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	year_n	277	4	4.3748	3	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52343	Of adoration in spirit and truth written in IV. bookes by Iohn Eusebius Nieremberg native of Madrid. S.I. And translated into English by R. S S.I. In which is disclosed the pith & marrow of a spiritual life, of Christs imitation & mystical theology; extracted out of the HH. FF. & greatest masters of spirit Diadochus, Dorotheus, Clymachus, Rusbrochius Suso, Thaulerus, a Kempis, Gerson: & not a little both pious & effectual is superadded.; De adoratione in spiritu et veritate. English.	Nieremberg, Juan Eusebio, 1595-1658.; Strange, Richard, 1611-1682.	1673 (1673)	Wing N1150A; ESTC R224195	255,001	517

all the cagernes of our hart and spirit but prefer a momentary pleasure before the grand affaire of eternity What is it that we are so ambitious off unles we be very greedy of glory what hunt we so earnestly after one moment sufficeth for the purchase of eternity If the largest extent of the earth be but a point in respect of heaven which is limitable what will the narrow bounded life of man be in regard of an unlimited eternity and is it possible that time can be spard from the pursuit and attainment of glory if having exposd a full exchequer of gold God should say to some needy beggar thou art yet to live a thousand yeares and shalt have nothing to sustain thy want for so long a respit of time but what thou canst carry out of this treasury in the space of an hour would he thinkst thou play the trewant in that short interim or spend that remnant in play or sleep why do we not bestir our selves an eternity expects us nor can we lay up provision for it but in the short interstice of this life why do we interrupt so laudable a commerce and sit still with our hands in our pockets a thousand yeares carry les proportion to an eternity then a moment to a thousand yeares what then wil ten or twenty yeares the utmost tearm of thy life be in regard of an endles duration why ceasest thou from doing good life flyes from thee death runs towards thee eternity stands still and thou nevertheles art slow in coffering up eternal riches What a tedious journey under took the queen of Saba for no other end but to enjoy the sight of Salomon her intention aymed not at any long stay but to return presently to her country many come from remote lands to behold a man whom fame hath cryed up for some rare talents of wit or art with how much more reason ought we be content to employ before hand prolix endeavours to be able but once to contemplate God in the height of his majesty if permission were given to all of making our journey to heaven on foot and nothing else were prerequired but only a pilgrimage of a thousand yeares no body I believe would decline the enterprize Thy journey thither is much more compendious thou needst not lift thy foot over thy threshold nor out of thy bed and why dare we not aspire with all our might to compass a good which is so nigh us the sole lustre of gold or flashings of a gem are able to make men brook the roughnes and danger of the seas and the clarity of God strikes us no more then if we were insensible neyther do we prize an invaluable good at so much as the value of a little labour But what do I insist upon eternity although glory were not eternal but momentary yet it is a good so boundlesly great that an eternity of suffering should not be deemd too much to purchase it but for a moment we beholding God intuitively in that instant O how exquisite must that needs be which God hath provided for his friends if he prepared and gave himself to be crucifyed even for his very enemyes how exquisite must that needs be which cost God so dear for which he was at so great expense at no les then his life auctority passion and omnipotency If Gods manufactures as the heavens the motions of the stars the nature of beasts orderd onely for the use of man be to us such an object of admiration what will that be which he exhibits to the ostentation of his majesty if we admire the artifice of an eye though in a loathsome creature or carriage-beast what wil that be which eye hath not seen nor ear heard nor can enter into the hart of man if he hath made the fabrick of this world which is but the cottage of miserable Adam a bridewel of sinners acave of brute beasts of such an admirable structure that heathens at its contemplation were rapt into extasy what shal we think of his own royal Pallace as much as a nasty stable falls short of the court of some great Monarch which is adornd with guilded roofs paved with pretious stones hung with most rich tapistry yea as much as the magnificence of the heavens exceeds the horrour of a stinking prison so much far more must thou imagin the dwelling place of the blessed to surpass the beauty of this universe which respectively will be found but an object of loathsomenes All the comelines of this world falls so far short of the seat of the blessed that all this artifice which the Philosophers admired with so much astonishment is in respect of it but an eye sore and blemish of deformity If heaven and nature which God provided as it were by the by and with as much ease as one can speak be so ravishing what wil that be which he hath from all eternity on set purpose prepared for those that make him their love In the guifts of nature God carried himself master-like he made them all with a commanding word but in his glory he resembles an industrious servant passing to and fro seeking as it were to give content If the beauty of this visible world where he was not so sollicitous to please be so winning and enamouring how much more pleasing wil he be in that where he made it his task study to please The whole machin of the world was no more chargable to him then the expense of one voyce he made it with a word but glory made him as it were set his wits on work and as obsequious as a servant yea most patiently to brook disgraces torments and death it self If thou shouldst bestow a hundred yeares in speculating the greatnes of glory shouldst frame some high conceit of its worth thou mightst wel deem all to be nothing and thy conceptions to fall so far short of comprehending it that thou canst not so much as conjecture thy self to have come nigh it But in that imperfect idea which thou hast conceived rayse thy self to the gates of heaven beholding it open take as clear and exact a view of it as thou canst that being done cast thy eyes upon the earth and what is remarkable in its rarities compare then the goods of both together and see whether earthly things wil abide the test Wonder then at so many unfortunate endeavours of men in purchasing a little worldly pelf or rather nothing and their trewantly sluggishnes in seeking after the true good Contemplate thence from the top of the stars the frustrated labours of mortals and their certain hazards in obtaining an uncertain good and do thou hear thy soveraign inviting thee in such like words come enter into possession of my kingdom heavenly treasures This is a most certain guift seald with no les a promise then that of divine faith and recommended to us by the diligence and death of Christ heaven having so voted

were great for this respect that they were not the greatest nay although thou didst outrun a great many almost all if one alone outstripd thee the prize would be lost and all as good as nothing Now our merits are at a greater certainty and more fruitful now not the least of our works perisheth now all our services are recompensed according to the degree of their fervour Why then should we now be so pittifully sluggish with certain forfeyture of a secure reward what if thou wert ascertaind that none at all should be damned but all partake of salvation that ought not to give thee a pretence of being negligent but rather highten thy fervour towards a more ample enrichment of merits and increase of glory Go to the sufferings of this life are not condigne or commensurate to the future glory suffer not lazynes to reside in thee for it is the moth of merits and scab of vertues taking away all the grace of our actions rendring them so light of weight and distastful to God that his stomack wil not disgest them If thou yealdst thy self to slouth sadnes wil not a little annoy thee being forced to sustain the heat and burden of the day without any comfort the sting of conscience bereaving thee of that but promptitude and alacrity wil make thee insensible of the incumbrances of this life and is highly pleasing and acceptable to God What master of a family loves not to see his servants pleasantly merry and going cheerfully about their work If man love to behold a pleasant countenance so doth God a cheerful mind Let not the sad look of thy negligence contristate Almighty God neither do thou superadd to the bitternes of this life the wormwood of sluggishnes a sluggard partakes neither of the joyes of God nor of this world A tepid religious man in most things is in a worse condition then a wordling This though he share not of spiritual comfort yet he doth of temporal the tepid for the most part is deprived of both He that is habituated in sin is not without hope of being coverted and acquiring sanctity but he that growes tepid after his conversion hath forfeyted part of that confidence there being greater hopes of a sinner then of him Great sinners very often become great Saints but it is a piece of a miracle if he that is tepid become such a one Experience teacheth us that it is more difficil for the lukewarme to become fervorous then for a sinner to become a Saint for a tepid man is far from resenting his condition as evil because he deems himself secure and that a mediocrity in vertue sufficeth to salvation he doth acquiesce in this he must notwithstanding be wary and dread his security for the danger is very eminent But which is no mean subject of terrour God cals makes enquiry after sinners Christ takes his refection with them but as for the frigid they turn his stomack and he loathingly vomits them out of his mouth Shal I say somthing no les frightful the tepid obstruct the current of Gods mercy and suspend the influences of his profuse liberality while he is bountiful towards the greatest sinners but towards the negligent he is as it were sparingly parcimonious not communicating to them what he oftentimes more willingly confers upon the other I wil add something yet more formidable which ought to make each bone of our body shiver and quake God who is stil giving to all erecting every where trophees of his bounty with the tepid he is on the taking hand depriving them of those talents which he had mercifully lent them before What more noxious then to debar him as much as in us lyes from being beneficent what worse then not to suffer him to be good impeding the activity of his goodnes and munificence Is not he accursed who is the occasion of such a curse how deservedly then is he accursed who doth the work of God negligently Many things which are evil are at least serviceable in some respect but slouthfulnes is so naughtily naughty that it is in no sort conducible What can be imagined worse then heynous sins yet these many times through the wonderful wisdome and goodnes of God who knowes how to extract good out of evil conduce to our conversion and sanctification we seeking him after such foul lapses with greater fervour and humility Slouthfulnes obstructs all this it is so hurtfully evil that it shewes it self in part less good and proficuous then the very malice it self of greater sins Slouthfulnes is the worm of time it eats and spoiles the choisest things we have yea it is an enemy to eternity lessening life eternal by lessening our merits and it also wasts our temporal by its mortiferous idlenes If thou demand whose life is shorter I wil undoubtedly reply that of the negligent though he protract it to a hundred years if thou ask whose is longer I wil answere that of the diligent though he live but for a short space death and slouthfulnes is equivalently the same thing What marchant would sit idle at home if by one dayes paines he could compendiate the return of a thousand years do not thou set light by time one day of fervour is more available then a million of remisnes and tepidity A short life ful of a vigorous ardency is equivalent nay prevalent to a long one if it be cold and phlegmatique If thou covet to live long live diligently But how shameful is the shame of sluggish idlenes how ridiculously infamous would he be who being picked out from among all the peers of the realm to fight a duel in his kings behalf having before boasted much of his valour should now in the very lists of combat where his soveraign and all his court stand spectatours not have the courage to draw his sword nor move his arme to make a thrust but bend all his forces to flight leaving his adversary an unbloody victory O sluggard thou maintainst Gods quarrel many Angels beholding and enuying thy happines who would take it for a great honor to suffer and combat for the glory of God as thou mayst this favour is done thee to be his champion thou art become a theater or spectacle to God the B. Virgin his Saints and Angels thou hast often promised to behave thy self valiantly why art thou now being come to the push so dastardly cowardish o infamy of nature do not defame the grace of God nor frustrate those supplies which are kept for a reserve why art thou so hartles in this work consider how fervently God desires that thou performe it with fervour The III. Chapter How incommodious a thing is sleepines VVHAT more seemly to season the first thoughts of the day then the ancient of dayes my God that so our mind in its first undertakings may be consecrated to him The thought and love of God must not be intermitted and how much less denied at a seasonable time Pay the

upon thee by name when it stood ●ritten in the front of the book that he was to do the will of God he said o heavenly Father even for that contemptible Caytif Iohn will I also undergo a whipping a crowning a cross ignominy even death it self I give I offer I sacrifice my self wholly for his salvation And will it not be also thy duty to reflect upon Christ and say o my God this day for my Saviours sake wil I embrace all corporal labours and anguish of mind that I may love serve and glorify him with all the extent of my affection If God had created thee in the state of grace in an ample freedome of will and had by divine revelation indoctrinated thee in all the mysteries of our faith and thou didst see thy self dear to him and his B. Son become man and crucified with unspeakable love for thy sake were it not thy duty in these circumstances to give thy self wholly to God and power thy self forth upon him it is all one as if he had but just now created thee be o● good courage thou shalt awake in the state of grace behold thou findst thy redemption accomplishd to thy hand by the death and torments of thy God and this with so early a love that Christ sufferd for thee a thousand and so many yeares before thou wert born that he might have plenty of grace in store for thee Neyther Adam nor S. Michael nor Gabriel nor any other of the Angels no nor their queen her self the sacred Virgin found such preventing diligence such a feat of love to wit that God had already died for their releasment Be inflamed then forth with with a recipocal love and burning desires towards so magnificent a goodnes so speedily provident over thy affaires and do not contemn such an anticipation in what concerns thy eternal weal. Adam stood in expectation of this benefit the space of 4000. yeares but the benefit it self hath expected thee already above 1600 and it is neyther right nor reason that thou requite such sedulity and quicknes with so much sluggishnes and delay Procrastinate no longer thy conversion to God who hath so long expected thee in a great deal of patience Put case a proffer of coming to life were made to the soules which now are only in a possibility of existence and this upon the same conditions helps and favours which God hath daignd to bestow this day upon thee how would they joy how happy would they esteem themselves how officiously would they spend that day how would they in the very entrance of life sacrifice themselves to such a benefact or And what if he should make this proffer to those whom this very night he hath sentenced to hel fire while he so lovingly stood centry over thee in thy repose with what incredible fervour would they at their first return to life consecrate themselves to Almighty God as also the remnant of that day and their whol life if they did but once behold themselves adornd with divine grace with supernatural habits and such opportunities of serving so beneficial a God Be thou confounded for not sacrificing thy self more fervently to him who is much more munificent towards thee it is a greater matter to have preserved thee from damnation then to have reprieved thee being once condemned Spur up thy self to outstrip the fervor of many just soules and be thankful that thou findst not thy self this morning plungd in hell but freed from it as also from so many dangers and sins which innumerable others have this night incurd Do thou alone wish to give him if it were possible that glory which all the Saints will be still rendering through the great day of eternity which desire thou must unfaignedly iterate in the course of the whole day and that with sighs from thy very hart neither in the morning only but oftner as if then newly set on foot and created begin the journey of Gods service allwayes with a fresh and vigorous courage The V. Chapter That our daily fervour must be retained THOV providest but fondly for this dayes life neyther art thou secure of that if thou delayst it till to morrow If the use of this dayes life be granted thee live wel and perfectly for he only is said to live who lives wel Thou diest miserably being yet alive if thou leadest not a good life Each morning when thou awakest purpose to live that day as wel as possibly thou canst as if thou wert undoubtedly to dye the same night Delay not the amendment of any defect till another day which perchance thou wilt never see eyther the day or thy wil wil fayl thee The day to come wil go wel with thee if the present do One must never hazard a thing so good as is a good life but be alwaies in an active fruition of it Thou art industrious in avoiding any thing that may endanger life and why dost thou by delaying prepare and call danger to a good life Live to day and protract not to amend what is amiss after this week or month or the disposall of this affair To day God is our Lord and to day must thou be the servant of God for he is thy servant to day since he to day makes the sun rise to thy behoof He delaies not his guifts till to morrow neither must thou thy services To day God heaps benefits upon thee which thou canst not challenge be not thou wanting to services which he exacts The services of another day wil not suffice for the beneficence of their day why wilt thou have them satisfy for the day past and for the benefits of the present its own goodnes is not sufficient to pay its debt why wilt thou make it pay for the malice of another God especially redoubling thy debts and his graces to day God is God and to day thou art his creature to day Christ is thy redeemer and thou to day his redeemed IESVS is Christ yesterday to day thou hast a being to day and shalt perchance not have one to morrow To day and every moment art thou a debter to God who impends continually his omnipotency to thy behoof thou also must each moment impend all thy forces in his love and service How darest thou incur the loss of one hour since thou canst not make recompense for the least benefit which thou receivest this instant flowing from the ocean of Gods infinite love How darest thou suspend the quitting thy obligation for the interval of one day or hour for if God suspended his munificence but for a piece of an hour thou wouldst not be in the world or if he suspended his indulgence thou wouldst be in hell An eternal salary is promised thee thou must not merit by interrupted services If thou wilt truly live never intermit to live wel this is an eternal truth O Truth give me grace to serve thee truly henceforth for all eternity and that I may eternally