Selected quad for the lemma: mercy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
mercy_n	goodness_n	great_a	sin_n	6,173	5	4.6117	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A95658	A voyage to East-India. Wherein some things are taken notice of in our passage thither, but many more in our abode there, within that rich and most spacious empire of the Great Mogol. Mix't with some parallel observations and inferences upon the storie, to profit as well as delight the reader. / Observed by Edward Terry minister of the Word (then student of Christ-Church in Oxford, and chaplain to the Right Honorable Sr. Thomas Row Knight, Lord Ambassadour to the great Mogol) now rector of the church at Greenford, in the county of Middlesex.	Terry, Edward, 1590-1660.	1655 (1655)	Wing T782; Thomason E1614_1; ESTC R234725	261,003	580

first seasoning while life remaineth That dangerous time of youth by the envy and cunning and help of Satan carries very many young men left too much unto themselves into most shameful courses They being of themselves like a Ship on the maine Ocean that hath neither Helm nor compass and therefore moves it knows not whither Or in this like weak limb'd Children who if they be suffered to go too much and to soon lame themselves for ever Yet many think that in that time of life their youth gives them some liberty and priviledge aliquid aetati juvenum est concedendum they say which words abused make them the Divels dispensation and not Gods though they may fondly and falsly suppose that because they are young they may be borne withall in any thing they do as if Pride Drunkenness Whoredome and the like most fearfull exorbitances were not faults in youth they not considering that want of years and want of judgement which judgement enables to put a right difference 'twixt good and evill usually go together And that youth is like unto green wood which is ever shrinking and warping for as with the antient there is wisdom Job 12. 12. so pampered and ungoverned youth is commonly rash heady insolent wedded to its own will led by humour a rebell to reason a subject to passion fitter to execute than to advise and because youth cannot consider as it should it is no marvell if it so often miscarry The ways of youth being steep and slippery wherein it is very hard to stand as very easy to fall and to run into most fearful exorbitances It being the usual manner of young men so much to intend as they falsly think the love of themselves in the love of their pleasures as that they cannot attend the love of God And therefore that man may much better hope to come safely and happily unto the end of his course who hath passed over his first journey I mean his youth well But which is a very great hinderance unto many young men when they do but begin to enter upon their way there are many Parents which do not desire that their Children should be good betimes they being misled by one of the Devils Proverbs which is a young Saint an old Devill It is true that some who have been wild and wicked in youth have proved good in age But it is a most tryed truth to encourage the groth of early holiness which hath been made good by much experience that a Saint in youth an Angell in age And truly very many Children may thank their Parents for much of the evill that is in them beside their Birth-sin poysoning them as they do by their evill examples Children confidently believing that they may lawfully do any thing they see their Parents do before them hence Juvenal speaks well Maxima debetur pueris reverentia Therefore Parents should take heed what they do or what they spe●k before their Children As 't is writ●en of wise Cato though an Heathen that he was wont to carry himself with as much grav●ty before his Children as if he had been before the Senate of Rome The neglect of which care shall give Children cause one day to speak that in truth unto their Parents which Zipp●rah sometimes sp●ke unadvisedly unto her husband Moses when he had Circumcised her son Ex 4. 25. Surely a bloody Husband art thou unto me so these will say to their Parents that they have been bloody Fathers and bloody Mothers unto them in giving them a Serpent when they should have given them a Fish a stone when they should have given them bread in teaching them to swear when they should have taught them to pray un●oing them by their evill when they might have done them much good by their holy and unblameable examples as also by their early instruction and their timely correction which might have prevented through Gods blessing their rushing into the pit of ruin But why Parents thus generally fail in their duties we need not much marvell if we consider the carelesness or rather inability of most Parents to instruct their Children Scilicet expectas ut tradet mater honestes Aut alios mores quam quos habet Ju. No Mother can good precepts give Who hath not learn'd her self to live It is not to be hoped that Parents should give their Children better precepts than they have learn'd themselves But here I must prevent an objection and 't is this That if Parents be not wanting in their duty herein it is not al the care they can possibly have which of it self can make good Children For how many good Children have fall'n from bad Loins And how many gracious Parents to their greatest grief have been the Fathers and Mothers of most untoward Children The reason is because goodness doth not like lands and goods descend from Parents to Children for God will be the free giver and bestower of all his Graces and will have mercy on whom he will have mercy So then if our Children be good we must thank God for that if evill they may thank us and themselves us for their birth-birth-sin and many times for more of their evill then so as before themselves for the improvement of that evill in the ways of wickedness However we may conclude this as a rule that those Children of all others in all probabilities are like to prove best who have been best seasoned in their young years for train up a Child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it Pr. 22. 6. In the wars 'twixt Syria and Israel there was a little Maid of Israel taken by the Syrians 2 Kings 5. and she was put to wait upon the wife of Naaman the Syrian That Naaman was a great man with his Master the King of Syria and honourable saith the story c. but he was a Leaper and that stain of Leprosie sauced all his greatness so much that the poorest man in Syria would not have changed place with him to have had his skin to boot There is no greatness that can exempt a man from the most loathsome and wearisome conditions doubtless that Leprosie must needs be a grievous burden to that great Peer The Maid of Israel tells her Mistriss would God my Lord were with the Prophet which is in Samaria for he would recover him of his Leprosie Her Mistriss presently tells her Lord who upon this report immediately repayr unto that Prophet and is healed of his disease I report that storie to this end that it is very good for Parents to acquaint their Children while they be young with the knowledge of God and of his Prophets for we do not know what great good they may do by it The generall neglect of which and of many other duties of Parents for the good and welfare of their Children as the great faylings of others I have named in their severall relations are principal and most apparent

probaby so named at first by some Welshman in whose language Pen-guin signifies a white head and there are very many great lazy fowls upon and about this Island with great cole-black bodies and very white heads called Pen-guins The chief man of the eight there left was sirnamed Cross who took the Name upon him of Captain Cross He was formerly a Yeoman of the Guard unto King James But having had his hand in blood twice or thrice by men 〈◊〉 by him in severall Duels and now being condemned to die with the rest upon very great fute made for him he was hither Banished with them whither the justice of Almighty God was dispatched after him as it were in a Whirlwind and followed him close at the very heels and overtook him and left him not till he had payd dear for that blood he had formerly spilt This Cross was a very stout and a very resolute man who quarrelling with and abusing the Natives and engaging himself farre amongst them immediatly after himself with the rest were left in that place many of these Salvages being go 〈…〉 together fell upon him and with their Darts thrown and Arrows shot at him stuck his body so full of them as if he had been Larded with Darts and Arrows making him look like the Figure of the man in the Almanack that seems to be wounded in every part or like that man described by Lucan totum pro vulnere corpus Who was all wound where blood touched blood The retaliations of the Lord are sure and just Hee that is mercy it self abhorrs cruelty above all other sins Hee cannot endure that one man should devour another as the Beasts of the field Birds of the ayr Fishes of the Sea doe and therefore usually shewes exemplary signall revenges for that sin of Blood selling it at a dear rate unto them that shed it Every sin hath a tongue but that of blood our-cryes and drowns the rest Blood being a clamorous and a restless suter whose mouth will not be stopt till it receive an answer as it did here The other seven the rest of these miserable Bandi●i who were there with Cross recovered their Boat and go● off the shore without any great hurt and so rowing to their Island the waves running high they split their boat at their landing which engaged them to keep in that place they having now no possible means left to stirre thence And which made their condition while they were in it most extremely miserable it is a place wherein growes never a tree either for sustenance or shelter or shade nor any thing beside I ever heard of to help sustein nature a place that hath never a drop of fresh water in it but what the showrs leave in the holes of the rocks And besides all this there are a very great number of Snakes in that Island as I have been told by many that have been upon it so many of those venemous worms that a man cannot tread safely in the long grasse which growes in it for fear of them And all these put together must needs make that place beyond measure uncomfortable to these most wretched men To this may be added their want of provision having nothing but dry Bisket and no great quantity of that so that they lived with hungry bellies without any place fit for repose without any quiet rest for they could not choose but sleep in fear continually And what outward condition could make men more miserable than this Yet notwithstanding all they suffered these seven vile wretches all live to be made examples afterward of Divine Justice For after they had continued in and endured this sad place for the space of five or six moneths and they were grown all even almost mad by reason of their several pressing wants and extremities it pleased God by providence to bring an English Ship into that road returning for England four of these 7. men being impatient of anymore hours staythere immediatly after that ship was come in made a float with the ruines of their split boat which they had saved togither and with other wood which they had gotten thither and with raveld and untwisted boat-roapes fastned as well as they could all together for there are no such sudden teachers and instructers as extremities are These four got upon the Float which they had thus prepared and poysing it as well as they could by their severall weight hoped by the benefit of their Oares and strength of the tyde that then ran quick toward the ship newly arrived they might recover it but this their expectation failed them for it being late in the day when they made this attempt and they not discovered by the ship which then road a good way up in the Bay before they could come up neer unto her the tyde return'd and so carried them back into the main Sea where they all perished miserably The day following the ship sent a boat to the Island which took those three yet surviving into her as the other four might have been if they could but have exercised their patience for one night longer these survivers came aboard the ship related all that had befallen to their fellows But these three notwithstanding all their former miseries when they were taken into the ship behaved themselves so l●wdly as they returned homewar● that they were very often put into the Bilbowes or ship-stocks in the way returning and otherwise many times punished for their great and severall misdemenours at last the ship being safely returned into the Downes she had not been there at an anchor above three hours but these three Willains got on shore and they had not been ashore above three hours but they took a Purse and a very few hours after were apprehended and all taken for that fact and suddenly after that their very foul storie being related to the Lord chief Justice and they looked upon as men altogether incorrigible and uncapable of amendment by lesser corrections by his speciall Warrant were executed upon their former Condemnation for which they were banished not to return hither again but never pardoned neer Sandwich in Kent where they committed the robbery from whose example wee may learn that it is not in the power of any affliction how heavy soever it light and how long soever it lye if it be not sanctified to do any man good That when the rod is upon a man if he be not taught as well as chastned all the stripes bestowed on him are cast away A man might have hoped that these wretched fellowes had been long enough in the fire to have purged away their dross But afflictions like fire harden as well as soften and experience teaches us that the winds and waves though they beat with their greatest violence upon the rocks yet leave them as they found them unmovable It being a most tryed truth recorded by Solomon Prov. 27. 22. That bray or beat a fool in a morter he will not

warnings but would not take them before the woe took hold of it And therefore after all those monitions Titus the Son of Vespatian the Emperour was made instrumental to fulfill those many Prophesies which threatned Jerusalems 〈◊〉 overthrow But that Commander and Conqueror though a stranger● an adversary and a profest enemy to the Jews and sent to destroy them when he saw as Josephus reports the spoyl and slaughter which fell upon that wofull and most miserable City he calls his Gods to witnesse that he was exceedingly troubled at it He that is glad at calamity shall not be unpunished Prov. 17. 5. And if an Heathen a forraign enemy sent to destroy could take no pleasure in executing of punishment though upon enemies but the contrary men which enjoy the light should be by much more troubled in the beholding of slaughters which happen among themselves or brethren And therefore Tully writing to Atticus speaks exceeding wisely in telling him thus extremum est malorum omnium bells civilis victoria His reason because men having done much mischief already in those unnatural engagements are flesh't and heartened to go on and to do more mischief still Hence it was that the very Heathens were not wont to make any triumphs for victories gain'd in their Civil Wars as Lucan speaks Bella geri placuit nullos habitura Triumphos And there is very much to this purpose in that sad but very remarkable story of the Israelites and Benjamites as we may observe in the of Judges Chapters 20. and ●1 Some Benjamites there at Gebiah had committed an abominable wickednesse the rest of that Tribe instead of punishing did patronize it and chose rather to die in the resisting of justice than live and prosper in the furthering thereof It is one of the mad principles of wickednesse that when men have once resolv'd to do a thing be it never so bad and to say they will do it it is very great weaknesse to relent therefore they will chuse to suffer to die rather then yield or go back from their resolutions thinking that causes whatsoever they be when they are once undertaken must be upheld although with bloud And from this false ground the Benjamits there put themselvesin Arms and will be Champions to defend the leud●●ss● of their brethren and make themselves worse by the ab●tting of a monstrous sin than the others were by the commission thereof Because the last was done upon resolution and so probably was not the other Now that no man may conclude a cause therefore good because the successe is so the Tribes of Israel that went against the Benjamits had by far the better of the cause But the Benjamits for the present the better in their success for the wickednesse of Benjamin sped better for a time than the honesty of Israel Twise was the better part foil'd by the lesse and worse the good cause was sent back with shame The evil returned with victory and Triumph But wickednesse could never brag of any long prosperity The triumphing of the wicked is short And wickednesse cannot complain of the lack of payment for still God is even with it at the last as we may observe in the story of those Benjamits who in conclusion were made to pay extreamly dear for their sin In whose example we may take notice that the retaliations of the Lord are sure and just But after all this when the rest of the Tribes of Israel being so highly provoked had slain such a very great number of the Benjamites almost to the utter ruine of their Tribe for acting and abetting such a monstrous wickednesse observe how the rest of Israel behaved themselves towards their Brethren they did not rejoyce and make Triumphs for that their victory but they weep over their dead bodies Judg. 21. 2. and study how that breach a mong the Benjamites which their sin and provocation had enforced the rest of Israel to make might be made up again The Prophet Oded gave good counsel in a case which was something parallel to this and it was well followed 2 Chr. 28. for when they of Samaria had taken a very great number of their brethren of Judah Jerusalem Captives two hundred thousand and much spoil and were carrying it and them to Samaria the Prophet I say gave this counsel that they should not strip and starve but put cloathing on their loins and shoes on their feet and meat and drink in their bellies and send them home again and so they did There are very many who walk quite contrary to these rules and dare do as those wicked ones mentioned in the second Chapter of the book of wisdom saying let us oppresse and let our strength be the rule of Justice as if there were no power either in Earth or Heaven to contradict them But however let others who observe the courses of Gods Providence and withall see the oppression of the poor and the violent perverting of judgement and justice in a Province not marvel at the matter for he that is higher than the highest regardeth and there be higher than they In that Parable Luke 16. Dogs are mentioned and why so that their tongues might condemne the mercilesse bowels of their Master who shewed pity in their kinde When their Master had no Compassion on the poor Lazar he not considering that there is a mercy a pity and a care due unto the most despicable piece of humanity Frustra misericordiam petit qui misericordiam non facit in vain shall they one day hope for mercy and pity that will not now exercise it Undoubtedly there is nothing becomes power and greatnesse better than bowels and inwards of pity and mercy These make the faces of men in power to shine and themselves to resemble God who is most properly called optimum maximum first by the name of his goodnesse and then by the name of his greatnesse first by the name of his mercy and then by the name of his might But the ignorance of those Indians before spoken off makes them more pitifull than they need to be and if they had knowledge to make doubt of and to scruple other things as they should I might have spared my next Section which will acquaint my Reader by telling him further SECT XXI Of other strange and groundlesse and very grosse opinions proceeding from the blacknesse and darknesse of ignorance in that people ALl error in the World proceeds either from ignorance commonly joyned with pride or else from wilfulnesse This is most true as in natural and moral so in spiritual things For as knowledge softens sweetens mens manners so it enricheth their mindes which knowledge is certainly a most divine a very excellent thing otherwise our first Parents would never have been so ambitious of it This makes a man here to live twice or to enjoy here a double life in respect of him that wants it But for this knowledge it certainly must be esteemed better or worse by

God the happiness of his countrey and the good of himself and Relations to consider that here where there is so much light and truth light to guide and truth to settle men in the way of life and Salvation there should be so much wavering wandering and wickedness For aske among the Heathens who hath done such things the Virgin Israel hath done very fil●hily or an horrible thing as if the Prophet had said in other language Strumpets Harlots Prostitutes who sell their Souls with their Bodies had done but their kind but for Israel whom I have esteemed as a Virgin for England which I have owned above all the Nations of the earth to do such and such things who would have thought it Nay further as before considering all the means that we of this Nation have had above all the Nations in the world beside to teach us to know God and the great variety of mercies we have enjoyed to provoke us to love God that have had the wind and Sun of all other people the Sun shines not upon a Nation if we be considered collectively and together worse than we are It was sometimes prophesied of Jerusalem that Jerusalem should become so bad that it should justifie Sedome Ezek. 16. we of this Nation considered as before are a people that justifie Jerusalem oh what proficients have we been in the School of Satan when as those sins which the Apostle would not have so much as named among Christians have been so common amongst us so that we may boldly say how that Sodome and Gomorrah and those other Cities which Almighty God overthrew in anger and repented not those Cities which suffer the just and eternall vengeance of Almighty God lie not in Ashes for greater sins than have been committed amongst us But I can take no pleasure to be long raking in filthiness and corruption I will therefore make hast to give over this unpleasing unsavoury and nauseating discourse The rather because I know that neither counselling nor declaming against the sins of the present times doth much good This I believe that if I were filled with a spirit of false-hood and could prophesie of wine and strong drink my book would want no buyers to read and like it but I shall leave that discourse unto those that have not heard of Death in the Pot for my part I shall desire to be inrolled in the number of those who can wish with the Prophet Jeremy that their heads were waters and their eyes fountains of teares c. and that they had in the wilderness a lodging place that they might set down and weep day and night for the sins of the Nation and places where they live that they might sit down and weep and weepe over and over again those sins figh and cry for the Abominations they must needs take notice of by which retirement they might be freed from seeing and hearing and from vexing their Souls from day to day at the unlawfull deeds and filthy conversation of others and have better leisure to think themselves out of this wicked world Oh what cause have we of this Nation to beleeve that judgment is near when the Lord hath tryed us every way and all hath done us no good As f●rst God hath been exceeding good unto us in many favours so that it might have been said of England as one speaks of Israel that the Lord made that people a president of his love and favour that all the Nations of the world might learn by them from their example what God could do and what he would do for a people whom he loved but we have not been bettered by these benefits and doubtless if many amongst us had not been so blinded with light and sick of being well the body of this Church and state had never received such wounds as seeme incurable Oh if we had not sinn'd away our mercies God would never have taken away any of his loving kindnesses from us but our offences have been marvellously increased by our obligations there being no sins of so deep a die as thosewhich are committed against mercy The Lord hath tryed us otherwise his judgments have been in the land and the keenest of all temporall judgments the sword and the sharpest of all swords that which peirceth deepest because drawn amongst our own selves which hath made us our own spoylers our own prey yet we the inhabitants hereof have not learn'd Righteousness we have been encouraged by peace and we have slighted that and we have felt the sword of war and that hath done us no good Saevior armis Libertas nocuis Liberty as it hath been abused having given us deeper more dangerous wounds than ever the sword could So that neither the Majestie of God nor the Mercy of God the Goodness of God nor the greatness of God the favour of God nor the frown of Almighty God hath wrought upon us to reform us Now all these particulars put together they may give us great cause to feare what we shall be made to feel the weight of many sad conclusions which for the present we will not regard as that sin committed and unrepented of ever leaves a venome and a sting behind it and therefore that to sin is not the way to prosper that the longer a reckoning runs one the greater still the Summe and that the further compass a blow fetcheth about the heavier still it lights I shall speak it again under how many sad discouragements have many able sober minded and orthodox Ministers of the Gospel laboured in these later times who as if they had not enemies enough abroad find them at home in their own house their own coat proprijs pennis configimur wounded we are by our own quills by some who are excellent at close bites and though they speak us fair can open their mouths as wide against us as any others and then when we deserve nothing but well As the Athenians by their Ostracisme would punish desert and Crown ignorance But vessels that are most hollow and empty make the greatest sound and noyse And as love thinketh no evill So envy can speak no good we need not wonder at this when we consider that men of the highest deservings have many times had the worst usage And then if we find such dealing from amongst our selves we need not marvel at any thing we suffer from others from any from all that do not think well of us that do not love us and for that reason which Martiall expresseth in this Epigram Non amote Sabidi nec possum dicere quare Hoc tantum possum dicere non amote I do not love I love not Sabidie My reason of dislike I know not why When the Cynick was asked what beast did bite soarest and worst he answered of tame beasts a flatterer and of wild beasts a Slanderer many a good man sometimes feeles the ●eeth of both these of the tame beasts who when they creep into their