Selected quad for the lemma: hand_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
hand_n	good_a	lord_n	time_n	5,857	5	3.5743	3	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29157	A sermon preached at the funeral of Thomas Shadwell, Esq. late Poet-Laureat, and Historiographer-Royal, who was interred at Chelsea, November 24, 1692 by Nicholas Brady ...	Brady, Nicholas, 1659-1726.	1693 (1693)	Wing B4176; ESTC R19587	9,404	30

gave me drink I was naked and ye cloathed me I was sick and in prison and ye visited me How pleasing and agreeable must the Surprize then be when they find every Instance of Charity and Compassion which they formerly extended to their distressed Brethren accepted and rewarded as fully and effectually as if it had been performed to Christ himself Verily I say unto you in as much as ye have done it to the least of these my Brethren ye have done it unto me Then every Action of Piety and Devotion every Advancement in Godliness and Holiness every Christian Combat and Struggling with Temptations every single Act of Faith and Resignation shall have its due Commendation and particular Regard How delightful and ravishing will the Prospect be when all their Virtues shall be thus ranked in order and attend them jointly to the Throne of Grace and there present themselves in their Favour and Behalf as so many Offerings of a sweet smelling savour Then shall their Redeemer know his own by these their Fruits and confess them before his Father which is in Heaven and they shall see face to face the Holiest of Holies in whose presence is fullness of joy The Scene is so glorious and so transcendently inviting that it needs no ●oil no Painter's Art of Shades and darker Colours to give these brighter ones more Splendor and Vivacity and therefore it needs not to be set off by comparing it with the miserable condition of such unhappy Wretches whose Works are said to go before them unto Judgment Sense cannot reach the Beauty of it nor Imagination figure any Resemblance to it for eye hath not seen nor ear heard neither hath it enter'd into the heart of man to conceive the things which God has prepared for them that love him Blessed therefore are the dead which die in the Lord if we look upon Death as the Entrance into another World For their Works do follow them Into this happy State and Condition I hope our deceased Brother is already enter'd with whom my Acquaintance was so intimate during my short Familiarity with him that it qualified me to know him as well as those who had conversed with him much longer and I cannot but do his Memory that Justice to declare that during the time of my Acquaintance with him I found in him a most zealous Affection to the present Government a great deal of Honesty and Integrity a real Love of Truth and Sincerity an inviolable Fidelity and Strictness to his Word an unalterable Friendship wheresoever he professed it and however the World may be mistaken in him a much deeper Sense of Religion than many others have who pretend to it more openly His natural and acquired Abilities made him sufficiently remarkable to all that he conversed with and cannot be unknown to any here present very few being equal to him in all the becoming Qualities and Accomplishments which adorn and set off a complete Gentleman His very Enemies if he have left any behind him will give him this Character at least if they knew him so throughly as I did and therefore it is but cold Justice in a Friend who received from him during his Life all the Marks of a true Affection which shall make his Memory dear to me when he is nothing else but Dust and Ashes His Doath seized him suddenly but could not unprepared since to my own certain knowledge he never took his Dose of Opium but he solemnly recommended himself to God by Prayer as if he were then about to resign up his Soul into the Hands of his faithful Creator These Considerations give me good Grounds to hope that this dead man is blessed because from thence I have reason to believe that he died in the Lord. I should enlarge farther upon his Character but that he always in his life time disapproved of that Custom upon these Occasions and most especially in relation to himself nor should I thus far have infringed his Will in this particular but that I was willing to inform the World how much some People have erred in their Opinion of him Let us then in the Name God so manage our selves during the Course of this Life that we may be qualified for the Enjoyment of a better that when we shall go hence and be no more seen we may rest from our labours not enter upon greater Miseries and that our works which shall follow us may recommend and not impeach us that so we may have a just Title to that Blessedness which is the portion of those dead which die in the Lord. To which God of his infinite Mercy bring us all through the Merits and Mediation of our Blessed Saviour to whom with the Father and the Holy Spirit be ascribed all Honour Power Might Majesty and Dominion henceforth and for evermore Amen FINIS Books newly Printed for James Knapton at the Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard THE Design of the Book of Ecclesiastes or the Unreasonableness of Mens Restless Contentions for the present Enjoyments Whereunto is added a Paraphrase with some Notes on part of the Book of Ecclesiastes In Octavo Directions to a Holy Life In Three Parts I. The Benefit of being truly Religious II. The Necessity of Good Works III. The Exercise of the Love of God By a Divine of the Church of England In Octavo A Guide to Eternity Extracted out of the Writings of the Holy Fathers and Ancient Philosophers Written originally in Latin by John Bona and now Done into English by Sir Roger L' Estrange The Third Edition In Twelves An Earnest Invitation to the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper By Joseph Glanvill late Rector of Bath and Chaplain in Ordinary to his Majesty

inconsiderate as to have no prospect of the Misery that attends him yet at best he sees nothing before him but Darkness and Confusion a Land of Silence where all things are forgotten It is therefore absolutely necessary that we live here as Probationers for Heaven and Happiness if we expect hereafter to be partakers of that Blessedness which is the Portion of those dead who die in the Lord. You have been told already that to die in the Lord is to die in his Fear and in his Favour But how shall he die in the Fear of the Lord whose Days have been consumed in the Contempt of his Commandments Or how shall he die in the Favour of the Lord whose Life has been full of rebellious Provocations He may die indeed under the Terrours of the Lord but not in his Fear or perhaps flatter'd by his own deceitful Heart but not favour'd by the Almighty In deed could we all know our End and the Number of our Days and were every one of us certified how long he has to live it might seem tolerably safe to devote some part of our Life to Sin and Folly reserving at the same time a considerable Portion for the After-Exercises of Piety and Devotion we might then for some years indulge our sinful Appetites and set by so many more for the working out our Salvation But alas we know not how soon Death may seize upon us his Arrest may be sudden surprizing and unlooked for we ought therefore to live in the constant expectation and be conversant perpetually in our Preparations for it Watch ye therefore says our Saviour for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of Man cometh And what will become of us if our Lord when he comes shall find us sleeping It will then be in vain to ask when he will be no more entreated in vain to seek him when be will not be found in vain to knock when the Gate is shut against us then if we cry never so much Lord Lord open unto us we shall receive no other Answer but a positive Denial Verily I say unto you I know you not Depart from me ye workers of iniquity This Life is the Day wherein we must work the Night of Death is drawing on apace wherein no Man can work and besides the great Danger of being surprized by that how madly does he proceed that squanders away the Morning and the Noon of Life and sets not about his Days work until the Evening How comfortless every night must that Man lie down to his necessary Repose that knows not but he may wake in another World and yet finds himself to be unprepared for it Can any Man be secure of dying in the Lord that takes no care to go to Bed in his Favour and yet cannot tell but he may die before he rises He that would make sure of so blessed a Condition should live every Day as if it were his last be always disintangled from the Cares of this World as if he were then upon taking his leave of it have his thoughts still fixed upon a Blessed Eternity as if he were just launching out into it for our Lord may come in a day when we look not for him and in an hour that we are not aware of and therefore the only sure Way not to be taken unprovided is to be every hour prepared as if that were it It is an easie thing to say I will repent to morrow I will consider my ways and fit my self for my end but are we sure that to-morrow is our own And may not our Case be like the rich Man 's in the Gospel whose Soul was required of him that very night The Disappointment in this Case is so very dreadful being not only the loss of a few hours which we proposed to our selves here but of a joyful Eternity in the World which is to come that it will highly concern every reasonable Man timely to provide against so dismal a Misfortune and this can be done no better a way than by a stedfast Faith and an uniform Obedience 1. Then a stedfast Faith is an excellent Preparative to qualifie us at all times for dying in the Lord. Faith says the Apostle is the substance of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen by this we depend upon the Promises of God and settle to our selves a firm assurance of them this discloses to us the Secrets of the invisible World and makes us familiar with that Land of Spirits it sets Heaven and Happiness before our Eyes it lifts up the Heads of those eternal Gates and sets wide open the everlasting Doors it gives us a Relish and Antepast of that Glory which shall one day be revealed and makes us taste and see how good the Lord is By this Stephen saw the Glory of God and Jesus standing on the Right Hand of the Almighty by this St. Paul was rap'd into the third Heaven and heard and saw such things as were unspeakable through this he desired to be dissolved and to be with Christ this made all the Sufferings of Martyrs and Confessors easie to them and delightful this supports the Faithful in the Agonies of Death and makes up in a very great measure the Blessedness of those dead which die in the Lord. But 2. An uniform Obedience is an excellent Preparative to qualifie us at all times for dying in the Lord. This secures to us those precious Advantages which Faith but reveals and entitles us to the Treasures which that only discloses this fits us for the Enjoyment of a Blessed Immortality and applies to us the Promises of eternal Felicity that indeed shews us what Heaven is but this assures us that it is ours that gives us a View of everlasting Happiness this puts us actually in possession of it For Christianity my Brethren is not a bare Speculation it is defined to be a Practical Science and the main intent of it is to regulate our Actions It is true indeed in order to that it must inform our Understandings but if it operates upon us no farther it only enhances the Heinousness of our Transgressions by making every offence become a sin against Knowledge And therefore we find the Holy Apostle when he compares together the three great Christian Graces giving the Preference to that which is Practical to the prejudice of the others which are chiefly Contemplative Now remain says he Faith Hope Charity these three but the greatest of these is Charity He then who is always conversant in the Duties of his Profession always employed in the Exercises of Devotion and keeps a Conscience void of offence towards God and towards man he is the Man who let Death come when it will is never found dejected or unprovided Blessed is that wise and faithful servant whom his Lord when he cometh shall find so doing he takes the surest and most infallible way to secure to himself whenever he shall die the