Selected quad for the lemma: life_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
life_n	eat_v	flesh_n	meat_n	7,845	5	9.0841	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45182	Christ mysticall, or, The blessed union of Christ and his members also, An holy rapture, or, A patheticall meditation of the love of Christ : also, The Christian laid forth in his whole disposition and carriage / by J.H. D.D. B.N.	Hall, Joseph, 1574-1656.	1647 (1647)	Wing H374; ESTC R16159	67,177	294

to me saith Christ wherein God the Son receives the Bride as mutually partaking of the same nature and can say This now is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh wherein God the holy Ghost knits our wils in a full and glad consent to the full consummation of this blessed wedlock And those whom God hath thus joyned together let no man no Devill can put asunder What is there then which an affectionate husband can withhold from a dear wife He that hath given himself to her what can be deny to impart He that hath made himself one with her how can he be divided from his other-self Some wilde fancies there are that have framed the linkes of marriage of so brittle stuffe as that they may be knapt in sunder upon every sleight occasion but he that ordained it in Paradise for an earthly representation of this heavenly union betwixt Christ and his Church hath made that and his own indissoluble Here is no contract in the future which upon some intervenient accidents may be remitted but I am my welbeloveds and my welbeloved is mine And therefore each is so others that neither of them is their own Oh the comfortable mystery of our uniting to the Son of God! The wife hath not the power of her own body but the husband We are at thy disposing ô Saviour we are not our own Neither art thou so absolutely thine as that we may not through thine infinite mercy claim an interesse in thee Thou hast given us such a right in thy self as that wee are bold to lay challenge to all that is thine to thy love to thy merits to thy blessings to thy glory It was wont of old to be the plea of the Roman wives to their husbands Where thou art Caius I am Caia and now in our present marriages we have not stuck to say With all my worldly goods I thee endow And if it be thus in our imperfect conjunctions here upon earth how much more in that exquisite one-nesse which is betwixt thee ô blessed Saviour and thy dearest Spouse the Church What is it then that can hinder us from a sweet and heavenly fruition of thee Is it the loathsome condition of our nature Thou sawst this before and yet couldst say when we were yet in our bloud Live Had we not been so vile thy mercy had not been so glorious thy free grace did all for us Thou washedst us with water and anointedst us with oyle and cloathedst us with broidered work and girdedst us about with fine linnen and coveredst us with silk and deckedst us with ornaments and didst put bracelets upon our hands and a chain on our neck and jewels on our fore-heads and eare-rings on our ears and a beautifull crown on our heads What we had not thou gavest what thou didst not find thou madest that we might be a not-unmeet match for the Lord of life Is it want of beauty Behold I am black but comely what ever our hiew be in our own or others eyes it is enough that we are lovely in thine Behold thou art fair my beloved behold thou art faire yea pleasant Thou art beautifull O my love as Tirzah comely as Jerusalem How fair and how pleasant art thou O Love for delights But oh Saviour if thou take contentment in this poor unperfect beauty of thy Spouse the Church how infinite pleasure should thy Spouse take in that absolute perfection that is in thee who art all lovelinesse and glory And if she have ravished thy heart with one of her eyes how much more reason hath her heart to be wholly ravished with both thine which are so full of grace and amiablenesse and in this mutuall fruition what can there be other then perfect blessednesse The Spirit of God well knowing how much it imports us both to know and feel this blessed union whereof himself is the onely worker labours to set it forth to us by the representations of many of our familiar concernments which we daily finde in our meats and drinks in our houses in our gardens and orchards That which is nearest to us is our nourishment What can bee more evident then that the bread the meat the drinke that we receive is incorporated into us and becomes part of the substance whereof we consist so as after perfect digestion there can be no distinction betwixt what we are and what wee took Whiles that bread was in the bing and that meat in the shambles and that drink in the vessell it had no relation to us nor we to it yea whiles all these were on the Table yea in our mouths yea newly let down into our stomacks they are not fully ours for upon some nauseating dislike of nature they may yet go the same way they came but if the concoction be once fully finished now they are so turned into our blood and flesh that they can be no more distinguished from our former substance then that could be divided from it self now they are dispersed into the veins and concorporated to the flesh and no part of our flesh and blood is more ours then that which was lately the bloud of the grapes and the flesh of this fowl or that beast Oh Saviour thou who art truth it selfe hast said I am the living bread that came down from heaven My flesh is meat indeed and my blood is drink indeed and thereupon hast most justly inferred He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood dwelleth in mee and I in him and as a necessary consequent of this spirituall manducation Whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternall life Lo thou art bread indeed not the common bread but Manna not the Israelitish Manna alas that fell from no higher then the region of clouds and they that ate it died with it in their mouths but thou art the living bread that came down from the heaven of heavens of whom whosoever eats lives for ever Thy flesh is meat not for our stomacks but for our souls our faith receives and digests thee and makes thee ours and us thine our materiall food in these corruptible bodies runs into corruption thy spirituall food nourisheth purely and strengthens us to a blessed immortality As for this materiall food many a one longs for it that cannot get it many a one hath it that cannot eat it many eat it that cannot digest it many digest it into noxious and corrupt humours all that receive it do but maintain a perishing life if not a languishing death but this flesh of thine as it was never withheld from any true appetite so it never yeelds but wholesome and comfortable sustenance to the soul never hath any other issue then an everlasting life and happinesse O Saviour whensoever I sit at mine own Table let mee think of thine whensoever I feed on the bread and meat that is set before mee and feel