Selected quad for the lemma: master_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
master_n	city_n	house_n	zion_n	22	3	9.6829	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A61120	Kaina kai palaia Things new and old, or, A store-house of similies, sentences, allegories, apophthegms, adagies, apologues, divine, morall, politicall, &c. : with their severall applications / collected and observed from the writings and sayings of the learned in all ages to this present by John Spencer ...	Spencer, John, d. 1680.; Fuller, Thomas, (1608-1661)	1658 (1658)	Wing S4960; ESTC R16985	1,028,106	735

to be as tickle as Eli's stool from which he may easily break his neck that he must drink wormwood in a cup of gold and lie in a bed of Ivory upon a pillow of thorns so that he may well say of his glory as one said of his roab O nobilem magis quam felicem pannum or as Pope Urban said of his Rochet That he wondered it should be so heavy being made of such light stuff Prayer turning Earth into Heaven IT is said of Archimedes that famous Mathematician of Syracuse who having by his Art framed a curious Instrument that if he could but have told how to fix it it would have raised the very foundations of the whole Earth Such an Instrument is Prayer which if it be set upon God and fixed in Heaven it will fetch Earth up to Heaven change earthly thoughts into heavenly conceptions turn flesh into spirit metamorphose nature into grace and earth into heaven To passe by the offences of our Brethren DAvid was deaf to the railings of his enemies and as a dumb man in whose mouth were no reproofs Socrates when he was abused in a Comedy laughed at it when Polyargus not able to bear such an indignity went and hanged himself Augustus sleighted the Satyrs and bitter invectives which the Pasquills of that time invented against him and when the Senate would have further informed him of them he would not hear them Thus the manlier any man is the milder and readier he is to passe by an offence as not knowing of it or not troubled at it an argument that there is much of God in him if he do it from a right principle who bears with our infirmities and forgives our trespasses beseeching us to be reconciled When any provoke us we use to say We will be eeven with him but there is a way whereby we may not onely be even but above him and that is forgive him We must see and not see wink at small faults especially Qui nescit dissimulare nescit vivere may with some grains of allowance passe current He that cannot dissemble is not fit to live Kingdomes and Common-wealths their successions from God THe Romans closing in with that permanent errour of Mankind to mistake the Instruments and secundary Agents in Gods purposes for the main Efficient were wont variously to distinguish the derivation of their Empire as by force so Iulius Caesar was invested by the Senates election so Tiberius by the Souldiers so Severus and by Inheritance so Octavius Augustus But most true it is that to what means soever they imputed their Emperours were it Birth or Election Conquest or Usurpation 't is God who gives the Title to Kingdoms and Commonweales by the first and it is he also that directs and permits it by the last The whole Heart to be given to God SOme great King or Potentate having a mind to visit his Imperiall City the Harbinger is ordered to go before and mark out a house suitable to his Retinue and finding one the Master of that house desireth to have but some small chamber wherein to lodge his wife and children It is denyed Then he intreats the benefit of some by-place to set up a Trunk or two full of richer goods then ordinary No saies the Harbinger it cannot be for if your house were as big again as it is it would be little enough to entertain the King and all his royall train Now so it is that every mans body is a Temple of God and his heart the sanctum sanctorum of that Temple His Ministers are sent out into the world to inform us that Christ is comming to lodge there and that we must clear the rooms that this great King of glory may enter in O saies the Old man carnall yet but in part renewed give me leave to love my wife and children No it cannot be having wife and children he must be as having none Then he desires to enjoy the pleasures of the world That 's denyed too he must use this world as if he used it not not that the use of these things is prohibited not that the comfortable enjoyment of our dearest relations is any way to be infringed but the extraordinary affection to them when they come into competition with the love that we owe unto God For he will have the whole heart the whole minde the whole soul and all little enough to entertain him and the graces of his holy Spirit which are attendant on him Nec mihi nec tibi sed dividatur was the voice of a strange woman and such is that of this present world But God will take nothing to halfs he will have the whole heart or nothing The good Christians comfort in time of the Churches trouble MArtin Luther perceiving the cause of the Church to go backward puts pen to paper and writes to the Elector of Saxony where amongst other expressions this was one Sciat Celsitudo tua mhil dubitet c. Let your Highnesse be sure that the Church's businesse is far otherwise ordered in Heaven than it is by the Emperour and States at Norimberg And Gaudeo quod Christus Dominus est c. I am glad that Christ is King for otherwise I had been utterly out of heart and hope saith holy Myconius in a letter to Calvin upon the view of the Church's enemies Thus it staggers many a good Christian at this day to see Sion in the dust the Church under foot the hedge of government and discipline broken down all the wild beasts of Heresie and Schism crept in such as labour to root out true Religion to dethrone Christ and to set up the idle fancies and enthusiasticall conceits of their own phanatick brains some crying out against the Church with those Edomites Down with it down with it even to the very ground others casting dirt upon her harml●sse ceremonies But let the Churches friends rest assured that God sees and smiles and looks and laughs at them all that the great counsell of the Lord shall stand when all 's done that Christ shall reigne in the midst of his enemies and that the stone cut out of the mountains without hands shall bring down the golden Image with a vengeance and make it like the chaff of the summer floor Dan. 2. 35. The sad condition of People under Tyrannicall Government IT was a just complaint of Draco's Lawes in Lacedemonia that their execution was as sanguin as their character for they were written in bloody letters And the Romans lamented the cruelty of those Tribunalls where the cheap proscription of lives made the Iudgement-seat little differ from a Shambles A Man made Offender for a word Poor Men sold for shooes Or as the Turks at this day sell heads so many for an Asper Such is the condition of People under Tyrannicall government under

making but set in a plain frame not gilded And a deformed man is also his Workmanship but not drawn with even lines and lively colours The former not for want of wealth as the latter not for want of skill but both for the pleasure of the Maker and many times their Souls have been the Chappels of Sanctity whose bodies have been the Spitals of deformity Profession and Practice to go together THe Prophet Esay chap. 58. 1. is willed to lift up his voyce like a Trumpet there are many things that sound lowder than a Trumpe● as the roaring of the Sea the claps of Thunder and such like yet he sayes not Lift up thy voyce as the Sea or lift up thy voyce as Thunder but lift up thy voyce as a Trumpet Why as a Trumpet Because a Trumpeter when he sounds his Trumpet he winds it with his mouth and holds it up with his hand And so every faithfull heart which is as it were a spirituall Trumpet to ●ound out the prayses of God must not onely report them with his mouth but also support them with his hand When Profession and Practice meet together quàm benè conveniunt What a Harmony is in that Soul When the tongue is made Gods Advocate and the hand Executor of Gods will then doth a Man truly lift up his voice like a Trumpet All men and things subject to Mortality VVHen the Emperour Constantius came to Rome in triumph and beheld the Companies that entertained him he repeated a saying of Cyneas the Epirote that he had seen so many Kings as Citisens But viewing the buildings of the City the stately Arches of the Gates so lofty that at his entrance he needed not to have stooped like a Goose at a barn-door the Turrets Tombs Temples Theaters Aquaeducts Baths and some of the work so high like Babel that the eye of Man could scarcely reach unto them he was amazed and said That Nature had emptied all her strength and invention upon that one City He spake to Hormisda the Master of his works to erect him a brazen horse in Constantinople like unto that of Trajan the Emperour which he there saw Hormisda answered him that if he desired the like horse he must then provide him the like stable All this and much more in the honour of Rome At length he asked Hormisda What he thought of the City who told him that he took no pleasure in any thing there but in learning one lesson That men also dyed in Rome and that he perceived well the end of that Lady City which in the judgement of Quintilian was the onely City and all the rest but Towns would be the same with all her Predecessors the ruines whereof are even gone to Ruine this is the doom that attendeth both Men and Places be they never so great and stately The consideration whereof made a learned Gent. close up that his admirable History of the World in these words O eloquent just and mighty death whom none could advise thou onely hast perswaded what none hath dared thou hast done and whom all the world hath flattered thou onely hast cast out out of the world and despised Thou hast drawn together all the far-stretched greatness all the pride cruelty and ambition of Man and covered it over with these two narrow words HIC JACET Faith in Christ the onely support in the time of Trouble IN that famous battle at Leuctrum where the Thebans got a signall Victory but their Captain Epaminondas his deaths wound It is reported that Epaminondas a little before his death demanded whether his Buckler were taken by the enemy and when he understood that it was safe and that they had not so much as laid their hands on it he dyed most willingly and cheerfully Su●h is the resolution of a valiant souldier of Christ Iesus when he is wounded even to death he hath an eye to his shield of faith and finding that to be safe out of the enemies danger his soul marcheth couragiously out of this world singing S. Paul's triumphant ditty I have finished my course I have kept the faith Henceforth is laid up for me a crown of righteousnesse 2 Tim. 4. 7. 8. Nothing but Christ to be esteemed as of any worth AS the Iewes use to cast to the ground the book of Esther before they read it because the Name of God is not in it And as St. Augustine cast by Tullies works because they contained not the Name of Christ. So must we throw all aside th●t hath not the Name of Iesus on it If honour riches preferment c. come not in the ●ame of Iesus away with them set them by as not worth the taking up give them no entertainment further than as they have reference to Christ and Eternity Humility the way to Glory WE say in our Creed that Christ descended into hell descendit ut ascendat He took his rising from the lowest place to ascend into the highest And herein Christ readeth a good lecture unto us he teacheth us that humility is the way to glory and the more we are humbled the more we shall be exalted Adam and those once glorious Angells were both ambitious both desired to climb but they mistook their rise and so in climbing both had grievous falls If we then would climb without harm we must learn of Christ to climb so shall we be sure to tread the steps of Iacob's ladder which from earth will reach even to the highest heavens A Kingdome divided within it self cannot long stand MElanchton perswading the divided Protestants of his time to peace and unity illustrateth his argument by a notable parable of the woolves and the dogs who were marching onward to fight one against another The woolves that they might the better know the strength of their adversary sent forth a master-woolf as their scout The scout returns and tells the woolves That indeed the dogs were more in number but yet they should not be discouraged for he observed that the dogs were not one like another a few m●stiffs there w●re but the most were little currs which could onely bark but not bite and would be affraid of their own shadow Another thing also he observed which would much encourage them and that was That the dogs did march as if they were more offended at themselves than with us not keeping their ranks but grinning and snarling and biting and tearing one another as if they would save us a labour And therefore let us march on resolutely for our enemies are their own enemies enemies to themselves and their own peace they bite and devour each other and therefore we shall certainly devour them Thus though a Kingdom or State be never so well provided with Men Arms Ammunition Ships Walls Forts and Bulwarks yet notwithstanding if divisions and heart-burnings get into that Kingdom that State or that City like a spreading gangreen they will

rapacity and drunkenness so soon he declared his censure of them with this exclamation I confess that your Religion may be good your devotion good your Profession good but sure your hospitality is stark naught Apud quos ne Deus quidem biduò commorari permittitur that you will not give your God two days lodging Here now was a sad occasion given for the Enemies of God so to judge of them that seem to make profession of his holy name This the shame of Christians the disparagement of Religion when it is forced against the nature of it to encourage lewdnesse This an abuse of the promises of Grace of the Covenants and pledges of Grace which are the Sacraments when encouragements to evill are derived from so mercifull Indulgence Again it is a dishonour done to the honour of Grace and Godlinesse when from the Sermon which forbiddeth such a sin we shall immediately run into the sin forbidden by the Sermon and so give an unhappy occasion for weak ones to be offended The loss of a faithfull Ministery not to be sleighted And why so GAlinus the Emperour when tydings was brought him of the loss of Egypt Well said he let it go Cannot we live without the Flax and hemp of Egypt And when he had also lost France two great and mighty Countries What said he Cannot the Land stand sine sagis trabeatis without those Souldiers Cassocks which France doth send us This was a piece of Heathenish stupidity But if ever it shall come to pass quod avertat Deus that the Ministers of the Gospel should be driven into corners let no good Christian make slight of it but be deeply affected and affectionately taken with the loss For they are such as watch for our souls the comforters of Sion the Sons of Consolation spirituall fathers repairers of the breach such as stand in the gap of Gods anger spirituall Physitians Doves which bring the Olive leafe of peace to the troubled soul and what not They are sanguis mundi when they dye or fail a Man may justly feare the World 's a dying they are the butteresses and pillars to uphold it from ruine and confusion grievous then must it needs be and matter of great concernment when such are taken away The secure Worldlings suddain ruine LOok upon a weary Traveller scorched with the heat of the Sun how he resteth himselfe under the shady leaves of some fair spreading Tr●● and there falls asleep so long that the Sun coming about heats him more then formerly so that he is ready to faint his head akes and all his body is as it were stewed even in its own sweat Thus it fares with the Men of this World such as having wearied themselves in heaping up the things thereof lye down and sing a foolish Requiem to their Souls mean while the course of their life runs on the Sun comes about Death overtakes them and instead of a comfortable shade to refresh them they may easily perceive the fire of Hell if God be not the more mercifull ready to consume them A child of God preserved by God though never so much slighted by the World THey that work in Gold or Silver let fall many a bit to the ground yet they do not intend to lose it so but sweep the shop and keep the very sweepings safe so that that which they cannot at present discover the Finer brings to light Thus the World is Gods Work-house many a dear child of God suffers and falls to the ground by banishment imprisonment sorrow sickness c. but they must not be lost thus God will search the very sweepings and cull them out of the very trash and preserve them What though they be slightly set by here in this world and lie amongst the pots no better accompted of-than the rubbish and refuse of the Earth God will finde a time to make them up amongst the rest of his Jewels Mal. 3. Ult. True knowledge never rests on the Creature till it center in God the Creator AS the Legend speaks Historically which is onely true Symbolically of St. Christopher that before he was converted to the faith he would serve none but the strongest He had for his Master a Man of great strength and puissance but a King subdued him Him he forsook for that King but finding him to be overcome by a Neighbour he betook himselfe to that other Pagan Conquerour This Conquerour was also tyrannized over by the Devill to whom he was a meere slave doing all his base commands This he could not endure but entered into service with the Devill For awhile he admired the power of his new Master and what a dominion he exercised over the sons of Men but in a short space he found out his weakness also so feeble and fearfull was he of a piece of Wood he durst not passe by the Cross but when that stood in his way he must by all means back again Now the weary servant longed to know what this Cross meant that he might find out a more potent Lord It was told him that Christ was the Lord of that Ensign and that the Cross was his Banner Thither then he flyes and there he found out a most mighty yea an Almighty Master So true knowledge never rests on the Creature till it center in the Creator aims at none but the highest and climbs from strength to strength from height to height till it appear before God in Zion higher than Riches in their Treasury then Princes on their Thrones then stars in the Firmament fetching all her light and comfort from God in Christ Iesus How it is that wicked men are said to hasten death BErnardinus Senensis a devout man tells of a stripling in Catalonia being eighteen years of age that having been disobedient to his parents fell to robbing and being hanged on the Tree and there remaining for a spectacle to disobedient children on the next morning a formall beard and gray hairs appeared on him as if he had been much struck in years which the people hearing of and wondering at the suddennesse of the change urging how young he was at his death A grave reverend Father of the Church being then present said That he should have lived to have been so old as he then appeared had he not been disobedient The devout man it 's probable may be out in the story but the other was in at the application For Stat sua cuique dies every mans daies are determined the number of his months is with God he hath appointed him his bounds that he cannot passe there is a measure of his daies in respect of Gods prescience and providence But in respect of the course of nature the thread of life which might have been lengthned is cut off by Gods command for sin as in the Family of Eli and the People of the

Mortality when by the course of Nature they are driven on and carried out to their last home the very encrease of their life tendeth to a decrease till they meet all in one place that which Adam hath provided for all his Posterity and where himself being already laid all shall be brought unto him How it is that the Sins of Parents are visited on their Children IT is reported of a Persian Emperour Artaxerxes the long-handed that for such faults as his Nobles and Captains committed he enacted That whereas their hair was wont to be pulled their head● tire or turbants should be so used and for such offences as their bodies had been wont to be beaten their robes should be publiquely scourged In like manner God dealeth with men when they offend of themselves he punisheth not themselves alwaies in their persons but oft-times in their possessions in their goods and chattels and in their temporal estates And if in their possessions no marvel if in their children too they being part of their possessions nay part of themselves Witnesse that indulgent Master Math. 15. 22. Reproofs of a Wise Man not to be sleighted IT is storyed of Alexander the Great that having had a Philosopher a long time with him at length said unto him Recede ● me prorsus consortium tuum nolo Be gon from me I desire not thy company And being asked why made answer Quod quum tantopere mecum degeris c. because having lived so long with me thou hast not reproved any vice in me For either thou hast observed me not to erre which is a great argument of Ignorance because being a Man I know my self to be exposed to many errours Or else thou hast known me to erre and hast held thy peace which is a proof of thine unfaithfullnesse It was the praise of that great Monarch thus to do and in this he jumped even with the Preacher It is better to hear the Rebuke of the Wise Man c. It may be not so pleasant but sure it is better and there is lesse hurt and more good that ariseth from it There is in Reproof a jarring and harsh Musick because it opposeth the fault that is committed it disagreeth with the mind of him that hath committed it but yet it soundeth sweeter then the melodious songs of flattering Parasites who leading on to Wickednesse do lead into destruction Magistrates to be Men of Understanding HEraclitus being sick examined his Physitian concerning the cause of his sicknesse but finding that he was ignorant thereof he would take none of his Physick saying If he be not able to shew me the cause he is lesse able to take away the cause of my disease Thus there are many sores and sicknesses in a Common-wealth mille nocendi artes a thousand wayes of cheating the generality of Men is as Ovid said of Autolycus furtum ingeniosus ad omne witty in all kind of wickednesse ●ay mundus in maligno positus the World is set upon Mischief And such is the subtilty too of Offenders that Tertullus his trim tale for the Iews goes currant till the Apostle comes after him and unstarcheth it How easy is a fair glove drawn upon a foul hand a bad cause smoothed over with goodly pretences so cunning so wary and so wise are the Many that as Caesar said of the Scythians difficilius invenire quàm interficere it is harder to find them then to foil them like the Fish Sepia they can hide themselves in their own mud cover themselves close in their own devices The Magistrate then that Physitian of the body-Politick had need to be Wise and learned to get and keep that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one ear open for the defendant to be a Man of great experience 〈◊〉 and judgement to catch all such with the hooks of Iustice who are crafty and slippery to avoid them and by this means take away the causes of Corruption Men to be carefull how they make Oath in Iudicature or otherwise IT is said of Alexander the great that being about to destroy Lampsacum an eminent Port-town in Bithinia Anaximenes the Philosopher and his former Master being a Native of the place came to meet him and to entreat him in the behalf thereof which being foreseen by Alexander He swore that he would not do that which Anaximenes should ask him Whereupon Anaximenes told him That which I desire is that thou wouldest destroy Lampsacum Now Alexander being so taken by his word for the reverence of his Oath did not destroy the place Most Noble was it in this great Man to keep his Oath and necessary is it for all inf●riours to keep theirs For an Oath is not a slight businesse although it be despised because Men are accustomed thereunto namely being the testimony of God concerning things doubtfull and therefore to cite God as the Witnesse to a Lye must needs be a foul Wickednesse and horrible Impiety Tedious length of Law-suites condemned IT is said of Hippocrates the famous Physitian that he was never seen to be in choller with any Man And that he had many Schollers yet permitted none to practise before they had taken an Oath at the Altar of Apollo to abbreviate the cure of all diseases to the utmost of their power A good President for Physitians then and a good Pattern for Lawyers now to dispatch their Clients cause with expedition not to spin out time in the suit donec evacuata Marsupia till all their Money is gone In the Iewish Common-wealth Judgment ●ea●s were placed in the gates of the Cities Ruth 4. 2. intimating quick dispatch that causes should not depend so long as to become aged and gray-headed in Courts lest they force the poor Client to say unto his Lawyer as Balaams Asse did to his Master Am not I thine Asse which thou hast ridden upon since thy first time till this present day Numb 〈◊〉 30 Cruelty of the Wicked no prejudice to the Godly IT is reported of Constantine that being spoken to by many to punish some who had thrown stones at his Image saying that with the stones they had bruised all his face he wiping his Face with his hand and smiling with his Countenance gave them this answer Ego ver● vulnus nusquam in fronte factum video c. I do not feel any hurt about me or any wound made in my face but my head is sound and all my body likewise Plainly so it is with them that keep the Commandements of God all the evill which the Devil or any wicked man can work or do against them it is but like an evil done to their Pictures they feel it not For how should they feel evill to whom all things work together for their good It is true they may know sorrow but not so to know it as to take care for it they may find the dealings of Wicked