Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	work_n	world_n	worthy_a	125	3	6.2266	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A67468	The life of John Donne, Dr. in divinity, and late dean of Saint Pauls Church London	Walton, Izaak, 1593-1683.	1658 (1658)	Wing W668; ESTC R17794	42,451	172

THE LIFE OF IOHN DONNE Dr. in DIVINTY AND Late DEAN of Saint PAULS Church LONDON The second impression corrected and enlarged Ecclus. 48.14 He did wonders in his life and at his death his works were marvelous LONDON Printed by I. G. for R. Marriot and are to be sold at his shop under S. Dunstans Church in Fleet-street 1658. TO MY Noble honoured Friend Sir ROBET HOLT of Aston in the County of Warwick Baronet SIR WHen this relation of the life of Doctor Donne was first made publick it had besides the approbation of our late learned eloquent King a conjunction with the Authors most excellent Sermons to support it and thus it lay some time fortified against prejudice and those passions that are by busie and malicious men too freely vented against the dead And yet now after almost twenty yeares when though the memory of Dr. Donne himself must not cannot die so long as men speak English yet when I thought Time had made this relation of him so like my self as to become useless to the world and content to be forgotten I find that a retreat into a desired privacy will not be afforded for the Printers will again expose it and me to publick exceptions and without those supports which we first had and needed and in an Age too in which Truth Innocence have not beene able to defend themselves from worse then severe censures This I foresaw and Nature teaching me selfe-preservation and my long experience of your abilities assuring me that in you it may be found to you Sir do I make mine addresses for an umbrage and protection and I make it with so much humble boldnesse as to say 't were degenerous in you not to afford it For Sir Dr. Donne was so much a part of your self as to be incorporated into your Family by so noble a friendship that I may say there was a marriage of souls betwixt him and your * reverend Grandfather who in his life was an Angel of our once glorious Church and now no common Star in heaven And Dr. Donne's love died not with him but was doubled upon his Heire your beloved Uncle the Bishop of * Chichester that lives in this froward generation to be an ornament to his Calling And this affection to him was by Dr. D. so testified in his life that he then trusted him with the very secrets of his soul at his death with what was dearest to him even his fame estate children And you have yet a further title to what was Dr. Donne's by that dear affection friendship that was betwixt him and your parents by which he entailed a love upon your self even in your infancy which was encreased by the early testimonies of your growing merits and by them continued till D. Donne put on immortality and so this mortall was turned into a love that cannot die And Sir 't was pity he was lost to you in your minority before you had attained a judgement to put a true value upon the living beauties and elegancies of his conversation and pitty too that so much of them as were capable of such an expression were not drawn by the pensil of a Tytian or a Tentoret by a pen equall and more lasting then their art for his life ought to be the example of more then that age in which he died And yet this copy though very much indeed too much short of the Originall will present you with some features not unlike your dead friend and with fewer blemishes and more ornaments than when 't was first made publique which creates a contentment to my selfe because it is the more worthy of him and because I may with more civility intitle you to it And in this designe of doing so I have not a thought of what is pretended in most Dedications a Commutation for Courtesies no indeed Sir I put no such value upon this trifle for your owning it will rather increase my Obligations But my desire is that into whose hands soever this shall fall it may to them be a testimony of my gratitude to your self and Family who descended to such a degree of humility as to admit me into their friendship in the dayes of my youth and notwithstanding my many infirmities have continued me in it till I am become gray-headed and as Time has added to my yeares have still increased and multiplied their favours This Sir is the intent of this Dedication and having made the declaration of it thus publick I shall conclude it with commending them and you to Gods deare love I remain Sir what your many merits have made me to be The humblest of your Servants Isaac VValton TO THE READER MY desire is to inform and assure you that shall become my Reader that in that part of this following discourse which is onely narration I either speak my own knowledge or from the testimony of such as dare do any thing rather that speak an untruth And for that part of it which is my own observation or opinion if I had a power I would not use it to force any mans assent but leave him a liberty to dis-believe what his own reason inclines him to Next I am to inform you that whereas Dr. Donne's life was formerly printed with his Sermons and then had the same Preface or Introduction to it I have not omitted it now because I have no such confidence in what I have done as to appear without an apology for my undertaking it I have said all when I have wished happinesse to my Reader I. VV. THE Life of Dr. DONNE Late DEANE of Saint PAULS Church Lond. IF the late deceased Provost of Eaton Colledge Sir Henry Wotton that great Master of Language and Art had lived to see the publication of these Sermons he had presented the world with the Authors life exactly written which was a work worthy his undertaking and he fit to undertake it Betwixt whom and the Author there was such a friendship contracted in their youth as nothing but death should force a separation And though their bodies were divided yet their affections were not for that Learned Knights love followed his friends fame beyond death and the forgetfull grave And this he testifyed by intreating me whom he acquainted with his intentions to inquire of some particulars that concerned it not doubting but my knowledge of the Author and love to his memory might make my diligence usefull I did prepare them in a readiness to be augmented and rectifyed by his powerfull pen but then death prevented his intentions When I heard that sad news heard also that these Sermons were to be printed want the Authors Life wch I thought worthy to be recorded indignation or grief truly I know not wch transported me so far that I reviewed my forsaken collections resolved the world should see the best narration of it that my artlesse pen guided by the hand of truth could present to it I shall

be demanded as once Pompeys poor bondman was he was then alone on the Sea-shore gathering the scattered pieces of an old broken Boat to burn the neglected body of his dead Master Who art thou that preparest the funerals of Pompey the Great Who I am that so officiously set the Authors Memory on fire I hope the question will have in it more of wonder then disdain wonder indeed the Reader may that I who professe my self artlesse should presume with my faint light to shew forth his Life whose very Name maketh it illustrious But be this to the disadvantage of the person represented certain I am 't is much to the advantage of the beholder who shall here see the Authors picture in a naturall dresse which ought to beget faith in what is spoken for he that wants skill to deceive may safely be trusted And if the Authors glorious spirit which now is in heaven can have the leisure to look down and see me the meanest of all his friends in the midst of this officious duty confident I am he wil not disdain this well-meant sacrifice to his memory for whilst his conversation made me many others happy below I know his humility and gentlenesse was eminent and I have heard Divines say That those vertues which were but sparks upon earth become great and glorious stars in heaven This being premised I proceed to tell the Reader the Author was born in London of good and vertuous parents and though his own learning and other multiplied merits may justly seem sufficient to dignifie both himself and his posterity yet the Reader may be pleased to know that his Father was masculinely and lineally descended from a very ancient Family in Wales where many of his name now live that deserve and have great reputation in that Countrey By his Mother he was descended of the Family of the famous and learned Sir Tho. Moor sometime L. Chancelour of Engl. as also from that worthy and laborious Iudge Rastall who left Posterity the vast Statutes of the Law of this Nation most exactly abridged He had his first breeding in his Fathers house where a private Tutor had the care of him untill the nineth year of his age and in his tenth year was sent to the University of Oxford having at that time a good command both of the French and Latine Tongue This and some other of his remarkable abilities made one give this censure of him That this age had brought forth another Picus Mirandula of whom Story sayes That he was rather born than made wise by study There he remained in Hart-Hall having for the advancement of his studies Tutors of severall Sciences to attend and instruct him till time made him capable and his learning expressed in publick exercises declared him worthy to receive his first degree in the Schooles which he forbore by advice from his friends who being for their Religion of the Romish perswasion were conscionably averse to some parts of the Oath that is alwaies tendered at those times and not to be refused by those that expect the titulary honour of their studies About the fourteenth year of his age he was transplanted from Oxford to Cambridge where that he might receive nourishment from both Soiles he staid till his seventeenth yeare all which time he was a most laborious Student often changing his studies but endeavouring to take no degree for the reasons formerly mentioned About the seventeenth yeare of his age he was removed to London and then admitted into Lincolns Inne with an intent to study the Law where he gave great testimonies of his Wit his Learning and of his Improvement in that profession which never served him for other use than an Ornament and Self-satisfaction His Father died before his admission into this Society and being a Merchant left him his portion in money it was 3000 l. His mother and those to whose care he was committed were watchfull to improve his knowledge and to that end appointted him Tutors in the Mathematicks and all the Liberall Sciences to attend him But with these Arts they were advised to instill particular principles of the Romish Church of which those Tutors profest though secretly themselves to be members They had almost obliged him to their faith having for their advantage besides many opportunities the example of his dear and pious Parents which was a most powerfull perswasion and did work much upon him as he professeth in his Pseudo-Martyr a book of which the Reader shall have some account in what followes He was now entred into the eighteenth year of his age and at that time had betrothed himself to no Religion that might give him any other denomination than a Christian And Reason and Piety had both perswaded him that there could be no such sin as Schisme if an adherence to some visible Church were not necessary He did therefore at his entrance into the nineteenth year of his age though his youth and strength then promised him a long life yet being unresolved in his Religion he thought it necessary to rectifie all scruples that concerned that and therefore waving the Law and betrothing himself to no Art or Profession that might justly denominate him he begun to survey the Body of Divinity as it is controverted betwixt the Reformed and the Roman Church And as Gods blessed Spirit did then awaken him to the search and in that industry did never forsake him they be his own words * so he calls the same holy Spirit to witnesse this protestation that in that disquisition and search he proceeded with humility and diffidence in himself and by that which he took to be the safest way namely his frequent prayers and an indifferent affection to both parties Being to undertake this search he believed the Cardinall Bellarmine to be the best defender of the Roman cause and therefore betook himself to the examination of his Reasons The Cause was weighty and wilfull delayes had been inexcusable both towards God and his own conscience he therefore proceeded in this search with all moderate haste and before the twentieth yeare of his age did shew the then Dean of Glocester whose name my memory hath now lost all the Cardinals works marked with many weighty observations under his own hand which works were bequeathed by him at his death as a Legacy to a most dear Friend The year following he resolved to travell and the Earl of Essex going first the Cales and after the Island voyages he took the advantage of these opportunities waited upon his Lordship and was an eye-witnesse of those happy and unhappy employments But he returned not back into England till he had staid some years first in Italy and then in Spain where he made many usefull observations of those Countreys their Laws and manner of Government and returned into England perfect in their Languages The time that he spent in Spain was at his first going into Italy designed for travelling the Holy Land and for