Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	comfort_n	life_n	live_v	4,359	5	5.5637	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A47787	The temperate man, or, The right way of preserving life and health, together with soundness of the senses, judgment and memory unto extream old age in three treatises / the first written by the learned Leonardus Lessius, the second by Lodowich Cornaro, a noble gentleman of Venice, the third by a famous Italian; faithfully Englished.; Hygiasticon. English. 1678	Lessius, Leonardus, 1554-1623.; Cornarus, Ludwig.; Herbert, George, 1593-1633.; Ferrar, Nicholas, 1592-1637.	1678 (1678)	Wing L1181; ESTC R32465	69,139	222

of Architecture that they are coll in summer and warm in winter I enjoy aso my gardens and those divers parted with rills of running water which truly is very delightful Sometimes of the year I injoy the pleasure of the Euganean hills where also I have fountains and gardens and a very convenient house At other times I repair to a village of mine seated in the valley which is therefore very pleasant because many ways thither are so ordered that they all meet and end in a fain plot of ground in the midst whereof is a Church suitable to the condition of the place This place is washed with the river Brenta on both sides whereof are great and fruitful fields well manured and adorned with many habitations In former time it was not so because the place was moorish and unhealthy fitter for beasts than men But I drained the ground and made the air good Whereupon men flockt thither and built houses with happy success By this means the place is come to that perfection we now see it is So that I can truly say that I have both given God a Temple and men to worship him in it The memory whereof is exceeding delightful to me Sometimes I ride to some of the neighbor cities that I may enjoy the sight communication of my friends as also of excellent Artificers in Architecture painting stone-cutting musick and husbandry whereof in this age there is great plenty I view their pieces I compare them with those of Antiquity and ever I learn somewhat which is worthy of my knowledg I survey places gardens antiquities publick fabricks temples and fortifications neither omit I any thing that may either teach or delight me I am much pleased also in my travels with the beauty of situation Neither is this my pleasure made less by the decaying dulness of my senses which are all in their perfect vigor but especially my Taste so that any simple fare is more savoury to me now than heretofore when I was given to disorder and all the delights that could be To change my bed troubles me not I sleep well and quietly any where and my dreams are fair and pleasant But this chiefly delights me that my advice hath taken effect in the reducing of many rude and untoiled places in my country to cultivation and good husbandry I was one of those that was deputed for the managing of that work and abode in those fenny places two whole months in the heat of summer which in Italy is very great receiving not any hurt or inconvenience thereby So great is the power and efficacy of that Temperance which ever accompanied me These are the delights and solaces of my old age which is altogether to be preferred before others youth Because that by Temperance and the Grace of God I feel not those perturbations of body and mind wherewith infinite both young and old are afflicted Moreover by this also in what estate I am may be discovered because at these years viz. 83. I have made a most pleasant Comedy full of honest wit and merriment which kind of Poems useth to be the child of Youth which it most suits withal for variety and pleasantness as a Tragedy with old Age by reason of the sad events which it contains And if a Greek Poet of old was praised that at the age of 73 years he writ a Tragedy why should I be accounted less happy or less my self who being Ten years older have made a Comedy Now lest there should be any delight wanting to my old age I daily behold a kind of immortality in the succession of my posterity For when I come home I find eleven grand-children of mine all the sons of one father and mother all in perfect health all as far as I can conjecture very apt and well given both for learning and behavior I am delighted with their musick and fashion and I my self also sing often because I have now a clearer voice than ever I had in my life By which it is evident That the life which I live at this age is not a dead dumpish and sower life but chearful lively and pleasant Neither if I had my wish would I change age and constitution with them who follow their youthful appetites although they be of a most strong temper Because such are daily exposed to a thousand dangers and deaths as daily experience sheweth and I also when I was a young man too well found I know how inconsiderate that age is and though subject to death yet continually afraid of it For death to all young men is a terrible thing as also to those that live in sin and follow their appetites whereas I by the experience of so many years have learned to give way to Reason whence it seems to me not only a shameful thing to fear that which cannot be avoided but also I hope when I shall come ta that point I shall find no little comfort in the favor of Jesus Christ Yet I am sure that my end is far from me for I know that setting casualties aside I shall not die but by a pure resolution because that by the regularity of my life I have shut out death all other ways And that is a fair and desirable death which Nature brings by way of resolution Since therefore a Temperate life is so happy and pleasant a thing what remains but that I should wish all who have the care of themselves to imbrace it with open arms Many things more might be said in commendation hereof but lest in any thing I forsake that Temperance which I have found so good I here make an End A DISCOURSE Translated out of Italian That a Spare Diet is better than a Splendid and Sumptuous A PARADOX I Verily believe however I have titled this opinion yet it will by no means be allowed for a Paradox by a number of those whose judgment ought to bear the greatest sway And to speak freely it would seem to me very uncouth that any man that makes profession of more understanding than a beast should open his mouth to the contrary or make any scruple at all of readily subscribing to the truth and evidence of this Position That a frugal and simple Diet is much better than a full and dainty Tell me you that seem to demur on the business whether a sober austere diet serves not without further help to chase away that racking humor of the Gout which by all other helps that can be be used scarce receives any mitigation at all but do what can be done lies tormenting the body till it have spent it self Tell me whether this holy Medicine serve not to the driving away of Head-ach to the cure of Dizziness to the stopping of Rheums to the stay of fluxes to the getting away of loathsome Itches to the freedom from dishonest Belchings to the prevention of Agues and in a word to the clearing and draining of all ill Humors whatsoever in

have used therein I say therefore that the infirmities which did not only begin but had already gone far in me first caused me to leave Intemperance to which I was much addicted For by it and my ill constitution having a most cold and moist stomach I fell into divers diseases to wit into the pain of the stomach and often of the side and the beginning of the Gout with almost a continual fever and thirst From this ill temper there remained little else to be expected of me than that after many troubles and griefs I should quickly come to an end whereas my life seemed as far from it by Nature as it was near it by Intemperance When therefore I was thus affected from the Thirty fifth year of my age to the Fortieth having tried all remedies fruitlesly the Physicians told me that yet there was one help for me if I could constantly pursue it to wit A sober and orderly life for this had every way great force for the recovering and preserving of Health as a disorderly life to the overthrowing of it as I too well by experience found For Temperance preserves even old men and sickly men sound But Intemperance destroys most healthy and flourishing constitutions For contrary causes have contrary effects and the faults of Nature are often amended by Art as barren grounds are made fruitful by good husbandry They added withal that unless I speedily used that remedy within a few months I should be driven to that exigent that there would be no help for me but Death shortly to be expected Upon this weighing their reasons with my self and abhorring from so sudden an end and finding my self continually oppressed with pain and sickness I grew fully perswaded that all my griefs arose out of Intemperance and therefore out of an hope of avoiding death and pain I resolved to live a temperate life Whereupon being directed by them in the way I ought to hold I understood that the food I was to use was such as belonged to sickly constitutions and that in a small quantity This they had told me before But I then not liking that kind of Diet followed my Appetite and did eat meats pleasing to my taste and when I felt inward heats drank delightful wines and that in great quantity telling my Physicians nothing thereof as is the custom of sick people But after I had resolved to follow Temperance and Reason and saw that it was no hard thing to do so but the proper duty of man I so addicted my self to this course of life that I never went a foot out of the way Upon this I found within a few days that I was exceedingly helped and by continuance thereof within less than one year although it may seem to some incredible I was perfectly cured of all my infirmities Being now sound and well I began to consider the force of Temperance and to think thus with my self If Temperance had so much power as to bring me health how much more to preserve it Wherefore I began to search out most diligently what meats were agreeable unto me and what disagreeable And I purposed to try whether those that pleased my taste brought me commodity or discommodity and whether that Proverb wherewith Gluttons use to defend themselves to wit That which savors is good and nourisheth be consonant to truth This upon trial I found most false for strong and very cool wines pleased my taste best as also melons and other fruit in like manner raw lettice fish pork sausages pulse and cake and py-crust and the like and yet all these I found hurtful Therefore trusting on experience I forsook all these kind of meats and drinks and chose that wine that fitted my stomach and in such measure as easily might be digested Above all taking care never to rise with a full stomach but so as I might well both eat and drink more By this means within less than a year I was not only freed from all those evils which had so long beset me and were almost become incurable but also afterwards I fell not into that yearly disease whereinto I was wont when I pleased my Sense and Appetite Which benefits also still continue because from the time that I was made whole I never since departed from my setled course of Sobriety whose admirable power causeth that the meat and drink that is taken in fit measure gives true strength to the body all superfluities passing away without difficulty and no ill humors being ingendred in the body Yet with this diet I avoided other hurtful things also as too much heat and cold weariness watching ill air overmuch use of the benefit of marriage For although the power of health consists most in the proportion of meat and drink yet these forenamed things have also their force I preserved me also asmuch as I could from hatred and melancholy and other perturbations of the mind which have a great power over our constitutions Yet could I not so avoid all these but that now and then I fell into them which gained me this experience that I perceived that they had no great power to hurt those bodies which were kept in good order by a moderate Diet So that I can truly say That they who in these two things that enter in at the mouth keep a fit proportion shall receive little hurt from other excesses This Galen confirms when he says that immoderate heats and colds and winds and labors did little hurt him because in his meats and drinks he kept a due moderation and therefore never was sick by any of these inconveniences except it were for one only day But mine own experience confirmeth this more as all that know me can testifie For having endured many heats and colds and other like discommodities of the body and troubles of the mind all these did hurt me little whereas they hurt them very much who live intemperately For when my brother and others of my kindred saw some great powerful men pick quarrels against me fearing lest I should be overthrown they were possessed with a deep Melancholy a thing usual to disorderly lives which increased so much in them that it brought them to a sudden end But I whom that matter ought to have affected most received no inconvenience thereby because that humor abounded not in me Nay I began to perswade my self that this suit and contention was raised by the Divine Providence that I might know what great power a sober and temperate life hath over our bodies and minds and that at length I should be a conqueror as also a little after it came to pass For in the end I got the victory to my great honor and no less profit whereupon also I joyed exceedingly which excess of joy neither could do me any hurt By which it is manifest That neither melancholy nor any other passion can hurt a temperate life Moreover I say That even bruises and squats and falls which often kill others

disorderly For if a friend who visits thee in thy sickness and only comforts and condoles doth perform an acceptable thing to thee how much more dearly should a Physician be esteemed who not only as a friend doth visit thee but help thee But that a man may preserve himself in health I advise that instead of a Physician a regular life is to be imbraced which as is manifest by experience is a natural Physick most agreeable to us and also doth preserve even ill tempers in good health and procure that they prolong their life even to a hundred years and more and that at length they shut up their days like a Lamp only by a pure consumption of the radical moisture without grief or perturbation of humors Many have thought that this could be done by Aurum potabile or the Philosophers-stone sought of many and found of few But surely there is no such matter if Temperance be wanting But sensual men as most are desiring to satisfie their Appetite and pamper their belly although they see themselves ill-handled by their intemperance yet shun a sober life because they say It is better to please the Appetite though they live Ten years less than otherwise they should do than always to live under bit and bridle But they consider not of how great moment Ten years are in mature age wherein wisdom and all kind of vertues is most vigorous which but in that age can hardly be perfected And that I may say nothing of other things are not almost all the learned books that we have written by their Authors in that age and those Ten years which they set at nought in regard of their belly Besides these Belly-gods say that an orderly life is so hard a thing that it cannot be kept To this I answer that Galen kept it and held it for the best Physick so did Plato also and Isocrates and Tully and many others of the ancient and in our age Paul the Third and Cardinal Bembo who therefore lived so long and among other Dukes Laudus and Donatus and many others of inferior condition not only in the city but also in villages and hamlets Wherefore since many have observed a regular life both of old times and later years it is no such thing which may not be performed especially since in observing it there needs not many and curious things but only that a man should begin and by little and little accustom himself unto it Neither doth it hinder that Plato says That they who are imployed in the common-wealth cannot live regularly because they must often endure heats and colds and winds and showers and divers labors which suit not with an orderly life For I answer that those inconveniences are of no great moment as I shewed before if a man be temperate in meat and drink which is both easie for common-weals-men and very convenient both that they may preserve themselves from diseases which hinder publick imployment as also that their mind in all things wherein they deal may be more lively and vigorous But some may say he which lives a regular life eating always light meats and in a little quantity what diet shall he use in diseases which being in health he hath anticapated I answer first Nature which endeavors to preserve a man as much as she can teacheth us how to govern our selves in sickness For suddenly it takes away our appetite so that we can eat but a very little wherewith she is very well contented So that a sick man whether he hath lived heretofore orderly or disorderly when he is sick ought not to eat but such meats as are agreeable to his disease and that in much smaller quantity than when he was well For if he should keep his former proportion Nature which is already burdened with a disease would be wholly oppressed Secondly I answer better That he which lives a temperate life cannot fall into diseases and but very seldom into indispositions Because Temperance takes away the causes of diseases and the cause being taken away there is no place for the effect Wherefore since an orderly life is so profitable so vertuous so decent and so holy it is worthy by all means to be imbraced especially since it is easie and most agreeable to the Nature of Man No man that follows it is bound to eat and drink so little as I No man is forbidden to eat fruit or fish which I eat not For I eat little because a little sufficeth my weak stomach and I abstain from fruit and fish and the like because they hurt me But they who find benefit in these meats may yea ought to use them yet all must needs take heed lest they take a greater quantity of any meat or drink though most agreeable to them then their stomach can easily digest So that he which is offended with no kind of meat and drink hath the quantity and not the quality for his rule which is very easie to be observed Let no man here object unto me That there are many who though they live disorderly yet continue in health to their lives end Because since this is at the best but uncertain dangerous and very rare the presuming upon it ought not to lead us to a disorderly life It is not the part of a wise man to expose himself to so many dangers of discases and death only upon a hope of an happy issue which yet befalls very few An old man of an ill constitution but living orderly is more sure of life than the most strong young man who lives disorderly But some too much given to Appetite object that a long life is no such desirable thing because that after one is once Sixty five years old all the time we live after is rather death than life But these err greatly as I will shew by my self recounting the delights and pleasures in this age of 83 which now I take and which are such as that men generally account me happy I am continually in health and I am so nimble that I can easily get on horseback without the advantage of the ground and sometimes I go up high stairs and hills on foot Then I am ever chearful merry and well-contented free from all troubles and troublesome thoughts in whose place joy and peace have taken up their standing in my heart I am not weary of life which I pass with great delight I confer often with worthy men excelling in wit learning behavior and other vertues When I cannot have their company I give my self to the reading of some learned book and afterwards to writing makinglit my aim in all things how I may help others to the furthest of my power All these things I do at my ease and at fit seasons and in mine own houses which besides that they are in the fairest place of this learned City of Padua are very beautiful and convenient above most in this age being so built by me according to the rules

2. de vitis Philosophorum 34. The third Commodity of a sober Diet is That although it doth not cure such diseases as are incurable in their own nature yet it doth so much mitigate and allay them as they are easily born and do not much hinder the functions of the mind This is seen by daily experience for many there be who have ulcers in their Lungs hardness of the Liver or Spleen the Stone in the Reins or in the bladder old dry Itches and inveterate distempers in their Bowels swellings in the Guts waterish Ruptures and divers other kinds of Burstnesses who yet notwithstanding by the help of good Diet only prolong their lives a great while and are alwaies chearful and expedite to the affairs and businesses of the mind For as these diseases are very much exasperated by over-eating so that they do very much afflict Nature and in a short space overthrow it so by a sober course of life they are marvellously allayed and mitigated insomuch as very little inconvenience is felt by them nor do they much shorten the ordinary race of mens lives CHAP. VII That it makes men to live long and in the end to die without pain 35. THe fourth Commodity is That it brings not only health but long life to the followers thereof and leads them on to extream old Age so that when they are to pass out of this world their departure is without any great pain or grief inasmuch as they die by a meer resolution Both these things are manifest in Reason and in Experience For as for old Age it is evident That holy men in the Deserts and Monasteries of old lived very long albeit they led most strict lives and almost utterly destitute of all bodily conveniences which thing ought chiefly to be attributed to their sober Diet. So Paul the first Hermite prolonged his life to almost 115 years of which he lived about a hundred in the desert maintaining himself the first Forty of them with a few Dates and a draught of water and the remainder with half a loaf of bread which a Raven daily brought him as S. Jerom writes in his Life S. Antony lived 105 years whereof Ninety he spent in the desert sustaining his body with bread and water only saving that at the very last he added a few herbs as Athanasius testifieth Paphnutius exceeded Ninety years eating bread only as is gathered out of Cassian Collat. 3. chap. 1. S. Hilarion although he was of a weak nature and alwaies intent upon divine affairs yet lived Eighty four years whereof he passed almost Seventy in the desert with wonderful abstinence and rigor in his diet and other ordering of his body as S. Jerom writes James the Hermite a Persian born lived partly in the desert and partly in a Monasterie 104 years upon a most spare diet as Theodorets Religious History in Julian makes mention And Julian himself surnamed Saba that is to say Old man refreshed himself only once a week contenting himself with barley-bread salt and water as Theodoret in the same place recounts Macarius whose Homilies are extant passed about Ninety years whereof he spent Threescore in the desert in continual fastings Arsenius the master of the Emperor Arcadius lived 120 years that is Sixty five in the world and the other Fifty five in the desert with admirable abstinence Simeon Stylites lived 109 years whereof he passed Eighty one on a Pillar and Ten in a Monastery But this mans abstinence and labors seem to exceed humane nature Romualdus an Italian lived 120 years whereof he spent a whole Hundred in Religion with exceeding abstinence and most strict courses Vdalricus the Paduan Bishop a man of wonderful abstinence lived 105 years as Paul Bernriedensis witnesseth in the Life of Gregory the Seventh which our Gretzer brought to light some few years ago Francis of Pole lived till he was above Ninety years old using marvellous abstinence for he made but one repast a day after sun-set and that of bread and water very seldom using any of those kinds of food which belong to Lent S. Martin lived Eighty six years S. Epiphanius almost a Hundred and fifteen S. Jerom about an Hundred S. Augustine Seventy six S. Remigius Seventy four in his Bishoprick Venerable Bede lived from Seven years old till he was Ninety two in a Religious Order It would be too long to recount all the Examples that might be brought out of Histories and the Lives of the Saints to the confirmation of this matter I omit very many in our times who by means of a sober course of Life and Diet have extended their lives with health until Eighty Ninety and Ninety five years space or upwards There are also Monasteries of women in which upon a most spare diet they live to Eighty or Ninety years so that those of Sixty and Seventy years old are scarce accounted amongst the Aged 36. Nor can it be well said That these whom we have recounted lived to so great ages by the supernatural gift of God and not by the power of Nature Inasmuch as this long life was not the reward of some few but of very many and almost of all those who followed that precise course of Sobriety and were not cut off by some outward chance or violence Wherefore S. John the Evangelist who alone amongst the Apostles escaped violent death lived Sixty eight years after the Ascention of our Lord so that it is very probable he arrived to the age of a Hundred years And S. Simeon was a Hundred and twenty years old when he was martyred S. Dennis the Areopagite lived till he was above an hundred years old S. James the younger saw Ninety six having continually attended prayer and fasting and alwaies abstained from flesh and wine 37. Besides this Priviledge belongs not only to Saints but also to others For the Brachmans amongst the Indians live exceeding long by reason of their spare diet And amongst the Tunks the Religious professors of their Mahometical superstition who are very much given to abstinence and austerity Josephus in his Second Book of the Wars of the Jews chap. 7. writes That the Essenes were men of long lives so that many of them lived till they were a Hundred years old through the simplicity of the diet which they used and their well-ordered course of living for there was nothing but bread and some one kind of gruel or pap set before them at their meals Democritus and Hippocrates prolonged their lives to a Hundred and five years Plato passed Eighty Last of all when the Scripture saith in Ecclus. 37. 30. He that is temperate adds to his life it speaks generally of all those that follow abstinence and not of Saints only Nevertheless I grant indeed That wicked men and in particular Homicides and Blasphemers do not for the most part live long albeit they be temperate in their diets for the divine vengeance persecuteth them And yet these commonly