Selected quad for the lemma: woman_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
woman_n	bruise_v	heel_n	serpent_n	2,564	5	9.8176	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29031	Some considerations touching the vsefulnesse of experimental naturall philosophy propos'd in familiar discourses to a friend, by way of invitation to the study of it.	Boyle, Robert, 1627-1691.; Sharrock, Robert, 1630-1684.	1663 (1663)	Wing B4029; ESTC R19249	365,255	580

affirme that the knowledg of the Creatures does lesse advantage Man as it ennables him to Master them then as it Assists him by admiring and serving him to become Acceptable to their Author And what ever our distrustful Adversaries are pleas'd to surmise to the contrary certainly God intended that his Creatures should afford not only Necessaries and Accommodations to our Animal part but Instructions to our Intellectual The World is wont to be stil'd not unfitly by Divines The Christians Inne but perchance it may be altogether as properly call'd his Ship for whereas both Appellations suppose him a Traveller the Inne though it refresh him in his Journey does not further him in it but rather retard his progresse by detaining him in one place whereas a Ship not only serves the Passenger for an Inne when he is weary but helps to convey him towards his Journey 's End And according to this Notion to suppose that God hath placed in the World innumerable things to feed Man and delight him and none to instruct him were a conceit little lesse injurious to God then it were to a wise Merchant that sends Persons he loves to a farre Country to think that he would furnish their Cabinets with plenty of Provisions soft Beds fine Pictures and all other accommodations for their Voyage but send them to Sea disprovided of Sea-Charts and Mariners Compasses and other requisite helps to steer their Course by to the desired Harbour And indeed so farre is God from being unwilling that we should Prye into his Works that by divers Dispensations he imposes on us little lesse then a necessity of studying them For first he begins the Book of Scripture with the Description of the Book of Nature of which he not only gives us a general account to informe us that he made the World since for that end the very first Verse in the Bible might have suffic'd But he vouchsafes us by retaile the Narrative of each Day 's Proceedings and in the two first Chapters of Gen●sis is pleas'd to give nobler hints of Natural Philosophy then men are yet perhaps aware of Though that in most other places of the Scripture where the Works of Nature are mentioned but incidently or in order to other purposes they are spoken of rather in a Popular then Accurate manner I dare not peremptorily deny being unwilling to interesse the reputation of Holy Writ design'd to teach us rather Divinity then Philosophy in the doubtful contentions of Naturalists about such matters as may though the History of the Creation cannot be known by the meer Light of Natural Reason We may next observe that God has made some knowledg of his Created Book both conducive to the beliefe and necessary to the Understanding of his Written one Our Saviour making it one cause of the Sadduces great Error about the Resurrection that they knew not the Power of God And the Scripture being so full of Allusions to and comparisons borrowed from the properties of the Creatures that there are many Texts not clearly Intelligible without some knowledg of them as may appear even by the first Gospel The Promise that the Seed of the Woman should Bruise the S●rpents Head and have his Heele bruised by that subtle Creature preached to fallen Man in Paradise and by the representation of the Worlds Four great Monarchies and the Genius of each of them under the Notion of Four Beasts in Daniels prophetick Vision and that often repeated Precept of our great Master to his Disciples is coucht in an expression alluding to the properties of Animals For where he commands them to be Wise as Serpents and Harmlesse as Doves he does not only recommend to them a Serpentine warinesse in declining dangers but seems also to prescribe not alone an inoffensivenesse towards others the conspicuousnesse of which quality in Pigeons have made them though erroneously be supposed to have no Gall But also as harmlesse a way of escaping the dangers they are actually ingaged in as that of Doves who being pursued by Birds of Prey endeavour to save themselves not by fight but only by flight And indeed so many of the Texts in Scripture are not to be competently illustrated without some knowledg of the properties of the Creatures related to in them that I wonder not that Levinus Lemnius Frantzius Rueus and other Learned Men have thought it requisite to publish entire Treatises some of the Animals others of the Stones and others of the other Works of Nature mentioned in Scripture Only I could wish that they had been as wary in their Writings as commendable for their Intentions and had not sometimes admitted doubtful or fabulous accounts into Comments upon that Book whose Prerogative it is to teach nothing but Truth Nor ought their Labors to deterre others from cultivating the same Theme For as such is Gods condescention to Humane weaknesse most of the Texts to whose Exposition Physiologie is necessary may be explicated by the knowledg of the external or at least more easily observed qualities of the Creatures So that there are divers not to be fully understood without the Assistance of more penetrating indagations of the Abstrusities of Nature and the more unobvious properties of things an Intelligent and Philosophical peruser will readily discerne Now if you should put me upon telling you Pyrophilus what those Attributes of God are which I so often mention to be visibly display'd in the Fabrick of the World I can readily answer you that though many of Gods Attributes are legible in his Creatures yet those that are most conspicuous there are his Power his Wisdome and his Goodnesse in which the World as well as the Bible though in a diff●ring and in some points a darker way is designed to instruct us which that you may not think to be affirm'd gratis we must insist a while on each of the Three And fi●st How boundlesse a power or rather what an Almightinesse is eminently displayed in Gods making out of Nothing all Things and without Materials or Instruments constructing this Immense Frabrick of the World whose Vastnesse is such that even what may be prov'd of it can scarcely be conceived and after a Mathematical Demonstration its Greatnesse is distrusted Which yet is I confesse a wonder lesse to be admir'd then the Power expressed by God in so immense a Work which neverthelesse some moderne Philosophers whose opinions I find some Cabalists to countenance suppose to be not the only Production of Gods Omnipotence Not to mention Elephants or Whales some of which an Hyperbolist would not scruple to call moving Mountains and Floting Islands and to passe by those stupendous Hils and those Seas where the Light looses it selfe as Objects which their neernesse only represents so Bulky let us hasten to consider that whereas the Terrestrial Globe we Men inhabit containes besides all those vast Kingdomes the Unions of some of which constituted the Worlds foure celebrated Monarchies those spacious since detected American Regions that