Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	sin_n	sting_n	victory_n	14,564	5	9.4854	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A55553	A sermon at the funeral of the reverend Mr. Thomas Grey, late Vicar of Dedham in Essex preach'd in the parish-church of Dedham, Febr. the 2d. 1691/2, with a short account of his life / by Joseph Powell ...	Powell, Joseph, d. 1698.	1692 (1692)	Wing P3064; ESTC R3154	24,894	36

what we are designed in another World Hence Christ's Kingdom is said not to be of this World hence we are directed to look upon our selves as Pilgrims and Strangers on this Earth John 13.36 Heb. 11.13 1 Pet. 2.11 Heb. 13.14 Phil. 3.20 that we are put in Mind that we have here no continuing City and are exhorted to be in the continual search after one that is to come that we are counselled to Set our Affections on things above and not on things on the earth to have our Conversation in another World That is to behave our selves as those who expect a Portion and an Interest there and if we consider a great number of the Gospel Precepts and weigh those high degrees of Vertue they oblige us to and to deny our selves in a great many Instances which are very hard and difficult and yet not altogether necessary for this World yea sometimes to hate and despise this World and to chuse the greatest Evils of Life together with those Duties of over-looking our own Advantage for the greater Benefit of others of doing Good for Evil of wasting our Spirits and laying out the Strength and Vigour of our Days in doing good to Mankind we cannot but conclude that these Rules have a respect to some future World and that they are designed to raise us up to such a Temper of Mind as may prepare us for something God has intended us for when there shall be an end of this Life of Man upon Earth Neither can we possibly have any doubt of this who believe the Christian Revelation the Promises whereof have so direct a reference to a Future State of things This Faith was the great support to the Primitive Christians under those hard Circumstances they were in Their Thoughts were six'd upon such Promises as these Revel 3.5.21 21.7 22.5 Him that overcometh will I cloath in white rayment and I will not blot out his name out of the Book of Life and I will confess him before my Father and he shall sit down with me in my Throne even as I have overcome and am set down with my Father in his Throne and he shall inherit all things and he shall reign with me for ever and ever Hence it was that they were such great Instances of Vertue such Bright and Shining Lights to the World such Glorious Examples of a mighty Zeal for God of an ardent Piety and Devotion of the most heroick Goodness the most enlarged Charity an exemplary Patience and a very intire Resignation of themselves to the Will of God Hence it was that they so readily parted with their Lives and so willingly chose to die to the amazement of the Heathen World who observed of them that it was the belief of a Life after this that was the Cause of all this Courage and Resolution who therefore would not sometimes suffer them to be buried but burnt their Bodies and dispersed their Ashes foolishly thinking that this would abate their Hope of a Resurrection Now if this be the great thing that the Christian Institution teaches us That this World is not our home but that we live here expectants of one to come What great reason have we to be fond of this Life Or who can blame any Man for desiring and courting Death upon these Principles What is related of Trismegistus when he died whether ever said by him or no does very well become a dying Christian expressing his future Hopes and Expectations I have hitherto lived an Exile from my Country but now I am going safely thither I am returning to that Blessed City whither we cannot pass without taking Death in our way 2. The having the Sting of Death pulled out for us Death must be allowed to be very terrible to a wicked Man for when he dieth His hope perisheth Prov. 11.7 his expectation is utterly cut off There 's an end of all that in which he has placed his Confidence the Man who has Calculated all his Projects and designs meerly for this World must needs be strangely surprized when the Message is brought him that God requires his Soul and that he must give up his Account and his Stewardship for so the Scripture calls this Life is at an end But the loss of his present Enjoyments is not all he goes out of this World in a State of Guilt and is haled to the Divine Tribunal and there Sentenced to a Punishment we know little more of than this That it is certainly a very Terrible one and probably greater than we can at present conceive it to be 'T is far otherwise with the Good Man he parts with nothing that is overvaluable to him having never engaged his Affections to what he always knew was to be left in a few days and he goes out of the World with his Sins Pardoned and delivered from the Threatnings annext to the Law and this is that pulling out the Sting of Death which we owe to the Merits and Satisfaction of our Blessed Saviour in Consideration of which a Christian may look on Death as a hurtless thing whose wounding Power is taken away as St. Paul tells us in that Triumphal Song 1 Cor. 15.55 O Death where is thy Sting O Grave where is thy Victory The Sting of Death is Sin and the Strength of Sin is the Law but thanks be to God who giveth us the Victory through our Lord Jesus Christ 3. The Thoughts of being absolutely and perfectly freed from Sin All the Evils and Miseries of this Life put together are not half so much a Burden to a Pious Christian as the sharp Contest that is kept up within him betwixt the Flesh and the Spirit The struggle betwixt the Principles of Grace and those of a Corrupt Nature and the Advantage which the Devil and Temptations and his own Evil Inclinations not perfectly subdued often get of him through the Remainders of Sin in him These are Matters of his daily Sorrow and Repentance and Humiliation and he often Trembles for those Sins he has fallen into though long since and which yet he hopes he has truly Repented of and to his very last Breath continues to work out his Salvation with fear And though he uses all Diligence Heb 6.11 according to the Apostle's Advice to reach to the full assurance of hope unto the end yet he confiders that this is a Modest and Humble sort of Assurance which the Apostle speaks of and so very well consistent with some Fear Now Death is desirable by a sincere Christian on this Account that it sets him above all his Troubles and his Fears It puts him into a State where the Devil shall have no further Advantage against him where this struggling betwixt Grace and Nature shall perfectly cease where he shall no more dishonour God nor blemish his own Nature nor have so much as the Sins of Infirmity to lament and bewail but shall live in a perfect freedom from those Moral Evils which created so

lively and full of vigour but may not our Constitution soon be broken and we cast upon a Bed of Sickness grapling with Pains or crying out under extream Torture We enjoy Liberty and have a quiet Possession of the Blessings of Life but is it impossible that ever we should fall under the Yoke of some of the mighty Nimrods of the World the Hunters of Mankind Job 7.15 When as Job expresses it we should choose strangling rather than Life i. e. If we were at our own dispose the worst of Deaths would be far more desirable than such a Life When Xerxes viewing his numerous Army bemoan'd it that within a little more than half an Age there would not be a Man of them left alive one of his Captains reply'd Sir Let not this trouble you for they are like to endure so great fatigue and so many hardships that the greater number will in all probability wish themselves dead a long time before they shall be so happy as to die And thus the Roman Orator comparing the Great Pompey's Sickness at Naples where he had like to have died with his last End concludes That it had been much better for this Great Man to have died when he had the Command of the Arms of Rome and was the darling of the World for this had prevented the Bloody War with Caesar the loss of his Army his flying with Disgrace his being slain by one of his own Servants the presenting his Head to his Father-in-Law his Children turning Fugitive and the Consiscation of his Estate but he had dyed in Honour and never known any of these Evils neither himself nor his Family And upon this account was that wise saying of Solon to Croesus who had cause enough afterward to remember and acknowledge the Truth of it That he must first see him die before he judged of his Happiness it being a Point of the Grecian Wisdom to account no Man happy before his Death 3. A view of Death with respect to the Good and Evil of this Life 'T is true Death deprives us of all those which are properly called the Goods of Life But as these are not over Considerable so it is our present want of them that renders them of any Consideration at all If we did not need them their absence would be no injury to us in this Life the true Notion of Riches being a sufficiency to answer our Conveniencies beyond which all is but meer imagination and attended with the increase of trouble Since therefore Death puts us in Circumstances that we cannot want them and perfectly takes away their use what trouble can it be that it removes us from them To look upon it as a very uncomfortable thing to be cast into Circumstances where we cannot use these Goods is to be so drowned in sensuality that we are thereby become fit for nothing beyond this World and hardly fit for this But then Death takes us also from the Evils of Life which are more in Number than the Goods and much over-balance them in respect at least to the generality of Mankind A bare enumeration of the Evils of Life does sufficiently in Tully's Opinion commend Death which puts an end to them He tells us of one who writing a Book in the praise of Death did therein only describe the Calamities of humane Life On this Account Death has been sometimes interpreted as a Reward for Eminent Piety The very Heathens seemed to have looked upon it under this Notion Thus when those who built the Magnificent Temple of Apollo prayed that what was best for Man might befal them the third day after they were found dead which was reckoned upon as a Reward of their Piety Agreeably to this Isaiah 57.1 the Prophet Isaiah speaking of the Death of Good Josias says He was taken away from the Evil to come 4. The Universal Law upon humane Nature that all who are born must die It has ever been accounted a great part of Wisdom to bring our Minds quietly to comport with what is not in our Power to avoid By this Consideration we bear up under all the disasters of Life this brings us into Temper when we have royl'd our selves never so much upon the death of our nearest Relations or dearest Friends And the same Thought ought in common Discretion to bring us at least patiently to submit to our own Deaths whenever they come This is the great Argument that runs through all the Books of the Moralists A Pilate says Plutarch cannot in a Storm command the Billows or calm the Winds or by Hectoring cause the Storm to cease he at last therefore commits himself to its Fury pulls down all his Sails by the Board and expects the sinking of the Leaky Vessel and thus must we when Life grows painful and uneasie and Death approaches wait our Dissolution according to the Common Law of Nature since that which is unavoidable ought to disturb us as little as is possible This is the Principal Argument of all Seneca's Books of the Brevity of Life and the Tranquillity of the Mind and his Discourses of Providence That it is a very unbecoming thing to struggle with the Laws of Fate and not to be carried willingly whither we must go whether we will or no. But far greater reason have we for this who are taught what a Vertue it is and how capable of Reward chearfully to submit to the Wisdom of God in disposing of our Lives and these are such Arguments as are proper to induce a Wise Man not to be over fond of Life and to know when he has enough of it and at least quietly and calmly to entertain the Message of Death when it is sent to him But then a Pious Christian has Arguments beyond all these to do not only thus much but a great deal more to be perfectly above any fondness for Life and to rejoice at the Thoughts of his Dissolution and with submission to the Will and Providence of God heartily to desire his Dismission and they are these following I. A General Consideration of the Religion we Profess which has chiefly a respect to a future World II. Our Knowledge that the Sting of Death is pulled out III. The Thoughts of being absolutely and perfectly freed from Sin IV. The enlargement of our Faculties and Perfection of our Vertue V. The immediate Possession of Happiness at Death VI. The Completion of this in Body and Soul at the General Judgment 1. A General Consideration of the Religion we Profess which has chiefly a respect to a future World The Christian Religion Promises us very little or nothing that respects meerly this present Life In this it differs from God's Ancient Covenant with the Jews that it secures us of nothing of this World absolutely but requires us to refer all things to God's Wisdom and Providence to appoint them to us as they shall best tend to the making us wise and good and to the sitting of us for