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A54501
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A dying fathers last legacy to an onely child, or, Mr. Hugh Peter's advice to his daughter written by his own hand, during his late imprisonment in the Tower of London, and given her a little before his death.
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Peters, Hugh, 1598-1660.
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1660
(1660)
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Wing P1697; ESTC R32303
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33,960
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130
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Funeral Sermons you may reade about it I say Life is sweet and Death terrible many in several distempers may call for it neither minding what it is nor whither it leads Job describes it in his Agony and Heathens could say The first good was not to be born and the next to dye quickly Paul above any desires it upon right grounds Yea the last words in the Canticles and the last in the Bible are for the Lord Jesus to come quickly yea to come to judgment as if it were the breathings of the spirits of the Just in the last times of which spirit if you be these will be your Reasons as theirs First That you may see Him of whom you have heard so much who hath done and suffered so much for you Secondly That you may have full draughts of what you now tast only Thirdly That your Beloved may come to you or you to Him for whose sake and love you may undergo here many frowns brow-beatings if not worse thus the absent Spouse waits for her Beloved Fourthly When the Sanctuary is troden upon Isa. 64.1 Fifthly That the double Vail of Corruption and Affliction may be taken off from you Thus to wish for Death is to wish for Life These things I pray study and to help you further remember Balaam would fain die the Death of the Righteous which you can never do unless you live the Life of the Godly to which I have written so much before Only let me adde That you must live in daily Expectation of this great Change for though there be but one way into the World there are many out I know nothing to sweeten it but the Death of Christ who suckt out the poison of it and saves to the uttermost Romans and Fools can dye bravely write their own Elegies I am sure a well-led life is the best Monument If one at your door should cry every morning You must dye it would not reach far but Christ dyed for you My Child 30. They say and truly Where Death leaves you there Judgment finds you Nothing flies so swiftly than as the soul out of the body and you know Eternity hangs upon a moment and such is our Life and especially such is the last groan and pang and thither it leads It is a vast Ocean hath neither bound nor bottom where you are to come before an impartial Judge with a naked and open breast it is unavoidable and the miscarriage there intolerable Many Books are written by many about these last things and Apothegmes not a few the World and the Flesh will not appear for you the former can lend you but a few Ceremonies and Complements the other dare go no further than the Judges door but a good Conscience sprinkled by the Blood of Christ will enter with boldness and plead and hear the voice of Come ye blessed Your wisdome will be to carry your Pardon in your bosome there Wit and Learning Parts and Wealth will get no hearing there the Eloquent Orator is dumb no Coin is currant but the Blood of a loving Saviour No man can appear there by any other Proxy there Greatness must give way to Goodness there Hypocrisie is unmask'd Truth naked there your fellow Saints shall sit Judges though dispised amongst men there the Son of man shall appear because despised as the Son of man there Preaching Miracles Casting out Devils will not profit but a Name written in the Book of the Lamb Oh that you would consider betimes what a nothing a thousand years are to Eternity yea where you shall be an hundred years hence if the Grave make no distance betwixt the Scepter and the Mattock what will Eternity do when that shall make the difference Wherfore I pray measure all your works by Eternity eat drink sleep work by Eternity the cry of a damned soule is I never minded Eternity how many are every day carrying faggots to burn them to Eternity Call that good that holds for ever Let but the Judge be your Husband and fear nothing The ever-living God love you and keep you to all Eternity My Child 31. And because I have brought you so far as the Great Day give me leave to awaken you with the condition of the place Heaven and to let you know it in the particulars which are the presence of all good and the absence of all evil the former commends it self unto you in these First in the universality of it whereas all things here below are but partial so in the suitableness of it they are there spiritual and suitable to the Spirit Secondly for their Continance the good things are not like Cherries drawn by the lips or Comforts tasted and gone but they stay and are good for ever Thirdly Evil knows no place there Sin cannot dwell with that Holiness Sorrow cannot mingle it self with that Joy no more fading Riches dying Friends changing Honors perishing Beauty no more aking heads nor languishing diseases no more hearing the chain of the Prisoner nor anger of the Oppressor no cry of what do you lack every Bottle is full and every Bed easie being of never-blasting Roses and Sweets where every Room is paved with Love where Wisdom Power Mercy and Grace have combined to make all glorious and pleasant Then never be troubled about a dunghil-world when the Apostle to the Thessalonians sayes all in a few words We shall be with the Lord for ever and that includes all answers all hard Questions all hard Labours under the Sun Remember the Swaggerer that met the poor man ever mourning over his sins quoth he What still mourning c. But what if there be no Heaven Ah Sir quoth the other what if there be a Hell The Doctrine of Hell was never enough preach'd some thinks and there on the contrary is the presence of all evil and the absence of all good you may study it by the former where the Tormented never die and the Tormentor is never weary where thought and fear despair punishment extremity meet altogether in Eternity The Father of our Lord Jesus Christ preserve you to his Heavenly Kingdom My poor Child Union with Christ and Knowledge sound The Scriptures reade in Pray'r be found A constant Watch and growth in Grace Good Conscience Time short Work apace Contentment in Condition Low No Trifling Spirit in you grow Nor Busie nor Pragmatical Truth still appearing in your All Wisdom directing soon and late In Calling and in Marriage-state The World describ'd in its bad wayes A Friend indeed beyond all praise And Sin the Mother of all Grief Grace often question'd for relief With Providences running crosse Fears sinfull causing Doubts and Losse Dayes of Adversity and Evil Errors that spring from Self and Devil Sabbath for Rest and Worshipping And Free-grace pitying pardoning With accurate and holy walking Hard to believe though easie talking Death ghastly looking and Sins daughter With Judgment that will follow after Heav'n in its great Magnificence Hell's punishment in
commend You dear Child 18. And because sin will be creeping into all your conditions waies and works something I must advise you about it from Experience though many Books are written about it as Mr. Goodwyns Sinfulnesse of Sin c. Yet Two things take from me Be marvellous careful it break not in Secondly as diligent to drive it out speedily And for the former Gouge and Gurnal I commend about the putting on the whole Armour Ephes. 6. Sin is a breach of the Law and the strength of Sin is the Law from that breach the soul being as well left to Sin the Keeper as to Satan the Jaylor by the Fall and nothing but the Satisfaction of Christ put in to Divine Justice can remit the Authority of it yea though the power and filth in part be taken away by Sanctification yet it will break in again as an inmate and will at least get some out-room as pride in cloathes cozenage in dealings lust in the eye passion c. and bad work it makes where-ever it is Oh keep it at staves length Peter David Heman and others ever crack under it As you cannot build your Reformation upon unrepented sin So you should not make daily work for repentance by admitting sin which must be reformed Therefore to prevent this mischief you must exercise hatred against it as against an Enemy that cut the throat or would of your best Friends and yours also and pursue it with a deadly feud hate it in all the stock and linage of it my Child A little sin is sin down with it keep your guard and hate it in all the forrage that may maintain such an Enemy I mean in the occasions leading to it in which I might be large On with all your Armour speedily and when you find it hath bespotted you do as a good houswife with her linnen get a Washing-day I mean a Fasting-day out with it by hand laver bucking if it be a stain that gets through and through it will â—ut the next spring for bleaking I mean a sin premeditated as Davids a few common tears will not help there but extraordinary and the Blood of Christ above all Ask the Damned what they aile Sin sin they cry Ask the distressed Conscience Sin too Ask the Afflicted Sin For the Bulrush will not grow without mire That which crosseth the Law of God make thy greatest crosse that which divides you from the best Good call your worst Evil It made Christ to bleed to groan to die The Lord sprinkle thy Conscience with the Bloud of the Everlasting Covenant that you may not sin to death My dear Child 19. And next because bordering upon what went before I would add a case which so often even choice Christians are incumbred with and that is Their questioning all their works after manie years Experience and Profession and their Objections many against themselves as from sin before Conversion in Conversion after it repeated sins against Judgment Mercie Light Means yea even cutting Purses under the Gallows against all Examples and what not Nay it cannot stand with Gods honour to save c. though Isa. 55.8 answers all This therefore I would have you know that though it be not safe to dig at Foundations often lest we shake the Building so our great care is to have sound Foundations to build upon which in the general is Christ and other none can lay Make quick work and see you be in Christ and offer your Evidences to a discerning Friend or more and know that God hath limited his tenders of Grace to a day of this Life of the Gospel and of Conscience awakened therefore look out whilst it is To day Put by Spiritual sloth Cares of this World bosom Corruptions or what ever may hinder God is not bound to your limitings Were it not from his Mercy and and to leave every soul inexcusable why should the Lord give any time of Grace Remember this day ends suddenly How unworthy to put the Lord off till tomorrow and how retaliated See Prov. 1. 29 c. Your delayes rob your soul long of Comfort and you keep your self the longer out of Christ's service The nature of sin is poison do not stay till to morrow for an Antidote What got Lots Wife by lingring in Sodom the Lord must pull us out Nor can you plead any thing for hereafter which you may not now Oh to work to work and if you find it will not amount to Grace then cry mightily Ply the Lord with all the Promises of his Free-grace Isa. 55.1 Matth. 11. last Revel. 22.17 Isa. 53. the whole Chapter Jer. 3.1 and many more Tell the Lord none so vile as you none so good as Himself Tell him his Nature is Mercy he may be a gainer by his Grace However hang upon him living and dying in the use of all means Hos. 14.3 4 5. But if you have your share in Christ though hardly discerned make much of it you need walk very humbly very holily do not question continually as some do Psal. 18.1 Love the Lord who hath been your strength and will answer all thy hard questions dear Child 20. I add hereunto your Case under crosse Providences yea such as where Promises seem to speak one thing and Providence another Under which the best Saints have had great and strange sinkings of spirit For which you have Sibbs Burroughs and others to help My poor thoughts also are these for Case and Cure When Joh faints Joh 4.5 When David chides his soul Psal. 42. When Heman is even distracted Psal. 88.15 Jacob will not be comforted Gen. 37.35 and so divers This great Dissertion springs from either the overweening some Comforts we enjoy our overvaluing them breeds much trouble in the losse of them So David with his Absolom or from the surprizall being sudden and unexpected a prison at first uncouth in time easie and sweet where a mortified heart grows suited to it to this I could speak much or else it may spring from some secret weight God may put into this Change of Providence which we are not aware of and so the scale grows heavie with some Lead hanging at the bottom unseen a small thing troubles more than a greater the former we apply to our own strength in it but for the other to Gods Or lastly it may spring from the Dispensation it self As when the Crosse is heavie or multiplied or of long continuance or toucheth some noble part as wounds that touch the Liver Heart Brain c. Nay I must tell you when we make our Case worse than God doth as by our refusing the Lords Comforts which Jacob did Gen. 37. or where we let loose the Reins of Passion as David Oh my son my son c. Or when we drown all our present Enjoyments in that one crosse Providence which is too near the spirit of Haman who crost by Mordecai slights all his Favours at Court and dies upon the other Your Cure