to defer their being baptiz'd to the very Point of Death upon a false Conceit that every Sin committed after Baptism would be mortal and upon a charitable Surmise that just dying in the Communion of the Church would absolve them from all the Errors of their past course of Life Who knows but the better sort of Dissenters have these Scruples on them That if they should be too soon admitted into the Bosom of the Church they could by no means live up to the Rules and Orders of it and so by being unworthy Members should be the greater Sinners Whereas delaying their admission to the last they may possibly suppose that such a final Action determines their Salvation and to be buried in the Church is a sufficient Atonement for long Absence from it Charity thinketh no Evil. Then He might have took occasion to perswade the Brethren there preseut that they would be as well affected in their Life and Health as they generally come to be in their last Sickness and Point of Death i. e. to bring their Bodies to the Church while their Souls are yet in them For Souls and Bodies united might be offer'd as a more acceptable and well-pleasing Sacrifice to Christ and his Spouse the Church more acceptable than the bare Carcass and the Refuse of Mortality Why should they desire to be interr'd within the Precincts of the Church Unless they naturally think it their own last Home and their proper Place Would any of Us request that our dead Bodies should be carried into an Enemy's Country rather than be laid up in our Native Land It must argue some Affection to that Spot of Earth where we resolve to lay down our mortal Man and mix our common Dust. Many of the good Old Christians in the Times of Persecution when they had fix'd upon their Place of Sepulture in Rocks suppose or Dens or Caves of the Earth when they had fix'd I say upon the Pla●● they used often to visit it to