Selected quad for the lemma: virtue_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
virtue_n	darkness_n	light_n	shine_v	1,307	5	9.6147	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A43139	A Sermon disswading obloquie against governours preached on Sunday Decemb. 7, 1662 in a solemne audience, and now, at the request of divers that heard it, made publick / by William Haywood.	Haywood, William, 1599 or 1600-1663.	1663 (1663)	Wing H1238; ESTC R25425	18,140	47

speakers that can turn the most venerable things into matter of scorn can scoff at the sacred Ceremonies of Religion as Michal scoffed at David dancing in his linen Ephod 2 Sam 6.20 The eye that mocks at his father Prov. 30.17 and despiseth his mother let the Ravens of the valleys pick it out and the young Eagles devour it How these kind of sins provoke the patience of heaven ye may see by those children that mocked Elisha 2 Kings 2.24 Together with the Derider ye may set the Depraver who interprets all occurrences in the worst sense 1 Sam. 18.29 like Saul the Tyrant who imagined David's Victories over the Philistines so many secret steps to the Kingdome of Israel David's courteous and affable demeanour 1 Sam. 18.15 his art to win the hearts of the people 1 Sam. 20.30 His obsequiousness to Jonathan a kind of cunning to save himself and discover Saul's projects Like Depravations abound with some of our people who interpret Uniformity of Divine Worship a stinting the liberty of the Spirit Appointing a convenient length of publick Prayers a Devourer of Preaching Reviving ancient and decent Ceremonies a step to bring in Popery We owe the beginning of all our late bloudy Wars to Depravations of this sort Let such kind of false glosses and abusive paintings be allowed ye may see by the common practice of subtil Lawyers how easie it is to deform the fairest face and to make the best cause look like the worst There cannot be a worse Requital of the great pains of our Governours and their care for our safety then thus to mis-construe their endevours for our good and while we enjoy peace and plenty under them for bread on this manner to return them stones Ye have seen this Evil speaking against Rulers what it is and which be the usuall kinds of it Adde now some reasons why it is forbidden and we have done And we need go no farther then our Text to begin They are called in Exodus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because they bare the burthen of the people Num. 11.14 I am not able to bear all this people alone saith Moses Do they bear with so much love our infirmities and shall we full of so much spight heap them with calumnies Then they are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gods as executing his judgements sitting in his Throne and placed nearest to him as his Deputies So that whereas Railing against one of the people is but Obloquy speaking evil of our Rulers is a kind of Blasphemy And marvel not at it Rom. 13.2 For if he that resisteth the Power resisteth the Ordinance of God he that depraves lawful Powers depraves God's Ordinance too Hence is it that Moses tells the rebellious Your murmurings are not against us Num. 16.11 but against the Lord And what is Aaron that ye murmure against him Thou and all thy company with thee o Corah are gathered against the Lord. And so are all that combine against their rightful Governours If Rebellion of the hand if Resisting be damnable neither is Rebellion of the tongue nor Depraving excusable Against the Ordinance of God they are both alike Against the Ordinance of God Yea and against Nature too For what more unnaturall then to repay evil for good and where all the Honours and Rewards we can devise are but a scant Compensation there to return ill language Disobedience and Contradiction to wound their Honour and Renown in whose good report consists our own to render for benefits inestimable wounds incurable For no art nor diligence can make amends for defaming Magistrates Private Obloquies may be recanted and some restitution made But Detractions against Rulers spread beyond all power of recalling and flie into foreign Countreys and blemish their reputation not onely during life but after death deceiving not the present age alone but posterity also and making whole Nations by their own tongues instruments of their own miseries The Defamers therefore of Rulers are not onely hominum but humanitatis hostes as one calleth them not enemies of men alone but enemies of all man-kind For every Reproch of those in Authority is a pushing against Authority and every pushing against Authority a step to bring in Anarchy and Anarchy is the worst kind of Tyranny turning a peaceable Order of men into the Confusion of wild beasts No wonder if contempt of Magistracy therefore be indicted as a breaker of all God's ten Commandments Of the whole first Table For who shall restrain Atheism against the first Commandment keep out Superstition against the second punish Blasphemy and Perjury against the third or uphold the publick Worship of God according to the fourth when Magistracy is down And of the second Table no less For if publick Fathers of the Countrey lose their honour how can private Parents expect any from their children according to the fifth Commandment Who shall punish Murther against the sixth Adultery against the seventh Thest against the eighth or Slander against the ninth Nay what greater Thest then by Slander to rob Magistrates of their power and our Countrey of their protection both at once Who shall defend private men in their right and property and keep off him that against the tenth Commandment covets and would invade his Neighbour's possessions when Princes cannot be quiet in their own possessions So of all the Commandments in both Tables the depraver of Magistrates is guilty Guilty also of the destruction of multitudes of kindling Wild-fire of spreading Leprosie of dispersing Pestilence For no such Wild-fire as the tongues of Detractors kindle No such Leprosie as proceeds from their foul breath No such contagious Pestilence as their mouths scatter No such Aegyptian darkness as they would bring in The good name and vertues of Magistrates shine like a Lamp far and near like the Moon in a clear night or like the Sun in the firmament The obscuring of their light by foul Aspersions is like eclipsing the great Luminaries of Heaven casting horrour and amazement on the world Adde to this the wofull Consequences too freshly bleeding in late experience no conscience made of reviling Rulers and shortly none of rising against Rulers none of Rapine Sacriledge Oppression Murther plucking the Sword out of the Prince's hand and sheathing it in one anothers bowels All through the mischief of virulent tongues which with their pestilent air smother the Truth overwhelming both Prince and people in a dark storm of Sedition and insatuating the Common sort with rage and Madness not caring like mad dogs whom they snarle and snap at whom they mischief or undoe persecuting Innocence many times to death and after death not thinking it enough they have murthered good men in their Persons unless they murther them in their Fame also to all posterity Rightly therefore are perverse tongues compared to teeth and the Detractor called a Back-biter Cal. 5.15 But if ye bite and de your one another take beed ye be not consumed one of another Elsewhere David terms such a tongue Psal 57 4. spears and arrows and a sharp sword For nothing cuts like it nor any such ready instrument of Murther The tongue of Detractors it was that nailed Christ to his Cross 1 Sam. 22.18 The tongue of Doeg that murthered fourscore and five Priests in one day Though Doeg's hand were bloudy also Psal 52.2 yet David complains of the tongue saith nothing of the hand Num 21.6 The tongues of murmurers Num. 16.33 that called in fiery Serpents The tongues of Corah Dathan and Abiram that made the earth open her mouth Observe what a fearful judgement and how all the four Elements seemed to abandon those Revilers of Magistrates Below the face of the Earth they sunk that they might not pollute the very ground they trode on From the Air they were excluded that their breath might not poison the air Beneath the Waters they descended that their carkases might not defile the waters Below the earth and the depth of it down to the center they were plunged down to hell it self that the earth might not be dishonoured with their grave O the horrid guilt of mutinous tongues that could deserve such a judgement What need more be added when Christ brandeth the Pharisees slander with sin against the Holy Ghost Mar. 3.29 30. and makes the foulest of all crimes but a sin of the tongue the onely sin that shall accompany the damned in Hell where they shall blaspheme and rail and curse themselves and the higher Powers when they can doe no more Let all these things move us to beware of so ungrateful so unnatural a sin as to revile and speak evil of those whose whole care and study day and night is onely to doe us good to blast and deprave their good names who defend us and our names and all we have else from injury Be so far from evil-speaking of such that we neither endure to hear evil of them from others nor to think or imagine any in our hearts or give credit to ill rumours we hear with our ears But inure our selves quite contrary to think and speak the best to put the fairest colours we can upon all that our Rulers doe to defend their Reputation and honour them as our Parents ever blessing and praying for them That God would deliver them from the peril of all wicked tongues and more wicked hands And though undeservedly sometimes they hear ill that they may never be discouraged from doing well nor by the unthankfulness of some few envious people be withdrawn from loving and caring for all their people But that Rulers and people may be happy one in another and being mutually praised and blessed one of another may receive the blessing of Peace internal and external here till they be received into the blessing of Peace eternall hereafter To which c. THE END