Selected quad for the lemma: water_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
water_n	grain_n	year_n	young_a	171	3	7.9016	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52345	A treatise of the difference bbtwixt [sic] the temporal and eternal composed in Spanish by Eusebius Nieremberg ... ; translated into English by Sir Vivian Mullineaux, Knight ; and since reviewed according to the tenth and last Spanish edition.; De la diferencia entre lo temporal y eterno. English	Nieremberg, Juan Eusebio, 1595-1658.; Mullineaux, Vivian, Sir.	1672 (1672)	Wing N1151; ESTC R181007	420,886	606

which must not there happen the Gates on all parts being shut to comfort Hope beguiles us in our evils and in some sort frees us from the sense of suffering There is no labour or toil so great which hope makes not tolerable The most afflicted and wretched persons live and subsist with expectation that one day their miseries will change or end But that ease and comfort is denied the damned whose unhappiness is never to have an end nor their torments alteration They would esteem it for a comfort if a thousand years hence they might be sure of that little drop of water begg'd by the rich glutton But what speak I of a thousand years it after an hundred thousand after a thousand times so many so that some certain time were prefixed and the door but of some small hope set open unto them If all the space which is taken up by the Earth covered by the Water filled with the Air and encompassed by the Heavens were full of grains of Wheat And a damned Soul were told that after all that Wheat were eaten by some small Bird which after every hundred thousand years should come to take one grain and when it should have taken away the last they would give it that drop of water which was demanded by the assistance of Lazarus it would be comforted to see this onely change and so small an ease in the midst of his pains Yet it shall not have this and after so many millions of millions of years the miserable wretch shall be in the same torments raging in the same manner and as much void of all comfort as ever This is it shall burst the hearts of the damned when they shall perceive all remedies to be then impossible which in this life were so easie to be obtained With the crums of bread which fell from his table the rich Glutton might have purchased eternal happiness and now the refreshment of one drop of water is denied him What rancour shall they have against themselves when they shall remember that by the forbearance of one momentary pleasure they might have escaped eternal torments How raging will their very entrails be to consider that that is now past help which was heretofore so easily to be avoided Let therefore a Christian open his eyes and whilest he may remedy that which hereafter when he would will be impossible Now is the time acceptable now is the time of Salvation now is the time of pardon and indulgence now that may be gained in a moment which all Eternity cannot hereafter redeem What other thing was signified unto us by the flames of the Babylonian furnace Dan. 3. which as the Scripture saith mounted unto the height of fourty nine Cubits It doth not say fifty as is usual in other places to give the compleat number although some be wanting And who I pray you approached so near unto that flame which flew and moved up and down in the air that could so punctually measure the height of it to arise just unto fourty nine Cubits and not to reach fifty But herein was the Mystery which we are about to speak off The Number of fifty was the Number of the Jubilee and signified Indulgence and Pardon and by the flames of that Furnace were figured the flames of Hell which how far soever they shall exceed the torments of this life yet shall never attain unto a Jubilee and remission of their pains Now 't is true they may Now every year every moneth every day every hour and every moment is a time of Pardon and Jubilee What would a damned Soul give for one onely quarter of an hour of those whole days and weeks which men mispend in this life for to be able to do penance in Let us not therefore be prodigal of a thing so precious let us not lose time and and with it Eternal Glory The time of this life is so precious that St. Bernardin dares give it this exaggeration saying That time is worth as much as God because by it God is gained Let us not therefore fling away a thing of that value but let us make use of this cheap bargain purchasing with time Eternity and God himself the Lord of Eternity fulfilling that which was said by Ecclesiasticus Eccl. 20. Is there any who for a small price will redeem many things Upon which words Galfridus says Galfrid in Cant. If there be due unto thee eternal bitterness and thou mayst escape it by suffering what is temporal certainly thou hast redeemed great matters for a small price In blessings eternal it is likewise a great comfort to have them free from change so as they can neither end nor diminish and that temporal Goods changing and consuming themselves they remain in the same firm and stable condition for all Eternity Let a Christian compare the brevity and inconstancie of the things of this life with the immutability and eternal duration of those of the other Let him seriously observe the difference betwixt those two words Now and Ever The fools of this world say Let us now rejoyce The wise and vertuous say it is better that we forbear our pleasures now that we may hereafter enjoy eternal happiness The worldlings say Let us now live daintily and fare deliciously The Servants of Christ say Let us dye in the flesh that we may live ever without change The Sinners say Let us now enjoy the world They who fear God say Let us flie from this unstable world that we may for ever enjoy the Coelestial Compare these two and see who are the wiser those who aim only at which endures but this momentary instant Now or those who look after Eternity which lasts for ever those who shall suffer eternally without any profit at all or those who are content to suffer a little in this world for so great a gain as is the Kingdom of Heaven O most miserable and disconsolate life of the damned who are n●ither to have end in their torments change in their griefs nor to reap profit by the pains which they suffer Three things onely afford us comfort in the troubles of this life that either they may end or become more supportable by change or at least that we shall be recompensed by some benefit for our sufferance all which will fail in eternal pains in which there is no hope either of end change or profit A fearful mistake to suffer for a whole Eternity without benefit hereafter for not suffering a moment now with so great a reward as is the eternal Glory of God and Kingdom of Heaven CAP. X. How Eternity is without comparison FRom what is already spoken may be collected the third Quality of Eternity which is to be without comparison For as there is no comparison betwixt what is infinite and what is finite so there can be none betwixt what is Eternal and what is Temporal And as the Mountain Olympus or if any greater in the world is

brought forth The same happened in the Siege of Jerusalem as Eusebius recounts in his Ecclesiastical History At the Siege of Numantia when Scipio had cut off all provisions from entring the Town the Inhabitants fell into that mortal and dog-like famine that every day they sallied forth to catch Romans as if they had hunted after wilde beasts Those whom they took they fed upon their flesh and drunk their blood as if they had drunk fountain water or fed upon Kid. They pardoned none but such as fell into their hands were cut in quarters and sold by pieces publickly in the Butchery in so much as the flesh of a dead Roman was of greater value than the ransome of a live one In the fourth book of Kings there is mention made of a Famine in Samaria in the time of Elizeus the Prophet which much exceeds this The want of food was so great that the head of an Ass was sold for 80 pieces of silver and the fourth part of a small measure of Pigeons dung for 5 pieces The most lamentable and inhumane was that having spent all their provision Women eat their own Children and one Woman complained to the King of Israel that her neighbour had broken an Agreement made betwixt them which was That they should first eat her Child and that done the others I sayes she have complied with my obligation and we have already eaten mine and now she hath hid hers and denies me my part Which the King hearing rent his garments and was struck with unspeakable sorrow Josephus in the seaventh Book of the Wars of the Jews relates a story much like unto this Joseph l. 7. de bel Jud. c. 2. but executed with more fury and after a more strange manner There was saith he in Jerusalem when it was besieged a Lady rich and noble who had hid in a house of the City the most part of her wealth and of the rest lived sparingly and with great moderation But she was not suffered to do so long for the Souldiers of the Garrison discovering her stock in a short time bereaved her both of what she had within doors and without and if she chanced at any time to be relieved by friends or beg some little thing to asswage her hunger they would take it from her and tear the morsel out of her mouth Seeing her self therefore destitute of all hope or counsel and certain to die of hunger and no possible remedy left for her necessities she began to arm her self against the laws of Nature and beholding the Infant which hung at her breast she cried out in this manner O unhappy Son of a more unhappy Mother how shall I now dispose of thee where shall I preserve thee things are driven to that exigent that though I save thy life from famine thou art certain to be a Slave to the Romans Better it is my Son that thou now sustain thy Mother who gave thee being and strike a terrour into those cursed Souldiers who have left me no other way of subsisting better that thou become an argument of pity unto future ages and raise sorrow in hearts not yet born At these words she cut the throat of her tender Infant divided it in the middle rosted one half and eat it and laid aside the rest for another meal She had no sooner ended this lamentable Tragedy but the Souldiers entred who smelling the rosted flesh began to threaten the Woman with death if she discovered not her store But she distracted with rage and horrour of her act and desiring nothing more than to accompany her dead Infant without fear or being abashed at all replied in this manner Peace friends we will share like brothers and saying this she fetched the half Child and placed it upon the Table before them At which hideous sight the Souldiers being amazed and confounded conceiv'd so great horrour and compassion in their hearts that they were not able to utter one word but she to the contrary staring upon them with a wilde countenance full of fury and distraction with a hoarse and broken voice spake in this manner Why how now Masters how comes this to pass is not this my Son the fruit of my own body is not this my act why do ye not then eat since I have begun unto you are you perhaps more nice than a Woman are you more scrupulous than the Mother which bore it for shame fall too It is I who have eaten of it first and 't is I will bear you company in eating of the rest But they not being able to behold so horrible a spectacle fled out of doors and left the miserable Mother with that little which remained of her Son and all her wealth Unto these stories I shall add one more lamentable in which will clearly appear unto what calamity humane life stands exposed It is written by William Paradin a man of great learning and diligence in a Treatise of things memorable in his time He relates it thus In the year 1528 men were grown so dissolute in their lives and so given over to all sorts of wickedness that notwithstanding those cruel and bloody warres which then raigned in most parts of Europe they humbled not themselves nor converted unto their Lord God but became every day worse and fell into that extremity of vice and mischief that God being offended let loose the sharp arrows of his wrath and vengeance against the Realm of France with such fury that all men thought the final destruction of that Kingdom was then come The want of corn wine and other fruits of the earth and the miseries and calamities of those times were such as no Records ever mention the like For five continued years beginning at the year 1528 the four Seasons of the year never kept their due and natural course but were in that confusion and disorder that sometimes Autumn came in Spring and Spring in Autumn Summer in Winter and Winter in Summer onely the unnatural Summer seemed to overcome the rest of the parts of the year and the heat doubled his forces against his enemy the cold insomuch as in December January and February when the cold ought to season and mellow the earth with frost and snow the heat was so excessive that the ground was parched and burnt up which was a most prodigious thing to behold In all those five years there was no two dayes together of hard weather neither those so intense as to glase the waters with the least shew of ice by which excessive heat were bred in the bowels of the earth an infinite number of Vermin Snails Grubs Worms Lizards and other creatures which eat up the young and tender corn in the hearb and much of it was devoured and consumed in the husk before it sprung up which was the reason that Wheat which uses to sprout up divers sterns from one grain hardly put forth one or two and those so abortive weak and dry that in

the Pikes and Launces to obtain that honour at the price of his own blood Because King Saul published in the Army that he would give his Daughter in Matrimony to him that should overcome the Giant Golias there being none found that durst attempt it David slighted all danger in hopes of obtaining such a recompense What have not men attempted to gain a terrestrial reward Nothing hath seemed much unto them For the gaining then of Heaven all things ought to seem little unto a Christian Seneca wondered at what Souldiers did and suffered for so short and transitory Kingdoms as are those of the Earth and that not for themselves but for another Much more may we wonder that the sufferings and labours of this life by which we are to gain the Kingdom of Heaven not for a stranger but for our selves seem so great and grievous unto us What did not Jesbaam perform for the advancing of the Kingdom of David though he was esteemmed a poor wretch and a dastard 2 Reg. 23. 1. Paralip 11. Vid. Sanctium Tirinum 2 Reg. 23. seeing that the Kingdom of David lay at stake he took such courage that he set upon 800 men and slew them in his first fury and at another occasion he killed 300. For the same Kingdom of David Eleazar Son of Ahostes fought with such constancy and valour that he slew innumerable Philistins continuing the Battel until he was so weary that he was not able to move his arm no longer and it remained so stiff with weariness as if it had been of stone If for a Kingdom of another Man's Dominions these men were so valiant why do not we take courage and procure with great valour to make conquest of the Kingdom of Heaven though we lose all our strength and even our lives in the Conquest since in respect of it all toil and labour is nothing For the advancing then of the Kingdom of David his worthies performed such actions as if they were not authorised by holy Scripture might seem incredible But what speak I of advancing his Kingdom when only to fatisfie a gust of his and perhaps an impertinent one which was to drink of the water in the Cisterns of Bethleem the young men threw themselves into the thickest of the Enemies Squadrons and with their naked swords cutting a passage through the middest of the Army fetcht the desired waters If men undergoe such hazards for the Kingdom nay for the pleasure of another and that momentary what ought we to do for those eternal joyes which are to be our own and for the Kingdom of Heaven wherein we expect such immense honours riches and pleasures Why do we not all take heart and courage It is the Kingdom of Heaven we hope for joyes riches and honours eternal are those which are promised us All is but little what can be suffered in time to obtain the same Semma for the defence of a poor field sowed with lentils durst fight alone against an Army of the Philistians 2 Reg. 23. For the defence then of grace which is the seed of God and to assure our glory which is the fruit of the Passion of Christ it is not much if without shedding of blood we fight against our unruly appetites and conquer our corrupt nature in this life that we may render it more perfect in the other To this purpose the consideration of glory is most powerfull having still before our eyes Heaven which is promised us And let not the eternal reward proposed by Christ be less efficacious than the temporal proposed by Man This was signified by our Lord unto the Prophet Ezechiel in those four living creatures so much different in nature Ezek. 1. but all one in their employment and puesto to wit an Eagle a Lyon an Ox and a Man which he beheld in the middle of the air flying with each one four wings as swift as a flash of lightning What thing could so force the heavy nature of an Ox as to equal the flight of an Eagle or what could associate the fierce nature of a Lyon with the gentleness of a Man The same Prophet declares it saying that they carried Heaven on their heads having the Firmament above them Because if Heaven be in our thoughts it will encourage us to all things It will make material Men equal unto Angels and subject them unto reason who in their customs are brutish as wild beasts so as he who is slow and heavy as an Ox shall flye with four wings and by conquering his own nature become in his flight equal to the birds of the air and he which feeds grovling upon the earth shall elevate himself and quit his short and transitory pleasures for those which are eternal § 3. Neither is this much For so great is the good which we expect that for it to be deprived of all other goods whatsoever ought to be esteemed a happiness and to suffer all torments and afflictions as a pleasure Let us hear what St. Chrysostome sayes Chrysost Tom. 5. Hom. 19. How many labours soever thou shalt pass how many torments soever thou shalt endure all are nothing in respect of those goods to come Let us hear also what St. Vincent Martyr said unto Dacianus the President and with what joy and patience in his torments he confirmed what he had spoken When they hoisted him up on high upon the Rack and the Tyrant in a scoff demanded of him where he then was the Saint smiling and beholding Heaven whither he was going answered I am aloft and from thence can despise thee although insolent and puft up with the power thou hast upon Earth Being after menaced with more cruel torments he said Me-thinks thou dost not threaten but court me Dacianus with what I desire with all the powers and faculties of my Soul And when they tore his flesh with hooks and pincers and burnt him with lighted torches he cried out with great joy In vain thou weariest thy self Dacianus thou canst not imagine torments so horrid which I could not suffer Prison Pincers Burning-plates of iron and Death it self are unto Christians sports and recreations and not torments He who had the joyes of Heaven before his eyes scorned and laughed at the bitterest torments upon Earth Let us consider them also and we shall not shun the sufferance of any thing whereby we may gain Heaven What pity is it that a Christian for some short and sordid pleasure should lose joyes so great and eternal because he will not bear some slight injurie here should be deprived of celestial honour there for not paying what he owes and not restoring what he hath unjustly taken should forfeit the divine riches of Heaven and for one pleasant morsel which the Devil offers him should deprive himself of that great Supper whereunto God invites him Who would choose rather to feed upon bones and craps which fell from the Table than to he a Guest at the