Selected quad for the lemma: work_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
work_n	good_a	know_v	tree_n	4,740	5	8.9177	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A17079	The vertuous daughter A sermon preached at Saint Maries in Warwicke, at the funerall of the most vertuous and truely religious young gentlewoman, Mistresse Cicely Puckering, daughter and co-heire to the right worshipfull, Sir Thomas Puckering, knight and baronet, the fourteenth day of Aprill, 1636. By Iohn Bryan, parson of Barford.	Bryan, John, d. 1676.	1636 (1636)	STC 3955; ESTC S114258	15,760	30

This doctrine is pregnant of profitable uses It may serve by way of inference to informe our judgements Inference 1 1 That it is not sufficient to have the theory or knowledge of vertue onely but practice must be added to speculation It is not vertue to know good and evill but to doe good and eschew evill Our Saviour saith Jf ye know these things Iob. 13.17 Luke 11 2● happy are ye if ye doe them Againe he saith Blessed are they that heare the word of God and keepe it implying that the knowledge of Gods word and bare understanding of the mysteries of salvation maketh no man happy but who so looketh into the perfect law of liberty James 1.25 and continueth therein hee being not a forgetfull hearer but a doer of the worke this m●n shall be blessed in his deed Reade Matth. 7.24 to the end Inference 2 2 That it is not enough to speake well but wee must also doe well The Scribes and Pharises have this brand of hypocrisie set upon them by our Saviour Christ (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epict●tus They say and doe not Matth. 23.3 (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Arl. Eth. lib. 2. cap. 4. Too many in our dayes are like those Scribes and Pharises for though their tongues be steept in religion yet their lives are stained with foule abhominations to the great scandall of their glorious profession Let not these men thinke that God is any whit at all pleased to heare them speake piously of him and his kingdome and the righteousnesse thereof while they refuse to admit his kingdome into their hearts and to expresse the power of it in their lives Nay he is greatly herewith offended (c) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Agell lib. 17. cap. 19. Deut. 5.28 29. T it 1.16 What hast thou saith he to doe to take my covenant in thy mouth seeing thou hatest instruction and casteth my words behinde thee and livest unjustly and unchastly The Israelites spake well to Moses by Gods owne testimony They have well said in all that they have spoken but he wisheth Oh that there were such an heart in them that they would feare me and keepe my Commandements They proved afterward such as Paul speakes of who professed they knew God but in their workes they denyed h●m being abhominable disobedient and to every good worke reprobate Inference 3 3 That we must not content our selves to doe vertuous and religious workes but wee must have a care that we doe them in a vertuous and religious manner First therefore they must proceed from a good root and fountaine even a principle of regeneration within A corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit And to them that are defiled and unbeleeving is nothing pure but their best workes are defiled in Gods eyes Math. 7.18 Tit. 1.15 Secondly they must be done in obedience to Gods command Respect to his will must be the ground and motive of our working Thirdly Gods glory must be our utmost end 1 Cor. 10.31 1 Pet. 4.11 Whatsoever we doe we must doe all to his glory Jf any man speake let him speake as the Oracles of God if any man minister let him doe it as of the ability which God hath given him that God in all things may be glorified Fourthly wee must be abundant alwayes in good workes unwearied in wel-doing And finally when we have done all that we can we must say we are unprofitable servants wee have done but that which was our duty to doe Inference 4 4 That we ought not to content our selves with an ordinary measure of grace and vertue but we must seeke to excell others like this woman in my Text who excelled all other daughters that did vertuously It is the Apostles injunction 1 Cor. 14.12 Eph 5 ●5 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Mat●h 5.47 Seeke that ye may excell And againe See that ye walke exactly or precisely not as the ordinary sort of Professors walke Our Saviour saith That if ye salute your brethren onely what doe you more than others implying that wee must exceed others in weldoing Math 5.48 setting God himselfe before us as our patterne Be ye perfect even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect Inference 5 5 That we ought not to praise but rather to reprove and condemne vitious persons The Apostle speaking of some disorders among the Corinthians saith thus 1 Cor. 11.22 Shall I praise you in this I praise you not As who should say I have no warrant to commend such as walke disorderly Pro. 2● 4. Salomon saith That they that forsake the law praise the wicked branding them with a marke of Apostasie from Gods law that speake well of evill men Pro. 5.20 Against these the Prophet pronounceth a woe Woe saith he to them that call good evill and evill good These doe what in them lyeth to make Gods commination of none effect Pro 10 7. For he hath threatned that the name of the wicked shall rot and stinke Let not therefore ungodly ones who have neither the habit nor the exercise of any grace or vertue in them whose soules serve for no other use then the soules of swine to keepe their bodies from putrifying as if they were borne for no other end than to consume Gods good creatures expect any praise either in life or death Fruges consumer● na●i except it bee from flatterers for as to them who continue patiently in weldoing shall be glory and honour so to them who obey not the truth but obey unrighteousnesse shall be shame and confusion of face both here and hereafter Reade Ierem. 22.17.18.19 Job expostulates thus with his friends Iob 13.7 Will you speake wickedly for God and talke deceitfully for him If wee may not speake falsly to glorifie God much lesse may we to glorifie men Thus should we justifie the wicked and so make our selves abhomination unto God Nay 't is dangerous for men to affect and receive praise and glory when they deserve it not Reade Acts 12.22.23 Inference 6 6 That such as unfainedly desire and endeavour to doe vertuously shall not faile to have praise both of God and men First of God who hath promised that although the credit of his servants may for a season be covered with a cloud of reproach as Iosephs was yet hee will bring forth their righteousnesse as the light and their judgement as the noone day The Apostle Paul saith Rom. 2.29 hee that is a Iew inwardly that is really religious who hath the inward power of godlinesse as well as the outward forme shall have praise of God And this indeed is the true praise 2 Cor. 10.18 For not he that commendeth himselfe saith Saint Paul is approved but whom the Lord commendeth Secondly of men Men will praise thee Psal 49.18 saith the Psalmist when thou dost well to thy selfe Now a man then doth good to himselfe when he doth vertuously And not

THE VERTVOVS DAVGHTER A Sermon Preached at Saint Maries in Warwicke at the Funerall of the most vertuous and truely religious young Gentlewoman Mistresse Cicely Puckering Daughter and Co-heire to the right Worshipfull Sir Thomas Puckering Knight and Baronet the fourteenth day of Aprill 1636. BY IOHN BRYAN Parson of Barford PSAL. 8.2 Out of the mouthes of Babes and Sucklings hast thou ordained strength LONDON Printed by Thomas Harper for Lawrence Chapman and are to be sold at his shop in Holborne at Chancery lane end 1636. To the right Worshipfull Sir THOMAS PVCKERING Knight and Baronet and to his vertuous and religious Lady increase of all saving graces here and everlasting peace and rest in heaven THis Sermon preached at the funerall of your dearest childe who was a gratious Saint on earth and is now a glorious one in heaven I doe humbly dedicate to you both it being yours by all manner of right and the best Present J am able to present your Worships with My poore paines taken herein J heartily acknowledge to deserve neither yours nor the acceptation of any that are judicious but the speeches which proceeded from the heavenly mouth of your blessed Daughter which are here related deserve in the judgement of wise and good men to be written in letters of Gold and to be known and read of all men being full of life and power to quicken the dullest soule to a love and liking of the wayes of godlinesse The desire to heare this Sermon preached was great and generall as appeared by the great confluence of people out of Towne and Country neither is it doubted but that some good was then wrought upon many souls And the desire to have it published is greater and more generall there being hope conceived that much glory may be brought to God and much edification to men by considering the worke of God upon so tender yeares Your Worships have much honoured God and your selves by bearing so great a triall with such admirable patience and comfort What remaineth but that you alwayes set before your eyes this matchlesse patterne which proceeded from your owne bowels for your imitation that as you were instruments to give her a temporall life so she though dead yet speaking may be an happy instrument though not to give yet to increase and maintaine the life of grace and consolation in your soules You have begunne to cleave to Christ with firme decree and ●ull purpose of heart and the world observeth that you are already rich gainers by this great losse Goe on I beseech you and grow daily in the exemplary practise of a really religious life being fully assured that he whose glory you seeke and whose yoke you beare will in due time make up this breach and recompence this losse if not in the same kinde which I pray and hope yet in some other which shall be most for his glory and your comfort in the end Neither is there cause that you should overmuch lament the losse of this one childe seeing God hath blessed you with many children though but one living upon whom God Almighty double his blessings For to omit many whose parents in effect you are may I not call those sixe poore children in Warwicke for whom you have provided honest and profitable trades and callings every seven yeares successively to the worlds end of whose death there is no feare while the common wealth and lawes continue in life your children But fearing lest J should exceed the bounds of an Epistle desiring your favourable acceptance of this poore expression of my thankefull minde for your many favours J humbly take my leave and rest Your Worshi●s much obliged and in the Lord ever to be commanded Iohn Bryan The Vertuous DAVGHTER PRO. 31.29 Many Daughters have done vertuously but thou excellest them all THis Chapter spends it selfe for the most part in the description commendation of a vertuous woman The exordium or beginning of the encomium is in the tenth verse Who can finde a vertuous woman for her price is farre above rubies The conclusion of it is in the four last verses whereof my Text is one Wherein the holy Ghost giveth her as we see a most ample testimony and commendation by way of comparison for hee compareth her not with a vitious one whom it is no great grace to surpasse but with the vertuous nor with one onely but with many all which he witnesseth she doth not onely equallize but farre excell Many daughters have done vertuously but thou excellest them all The maine lesson which the Spirit of God intendeth to teach us in this context and especially in these words is this That such as doe vertuously may and should bee praised yea the more vertuously any doe the more praise and commendation is due to them This good woman described in this chapter is as you see not onely positively but superl●tively praised For the explication of this point Explication nothing needs opening save what is meant by doing vertuously What it is to doe vertuously Morall Philosophers define vertue thus It is say they an habit of the minde acquired and confirmed by custome use and practise enabling a man to rule his appetite and to discharge the duties of his calling in a laudable manner In fewer words thus It is an elective habit inclining the will to well-doing Now to wel-doing they teach (a) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aristot eth lib. 2. cap. 4. foure things to be requisite 1 That t●e thing or subject matter of the action be in it selfe lawfull and good even such as is approved and warranted by the judgement of wise men for this they make the rule of vertue (b) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 lib. 2. cap. 6. 2 That the agent both know and purpose the doing of it for he that doth a good action ignorantly or rashly cannot be said to doe well seeing science and counsell are the foundation of every good worke for as to him that knoweth to doe good and doth it not to him it is sinne so to him that doth good and knoweth it not or purposeth it not it is sinne also 3 That his end be right for hee that doth a good worke for some by-respect and not out of love to goodnesse and for it owne sake he may doe something which may be materially good but it is at the best far from being well done 4 That he continue and hold out unto the end in his purpose and endeavour of doing well for perseverance is the complement and crowne of vertue Divinity defines it thus It is a gift of Gods Spirit and a part of regeneration whereby a man is made apt and able to deny all ungodlinesse and worldly lusts and to live soberly righteously and godly in this present world And to doe thus is to doe vertuously Confirmation 1 For confirmation of this truth first I will give you some examples of vertuous women both out of the old and new

onely the common sort of men but also Magistrates and men in high place will commend and encourage us The Apostle Paul saith that Rulers are not a terrour to good workes but to evill Rom. 13. ● will thou then not be afraid of the power doe that which is good and thou shalt have praise for the same To come to the occasion in hand for I must wave all other generall uses for want of time by this that hath been said it may appeare that I have warrant sufficient signed with Gods owne hand to speake in the praise and commendation of this young Gentlewoman whose funerall rites wee now celebrate forasmuch as she hath deserved praise having not onely done vertuously but excelled all others of her sexe and age take them both together that I ever heard or knew of for when shee dyed shee was little more then twelve yeares of age And besides all that hath beene spoken for the lawfulnesse and conveniencie of this practise of praising the dead I have for my patterne and precedents herein not onely many late divines who have in those funerall Sermons which they preached at the burials of godly persons beene exceeding large in their commendations and were never yet excepted against for flattery But also many antient Fathers who not onely in their consolatory Letters written to them which lost their friends have inserted large praises of them but also in their Sermons at their funerals have done the like Among others Ierome is most noted who although he call flatterers sparkles of the divell Scin●llo● Diaboli yet none ever more exceeded in the commendation of any then he of that vertuous and godly Matron Paula both in his Sermon which he preached at her buriall in Bethlehem in a very great assembly of sundry nations and also in his Epistle written ad Eustochium which hee entituleth the Epitaph of Paula Aquin. 2 2● qu. 132. True it is as they teach in Schooles that to praise a man for that which is not praise worthy or more then is meet or not for a right end is sinfull and cannot be justified but with due cautions to commend cannot be justly censured I will not therefore put on that resolution which Cicero once did I will not said he be a prais●r Nol● esse laudator ne videar adulator lest I should seeme a flatterer for so I should not onely wrong the dead in robbing her of her due honour although she being received into the society of Saints in heaven needeth not our praises more than our prayers but I should also deale perfidiously both with God and you First with God Mat. 5.15 in hiding a glorious candle under a bushell which he lighted for others to see and worke by and whose command to his Apostles I have just cause in this case to apply to my selfe Mat. 10. ●7 What I tell you in darkenesse that speake ye in light and what ye heare in the eare that preach upon the houses Secondly with you in keeping from you that pretious treasure which may haply enrich you for ever One compares the words of Saints to pure silver the more you have of them the wealthier you are Mat. 7.6 Pro. 25.11 Our Saviour cals them pearles and Salomon sayes they are like apples of gold in pictures of silver Sure I am all that heard this childe speake oft in her health but especially the day before and that they shod died as the sun shines most gloriously at his sorting did wonder at her gratious words and might well say never childe spake like this childe so that we who heard her utter such divine saying● so roundly and in such an emphaticall manner were forced to cry c●●● Doubtlesse wee have heard strange things to day Neither can it ●e doubted but that the promise which Christ made to his Apostles was in a degree made good unto her It shall be given you what ye shall speak● Ma● 13.11 for it is not you that speake but the holy Ghost You know our Saviours saying to the Pharise● teaching us thereby to judge of the heart by the mouth i●●he life give not the tongue the lye Mat. 11.34.35 Out of the aboundance of the heart the 〈…〉 speaketh A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth good things The good things which this deare Hand-maid of the Lord brought out of the treasure of her heart argued it to be truely good 2 Pet. 1.5 6.7 The chaine of Christian graces spoken of by Peter did adorne and beautifie her sweet spirit neither was any one linke of that golden chaine wanting in her as might easily be evinced by demonstrative evidences But my purpose is onely to instance in three of those graces whereof when ye have heard undoubted proof ye may then doe like him who by the length and bignesse of Hercules his foot Agellius l. 1. c. 1. gathered the proportion of his whole body The graces or vertues I shall instance in are knowledge piety and patience they are the Cardinall graces on which all others hang and turne and these were very evidently discernable in her even to such as had but halfe an eye And first to give some evidences of her knowledge the Apostle taxeth certaine women in his time who were alwayes learning 2 Tim. 3.7 and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth whom he therefore calleth silly women She was none of those women but might truely say with David J have more understanding than all my teachers Psal 119.99 100. J understand more then the Ancients And the truth of this appeareth by the confession of her best teachers that they never received so much edification by any of her yeares as by her words as also of the Doctour that was with her who professed that hee never heard any childe speake with more judgement in all his life She did indeed desire to be instructed by mee her words were these J pray you tell mee what course I shall take to live this short time that I have to live as I ought Deare soule I needed to receive instruction of thee God saw my need and therefore sent me seasonably unto thee and I have learned of thee better then ever I did before both how to live and dye happily The Apostle exhorts us to be children in malice 1 Cor. 14.20 not so in understanding But oh that we were all like this childe in understanding For such was her knowledge farre beyond her yeares not confused but distinct not swelling but humbling not like the light of the Moon but of the Sunne a favorie affecting and hearing knowledge it warmed her owne heart and ours also Take one proofe of her knowledge in religion long before her sicknesse When the Nurses childe in the house was drowned and the Mother mourned sore for it she gave her this grave counsell Seeing Gods will is done in taking away your childe