our selves for the solemnities of our funerals sicknes it is a gradual puting of this vail of flesh that we may be cloathed upon with our house which is from heaven it is the the harbinger of death that we may say with that holy man when sickness comes death worketh in us death works apace it works away our health it works away our strength it works away our ease and works us into our graves CHAP. LII LOrd make me to know my end was the sickbed prayer of holy David When patient Job was almost suffocated with the violence of his distemper he concludes thus I know thou wilt bring me to death and to the house appointed for all living CHAP. LIII ANother design of God in sickness is to communicate experience of his power and goodness in strengthning and supporting under it Then is his strength made perfect in weakness then hath the pious soul experience of Divine power strengthning him upon his bed of languishing and making all its bed in its sickness when flesh and heart failes then God demonstrates to the soul that he is the strength of its heart and portion for ever Thus sickness is sometimes laid upon us is that we may experience the excellency of divine visits that in the end we may say thy visitation hath preserved my spirit CHAP. LIV. SOmetimes sickness is laid upon us to make us sympathize with others in the same condition David speaking of his very enemies when they were sick sackcloth was his clothing how much more should we sympathize with the members of our spiritual head and be sensible of the afflictions of Joseph CHAP. LV. ANother end of sickness is to teach us to pray when our bodies are the sinks of filthy humors our souls should be vialls of precious Odors Hezekias turned his face to the wall and prayed when his life was like to be cut off with pining sickness when our natural beauty doth consume away like a moth then we begin with an O spare me that I may recover strength before I go hence and be seen no more And we begin to pour out a prayer when heavens chastising hand is upon us CHAP. LVI SIckness is many times sent to try whether we will resign our selves and Relations up by Death as Job did his children and as holy Ely said It is the Lord let him do what seemeth him good Sometimes the knife of sickness is ready to slay an Isaac to try whether we will be willing to sacrifice him to the will of God If he will have our friends to eternity who can give a randsom for them We are apt to cry after them as Elisha did when Elijah was taken to heaven My Father my Father but he stopt not to answer him O Absolom my Son my Son cryeth the affectionat parent would God I had dyed for thee Why should we mourn and weep for our dying Relations when all tears are wiped from their eyes and they are singing Hallelujahs with harps in their hands to him that sits upon the throne and to the Lamb for ever and ever The more lovely and excellent the friend was we parted with the more admirable was our obedience CHAP. LVII SIckness sometime coms to try whether we are willing to leave this world and to come to glory We should live so as to be ready at an hours-warning to leave all and to go to eternity Thou shal call me out of this life and I will answer thee said the holy man Sometimes a Feaver or a consumption stands at the bed-side and cries Husband come away from thy wife Parent come away from thy child now how ready should we be to be offered and how willing that the time of our departure be at hand that upon the least intimation we may readily go up to mount Nebo and dye CHAP. LVIII MAny times divine providence bids us go into a distemper and dye and go into a sick bed and dye and certainly did we but with an eye of faith see whether our diseases would carry us it would be a thousand times harder duty to be content to live then to be willing to dye if sincere Christians CHAP. LIX ANother arrant that sickness comes upon it is to try whether we will hold fast our integrity when the hand of Heaven toucheth our bone and our flesh he that can trust God although he kill him the trial of that mans faith is more pretious then Gold and will conduce to his praise honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ CHAP. LX. ANother end it is to conform us more more to the divine Image one great part of sick bed chastisements is to make us partakers of Gods holines although the outward man decay the inward man is thereby renewed day by day after the image of him that created it outward pains often procure inward peace The loadstone of mercy draws us not so nearly unto the likeness of God as the cords of affliction CHAP. LXI ANother arrant sickness comes upon it is to turn men from the ways of sin and iniquity unto virtue and obedience hence God complains of the Jews I have sent amongst you the pestilence yet have you not returned many times a fit of sickness it doth more good than an hundred Sermons Sickness it comes to convince of sin which is the meritorious cause of all diseases When our own wickedness doth correct us we should then know and see that it is an evil thing and a bitter to forsake the Lord in all our weaknesses God looks upon us to see if any say I have sinned and it profiteth me not This was the effect of holy David's sickness for he cryeth out There is no soundness in my flesh because of thine anger neither is there any rest in my bones because of my sin CHAP. LXII IF we did but behold the plagues the Consumptions the inflamations and the extreame burnings that attends as pageâ— upon our pride wantoness carnallity and intemperance we should stand in awe and sin not but commune with our own hearts upon our sick beds and our spirits would make a more dilligent search into the causes of our distempers CHAP. LXIII ANother errant of sickness is to convince us of the vanity of the creature what a vain treasure is that which a lump of phlegme may take from us a dead corps is a poor thing it must return naked as it came into the world If we could but view our selves as we lye in our Graves and Coffins what a poor thing would the World be in our eyes When a man looks upon his stately buildings and sees the sweet situation the wholesome aire the convenient rooms oh what golden dreams a man is involved in but did we see Death coming up into our windows what pleasure then hath a man in his house after him when the number of his moneths are cut of in the midst How vain are Noble Pedigrees and generous extractions and ancient Families when we must
with a knife of steele then of Bone We choose the ablest Carpenter for our buildings but indebted Trades-men disbanded Souldiers wandring Mountebanks wicked Jews the very scorn of the people serve for our bodies a Taylor shall as soon mend a stitch fallen in our bodies as a learned Physitian The Proverb is changed from all are fools or Phisitians to all fools are Physitians Tractent fabrilia fabri let every one handle his own tooles but men will not learn wisdom until the dust of the grave that powder of experience be cast in their eyes Many Patients become Martyrs to their Physitians ignorance Degrees and tryals of mens abilities are good political Shiboleths and very needfull The English people strangely betray their simplicity in affecting strangers and forrain Physitians he that came the last tyde from Gravesend hath but Englsh enough to write me cure all these Diseases par la grace of God having cured the Ala-mode distemper in himself is well studyed in Hypocras Gallon rather then Hippocrates and Galen is a rare Doctor Their practise being like countrey dance called hit or miss Possibly they may cure some old Distemper just taking its leave and through the energy of a former course thrust out of doors but they may as well promise a man success from thence as that a blind man shall hit the mark a second time because he did it once In an able Physitian there is required natural abilities advanced by study and confirmed by experience CHAP. XXVII TAke heed of dashing your health upon these Rocks least you shipwrack all when your body is in a storm call in the help of a skilfull Pilot I mean an able Physitian and in bleeding purging sweating vomitting and blistering depend not on the advise of any without an able Physitian for with the well advised is wisdom and in Councel there is safety men doe not depend upon the advise of an Attorney when their estate is in danger but fee a Councellor why should they dally with their health more then their estates There are many considerable motives may be urged to perswade to take the advice of able Physitians As our own safety Physitians being better acquaintanted with the nature of all remedies and with the Anatomy of the body of man understand the scituation of the parts and the circulations of the blood better then any Artist whatsoever Again for the satisfaction of the world that all may be convinced that the best means were used that could be I have known some that have been almost distracted after the death of relations because they advised not in time with some able Physitians Again Because we cannot rationally expect the concurrence of a Divine influence unless we make use of the most probable of second causes and the most likely means we must use our best indeavors if we would have them effectuall in the production of any end Again Because a person dying in the omission of the most proper and rational means may be in danger of an indictment for self murther which few consider CHAP. XXVIII MOreover it is very requisite that care should be used in the choyce of faithfull Persons to prepare and compound those remedies which learned and experienced Phisitians prescribe a business of so great consequence ought not to be committed to serving men who never served Apprentiship to any Imployment of that nature And therefore the wisdom of Authority hath established a Society of Apothecaries to be instructed imployed in that useful Art they have demonstrated to the world their care to prevent abuses in medicines by erecting a Publick Elaboratory for the preparation of Chymicall remedies in the most exact manner CHAP. XXIX ANother excellent Rule to be observed in order to the cure of distempers is that the Patient be very exact in observing the directions of the Physitian in his Dyet Aire Exercise Evacuations Sleep and Passions of the Mind there arc many Patients that will promise their Physitian fairly but as soon as their back is turned observe no rules yet be very ready to censure the Physitian if they do not recover They will not persevere until the distemper be removed If a man layeth a plaister to an ulcer and takes it off presently it can never heal If the Physitian throws water and the Patient throw on fuell how can the fire be extinguished What folly is it to blame our food for not satisfying our hunger when we eat but a bit Many Patients are like the Babel builders when the Physitian prescribes a trowel they will use a hammer when the distemper calls for sweats they will use none but cooling Juleps and consult more the antique picture in the Almonack then the stare increase and declination of the distemper If sleep be wanting then Syrup of Poppy must be had which translates the morbifick matter to the brain and causeth a frenzy or else such a sleep is procured which onely the last trumpet can awake And it is an endless thing to argue with some people to whom sense is a riddle and reason a Paradox If people would put on their considering caps they might sooner put off their sick caps Although some people may be called Patients because they exercise the Physitians Patience yet they are not so in using their own for they will not persevere in a regular course until the remedy can have its due operation if they are not cured of those distempers in a day which they have been contracting a year then leave the medecine and chop and change and run from one thing to another and be constant to nothing And one imprudent rib shall slay more persons then the Jaw-bone of an Ass And practice by book receipts where through the default of the printer a dram of Mercurius vitae shall be prescrib'd in stead of a few grains yet down it goeth because the judgement of the reader knows not the exact dose In Dyet they will not be confin'd but like Timothy to drink a little wine CHAP. XXX ANother rule to be observed in the restoring of health is the care of the attendance a good nurse is a good sign of recovery If the attendance are not carefull the abillities of the Physitian and the goodness of the medicine is but in vain Now the care of attendants is evident in giving the remedies which are prescribed and in hindring the Patient from those things which are hurtfull but the generality of attendance are like Eva instead of discouraging will tempt and invite to the eating forbidden fruit to the ruine of the patient and sometimes of the posterity CHAP. XXXI THE rule to be observed in the right use of remedies is to apply our selves to the use of proper means before nature is vasted delay in this case proves alwaies dangerous therefore the Poets rule is good Principiis obâ—sta sero medicina peratur People generally flatter themselves into their graves with the conceipts of colds and surfeits and so confounding
diseases with their symptomes and nicknamed distempers and giving them some common denomination and apprehending that it being nothing else but what they have known some recover of they neglect the properest remedies until it be too late or until the distemper be complicated and hath taken deep root It costs many a man his life whilest he eyeth only the external causes of distempers It is usual to discourse thus I have left off a coate or put on a damp shift or eaten somthing that did not agree with my stomach or drank cold beer when hot or over walked my self or have been frighted or grieved or the like when at the same time the stomach is disordered by a loade of corrupt humors and a meer Quagmire the Blood inflamed the Liver and Spleen obstructed and the Lungs perished and this is not taken notice of as if a man when his house is on fire should not mind it so as to quench it but satisfie himself with this consideration that it came only by a boy throwing a squib c. And many times they will depend upon the advice of some friend or apish Doctor until cold sweats affright and then the learned Physitian is sent for when the time for purgation and bleeding is let ship and so the Physitian shares with the Patient in the infamy of miscarriage and he is sent for not to cure that he cannot because nature is spent but to try whether he can antidate resurrections Nothing destroyes more Persons then imprudent hearkning to the advise of persons of other professions and neglecting learned Physitians until it be too late CHAP. XXXII A Nother effectual ingredient in the cure of distempers and that which is most necessary is the concurring influence of a divine blessing unto God the Lord belong the issues from death and therefore it concerns us so to behave our selves that we may procure a divine Benediction The best way to procure a divine influence to cooperate with the means is by a Holy and a pious life so saith God Almighty to the Jews If you obey my statutes and hearken to my Judgments I will bless your bread and your water remove sickness from the midst of you Solomon urgeth the consideration of our health as a very strong argument to promote divine fear It shall be health our Navel and marrow to our bones Wisdom is a Tree of life to them that lay hold upon it what man is he that loveth life and many dayes let him depart from evil and do good Godliness hath the promise of the life that now is as well as of that which is to come Solomons asking of wisdom was attended with the addition of long life If the obedience of our naturall Parents hath the promise of long life annext to it much more the service of our spiritual parent especially so far as life is good life is yours saith the Apostle because you are Christs CHAP. XXXIII PIety it secures men from the power of evil Angels who have a great influence in the procuring of distempers by a Divine permission as in the case of the excommunicated Corinthian and the incestuous persons about Lots House struck blind Herod destroyed by an Angel and the evil angels sent amonst the Israelites and several other examples of the like nature and the Demoniacks in the Gospel Again Piety it usually secures men from the stroke of Humane Justice as it guards them from those flagitious impieties which expose them to the penalties of humane lawes as murders thefts and rapine And it also preserves men from the terrors of an evil conscience which makes men many times wash their hands in their own blood as Judas did Again Piety preserves life as it teacheth men temperance and moderation in the use of those means that preserve life We find in Sacred Oracles that immature death is threatned as the penalty of disobedience and that the Penmen of Holy writ doe often inculcate the benefit of the fear of God as it is attended with the promise of longaevity So that to imagine the life of man to be fixed beyond the possibility of the Almighties abbreviation or prolongation is vain and inconsistent with scripture and reason CHAP. XXXIV THe Turks dream that the manner and moment of every mans death is prefixt by the Immutable laws of fate and that his lot is written in invisible Characters in his forehead that they accompt it vanity and cowardise to arm themselves against the blows of war by defensive weapons but it is to be hop'd that Christians have learned better It being a confest verity that every natural motion hath its beginning duration and period dependent on the will of the first motive now the life of man being a natural motion our nativity and death are both order'd by divine providence for in him we live and move and have our being The natural life of man consisting in a requisite harmony of the first qualities and in a proportionate comixture of the natural heat and radical moysture which harmony is more or less according to the more or less exquisite temperament of body assigned to each single person by the free dispensation of the divine will It followeth that the continuance of every individual in this natural life dependeth upon the pleasure of the first cause as Holy Job intimates when he saith our dayes are determined and the number of our Months are with him who hath set bounds to humane nature so that no man can live beyond the durability of his specificall temperament the principles of his vitality and permissions of providence CHAP. XXXV THe only wise God hath composed our bodies like a lamp of heat and moysture hath given appetites of hunger and thirst to feed this lamp and so supply the expences of the moysture by the heat he hath given us reason and understanding to govern our appetites and the revelation of his will to guide our reason now if we through the depravation of our natures and the predominancy of temptation do suffer our appetite to dethrone our reason and give way to Ebriety Gluttoners salacity other immoralities which have a natural tendency to extinguish the lamp of life we may justly exspect to be cut off in the midst of our dayes and to dye before our time by being wicked over much as Solomon expresseth it Whereas piety and obedience like the Tree of life in paradise not only sacramentally but really conduceth to health and long life so far as it is a blessing and this it doth by impregnating our elements with the tincture of a divine benediction by meliorating our temperaments and constitutions by infusing salutiferous dispositions in the air propitious influences in the host of heaven which many times impress the seminalities of diseases upon the blood and spirits so that the period of our days and all the second causes conducing thereunto are circumscribed within the circle of a divine prenotion and limitation CHAP. XXXVI A
Leper Lord if thou wilt thou canst make me whole and Christ did it I will Be thou clean Thou art my King command deliverances for Jacob said David when the water-spouts came pouring upon him Vnto God the Lord belong the issues from Death CHAP. LXXII WHat a great impiety is it to go to Witches or Wizzards or such as have familiar Spirits nay to the Devils for cure A thing absolutely forbidden in Scripture A sad thing for a man to procure the Devils blessing with Gods curse It is called Idolatry and Whoredom It is a violation of our Baptismal Covenant Shall not a Nation seek to their God in Covenant Our Saviour abhorred to worship them and shall his members do it They use good words the better to deceive the ignorant They use charms circles spells words and other signes which have no naturall virtue nor can we with any ground pray for a blessing upon these The Devil being herein God's Ape for As God hath made a Covenant with his people and hath appointed signs and Seales upon the faithfull use of which he is present to perform what he hath promised So the Devil makes a Covenant with Witches upon which he hath given signes and tokens that if they use the one he wil perform the other Let such as are guilty in this kind repent and pray that the thoughts of their hearts may be forgiven them as the Apostle counselled Simon Magus The power of Christ is the same now in Heaven as when on earth in his hand our breath is and all our wayes in him we live and move and have our being we live not by bread alone but by the word of blessing out of his mouth Many a man loseth his life for want of asking it We are apt to blame this means and that accident but seldom say as she did Lord if thou hadst been here My Brother or Sister had not dyed the means alone are but like Elijahs staff it will not doe unlesse he come himself By fervent prayers we should invite Omnipotence to our beds sides And call for the Elders of the Church to pray for us All second causes are but the instruments in Gods hand to lengthen or shorten as He pleaseth CHAP. LXXIII THere are three general second causes of the death of all men assigned in 1 Sam. 26.10 As some inward corrupt Humour or Disease that smites the vitals extinguisheth Nature's lamp as a Lamp goeth out when the oyle it putrefied or corrupt as Asa's Gout Jehoram's bloody-flux the plague of Leprosie the womans child's Headach and those diseases mentioned in the 28. of Deuteronomy Another second cause is some external accident as a Lamp is putout by the Wind so the unbelieving lord kil'd in a crowd Ahab slain with an arrow the Captain of fifty with Lightning Jobs children with the fall of a house the good Prophet by a Lion Absolom hanged in a tree by the hair Sodem by fire the fifty two children by the Bears The old world by water the Rebels against Moses the earth swallows up CHAP. LXXIV ANother second cause is when the naturall heat and radical moysture is consumed as in old age as Jacob when a man comes to his grave in a full age as a shock of corn comes in its season as a Lamp must go out when there is no more oyle to feed it Yet Providence hath a hand in all these second causes so that men provoke God by their impieties to cut the thred of their their lives and by Piety and Obedience they may prevaile with Him to lengthen their days if he see good CHAP. LXXV ANother means towards the procuring the concurrence of a Divine blessing with the means is To act faith and a holy confidence in God with the use of proper means one touch of faith will cure our faith will make us whole therefore trust in the Lord for ever for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength I had failed unless I had believed said David Faith is the best cordial in quietness and confidence lyeth our greatest strength why should we be cast down let us hope in him who is the health of our countenance What time we are afraid we should trust in God and beware of slavish fear and carnal confidence former experience is a good ground of confidence He hath delivered and in him we trust he will deliver us Stand still and see the salvation of God is good counsell towards recoery of health it is a sign of carnall confidence in the means when we are continually trying new experiments and run from one thing to another and leave rationall and experimental remedies CHAP. LXXVI REpentance and humiliation is another means towards recovery from sicknesse if we humble our selves under the mighty hand of God he will exalt us in due time the way to hasten the cure is to hasten repentance our desire of life should be in order to our preparations for death if we break off our sins by righteousness it may be a lengthning of our tranquillity Nineveh's repentance spared their lives if men will not reform then God resolves to make them sick with smiting them as the Prophet speaks The last means to procure a Divine blessing it is a patient waiting the good pleasure of God without murmuring and repining They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength God hath his times for deliverance It is goad for a man to hope and quietly to wait for the salvation of God and not to say This evil is of the Lord why should I wait for him any longer God hath his time to an hour as our Saviour intimates Father save me from this hour The Promise is that Women shall be saved in child-bearing if they continue in faith and patience and it is of force in all other dangerous distempers A meek and a quiet spirit under all Divine chastisements is a very great ornament Some make Afflictions seem amiable by a pious and a patient Deportment CHAP. LXXVII MUrmuring is a dangerous sin we have the Jews for an example who were destroyed thereby A dreadful thing when a mans body is so weak that he cannot rise up in his bed yet his corruptions are so strong as to rise into an uproar against Gods will and Authority It may be some in Sickness may let fly their discontented spirits against their children or relations but they may answer as Moses to the Israelites What are we your murmurings are not against us but against the Lord. Some men practise what Jobs wife attempted viz. curse God and dye Murmurers shall be judged at the last day as ungodly men as Jude speaks Some in sickness howl upon their beds when they should be blessing God In all sickness we should say with Naomi Truly the hand of the Lord is against me and not in a stupid senseless way cry out Indeed I am not well but I shall shake it off it is only a flight distemper I wil work