Selected quad for the lemma: glory_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
glory_n	affliction_n	eternal_a	moment_n	4,141	5	9.1958	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A89235	Miscellanea spiritualia: or, Devout essaies: composed by the Honourable Walter Montagu Esq.; Miscellanea spiritualia. Part 1.	Montagu, Walter, 1603?-1677.; Marshall, William, fl. 1617-1650, engraver.	1648 (1648)	Wing M2473; Thomason E519_1; ESTC R202893	256,654	397

for our P●ney This irregularity in our nature may be much corrected by pondering seriously every day the property of time and the state of e 〈…〉 ity I do not meane to impose upon any body a subtile penetration into any abst●use conceptions upon these subjects only a pious reflection upon the familiar notions of each of them as the lightness and inanity of the one the weight and immensity of the other unto which every one may conceive himself passing on as a straw upon a ●orrent and at the foot of this precipice suppose an Ocean of endless joy or misery which hath a division in it of these two qualities of Good or Evil but no difference in the infinity of either and we may contemplate how we are not carried to either of these as we are the greater or the lesser straws but as we come off clean or fowl from this torrent of time it is not by the greatness but by the purity of our lives that we are delivered over to these divers states in this indivisible eternity these are 〈◊〉 tations competent to all sises of mindes in reference to this method of meditation on Eternity When King David was upon this application as he saith I thought upon old days and the Eternal years had I in minde he telleth us th●● he swept his Spirit that thought presently applied him to the cleaning of his Spirit which temporary objects had bedusted and sure our soul in this point is like our eye which may have dust and filth in it while it is closed whereof it is not sensible but as soon as it is open it presently findeth the offence so our minde wh 〈…〉 she is shut to the apprehension of eternity may have many impurities in her which she discerneth not but as soon as her thoughts are wide open upon that object she feeleth the offensiveness of every fowl Atome sticking on her so as this cogitation of the Royal Psalmist is the readiest address to that cleanness of heart to which our Savior hath annexed the seeing of God Me thinks this lesson is given us by the nature our soul which partaketh both of Time and Eternity as having a beginning and no end to couple in our thoughts the images of both these Beings that as the minde draweth fluent and transitory affections from time she may derive also fixed and permanent desires from Eternity and this intermixture of these divers impressions is the greatest setlement or simplicity a soul can attain unto during her operation by such organs as are meerly temporary and the Holy Spirit giveth this security to the frequent meditation on the ending and endlesness of our two lives In all thy works remember thy latter ends and thou will not sin for ever And surely this habitual prospect on our end will abate much the sense of any present condition for it affecteth us not with what we are or have been but with what we are to be for ever and since by Na●●ue death hath a share in every day we live they who let this debt run on without paying unto it any of their time will finde the sum risen so high as they will at last come to owe death even their eternity But by this order I propose of assigning some parcel of every day to this discharge we may convert that portion we pay death into a debt accrening unto us of eternal life which at our last day death shall be forced to deliver to us In order to this address of your cogitations I will offer you this obvious conception to suppose all states of life imbarqued upon one vessel and that continually sinking which surely is sensible enough to such as are not dizied and distracted by the motions of it and when the vessel is palpably sinking doth the General who is commanding above think himself in a better state then the slave working in his chains Doth he that is in the lanthorn account himself happier then he that lieth in the hold because he is like to perish some minutes later Do not they all then alike forget what they have been and think onely on what they are to be they who will accustom themselves to ruminate upon this similitude reporting aptly to all the conditions of this life which are in an equal certainty of expiration may easily forget their present posture and be possessed intirely with their future expectation which in one instant becomes unalterable to all Eternity and they cannot be assured that this instant is not as near them as their next thought I surely then I am perswaded that whosoever shall fasten his thoughts attentively once every day upon this meditation shall not be disquieted with that kinde of life he is reduced unto but rather joyed to consider that he is in a capacity of making our of any sort of life never so grievous a life everlasting and eternal beatitude whereof he may be assured from S. Paul the Patern and Patron of prisoners whom he may suppose speaking this to him in his chains Our light affliction which is but for a moment worketh for us a far exceeding and eternal weight of glory and if our prisoner be one that hath the thorns of an ill life to pull out of his conscience he will think himself much happies while he is in a state which conduceth to his repenting of what he hath done then when he was in a condition that did contribute to his doing what he was to repent §. VIII The final and most solid assignment of confort for this condition NOw then to sum up the true account of all my propositions I do not pretend they should amount to so much as the Stoicks have vainly reckoned upon their precepts I do not promise the minde such an apathy or insensibleness of all distresses and afflictions as those Rational Charl●tans have undertook this deading and stark calming of all passion is rather a dream of Philosophy then the rest of a Christian and of that fancied slumber of theirs we may say with the Psalmist of these mens fancied riches They have slept their sleep and have found nothing a Christian must not affect to say I have slept a good sleep but I have fought a good fight and my Crown hangs where I must take it away by violence it will not fall upon my head while that lieth upon the pillows of my sensitive appetites they therefore who are the best studied in the precepts of Reason or the power of Grace must expect to meet with some dark obscure parenthesis's in their Solitude which at sometimes they cannot understand and the more contestingly they set their Reason to explain them the more intricate they perhaps will finde them at that conjuncture for there are some intervals of wearisomness and disfavor in our Spirits which no Reason can clear to us though it may be they have a coherence with the whole contexture of our peace as being interposed by God to introduce