Selected quad for the lemma: friend_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
friend_n	affection_n	good_a	great_a	824	5	2.2463	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A36873	The love of God, or, Love divine being the subject of these ensuing meditations / collected out of Mr. Gorings English translation ; originally penned by Peter Du Moulin ... ; digested into divine poems by William Wood ...	Wood, William.; Du Moulin, Pierre, 1568-1658.	1656 (1656)	Wing D2588; ESTC R37780	15,390	32

catch a fall As in a crosse-way man is set to stand Sometimes the spirit then flesh gets upper hand Between the love of God and worldly love Some strange suggestions do him try and prove How oft i● it after Gods love prevailed By fresh assaults the faithfull ●●e assailed And the fresh forces the Spirit do withstand Against Gods fear and love themselves do band The faithfull being by these appetites Beset with lusts and such like lewd delights Shall feel this love of God within his heart Thus speaking Man whence is it thou doest start O wretched man whether now wilt thou go Doth not God see 't thy inclination know Despisest thou his menace and his frown Rejectest thou his promises to own Forgettest thou thy honoured high vocation Dares thou provoke Gods Spirit to indignation Why shouldst thou on his Church a scandall bring Since Christ thereof is Soveraign Lord and King Where are the promises which thou hast made him For guifts receiv'd as yet thou hast not paid him Is this the way to Heaven thou dost devise And being fall'n art thou assured to rise And for short pleasures which have lost their tast Thy peace of Conscience must it be displac'd For pottage wilt thou of thy right bereave Thy self and vainly so thy birth-right leave At these suggestions will the faithfull stay Crosse his desires and let them bear no sway But all 's not done our frailtie's yet not quelled Nor froward flesh which hath so long rebelled For after these our holy resolutions We have great dulnesse causing diminutions And then the Divell doth espy occasion Makes a fresh onset by a re-invasion If we be idle use bad company Neglecting pray'r or duties else of piety Then our desires do rouze themselves again The Flesh and Spirit for mastery strive amain Which makes the faithfull in this restlesse strife Desire his death and 's weary of his life O wretched nature it selfs enemy Destroyes it self pursuing misery O thou corruption that takes root so deep O mutinous sedition that doth keep In us hostility and doth not slack But us as slaves to Egypt would bring back Which like Lots wife lookes back with her desire On sinfull Sodom flaming all with fire If we have thoughts that fixed are on death Our flesh will whisper we may yet long breath If we shall hear or read Gods sacred Word Threatning our ruine by his glittering sword It soothes us up and doth us so perswade VVe are secure to others it is said If we Heav'ns glory shall recount consider It will suggest we shall come early thither If thou incited be to help the poor I● doth suggest it will impair thy store If thy friends frailty thou wouldst reprehen● 'T will over-aw thee lest thou him offend Each good affection hath ev'n as it were Like to a Pot on either side an ear By which the world and flesh take hold upon Striving to lett the execution Rebekah's steps we next must imitate VVho great with Childe her God did supplicate VVho instantly resolved her request Two striving Twinns they did her Womb molest A lively figure not so old as true Of man it represents the old and new The old man's carnall by corrupted nature The other new is the regenerate Creature As in a conflict both do daily strive And are at odds so long as wee 're alive Unto Rebekah's suit God did decree The old unto they young should subject be The flesh unto the spirit must be subjected And by that means shall be of God accepted The fift degree is that wherewith we shall love God in the life to come NOw here remains the last and chief degree This highest step is Heav'ns felicity VVhich is the love wherewith at last we shall Love God in 's glory that 's Coelestiall For we love things by nature here below According as by science we them know VVe therefore shall God love much better then VVith love of Saints and not as mortall men Now as th'Apostle saith we know in part But then revealed open and apart As in a Glasse we see but here obscurely But then perspicuously as Christall purely VVhen he in glory shall consummate grace Then shall we see as it were face to face Our love which here dstractedly doth stand And sees far● off shall then see near at hand Our love on God shall onely fixed be Being the obiect of felicity As when two swelling Rivers proud and high Encountring each other furiously They joyn in force and by their strong invasion Do make a marvellous flood and inundation So that the love of God and self affection Are like two Streams on earth have no connexion Which no where else hencforth shall have their meeting 'Till they in Heav'n each other give the greeting When these affections twain shall be commixt And in one love are fast and firmly fixt For then in loving God our selves may love Because that league God doubtlesse will approve And dwell in us where he delights to dwell Resembling him whose north no tongue can tell For Saints and Angels they undoubtedly Do love themselves with ardent fervency Let us forbear to love untill that time Our selves or ought in us doth not incline Our hearts and make them hopefull of this love Which is eterniz'd in the Heav'ns above But now for that this love wherewith we shall Love God in Heav'n is supernaturall Springs from the view and lovely contemplation Of his own face beyond all admiration Love is not kindled else but by the sight Let 's learn what sight this is brings this delight Our bodies eyes two wayes discern and see Or apprehending what the image be For so the bodies to our view exposed They are apparent visibly disclosed Or by in letting to our nat'rall sight The thing we see which truely is the light So do we see the day no otherwise Then that it daily enters in our eyes Now God that is the chief supremest light In 's glory will shew souls that hee 's most bright For in his Saints he keeps his habitation And 's in them all in all without cessation But in this life we in his works behold His wondrous workmanship so manifold In which he made an abselute impression As 't were his vertues Picture past expression Therefore as now we see the nat'rall light Then shall we see our God with such a sight But now we see it not but with these eyes The bodies windowes and no otherwise For then the light of God through all our parts We shall receive which holifies our hearts Ev'n as a man were only eye throughout As he should see at once things round about This sight of God it will assuredly Transform us like himself in puritie For as a mirrour by the Suns reflection Shines like the same in clearnesse sans defection For God receiveth none to contemplate His face save those are in Celestiall estate He doth transform them that the semblant prove Like to himself irradiate in love As God himself is perfect love and charity It man behoves to imitate his paritie Upon this view and heavenly radiation Should be inflam'd with loves association And burn with heat of this hot spirit'all fire Whose ardency the Saints in light acquire A fire which to the Seraphims gives name So call'd because their ardour aye inflame The summe of all is their officious love Their fervent zeal their service to improve Here these degrees and steps of love must end For higher Heav'n-ward we cannot ascend Of Jacobs ladder this step is the last By which we mount where speechlesse joyes are plac't FINIS