Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A Word B Word C Word D Occurrence Frequency Band MI MI Band Prominent
duty_n child_n honour_v parent_n 3,428 5 9.3487 5 true
View all documents for the selected quad

Text snippets containing the quad

ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A38573 Witt against wisdom, or, A panegyrick upon folly penn'd in Latin by Desiderius Erasmus ; render'd into English.; Moriae encomium. English Erasmus, Desiderius, d. 1536.; Kennett, White, 1660-1728. 1683 (1683) Wing E3215; ESTC R15011 99,706 204

There is 1 snippet containing the selected quad. | View lemmatised text

and fetter'd by the gross particles of Matter so that she can neither freely range after nor when haply overtook can quietly contemplate her proper Object of Truth Farther Plato defines Philosophy to be the meditation of Death because the one performs the same office with the other namely withdraws the mind from all visible and corporeal objects therefore while the Soul does patiently actuate the several organs and members of the Body so long is a man accounted of a good and sound disposition but when the Soul weary of her confinement struggles to break Jail and flie beyond her cage of flesh and bloud then a man is censured at least for being maggoty and crack-braind nay if there be any defect in the external organs it is then termed down-right madness And yet many times persons thus affected shall have Prophetick Extasies of foretelling things to come shall in a Rapture talk languages they never before learned and seem in all things actuated by somewhat Divine and Extraordinary And all This no doubt is only the effect of the Soul's being more released from its engagement to the Body whereby it can with less impediment exert the energy of Life and Motion From hence no question has sprung an observation of like nature confirmed now into a settled Opinion That some long experienced Souls in the world before their dislodging arrive to the height of Prophetick spirits If this disorder arise from an intemperance in Religion and too high a strain of Devotion though it be of a somewhat differing sort yet it is so near a kin to the former that a great part of mankind apprehend it as a meer Madness especially when persons of that superstitious humour are so pragmatical and singular as to separate and live apart as it were from all the world beside So as they seem to have experienc'd what Plato dreams to have happened between some who inclosed in a dark cave did only ruminate on the Ideas and Abstracted speculations of Entities and one other of their company who had got abroad into the open light and at his return tells them what a blind mistake they had lain under that he had seen the substance of what their dotage of imagination reach'd only in shadow that therefore he could not but pity and condole their deluding dreams while they on the other side no less bewail his phrensie and turn him out of their society for a Lunatick and Madman Thus the vulgar are wholly taken up with those objects that are most familiar to their senses beyond which they are apt to think All is but Fairy-land while those that are devoutly Religious scorn to set their thoughts or affections on any things below but mount their soul to the pursuit of incorporeal and invisible Beings The former in their marshalling the requisites of Happiness place Riches in the front the endowments of the Body in the next rank and leave the accomplishments of the Soul to bring up the rear nay some will scarce believe there is any such thing at all as the Soul because they cannot literally see a reason of their faith while the other pay their first-fruits of service to that most simple and imcomprehensible Being God employ themselves next in providing for the happiness of that which comes nearest to their immortal Soul being not at all mindful of their corrupt bodily carcasses and slighting money as the dirt and rubbage of the world Or if at any time some urging occasions require them to become intangled in secular affairs they do it with regret and a kind of ill will observing what St. Paul advises his Corinthians Having wives and yet being as though they had none Buying and yet remaining as though they possessed not There are between these two sorts of persons many differences in several other respects As first though all the Senses have the same mutual relation to the Body yet some are more gross than others as those five corporeal ones of Touching Hearing Smelling Seeing Tasting whereas some again are more refined and less adulterated with Matter such are the Memory the Understanding and the Will Now the Mind will be alway most ready and expedite at that to which it is naturally most inclined Hence is it that a pious soul imploying all its power and abilities in the pressing after such things as are farthest removed from Sense is perfectly stupid and brutish in the management of any worldly affairs while on the other side the vulgar are so intent upon their business and imployment that they have not time to bestow one poor thought upon a future Eternity From such ardour of Divine meditation was it that St. Bernard in his study drank Oyl instead of Wine and yet his thoughts were so taken up that he never observ'd the Mistake Farther among the Passions of the Soul some have a greater communication with the Body than others as Lust the desire of meat and sleep Anger Pride and Envy with these the Pious man is in continual war and irreconcileable enmity while the Vulgar cherish and soment them as the best comforts of Life There are other affections of a middle nature common and innate to every man such are Love to ones Country Duty to Parents Love to Children Kindness to Friends and such like to these the Vulgar pay some respect but the Religious endeavour to supplant and eradicate from their Soul except they can raise and sublimate them to the most refined pitch of Virtue so as to love or honour their Parents not barely under that character for what did they do more than generate a Body nay even for that we are primarily beholden to God the first Parent of all Mankind but as Good men only upon whom is imprinted the lively image of that Divine nature which they esteem as the chief and only Good beyond whom nothing deserves to be beloved nothing desired By the same Rule they measure all the other offices or Duties of Life in each of which whatever is earthly and corporeal shall if not wholly rejected yet at least be put behind what Faith makes the substance of things not seen Thus in the Sacraments and all other Acts of Religion they make a difference between the outward appearance or body of them and the more inward Soul or Spirit As to instance in Fasting they think it very ineffectual to abstain from flesh or debar themselves of a meals meat which yet is all the vulgar understand by this duty unless they likewise restrain their passions subdue their anger and mortifie their pride that the Soul being thus disingaged from the intanglement of the body may have a better rellish to Spiritual Objects and take an Antepast of Heaven Thus say they in the holy Eucharist though the outward Form and Ceremonies are not wholly to be despised yet are these prejudicial at least unprofitable if as bare Signs only they are not accompanied with the thing signified which is the body and bloud of Christ whose