Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
religion_n	good_a	king_n	subject_n	3,003	5	6.4581	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A39714	A farrago of several pieces being a supplement to his poems, characters, heroick pourtraits, letters, and other discourses formerly published by him / newly written by Richard Flecknoe.	Flecknoe, Richard, d. 1678?	1666 (1666)	Wing F1223; ESTC R24037	24,825	93

spiritual ones and never perceive how miserable they are nor know they the whilst what harm they do to others for to do ill most commonl●y goes no farther then ones self but to speak of it is a spreading sin and one knows not how far it goes 't is like oyle which easily insinuates self into others minds and afterwards so spreads and dilates it self as the stain of it can ne're be wholly taken out again As the Weapon-salve cures at distance so do those discourses wound and they raise up more Spirits with them like ignorant Conjurers then they can lay again Amongst the rest lascivious speeches are the most dangerous of all for such is mans proneness to lust and the Lubriety of his mind as 't is well compared to Ice about the brink of some precipice which of it self is so slippery as they can hardly abstain from falling in but when you add the Impulse of others 't is in a manner impossible Such then I shall avoid as publick Impoysoners or as those infected with the Plague who long to communicate their contagion to others and there is nothing more infectious then such mens company Above all I can least suffer them when they talk profanely of God and of Religion and 't is but the duty of every Christian to reprehend them for it for as he shu'd be counted no good subject who could hear the King and State ill spoken of so shu'd he be no good christian who could hear the like of God and of Religion and this is that which renders the state of such as these more desperate and deplorable and wholly exempts them from the General pardon of other sinners for if he who excuses his fault redoubles it he certainly who Glories in it renders it a hundred times more inexcusable then before for by the first he only offends God but by this he Braves him too and the first may be repented of and so forgiven but in this they are so far from repenting it and consequently of being forgiven as they declare a will of committing it again OF RELIGION AND GOOD LIFE To Theotima I Knew a Noble man who was wont to say when he saw any one bravely vitious indeed That they were valianter then he who durst be damn'd And though we are not lightly to judge so of any one yet when we see any professedly wicked and Irreligious 't is much to be feared that they are in a damnable state for there are two things conducing to ●alvation a Good Life and Good Religion and the one without the other nothing avails us as the Apostle sayes towards the attaining of Eternal Life For the first our Rule is the Commandments of Almighty God which whosoever transgresses is in danger of damnation For the second the Evangil of our Saviour Christ tells us that out of his Church there is no Salvation Of the first there is no doubt since even the very Heathens themselves by the only light of Nature held absolutely necessary for a Good Life the observance of all that God has commanded us for the second there is much doubt even amongst Christians themselves Some holding they may be sav'd in all Religions as well Christian as Iewish or Pagan c. And if so what needed our Saviour to have come into the world to teach us a new Religion since there were old Religions enow in the world before Others again are of opinion That in all Christian Religions they may be sav'd at least and if so what needed the Holy Scripture so nicely to distinguish betwixt the True Church of Christ and Herisies pronouncing all Hereticks infallibly damned or such as adher'd to their private opinions against the Generally received ones of the Church which being so Theotima all who have any care of their salvation besides living well are to endeavour to follow the Religion anciently instituted by our Saviour Christ and to insist on the foot-steps of the ancient Christians to find it out which however obscur'd by length of time may yet by those who diligently seek be easily discovered Since then our Saviour has said that Seducers should come but that his Church should never fail Let us not hearken to these new start-up Teachers crying out here is Christ and there is Christ so long till they make many doubt whether there be any Christ or no which is all the fruit of their new Doctrines to make people doubt of the old and be certain of nothing nor will there ever be an end of them till they return into the old again For if it be lawful for any man to begin a new Religion another will presently start up and cry Why not I as well as he and so they will at last increase to Infinite As we tender then our salvation Theotima let us hold firm unto the old which our Saviour himself has instituted and taught us who sayes of himself That he is the Way the Truth and the Life the Way in which we cannot err the Truth by which we cannot be deceived and the Life in which and by which we are to live Eternally To the same Counselling him to write OF SPIRITUAL MATTERS YOu are the first Theotima who encouraged me to write of spiritual matters from which I confess I was but too much discouraged before by the Libertines of the Time who make no more of God ●or Godly things then they did of the King and his Regalities in the dayes of Rebellion But where should I find Readers when I have done when besides your self and some few others resembling you it is a Language none now adayes understand more then old ●sk or the Punick and Carthagenian Tongue when I shall find opportunity I shall not be wanting to it but for importunity this is not a Time nor Place There are spiritual Books enow already unless they were better followed and enow of Religion unless they were better understood Mean time I thank you for the good opinion you have of me to think me capable of so good a work whilst some are so scrupulous as they should think themselves damned if they should but laugh and have so little scruple on t'other side as to think me little better because I am not as melancholly as themselves I thank God I have always been a profest Enemy to Vice and although this be but a negative kind of Vertue yet 't is somwhat as the world goes now where those may be counted Saints who are not altogether Sinners as those who are not altogether knaves may be counted honest men and I thank God I am still constant to my first principles as you will see by these pieces which I send you here which though they are not so spiritual as you desire tend towards it yet at least in a moral way and credit me Theotima We have as much need now of Morality as Divinity and 't is but a preposterous way to perswade the t'one without the other or seek to plant vertue and piety in their hearts without clearing them first of vice and impiety This then is the way Theotima which I have ta'n which if I find but approved by you I shall with the more chearfulness pursue it and glory in the Title of being Your devoted Servant and Convertit FINIS

into the world when behold the mother having invocated Iuno thrice and Lucina as oft was at last happily delivered of a Son who had all the aforesaid endowments of Heaven and all the applaudisments that possibly could be on Earth for celebration of his Nativitie And as there are never wanting some on Earth who undertake to know all that is done in Heaven Your Astrologers undertook by inspection of his stars and calculating his nativity to foretel that in the management of Arms and perfect knowledge of the Equestrian Art he should be the compleatest Cavalier of his time and every waies the most accomplished But it was not their predictions that made him so but his being so that verified their predictions How he past his youth is not necessary to declare for youth most commonly are but the same in little as afterwards they are in great when they are men And how great he was would require a Chronicle to tell as how he surpassed Lucullus rate in peace who held that none who could not spend a private patrimony at an entertainment should be accounted splendid and magnificent and Crassus rate in war that none should be counted rich that could not maintain an Army at their own proper cost To tell his name only is Chronicle enough 'T is William Duke of Newcastle who as if his fate and the Crowns were inseparably conjoynd supported the Crown whilst he stood and when by the iniquity of the times he fell the Crown fell too till they were both at last restored again and raised to greater heighth then ever they were before The Crown by Heavens favour and He by favour of the Crown The Pourtrait Of MARGARET Dutches of NEWCASTLE IT will be most hard and difficult for me to make this Pourtrait well since other Ladies for the most part are all outside and nothing else and when you have seen but that you have seen them all but that which you see in her is the least part of her she being all soul and mind nor could an Angel in a mortal body be more spiritual then she nor have more interior graces and perfections For her exterior then I will only say that Heaven and Nature never agreed better 'i th composition of any one giving her a beautious mind in a beautious body and you would easily imagine her as good as fair to see when she sees any one in misery how tender and compassionate she is even like that noble Tree ready to wound her self to afford balm and cure for others wounds Nor has Fortune been wanting to make her as great as fair and good none ever better deserving it by the greatness of her mind nor comporting better with all states and conditions whilst none ever carryed it higher in adversity nor lower and more humbly in prosperity so counterpoising either within her self when others are all without themselves or too much deprest with the one or elated with the other To which supream heighth of wisdom since she could not attain without as supream and high Philosophy It ocurs in the next place to speak of that For which I need only remit you to her works in which she of all others has most reason to glory they being only Nurses and Fosterers of others opinions but she the true parent of hers using that liberty which heaven has bestowed on every one and humane custtom allows to have their opinions free which though in point of Faith and Manners of good Raeson it be restraind to avoid error and confusion in Church and Comonwealth yet in Philosophy it has been alwaies free Every one having liberty to hunt in common nor was it ever inclosed by any unless by some few Schools of so inconsiderable Authority as when you are once out of their walls you are out of their jurisdiction to whom she has been so little beholding as never any with less help of them addrest themselves to writing nor ever performed it more happily then she of whom one may well say that whilst oothers only traslate many Books to make one she without help of translation has writ so many As it is the Admiration of every one which being so rare and extrordinary in her sex does as little derogate from others as miracles do from the ordinary works of God Let all then cease to envie what she has writ or think that flattery which we write of her whose vertues and perfections are so great and many as they ought rather to think those envious who praise her not then flatterrs who do To the Lady GERRARD Baroness of BROMLEY Of Education MADAM ALmighty God having blest you with such a son as a more hopeful in Nature can hardly be you do wisesly and like a pious mother indeed to take care betimes of his Education without which Parents do but half their duty and leave with all the better half undone for Education is not only a second Nature but also a perfectioning of the first and that which whilst their birth makes them only children does make them men You are to consider then how that mother does nothing who only brings children into the world unless she takes care they should live well whilst they are there by which she makes both her self and children happy for a good child is the happiness of the mother and a good life the happiness of the child This being so if you but examine well what 't is that makes that almost all our youth now adaies have so little sence of Vertue and Religion you will find that 't is only because they are not traind up enough in the principles of either whilst they are young For the Age proper for their Educacation being chiefly their first fifteen years or their Infancy Childhood and Adolescence or Youth in which the main business ought to be the removing of Vice Error and Ignorance from their souls and minds You shall find that whilst their Parents take care only of the two last the first which ought to be the principle is wholly neglected by them left undone They never considering that man is like a Garden where it is not enough to ●ow good seeds but you must be daily plucking up ill weeds too or else they will soon be over grown with them During their Infancy then leaving the care of the first year unto their N●rses who give them suck As soon as they arive unto the second year their Parents should provide them of some discreet Governant who may carefully observe their natural inclinations either to good or evil and cherish the one and correct the other as they shall see occasion Some may say now this is too soon to begin with them and that children can apprehend nothing yet But they who say so rather want apprehension For when is the time I pray to bow and bend a Tree to rectifie it and make it st●ait Or make a Garment take a good fold or pleyt but when it is first put