Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	wonderful_a	world_n	year_n	124	3	4.9070	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A62129	A gentleman's religion in three parts : the 1st contains the principles of natural religion, the 2d. and 3d. the doctrins of Christianity both as to faith and practice : with an appendix wherein it is proved that nothing contrary to our reason can possibly be the object of our belief, but that it is no just exception against some of the doctrins of Christianity that they are above our reason.	Synge, Edward, 1659-1741.	1698 (1698)	Wing S6380; ESTC R24078	100,488	452

exception who are in their Wits have naturally a most earnest desire to preserve their Lives as long as they can and to keep themselves free from Pain and Trouble I think I may reasonably conclude that there must have been some extraordinary strong and even irresistable Motive which could prevail upon such Multitudes of People to forsake theirs and their Ancestors old Religion and to embrace Christianity which then had but newly appeared in the World and which in those Days did seldom fail to involve its Proselytes in most grievous Troubles and Persecutions XVII That this Motive could not be the Hopes of any Profit or Advantage in this Life is most evident Because Christianity was in those Days most commonly persecuted even unto death It must therefore of necessity be the hopes of some Benefit or Happiness which should accrue to them after this Life was at an end And this Benefit or Happiness could not seem small and inconsiderable to them nor could the Hope which they conceived of it be weak or doubtful For there is scarce any Man or ever was in the World who would run himself into certain Misery and Persecution even to the losing of his Life only upon a weak and doubtful Hope of some small and inconsiderable Benefit or Happiness to be enjoyed in a Life to come I conclude therefore That the Primitive Christians were undoubtingly possessed with a strong Belief and most firm Persuasion That whosoever should truly embrace profess and live according to the Christian Religion in this Life was certainly to be made Partaker of some great and inestimable Happiness in the Life to come XVIII That this Belief and Persuasion did not proceed from any Frenzy or Madness which sometimes possesses Man with very strong Imaginations is very evident both because there was such a Multitude of them who exactly agreed in the same Sentiments and also because it appears both from the Writings and Actions of the Primitive Christians that they were Men of Reason and Sobriety and some of them Persons of great Learning As evident also it is that it could not proceed from the Force of any Argument drawn from the Principles of bare Natural Reason without Revelation For What Man in his Wits without pretending some Revelation from Heaven could ever be persuaded that the Embracing of the Religion taught by such a particular Person more than another would make him happy in the Life to come I conclude therefore That the Disciples of Jesus who preached Christianity abroad in the World did convince and satisfie their Proselytes that it was revealed by God from Heaven that whosoever would believe on Jesus and receive and live according to his Religion should be made very happy in the next Life XIX The main Argument which the first Preachers of Christianity made use of to convince the World that this was a Divine Revelation was this viz. Because that Jesus in his Life time did perform such and so many Miracles and wonderful Works as sufficiently shewed that he had his Commission and Power from God and because his Disciples whom he had appointed to teach his Religion to the World for many Years after his Death did likewise continue to work many Miracles in the Name of Jesus Which shewed that God was with them in what they did and taught The things by them alledged to have been performed by Jesus were such as these That he healed all manner of Diseases and Distempers with a Touch or barely with a Word speaking That he gave Sight to the Blind Hearing to the Deaf Speech to the Dumb and Strengh and Agility to the Lame and Maimed That he raised several Persons from the Dead and that he himself arose from the Dead after he had been Crucified and a Spear thrust into his Vitals and had lay'n dead in a Sepulchre unto the Third Day And lastly That after his Resurrection having several times appeared to his Disciples and conversed with them for the space of Forty Days he was at last openly and in their sight taken up alive into Heaven The things alledged to have been done by his Disciples were The Healing the Sick the Lame the Maimed c. and in a particular manner their Speaking all Languages although they never had learned them That all these things were pretended by the first Preachers of Christianity is confessed on all Hands And undoubtedly they must needs at least pretend something that was very extraordinary or else they never could have converted such vast Multitudes under so many Disadvantages as they and their Religion laboured That these things were not only pretended but really and actually performed is to my Opinion uncontrollably evinced from the Testimony of the Disciples themselves Who declared these things for Truth unto the World Who could not themselves be deceived in those Matters of Fact of which they pretended to have been Eye-Witnesses Who never would go about to impose a Lye upon the World by which they could propose to themselves no manner of Advantage in this Life nor if it were a Lye in the Life to come Who never would have exposed themselves to Poverty to Racks to Gibbets to Fire and Faggot in a Word to all sorts of Torments and Deaths only for the sake of a fruitless and unprofitable Fable Who being Men of unblameable Lives for their Morality had doubtless more Honesty and Integrity than to affirm those things for certain Truths which they must needs know to be meer Inventions Who were too many in Number and too void of Craft and Guile to combine together in framing a false Story and none of them ever to betray or discover the Cheat Who could never hope to impose the Belief of such a Story upon a curious and inquisitive Age such as that was wherein they lived if it had been false and therefore would certainly never have attempted it if they had not known it to have been true And Lastly who instead of convincing such Multitudes as they did must needs have been palpably discovered and exposed to the World for a Company of lewd Cheats and Impostors in pretending that such and such things were done in the Land of Judea and Jerusalem and done openly too in the Face of the World when it was so easie a matter to go or send to the place to make Enquiry and so to find out the Cheat if a Cheat it had been But that these same Miracles and wonderful Works did far surpass both the Course of Nature and the Power of Art is very evident That they were not perform'd by the Assistance of any wicked Spirit does sufficiently appear because the very Intent and Design of them was to propagate a Doctrine in the World which by all must be allowed to teach the purest and most strict Morality to which it cannot be imagined that any Impure and Evil Spirit would contribute any help It remains therefore that these things must needs have been performed either by the immediate

a Token of his Work stamped and engraved this his Mark and Character upon them X. There is no Man of common Sense who builds a convenient and goodly Structure but he takes care likewise to keep it in good Order and Repair after it is built And there is no Fabrick but in Tract of Time will visibly decay if constant care be not taken of it Since thefore God has erected and framed this goodly Structure of the World and since in so long a time there is no Manner of decay to be found in it as is abundantly proved by Hackwell in his Apology on this Subject I conclude That God not only made this World by his Power but also governs it by his Providence And for the only Objection which seems to be of any Force against God's Providence namely that wicked Men do often thrive and prosper whilst good and Vertuous Men are oppressed with Misery it is most easily and naturally solved by supposing what shall anon be proved That there are abundant Rewards for good Men and sufficient punishments for the wicked to be distributed in a Life which is to come which will bring all things to be equal at the last XI Every Parent who begets and brings up a Child every Master who feeds and pays a Servant every Prince who governs and protects his Subjects and every Benefactor who does any act of Kindness for another may very reasonably and do always expect a Return of Love Obedience and Gratitude in due Proportion to the Benefits received from them Since then God is more than a Parent to us for he made us and our Parents too since he is so kind a Master who gives us our Food and all the Conveniences of Life since he governs and protects us by his over-ruling Providence more effectually than any earthly Prince does his Subjects And lastly since he is our greatest and supreme Benefactor who has given us all the good which we possess and enjoy I cannot but conclude that he expects a return of Love Obedience and Gratitude from us I will not say proportionable to the Benefits received from him for that perhaps may exceed our Ability but proportionable unto our Ability or Capacity XII That God is wise and powerful I gather from his Work which I contemplate in the Visible World And from thence I conclude That he will sufficiently punish those Persons who despise him so far as not to love thank and obey him according as he expects and requires from them That he is also good and gracious I gather from those good things which he has bestowed upon us relating both to our Bodies and Minds And from thence I conclude That he will abundantly reward all those persons who take care to pay him that Love Gratitude and Obedience which he expects XIII That these Rewards and Punishments are not finally distributed in this Life is very evident Because we often see Men that are notoriously wicked enjoy all the pleasures and others that are conspicuously vertuous undergo almost all the Calamities of this World even unto their very Graves I conclude therefore That there is another Life after this in which these Rewards and Punishments shall be duly distributed XIV When a Man is once convinced that there is a God to whom there is a Service due and that there are Rewards and Punishments to be dispensed to all Men according as they have performed or neglecting that Service the grand Enquiry that every Man is concerned to make is What he must do to avoid these Punishments and to be made Partaker of these Rewards And here I think I may most easily and naturally make these following Conclusions viz. 1. He who does what God requires from him shall not be punished but rewarded 2. God requires from every Man that he should use his honest Endeavour by all means to know and understand his Will as perfectly as he can For this is but Reason for every Master to expect from his Servant much more for such a Master as God 3. If a Man does his heartiest and best Endeavour first to know and then to perform the Will of God God will require no more from him For to me it seems utterly inconsistent with the Wisdom of God to expect and with his Goodness to require any more from a Man than what he is able to perform i. e. any more than his best and most hearty Endeavours XV. There are in the general but two ways of finding out knowing the Will of God The one is by the use of our natural Reason and Understanding the other is by attending to that Revelation which God has made of his Will to the World Here then I conclude I must make it my Business sirst to enquire into the Truth and Reality of this Revelation and then to make use of that and my Reason together in order to find out what is God's Will XVI That there was such a Person as Jesus of Nazareth in Galilee in the time of Tiberius Caesar the Roman Empetor That he had a Company of poor Men for his Disciples That He and his Disciples went about the Country of Judea Teaching and Preaching That he was put to death upon the Cross after the Roman manner under Pontius Pilate the Roman Governor of Judea That after his Death his Disciples went about into all or most Parts of the then known World Teaching and Preaching that this Jesus was the Christ the Son of God and Saviour of the World and that he was risen from the Dead and gone into Heaven That in a few Years they converted a very great Number of People in all places to this Belief That the Professors of this Belief were called Christians That they were most cruelly persecuted and many Thousands of them put to death and that with most exquisite Torments for no other Reason but because they were Christians That these Persecutions were several times renewed againg them for the space of about Three Hundred Years And yet for all this that the Number of Christians daily increased and that not only Ideots and Unlearned Men but great Scholars and Philosophers were converted to Christianity even in the Times of Persecution All this being merely Matter of Fact was never yet denied by the greatest Enemies of Christian Religion And indeed these things are so abundantly testified by the Histories and other Writings of those Times and have been so generally receiv'd for Truth as well by the Opposers as Believers of Christianity by a constant universal and uninterrupted Tradition from those Days even unto this Time that a Man may as well deny the Truth of any or of all the Histories of the World as of this Now since all Men generally have a strong Inclination to retain and stick to that Religion whatever it be in which both they and their Fathers have been brought up and no less an Aversion to all causeless Innovations in Matters of Religion Moreover since all Men without