the rule of our passions and sufferings Do we dayly profess to God Thy will be done and now it appears to be particularly Gods will seeing nothing is brought to passe in Heaven or in Earth without the will of him that ruleth over all why doe we not give the Lord leave to do what he will in Heaven and Earth whom we so often standing professe the Maker of Heaven and Earth what Atheisme now possesseth us because Gods will crosseth ours to stick at last to pronounce with good Eli in as hard a case as great a loss as any we can complain of the utter ruine of his family and Excision from the Priesthood the loss of two sons and the Ark of God at once It is the Lord let him do what seemeth good unto him 3. There is yet a greater reason of thy Resignation in this Case in that God hath the propriety and right the Soveraign Dominion of all we only the short use If God recall but his own Gift what Injury what so great cause of complaint May not God as well take the Child away from the Mother to whom it was committed only to breed up in the fear of God as the Mother takes it home from the Nurse 'T is call'd to a better home what Relation or Title soever thou canst plead in the dear loss Whether thy Husband thy Child thy Father Brother or thy friend which is as thy own soul God pleads a nearer claim his Creature his Image his Member the price of his redemption c. his by many Titles his even before he was and his when he shall not be 3 Duty or Inquiry How we are from the present sense of anothers death to prepare for our own 1. Prepare by a tender and watchfull apprehension of all those Memento's and Remembrances of Mortality wherewith God and Nature dayly allarum us so that nothing is more frequently represented howsoever nothing be less thought on than death and we at last complain of a surprisal Like to the Man in the old story who had covenanted with death that he should before his last stroak give some warning with a Finger at least lift up and yet after many funerals of his friends and many parcel-funerals and decayes of his own body and senses being to die required some other Messengers and Fore-runners of his end and challenged Death for not knocking at the door before he entred only because he would not hear the knocks Amongst the many Remembrances of death So the Captain of fifty seeing the other Captains consum'd by strâ— foll upon his face with I pray thee let my life be precious in thy sight 2 Kings 1 13. the most sensible and sharp admonitions towards this preparation are sounded to us by the Last groans of our expiring friends as by the last Trump that Grave which buries part of our Souls with their bodies must needs call some of our thoughts that way And how few are there amongst us that have lived half the age of man that hath not out-lived half his Family or Acquaintance That continued Felicity of the Grecian Prince to pass an whole age without the losss of one Friend was a glory or boast not to be seconded by many Now the first preparative for death is the premeditation of it Death like the Basilisk losing its sting and force being first seen and viewed by us 2 Prepare not only by a weariness and contempt of life and of the world wherein you no longer find your Friend but by a more comfortable Thought of going to him and over-taking him Prepare to follow If this could so sweeten Socrates last deadly draught the Thought of passing to the society of Orpheus Homer and the ancient Sages How much more should it make us gladly embrace death that leads us to the society of Angels and takes us not away but restores us to our Friends and to the Spirits of Just men made perfect by the Vision of the most Holy One Especially if we consider that the Friends we go away to are much more than those we part from VVe are gatherd to our Fathers 3 Prepare by casting aside all that makes Death bitter or terrible unto us Now we fear death saith the Monk on Climacus for one of these two Causes either because we love this present Life or Distrust a better So Reuben Gad and Manasse did chuse their seat on this side Jordan because they saw the ground fit for pasture Num. 32 5. Some there are unwilling to leave their Pastures and Cattel for all the beasts and houses Divines or Astrologers talk of in heaven Some with St Peter confounded with the Glories and bright Honours of the world cry out in an Extasie It is good to be here let 's here fix our Tabernacle but the Text tells us He knew not what he said being dazled with the glorious light Luke 9.33 Others that with the Apostles betray a fear of storms and the danger of death though Christ be in the storm with them deserve Christs check O ye of little faith what are you afraid of So that our whole work of Preparation is reduc'd to these two points Contempt of this world Faith hopes of a better that we strive to leave the world its noise and vanities before we depart out of it Look on the earth and all his Comforts as passengers in swift streams still fleeting and parting from us or we from it and as Sojourners or Pilgrims abstain from fleshly lusts never fix our delight in a pleasant way or Inne which is suddenly to be quitted And seeing no distance can hinder us more than the banish'd Jews from turning our faces towards the heavenly Jerusalem let us that we may be able with the Martyrs of old to refuse Life in hopes of a better Resurrection lay hold on Eternal life before this life fail us lay hold by a lively faith on the hands of our Saviour stretch'd out to receive us and lay that sure foundation for the time to come of Good Works that best preparative to a good death a good life Let us not rest till we have brought our Souls to that temper of the good Heathen Summan nec metuas diem nec optes neither to fear nor desire over-passionately the day of our change or rather to this Resolution of St. Paul Phil. 1.21 22 23 24. If I live I shall do well if I die I shall do better To me to live is Christ To die is Gain And now that we may with David rise from our sorrow and wash our faces with tears of Joy in the thought of this Virgin who is not lost but gone before us to that place whither we all strive to follow Let us reflect on that principal Comfort the hopes of that life however lost on earth to us yet recover'd in heaven being hid with Christ While your Eyes overflow with tears being fixed on the Corps on the Mantle here dropt below send your thoughts beyond
affection towards him his Lamenesse upbraids thy halting between God and the world his Stone the Symptome of the hardnesse of thy heart his bad spleen argues thy rotten malice and what ever corruptions answering still some more corrupt desires of thy Soul so wilt thou find as great necessity to Phisick and purge thy Soul as the others body 3. After the Cause is removed by washing away with thy tears thine own or thy friends stams then mayst thou safely orderly and as the Physicians prescribe secundum artem proceed to remove the Effect to use all the means God allows for recovery for to this end saith the wise man God created the Phisician as well as the herbs of the field for the time of need Only remember that you first beg the life of God before you seek it from the Phisician 'T was Asahs fault not that he sought the Phisician but that he did not seek the Lord 2 Chron. 16.12 only as you use the means so trust not in them but in Gods blessing and believe they have no farther operation or vertue than while they are joyn'd with your Prayers Epaphroditus Recovery St. Paul ascribes to Gods mercy on him and on the Corinthians but his mercy awakened by prayers Phil. 2.26 27. his own preservation from the sentence of death pass'd against him at Ephesus to combate with wild beasts 1 Cor. 15 32. which was drawn upon him by more Salvage Beasts Demetrius and his Silver Smithes Act. 19.24 he imputes to the Prayers of the Corinthians 2 Cor. 1.8 9 10 11. Who knowes whether our letting our hands fall from prayer hath not caus'd death to prevail over the person we now mourn for 2. Duty or enquiry How we are to moderate our grief in the death of near Relations which by these degrees will be discovered 1. Some affections some natural passions are not to be denied God doth not like the Lacedemonians load his Children with stripes and require that hardinesse in them that they should return no signs of griefs nor groans at all 'T is no stoical Apathy no senselesse stupidity God requires but only patience under his chastisements for if we did not feel the blow how should we look up to the hand that smites us How should affliction lead us to godly sorrow but by that sensible sorrow which is according to the world that which is natural is first and then that which is spiritual Even worldly sadnesse and melancholly is a good disposition to Devotion and a fair degree to an humble temper We find our Saviour weeping over Lazarus Grave insomuch as the people could inferr thence See how much he loved him John 11.35 36. I know no Divinity but that which the Sword and the Spirit unlike that which came in the shape of a Dove hath framed in this latter age that excludes humanity but delights always to plant it self in soft breasts and either makes or finds good nature I find in the Catalogue and Spawne of highest Crimes which the dreggs of these last times should bring forth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 want of natural affection reckoned 2 Tim. 33. and that joyn'd with Haters of God Truce breakers False Accusers unthankfull cursed Speakers having a shew of godlinesse and denying the power thereof Rom. 1.30 And the Apostle argues it strongly How can he love God whom he hath not seen who loves not his brother whom he hath seen So then t is not only not unlawfull but a duty to mourn with those that mourn if you will receive the Apostles Prescription Rom. 12.15 It is in the Scripture noted as an extream judgement and curse on the wicked Job 27.15 Ps 78.64 his Widows shall not weep as either wanting leasure from other sorrows or liberty from their cruel enemies or oppressed with Gods sore displeasure so far as to yeeld and acknowledge the just curse with silence Jer 16.5.7 or else having spent their tears and grief and dryed up the fountain of sorrow their very heart Ezek. 24.16 17.22.23 that the heaviest judgement you shall not mourn nor weep but shall pine away in your iniquity and mourn one towards another for one to comfort another c. Tears are the first office we do for our selves and the last for others They may not please themselves that can with dryest eyes behold the sicknesses the losses the Funerals of Friends as who had attain'd a greater measure of Religion or Discretion or the Spirit or who had subdued their desires to a perfecter Resignation and submission to Gods will Let them question themselves whether this Apathy this stoutness proceeds not from a spirit void of sense and natural affection and not from an humble Resignation to the Providence and pleasure of God whether this calm arise not alike to that of the dead Sea from a curse 2. On the other side Though Religion forbids not mourning yet it forbids us to mourn as those that have no hopes Though it excludes not all grief yet it moderates our grief and teacheth us to turne our sadness to an holy sorrow our melancholly to devotion and convert our discontents to repentance Religion otherwise will require us to weep our Carnal Tears over again when they flow either from immoderate or mere worldly sorrow Hence then we are to enquire 3. How farr we are to mourn For what and how we are to grieve and and that either in regard of the Object or Measure of our grief 1. In regard of the measure of our grief we are so far to mourn as we joyn prayers with our tears so far which is the true measure of all our passions by which we may discern when they are immoderate as not to indulge fruitless tears and complaints instead of real duties When our passions hinder not the free use of reason and Religion and take not up the place of other Services when they cause us not to omit the Evening Sacrifice as Aaron did upon grief for the death of his two Sons Nadab and Abihu Lev. 10. ult which yet Moses is said to be content with and God to permit not that he indulgeth more the extremities of this passion which most banisheth the sense of Humanity or Piety but in regard of some holy Reflection in this his greif that included some sorrow for the scandal and breach of Gods worship This may be some cause why God would not permit his Priests that naturall Affection to mourn for any friends but their nearest kin Lev. 21.2 Lest it should make them lesse holy God would have them less humane then others He would have them esteem no relation so near to them as that of God and his Service He suffers them not to grieve for the loss of any thing while they may in so near a distance enjoy God the reason is alleaged verse 6. In them it is interpreted Profaneness what in others were but a commendable affection and sign of a good nature seeing sorrow indulg'd must needs bring with it some
distraction in Religion The Heaviness of heart for Christs departure caus'd the Disciples to sleep when they should have watched and pray'd St. Gregory breaks off his Comment on Ezekiel to write Epitaphs on his Son as Aaron omits the evening sacrifice or a great part of the Ceremonie at his Sons death 2 In regard of the object we are to mourn for sins first and then for afflictions sicknesses deaths as the Effects and Consequents of sin So that death and other evils are the improper and secondary objects of sorrow Sin the onely proper object of grief and just cause of tears Because 1st Sin is the only evil John 17.15 being the cause of all other evils and without which miseries themselves are not miserable but are turned to the innocent to Exercises of their graces and occasions of redoubled Rewards and Glories 2. Sorrow in other evils save in sins only is useless and brings no proper remedy but adds more disquiet to our troubles Our tears naturally fall upon our breasts as it were to wash the stains of that part and are not to be wasted over graves that may save souls Our tears 't was the complaint of St. Chrysâ—stome are most abus'd by us wee lavish and spend them where they are not availeable on outward evils or over the dead We seldom saith he weep in the right place But as sins first deserve our sorrow so affliction and misery the consequents of sin more sensibly provoke our griefs and are indeed the just but secondary cause and objects of Sorrow Whence Sicknesses and Deaths are to be considered look'd on as the wages nothing surer than the Hirelings wages the effects and consequents of Sin For first so Sin and Affliction in Scripture are both represented under the name of Death Open my eyes O Lord that I sleep not in death that is in Sin that leads unto Death Ps 13.3 Pray unto the Lord to take away this death only Exod. 10.17 that is the plague of Vermin that did not so much threaten to destroy as to disquiet Pharoabs life In the Prophet Ezek. 7. sword without and death within is threatned when Famine Plague and other messengers of death are denounced whereupon the wise man concludes safely Prov. 8.38 He that loves sin loves death 2. To look on Affliction otherwise as not sent by providence either to punish or to discipline us as the Fiery Tryal either to refine and purge to better us or to consume us as the Wind either to fanne or to scatter us utterly is to look on them no otherwise than the Heathen as Chances and the casual events of the Fates Thus to bear them as things of course without any thoughts of Sin is to say that afflictioÌ„ riseth out of the dust or what is a blasphemy God less endureth That God willingly grieveth the children of men Jupiter non nocet nisi ut prosit Sen. From this consideration that Death and all other evils are the effects and consequents of Sin will follow these father Inferences 1. Against security in health or youth that as Death came into the world by Sin so it came over all the world in that all have sinned that we may not wonder when we find Children conceived in Sin should have death bequeathed to them before they are well entred into life Whence they which are not marks large enough for any of Deaths darts for any wound are yet wounded so often by it and find their grave in the womb that even the Child that is not grown to Davids span is yet old enough to die No security in any place or state of life while we carry about us not a body only but a soule temper'd with contrary and corrupt humors and a body of sin and death as well as of flesh We may conclude with the Apostle Rom 8.10 The body is dead through sin VVhat wonder if so many are cut off in the flower of their strength e're they well know how to live and lesse how to die 'T is the sinner not the sick or aged person dies Paradice alone had the tree of Life in it when Adam was cast out of that into this our Farth he brought nothing but Death and the Emblemes of Mortality See him no sooner faln than cast out of Paradice a flaming sword and a destroying Angel driving him from the Tree of Life the skins of Beasts that is Mortality it self serving to cover him and at last he condemn'd to dig continually the earth and to prepare his own Grave His posterity ever since feeding their Luxury and sustaining their life with the death of birds and beasts mortibus vescimur doth not he seem to have planted in this our earth the tree of Death whereon all the fruits perish e'r they come to maturity some in the bud others in the growth VVe passe through so many deaths to Eternal life from the womb of the mother of the world of the earth to heaven In the midst of life we are in death and like sentenc'd persons under a reprieve however we are permitted to live yet to enjoy no certaintie of life as not knowing when we may be called forth to execution VVhile we walk upon earth we alwayes tread over our graves and know not whether our next step may bring us into it For our bed is made in the dark and our graves lie ready open for us but as pits covered with snow 2 Against impatience or Immoderat sorrow If sin brings forth death we are to coÌ„sider death as an evil not so much inflicted by God as drawn upon our selves by our own deserts as it were our own choice and therefore with more patience to be indured Wisd c. 1.13 16. God made not death adeo non est creatione sed ordinatione aut ultione in poenam peccati he fram'd it not he meant it not for a creature but ordain'd it for a punishment of his disobedient creature for then should the great work-man have destroy'd his own works which yet he allow'd to be good the Creator should have been the Abbaddon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Confounder of his own creature but death was the creature of Mans Invention and as his own brood makes way for its birth like the Viper by eating through the entrails of the Parent 3. Against fear of death as well as sorrow that as other Afflictions so death in its self is not simply evil and therefore not simply to be fear'd or mourn'd but in reference to sin the sting of death is sin Sin alone makes death deadly and miseries miserable Death like those creatures which take their colours from the place to which they cleave as the Polypus and Camaeleon becomes good or evill as the persons are to whom it happens It is the voice from Heaven could our dull earth be perswaded to hear it that they are blessed who die in the Lord What is it then we mourn for either our friends losse who is more
your sight after the better part ascended above to the Heavens as we have great cause to believe and hope by the assurances of eternal life in this Virgin departed And what greater assurance can there be If in the words of the Church we are to know for a truth Preface before the Catechism and it is certain by Gods word that Children being baptized have all things necessary for their salvation and are undoubtedly saved How much more this child who was blessed with a Lois and an Eunice that gave her a Bible for the first thing to play withall and taught her first to lisp the language of Canaan before she could speak her Mothers Tongue who even with her milk suck'd in the sincerer milk of the word As they write of the blessed Virgin Mary that at three years she entred the Temple offer'd her self as a living Sacrisice at the Altar warm'd her hands and her heart at the holy flame and made Religion her pastime before the vanities of the world or the pleasures of sin could seduce her so was this Virgin brought by her Parents to the Temple as it were after her Saviours steps to ask of the Doctors the way of life even before she could firmly walk in it She learn'd Repentance ere she knew what it was to Sin She first began the life of Grace ere she attain'd the full life of Nature and had her Senses exercised in the knowledge of Good and Evil before she could distinguish the degree of bravery and Pride She yeelded her self to be regulated by Religion before she could be abused by sense or reason Her first care was not her Dress or Looks but her pensum quotidianum de flore Scripturarum as St. Hierom directs Laetal l. 2. Ep. her dayly task out of the choicest Scripture to sanctifie her memory as well as her Affections Instead of wanton Songs she repeated the Psalms which was an ability required to make a Divine in the Primitive times but was it not strange in those tender years she had not only strength and force to hold Davids Harp but to tune it when others of her soft age would call for a Companion she cryed out come Lord Jesu come quickly and I pray thee help thy servant whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious blood What can we imagin but that she who breath'd her first air in Devotion and her last in Prayers who was sealed to eternal life by Baptisme and kept in the assurance and blessed hope thereof by a pious education had gained the Love of our Saviour much sooner than the young man who had observed all that God commanded even from his youth though not so perfectly as he conceived In summe she was brought up One of the Order of St. Pauls Virgins who from her Infancy onely cared for the things of the Lord. And here might it be safe to expostulate with the Almighty I should aske Why these Graces that are not to be received in vain by us or rather Offer'd than Given Why so fair characters that others might take copies from thus immediately blotted out and dust thrown on them VVhy doth God delight to crop such fragrant flowers in the bud ere they are fully blown Is it that the unwholsom Air or rude Touch might not fully them Indeed so we read some hastily snatched out of the world as out of a Pest-house Ne malitia corrumperet Intellectum before Malice or Vanity should infect their minds Some are taken away out of a special Love and Tenderness of God because there is some good Thing in them towards the Lord God as Jeroboams son 1 Kings 14.13 Is it to shew that we have here no abiding City that this world is but our Tyring room or stage where some Mute persons are brought in onely for Number or shew meerly to passe over the Stage and so serve to grace it even in the Passage not unlike Angelical apparitions Or is it as a devout pensive VVriter observes that God trains us as we do our children by giving them gay and precious things but demanding them immediately again to try our Submission whether we could with Abram yield up sacrifice a child at Gods call and give thanks with Job to God even when he resumes his Gifts The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away Blessed be the name of the Lord. Let not this yet discourage Parents from making their Children fit for Heaven and the society of Angels But rather shame those careless and indulgent Parents Parents indeed as the Apostle terms them afte rthe flesh as who had no share in the Soul who being forward to surrender to God in Baptism by a most holy Vow the Children they received from him are not yet afraid with Ananias and Saphira to withdraw that they had once devoted to the Lord and neglect the teaching them to keep their Vow as religiously at least as formal Nuns would VVill they not allow that Diligence that senselesse Creatures use in trayning and practising their young ones seeing we bring them forth as deformed and mishapen in the sight of God as any ugly Lumps of flesh the Bear is said to whelp Shall we deny them the labour of our Tongues to instruct them and to lick them into shape Having betray'd them to a life of Sin and Misery Ought we not in conscience in Equity procure them that other life of grace and glory Let the Duty or the Shame the Terror or the Comfort answerable to the Education of your Children move you to express your Affection in this pious Care of providing a richer stock of manners then of Fortunes and hopes of a more lasting Inheritance St. Hierom observes from Ezekiel 18.28 The Sonne shall not bear the iniquity of the Father nor the Father the iniquity of the Son That this only frees and secures the Parents in these Children that yet arrive not to the use of Reason that live not on their own score that have no proper Motion of their own but as the Parents limbs what the Parents derive to them in these the Parents negligence or sinfull Indulgence makes them who are said to live again in their Children to perish rather in their sinfull courses and to invert the threat of the Commandement that the sins of the 3 and 4 Generation shall be visited and avenged on the Parents who have propagated those sins by their loose neglect or example On the other side the joy of those shall be redoubled and multiplyed with their seed who being not more ambitious to enlarge their Family than the Houshold of the Faithfull or to propagate their own name more than Gods may with boldness present themselves with their righteous seed at the Throne of God Behold us and the Children that thou hast given us These are they that may with more comfort lose their Children at Gods Call than others enjoy them amidst other frail possessions and uncertain contents of this life seeing children so lost are not to be accounted lost Whence the Father observes Job having by his patience merited a double Restitution of all his other losses had not his Children redoubled for they are not taken away they are only secured in the hands of God and sent as pledges before us to be more happily recovered and enjoyed for ever when some shall be gathered to their Fathers and others more gloriously gather'd to their Children whom they are to follow first in their Innocence then in their Inheritance and Happiness That Kingdom of Heaven which none shall enter that are not like unto those little Children To both which God fit us and then hasten his Kingdom Even so sweet Jesu come quickly Amen FINIS