Selected quad for the lemma: nature_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
nature_n	air_n	earth_n	element_n	2,483	5	9.5484	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A62447	The treasures of the sea A sermon to the mariners upon Deut. XXXIII. xviii, xix. And of Zabulun, he said, Rejoice Zabulun in thy ports, and Issachar in thy tents. They shall call the people unto the mountain, there they shall offer sacrifices of righteousness: for they shall suck of the abundance of the seas, and of treaures hid in the sand.	Thomson, William, d. 1699.	1683 (1683)	Wing T1036A; ESTC R203769	22,323	44

The Treasures of the Sea A SERMON TO THE MARINERS UPON DEUT. XXXIII xviii xix And of Zabulun he said Rejoice Zabulun in thy Ports and Issachar in thy Tents They shall call the people unto the mountain there they shall offer Sacrifices of Righteousness For they shall suck of the abundance of the Seas and of Treasures hid in the Sand. Terra parùm fuerat Terris adjecimus undas Fortunae varias auximus arte vias LONDON Printed for Robert Kettlewell at the Hand and Scepter over against S. Dunstans Church in Fleet street M DC LXXXIII Reader THis Sermon was occasionally Preach'd upon Mr. William Harrington's that famous and successful Engineer recovering the lading out of the Katherine sunk unfortunately in the Downs many fathoms under Water The good man therefore having been prosperous beyond expectation in a concern of so high a value viz. 14000 l. and upwards was willing to return his thanks to God and therefore made choice of me to perform that Religious Office which after the Service of the Church I did solemnly in this following Sermon Leigh in Essex Nov. 21. 1682. William Thomson TO THE Right Honourable and Right Reverend Father in GOD HENRY Lord Bishop of LONDON My Lord SOme Philosophers tell us That all the great and goodliest Natures display their Excellencies in three things Light Heat and Love The more Light dances in Precious Stones the more is their worth Heat raises Eagles above Worms and those Palms are held the Noblest which have the most Love and Inclination to their Fellows I need not tell the World how eminent those Qualities are in your Lordship whose Vnderstanding daily assists the best Monarch and the best Church in the World with its Lights and Counsels whose vigour and activity of Spirit mingled with the Nobleness of your Blood has worthily advanced you to the best Office in the Church and whose Candour and Bounty triumphs over so many Hearts But it is these Virtues that make all us especially who have the Happiness to live under your Lordships care to study all possible ways to give testimony of that Honour and Duty we owe you Among the rest I have put in my Mite and with your Lordships leave will hereafter endeavour to mend both the coyn and the summ I would not fill your Lordships left hand with a Letter and therefore humbly begging your Blessing I rest Right Honourable and Right Reverend Lord Leigh Nov. 21. 1682. Your Lordships most Dutiful Son and Servitor THOMSON To the HONOURABLE GEORGE LEGGE Esq Master of the Ordance to his Majesty CHARLES the Second c. Noble Sir THis Discourse is due to you upon the account of your favours to Mr. Harrington And therefore as he was pleas'd to make me the Orator of his thanks to God so am I also the Messenger of his thanks to You. I am a great Admirer of your Honours unshaken Loyalty and other your great Virtues and I am as devout a Beedsman for your lasting Prosperity That therefore Heaven may bless all that Wisdom Conduct and Integrity which shines so gloriously in you above most others is the daily Orison of Noble Sir Leigh in Essex Nov. 21. 1682. Your Honours in all Duty and Observance THOMSON To the Right Honourable DANIEL Lord FINCH one of the Lords of His Majesties Most Honourable Privy Council c. My Noble Lord YOur many favours oblige me and your high Concerns in the Admiralty encourage me humbly to offer this Discourse such as it is at Your Lordships feet I can say little of its suitableness to a Person of your great Quality and less of its Worth But if your Lordship shall please to accept of these Prolusions I will hereafter endeavour something more worthly your Lordships notice that I may at once give testimony of my thankfulness for the favours already received and demonstrate how much I am Noble Patron Leigh in Essex Nov 21. 1682. Your Honours most obliged Servitor THOMSON To the Worshipful SAMUEL HARE Of LEIGH Esquire Worthy Sir THE daily Experience I have of your Zeal to Religion your Loyalty to the Government establish'd and your Kindness to me has emboldened me to present the following Sermon to your view which however imperfect as the rest of my Productions may yet retrieve to your Memory what you have already heard from the Pulpit There is variety of Inductions from the words and such as have led us through some of the most important points of the Christian Faith It may therefore serve at once for a Sermon and System of Religion Accept it therefore if not upon these accounts yet as it is intended for an acknowledgement of the many obligations by you conferr'd upon Good Sir Leigh in Essex Nov. 21. 1682. Your most Humble and obliged Servitor THOMSON DEUT. XXXIII xviii xix And of Zabulun he said rejoice Zabulun in thy going out and Issachar in thy Tents They shall call the people unto the mountain there they shall offer Sacrifices of Righteousness For they shall such of the abundance of the Seas and of Treasures hid in the Sand. HOwever some men wedded to Cowardice and Sloth have declaimed against the dangers and roughness of the Sea looking upon every storm as a Trumpeter of Death and every Wave as a Winding-sheet Yet if we shall but seriously inspect the nature of the Watry Element we shall find her as calm as any of the rest and no less advantageous to humane Nature For whereas the greedy Earth when she shakes spares neither Men nor Cities and the mutable Air insects us with unhealthful blasts and the Fire scorches our Blood Old Neptune is of a more tractable disposition and if his angry Sister Juno the Air will but let him alone never fails to be favourable to the concerns of the World So that Tertullian though in the commendations of other things plentiful enough of words yet in the praise of Water flows with an Eloquence worthy himself and the subject telling us that it is the ancientest of all the Elements and that none of them has so many Patronages of Nature so many Priviledges of Grace so many solemnities of Discipline nor any so highly advanced in the mysteries of Religion De Bapt. Thales asserts it the principle of all things and later Chymists assure us that it is productive of whatever the skilful Operator pleases that all Art is nothing but an imitation of the great process of God Almighty in the Creation of the World who having out of nothing call'd a confused and as seemeth from the Text a liquid matter the Spirti of God moved upon the waters Gen. 1. 2. giving motion to the fluid Mother of all things who being warmed by that agitation brought forth the succeeding parts of the Universe in their Order Whence Marius Victor Et sacer extensis impedens Spiritus undis Altrices animabat aquas dans semina rerum And agreeable hereunto the Stoicks made this Element the food of the Stars as judging it

quickly put an end to our sins and miseries Let us enjoy our long expectations call the Sea to deliver up her dead and the Earth to set free her Prisoners that we with all them that are departed in the true Faith and fear of thy most Holy Name may have our perfect consummation and bliss both in Body and Soul by entring into the full fruition of the face and excellencies of the most adorable Trinity Now as we have given different senses of the words so shall we also in correspondence thereunto make our Applications And first to the adventurous Marriners that they do above all things labour to secure the favour and protection of God by an Holy Life And truly if they shall but seriously consider the condition thereof they will find themselves to lye under many and extraordinary circumstances that call them thereto as 1. The wonders and mighty works of God which they behold as the Psalmist speaks They that go down to the Sea in Ships and occupy their business in great waters these see the works of the Lord and his wonders in the deep Psal 107. 23. The several climates the different rising and setting of Stars the divers temperatures of the air the various commodities of all Countries call upon you to praise and adore that God who has disposed all things in such a wonderful order and so various a manner for the benefit of the whole 2. The dangers of Storms of Rocks of Shelves of Sands make your preservations miraculous and consequently require the greatest and most constant Devotions to God for your safeties Pacuvius gives us a description of a Tempest sufficient to allay the courage of the most valiant and it is this Inhorrescit mare Tenebrae conduplicantur c. The Sea roars with horrour the darkness becomes palpable the blackness of the night and storms is a perfect blindness the Lightning flashes through the Clouds and Heaven trembles with the Thunder Hail and rain mixt together fall 't is hard to say in greater plenty or violence the Winds break out from all points as if they would not only destroy themselves but all the World and the Ocean rages with the Tyde Now how canst thou expect to be preserv'd in such concussions and strugglings of Nature How canst thou expect that God should becalm this Tempest asswage the fury of the Elements and stretch out his almighty arm to save thee in dangers so great if thou daily provokest him to anger by thy sins No worship him all the days of thy li●e with a pure mind and a chaste body and then call upon him in the needful time of trouble and he shall hear thee at large He shall still the raging of the Sea and the storms when they arise He shall preserve thee in a thousand dangers shall bless thee in thy going out and in thy coming in and bring thee safe and prosperously into the Haven where thou wouldst be so that thou shalt rejoice like Zabulun in thy Ports 3. The great Profits and Emoluments which accrue from your employment is a third obligation to your Piety Navigation is that which makes the Riches of the World common and the Merchant may truly be said to suck the abundance of the Sea and treasures hid in the Sand. It is he that mingles the manners and wealth of all Nations together that makes good the poverty of one place with the riches of another Navigation is certainly the greatest and most useful Art humane nature was ever master of And whatever there is of Wit whatever there is of Manners whatever there is of Riches whatever there is of Glory nay whatever there is of Religion in the World is in great measures owing to the professors thereof Go then happy Marriner fear thy God above all things and he shall bring the Winds out of his Treasures to fi●l thy Sails with gales of Prosperity Go spread thy Religion thy Laws thy Manners and Customes through the Universe and for thy reward reap the harvest of the River sack the abundance of the deep and Treasures hid in the Sands 4. The great Influence that good example has upon others calls upon you especially to a circumspection in your manners that no Profaneness Injustice or Intemperance appear in you to the scandal of others or the disparagement of our Religion For it is not deep Mysteries multitude of Laws or Rational Discourses that will convert Nations Holy Examples move beyond Precepts and a conversation void of offence is the most effectual Sermon to bring those that are without into the fold of the Church In vain therefore poor Christendom dost thou expect the coming in of unbelievers while they see thy wickedness at home thy profaneness abroad Learn then all and especially those who view foreign and unconverted Nations a conversation suitable to the doctrine ye profess Learn that most useful lecture of our Saviour Mat. 5. 16. Let your light so shine hefore men that they may see your good works and glorifie your father which is in heaven 2. The second of our Applications shall be to us all but especially to the true Zabulonites that we learn highly to esteem this Religion we profess A Religion which has overcome so many difficulties been confirm'd by such Miracles continued by such a wonderful Providence through so many Ages A Religion that glories in so many Martyrs Doctors Pastors Bishops and Holy men of the clearest Spirits and greatest accomplishments in the World A Religion that corrects our Errours that bridles our Passions that sanctifies our Natures and gives us the greatest assurances of Gods love to us here and the most infallible revelations of a future and eternal felicity What if some little Spirit blown up with a system an experiment a fantastick song or some giddy vortex in his Head make now and then a fally out against this Truth Is it reasonable for this think you to waver in our Faith or grow neglective of our duty No we have a Law deliver'd by the Word it self which millions of Martyrs have sign'd with their Blood which the best of mankind professes the wisest heads of the World have illustrated with the lights of their Writings and for whose defence Heads and Pens the most able labour daily But alas that ancient Zeal which brought the Church to so great Glory and so vast extent seems much decay'd and instead thereof the Spirit of Atheism Heresie Schism and luke warmness has succeeded So that the state of Religion runs low the Word of God wants its due belief the holy Priests that reverence that becomes persons who handle the mysteries of God the Churches the decency of holy places And in short God is defrauded of that Glory which all beings owe to the Majesty of Heaven and we all want those comforts of Religion our wiser and more zealous Ancestors enjoy'd The Lord in his due time restore that devotion and prudent Zeal which was so remarkable in the early Christians 2 Cor. 9. 2. that many may be provoked to the same Repentance Faith and good works may suck the abundance of the Seas and treasures hid in the Sand i. e. the secrets of the Law and Mysteries of the Gospel 3. Let us all prepare for that account we must give when Christ shall seize the heritage and benediction of Zabulun and Issachar when the Sea shall give up her dead and the Earth restore the Bodies committed to her charge that so whatever our condition is in this World our Souls and Bodies may be happy in the next For They that be wise shall outshine the brightness of the Firmament and they that turn many to righteousness as the Stars for ever and ever Dan. 12. 3. And as S. John teaches 1 Joh. 3. 2. Beloved now are we the Sons of God and it does not yet appear what we shall be but we know that when he shall appear we shall be like him For we shall see him as he is This is that vision alone which can terminate all our desires in the enjoyment of that essence whose boundless goodness shall fill us with the perfection of himself For in his presence is fulness of joy and at his right hand are pleasures for evermore Psal 16. 11. FINIS