Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	life_n	live_v	think_v	8,106	5	4.3475	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A59557	A sermon preached at the second general meeting of the gentlemen and others in and near London who were born within the County of York in the Church of St. Mary-le-Bow, February 17, 1679/80 / by John Sharpe ...	Sharp, John, 1645-1714.	1680 (1680)	Wing S2985; ESTC R18978	18,137	40

and all the Pomps of it which they so magnifie in this kind of life alas it is rather an effect of pusillanimity and love of our ease and a desire to be free from cares and burdens than of any true nobleness of mind If we would live to excellent purpose indeed if we would shew true bravery of spirit and true piety towards God let us live as our blessed Lord and his Apostles did Let us not fly Temptations but overcome them let us not sit at home amusing our selves with our pleasing contemplations when we may be useful and beneficial abroad Let us so order our devotions towards God that they may be a means of promoting our worldly business and affairs and doing good among men Let us take our fit times of retirement and abstraction that we may the more freely converse with God and pour out our souls before him but let this be only to the end that we may appear abroad again more brisk and lively in vanquishing the Temptations that come in our way and more prompt and readily disposed to every good work This is to imitate our Lord Jesus to walk as we have him for an example This is a life most sutable to the contrivance and the genius of his Religion which is more accommodated to Cities and publick Societies than to Cloysters and Deserts And lastly this is to walk in a conformity to his command who hath bid us make our light so to shine before men that they may see our good works and glorifie our Father which is in Heaven But Fourthly and lastly If it be a thing so necessary that every man should do good in his life as hath been represented then how much to be Reproved are they that do no good till their death That live scrapingly and uncharitably and uselesly to the world all their lives long and then when they come to dye think to Atone for their sins and neglects of this kind by shewing some extraordinary Bounty to the poor or devoting some part of their estates to publick or pious uses I must confess this kind of proceeding doth to me seem just like the business of putting off a mans repentance to his death-bed It is absolutely necessary that a man should repent though it be never so late and so it is that he should do good if he have done little good in his life he is bound as he loves his soul to shew some extraordinary uncommon instances of Charity and a Publick spirit when he comes to die But then it is here as it is with the long delaying of Repentance the deferring it so long has robbed the man of the greatest part of the praise and the comfort he might have expected from it His Rewards in heaven will be much less though his good deeds should be accepted but he is infinitely uncertain whether they will or no. It must be a very great act of Generosity and Charity that can obtain a pardon for a whole life of uncharitableness Let us all therefore labour and study to do good in our lives let us be daily giving evidences to the world of our kind and charitable disposition and let not that be the first which is discovered in our last Will and testament If God hath blessed us with worldly goods let us distribute them as we see occasion in our life time when every one may see we do it voluntarily and not stay till we must be forced to part with them whether we will or no for that will blast the credit of our good deeds both with God and man I have said enough concerning the first point recommended in the Text viz. doing Good I now come briefly to Treat of the other that is Rejoycing which is equally a part of the business of this day There is no good saith Solomon in any earthly thing or there is nothing better for any man than to rejoyce and to do good The Rejoycing here recommended is capable of two sences the first more general and more concerning us as Christians the other more particular and which more immediately concerns us as we are here met upon this occasion In the first place by Rejoycing we may take to be meant a constant habit of joy and chearfulness so that we are always contented and well pleased always free from those anxieties and disquiets and uncomfortable reflections that make the lives of mankind miserable This now is the Perfection of Rejoycing and it is the utmost degree of Happiness that we are here capable of It must be granted indeed that not many do arrive to this state but yet I doubt not but that it is a state that may be attained at least in a great measure in this world Otherwise the Holy men in Scripture and particularly the Apostles of our Lord would never have recommended it to us so often as they have done Rejoyce ever more saith S. Paul to the Thessalonians and to the Philippians Rejoyce in the Lord always and again I say rejoyce The way to attain to this happy condition doth consist chiefly in these three things First a great innocence and virtue a behaving our selves so in the world that our Consciences shall not reproach us This St. Paul lays as the Foundation of Rejoycing This saith he is our rejoycing the Testimony of our Conscience that in simplicity and godly sincerity I have had my conversation in this world It is in vain to think of any true solid Joy or Peace or Contentment without a hearty practice of all the duties of our Religion so that we can satisfie our selves of our own sincerity before God And then secondly to make us capable of this constant Rejoycing besides the innocence of our lives there must go a firm and hearty perswasion of Gods particular Providence a belief that he not only dispenseth all events that come to pass in the world even the most inconsiderable but that the measure of the Dispensations of his Providence is infinite Wisdom and Goodness and nothing else so that nothing doth or ever can happen to us in particular or to the world in general but what is for the best Now when we firmly believe this and frequently attend to it how can we be either solicitous for the future or discontented at the present events of things let them fall out never so cross to our desires and expectations This is the best Antidote in the world and an effectual one it is against all trouble and vexation and uneasiness that can happen to us upon any occasion whatsoever to wit the consideration that all things are managed by an infinitely Wise and good God and will at last prove for the best how unaccountable soever they appear to us at present And this is that which the wise man insinuates in the verse before the Text when he saith that God hath made every thing beautiful in his season Thirdly Another requisite both for the procuring and preserving this continual

accounts so it is a singular Advantage to a man for the carrying on his secular designs Nay to do good is to Embalm a mans name and to transmit it with a grateful Odour to posterity The memory of a good man shall be blessed And the sence of mankind has always been that too much honour could not be given to the name of those that have done good in their generation But which is a great deal more than all this to do good is the most certain effectual means to procure the blessing of God upon our endeavours and to entitle our selves to his more especial care and providence and Protection So that let what will come in all circumstances and conditions the good man has the greatest assurance that all things shall at least be tolerably well with him and that he shall never be miserable Trust in the Lord saith David and be doing good so shalt thou dwell in the Land and verily thou shalt be fed Nay further to do good is to entail a blessing upon our Children after us I have been young and now am old saith the same Psalmist yet saw I never the Righteous that is the merciful and good man for that is the Notion of the word in that place and in most others such an one saw I never forsaken nor his seed begging their bread Lastly to conclude this point To do good besides all these advantages that attend it is most to consult our own peace and to make the best provision possible for our pleasure and delight Charity as Dr. Hammond used to say is really a piece of Sensuality And Epicurus himself the great Master of Voluptuousness would confess that it was not only more Brave but more Pleasant to do kindnesses than to receive them And certainly every good man will find it so for as the exercise of Charity and Beneficence is as truly a gratification of our Natural Inclinations and Appetites as any other action or thing that causeth pleasure to us So is it also a gratification of those Appetites which are the highest and the noblest we have Now by how much the appetite that is gratifi'd is more noble and divine by so much must the delight that ariseth from that gratification be more exquisite So that it was no very great Hyperbole of our Divine Poet when he said that All joys go less Than that one joy of doing kindnesses And which is further to be considered it is not with this pleasure as it is with most others that vanish with the enjoyment nay often leave bitterness and melancholy upon the mind after they are gone off For to do good is a permanent pleasure a pleasure that will last as long as our lives The memory of our good actions will always be accompanied with Delight and Satisfaction when all our other pass'd Enjoyments prove matters of anguish and torment to us upon our reflections on them these will be a refreshment and the nearer we approach to death still the more comfort we shall find in them Would we therefore treasure up to our selves a stock of lasting peace and joy to support us in all conditions of our life and so make our passage easie at our death let us do all the good we can I think I have said enough to convince any one of the truth of Solomons Proposition that there is nothing better for a man nothing that more concerns him either in point of duty or happiness than to do good in his life Much more might be said and what hath been said might have been said with more advantage and greater evidence if it had been fit to insist upon every particular but I will pursue this argument no further but proceed to the second general point I propos'd which is to set before you the practicableness of this great duty by shewing the several wayes which every person though in the meanest Circumstances is capable of doing good A great many there are that are as strongly convinced as may be that 't is both their Interest and duty to be doing good in their lives but they complain that it is not in their power they have not any Means or Opportunities for it and they bemoan themselves sadly upon this account as thinking their lives useless because they have not those visible Capacities of being serviceable to the world that others have To such as these let me say this in the general There is no condition in the world so mean and despicable but yields us Opportunities of doing good There is neither Old nor Young Man nor Woman Rich nor Poor High nor Low Learned nor Unlearned but in their Sphere by a good husbandry of those Talents that God has intrusted to their care and management they may be very useful to others and prove instruments of much good to their generations This truth St. Paul most elegantly sets forth in 1 Cor. 12. where he compares the Society of Christians to a Natural body There he shews that as in the Natural body there are many members and all those members have not the same dignity and honour nor the same use or office and yet every member even the meanest hath its particular use by which it doth real service to the body nay so useful it is that the body cannot be without it so it is with the Church of Christ and with every body politick There is a necessity both in the Church and in the State that there should be variety of functions and callings and degrees and conditions There must be some to govern and some to be governed there must be some more conspicuous some more obscure some whose gifts and endowments lay this way and some whose Talents lay in another way and yet there is not one of these but in his degree and station either is or may be as useful as any that belong to the Society So that the eye cannot say to the hand as our Apostle there expresseth it I have no need of thee Nor again the head to the feet I have no need of you nay more those members of the body as he continues that seem to be most feeble are yet very necessary To reduce the Apostles notion to its particulars or to shew in how many respects every individual person that is a Member of a Society is necessary to the publick and either doth or may serve the Weal of it and so do good in his life is a task too great for me to undertake at this time let it suffice at the present to propose to you these general heads First of all none can want opportunities of doing good that is in a capacity of performing any acts of mercy or charity strictly so called whether that charity be shew'd to the bodies or souls of men Now the instances and expressions of this way of doing good are infinite as infinite as are the wants and necessities of mankind To the bodies of men we do good when ever