Selected quad for the lemma: love_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
love_n	grace_n	heart_n	let_v	4,990	5	4.5358	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A61192	Solace for saints in the saddest times from the consideration of the happy temperature and lovely composure of all times and providences as to Gods glory and their good : held forth in a brief discourse on the first words of the Canticles / by Joshua Sprigg.	Sprigg, Joshua, 1618-1684.	1648 (1648)	Wing S5075; ESTC R28871	13,744	53

glory in the Ornament of all manner of ellegancies then prose As Metaphors similitudes tropes and figures and most amiable resemblances taken from Jewels spices and vineyards Orchards Gardens Winesellars and the chiefest beauties and greatest varieties of al the works both of God and man the Songs in Scripture are the elegantest parts of Scripture Moses and Deborahs Songs c. Agreeably the Administration of Christs Kingdom is full of elegancies and they that have spiritual eyes and eares that can try words do admire them what elegancies in bringing Israel out of Egypt it is said he bare them upon Eagles wings Deut. 32. Especially now in these latter days this part of the Song that is now fulfilling abounds herein What high strains of providence neat contrivances Every other work is an elegancy The actions of our enemies are nothing but Ironies they speak evil against us but it is intended against themselves The wicked is insnared in the works of his own hands the Bishops made Cyphers instead of making the Parliament so Look abroad amongst the Turks and Indians where Christ hath no visible Church nor people and there is no such needle-work of providence and so it hath been from the beginning Gods name therefore hath been great in Israel only in Israel The Lord Psal 76. 1 Psa 99. 2. would not have us think only that things are administred in a just way but in the most comely excellent and heroical way That which the wise Ladies of Sisera's Mother are supposed to say of Sisera's prey in Deborah's Song may be said of the administration or providence of Christs Kingdom the whole piece of it It is a prey of divers colours of divers colours of needle work of divers colours of needle work fit for the necks of them that take the spoyl Christ is not content to provide things wholsom but through the inlargedness of his heart he makes all toothsom for his Church we have not only meat but sauce For this way he hath chosen to make known his manifold wisdom and to unfold it Ephes 3. 10. And beloved that particular believers do not observe so much in Christs private administrations to them is long of their eyes There are Christians that should another write the history of Christ and their mutual carriages which are transient and little heeded by themselves perhaps they would admire them be exceedingly delighted therewith how Christ governs their spirits answers their prayers subdues their corruptions exercises their graces the lively and lovely touches in all these could they be described by a pen would even proceed to a ravishment of the heart of whoever should understand them The elegant ways that Christ hath to fall off and come on in his love his chastning and cherishing love Therefore let us not look with Vse such dismal apprehensions upon Christs administrations publike or particular It is I says Christ be not affraid so I say it is a Song therefore be not affraid Christs heart was in love in the original invention of it and so it is in the immediate and particular acting of things it is a love-song a marriage-song for so they were wont to have Songs at their weddings in former times and when the Churches marriage with Christ is solemnized who is now espoused then shal this Song be sung with understanding and unspeakable delight Vse 2. 2. Be not weary and impatient we do not use to be weary of hearing a delighful Song Songs have that advantage above prose that they steal away the eare with a great deal of pleasure Certainly if you did but heare the melody of this Song and did discern the curiousness of the composure I mean could you perceive the sweet spirituall strains of Divine working in and Philosophers say If we could hear the musick of the sphears we might live upon it for the Church and particular believers we should not need to crave your patience Why beloved if you do not understand nor admire it your selvs through your dulness and heavines yet give the Lord leave to sing out his Song have that civility and respect to him Christ is taken with it therefore there is great worth in it The long suffering of the Lord is salvation if it were not a lovely Song Christ would never doaze himself with singing of it 3. Let us sing this Song as we find the Church singing some parts of it Rev. 5. 9. 14. 3. and 15. 3. You may see there what the Song is and who they are that sing it such only as are redeemed from the earth i. either such as are truly sanctified or more strictly such as are redeemed from the earthly Kingdom of Antichrist and indeed none but such can see a beauty and a glory in the administrations of Christ none but such can rejoyce in them Therefore I call only upon such you that are the Lambs wife sing this Song with lightsome hearts observe all the ways of Christ with your spirits how he walks towards you in outward and inward things what strict measures and proportions he observes in your temptations that they be not above your mastery and in your comforts that they be not too strong for you neither observe the variety and change that is in your hearts temptations conditions conversations in Christs discoveries and manifestations of himself to you and Oh how amiable a sight it is to see brethren live together in unity but more admirable to see contraries c. This is the glory of Christs scepter it reconciles the Wolfe and the Lamb the Lyon and the Kid. how harmoniously these work together for your good and Christs glory when he makes himself the more welcom to you by keeping from you sometimes observe what musick his hand makes by touching contrary strings q he strikes a base and a treble together many times the publike note is high and thy particular low a spiritual mercy and an outward crosse strike together or an outward mercy and an inward temptation Observe how certain and unmoveable your happyness is the whole Song would be spoyled and run lame q if one particular that God hath determined should miscarry therefore your sins and infirmities shal not be able to hurt you nay these together with your afflictions are part of the Song I am black but comely I speak not this that you should slight sin or not watch against it no he that hath tasted of the grace of Christ will not sin that grace may abound though he loves that grace well Let us sing this Song with lightsom hearts with grace in our hearts David had Songs of pure adversity of his deep waters but here is more sweet then bitter in our conditions whether publike or private 1. Remember the burthen of the Song is Love so God loved his Church and so thy soul must be brought in at the end of every staff yea at the end of chastning Whom I love I rebuke and

same Tenor that he did formerly Because he did not spare Israel for those sinnes that are rife amongst us shal we say he cannot spare us I might instance in many things wherein God hath vindicated his liberty already and for particular believers there is a manifest difference professed by the Lord himself and his pen-men in his carriage to us and former beleevers We are come not to the Mountain Gal. 4. 1. Heb. 11. 40. Heb. 12. 18. c. Better things are reserved for us We are not children in non-age but heirs grown up and so we have more love and grace and are less snib'd then they God is not bound to lead us about in the wilderness as he did them Nay he hath promised to shorten his work in righteousness Rom. 9. 28. So that though Christ spins a long thread of patience yet at length and even on the sudden he will cut the thread agreeable to Esa 10. 22. The consumption upon the earthly Antichristian Church State shal overflow of a sudden as the deluge of the old world this some think that this last division that is going upon the seventh Thousand of yeers shal not be above 700 yeers yet as much and more shal be done in this space then in any 1000. before for as all things draw neerer their Center and period of their motion they make more speed Thus the times and things of the Church and of each particular beleever are a Song both as they are contrived and acted by Christ 2. It is a Song of Songs herein I shal take in some Considerations not essential to al Songs or the Songs of all languages though the Hebrew hath a resemblance of all the delightful properties of any kind of Song the Hebrew and our English have greater store of these properties I shal mention then any language I shal instance but in 3. things 1. The Variety that is in some Songs 2. The Rhime 3. The Elegancies First it is the commendation of a Song if it be of a delightful pleasing subject and variety is a great commendation and bestows much delightfulness upon a subject when the invention is copious and various when there be various persons and various parts acted by those persons various times tempers conditions as this is the snare of Romant's invented stories they have such a pleasing variety of passages and accidents as steal away too much time and heart from those that read them why here is all the variety in the world in Christs and the Churches actions sweetly tempered and subdued to a delightful harmony all is an exchange of love between Christ and his Church but here is sometimes amantium irae and then redintegratio amoris sometime Christ making love to his Church and slighted by her then the Church as much in love with Christ and as little satisfied sometimes the husband casts his wife into prison and then fetches her out and sets her upon a throne My beloved the variety of conditions that the Church appears in as in several dresses is like Josephs Coat of many colours commends the mystery the more being subdued and tempered as before even as many flowers of a various colour and smel bound up in a posie are more delightful and do catch the sense more then any single flower or as many colours curiously disposed by a skillfull pensil make up a lovely picture which one colour alone would not do and as that is the chief instrument which hath most strings and that the best musick that is playd upon most strings and that the best lesson that hath most division so is it here The mystery of Christs Administrations to his Church were not so beautifull were it all of a colour were it all plain work though all prosperity c. No but a ground work of black sets off the brighter colours with a greater grace so doth the Churches Adversity the Churches Prosperity and her straits inlarge her mercies the Long suffering of our Lord is Salvation So for particular believers there is a variety in their conditions outward and inward and this is the excellency thereof there is hope and fear comfort and discouragement health and sickness temptations and inlargements sin and grace and the ground-work being laid in these black colours sin and desertion and affliction c. the light and life and love of Christ are illustrated hereby sin abounds grace super-abounds Rom. 5. 20. 21. they are cast down and laid low with temptations raised high w th consolations That ship mounts up neerest to the heavens that hath its vicissitudes of descending very low by reason of unequal waves Jam jam tacturos tartara c. jam jam sydera summa their prayers are the better their love the sounder their faith is more exercised Thus you see how Christs administration is as a lovely Song the subject whereof is variety it self and this the Lord would have us to consider when he calls it a Song of Songs and would have us delighted with it as he is and if we could but get up to the top of some mountain to see all the variety and how it is ordered and disposed beautifully it would inamour us what variety of dispensation hath there been since God made Adam and put him in paradise We see man up down and up again what then is the variety of the whole mistery which though we cannot see distinctly and particularly yet the Lord hath given us an abstract of it q in the Prophesies though a deluge hide the particulars And thus the Lord would have us to look upon one time and passage with another If you look upon a most beautifull picture and look upon one colour of it especially if it be the saddest and darkest there is no beauty in it but set the whole variety in your eye and then it is delightful So let your eye be upon the Churches beauty as wel as her blackness look on the issue God gives out of temptation as wel as his action in leading into temptation 2. There is Rhime in some Songs and herein the Hebrew doth Symbolize with the English more then the Greek or Latine do Rhime is when one line answers another in sound as wel as in number of feet Thus God makes one time or age to Rhime to another one Christians heart condition temptations to Rhime to another our Chastisement to Rhime to our sins that such a sin is suited in the Chastisement returnes of mercies to Rhime to our prayers Rhime makes the Song the more pleasant though the matter be but ordinary and this commends the administration of Christ that it is all harmony all Rhime q crosses and mercies sins and duties altogether All work together for good Rom. 8. 28 through the love of Christ the love of Christ makes the same ending of all his dispensations they sound all alike and that sound which ends all is Love 3. Songs do in a more eminent manner