Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	dead_a	life_n	raise_v	9,308	5	6.9695	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A49388	Humane life: or, A second part of the enquiry after happiness. By the author of Practical Christianity; Enquiry after happiness. Part 2	Lucas, Richard, 1648-1715.	1690 (1690)	Wing L3398; ESTC R212935	101,152	265

God a common Reward of Christian Vertues for Christianity is said to have the Promises of this Life and that which is to come Wealth then may be received but it must not be designed as your first and chief End Thus Fame Honour and Power are great Blessings and Favours of Heaven but whoever immoderately thirsts after the one or the other is ambitious and vain glorious You may receive Temporal good things with Gratitude and enjoy them with Moderation but if you doat upon them you violate the Vow of your Baptism and virtually renounce your Faith for would not this be to forget that Heaven were your Kingdom and Country and Earth the place of your Exile or at best Pilgrimage This is a Lesson can never be too often inculcated not only on the account of that violent Opposition 't is almost every where encountred with but also the vast Importance 't is of to the quiet and contentment of a Trading Life this one thing is the Philosophy the Trader should be ever studying the Wisdom he should be daily pursuing that is a true and just Moderation of his Desires of Wealth Did Man know how to bound his Desires by the Necessities or Conveniences of Humane Life Could he regulate his Appetites by the modesty and moderation of Christianity not by custom and fancy I am confident this one thing alone would rescue him from the far greater part of Evils and Incumbrances which infest Humane Life Vanity and Ambition Envy and Emulation Wantonness and Fancy create most of these Difficulties and Necessities which stain the Beauty disturb the Peace and Order and destroy the Pleasure of Life When Mens Desires and Aims are too big for their Callings they are unavoidably plunged into Discontent and doubtful Projects and if they sink not finally into Ruin they cannot be held up but by such an anxious and restless Prosecution of the World as looks rather like Hurry or Distraction than Trade or Employment I can therefore never think a Trades-man happy till he has modesty enough to find content in the Revenue of a moderate and easie Trade till he understands what are the Bounds his Nature and his Station sets him and thô he know how to enjoy a great Fortune does never want one has Sense enough to use it and Vertue enough not to let his Happiness depend upon it Secondly A charitable Succour and Relief of others 'T is confessed by all that Men are born not for themselves only but for others too and God the Dispenser of Temporal Wealth commands such as are rich in this World to be rich in good Works too but it is always to be provided that Justice do first take place and then Charity This Direction therefore supposes the Traders Accompts to stand fair it supposes him to have discharged the Duties which he owes to his Relatives and Dependants or else to have none I will not insist on the Obligation or Pleasure of Charity I will not press you to it by the Interest of your present or future Happiness for the truth is to do right to the Trading World there is no rank or order of Men in the Kingdom that is more sensible of the Duty of Charity or more inclined and disposed to it none that give more eminent Proofs of it while living or leave more glorious Monuments of it behind them One thing only I will take upon me to recommend to you that is the Advice of Solomon Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do do it with thy might for there is no work nor device nor knowledge nor wisdom in the Grave whether thou goest that is what ever Good you design to do do it speedily and as much as in you lies be your own Executors How often are excellent Purposes strangled in the Birth by an unexpected Death How frequently are they perverted by the corruption and negligence of those to whose inspection they are committed Besides this way you shall reap the Fruit of your own Plantations you will enjoy the Pleasure and Satisfaction resulting from the Perfection Beauty and good Contrivance of the Foundations you have laid or you will be able to supply the Defects or correct the Errors of your Model and prevent those future Miscarriages which such Designs are liable to Thô all this be very much yet it is but the least part of what you will reap from being your selves the Executors of your own Bounty you will be sure that you dedicate it to Charity not to Vanity that you are building Almes-houses for the Living not Tombs and Pyramids for the Dead you will escape that common Cheat and Imposture the Rich put upon themselves while they entangled themselves in Covetousness all their Lives under pretence of designing mighty things after Death Thirdly The Trades-man ought to propose to himself a timely Retreat i. e. if the Necessities of this indigent State will give way to it which seems to me natural to finish Business e're we finish Life to lay down our Burden ere we tire and fall under the weight of it and quit troublesome Employments before our bungling discharge of them proclaim the decay of our parts and strength and the increase of our Avarice and Ambition Nay the very continuance of the same Cares for the World which looked before like Prudence will in old Age be reckoned Sin and Folly To Trade is but to make Provision for Life and therefore since common Sense will tell us that we must not be always providing for Life and never live 'T is plain Men ought if they may at length break off their Trade or at least so contract it that it may be rather Diversion than Travel as Solomon sends us to the Ants to learn Industry so might he learn Wisdom too the Enjoyment of their Treasure in the Winter being no less an Instance of the one than their Labour in laying it up in the Summer of the other Besides in ripe years the Advice of the Prophet seems to be addressed to every Man Set thy House in order for thou shalt surely dye and not live i. e. state your Accompts settle your Fortune compose the Differences of your Family and fix your Children so that you may be able to discern what course they will stear when you are gone and to correct any Error they are apt to fall into while you live which may otherwise when you are dead prove incorrigible and destructive If these Motives taken from Decency Prudence and Mortality seem too light there is another of more weight and moment behind that is the consideration of your Eternal Interest 'T is highly necessary to leave the World before you be torn from it and to acquaint your selves more familiarly with another World before you pass into it to make your aboad in it for ever Certainly it requires some time to prepare the Soul for Death and Judgment and that Man will be very unfit for either who is carried from the Counter to the

assaulted Secondly I will consider what ways the Date of Life may be lengthened Thirdly I will remove those Objections with which this Advice is encountered either from the promiscuous Events hapning alike to Good or Bad or from the early and immature Death of some righteous Persons To begin with the first of these First It has been too generally taught and believed That the Date of Humane Life cannot be protracted that every particular Man has a fixed and immutable Period decreed him beyond which he cannot go But this Opinion directly defeats the force of all Motives and Arguments to Vertue derived from Temporal Considerations and undermines our dependence upon God and redicules our Addresses to him as far as they concern this Life and the Things of it And how plain a step is this to the refutation and overthrow of Judaism which was built upon Temporal Promises and consequently to the overthrow of Christianity it self the Authority of the New Testament depending in so great a measure upon that of the Old I 'le leave every one to guess And were there no other Reasons to reject this Opinion besides these alone these I should think were abundantly sufficient since it is impossible that any thing should be consonant to Truth which is so repugnant to the Interest and Authority of Religion but there are so many more that I must be forced to croud them together that I may avoid tediousness and redundancy This Perswasion then is repugnant to all the Instincts of our Nature to what purpose is the Love of Life implanted in us by our great Creator why is Self-preservation the first Dictate and Law of Nature if all our Care and Diligence can contribute nothing towards it Vain and impertinent is that Law whose observation can procure us no Good nor its Violation any Evil. This is a Perswasion that flatly contradicts the Experience and Observation of Mankind in general how can the Period of Life be fixed and unalterable which we see every day either lengthened out by Care and Moderation or shortened by Excess and Negligence unless we can resolve to the utter overthrow of Religion not only that Life and Death but also that Vice and Vertue Wisdom and Folly which lead to the one and the other are alike predetermined necessary and fatal Nor is this Opinion less contrary to the Sense and Reason of the Wise and Prudent than to the Experience of the Multitude Self preservation is the first and chief End of Civil Societies and Humane Law but how foppish and ridiculous a thing were it for the Grave and Sagacious part of Mankind to enter into deep Consultation to frame solemn Laws and devise the strongest Obligations to fence and secure that Life which can neither be invaded one minute before its fatal hour nor prolonged one minute beyond it nor has Man only but God himself endeavoured to secure this Temporal Life by the strictest and most solemn Laws nor this only but he has made Life and Death the Reward of Obedience and Punishment of Sin This Opinion therefore is a manifest Calumny against the Wisdom and Sincerity of God against his Wisdom if he raise up the Pallizado's and Bulwarks of Laws to guard and defend that Life which can neither be violated before nor extended beyond its minute His Sincerity for his Promises would be ludicrous and insignificant and so would his Threats too if neither the Obedience of the Vertuous could lengthen nor the disobedience of the Sinner could shorten Life and in a word to what purpose does the Spirit in 1 Pet. 3.10 11. invite and encourage Men to Religion by the Proposal of Life and Prosperity if in the bottom and truth Life and Prosperity depend not on our Behaviour but our Fate and be not dispensed according to the open Proposals but the secret and unconditional the rigid and inflexible Decrees of the Almighty I would not stop here but heap together a multitude of other Arguments against this Error did I not remark that as it has prevailed too much to be despised so has it too little to be laboriously refuted and that it has so weak a Foundation that few of those that defend it do believe it or at leastwise so heartily as to suffer it to have any Influence upon their Counsels or Actions Turks Astrologers and the most superstitious Assertors of Fate being no more free from the Fears of Death or a Concern for Life than the rest of Mortals The truth of this Proposition being thus made out by unanswerable Reasons we are not to suffer our selves to be moved by any superstitious Imaginations by any obscure or subtle Objections or by any meer Colours or Appearances of Reason for what is once clear and evident ought to remain firm and unshaken thô we cannot unravel every Objection against it therefore thô I should not be able to reconcile this Doctrine with some obscure Texts of Scripture with a certainty of God's Prescience and with some particular Predictions of Men who have pretended to read the fatal Periods of Humane Life in the Schemes of Heaven yet ought its Authority to be preserved as built upon plain Texts and solid Reasons and attested by the Suffrages of the Prudent and Wise and by the daily Observation of the Multitude But the truth is there is nothing objected here but what is capable of a very easie answer the Scriptures which speak an appointed time for Man upon Earth are not to be understood of any particular personal Fate but of a general Law or Rule of Nature not of the extent of every particular persons Life but of the duration of Man in general or of the Mortality of our Frame and Constitution and the shortness of Man's residence here upon Earth and imply no more than that Man as well as all other Species of Animals and indeed of Vegetables for so far Job extends the Comparison hath his time appointed the Bounds of his Life or Abode here set him beyond which he cannot pass Psalm 90.10 The days of our Age are threescore years and ten and thô Men be so strong that they come to fourscore years yet is their strength then but labour and sorrow so soon passeth it away and we are gone As to Astrological Predictions if the Accomplishment of any of them be attested by unquestionable Authority and they be not like the Prophesies of Poets made of mended after the Event yet methinks were not the Minds of Men very prone to Superstition a thousand Errors should be sufficient to discredit and disparage one good Guess and no Man of Sense should have a value for a pretended Science whose Grounds and Principles are evidently uncertain and precarious no Man of any Religion should be fond of that which to say no worse of it seems to stand condemned by God in Scripture for thô I must not dissemble this Truth that the Idolatry which was ever blended with it seems especially to have drawn down