Selected quad for the lemma: lord_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
lord_n	charles_n	earl_n	viscount_n	14,908	5	11.7517	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A56470	A sermon preached at the funeral of the Rt Honorable John Earl of Rochester, who died at Woodstock-Park, July 26, 1680, and was buried at Spilsbury in Oxford-shire, Aug. 9 by Robert Parsons ...	Parsons, Robert, 1647-1714.	1680 (1680)	Wing P570; ESTC R4950	23,584	52

a more universal insinuating and prevailing example of it As for his Family on both sides from which he was descended they were some of the most famous in their generations His Grandfather was that excellent and truly great man Charles Lord Wilmot Viscount Athlone in Ireland Henry his Father who inherited the same Title and Greatness was by his late Majesty King CHARLES the I. created Baron of Adderbury in Oxfordshire and by his present Majesty Earl of Rochester He was a man of signal Loyalty and Integrity indeed and of such Courage and Conduct in Military affairs as became a great General But my endeavours of this kind are superseded tho I had time by my want of abilities to declare it worthily as well as by the notoriety of these severals and that person must be very ignorant of the late Transactions in the three Kingdoms and the misfortunes of our present King who understands not the service and value of that eminent Subject His Mother of whom I might speak great and worthy things were it not that I avoid the imputation of flattery was the Relict of Sir Francis-Henry Lee of Ditchly in the County of Oxford Baronet Grandmother to the present Right Honourable Earl of Litchfield and the Daughter of that Generous and Honourable Gentleman Sir John St. Johns of Lyddiard in the County of Wilts Baronet whose Family was so remarkable for loyalty that several of his Sons willingly offer'd themselves in the day of battel and died for it and whilst the memory of the English or Irish Rebellion lasts that Family cannot want a due veneration in the minds of any person that loves either God or the King As for his Education it was in Wadham College in Oxford under the care of that wise and excellent Governour Dr. Blanford the late Right Reverend Bishop of Worcester there it was that he laid a good foundation of learning and study though he afterwards built upon that foundation hay and stubble There he first suck'd from the breasts of his Mother the University those perfections of Wit and Eloquence and Poetry which afterwards by his own corrupt stomach or some ill juices after were turn'd into poison to himself and others which certainly can be no more a blemish to those Illustrious Seminaries of Piety and good Learning than a disobedient Child is to a wise and virtuous Father or the fall of Man to the excellency of Paradise His Quality I shall take no notice of there being so much of what was excellent and extraordinary in this great Person that I have no room for any thing that is common to him with others A Wit he had so rare and fruitful in its Invention and withall so choice and delicate in its Judgment that there is nothing wanting in his Composures to give a full answer to that question what and where Wit is except the purity and choice of subject For had such excellent seeds but fallen upon good ground and instead of pitching upon a Beast or a Lust been raised up on high to celebrate the mysteries of the Divine Love in Psalms and Hymns and Spirtual songs I perswade my self we might by this time have receiv'd from his Pen as excellent an Idea of Divine Poetry under the Gospel useful to the teaching of Virtue especially in this generation as his profane Verses have been to destroy it And I am confident had God spared him a longer life this would have been the whole business of it as I know it was the vow and purpose of his Sickness His natural talent was excellent but he had hugely improved it by Learning and Industry being throughly acquainted with all Classick Authors both Greek and Latin a thing very rare if not peculiar to him amongst those of his quality Which yet he used not as other Poets have done to translate or steal from them but rather to better and improve them by his own natural fancy And whoever reads his Composures will find all things in them so peculiarly Great New and Excellent that he will easily pronounce That tho he has lent to many others yet he has borrowed of none and that he has been as far from a sordid imitation of those before him as he will be from being reach'd by those that follow him His other personal accomplishments in all the perfections of a Gentleman for the Court or the Country whereof he was known by all men to be a very great Master is no part of my business to describe or understand and whatever they were in themselves I am sure they were but miserable Comforters to him since they only minister'd to his sins and made his example the more fatal and dangerous for so we may own nay I am obliged by him not to hide but to shew the rocks which others may avoid that he was once one of the greatest of Sinners And truly none but one so great in parts could be so as the chiefest of the Angels for knowledge and power became most dangerous His Sins were like his Parts for from them corrupted they sprang all of them high and extraordinary He seem'd to affect something singular and paradoxical in his Impieties as well as his Writings above the reach and thought of other men taking as much pains to draw others in and to pervert the right ways of Virtue as the Apostles and Primitive Saints to save their own souls and them that heard them For this was the heightning and amazing circumstance of his sins that he was so diligent and industrious to recommend and propagate them not like those of old that hated the light but those the Prophet mentions Isaiah 3.9 who declare their sin as Sodom and hide it not that take it upon their shoulders and bind it to them as a Crown framing Arguments for Sin making Proselytes to it and writing Panegyricks upon Vice singing Praises to the great Enemy of God and casting down Coronets and Crowns before his Throne Nay so confirm'd was he in Sin that he lived and oftentimes almost died a Martyr for it God was pleased sometimes to punish him with the effects of his folly yet till now he confessed they had no power to melt him into true Repentance or if at any time he had some lucid intervals from his folly and madness yet alas how short and transitory were th●● all that goodness was but as a morning cloud and as the early dew which vanishes away he still return'd to the same excess of riot and that with so much the more greediness the longer he had fasted from it And yet even this desperate Sinner that one would think had made a covenant with Death and was at an agreement with Hell and just upon the brink of them both God to magnifie the riches of his grace and mercy was pleased to snatch as a brand out of the fire As St. Paul tho before a blasphemer a persecutor and injurious yet obtein'd mercy that in him Christ Jesus might shew forth