Selected quad for the lemma: earth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
earth_n	let_v	people_n	praise_v	12,053	5	10.9906	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A50176	The wonderful works of God commemorated praises bespoke for the God of heaven in a thanksgiving sermon delivered on Decemb. 19, 1689 : containing reflections upon the excellent things done by the great God ... : to which is added A sermon preached unto a convention of the Massachuset-colony in New-England ... / by Cotton Mather.	Mather, Cotton, 1663-1728.; Mather, Cotton, 1663-1728. A sermon preached to the honourable convention of the governour, council, and representatives of the Massachuset-colony in New-England on May 23, 1689.	1690 (1690)	Wing M1171; ESTC W24924	55,477	128

they live in Heaven upon Earth But as for Dayes of Thanksgiving observed in the Assemblies of good men all men have seen the wonderful successes of them New Englands Prosperity has more visibly followed upon its Thanksgivings than upon its Humiliations as in times both of War and of Sickness has been more than once perceived We have seen the fulfilment of that Word in 2 Chron. 20.22 When they began to sing and to praise the Lord set ambushments against their Enemies Praises thousands of high praises be to our God that we may have a Day to celebrate His praises But that our praises may be awakened and that no man may make a Iar in our Harmony Consider how Reasonable these praises are for us all O consider with our selves Who is God it is He that Humbles Himself to behold the things that are in Heaven Consider Who is Man a poor Worm yea a cursed Viper Now that this GOD should look upon this man Lord What is man that thou shouldest be mindful of him Yet the Eternal God has been doing of Excellent things which we not only behold but also enjoy There is not one of us all who has not excellent things to be this Day praising the Almighty for They whose case is never so bad yet have cause to carry on this Day of Thanksgiving with us in that it is no worse The most miserable person in all this Congregation may with an eye to his own condition say like him in Psal. 119.156 Many are thy mercies O Lord. If I could find out the most unhappy and the most complaining person among you all even to that person would I say God has done Excellent things for thee and some that never sinned so much yet suffer more than you Consider Likewise how profitable these Praises will be to us all Behold an Expedient for the obtaining of all the Blessings that can be wish'd for It was said in Psal. 67.5 6. Let the people praise thee then our God shall bless us If the Earth send Vapours up to Heaven Heaven will make Showers to descend on the Earth Let our praises be continually ascending from us and they will soon issue in those things that are called The Showers of Blessing When we have a Jealousie of a Leaky Vessel we try it by first putting of Water before we trust Better Liquors in it if we that have little more than Water to comfort us will yet not permit it to Leak without Praises from us then God has more Excellent Things to do for us To be always Begging and Craving as a Dog for his Morsels ad Spem futuri semper hians without multiplyed praises unto God this is a most vile Disingenuity 'T is no less than a Loss of yea no less than a Curse on all our Blessings which we incurr by not praising the giver of them But the praising Soul may fill himself with such a Ioyful Hope as that in Psal. 71.14 I will Hope continually and will yet praise thee more and more Those that are sollicitous least God should Loose any of His Praises are the persons for whom God will be concerned that they don't Loose any of His Blessings these are they that shall experimentally understand the Loving kindness of the Lord. Man wouldest thou have any Excellent Things done for thy self Then bring thy praises for what Excellent Things have been done in the world I suppose by this time we have generally got our Hallelujahs ready but you call for a Catalogue of those Excellent Things which they are to be fixed on 'T is a Feast that you are this Day to be treated at and before you go out of these Doors a Feast you shall have I shall set before you a short Account of some Excellent Things which I intend as a Feast for your praises and believe me though your praises had and O that they may have no less than an Eternity to be Feeding on those matters in they never would be glutted never cloyed First The Excellent Things done by God in the Works of CREATION call for our Praises It was once the out-cry of the Psalmist in a Rapture Praise the Lord from the Heavens praise the Lord from the Earth praise the Lord all ye His Armies Truly 'T is our Business to praise Him for the Heavens and for the Earth and for all those Armies which He has replenished the World withal We have a good pattern for us in Psal 104.24 33. says the Psalmist O Lord how manifold are thy Works in wisdom hast thou made them all Well and what is now incumbent upon us that have the view thereof It follows I will sing praise unto my God while I have any Being Methinks the Children of Men too much imitate the Spider when they Look after nothing but building a little House for themselves and concern themselves with nothing but the petty Affairs thereof We should remember that we are Citizens of the WORLD and as far as we can we should visit every Corner of it with our Praises to Him of whom and for whom is all I make no question but that we do in a blessed manner Antedate Heaven by doing so The Praises of God are Exhibited in every part of the World and we forfeit the priviledge of Reason if we do not put as many of them as we can into our A●knowledgments There are above six Thousand Plants growing on that little Spot of the World which we Tread upon and yet a Learned Man has more than once found One Vegetable enough to make a Subject for a Treatise on it What might then be said upon the Hundred and fifty Quadrupeds the Hundred and fifty Volatils the five and Twenty Reptiles besides the vast multitudes of Aquatils added unto the rich variety of Gems and Minerals in our World Our own Bodies are to use the Phrase of the Psalmist So Fearfully and Wonderfully made that one of the Ancient Heathen at the sight thereof could not forbear breaking forth into an Hymn unto the praise of the great Creator 'T is impossible that any thing should be better shaped Indeed All the Things that we have every Day before our eyes have a most charming prospect in them and the very Deformities which the Flood has brought upon this Terraquecus Globe are made Beauties by the Disposals of the Lord that sat upon the Flood There is not a Fly but what may confute an Atheist And the Little things which our Naked Eyes cannot penetrate into have in them a Greatness not to be seen without Astonishment By the Assistence of Microscopes have I seen Animals of which many Hundreds would not AEqual a Grain of Sand. How Exquisite How stupendous must the Structure of them be The Wholes that are sometimes found more than an Hundred Foot in Length methinks those moving Islands are not such Wonders as these minute Fishes are But alas All this Globe is but as a Pins point if compared with the mighty Universe

The Hebrew Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is indeed a Substantive and it intimates that the Works of God are even Excellency in the Abstract and Majesty it self And the Chaldee Paraphrase here fitly puts upon them the term of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Magnalia noting in them something eminent and powerful Such things are done by Him who is Wonderful in Working Secondly The Duties of men are then specified hereupon Since excellent Things are done by God there are two things to be done by us First We are to sing the Praises of God It is ●here said Sing unto the Lord. And such is the expression in the Holy style as to signifie not only an exactness but also an instrument used in the Song We are with a Sacred Musick to magnifie the God who is worthy to be Praised Secondly We are to spread the Praises of God It is here said This is known in all the Earth but the version which is by some chosen for it rather is Let this be known in all the Earth We should not only our selves do it but likewise provoke and excite all the Earth to take notice of what Wonders have been done by Him who is fearful in Praises Wherefore the Truth to be now entertained with us is That it should be our study to SING and SPREAD the Praises due to the Eternal God for the EXCELLENT Things which are done by Him in the World It is by the Propounding of two or three Conclusions that this Doctrine will have its due Advantages PROPOSITION I. There are multitudes of Praises due to the God of Heaven from us To praise God is to Acknowledge the persections that are in Him 't is to Acknowledge the infinite Power Wisdom Goodness Justice and Holiness which are His Attributes and this we are to do In all our ways We have received our Being for this End and our Grand our Chief Errand into the World is That our God may have a Number of Rational Beholders to be sensible of His Excellencies When Mankind came first out of His Glorious Hand He then said as in Isa. 43.21 This people have I formed for my self they shall shew forth my praise In our Lower Little World no Creatures can be found capable of Conceiving and Expressing those Acknowledgments of God which are The Glory due unto his Name besides MAN who is therefore not unfitly called The High-priest of the Creation The devout Psalmist once called upon all Creatures with a Repeated Invitation Praise ye the Lord but they all reply that Man is to do it for them and they all therefore conspire to offer the Notices of the Almighty God unto Mans affectionate Contemplation To praise God is to Acknowledge in Him something Excellent as 't is said in Psal. 148.13 Let them praise the name of the Lord for His Name alone is Excellent thus when we Acknowledge an Excellency in all those Manifestations which God maketh of Himself then 't is that we praise Him Now the Praises owing to the God of Heaven from us are obliged not only by what He Is but also by what He Does indeed by what He Does it is that we come to Learn what He is We ought to Acknowledge an Excellency in the Nature of God which is to Ascribe Glory to Him The Language of our praises is to be that in Psal. 89.6 Who can be compared who can be Likened unto the Lord God should be truly Transcendent with us We should apprehend that as the Name of our God is I AM so all other Beings are as meer Non-Entities in comparison of Him subscribing to that in Isa. 40.17 All are before Him as Nothing We should apprehend the Being of God so Independent so Unchangeable so Mysterious as no other Being is and with Dazzled Souls fall into such praises as to say I cannot find out the Almighty to perfection The perfections that are in the Almighty God should even Astonish our Understandings and fetch the Exclamations of Moses from us in Exod. 15.11 Who is like unto thee O Lord who is like unto thee One while our praises are like Hannahs to say There is none Holy as the Lord Another while our praises are like Ethans to say Who is a Strong God like unto thee Sometimes our Praises like Pauls are to say God is only Wise and sometimes again God is True but every man a Lyar and then with David we are to praise and say O how great is thy Goodness But the Excellency which is in the Works of God is that which renders the Glory of His Essence most apparent unto us and the praises which we are to bring unto Him are in a great measure to spring from thence We are told in Isa. 28.29 The Lord of Hosts is Excellent in Working Our praises of God are in This to find the Reasons of them He has done Excellent Things First We ought with many praises to observe the Excellent Things which God has done for our selves As the Psalmist call'd upon himself in Psal. 103.1 Bless the Lord O my soul and forget not all his Benefits thus ought we to Reflect upon the many Benefits and Kindnesses of the most High towards our selves with praises too many to be Numbred too Hearty to be ended We ought to see something of God in all our Circumstances and upon all that happens to us we are to say The Lord be magnify'd But there are some Excellent Things done for us by our God Things which no Friend no Hand none else could have done for our Good and These Things we should with suitable praises be particularly grateful for It is the manner of the Iems to receive the Comforts of their Lives with a Baruk Adonai or Blessed be the Lord. We that are Christians may not suffer our selves to be exceeded by any people in Thankfulness unto God It is related concerning our Lo●d Jesus Christ in John 6.11 that he would not Eat a Meals Meat without a Thanksgiving over it Much more ought the more Excellent Things that are done for us to be so Acknowledged When God had heard a Prayer there was that praise returned for it in John 11.41 Father I thank thee for it We ought seriously to think What Answers of our Prayers what Reliefs of our Wants and Woes the great God has in an excellent manner favoured us withal and the Result of all should be Lord I thank thee for these Excellent Things A good Hezekiah himself may smart by failing here Those persons are worse than Pharisees in whose mouths God be Thanked is not a frequent but yet solemn interject on Secondly We ought with many praises to observe the Excellent Things which God has done for Others as well as for our selves Our praises must not be confined unto those mercies of God which we our selves have been the Subjects of But all His Dispensations abroad in the world are to be the Occasion of our Hallelujahs to Him A Soul that is Fill'd with