Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	lord_n	zeal_n	zealous_a	257	3	9.3245	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A78017	Balzac's remaines, or, His last letters· Written to severall grand and eminent persons in France. Whereunto are annexed the familiar letters of Monsieur de Balzac to his friend Monsieur Chapelain. Never before in English.; Correspondence. English. Selections	Balzac, Jean-Louis Guez, seigneur de, 1597-1654.; Chapelain, Jean, 1595-1674.; Dring, Thomas.	1658 (1658)	Wing B616; Thomason E1779_1; ESTC R209057	331,826	458

bestow on me but I had only one heart to give you the propriety of which I offered to you eighteen years ago and you had gain'd it sometime before It is true the present was but trivial I am ashamed to put you in mind now that great hearts are so necessary in great enterprizes and unless you reckon a great deal of passion and zeal for something I should not in time of War have mention'd a toy of so little use as that Yet my Lord is there no place for a violent passion in your service Cannot a zealous spirit produce some thoughts couragious enough to venter beyond the prospect of our present age and more Noble then to injure the glory of your great Name There are some persons over-credulons in my favour as to imagine so and I were very happy if their perswasions were not upon bad grounds As it is the most ambitious of all my designes so it is also the most ardent of all my desires But herein I must confess I can but little satisfie my self For what ever indulgent friends say I have little encouragement to believe from the view of my sufficiencies I discover neither a Mine nor a Bank in my brain to suffice for the recompence of supream vertue for requitall of heroicke actions and for the price of that which is inestimable On the other side I want that other facultie which descends from above and is called Enthusiasme The muses do not answer me at all times when I call them and I have often times begun Poems that ended at the Invocation It is possible I shall be better inspired for the future The excellencies of invention may at length be infused into me from Heaven and I may have my part of those illuminations it sends down to our brethren of the Academy I attend this happy hour of inspiration with impatience that I may employ it well and I cannot live contented till I have testified by some eminent act of gratitude pardon that eminent upon this occasion that I am as I ought to be My LORD Your c. Feb. 25. 1645. LETTER VIII To my Lord the Arch-Bishop of Thoulose My Lord THE successes of which I receiv'd information from your Letter redoun'd so much to your glory that Honouring you perfectly as I do I could not receive them with a moderate joy You have had justice at length of the Senate but it was the same Senate that did it you You do not only receive the just Honours that are due to you but even with the consent of them who disputed them with you by one and the same victory you have gain'd both your cause and your adversaries affection So though the conquest be desireable but the peace far better nothing should be wanting to your satisfaction who have obtained at once both the Good and the Better It remaines now my Lord that you enjoy this faire calme and these dayes of Serenity you have made such that is employ them all in that harvest that respects you and in the conduct of that flock which Jesus CHRIST hath entrusted to your care If you would you might have climb'd to Glory by other steps But all things being considered this is the surest and shortest for him that aimes at nothing but Heaven Could you exceed Cardinal Baronio in the solidity of your learning yet it is better to follow Cardinal Borromeo in the Sanctity of your Life and be the subject of others writings then the Historian of their actions How happy do I esteem the meanest labourers that you use in your great work and I cannot express how it troubles me to be perpetually desirous of being with you and yet to stick fast here and to be able to profess to you only with wishes and idle passions I know not when that I am more then any person in the World My Lord Your c. Jul. 25. 1633. LETTER IX To the same My Lord I Perceive there is no possibility for me to execute my grand enterprize or to effect what I have had in designe these ten yeares My journey to Languedoc is likely to become the exercise of a man that stirs not or the dreame of one awake If Heaven will have it so I shall at least have this happiness nothing can hinder me the enjoying in my mind the contentment which I fancy My imagination that hath power to bring me neer to places where I desire to be walks me continually round about this distant happiness and puts me into possession of one of the apartments of your Palace and soon after lodges me even in your Library O how I contemne the Jasper and guildings of the Escuriall when I am in that Cabinet This indeed is to inhabite a more Noble and stately Court to be the guest of an infinite number of rare souls and blessed intelligences where after a repast of Tanzies and Mellons the entertainment might be with light and truth I do not seek out high words to abuse them I employ them in their proper and naturall signification for what is there My Lord which the desire of knowledge and ambition of learning can imagine exquisite and rare but is to be found either in your books or conversation those three or four hours I had the honour to pass with you presented to me the riches of ages and antiquity you taught me things which not only the commonalty of the learned are ignorant of but such as it may be the Princes of the Schools understand not The severall manuscripts your goodness daign'd to shew me left so faire an impression of Christianity upon my soul that immediately I divorced my self from my old Loves and bad adieu to all the muses that are not holy Since that time I speak nothing but of the Primitive Church and the Oecumenicall Councells and you have so alienated me from Pagan-Rome that in those places of History where I meet with Aquilae I am sometimes ready to change it into Labarum A communication of such advantage deserves to be sought though it were at the end of the World and a thousand leagues are nothing to be travelled for it To confess freely the voyages of the Graecian Philosophers into Aegypt do very much reproach my immobilitie It is necessary that I rouze up this Lethargy or to speak more humanely that I prop up this weakness and provide redress to this infirmity and since it is impossible it should endure a Coach unless in a Downe or a Meadow I am at this instant going to purchase a Litter to make it more capable of the journey and transport me without disturbance to the feet of a greater Master then Gamaliel The ambition of a spirit cured of the Court may well be terminated there where I shall receive your answers to my Questions after I have rendred you my respects and sworne to you in the presence of Eusebius Theodoret and such like kind of witnesses that I am ever perfectly My Lord Your

my gratitude on my Lips or desire it out of my writings Such a violence is not in your power You may dispence with me as long as you please for what I owe to the Quality you hold in the world but you cannot hinder me from acknowledging the superiority which vertue exercises in the Rational Word You cannot give away her interest with your own Extraordinary persons must be treated with respects beyond the vulgar addresses And seeing you are so elivated above humane things by the sublimity of your soul I am afraid I should make too long a conclusion and not express in telling you only that I am with a kind of Religion My Lord Your c. Jul. 2. 1643. LETTER XV. To Monsieur Remy Professour of Rhetorick and Poet Laureat SIR THis is not the first day of my knowledge and esteem of Muses it is fifteen years compleat since I was first obliged to them when they undertook my protection against Don Roderigo In all this intervall it hath been my designe to testifie my gratitude to you and from thence forward my Pros● ever did homage to your Verse in presence of our friend of the Tournelle I brought him to confess that curious arguments were not spoyled by my hand that I had good fortune in composing the Characters of illustrious men If this poor deceas●d should rise again he would confirme this to you in five or sixe languages for he spake so many and would assure you in Poeticall expressions but those affirmative ones for he would also swear sometimes that I honoured you three compleat Olympiads and had not the courage to tell you so had this backwardnesse continued longer it might have been called Cowardice if not by a worser name There is no meanes to contain so much estimation and passion in my breast they will force their way out by some short and authenticke declaration and give you to know that that ancient Client of your Muses that Oratour who heretofore made your Paneygrick in the Cabinet of Monsieur Favereau that Hermite whom you have newly banquetted with your excellent verses hath read them more then once with admiration and concluded the Metamorphosis is worthy of antiquity and the other pieces of the Metamorphosis I begge the continuation of your favour and am with passion Sir Your c. Jan. 4. 1643. LETTER XVI To the Reverend Father de Marin a Divine of the Society of Jesus Reverend Father MOnsieur de Marin hath broke his Word with us and hath pass'd over at St. Cybardeau without comming to Balzac I entreat you reprove him for it when you see him and tell him from me that the affaires of Catalonia might very well have permitted him to turne a League out of his way and bestow halfe a day on me Shall we never walke all three together in the plain that he thought not unpleasant at the bottome of the green mountain upon the banks of the silver River neer the baths of Diana and over against her Miroir I expect you there and him too to make him relate his own History and offer him that Historian of whom you have so high an opinion The Father Marin prefers him before Salust and Livy but it may be some less obliging father will place him beneath Ammonius the Monke and Paul the Deacon I am Reverend father Your c. May. 12. 1639. LETTER XVII To the Reverend Father Vital Theron a Divine of the Society of Jesus Reverend Father YOu make complaints against your old age and I am resolved to write the Elogium of it I will extoll it publiquely and in genere Demonstrativo that age which is priviledged and cherished by Heaven free and exempted from all the oppressive tribute that other men pay nature and purposes as an example by our goddesses to excite ambition and courage in our young men The winters of Naples me thinks have some resemblance with it those cleare and serene Winters that are gilded with light and crowned with roses that of Masinissa was lesse green and vigourous and the child which he begot at fourscore was a production not comparable to your Poem at threescore and fifteen The reason is that the fire which descends from Heaven by way of inspiration is not extinguished by the diminution of naturall heat and if Art have found out the invention of unextinguishable lampes the Master of Art may very well preserve in its full force the igneous part of our mind and make the ardour and vivacity of its operations durable Are there not some sensible representations of this happy duration who knowes not that gold is refined by waxing old and that the Sunne its father is as bright in one thousand six hundred and forty two as he was the very day of his creation I must therefore disclaime that erroneous sentence which I have formerly so much cryed up as a proposition of eternall truth That there was never seen a handsome old woman Pardon me that rash expression I was not then acquainted with your Muse which gives my proposition the lye and decryes a Proverbe to which I thought to have given eternity Her age do's not cause the declining of her beauty but is the confirmation of it by the very suffrage of Time by approbation of the Present as well as the Past it is not a mark of the victory of yeares over her but a trophy of her resistance and strength against time I speak as I am really perswaded but were I as couragious as the Authours of your Country I should expresse much more I should say at least of this admirable old Lady that at the age of Hecuba she had as many Lovers as Helena in the flower of her youth I could alledge an infinite numbers as well of those that burn at Paris as that sigh on this side the Loire But it suffices me to speak for my selfe who am the most passionate of them all and as much as any person in the world Reverend father Your c. Marh 4. 1642. LETTER XVIII To my Lord the Duke of Espernon Governour and Lieutenant Generall for the King in Guienne c. My Lord THe obligations I have to you affect me in such a sensible manner that I am much unsatisfied with my selfe that I am able only to testifie to you vulgar resentments and acknowledgments for them Perhaps it were a safer crime to present you with none at all The silence of meditation is somewhat more devout then the Musick of Hymnes and Songs There is no Sermon so eloquent as an Extasie and study may have flattery and dissembling when the distraction of the soul discovers the bottome and secrets 'T is with confusion of my thought My Lord and a discomposed spirit that I thank you for your favours It was with transport and the losse of speech that I received them lately and I should yet continue in the same condition were I not afraid to breed ill example among those that receive favours My

traunce must not ever continue so drowzy as to hinder me from turning my eyes sometimes towards that side from whence my good fortune shines If I be dumbe with admiration I will at least make signes that I am not ungratefull on purpose and when I shall taste those pleasant dayes at Plassac which you invite me to seek I will say at least in my heart that you and the Sunne bestow them on me or make use of a verse in Virgil It is a God that do's indulge this leisure The gods my Lord I speak in the Language of Virgil can not make a richer present to mankind nay they have not reserved a better for themselves for it was affirm'd by one that leisure was their businesse and by another that it was their proper possession I hid my selfe in the village for the better pursuance of this businesse of Heaven and to enjoy a happy idlenesse to satiety but my fruition hath been disturbed and I could not escape discovery Though this little corner of the world be unknown both to the ancient and moderne Geography and Mercator speakes no more of it then Ptolomy my ill fate ha's pleas'd to bring it into reputation since my comming to it and it is now depriv'd of that sweet and peaceable obscurity wherein things unknown do rest All the Prose and Verse in Christendome have learnt the way thither Paraphrases and Comments Orations and Panegyricks flock to it from all parts but especially Letters which claime a right to be admitted from the farthest Countries of the earth and do verily believe they come to their own home because I have written volumes of them They do me much honour I confess it This persecution is too glorious for me But yet it is still a persecution to a spirit over-charged and that is no longer able I fret and repine here in vaine against this glory there is no way to acquit me from it but by escaping into some place of freedome where there is not only a porter to tell them I am not within but a Captain to speak it with authority and repell curiosity from searching after me You do me the favour my Lord to offer me this place of refuge wherein I may hope to be in security and I know well enough that without need either of Captain or Souldiers you have no house but your Name alone fortifies It is the safeguard of other mens and War respects it even upon the door of a cottage How can I fear my quiet then when so powerfull an authority assures it to me and your goodness vouchsafes to own me of whom I am and will ever be passionately all my life My Lord Your c. Janua 5. 1645. LETTER XIX To my Lord the Duke de la Roche-foucaut Peer of France My Lord IT is a great reproach to me to be so neer a neighbour to you and make so little improvement of that advantage But it would be a kind of lesser treason to live in your territories and repose my self under your protection without expressing one thought of gratitude for it It troubles me I am not able to say an action of it and I heartily wish it were possible for me to venture so far But my repose being grown to an incapacity of motion I am constrained my Lord to render you my duty in my mind and be of the Court of Vertevill in the same manner I am of the Academy of Paris that is without stirring from hence to either My indisposition sowes thornes for me every where it meets with precipices in the eevenest wayes and the infirmities of age do already so over-press me that if they encrease never so little more I shall not dare to go out of my Chamber till I have made my will In this pitious estate you preceive cleerly my Lord my faults are rather from necessity then choice and that I am not guilty of my unhappiness I lose so much in the want of your commerce your person hath so many Qualities to render it desireable abstracted from those of your condition that were I naturally an Enemy of greatness I should not be so much my own foe as to keep at distance from my good when it were in my power to approach it There needs not more for this but common sense and self-love and as in some mens judgment I have some of this love to spare so in my own opinion I do not altogether fail in the rationall part You may please to permit me this little act of vaine glory upon this occasion I will receive it as a favour from you But on the otherside you will do me justice in this honourable beliefe of me that there is no person more truly in his heart then my self My Lord Your c. Apr. 12. 1639. LETTER XX. To Monsieur the Count de la Vauguion SIR THe day you had the goodness to come and visit me my spirits were so enfeebled with a restless night and I was so incapable of all reasonable Society that if you went not away with a very low opinion of me you did an act of very high charity Since that time the disgrace of that unlucky half hour hath lain upon my heart and I have often fancied what you might conceive of the testimonies and approbation of the publique Questionless Sir you accused the people either of simplicity or imposture you judg'd that they had suffer'd themselves to be deluded by a very unable man or else they would deceive others for his sake had I but an indifferent esteem of you I should comfort my self up against all you could speak thereupon but I knowing your valour great as your valew I must confess Sir I have doubtfull apprehensions of my reputation for I am afraid I have either utterly lost it with you or extreamly endangered it To piece my self up again some way or other and try to shew my self to you at a more advantagious light then you saw me I have just now resolved to send you the discourse I was obliged to make Of the conversation of the Romans You will find there what you sought in mine at least you cannot be ill entertain'd in a place where Consuls and Dictatours make up the honour of the house I shall think my labour happy if it please you better then I have done but I should esteem my self much happyer then my labour and believe I had repaired my detriment with advantage could I but evidence to you with what respect I am SIR Your c. Mar. 28. 1640. LETTER XXI To the Reverend Father Stephen de Bourges a Capuchin Preacher Reverend Father YOu ought to commiserate me instead of complaining of me You know well on whom the unhappiness of your seperation falls or at least who loses most by it since you will be so good as to take a share in the mishap For my justification be pleas'd to consider only the present estate of things You are the distributer of the favours