Selected quad for the lemma: friend_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
friend_n	caesar_n	great_a	pompey_n	781	5	11.2029	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A34575	The great necessity of preparation for death and judgment a sermon preached in the parochial chappel of Macclesfield, in the county palatine of Chester, at the funeral of Mr. John Corker, als Cor Cor, of Hurdesfield, on the eleventh day of November, 1693, and since revised and enlarg'd at the request of the relations of the deceased / by Samuel Corker, als Cor Cor ...	Corker, Samuel, 1645 or 6-1713.	1695 (1695)	Wing C6307; ESTC R9062	80,354	95

then our ways and goings are to Gods pure and piercing eyes who beholds our closest artifices and subtilest disguises as clearly as he sees our open and scandalous offences For the darkness hideth not from him Ps 139.12 the night shineth as the day the darkness and the light are both alike to him Job 34.21 22 His eyes are upon the ways of man fixedly and intentively and he seeth critically and curiously all his goings there is no darkness nor shadow of death where the workers of Iniquity may hide themselves Seneca told Lucilius Epist 41. Jer. 17.10 Ps 7.9.94.12 God is near unto us he is with us an observer of our good and evil actions the searcher of our hearts who knows the secret motions counsels and affections of our Souls and keeps acquaintance with our thoughts and is familiar with all our purposes and designs Now if we do believe this great truth it must doubtless be of unspeakable use to us for the regular and orderly government of our lives and make us as circumspect and cautious of our thoughts words and works as if we visibly saw him standing before our eyes writing down every action of our life in order to call us to account for it This consideration had so great an influence upon holy Davids practice that he assigns it as the motive of his obedience I have remembred thy name and have kept thy Law Psal 119.55 168. c. I have kept thy Precepts and thy Testimonies for all my ways are before thee this is a powerful Amulet against sin and a great preservative of vertue a means to make us sincerely upright in all our ways and to tremble to commit any sin or wickedness in the sight of our all-seeing Judge before whose presence we shall not be afraid to appear hereafter if we set him before our Eyes here as an observer and witness of our actions Psal 16.8 for thereby our hearts will be over-awed with a sense of his omnipresence so that we shall walk very cautiously and circumspectly before him having respect to all his Commandments and with a concern to please him in all things by this means death and judgment will not be formidable to us 8 That we may be ready for a comfortable passage into the eternal World it is necessary that we possess our Souls with frequent Thoughts of Death and Mortallity This is the earnest and pathetical charge of the merciful and compassionate God who is very heartily concerned for the everlasting happiness of Men by his eminent Servant Moses whom he was pleased to make choice of to be the Commander and Governour of a numerous People he bespeaks them in a most affectionate and obliging manner to remember the days of old what great things he had done for them in chosing them for his People and delivering them from the hand of Pharaoh King of Egypt by a mighty hand and an out stretched arm in preserving them at the Red Sea and in the Wilderness in subduing the Nations about them and in giving them possession of the Land of Promise flowing with Milk and Hony he intreats them to consider the transitoriness of their condition and to withdraw their affections from Farthly Glories O that they were wise to consider their latter end Deut. 32.29 to study and apply their minds to that holy wisdom which would fit them for Life eternal We are now Gods peculiar People he is as solicitous for our happiness and salvation as once he was for the Israelites and with the same tender affection doth he importune us to consider our end and to what Eternity we are going whether to bliss or misery we are but Sojourners and Pilgrims here having Heb. 13 14. no continuing City no certain abiding place our condition here is fleeting and vanishing Jam. 4.14 we know not whether we shall continue here till to morrow for what is our Life it is even a Vapour exhaled from the Earth by the influence of the heavenly Bodies Psal 90.9 Psal 73.20 that appears for a little time and then vanisheth away like a Tale that is told which is at an end e're we consider it or as a Dream when one awaketh suddenly which disappears being then that we are such weak creatures Psal 39.4 we should pray with David Lord make me to know my end and the number of my days that I may know how frail I am and how near to death so teach us to number our days that we passing by the cares the glories and pleasures of this World may apply our hearts with all diligence unto true wisdom 90.12 which is to be wise unto Salvation For the attainment whereof and for the more effectual impressing upon our minds deep and serious thoughts of our mortal state it is expedient that we visit sick and dying persons as oft as opportunity invites us not only to condole with them and to afford them our pity and compassion in their affliction Job 6.14 Chap. 19.21 Heb. 13.2 3. which is some alleviation of their misery to administer seasonable comforts to them to give them ghostly advice and counsel to bear with patience the chastisements of the Lord and humbly to resign themselves to his wise disposal but also to stir up in our selves many Pious and Devout Considerations of our approaching Change In the presence of dying Persons there is represented both to our eye and mind many objects that will naturally suggest to us holy Meditations serious and awful Thoughts of Death and Eternity There we may see the person visited strugling with strong pains of bitter Agonies and Death sit in his ghastly countenance we may hear the rueful Groans of his expiring nature and observe him exercised with Soul-conflicts with great terrors of mind and with powerful convictions of sin and dreadful apprehensions of the wrath of God unfit perhaps to die and yet past all hopes of continuing long in this transitory life There we may see the mournful looks of the spectators and hear the bitter lamentations and cries of Wife and Children and observe the trickling tears of dear Relations For if Alexander the Great wept when he heard of the death of Darius and Caesar at the relation of Pompey's and Titus Vespasian at the miserable destruction of the Jews how shall they refrain from tears at the sight of a dying Friend strugling with the pains of Death and perhaps doubting of his salvation Such a spectacle as this will administer to us such thoughts as these This person is now about putting off his Earthly Tabernacle his Soul is entring into the Confines of Eternity and his Body ere long will be a prey to Death and be laid down in the cold and silent Grave where the Worms shall be its companions till it hath put on rottenness and corruption The Angels will convey the immaterial Soul to the Bar of Judgment to receive sentence to its eternal state This