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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A49757	Christ's power over bodily diseases Preached in several sermons on Mat. 8. 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13. And published for the instruction especially of the more ignorant people in the great dutie of preparation for sickness and death. By Edward Lawrence, M.A. minister of the gospel at Baschurch in the county of Salop.	Lawrence, Edward, 1623-1695.; Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1672 (1672)	Wing L653; ESTC R223651	140,079	330

recreations Lastly make Conscience of the duties of your relations so that you may refresh and revive and not disease and destroy one another our health and life doth much depend under God upon our relations You therefore that are parents do not spend your childrens bread in whoredom drunkenness idleness and revenge many parents finde their lusts more chargeable then their children It is very sad that children may cry out We might have had better education better trades better portions better health had not our merciless Parents loved their sins better then their children You that are children make not your parents lives miserable who have been a means of life to you be not such foolish children as to be the heaviness of your parents Prov. 10.1 Husbands Nourish and cherish your own flesh Eph. 5.29 Make not provision for your lusts with that which should make provision for your wives Wives do your Husbands good and not evil all the daies of your lives Prov. 31.12 labour to be their Comfort and Crown and not as rottenness in their bones So much for the Exhortation to all in general 2. Exhortation directed to people as they enjoy their health The duty which I shall exhort unto is to prepare for sickness and death In this Exhortation I shall use this method 1. I shall shew what this work of preparation is 2. I shall press this duty on several sorts of persons 3. Urge it with some Motives Lastly I shall give several Directions to direct us how to be prepared for sickness and death For the first This work of preparation is that whereby every sound believer is by the spirit of Jesus Christ setled in such a blessed state and frame that he is fitted for all that Christ shall do to him by sickness and death In this description observe three things 1. The principal efficient cause which makes this great preparation in us viz. the Spirit of Jesus Christ Hence Christ is called The Author and finisher of our faith Heb. 12.12 Where Jesus Christ begins a work of grace and salvation in a soul he never leaves it till he hath finished it and made it up for heaven therefore saith the Apostle Phil. 1.6 Being consident of this very thing that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it or finish it till the day of Jesus Christ that is till the day of death and of judgment so that this is the great work of Jesus Christ in every true believer to fit him and make him ready for sickness and death and the day of judgment 2. Here is the subject of this work or the person prepared viz. every true believer who is a vessel of mercy prepared for glory 3. Here is that wherein the nature of this work of preparation consists viz. in three things 1. He must be setled in the state of grace and salvation that is he must have a Scripture-right to God as he is the God of salvation by Jesus Christ and so a right to heaven and to all the blessings of the Covenant of Grace 2. He must be wrought into a gracious frame whereby he is bent to yield up himself in subjection and obedience to the will of God in sickness and in death Lastly Here is that which he must be prepared for viz. all that God shall do to him by sickness and death If God fill him with pain and misery he hath his graces of faith love patience humility and meekness to enable him to lie quietly and obediently and chearfully under the power and will of his heavenly Father If God call him by sickness into Eternity he is with Saint Paul ready to be offered and is made fit by grace to receive and enjoy the glory of heaven This gracious frame of heart is fully epxress'd Rom. 14.8 Whether we live we live unto the Lord or whether we die we die unto the Lord that is we live to this end to please and do the will and to seek the glory of the Lord and we are ready to die to the will and glory of the Lord. So much for the Explication of this work of preparation Secondly I shall press this Exhortation upon these seven sorts of persons 1. I shall exhort little children so far as they are capable to know and practise this duty to prepare for sickness and death Now because this applica●ion may seem strange consider that God himself thinks it not below him to be a Teacher of young children Psalm 148.12 13. Both young men and maidens old men and children let them praise the name of the Lord. And all parents are commanded to teach their children to know and do his will Deut. 6.6 7. And these words which I command thee this day shall be in thy heart and thou shalt teach them diligently or wh●t and sharpen them upon thy children So Prov. 22.6 Train up a childe in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it Observe there is a way for young children to go to heaven and it is that wherein they should be found when they are old and all parents are bound to set them in that way and indeed children are sooner capable then most conceive to know something of God and Christ and Heaven and Hell Timothy knew the Scriptures 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from a sucking childe 2 Tim. 3.15 And this appears by the timely fruits of the Spirit that sometimes drop from their pretty sanctified mouths And certainly baptized children being Christs Disciples and admitted into his School the Church have a right to be taught in the way to salvation and Christ is a Prophet to them and his Ministers are Ministers to them as well as to others And really Ministers have often more comfort from catechized Boys and Girls then from many old ignorant Atheists who are worse then children in the understanding of the Scriptures And lastly it makes much for Gods glory to have his Name praised by the mouths of little children Psal 8.2 Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength because of thy enemies that thou mightest still the enemy and avenger Observe God hath ordained that his praise in the mouths of little children shall be a strong and powerful means to stop the mouths of malicious subtil Atheists to still the enemy and avenger So we read Matth. 21.16 Out o● the mouths of babes and sucklings hast tho● perfected praise The praises that come to God by the blessed Angels and all the Saints in heaven and earth is perfected and made up by the praises of these young Saints Now considering these things and seeing sickness and death fetch away so many young children into Eternity I have chosen to direct one brief Exhortation to the young Boys and Girls among us Oh come therefore you sweet and pretty children and I will teach you the fear of the Lord be you prepared for sickness and death Heark sweet Children

he commanded and it stood fast And this truth that Jesus Christ could by speaking a word command and create the cure he proves by an argument taken from the less to the greater ver 9. For I am a man under Authority having Souldiers under me c. You may easily see the strength of this argument in this plain Paraphrase I am but a man and thou art the true God I am under Authority but all the power in Heaven and in Earth is thine I have Souldiers and servants under me and thou hast all things under thee Now saith he if I bid my Souldier go and march to such a place he goes and if I command another to come from quartering in such a place he comes and if I say to my servant Do such a business he doth it Thus all sicknesses and diseases are under thy command if thou sayst to a Fever Go and turn the moisture of such a one into the drought in Summer it goes and to the Consumption Go and rot the Lungs and eat up the flesh of such a one it goes and to the Palsie Go and torment such a one it goes and if thou commandest back a disease and sayest Come away and spare the life of such a one it presently comes And again if thou biddest any disease Do this make such a Father Childless such a Wife a Widdow such Children Fatherless it presently doth it And thus he wisely and strongly pleads that all diseases are at the Will of Jesus Christ so that a word from him makes them go and come and do what he will Obs 4. Christs carriage after the Centurions speech ver 10. When Jesus heard it he marvelled That must needs be a marvellous Faith which makes Jesus Christ himself to marvel 2. He highly commends the Centurions Faith I have not found so great Faith no not in Israel There are three things which speak the greatness of his Faith 1. It was the Faith of a Gentile and this Christ seems to intend by comparing it with and preferring it before the Faith of his Israel saying I have not found so great Faith no not in Israel 2. Because he did believe a great truth this is a great truth worthy of thy strongest faith to be exercised in that Jesus Christ is that God who commands and rules all the diseases and sicknesses of men 3. Because of the great power and life which appeared in the grace it self now the might and strength of his faith is seen both because by it he saw the substance of the truth with so much evidence and clearness and certainty as he did he did as plainly see that Christ had the command of diseases as that he himself had the command of his Souldiers and servants Beloved the stronger faith is the more plain and piercing insight it hath into its object and the great power of his faith appeared in believing this truth at such a time when the infinite power and Eternal Godhead of Christ was so little known and believed in the world And lastly by the strong pleadings of his heart grounded upon this truth whereby he draws virtue and power from Christ to heal his dying servant So that you see great reason why our Saviour commends the greatness of the Centurions faith 3. Our Saviour from hence takes occasion to teach the Doctrine of the Conversion of the Jews and Rejection of the Gentiles ver 11 12. and Christ makes this seasonable digression into this Doctrine because at this time a poor Gentile excels ever a Jew of his age in believing the power of Jesus Christ Lastly Christ commands the sick servants cure he speaks such a word as the Centurion did pray that he would and believe that he could speak ver 13. And Jesus said unto the Centurion Go thy way and as thou hast believed so be it done unto thee and his servant was healed in the self-same hour And thus Christ is honoured for his Miracle the Centurion is honoured for his Faith and the poor dying servant hath the comfort of both I shall now pass by all other Observations that may be made out of this Text and only insist upon this one Doctrine which I have chosen to be the subject of this discourse viz. Doct. THat all sicknesses and diseases are at the will and under the command and government of Jesus Christ so that he bids them go and come and do what he will to the children of men This Doctrine is grounded upon the Centurions pleading with Christ that all diseases were under his command and government as the Centurions souldiers were under him and also upon this that Christ testifies the truth of this in commending the Centurion for the greatness of his faith in believing this truth and improving it as he did To prevent the misunderstanding of this Doctrine I shall premise these three Cautions 1. That I do not hereby deny the power and influence that inferiour causes may have in bringing diseases upon us for I know that many sicknesses come from God through the hands of Angels and Devils and that other men and also our selves and that unwholesome dyet the seasons of the years and divers other things may be the instruments and means of diseases unto us but yet God is the first and chiefest cause of all diseases for it is not in the power of any creature to suspend or with-hold that Divine Power and influence which causeth our health but this is continued or denyed unto us according to the will and pleasure of God and no creature can cause our trouble without God for without him a creature can neither be nor work but falls to nothing and so cannot do good or evil 2. I do not exclude the Art of Physitians nor deny the virtue that is in any medicines for the healing of diseases knowing that the same God who had ordained food for our health hath also ordained physick for us in our sickness but still the first and chief of all is Jesus Christ 3. I do not exclude the power of God the Father or of God the holy Ghost but because I finde that by diseases God doth execute great judgements in the world and that he is pleased to make great use of these in his government both of his Church and of his enemies and that the Father hath committed all judgement to the Son Joh. 5.22 and because this command and government is ascribed to Christ in the Text therefore I shall frequently mention the name and authority of Jesus Christ God Redeemer in this case Now in the handling of the Doctrine I shall follow this familiar method 1. I shall explain the terms 2. I shall shew for what ends Jesus Christ doth thus cause and command diseases Lastly I shall make Use and Application For the first In the explication I shall tell you what I mean by sicknesses and then explain the exercise of Christs government and command of diseases in those acts of it

and devoured by worms Sometimes a Father is too fond of a childe and the very might and strength of his heart which might be better exercised in the love and service of God and Jesus Christ is vainly wasted and spent in the inordinate love and delight which he takes in his childe then God bids a disease go and it presently leaves a fatherless childe or a childeless father Sometimes when godly men are ripe for glory so that with Paul they have finished their course 2 Tim. 4.7 then God doth finish their time and sends a sickness as a messenger to fetch them home as a shock of corn in its season Job 5.26 There are multitudes of other seasons wherein God chuseth to visit his people which considerate Christians may observe and dilate and amplifie upon in their own thoughts 4. How often soever Christ commands diseases to go they go this we may also gather from the Centurions speech for by vertue of the same authority by which he bids his souldiers go once he bids them go as oft as he sees reason to command them So by the same power that Jesus Christ causeth diseases at any time he can cause them as often as he will for his power being unchangeable is not spent in any work but it is the same after as before Heb. 13.8 Jesus Christ the same yesterday and to day and for ever and his power being infinite there is never any thing to hinder but he can do what he will Hence many times diseases come thick upon us Job 10.17 Thou renewest thy witnesses against me by witnesses he 〈◊〉 diseases as well as other afflictions which God renews at his pleasure So Job 16.14 He breaketh me with breach upon breach when persons are sick we usually say o● them as David speaks of himself Psal 38.8 They are sore broken and it is God that thus breaketh them with breach upon breach with one breach after another Beloved when God begins to trouble us we are usually like Mariners on the seas one wave of affliction comes rolling after another Perhaps God first smites us in a beast then in a childe then in our selves David elegantly describes this Psal 42.7 Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of thy water-spouts all thy waves and billows are gone over me As at the noise of thunder or rain from the clouds which are Gods water-spouts the Brooks as it were call on the Clouds Come and fill us and the Rivers call unto the Brooks Come ye and raise us Or as in a terrible storm at Sea one wave calls to another Come and roll after me and that to another Come and follow me so one deep affliction calls to another to follow it the Ague cries to the Fever Follow me and the Fever to the Consumption Follow me and the Consumption to Death Follow me And thus all Gods waves and billows go over us so that a man may say with Heman Psal 88.7 Thou hast afflicted me with all thy waves And thus the day of our life is like a stormy day wherein are some shining gleams and then storms follow one another all the day and therefore as souldiers in a garrison when they have gallantly beaten back one storm of the enemy do not presently throw down their arms and dismantle the garrison but they make up their breaches and keep up their Guards and Centinels to be ready for a more desperate assault So when one affliction is past when one disease is healed let us be prepared for another till we have accomplished our warfare I refer you for more of this to the Application Lastly How long soever God appoints a disease to stay it will continue upon us this is also implied in the Centurions speech For by the same Authority that he commands a Souldier to go to a place he can appoint him to stay till he give order for his return So Jesus Christ can as long as he will continue the exercise of the same power which first caused the disease upon the exercise of which must needs follow the continuance of the disease and therefore we often see that some man continues in a sickly and dying condition for many years together so that their lives hang in doubt as it is said Deut. 28.66 they live as it were between the two Worlds being neither w●ll enough to live nor sick enough to die This it seems was Hemans case Psal 88.15 I am afflicted and ready to dye from my youth up Thus Job tells us cap. 7.3 I am made to possess months of vanity and wearisome nights are appointed to me whilst some are in their sweet and refreshing sleep they little dream what wearisome nights others spend on their beds of langushing crying out with Job in the next verse When I lye down I say When shall I arise and the night be gone and I am full of tossing to and fro unto the dawning of the day Many may cry out in their long and tedious sickness with Hezekiah Isa 38.12 I am cut off with pining sickness from day even to night wilt thou make an end of me This is the sad case or many they eat and drink and sleep and walk abroad but they carry about them perhaps a Hectick or Flux or Consumption whereby God is from day even to night making an end of them Oh look about thee man and consider What hast thou to take too when the hand of God hath made an end of thee when thou findest thy heart blessing thy self in thy wealth friends and other enjoyments go alone a while and tell thy soul This is but a poor portion when as to my enjoyment of it I am spitting it away and sweating it away and it goes away in the very filth and excrements of my body every day Beloved it hath cost me some serious thoughts to see an irresistible disease feeding upon a neer and dear friend Friends provide the wholesomest Dyet Physitians prescribe the fittest Medicines many Closets and Families and Congregations are full of fervent prayers for their health but still God bids the disease stay and waste and eat up the life of the friend and as Job speaks He is in one minde and who can turn him Job 23.13 and he taketh away and who can hinder him Job 9.12 So much for the explication of the first particular God commands diseases to go and they go Secondly He commands diseases to come and they come As the Centurion bids his souldier come and he comes so Christ can call away a disease from a sick person when he will and this is clear for God can at his pleasure suspend the exercise of his power which was the cause of our sickness and so the disease must needs cease and all the creature-creature-causes of diseases must cease to be when God denies the work of his power which caused their being and they cannot work to disease and trouble us if God will not work with them and besides he can at

other affliction to come and bring it down Grace grows to such a strength that now it 's able to bear a trial a storm is ready to fall therefore saith God now it 's to time to fetch my childe home The Christian is grown so ripe that it's time to bring him to heaven as a shock of corn in its season Thus you see for your comfort that sickness and death come from Christ in the best and fittest season Sickness never comes but to bring thee nearer heaven and Death shall never come but to loose thee into heaven Ah Christian heaven and happiness never come out of season Secondly Comfort in respect of the end of all sicknesses and death they come from Jesus Christ for our good We read 2 Cor. 4.17 Our light affliction which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory where we see that in all our afflictions there is a secret Power working us to heaven and salvation As for example in a Fever Ague or Consumption c. we feel a Power working outwardly against us against our health strength case and life so there is a mighty Power working inwardly for us working us from sin and the world to God and Christ and Heaven Hence is that known and tryed Scripture I say it 's a tryed Scripture it hath comforted many thousand hearts I mean Rom. 8.28 We know that all things work together for good to them that love God to them who are called according to his purpose Methinks this Scripture is a Spring which always runs with new and fresh comfort and it 's a sure way to finde comfort to look upon all our diseases and other afflictions through this Scripture Now to apply the comfort of it to the present case consider what is that good which all things work together for and this you may know by the following verses wherein the Apostle demonstrates this truth That all things work together for our good therefore saith he vers 31. What shall we say to these things If God be for us who can be against us that is let us look upon all our afflictions and miseries and then look upon our Predestination Vocation Justification and Glorification mentioned vers 29 30. And we may joyfully conclude that seeing God is for us so as to predestinate call justifie and glorifie us and these links can never be broken then nothing can be against us but all shall work for our good so that the great good that all things work for is not to make the godly the great Gallants of the world but to bring them grace and peace here and glory hereafter and all sicknesses diseases and deaths and all other dispensations are united and joyned together in this work to bring Soul-saving good to them that love God And the clear cause of this is in the Doctrine viz. because our Saviour hath the working of all these things he sends and rules and governs them and therefore there must needs be a Fatherly work in them because Jesus Christ as our Father and Saviour sends them to us and orders them for us That of the Apostle makes clearly for this 1 Cor. 3.23 Death is yours and by the same rule sickness is ours and for our good But why ours Answ Because the Lord of sickness and death is ours Hence we read Phil. 1.21 To die is gain Sickness is gain and death is gain to Gods Children Many a Childe of God gains more by a moneths sickness then by the outward mercies of many years and death will bring you more gain in one hour then all the prayers and Sacraments and Sermons of a whole age and therefore labour to see your gains as real and present to the eye of Faith as your pains troubles and losses are to the eye of Sense and in your sad parting with those things which sickness and death take you from comfort your hearts with those things which they bring you unto say Farewel my dear and pleasant Country thou hast fed me well and cloathed me well but I must leave thee for a better Country that is an heavenly Hebr. 11.26 Farewel my inward and faithful friends farewel my dear Jonathans How pleasant have you been to me Your love to me is wonderful Methinks when I am with you I feel the truth of Tertullians saying of the fellowship of the Primitive Christians Animo animáque miscemur Our very hearts and souls do enter into and are mingled and united with one another Many a sweet meeting and sad parting I have had with you but I must leave you a while to go to better friends in Heaven Magnus illie nos charorum numerus expectat I have a great company of dear friends in the other world which look for me and will rejoyce to see me with them with whom I shall always be serious yet never sad always merry and yet never vain Farewel my sweet Sabbaths savoury Sermons melting Sacraments farewel my dear Bible and all the blessed Ordinances wherein I have seen the Lord even the Lord in the land of the living I must no longer look in these glasses but go where I shall see him face to face Farewel my dear yoke-fellow parents my sweet children my beloved brothers and sisters I must leave you all to go to a better Father and Husband and Brother in heaven Farewel my good and convenient house my sweet place of secret and Family-worship I must be gone to my house not made with hands eternal in the heavens Farewel my poor but precious body go thou and sleep in Jesus in the earth whilst my Soul is raigning with Jesus in heaven where I shall remember thee and long to see thee till I meet thee again cloathed with Immortality and Glory These things Christians are the comforts of a sick-bed the sweet joys of a death-bed 3. Comfort in respect of the godly who are visited Herein is thy comfort that thou art a true part and member of Jesus Christ from whom all diseases come so that whatsoever Christ doth to thee he doth to himself I was sick saith Christ when his members were sick Mat. 25.36 So when the body is dead the poor ghastly corpse continues still joyned and united to Jesus Christ Hence the bodies of believers are said to sleep in Jesus and are called the dead in Christ 1 Thes 4.14 16. and it 's a most sweet and savoury consideration when a man looks on such a sad spectacle as a loathsome diseased body or thinks on the rotten carkass when the body is dead and sown in corruption then to fix the eye of Faith upon his glorious head at the right hand of the Father As thus look on thy face covered with the Small Pox and then look on the Face of Jesus Christ look on thy bones staring upon thee in a Consumption and then look upon the glory and beauty of Jesus Christ Nay go further look upon

when those evils which thou fearedst from men shall be brought upon thee by God when God shall fill thy body with greater pains then the cruellest Persecutor could invent or inflict Oh what a loss will then a suffering opportunity be when a man may say I had an opportunity to lose my life and save my soul and now I must lose my life and my poor soul too Direct 5. That you may be prepared for sickness and death do nothing but what you would have sickness and death finde you doing Remember what ever thou art about that sickness and death may finde thee in it Death found Zimri and Cozbi in whoredom Numb 25.8 and Death took Ananias and Saphira in a lye Acts 5. and Death caught Eutychus sleeping at a Sermon Acts 20.9 And on the other hand God took Enoch walking with God Gen. 5.24 And when Elijah and Elisha were talking together no doubt of some good Elijah was fain to break off his good discourse to go to heaven 2 Kings 2.11 and Christ went blessing his people to heaven Luke 24.51 And good Stephen as he was praying was taken from off his knees into heaven Acts 7.60 Oh Sirs if you would not go lying or swearing or drunk or swaggering or ranting into Eternity do not practise these sins now but walk in your callings recreations and duties as if you saw sickness and death fetching you out of these into heaven Direct 6. Labour to be filled with a merciful and tender disposition towards others in their sickness and misery this is a sure way for thee to finde mercy from God in thy sickness With the merciful thou wilt shew thy self merciful Psal 18.25 Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy Matth. 5.7 We have a precious promise to this purpose Psal 41.1 2 3. Blessed is he that considereth the poor By the poor is meant not only the poor in estate but also those that are poor and afflicted in respect of other afflictions And it 's a most blessed frame of heart for men when they sit in health and at ease and swim in wealth to be seriously considering their poor diseased and afflicted brethren The Lord will deliver him in time of trouble The Lord will preserve him and keep him alive The Lord will strengthen him on the bed of languishing thou wilt make all his bed in his sickness I say therefore shew mercy to others in their sickness and when the day of sickness and death and judgment comes thou shalt be sure as Paul prayed for Onesiphorus in the like case to finde mercy at that day Direct 7. Be fully satisfied in the belief of Gods care and providence towards thy friends whom thou art to leave behinde thee Beloved it makes the thoughts of sickness and death more grievous to many because of the sad and miserable condition which their poor Orphans and Widdows will be left in when they are gone and especially if their condition be like that of learned and godly Oecolampadius who when he should have made his Will had nothing to bequeath But this trouble is not so much for want of an Estate as for want of Faith therefore go chearfully to your sick beds or death-beds with the belief of these following Scriptures Jer. 49.11 Leave thy fatherless children I will preserve them alive and let thy Widdows trust in me In which words as appears by the context God threatens the Edomites that their children and wives shall be left so desolate that they shall have none but God to provide for them Yet God is so tender of poor fatherless children and widdows that though they were of the families and posterity of Esau yet saith he I will preserve them alive How much more tender then will he be of the poor families of his Jacob See also Psal 10.14 The poor committeth his cause to thee thou art the helper of the fatherless Perhaps it troubles thee to think what a company of poor helpless children thou art to leave behinde thee Why consider the infinite and all-sufficient God makes it one of his great works to help fatherless children therefore this great Creator of the world will be glorified by this name The helper of the fatherless See further Psal 68.3 4 5. Observe here one great reason why the righteous must be glad and exceedingly rejoyce and sing forth the praises of God is because he is a father of the fatherless and a judge of the widdow in his holy habitation Observe In his holy habitation God is in heaven not only filling Angels and Saints with his glorious likeness and presence but he is there also full of gracious thoughts towards poor fatherless children and widdows upon earth And although I do not think that there is any intercourse betwixt a Saint in heaven and his family upon earth and I do not know that he will in heaven be offering prayers for them upon earth yet I do not doubt but he will there know that he hath left a family behinde him upon earth and by his glorious vision of God will see that Infinite Power and Providence which provides for his and all other families upon earth so far as is for his own glory and the good of his Church See again Hosea 14.3 In thee the fatherless finde mercy It may trouble thee to think that although now thy wife and children are respected for thy sake yet when thou art gone they are like to finde the world cruel and unfaithful friends hard and unkinde c. but take comfort and satisfaction in this Scripture where thou seest not only that there is mercy in God for fatherless children but also that they shall finde it and have the comfort and experience of it I shall therefore conclude this with the exhortation of the Apostle Phil. 4.6 7. Be careful for nothing but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God and then as to any trouble about these things The peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus Direct 8. Labour to make a wise and holy use of the spectacles of mortality look upon your selves as following your dead neighbours and friends whom you see going before you into Eternity It is said of a dead man Job 21.33 The clods of the valley viz. the Graves and Sepulchres shall be sweet unto him and every man shall draw after him as there are innumerable gone before him Consider when you see any one buried that he is gone to an innumerable company that are dead and buried before him and that every man shall draw after him Oh remember that you are drawing after your dead grandfathers and fathers and friends which are gone before you Poor wretch thou thinkest that thou shouldest be like thy Neighbours to have as much wealth and honours and pleasures as they but look upon other Neighbours who are lodged in the chambers of death and