Selected quad for the lemma: love_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
love_n	affection_n	heart_n	mind_n	2,955	5	5.1791	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A02513	The arte of diuine meditation profitable for all Christians to knowe and practise; exemplified with a large meditation of eternall life. By Ioseph Hall.	Hall, Joseph, 1574-1656.	1606 (1606)	STC 12642; ESTC S118419	30,902	220

throgh their immunitie from those cares which accompany an actiue life might haue the best leasure to this busines Yet seeing there is no man so taken vp with action as not sometimes to haue a free minde and there is no reasonable minde so simple as not to bee able both to discourse somewhat and to better it selfe by her secret thoughts I deeme it an enuious wrong to conceale that from any whose benefit may bee vniuersall Those that haue but a little stocke had neede to knowe the best rules of thrift Chap. 2. THe rather for that whereas our Diuine Meditation is nothing else but a bending of the mind vpon some spirituall obiect through diuers formes of discourse vntill our thoughts come to an issue and this must needs be either Extemporall and occasioned by outward occurrences offred to the mind or Deliberate and wrought out of our owne heart which againe is either in Matter of Knowledge for the finding out of some hidden trueth and conuincing of an heresie by profound trauersing of reason or in Matter of Affection for the enkindling of our loue to God the former of these two last wee sending to the Scholes and masters of Controuersies search after the later which is both of larger vse and such as no Christian can reiect as either vnnecessary or ouer-difficult For both euery Christian had neede of fire put to his affections and weaker iudgements are no lesse capable of this diuine heate which proceedes not so much from reason as from faith One sayes and I beleeue him that Gods Schoole is more of Affection than Vnderstanding Both lessons very needefull very profitable but for this our age especially the later For if there bee some that haue much zeale little knowledge there are more that haue much knoweledge without zeale And hee that hath much skill and no affection may do good to others by information of iudgement but shall neuer haue thanke either of his own heart or of God who vseth not to cast away his loue on those of whom hee is but knowen not loued Chap. 3. OF Extemporal Meditatiō there may be much vse no rule forasmuch as our conceits herein varie according to the infinite multitude of obiects and their diuers manner of profering thēselues to the minde as also for the suddennesse of this acte Man is placed in this Stage of the worlde to viewe the seuerall natures and actions of the creature To view them not idly without his vse as they doe him God made all these for man and man for his owne sake Both these purposes were lost if man should let the creatures passe carelesly by him onely seene not thought vpon He onely can make benefit of what he sees which if hee doe not it is all one as if hee were blind or brute Whēce it is that wise Salomon puttes the sluggard to schoole vnto the Ant and our Sauiour sends the distrustfull to the Lillie of the field In this kinde was that Meditation of the Diuine Psalmist which vpon the viewe of the glorious frame of the Heauens was led to woonder at the mercifull respect GOD hath to so poore a creature as man Thus our Sauiour tooke occasion of the water fetcht vp solemnely to the Altar from the Well of Shilo on the day of the great HOSANNAH to meditate and discourse of the Water of life Thus holy and sweete AVGVSTINE from occasion of the water-course neere to his Lodging running among the pebbles sometimes more silently sometimes in a baser murmure and sometimes in a shriller note entred into the thought and discourse of that excellent order which God hath settled in all these inferiour things Thus that learned and heauenly soule of our late Estye when wee sate together and heard a sweet consort of Musicke seemed vpon this occasion carried vp for the time before-hand to the place of his rest saying not without some passion What Musicke may we thinke there is in heauen Thus lastly for who knowes not that examples of this kinde are infinite that faithfull and reuerend Deering when the Sunne shined on his face now lying on his death-bed fell into a sweet meditation of the glory of God and his approaching ioy The thoughts of this nature are not onely lawfull but so behooueful that we cannot omit them without neglect of God his creatures our selues The creatures are halfe lost if wee only imploy them not learne somthing of thē GOD is wronged if his creatures bee vnregarded our selues most of all if wee reade this great volume of the creatures and take out no lesson for our instruction Chap. 4. WHerein yet cautiō is to be had that our Meditatiōs be not either too farre-fetcht or sauouring of Superstition Farre-fetcht I cal those which haue not a faire easie resemblāce vnto the matter frō whēce they are raised in which case our thoghts proue loose heartles making no memorable impression in the mind Superstitious when we make choice of those grounds of Meditation which are forbidden vs as Teachers of Vanity or imploy our owne deuices though well grounded to an vse aboue their reach making them vpon our owne pleasures not only furtherances but parts of Gods worship in both which our Meditations degenerate and growe rather perillous to the soule Whereto adde that the minde bee not too much cloyed with too frequent iteratiō of the same thought which at last breedes a wearinesse in our selues and an vnpleasantnesse of that conceit which at the first entertainement promised much delight Our nature is too ready to abuse familiaritie in any kinde and it is with Meditations as with Medicines which with ouer-ordinary vse lose their Soueraignety and fill in stead of purging God hath not straited vs for matter hauing giuen vs the scope of the whole world so that there is no creature euent action speach which may not afford vs new matter of Meditation And that which we are wont to say of fine wittes we may as truely affirme of the Christian hart that it can make vse of any thing Wherefore as trauellers in a forreine countrey make euery fight a lesson so ought wee in this our pilgrimage Thou seest the heauen rolling aboue thine head in a constāt and vnmoueable motion the starres so ouer-looking one another that the greatest shewe little the least greatest all glorious the ayre full of the bottles of raine or fleeces of snowe or diuers formes of fiery Exhalations The sea vnder one vniforme face full of strange and monstrous shapes beneath the earth so adorned with variety of plants that thou canst not but tread on many at once with euery foote besides the store of creatures that flie aboue it walke vpō it liue in it Thou idle Truant doest thou learn nothing of so many masters hast thou so long read these capitall letters of Gods great booke and canst thou not yet spell one worde of them The brute creatures see the same things with as cleare perhaps