Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	day_n	life_n	world_n	8,295	5	4.5590	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A57061	A sermon preach'd before the Right Honourable the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen in Guild-hall Chappel, on Sunday the xxi of October, 1688 by Nathanael Resbury ...	Resbury, Nathanael, 1643-1711.	1689 (1689)	Wing R1131; ESTC R36776	11,824	35

those of Good Men those who are call'd and entituled God's Church and peculiar People are all cloudy and discouraging the one seeming to have been made only as Sheep for the others slaughtering This once almost stagger'd even David's Faith and put the Prophet Jeremy upon the arguing point with God. As for me saith David my feet were almost gone my steps had well nigh slipt for I was envious at the Foolish when I saw the Prosperity of the Wicked Ps 73.2 3. Righteous art thou O Lord saith Jeremy when I plead with thee yet let me talk with thee of thy judgements wherefore doth the way of the Wicked prosper wherefore are all they happy which deal very treacherously Jer. 12.1 As to this we are to Consider 1. That the Afflictions even of Good Men are oftentimes the fruits of their own doings There are many Promises for securing the good man's well-being even in this World which as they have their several Conditions so no question would be more illustriously accomplish'd here did they not themselves by their own follies make them void and of no effect Thus their Poverty is sometimes the chastisement of their Pride and Covetousness their Reproach and Contempt a just Recompence to their own peevishness severe and affected distances and the ill usage of other mens good Names Thus Prov. 11. ult Behold the Righteous shall be Recompenced in the Earth much more the Vngodly and the Sinner So that as to these present Fruits which they reap of their own Follies it is so far from bringing into Question the Care or Concern of Providence that it enforces the Argument and adds to the Demonstration it shews how careful and vigilant a Father they are Govern'd by that will by seasonable Chastisements reduce their Wandrings and by a timely Discipline prevent their undoing themselves By this shall the Iniquity of Jacob be purg'd and this is all the Fruit to take away sin Isa 27.9 Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth and scourgeth every Son whom he receiveth Heb. 12.6 The Church it self may at some times need this kind of handling as the Gold doth the Furnace a Wound its Corrosives or a Child the Rod And it is so far from giving us any reasonable ground to mistrust Providence while he permits his Church to fall under the severities of its Enemies that it argues his greater Care just as it doth the Wisdom and Concern of a Father when he makes his Child smart under the correction of a Fault However Secondly His Providence doth so effectually superintend the Affairs of the Church that it doth most assuredly over-rule in the Events of things that the Issue shall be good and this answers the whole Objection We know saith the Apostle that all things shall work together for the good of those that love God Rom. 8.28 This we may depend upon as an undoubted Truth that all Things without us Things which we have no Power over nor can any ways Order or Influence our selves these certainly how Dark and Unintelligible how Contrary and Discouraging soever they may seem at present to us yet such is the Care and Indulgence of Providence toward all His that they shall conspire together in the End for their real Good that is that it shall be really better for us that such or such were the circumstances of our Lives than if they had been otherwise or as we had propounded to our selves What if we our selves should Dye off in a State of Affliction and not out-live the Storm which it may please God to raise in our own Age yet may our particular severe Allotments have some considerable tendency to the well being of the General in the present or succeeding Generation We are not to limit the Issues of Providence to the bounds of our own time for that may be upon the Wheel now that may not be wrought off till some Ages hence and yet what is at this time befalling his Church may have its immediate conduciveness to that last upshot and all this because in the Management of that Infinite Providence to whom one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day 2 Pet. 3.8 What did all the Rage and Spight against the Primitive Church signifie tho' then but a little Flock but to add to its Numbers and encrease its Interest in the World the Innocent Lives and the Heroick Deaths of the first Professors won upon By-Standers and oftentimes provok'd them in a Rapture to leap out of Infidelity into a Blessed Martyrdom till at length the Roman Empire it self weari'd with its own insignificant Cruelties submitted to the Religion it had so long pursu'd with Rage and Barbarism What did all the Severities exercis'd in Queen Mary's days prove but that as the Banishment of some issu'd in the Promotion and Enlargement of the Reform'd Religion abroad so did the Exemplary Courage of others in the Flames here introduce the Universal Profession of it in this Kingdom which I trust in God will never be rooted out more Even particular Persons have so far out-liv'd their own Sorrows as to see and own that their Afflictions were the happy Ministries to their real well-being Thus David reflects It is good for me that I have been afflicted And it is not conceivable what an united Song to Providence the mighty Quire of Happy Souls will be composing in Heaven when they look back upon all the different passages of their Lives upon all the mis-judg'd Appearances of this World which they once Mourn'd and Repin'd under when they see plainly what a tendency every thing that befell them had to Qualifie them for that State It is an excellent Expression a Good and Learned Man hath nemo judicet de operibus dei ante quintum actum It is no good judging of the Plot till the Play be done It is the last Act that discovers all the Intricacies and brings all the odd and surprizing Passages to a pleasing and joyous conclusion And now I shall conclude with an useful Reflection or two upon the whole 1. That we would hence learn to make it some part of our Business in the World to be observing the Beauties of Providence It was for this end that God made the World and for this very end that he still interposes in the Affairs of it that he might gain from the Rational part of his Creation those just Revenues of Praise that are due to all the effects of his Wisdom Goodness Power Justice and Majesty which he so visibly Multiplies upon us every day It is an Excellent Reflection which the Moralist tho' an Heathen makes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. If we have our Wits and Reason about us what would become us more than to praise the Deity to speak well of him and to give him thanks Ought not saith he the Gardiner when Digging and the Husbandman when Plowing his Ground be still singing this Hymn 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. great is