Selected quad for the lemma: father_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
father_n	holy_a	nature_n	son_n	28,107	5	6.0716	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
B08106	An epistle of a religious priest vnto his father: exhorting him to the perfect forsaking of the world.	Southwell, Robert, Saint, 1561?-1595.	1597 (1597)	STC 22968.5; ESTC S95268	12,378	49

AN EPISTLE OF A RELIGIOVS PRIEST VNTO his father exhorting him to the perfect forsaking of the world TO THE WORSHIPFVL his very good father R. S. his dutifull sonne R. S. wisheth all happines IN childrē of former ages it hath bene thought so behofull a point of dewty to theire parents in presence by seruiceable offices in absence by other affectuall significa●ions to yeld proofe of their thankfull mindes that neither any child could omitte it without touch of vngratfulnes nor the parents forbeare it without iust displeasure But now we are falne into such calamitye of times and the violence of heresy hath so crossed the course both of vertew nature that their ingraffed lawes neuer infringed by the most sauage brute creatures cānot of Gods people without perill be obserued I am not of so vnnaturall a kind of so wilde education or so vnchristian a spirite as not to remember the roote out of which I braunched or to forget my secondary maker and auctor of my being It is not the carelesnes of a colde affection nor the want of a dew and reuerent respect that hath made me such a stranger to my natiue home and so slacke in defraying the debt of a thankfull minde but onely the iniquity of our daies that maketh my presence perillous and the discharge of my dewty an occasion of daunger I was loth to enforce an vnwelcome courtesy vp on any or by seming officious to become offensiue deeming it better to let time digest the feare that my return into the realme had bred in my kindred then apruptly to intrude my selfe to purchase theire anger whose good will I so highly esteemed I neuer doubted but that the beliefe which to all my frendes by descent and petegree is in maner hereditary framed in thē a righte perswasion of my present calling not suffering them to measure their censures of me by the vgly termes and odious Epitheetes wherwith heresy hath sought to discredite my function but rather by the reuerence of so worthy a Sacrament and the sacred doome of all former ages Yet because I might verye easely perceiue by apparent coniectures that many were more willing to heare of me then from me and readier to praise then to vse my endeuours I haue hitherto bridled my desire to see them with the care and ielosy of their saftye banishing my selfe from the sent of my cradle in my owne country I haue liued like a forreiner finding emong strangers that which in my neerest bloode I presumed not to seeke But now considering that delay may haue qualified feare knowing my person onely to import daunger to others and my per swasion to none but to my selfe I thought it highe time to vtter my sincere and duetifull minde and to open a vent to my zealous affection which I haue so long smothered and suppressed in silence For not onely the originall lawe of nature written in all childrens harts and deriued from the bowells and brestes of their mothers is a continuall soliciter vrging me in your be halfe but the souereigne decree enacted by the father of heauen ratified by his sonne and daily repeated by instincte of the holy ghost bindeth euery child in the dew of Christianitye to tender the estate and welfare of his parentes and is a motiue that alloweth no excuse but of necessity presseth to performance of dewty Nature by grace is not abolished but perfited not murdered but manured neither are her impressions quite rased or annulled but suted to the colours of faith and vertew And if her affections be so forcible that euē in hell where rancour and despite chiefly reigneth all feeling of goodnes is ouerwhelmed in malice they moued the rich glutton by experience of his owne misery to carry the lesse enuy to his kinred how much more in the Church of God where grace quickneth charity enflameth and natures good inclinations are abettered by supernaturall giftes ought the duety of piety to preuaile And who but more merciles then damned creatures could see their deerest frendes plunged in the like perill and not to be wounded with deepe remorse of their lamentable and imminent hazardes If in beholding a mortall enemy wroung and tortured with deadly pangues the toughest harte softeneth with some sorow If the most frozen and fierce minde cannot but thawe and melte with pity euen when it seeth the worst miscreāt suffer his deserued torments how much lesse can the hart of a childe consider those that bredd him into this world to be in the fall to farr more bitter extremities and not bleed with griefe of their vncomfortable case Surely for my owne parte though I chalenge not the prerogatiue of the best disposition yet am I not of so harshe and currish an humour but that it is a continuall corrasiue and crosse vnto me that wheras my endeuours haue reclaimed many frō the brincke of perditiō I haue bene least able to employ them where they were most dew barred frō affordinge to my deerest frendes that which hath ben eagerly sought and beneficially obtained of mere strangers Who hath more interest in the grape then he that planted the vine who more right to the cropp thē he that sowed the corne or how can the child owe so greate seruice to any as to him whōe he is indebted vnto for his very life and being With yong Tobye I haue trauailed farre and brought home a freight of spirituall substance to enrich you medicinable receites against your ghostlye maladyes I haue with Esau after long toile in pursuing a painfull chase returned with such pray as you were wonte to loue desiring therby to procure your blessing I haue in this generall famine of all true and Christian food with Ioseph prepared abundance of the bread of Angells for the repast of your soule And now my desire is that my drugges may cure you my pray delight you and my prouision feed you by whom I haue bene cured delighted and fedd my selfe that your courtesies may in parte be counteruailed and my ducty in some sorte performed Despise not good Sir the youth of your sonne neither deeme that god measureth his endouments by number of yeeres Hoary senses are often couched vnder greene lockes and some are riper in the springe then others in the Autumne of their age God chose not Isaï him selfe nor his eldest sonne but yong Dauid to conquere Golias and to rule his people Not the most aged person but Daniel the most innocent infant deliuered Suzanna from the iniquity of the iudges and Christ at twelue yeares of age was found in the temple questioning with the grauest Doctors A true Elias can conceiue that a little cloude may cast a large abūdant shower and the scripture teacheth vs that God reuealeth to little ones that which he concealeth from the wisest Sages His truth is not abased by the minority of the speaker who out of the mouthes of infantes sucklinges can perfit his praises Timothy

was yong and yet a principall pastour S. Ihon not olde and yet an Apostle yea and the Angels by appearing in youthfull semblances giue vs a pregnant proofe that many glorious giftes may be shrouded vnder tender shapes All which I alledge not to claime any priuiledge surmounting the rate of vsuall habilities but to auoid all touch of presumption in aduising my elders seing that it hath the warrant of scripture the testimony of examples sufficient groundes both in grace and nature There is diuersity in the degrees of our carnall consanquinity and the preminence appertaineth to you as superiour ouer your childes body Yet if you consider our alliance in the chiefe portion I meane our foule which discerneth man from inferiour creatures we are of equall proximity to our heauenly father both descended of the same parent and no other distance in our degrees but that you are the elder brother In this sense doth the scripture saye Call not any father vpon earth for one is your father which is in heauen Seing therfore that your superiority is founded vpon flesh and blood which are in maner but the barke and rine of a man and our equality vppon the soule which is mans maigne substance thinke it I praye you no dishonour to your age or disparagement to your person If with all humility I offer my aduise vnto you One man cannot be perfect in all faculties neither is it a disgrace to the goldsmith if he be ignorant of the milleners trade Many are deepe lawiers and yett shallowe Diuines manye verye de liuer in feates of the body and curious in externall complementes yet litle experimented in matters of their soule and farre to seeke in religious actions I haue studied practised these many yeeres spirituall phisicke acquainting my selfe with the beating and temper of euery pulse trauailing in the scrutiny of the maladies medicines in cident vnto soules If therfore I profer you the fruits of my long studies and make you a present of my profession I hope you will construe it rather as a duetifull parte then any point of presumption He may be a father to the soule that is a sonne to the body and requite the benefit of his tēporall life by reuiuing his parent from a spirituall death And to this effect did christ say thes words my mother and brethren are they that do the will of my father which is in heauen Vpon which place S. Climacus shewing to what kinred a Christian ought chiefly to relye draweth this discourse Let him be thy father that both can and will lay his labour to disburden thee of thy packe of sinnes Let holy compunction be thy mother to depure thee from thy ordure and filth Let him be thy brother that wil be both thy partner and cōpeditour to passe and perfite thy race towardes heauen Take the memory of death for thy perpetuall pheere and vnseparable spouse Lett thy children be bitter sighes of a sorowfull harte and possesse thy body as thy bondman Fasten thy frendshippe with the Angelicall powers with which if thou closest in familiar affiance they will be patrones vnto thee in thy finall passage This saieth he is the generation kinred of those that seeke God Such a father as this Sainte speaketh of maye you haue of your owne sonne to enter you farther in the fore recited affinity Of which happely it was a significāt presage aboding the future euent that euen frō my infancy you were wont in merimēt to call me father R. which is the custumary stile now allotted to my present estate Now therfore to ioine issue and to come to the principall drifte of my discourse most humbly earnestly I am to besech you that both in respect of the honour of God your duty to his Church the comforte of your children and the redres of your owne soule you wold seriously consider the termes you stand in way your selfe in a christian ballance taking for your coūterpoise the iudgementes of God Take heede in time that the word Thecel writtē of olde against Baltazar interpreted by Daniel Dan. 5. be not verified in you whose exposition was you haue bene poised in the scoale and found of to lighte weight Remember that you are in the waining and the date of your pilgrimage is well nere expired now it behooueth you to looke towardes your country Your force languisheth your senses impaire your body droupeth and on euery side the ruinous cottage of your faint feeble flesh thretneth fall And hauing so many herbingers of death to premonishe you of your end how can you but prepare for so dredfull a stranger The yonge may dye quickly but the olde cannot liue long The yong mens life by casualty may be abridged but the olde mens by no phisicke can be long adiourned and therfore if greene yeres sometimes must think of the graue the thoughtes of sere age should continually dwel in the same The prerogatiue of infancie is innocency of childhoode reuerence of manhood maturity and of age wisdome And seeing that the chiefe properties of wisdome are to be mindfull of things passed carefull of thinges present prouident of thinges to come vse now the priuiledge of natures talent to the benefitte of your soule procure hereafter to be wise in weldoing and watchfull in foresight of future harmes To serue the world you are now vnhable and though you were hable you haue litle cause to be willing seeing that it neuer gaue you but an vnhappy welcome a hurtfull entertainment and now doth abandon you with an vnfortunate farewell You haue long sowed in a field of flint which could bring you nothing forth but a crop of cares and affliction of spirit rewarding your labours with remorse and affording for your gaine eternall domages It is now more then a seasonable time time to alter the course of so vnthriuing a husbādry and to enter into the field of Gods Church in which sowing the seeds of repentant sorow and watering them with the teares of humble cōtrition you may reape a more beneficiall haruest gather the fruits of euerlasting comforte Remember I pray you that your spring is spent and your somer ouerpast you are now arriued to the fall of leafe yea and winter colours haue already stained your hoary head Be not careles saieth S. Augustin though our louing Lorde beare long with offenders for the longer he staieth not finding amendment the sorer will he scourge when he cometh to ludgement and his patience in so long expecting is onely to lend vs respite to repent not any way to enlarge vs leisure to sinne He that is tossed with varietye of stormes cannot come to his desired port maketh not much way but is much tormoiled So he that hath passed many yeeres and purchased little profitte hath had a long being but a shorte life for life is more to be measured by merittes thē by number of daies seeing that most men by many