helper Let vs reuerence the godly and honour the Lord and we shall stand inuincible in all oppositions or as mount Sion that cannot bee remoued but remaineth for euer Psal 125 1. Our death shall bee comfortable and our iudgement without rebuke wee shall benefit Christs church haue praise of God to whom Father Sonne and holy Ghost three persons and one immortall and onely wise God be rendred all glorie power and thanksgiuing now and euer Amen All glorie to God FINIS POINTS of instuction for the ignorant With An examination before our comming to the LORDS TABLE And A short direction for spending of time well LONDON Printed by William Hall for Francis Burton and are to be sold at his Shop in Pauls Church-yeard at the signe of the Greene Dragon 1613. TO THE Christian Reader the sauing knowledge of that truth which is according to godlinesse Tit. 1.1 * ⎠* CHristian Reader this short Catechisme thus gathered and set downe for the helpe of the ignorant cannot bee called new but renewed for their sakes For I may say in thiâ— case as Salomon in his Ecclesiastes said in a like case What is that that hath beene that that shall be Eccles 1.9 And what is that that hath beene done that that shall be done and there is no new thing vnder the Sunne The portion of meate which is heere offered to the tasle of the simple is no other then that which he hath already tasted of if he haue tasted any thing of the things of God and it is but the substance of other Catechismes set before him in another kinde of seruice that is with some difference of Cookery and dressing which considering our too great distaste with one kinde of meate though neuer so wholsome if wee be continuallie fedde withit without diuersitie may not be without some good vse at least for some short time For the affections of men stand no lesse diuersly affected towards the variety of Gods gifts in deliuering one and the same matter then doth the stomacke towards the dressing of one and the same kinde of meate in a diuers maner by some alteration of forme and manner of doing it And yet it is no part of my meaning to hold vp the market of nouelty by any schey-seruice as tendeth rather to tikle the eare then to satisfie the sounder iudgement or to say any thing for those who make books like to the apparell which they weare and fashions that they are weary of when a newer comes Onlie hauing taught these Principles most of them to a few priuately and finding it more easie to print them then to write them for the surer keeping of them in their memories who had learned them and the good of some abroad that desired them I was not vnwilling thus to giue them content by the benefit of the Presse and of Printing Neither haue I done this far any want for there is store of Catechismes abroad to which this worme of mine is no way comparable and God hath dealt mercifully with our age for the meanes of knowledge but we famish spiritually at the full measure of these meanes either by not vsing them at all or not as wee should This mite of instructions I could haue made much larger but that I considered in my Cruse of store the vessels that I had to fill King 4.4.6 which could not well receiue more and so left pouring as I perceiued their filling Accept therefore Reader what is heere offered to thy gentlenesse and take it in as good part as it is meant vnto thee And so I command thee and thy grouth in godlinesse to the grace and assistance of Al-mighty God and rest Thine in all Christian good will ROBERT HORN POINTS of instuction for the ignorant WHat is true happinesse To know God Ioh. 17.3 Ier. 9.24 Luk 15.17 and to know my selfe Can you knowe God Not so plainely and fully heere as wee shall heereafter by face Exod 33.20 1. Cor. 13.12 but as hee hath reuealed himselfe vnto vs. How is that By his workes without vs and within vs Rom. 1.20 1.19 and by some description of his nature and effects in his word How doth the word describe him Generally thus â—xo 3.14 Ioh. 4.24 â—xo 34 6. Psa 90. 〈◊〉 1. Tim. 1 17. Isa 5.5 Psal 103 8 â—m 4.13 1 Pet. â— 19 Psal 99 1 2 â— Heb. 1 3 Act. 17 25 26 1 Iob. 5.7 Mat. 〈◊〉 16.17 2. Cor. 13 13. He is what he is And more particular thus a Spirit euery way infinite goodnesse it selfe Creatour Preseruer and Ruler of all things distinguished into three persons Father Sonne and holy Ghost So much for the knowledge of God What say you of the knowledge of your selfe It may bee considered before the fall or since What are you by creation in Adam before the fall A reasonable Creature Mat. 10.28 Ge. 1.27 Col 3 10 Ephes 4.24 consisting of soule and body made after the image of God in knowledge righteousnesse and true holinesse What are you since by Adams fall A sinner Rom. 3 9 10 Iob 14.4 Rom. 6 23 5.18.19 Gal. 3.10 and by sinne subiect to all kind of misery and punishments as to the death of my body and the death of my soule which is endlesse damnation What are your sinnes A guiltinesse in Adams first offence that is Rom. 5.12.18 7.18 Ier. 17.9 Gen. 6.5 Matth. 15.19 Rom. 7.5 a depriuation of all good thereby and a disposition of my whole heart to euery thing that is against the Lawe of God with innumerable corrupt fruits thereof in thought word and deede What doe you consider in Man thus falling His recouery to saluation and duty for it What say you of his recouery It may bee considered in the worker thereof or the meane of apprehending it What say you of the worker The worker or substance of it is Christ Iesus the Sonne of God 1. Iohn 2.1.2 Ioh. 1.14 Iohn 3.16 Philip 2.7.8 Galat. 4.4.2 Cor. 5.21 Iohn 1.12 who in Mans nature which hee tooke in the wombe suffered the death of the Crosse and fulfilled the Lawe for all that receiue him What is the meane wherby Christ is apprehended Faith Galat. 2.20 Acts 6.31 which is a speciall perswasion of Gods fauour in his word Ioh. 1.12 Luk. 2.29 Ephes 3.17 1. Cor. 1.30 Ioh 20.28 2. Tim. 1.12 wrought in my heart by the holy Ghost whereby I doe truely and in particular beleeue that Christ is made vnto me wisdome righteousnesse sanctification and redemption When doth this faith beginne to breede and take place in your heart When by Gods grace I begin to be touched in conscience for my sinnes Psal 51.17 Isa 55.15 Math. 5.6 Phil. 3.7.8 Math. 15.25.27 Mark 9.24 to hunger and thirst after Christ and his merits aboue al things in the world and against all doubtings doe begin to beleeue By what meanes is this wrought It is begunne ordinarily
such to bee renued in their mindes reformed in their liues Eph. 4.14 And though they haue beene children long hauing so long and much forgotten God in the ignorance of childhood and vanitie of youth should they alwaies be so or should they not grow to be men in Christ and strong men in the saluation of God wisdome being their gray haires and an vndefiled life their old age 1. Cor. 16.13 The Israelites gathered twice as much Manna the day before the Sabbath as they did any day before because on the sabath they might gather none Exod. 16.22 and should not the hoare head that looketh euery day for the last sabbath of mortalitie and long sabbath of glorie in an age and day so neare vnto it heare twice as much pray twice as much do twice as much good be more fruitfull then in all his life before vsing not legs as youth but wings of repentance yet as young men think they haue a long time so put off remembrance so old men doe hardly beleeue that their time is so shoâ—â— or end so neere but that they 〈◊〉 take leasure and doe that hereafter which they should doe presentlie And who is there almost though hauing liued verie long alreadie that thinketh not hee may liue one yeer longer we read that threescore and ten is a great age Psa 90.10 but when we our selues are past it we forget what we haue read and look not to that which is gone but as couetous persons who onely liue vpon that which they expect not which they haue doe onely number the yeeres to come and build vpon seuen yeeres when perhaps there are not seuen months behind peraduenture not seuen daies not houres Little thought hee to die before the morrow who promising many yeeres of ease to himselfe said hee would pull downe his old barnes and build new Luc. 12.18.19 The like condition in sudden death may steale vpon the like foolish numberers of their daies For hee â—as a young man that so reckoned â—misse and shall they that be old so â—ckoning thinke to reckon well We say commonly Yong men may â—e and when we turne it to old â—en we say with good warrant Old â—en must die And yet as men by â—a thinkes anothers ship goes fast â—nd their owne stands still where â—eirs maketh as great hast to the â—ort as the others doth so old men â—inke that other old men weare aâ—ace and goe a maine to death as if â—eir owne yeeres did neuer a whit â—reake nor moue to the waine of â—se where the truth is that they â—aue as swift a gale and flight to the â—ort of all the liuing as the other â—aue who seeme in their eyes not â—o moue softly but to flie to their â—nd So much for the first reason â—he second followeth Nor the yeares approach wherein â—hou shalt c. This secoÌ„d reason giâ—en for remembrance is drawne froÌ„â—n age in a neerer degree to death by â—oÌ„mon course then the age that was spoken of though it may wel be called old age coÌ„pared to the times 〈◊〉 yong men childreÌ„ For these yeeâ— take all pleasure from our life wheâ— in affliction followeth affliction 〈◊〉 the clouds returne after the raine Eâ—cles 12.2 The reason may be drawâ— from the lesse to the more thus 〈◊〉 if Salomon had said It is an vâ—â— time in old age to begin repeÌ„tance much more at these stooping yereâ— where euerie step is in death aâ—â— they may say with Barzillat whâ— are come vnto them How long hâ—â— I to liue Doctr. 2. Sam. 19.34 The Doctrine is If in old age then mucâ— more in that age it is verie late 〈◊〉 consecrate our time to God wheâ— our houses are turned into our prisons and we haue no taste in that 〈◊〉 eat or in that we drinke 2. Sam 19.35 Of Ephraim it was said Thâ— gray hayres were here and there vpâ—â— him yet he knew it not Hos 7.9 thaâ— is hee had the markes of age in 〈◊〉 face and vpon his head and yet 〈◊〉 one that would still be young heâ— considered not that hee drew neeâ— â—o the graue and had tokens vpon â—im of a blasted life What would â—t haue beene said if being readie to â—ye downe in the graue he had fared â—s one that had come into the world but yesterday And that he thought not of putting off sinne and putting on holinesse in an age when he could neither put off nor put on his owne clothes The reasons This â—s the last time or rather houre and how shall we hope to be good if we begin but now And if it be somewhat late where memory is stronger how can it bee but verie late where memorie is quite gone Secondly repentance should bee voluntarie not extorted as at these yeares by bitter griefe and the feare of hell Thirdly our repentance then will be late repentance and late repentance is seldom or neuer true repentance Also those repentances that men frame to themselues at the last houre are but false conceptions that come not to bearing For in such repentances men forsake not their sinnes but their sinnes forsake them A reproofe to those desperat sinners Vse who put off all care of turning to God by repentance till the graue be readie for them and till they be readie to make vp their bed in the darke But many deceiued with this charme sorcery of the last hours repentance haue knocked when there was no opening Luc. 13.25.28 The foolish Virgins that came not for mercy whiles the Lords doore was open that is whiles hee was before the doore to giue it and they in the way to receiue it did stand without had none to open vnto them Matth. 25.10.12 So he was taken away to damnation that prepared not his wedding garment before his comming to the wedding feast Matth 22.11.13 Let these examples of reprobate putters off mooue vs to preuent the diuels houre of turning to God which is the last houre of life an houre when Gods doore of mercy is made fast and all hope is cut off for entring It is an euâ—ll seruant that putteth off all his worke to the last houre Eccles 12 And who knoweth not that hath vnderstanding that when those yeeres approach and that gastly houre is come there is businesse and worke enough in the mind and externall man of deaths condemned prisoner to resist and prepare against the extremitie of that combat which because it is the last of the day is like to be the sharpest Besides the last sicknes bringeth trouble inough with it when death the diuell mans vnremitted sinnes Gods intolerable wrath and the gaping pit and deepe lake of hell doe altogether with greatest terror astonishmeÌ„t present themselues to mans sorrowfull and sore incumbred soule Obiect You will say that a theefe was saued at the very last cast of life or some short time before hee departed from the Crosse to Paradise Luke 23.43 Answ I confesse that the
the good mans death but what is profitable and excellent In the third to the Philippians vers 21. the Apostle calleth this alteration by death not the losse of our body but the change of our vile body that it may bee facioned like to the glorious body of Christ And is there any thing in this but what is excellent and worthy if any thing be worthy our trauell best paines here Iohn speaking of the Saints glorified saith All teares shall be wiped from their eyes Apoc. 21.4 His meaning is that as soone as death shall let them out of the world they shall haue no more sorrow that is sorrow that causeth teares And the same Iohn saith Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord Apo. 14.13 that is they who hauing liued righteously die wel in him are in the hand by the helpe of death leade presently to blessednesse The Saints militant did alwaies with the eyes of faith in the Gospell behold this great honour and preferment by death in the happy ends of the righteous and therefore sighed desiring their house from Heauen 2. Cor. 5.2 for they knew that if it were an honour to be remoued from a base cote to a Princes court it could not but be a double that is singular honour to bee translated from the Cotes of the Earth to the Court of Heauen Therefore they sighed that is could not be merrie till that change should come Paul saith that to be losed to wit from the bonds of his corruptible bodie was best of all Philip. 1 23. which hee would not haue said if any preferment had beene better then that by death which is from basenes into the glorious libertie of the sonnes of God The reasons And further that there is so much good in the godlie mans death which is his change may be and is euident First by the things to which that their happie and blessed change by death is compared as to a hauen that after they haue passed the troublesome waues of the sea of this world carrieth them to their owne key or backe in the which they ride safely to their iourneys end after which they come home to their owne house being strangers here 1. Pet. 2.11 to the medicine that cureth most perfectly the sicknesse of life to the messenger that biddeth them to the marriage dinner of their great King Mat. 22.2.3 to their returne from banishment into their owne countrey and naturall land to their deliuerance from the gaole of sorrow where they are taken with Ioseph out of prison to be set with Princes to the laying downe of their tabernacle and to the putting on of their house from Heauen to a deliuerance like that out of Egypt from the bondage of corruption to the libertie of saints from a land of darknesse to a land where the sunne neuer goeth downe and from a land of destruction to the land of the liuing Now what is there in all these that is not perfitly good and desirable Secondly death abolisheth in the faithfull departed all power of sinning and sting of sinne Thirdly the bodie feeleth no more paine nor shal euer againe be sensible but of that which is excellently good desireable and comfortable and for the soule it shall presently be glorified Luc. 16.22 Fourthly death is but the dore of the soule out of an earthly dungeon such as the bodie is that must be destroied before the wormes into an heauenly kingdome or passage from death to life from a short death to a long life Lastly God executeth his iudgements vpon the damned and purgeth his Church by death An instruction to correct all vnreasonable and faithlesse weeping for our godly friends and brethren departed in the faith of Christ Vse 1 The Apostle to the Thessalonians exhorteth Christians if they sorrow for such not to sorrow for them as men that haue no hope 1. Thes 4.13 When Hester was taken from Mardochay who had brought her vp as his owne daughter to be married to King Assuerus and to receaue the crowne of Queene in the kingdome did he either bewaile or enuie that her great preferment the faithfull are taken from sorrowfullmen to be espoused to Christ and to receaue the crowne of glorie and shall they that liue by such vnmeasurable sorrow and taking on as is too commonly vsed at the graues of their friends vnwish to them in a sort so great happinesse Will a father be sorrie or can he without imputation of enuie repine that his sonne or daughter is with Ioseph taken out of prison to be set with Princes when thou giuest forth thy child to nurse and shee hath kept it long inough should shee because thou takest it home againe complaine thou wilt say she hath no reason for it Then what reason hath any father to murmure against the owner of the child hee taketh for taking of his owne Parents that so lose their children if they may be called lost that are so found are but nurses to them in their absence from their owne fathers house to nurse them with the milke of the Gospel and religiously to nurture them for the Lord who by death sends for them home to himselfe when he seeth time and when he so doth haue they cause to complaine of wrong father mother sonne wife husband brother are but lent goods which we must restore when the creditor and hee that owneth them calleth for them And shall we count our selues spoiled or vndone because they are required If one should lend vs a thing of price or thing that is costly would wee for a recompence of the vse of it vpbraid the owner because he sendeth for it or if we should might not he who was the lender iustly say is this my thanks and shall I be recompenced with so great impatiencie for my so great good will So if God should lend vs tenne deare children as he did to Iob and we should be made to part with them all in one day would it become vs with rough words to receaue that supposed losse or would we complaine of wrong where none is offered and where our good is sought and our childrens gaine be vnthankfull if we should may not the Lord of them and of vs iustly taxe our vnthankfulnesse and complaine of wrong May he not say did Iob my seruant so from whom I tooke ten children in one day and in a few daies all the honour and substance that he had did he not rather confesse my vnquestionable right in such moueables and say the Lord giueth the Lord taketh away blessed be the name of the Lord. Iob 1.21 If a great Lord should call vs and our child promising to both much honour and great wealth would we weepe and take on because our child is gone before and we our selues must shortly follow after would we not rather with much ioy so order our iourney and affaires that we also might with as great dispatch as might be receaue such preferment as wee know
of paine for the fruition of that which is perfectly pleasing and good Or to change death for life Or to passe from a wearie pilgrimage to their desired homes where they shall not onely neuer feele miserie but bee euer happie and blessed with the full sight of that the glimpse wherof shining vpon the face of our Sauiour in his transfiguration made Peter to say Master it is good to be here Math. 17.4 Salomon saith Better is the day of death then the day in which wee were borne Eccles 7.3 And why better except because when we are borne we come into misery when we die we goe out our death beeing changed by the death of Christ and made vnto vs not a death as the Law maketh it but our path and mid-way betweene this life and the other which is eternall or our doore and little wicket out of this world into that world and kingdome which is prepared for the Saints inhabited of the Angels and receiueth honour from God who is the light and temple of that Cirie Lastly death hath lost his sting his hell his victorie I speake in regard of the righteous that which remaineth if wee liue in the spirit and die in the Lord is profitable for vs. For it shall bring an end of all our labours and giue vs vp into the hands of Iesus Christ Now what feare is in all this Let them feare therefore who haue giuen vnto them a spirit of bondage and of feare in which they tremble at their owne estate and which maketh them to carrie in their breast tormenting furies that hold them day and night in the feare of endlesse death Let them feare who rest in sinne liue in errour and ignorance follow the lustes of the world and walke in all the waies of death but let not them feare who are at a couenant with themselues to haue no pleasure in such fond courses and direct waies of death but to haue their pleasure onely in the word of God to vnderstand it and in the mysterie of Christ to bee lightened with it who hate sinne that they may haue hope and walke in righteousnesse that they may walke with Christ Let not such feare for the power of death Satan is broken before such and such may haue boldnesse when they goe out of the world that they shall goe to God A comfort therefore to the faithfull Vse 3 who haue born the brunt of life for such may be comforted in death as a Souldiour who hath endured the skirmishes and scarres of warre is glad and may haue ioy that the enemie is spent and the warre ended where others because they haue spent no time or so little in the Lords seruice and giuen so few strokes if any in the cause of his truth and glorie may feare at the approach of death and iustly complaine of that day as of a day of death indeede and that eternall In the eleuenth Chapter to the Hebrewes the Apostle sheweth what great troubles the seruants of God endured and how ioyfull they were as at a royall feast in all those troubles and sufferings for Christ that they might enter vpon the comfortable death of the righteous They were so farre from fearing death as worldlings feare it that they ranne gladly to it in their hope of the resurrection and reioiced in the welcome day of death as in a day of the greatest good that could befall them The reasons were they knew with Sampson that they should slay moe at their death then they slew in their life Iudg. 16.30 As first that they should slay their last enemie by death which is not slain but by dying And secondly that they should kill the spawne of all enmitie sinne 's sinne which bred death 〈◊〉 4.7 and the miseries of eternall death Which death in the Saints bred by sinne as the worme in the flower killeth the corrupt flower that bred it that is that sinne that caused death And this made c I doubt not but the Prophet here sinned by impatiencie but his hope was in death Eliah to desire death not life and rather to die then to liue saying It is enough 1. King 19.4 It made Dauid to lay vp his flesh in hope Psal 16.9 It made Paul to say I am readie not to bee bound onely but to die at Ierusalem for the name of the Lord Iesus Act. 21.13 And as Simeon said Lord now lettest thou thy seruant depart in peace Luke 2.29 So the godly haue such comfort in death that they say with old Simeon and all Saintes Come Lord Iesu come quickly Apo. 22.20 apprehending death as their onely way to Christ and guide to happinesse and applauding death as Iacob applauded the Chariots that Ioseph his sonne sent for the bringing of him out of a land of miserie into a land of plentie and fulnesse where hee should haue foode inough the best in the land Gen. 45.27.48 The hope of Iob and expectation of the Saints is that they shall see God and come to Christ by death presently in their soules and in their bodies at the last day when all the bones in Golgotha shall rise at that voice that shall say returne yee sonnes of Adam Psal 90.3 For though death shall swallow them vp as the Whale did Ionah and shall binde them as the Philistims did Sampson and the shroude did Lazarus hand and foote Ioh. 11.44 yet the Whale of the earth shall not hold them nor the snares of death and shroude of darknesse preuaile against them when God shall speake by his last trumpet to the graues of the earth and they shall cast out all the Lords Ionahs Ion. 2.10 The bands of death shall fall asunder as corruption and rottennesse in that day in which Christ shall command the holds of darkenesse to deliuer his Saints saying loose them and let them goe Ioh. 11.44 This then beeing all that the righteous shall loose by their gainfull death For they shall loose a short miserable life and receiue a long euer blessed life in glorie what losse can there be in death and what greater aduantage then by dying This the godly know and therefore reioyce in death as they that finde great spoiles They finde that their bodie such as it is now in the estate of corruption is an image of golde which is disfigured that it can be brought to no shape till the owner melt and refound it to a new similitude Euen so the bodie that at first was beautifull hauing such a grace and maiestie set in the face of it that after a sort and outwardly it resembled the Creators image fairer then any of Gold they finde so to bee troden in the mire and so mishapen by sinne that it can neuer receiue the beautie and condition of the first worke till it bee dissolued and new-moulded by the hand of GOD at the resurrection of all bodies and therefore they desire death as the first necessary and blessed work-house of this their
Lord and in his feare and word to serue him Iob 28.28 to loue the good and hate the euill that oursoules may liue Am. 5.15 wee can encourage one another in wickednesse and say let vs eate and drinke for to worrow we shal die Esay 22.13 that is we remember our end but we remember it not wisely but as beasts to eate and drinke or we put off and make our end long but who prepareth for it and who is wise and of an vnderstanding heart Deut. 32.29 to consider it The rich man maketh his small barnes big as if he would make his short life endlesse Luk 12.18 The euill seruant saith my master deferreth his comming as if that which is put off would neuer come Math. 24.48 Nabal he that yet liueth in the carnall churles of this age applieth all his mind to riches and forgetteth his sudden end 1. Sam. 25.10.11.38 Absalons whol studie is to mount neuer thinking of his destruction so neare whose bodie though it stand at the lower end of the presence yet heart sitteth vnder the cloth of estate practising for the kingdome 2. Sam. 15.1.2.3.4.5 c. In the daies of Noah they eate they dranke they builded and remembred not the flood Luk. 17.27 In our daies men feede themselues without feare and forget their end Let vs therefore be warned better to remember our few and euil daies Gen. 47.9 to do the workes of God while it is day Ioh. 9.4 before the long night of sleepe come out of which there is no awaking till the last great trumpe call vs vp to iudgement Behold now is the accepted time behold now the day of saluation 2. Cor. 6.2 the rich man in hell once might and would not heare Moses and the Prophets afterward that is too late hee would and could not Luke 16.25.29 The enemie that is prepared for hurteth lesse and hee that maketh himselfe readie for the last enemie which is death neede not feare to such it bodeth no danger for such it hath no sting nor breath that can doe hurt If we first see this Basiliske death armed with repentance and with the shield and target of faith in our last houre by preparing for our end there is nothing in it that shall not be for our preferment and the full conquest of our troublesome life for then we may take it by the hand as a most welcome guest and as that last seruant whom the Master will send to bring vs to his great Supper and that at supper time when all things are readie Luke 14.17 when our warrefare is accomplished and our iniquities are pardoned when our weary course is finished and ioy commeth after the night of life which life was not properly nor can be truely called life but the shadow of death The person to be remembred followeth Thy Greatour c. The person in whose eye Salomon exhorteth his young Man to walke reuerently is God his Maker By which name or title hee doth secretly imply the great power of the Maker of all things and of mans Creatorr and sheweth that the end of Mans creation is to glorifie continually God his Creator as if hee should haue said Hee that gaue vs breath is Mightie and if he take away his breath by stopping our mouth and nosthrils we are gone and wherefore did he put his spirit of life into vs Was it to giue vs some large libertie to liue as wee list or was it not rather to prouoke vs to seeke his glorie that made vs This is Salomons meaning where we first are taught that the Al-mightinesse of the Creator and the worke of our strange and fearfull creation should make vs feare to liue in any forgetfulnesse of God by an impenitent and obdurate heart By such an argument the Prophet Amos stirreth vp a carelesse people to turne to God by repentance saying He that formeth the Mountaines and createth the winde which maketh the morning darknesse and walketh vpon the high places of the earth the Lord God of hosts is his name Ames 4.13 as if hee should haue said if God who is your mightie Lord and shall be your righteous Iudge bee able to create the windes to forme the Mountaines and to turne the morning into darknesse then is he able to persecute you with his storme to tumble the Mountaines vpon you and to couer you with the darknesse and shadow of death and to prepare an eternall iudgement of confusion for you to the destruction of soule and bodie For hee that made hell can cast into hell and he that causeth darknesse punish with vtter darknesse Dauid by a like argument inureth himselfe to the feare and reuerence of his wonderfull Maker saying I will praise thee that is I wil acknowledge thy goodnesse in all my life for I am feare fully and wonderfully made Psal 199.14 the meaning is if he should goe on in sinne the God who is fearefull can open hell to deuoure him and can shew himselfe as mighty in his iudgement to his destruction as hee was great in his loue to giue him being when before he was not So in Psal 119. ver 37. the Prophet hath these words thine hands haue made mee and fashioned me giue me vnderstanding therfore that I may learue thy commandements and he reasoneth thus Lord thou hast made mee in thy image therefore new-make me by thy word and as thou hast giuen me the shape of man so by teaching make me a new-man in the shape and soundnesse of a true worshipper Our Creation therefore should teach vs the life not of libertie but of repentance and holinesse in the feare of God The reasons Our life is nothing but a little breath and how easie is it for God to take away our weake life when weake man by stopping our breath is able suddenly and most certainely to send vs to our dust Gal. 2.22 Psal 104.29 And should not this weake and poore life fed with a little breath breath forth continually the praises of that God that so feedeth it from the shop of his prouidence Secondly God hauing greater power ouer vs then the Potter hath of the clay which he fashioneth who yet hath power to put it to some seruice or if it content him not to breake it to fitters Rom 9.21 Esa 45.9 should not this Clay Dust Man striue to please him in newnesse of life who hath power to bring him to glorie in his presence or if he be in no conformitie with his righteous will hath like power to breake him in peeces like a Porters vessell This condemneth those who set out no time for the dutie of meditating on their fearefull creation that the strange worke thereof may warne them to feare alwaies to doe euill Vse One cause why the people of Israel did so often and presumptuously prouoke God was because they forgate his wonderfull workes Psal 78.10.11 And it is said that the workes of God are sought out of all that loue them Psal 111.2.5
waues they came to Christ awoke him saying Master saue vâ— wee parish Mat. 8.24.25 But they had Christ with them in the Ship But some thinke not of Christ to awake him to their saluation being strangers to God through the ignorance that is in them til the ship of their body tossed with the tempests of their last sicknesse bee readie to sinke into death and by many leakes and wearings beginne to receiue into their soules that dead sea that must needs drown them in perditioÌ„ destruction before the Lord for euer For how many thus think of him till they can thinke no longer how many begin to liue that is truely to liue till they be readie to die and how many call to minde that Time of Times till there be no more time at least to them till that last time and houre of the day come vnto them in the which they must come to the barre to receiue their doome and iudgement The reason of all this backwardnesse to a new life in the feare of God is mens ouer-hungrie desire to follow those pleasures of sinne into which Satan putteth himselfe as he did into the Serpent to beguile Heue The subtile enemie knoweth with what bait to take a worldling to all forgetfulnes of God and of the iudgement to come And therefore as the hunter minding to take the Tygres young one is said to set vp certaine looking glasses in the Tygres way that is in the way that she passeth to seek her straying brood that finding in such glasses a perfect resemblance of her selfe the same may cause her to leaue the pursuit and to loose her whelpe So this old huntsman Satan obseruing what care man ought to haue which care but few men haue to saue from hell and destruction his stray soule doth set many goodly shewes or false glasses of pleasures which seeme but are not in the way of his Christian walke that by holding his sight in these deere-prized delights he may more willingly leaue the care of that one thing which is necessarie the saluation of his soule Therefore that wee may not bee taken in this Hunters snare our short life should be often thought of When we goe to bed we should remember our graue and when wee rise in the morning consider that we shall rise out of the graue of the earth at the last day With this key of meditation we should open the day and shut in the night And what befalleth others in the dust of their bodies we should thinke must come to vs we cannot tell how soone in our owne dust mortality Here therefore as the third Captaine sent from the King of Israel to Eliah to bring him and perceiuing that the other two Captains with their fifties were deuoured with fire from heauen at the request of Eliah grew wife by their experience and therefore fell downe and besought fauour for himselfe and his fiftie 2. King 1.13 So we seeing or hearing of so many fifties young and old that in these late yeares of mortalitie haue ended their liues in a fire of pestilence sent from the Lord should make supplication day and night not as that Captaine to the man of God but as true Christians to the man and God Christ Iesu that our liues deathes may be precious in his eyes and that we may not forget that what is done to others may come to vs. And if God haue knocked by many infirmities as by so many messengers at the doore of our fraile bodies wee should not defâ—â—re then chiefly to open to him by present repentance lest he breake in by incurable plagues and make his way by our certain destruction death remedilesse An apologie or defence of those good Christians Vse 3 who considering the vncertaintie and shortnesse of Mans time redeeme as much as may be of it into the band and to the glorie of Him that made and is owner of all their daies in a care of his seruice They know that Satan is a great gainer by the waste of time and that contrarily they shall gaine and Satan be looser by a wise redeeming of their few daies for good duties and therefore they care not to buie time with any redemption temporall so they may haue store of it for the markets of godlinesse and thefeare of the Lord. This would be well obserued for it sheweth the reason why the godly haue so great comfort in their short time and the wicked no true comfort in their few euill daies and so much horror at the end of them when they goe from their house to graue The godly haue much pleasure in their short though troublesom life because they haue bestowed it well and because they are become by such redemption of time citizens in title of a citie that cannot be shaken And therefore though their time bee short their short time here is very comfortable vnto them seeing as Noahs douâ— vpon the waters they waite daily till God open the window of his heauenly Arke to take them to rest from their labors The wicked who haue spent their short time euil must needs greatly feare at the end of their short time seeing when they see death they may doubt if it be peace hauing neuer yet loued the God of peace 2. King 9.22 The righteous are in the world as the Israelites in Babylon who beeing captiues in this prison of life care not how soone they bee deliuered that they may sing the songs of the Lord in their owne Land Psal 137.4 The wicked like spirituall Babylonians and as men at home in their owne naturall soile desire no other life and know no better and therefore it exceedingly grieueth them so soone to depart from this and so much against their wils To the godly by reason of good houres well employed 1. Cor. 15. death is the last enemie and to the wicked by their prophane life the first Gods Children count nothing their own here euerie day they gather Manna and haue but from hand to mouth till the long Sabbath come when they shall eate the fruites of the land of heauen Therefore their losse is nothing when they haue lost all here onely they loose miserie and finde saluation and what losse is that Surely such as they are glad of and the sooner they make the change the better for them The worlds children are here at home in their Mothers lappe here they haue their pleasure Luk. 16.25 and receiue their portion hauing great things for themselues and to leaue to their Babes when they are gone Here they wasted time the fairest and best part of it vpon their profits and lusts and little of it they bestowed if any of it well and what maruel then if they cry out to come to their account for time so precious so much abused The godly because their affection is to do good and God doth so mercifully blesse them that they constantly and heartily doe it therefore they are and
their bed of death they go to it in vtter darknesse where is weeping and gnashing of teeth So farre for the time which is called largely dayes that which is limitted called the appointed time followeth Of mine appointed time c. By appointed time Iob here meaneth his bounded life which can no more be extended beyond the appointed time then the Sea can passe her bounds Ps 104.9 Doctr. From whence this doctrine may be gathered that we liue by Gods decree not at our owne pleasure So Paul told the men of Athens for hauing taxed their superstition who wold bound the boundlesse presence of God to a temple made with hands and to Idols the worke of mens hands he she wecht hat the Almighty Maker of this Worlds-masse is not to be straitned who hath shut in with the straites of time fore-seâ— by himselfe all men and creatures hauing assigned their times and the bounds of their habitation Act. 17.26 And in this Booke of Iob it is moued by a question but taken for granted that there is an appointed time to man vpon Earth Iob 7.1 or a set time of mans warrefare here that is he is a Souldier and his life militant but how long and for how short a time he shall be and continue in this field of his bodie vnder corruption fighting against the strangelusts that are in the world it is ordered by him who hath summed vp all the number of his daies and measured his short time with a decree or Law which he cannot passe after it is said that God hath set Mans daies and numbred his moneths and limited his time that is that he hath set bounds to all the moments of his life here Iob 14.5 By which it is plaine that the maker of man hath in his hand the whole number of mans time such as it hath pleased himselfe to adde to the Moneths and yeeres that he hath giuen him in this vale of miserie The reasons First if God had not numbred the daies of man vpon earth they who loue the world would neuer leaue it nor they who suffer in it without speciall grace waite till God should worke their deliuerance from it They who liue in pleasure would neuer resolue to die and they would presently seeke their owne death and find it who liue in paine Secondly as wee are not borne at our owne pleasure so it is reason we should liue and die at his pleasure who hath formed vs in the wombe Thirdly God taketh small matters into his hands to order them Mat. 29.30 and shal we think that he hath not taken to himselfe the great matter of life and death to dispose of it A confutation of those who think that man can either shorten his owne life Vse 1 or draw it beyond the Lords score to make it longer Indeed man may by offering violence to himselfe become an vnnaturall instrument of the Lords iustice to cut of those daies that God hath finished but no man can later or sooner die then the Lord of death and time hath set his end Quest But hath not the Magistrate power ouer the life of a Malefactor and is it not in his hand to giue him his life or to take it from him when his sinne hath giuen him into the power of the Law and of the Magistrate vnto death Answ In this case the Magistrate hath no power but what is giuen him as when either the spite of time or sinne of Man shall accomplish what God hath purposed Ioh. 19.11 So Christ told Pilate who because he had the soueraignty of iudgement thought he had also the soueraigntie of life verse 10. But he had no power but what the decree of God and determined moment of mans saluation had then giuen vnto him If then the Magistrate saue a man who is iudged to die it is secretly to fulfill Gods time concerning him which is not yet come or if he cut him of it is because the time appointed to him by God is first come and he is Gods Minister to doe what God hath purposed to be done An instruction Vse teaching vs patience and contentment when any of our friends shall be taken from vs for God hath taken them from vs their time was come which as we cannot preuent so we may not enuie 2. Sam. 12.20.21 c. So for our own death we must willingly beare it seeing that God hath appointed that we shall once die and that once must once come Hebr. 9.27 It is I confesse naturall to all to be loth to lay downe this tabernacle but our obedience to the will of God must correct nature in so direct an opposition to his decree that hath made vs we must call to our remembrance not what we could wish but God hath purposed reasoning euerie man apart and priuately in his heart thus I must needes die because it is Gods ordinance and I will willingly die that I may shew my obedience to his will I must needes die to put of corruption and I will willingly die that I may see God Or I must needs die Looke Deerings 11. Lecture on the Epistle to the Hebrues that sinne may haue his pay the wages of sinne is death Rom. 6.23 and I will willingly die that sinne may be no longer and death may loose his sting and power So much for the mid-times of that naturall life in which Iob became attendant and did waite for a better life the period of time which he expected followeth Till my change were come Here Iob sheweth how long hee would waite by hope in his afflicted estateâ— euen till that period of time should come which he calleth the time of change when hee should finish the daies of his warre-fare on Earth and receaue the Crowne of his sufferings in glorie And here by the day of change he meaneth the day of death which is therefore called a change because it is the remoue of the faithfull from labour to rest in their bodies and from an Earthly to an Heauenly life in their soules which are taken vp to God Somewhere it is called the losing as of a Prisoner from the Prison and fetters of the flesh that hee may be with Christ Philip. 1.23 Also the godly in their blessed death are for this said to be taken away Esa 57.1 In their bodies from their house to graue from feare to security from sense of paine to ease and from their bodies of labour to their beds of rest in their soules from an house of clay to an house not made with hands from Men to Angels from Earth to Heauen from prison to libertie from mortalitie to immortall and from death to liue And we reade of the gathering of the righteous as of things scattered and straying from home to their people fathers Gen. 25 8. Iudg. 2.10 Thus we haue heard why Iob and other scriptures call the death of the godly a change From whence the doctrine is Doctr. That there is nothing in
our child hath entred on alreadie And why are we vnquiet seeing the Lord of Heauen and earth hath called our child from a base condition to noblenesse to bestow honours vpon him and ritches that shall not faile promising the like to vs by the way of death should we not rather so dispose our occasions and life that we may ioifully follow him whom wee haue not lost but sent before But you will say my child was young and died in his flowers well be it so yet they who die young so they die well are old inough to goe to God besides did not Ieroboams childe in whom were found good things die young 1. King 14.13 And did not Iosiah die old whom the Lord in a battle at Megiddo tooke from the filthy will of Iudah to plant him before himselfe in the garden of his owne presence in glorie 2. King 24.29 Neither can they be said to die yong whose perfection is growne to a blessed ripenesse before the Lord. But young or old if you haue reioiced in your child as in the Lords interest you will not think it much and why should you that the Lord should haue his owne or will you with Phurao offer to hold in the prison of life as in Egypt any seruant of his whom hee shall send for by death his last messenger and that aâ— supper time when all things are ready Luc. 14.17 While he liued God gane him to you as a pledge of his fauor now that he is taken away you must freely resigne him as a pledge of your obedience But you wil say He was my onely child Indeed the death of an onely childe is very greeuous to the Parents Zechar. 12.10 Am. 8.10 yet Abraham was readie to haue sacrificed his onely sonne Isaac at Gods commandement Gen. 22.3.10 and God gaue his onely sonne Christ to death for our salâ—ation Ioh. 3.16 wherefore as Elkanah said to Annah so and much more may the Lord say to vs am not I better to you then ten sonnes 1. Sam. 1.8 or are not our ten sonnes and all the children of the wombe his gift Ps 127.3 Then though he be your onely child and all you haue whom God thus by death taketh from you there is no cause of griefe or of complaint seeing the Lord hath but his owne when he hath taken him and seeing also that he taketh him and you giue him but as your pledge and earnest to binde vnto you the right of that inheritance that you looke for or as your Feof-fee of trust gone before to take the possession for you A reproofe to those Vse 2 who can see nothing in the death of their friends or in their owne deathes but what is dreadfull beyond measure and simply the end of man Such conceiue death not as he is to the righteous and as Christ hath made him to bee by his glorious death but as fooles iudge of him who behold him through false spectacles as he is in his owne vncorrected nature considered out of Christ that is vgly terrible and hideous So did they behold him in Amos who put the euill day of his comming that which they iudged to bee euill and the godly iudge to bee happie no day happier as far from them as they could by carnall delicacie and wantonnesse Amos 6.3 So did Belshazzar looke vpon him whose heart would not serue him to reade the hand-writing of his owne end so neare Dan. 5.5.6.30 And Nabal had no heart to die who when he must needes die died as a stone that is died blockishly and so faintly that he was as good as slaine before death slew him 1. Sam. 25.37.38 He had no comfort in death which hee could not see one that was as righteous but as churlish and prophane And no maruell for this Aduersarie death armed as Goliah and vaunting as that proud Gyant of Gath commeth stalking toward such in fearefull manner infulting ouer weake dust and daring the world to giue him a man to fight with Therefore at the sight of him the whole hoast of worldlings bewray great feare turning their backes and going backward as men readie to sinke into the earth with abated courages and lookes cast downe stained with the colours of feare death trembling like leaues in a storme and striken with the palsie of a sudden and violent shaking through all the bodie 1 Sam. 17.10.11 But the true Christian armed as Dauid with trust in God and expectation of victory by the death of Christ who by death ouercame death as Dauid cut off the head of Goliah with his owne sword dares and doth boldly encounter with this huge Philistian death supposed inuincible and seeming great but neither with sword nor speare but in the name of the God of the hoast of Israel by whose might onely hee woundeth and striketh him to the earth trampling vpon him in the returne of his soule to the place out of which it first came and singing ouer him this ioiful and triumphant song of victorie O death where is thy sting 1. Cor. 15.55 Hee hath Steuens eyes to looke into heauen and therefore cannot but haue the tongue of the Saints who say Come Lord Iesu come quickly Apoâ— 22 2â—â— For the ioy that is set before him he with his good Sauiour endureth the crosse of death and despiseth the shame of corruption to which the dust of his bodie must bee turned Heb. 12.2 Ob. Quest But you will say Is not death to be feared that worketh so fearefully beeing also enemie to nature and the wages of sinne Rom. 6.23 Ans Answ Indeede death is dreadfull out of Christ and in it selfe and wee haue reason to feare it as it is an effect of sinne for so God setteth his angrie countenance in it and so Aristotle it is simply fearefull and euill Which made an heathen man to say that of all terrible things death was most terrible Hee saw in the darke that death had much euill in it and that it was properly euill and but accidentally good but he could not see through the dark cloud that which made it so euill Therefore euill it is I confesse and fearefull And to this we haue a greater witnesse then the witnesse of man For the Apostle saith the sting of death is sinne 1. Cor. 15.56 Now so farre as it hath a sting and is in it strength it is to be feared The reason is so it is properly death and death in kinde But we speake not of death considered out of Christ or considered in it selfe but of death altered by the death of Christ and which by such a change is made our passage from death to life for so it is no dreadful thing but a thing desireable and so the sting is taken from it which is of force and carieth an edge of second death against all the workers of iniquitie who dying out of Christ die miserably hellishly and with horrible feare By Christ the doore death is made a doore out
of spirituall death into spirituall life out of vnhappinesse and paines mortall into all happinesse and ioyes eternall Further they who are set in Christ in whom they liue to whose glorie they desire to liue and die seeing they behold death not with carnall eyes but with the eyes of faith in the Gospell doe as hath beene said get heart and reioyce against death in their good consciences and all the terrour of it and so to them it is a disarmed enemie or enemie of no power and hurt For how can that Scorpion hurt that hath no sting Or why should that enemie be feared that hath neither hand to strike nor weapon to kill Such a Scorpion is death when we take sinne from it and death is such an enemie when once wee haue set it downe by reformation of life Contrarily naturall men feare death exceedingly death that bringeth so much good to the righteous and taketh so much euil from the Saints because death in them is not ioined with a godly and well reformed life They haue not done the good for which they came into the world and therefore they feare to diâ— They apprehend death as a strong enemy finding in it through their continuall wickednesse no likelihood of saluation nor signe of peace and therefore desire not to be dissolued but feare to bee dissolued nor thinke death to bee a change but a plague Or they haue all their pleasure and peace in their dayes here nor caring for the dayes of heauen nor fearing the long night of hell Here they are well and they know not where is better Therefore not hoping for a better life no maruell if they leaue this against their will Death to such is the beginning of eternall death and no port-way to Christ but a portall-doore to destruction Let vs therfore so liue that we may not feare death and so learne to die that wee may liue euer not with Diuels in torments but with God in his kingdome That wee may so doe wee must remember how it was said that death as it is an effect of the fall hath a sting which sting of death is sinne This sting we must pull from it by taking sinne from it in our daily repentance and daily turning to God by newnesse of life Hee that hath an enemie will doe what he can to weaken him and if he be fearefull because he is well armed hee will doe what lieth in him to disarme him that he may not feare him This enemie is death the last that shall be destroyed Let vs therefore doe all we can by putting off sinne and putting on righteousnesse to bring downe his strength and by taking away from our hearts and the conuersation of our liues the sinne and sting of drunkennesse whoredome blasphemie pride lying and other abominable lustes let vs put no weapon of malice or edge into deaths hands to feare vs with when wee should leaue this world with comfort and goe to God in peace So shall we neither feare death nor feele the gripes of second death Obiect But the godly haue feared death else why did Eliah flye from it in the persecution of Iezabel 1. Kin. 19.3 and Christ teach his to decline it in the persecutions of men Math. 10.23 and Christ himselfe pray against the bitter cup of it in in his agonie and before his apprehension Mat. 26.39 Ans I answere briefely These Saints did not nor were to fly from death as it is the end of life and blessed end of a good life but vsed the meants of flight onely to preuent violent and hastie death till the houre appointed should come that they were to giue their spirit in peace into the hands of him that made it And because such vntimely death was enemie to the good they had to doe and course they were to finish therefore they went aside by flying for some time and till the time of their departure came that they might do the good to which they were appointed and finish the course for which they were sent But where it is alledged that Christ himselfe prayed against the cup of death I answere two waies And first that hee prayed without sinne and without hauing sinne against it seeing that in that his supplication of teares and much feare he submitted alway to his fathers will and seeing also death was not to him as it is to vs. For to vs the sting of it is conquered and the force broken but to him it was in full power He felt the sting of it and wrastled with the force of it in soule and bodie Secondly I say that it was not meerely a bodily death though vnsubdued saue where himselfe subdued it that he trembled at but by the burden of our sinnes which hee was to vndergoe in which he beheld the whole There hee saw his fathers countenance turned against him and there knew that he must beare his wrath because hee bore our sinnes Besides Christ feared death beeing clothed with our flesh to shew that hee tooke our infirmities and bore our sorrowes and was perfect man And so death in some case may bee feared and at some time prayed against but euer vnder the correction of Gods will Esay 38.2.3 For the rodde of death turned into a Serpent made Moses to feare Exo. 4.3 and the best haue moderately declined and shrunke at the stroke of death when it came in some tempest And who doth not dread all Gods terrours wherof death is one And feare that which is the punishment of sin and curse of sinners And decline that which is the destruction of humane Nature and shrinke at that which hath made the strongest the wisest the richest the greatest to fall downe flatte before it Therefore the feare of death thus reproued is not the naturall feare of it which is in all but the seruile feare of it proper to euill doers and common to those who can haue no hope in death because they neuer cared to liue till they were compelled to die And now that wee haue heard what feare of death it is that Gods children must not bee stained with as namely that which is seruile and cowardly wee will shew and that briefely why such feare of death should fall vpon none of Gods seruants who in so great peace leaue this world and for so precious a crowne of glorie For if wee haue no better resemblance of death then when we sleepe nor better rest then at that time why should it be counted so hydeous a thing when the bodie is toiled and much spent with labour to send it to the sweet and deepe sleepe of death or to lay it in the quiet bed of the earth where no sounds or feare can disease it And if to Gods Children death bee not onely a departing from paine and euril but an accesse to all good nor the end of life but the end of death and beginning of life eternall can Gods children thinke it any disaduantage to exchange the sense
repaire from deformitie to fashion and from corruptible to eternall So death was Saint Pauls aduantage and how can it bee our losse if wee make Saint Pauls end If we had no hope after death wee might feare indeed But GOD hauing made their first Adam a liuing soule not a dying soule and all the sonnes of the second glorious soules not reprobate spirits Why should wee dread or feare to receiue our crown and glorie Or why should we be vnwilling with a ioyfull shout to salute our port and hauen after so many tiring stormes as wee haue endured vpon the raging sea of this world And why be sorie that we are going to our house of peace and home of long life which is at the right hand of God where is fulnesse of ioy and pleasures for euermore Psal 16.11 Doth any man feare to fall a sleepe at night that hath laboured hard all day What is the death of the faithfull but their sleepe of refreshing after the toiles of their life when the night is come in which no man can worke Ioh. 9.4 To this blessed sleepe of peace the Lord for his mercies sake lay euerie one of vs whom hee hath purposed to take to rest from labour in his time appointed Amen The end of the second Sermon THE THIRD SERMON ESA. Chap. 57. Vers 2 He shall enter into peace and they shall rest in their beddes euery one that walketh before him or that walketh in his righteousnesse THis scripture is a scripture of much comfort bringing a Gen. 8.11 an oliue leafe of peace in the mouth of it to the righteous that perish and to mercifull men that are shut vp with the flood of death in the Arke of their graues that they might not see the euill the great euill to come when they should see their enemies in the habitation of the Lord and Iuda with her King and inhabitants lead in Chaines of bondage to Babylon The words particularly and those of the fiue verses immediately before foure of them in the former Chapter the fift and sixt at the beginning of this containe two things as a complaint and comfort The complaint which is ioined with a threatning concerneth the vngodly that liued in their sinnes the comfort pertaineth to those that should be taken away in peace walking before the Lord that is in pathes of righteousnesse before him In the complaint the Prophet speaketh of a lamentable and very vniuersall destruction or plague that the Lord was preparing to send shortly vpon that wicked Rebell Iudah which was come to such a brimme of sinne and senslesse wickednesse and that is he would call for the wild beasts of the field and forrest of Babel meaning those Gentils and Nebuchadnezar their King to deuoure them and to execute the Lords iudgements vpon them eating their flesh and inuading their land Therefore where in a figuratiue speech at the 9. verse of the former chapter he calleth the beasts together as to some royall feast hee meaneth to forwarne the people of some grieuous iudgement prepared for them and comming toward them euen a iudgement of desolation and slauerie entended against them by the King of Babel and his great hoast The like we reade Ier. 9.22 Ezech 39.18.19 And because it might appeare that the Lords iudgements are euer righteous as he himselfe is most righteous and holy in the three verses that follow he speaketh of one maine cause that moued the iust God to send so great a storme of affliction and death in the captiuitie then threatned and that was their watchmen who should haue told them of their sinnes and giuen them warning with the Lords trumpet at their mouth of a plague so neere neither kept watch nor gaue warning but liued delicately and fed without feare being also couetous and greedie dogges that could neuer haue inough And indeed when a kingdome is ouer-runne by such in the forme and calling of Teachers it is a blazing-starre to that people and kingdome of some alteration at hand For if the Sun be set vpon the Mountains what shew can it make in the valleys or if the blind lead the blind must not both of them by the darknes that is in them of sinne and ignorance fall into the ditch of the condemnation of the Lord. Mat. 15.14 But all the fault though the greatest was not in those dumme and greedie Dogs the not teaching and ill ruling Ministers of that time the people them selues had their sinne also spoken of in the first verse of this Chapter and that was a carelesse regard of the deaths of the righteous beside their festrednesse and more then stand in sinne and wickednesse wherein they continued and went on carnally not feeling any stroke of Gods hand in that iudgement which he begunne at his owne house by taking away suddenly his best men And now if this complaint may bee vrged against vs and our coldnesse in a like case at this day as it was against them and if it shall make vs no wiser to God nor more carefull of our last end then it could them let vs prepare our selues to a like iustly deserued miserie and to pledge these in the cup in which they haue drunke before vs or begun vnto vs to destruction Thus farre the complaint The comfort entended only to those who should walke before God in their goodnesse fidelitie and truth for such should be sure vpon the remoue of their soules in soule to enter possession of an euerlasting and present peace and in bodie to rest most sweetly in the common bed and house of the earth till the last great day hath two things to be considered in it as a promise made and the persons to whom the promise is made The promise is in two things peace to the soule and rest to the bodie so soone as the soule goeth out of the bodie The persons to whom this promise is made are iust men and mercifull men that walke before the Lord that is that doe his commandements that they may liue Luc. 10.28 and keep his sayings that their part may bee in the tree of life Apoc. 22.14 The text may be resolued thus as a learned man resolueth it He that is the righteous shal enter into peace or vpon peace and they namely the godly shall rest in their beddes to wit immediately and presently vpon their deaths for as their bodies goe to rest so their soules shall enter into peace as Apoc. 14.13 Luc. 16.22 Euerie one that is euery godly one God is no accepter of persons and there is a generalitie of giuing in him as their must be a particularitie of receauing in vs that walketh before the Lord that is that hath his conuersation in the Lord walking in no way but by him nor in any course but after him This being as I take it the true both resolution and sense of this verse the first thing in it promised to the righteous is peace by which as was said
neither pacifie conscience nor reconcile God A kinde of lumbring peace worldly men haue in their accursed fraternitie and riches and they that wallow in pleasures haue a kinde of pleasure in that loathsome filth But the couetous person when the crosse lighteth vpon that which he conceiued to bee his heauen and peace here his wealth hath nothing within but pettishnesse and hellish melancholy The carnal Epicure natural man when hee is crossed in his health with disabilitie to follow that life of excesse which before he most intemperately followed is presently altered from happie to miserable He that rose vpon the wheele of honour when it turneth it turneth him out of his heauen of peace into a hell of shamefull and raging vnquietnesse And the fellowship that the world maketh so much of and calleth good when it is euill what is it and what strength hath it of sound continuance in the whole band of it when death hath vnloosed it When it is sicke and dying the pleasures of it are they not either forgotten as vaine or remembred as grieuous Loe therefore the peace of worldlings and what is that they leane vnto who make not God their stay and therefore are they chaffe which euery winde of change scattereth Psal 1.4 where the peace of Gods children is not in these crakling blazes of corrupt happinesse but in Angelicall ioies and ioyes of the palace nor earthly but such as the Saints haue which passeth vnderstanding And if that peace which standeth vpon stronger proppes and likelihoods then any which is carnall and meerely of the world doth be many times broken off by the vnquiet blasts that come from this earthly skie how shall that peace that is set but vpon rotten posts of casualtie and brittlenesse bee able to stand in so continuall a tempest of trouble and alteration as day and night beates vpon it Therefore our rest is placed in the things which are aboue the sphere of changeable mortalitie and not in transitorie matters All is vanitie and vexation vnder the Sunne Eccle. 2.11 And there is no perfect peace till we dwell before the God of peace Honours haue galles in them and riches prickes In labour there is no profit and ease slayeth fooles Prou. 1.32 After mirth commeth heauinesse as a cloud after a faire sunne-shine In laughter the heart is sad and there is much errour in laughing Eccles 2.2 The difference then betweene this life which wee haue and that which we looke for standeth in this that this life is our sea and the other our hauen and that here we ride vpon tempestuous waters and there at anchor in our roade and port of peace For here we sowe in teares there wee reape in ioy Here we are burthened there we lay downe our burthens Here we are abroad in our Inne there at home in our fathers house Luk. 15. Here are our yeares of bondage there our yeares of Iubilee and perpetuall redemption Here is our leading into captiuitie there our going out Here is the battell there the Crowne Here the Church trauelleth there shee is deliuered Here shee crieth out there shee remembreth her paine no more Hee that here begun saying to his Church I haue afflicted thee will there make an end and say vnto her but I will afflict thee no more Naum. 1.12 And how is the day of death better to vs then the day in which we are borne Eccles 7.3 and why doth the voice that came from heauen say they that die in the Lord rest from their labours and why doth the spirit in the hearts of Gods children say as much for euen so saith the spirit that is it is iust of the same mind Apoc. 14.13 if they who goe hence come not out of labor but exchange it Nor better their estate but alter it Nor end their miserie but to remoue onely from such miseries A confutation of that Legend of Popish purgatorie Vse 2 which as a painted sepulcher is more builded for the liuing then for the dead A lie and fancie the gainefullest in all Poperie For from this supposed lake and imaginate hell of the temporarie chastisement of soules in the fire of purgatorie came all their markets of Masse Dirges and other trentals for the dead But how doe the godly rest from their labours immediately vpon their death or saith the spirit if they must continue for some yeares after their blessed death in burning fire as terrible as the fire of hell saue in respect that the one is eternall the other but for a time And not end their miseries but prolong them Or is there any rest in the fire or peace in the fire and water Or remission of punishment in a place of punishment Or ease in labour Or blessednesse in miserie Hath Christ said It is finished Ioh. 19.30 and shall men say nay but we shall feele more of it in Purgatorie He hath done it and shall any vndoe it Or thinke to doe it better The blood of Christ is our purgatorie 1. Ioh. 1.7 It and nothing but it purgeth our sinne and prepareth places for vs in heauen We neede no other sacrifice but it nor aduocate but him A pitifull digression therfore from the bloud of Christ to the bloud of Hales From the fire vpon the mount to the painted fire of purgatorie from the liuing to the dead Esay 8.19 Purgatorie then what is it but an impudent checke to the merit of Christ and quiet of the Saints And for these who stand for the Kitchin in which it burneth and chimney whereout it smoketh or rather Kitchin for which it burneth and chimney that it makes to smoke let them tell vs where the place is when it began how long it must continue who are there punished what is there punishment and who the tormentor that wee may beleeue them In these points they are at oddes with themselues and how then can they be at euen with vs or with the truth But this is more largely discouered by a worthy preachor vpon this very place in print And so for this lie of Purgatorie let vs leaue it to the inuentors to the Mowles and to the Buckes Esay 2.20 that is to the Egyptians from whom it came and the old Greeke Poets of whom Plato first receiued it and Virgil after him and diuers heathen Philosophers and Poets after them and let vs come to the first of these comforts that are expressed here Peace c. By peace the Prophet meaneth the peace of the righteous in the full ioy of their soules after death As if hee should haue said they shall then in their soules receiue immediately perfect prosperitie and consummation of blisse So much the word translated peace Doctr. will beare From whence the doctrine is In heauen there is not onely true happinesse but perfection of happinesse nor sound ioy onely but fulnesse of ioy The ioies prepared for the Elect are so absolute and strange that neither eye hath seene to wit eye mortall
more pleasures then at feasts this estate of heauenly life is both a kingdome and a feast A kingdome for they that are in it haue ouercome and shall sit on thrones Apoc. 2.7 A feast yea the marriage feast of the sonne of God in which he shall euer be espoused to the Church his wife The contract is made below the marriage shall be consummate aboue with solemnities vnspeakeable But if these excellent things spoken of the citie of God cannot winne our loue thither remember we the rich man in torments Luc. 16.23 and by this burnt child learne to dread the fire of hell The places are contrarie and all things contrarie that be in them As therefore Heauen is a place of ioyes and honour eternall so hell is a kingdome of shame and perpetuall contempt Dan. 12.2 And now if so great glorie and pleasures so many and so endlesse cannot please you doe but a litte cast downe your eyes into that deepe lake where are nothing but flaming fire palpable darknesse and perpetuall burning and nothing but teares shrikes and outcries of hopelesse and reprobate consciences and nothing but torments and places of torment prepared for damnable sinners where is no intermission of complaints nor end of paine as farre from ease millions of yeeres to come as at their beginning The rich man in torments craued but one drop of water when whole riuers of water would not quench those riuers of brimstone that fed that fire and could not haue it Luc. 16.24.25 And if the rods wherewith God chastneth his children in this life be so smart and galling that they haue brought them downe to the brimme of despaire and so low in affliction that they haue wished for death what smart and galling plagues doe the damned suffer in the torments of hell who are beaten not with rods of chastisement but with an iron rod of destruction in whose confusions remedilesse the Lord will say euen he whom here they despised I will ease me of mine adâ—ersaries and auenge me of my fees Esa 1.24 And thus the feare of hell may be reason inough to draw our affections from these things below if the loue of heauen cannot But neither the loue of heauen nor feare of hell can worke in some any little distast of this worldly Egypt that they may eat of this Manna that is hidden Apoc. 2.17 That is of the bread of heauen in the kingdome of heauen A reproofe therefore to those who altogether mind the earth and earthly things Vse 2 not caring for that kingdome that cannot bee shaken Some haue an eye still in Sodome and hoofe in Egypt and so sticke to the place of their banishment in which they take case purpose coÌ„tinuance that they neuer mind their countrey nor affect their remoue vnto it They cloy their stomacks with the grose dinners of this present world and so haue no appetite to the Lambs dinner where Christ being gouernour keepeth his best things last Ioh. 2.10 When we speake to them of peace they prepare themselues to battell Ps 120.7 In heauen is peace and here on earth is nothing but warre within and without within in our selues without in the world and yet men had rather liue in a field thus swimming in blood then by walking before God dwell in tabernacles of peace A signe that heauen is not there citie nor Christ their head For they that belong to the citie of peace will seeke heauens peace and they that belong to Christ desire to bee with him Colos 3.1 Where the head is there would the body be If then we doe not ascend to heauen by a spirituall life but digge downe to the hels by a carnall if couetousnesse hold vs in the world and the loue of God cannot draw vs out if to be thus absent from Christ be our happinesse and we count it our greatest vnhappinesse to come vnto him by going hence Christ is not our head but he that hath the Dragons head the world is our citie and heauen our strange citie to which either we meane not to come or would not willingly but by the violence of death when we can liue no longer For can Christ bee our head whom wee care no more for and heauen our countrey which we seeke no sooner after Therefore while we are on the earth in our bodies if we will be the members of Christ and the citizens of heauen let vs dwell before God in our soules framed in the forme and manner of a ship which is close downeward and shut to the world but open aboue enlarged to heauen where our treasure is and expectation ought to be So did our fathers who walked with God to whose righteous soules this peace is come and who now are most safe vnder the shadow of their Altar Christ vpon whom whiles they liued they offered all their spirituall sacrifices and now being taken vp to heauen in their soules praise him with ioifull lips continually and follow him in white whether soeuer he goeth A comfort to those Vse 3 who for this peace-sake fight lawfully in all the warre of the world against it They who in such a presse of worldly affaires beeing with Zacheus vpon too low a ground to see Christ doe therefore climbe vp in their affections aboue earthly matters and worldly desires treading the Moon vnder their feete shall heare one day perhaps this present day their sweet Sauiours voice saying Come to mee at once for this day is saluation come to your houses Luk. 19.5.9 And then as God said to Abraham Arise and walke about this Land this is the countrey that I will giue thee Gen. 13.17 So he will one day say to euery child of Abraham Behold thy heauenly land that is the place of thy perpetuall aboad come to it walke about it and liue in it for euer Then wee shall haue that blessing that all our prayers hearing readings in the word and other godly striuings like that of Iacob with the Angell before hee blessed him laboured vnto Gen. 32.26 Herod promised much when he promised halfe his kingdome Mark 6.23 But Christ both promiseth will giue a whole kingdome Math. 25.34 And where among men the elder onely doth inherit here all sons are heires and all receiue not some few Manors and small Lordships but crownes of righteousnesse Rom. 8.17 O then what should let our desires with the tribes of Renben Gad to passe ouer this Iordan of death by the parting not of waters but of soule body to come to our Land of promise Num. 32.3.4.5.6 Iacobs 7. yeeres seemed light vnto him in regard of Rahel for whom he serued Ge. 29.20 And why should the labour trauel not of 7. yeares for it may be as was said we shall not serue 7. dayes we serue not a churlish Laban but a most bountiful redeemer I say why shold this short labor of ours trauell of so short time seeme any thing in respect of that faire
Rahel and life to come So much for the first of those comforts that are promised namely peace that properly concerneth our soules The second which is rest and belongeth to our bodies followeth And they shal rest in their beds c. By beds the Prophet vnderstandeth the places into which the Lord bestoweth the bodies of his seruants in or after their death whether water or fire or the panches of wilde beasts or the chambers of the earth or sea or aire And these he calleth beds because they shall rest quietly in them as men in their beds till the morning bell or loud trumpet of the last great day warning all flesh to rise shal raise them Therefore it is an vsuall thing in the scriptures so soone as men die to say they fall a sleepe Whereby is meant that they are laid in their beds of peace whether Churchyard or Church and that before their bodies are carried forth for buriall thither the places in which God taketh their soules to his presence are their beds and so the beds of their death are the beds of their peace Beds made for them by God himself in the which after their last long sleep of death they presently enter into their last sweet sleepe of peace The Papists say otherwise who hold that the righteous take no possession of their beds of rest till the Priest haue put them into their beds of earth Indeed men giue them burials then but God doth prouide for them their bed of burial lat their death And they are called beds of rest to put difference betweene these beds of our nights-sleepe and those of our sleepe in death For here bee our beds neuer so soft or well made we often take no rest by reason of some disorder in our bodies or fancies in our head but in these sleeping places which the Prophet calleth beds of rest wee may lay vs downe and sleepe in peace Psal 4.8 the Lord of life being our keeper who will make vs dwell in safetie Indeed in it own nature the graue is an house of perdition rather then bed of rest but being altered to the Iewes in promise to vs in performance by Christs graue who was buried in the earth to change the nature of it it is made to vs a chamber of rest and bed of Downe The point here taught is Doctr. The graues of the righteous which by nature are houses of destruction and chambers of feare are by Christ and the graue of Christ made to them chambers of safetie and beds of rest Christ by his buriall hath consecrated and perfumed our graues making them which were prisons to hell gates to heauen Which made the Apostle speaking of the dead in Christ to say they sleepe not they die As if hee should haue said they goe to their beds and not to destruction 1. Thes 4.15 And the same Apostle speaking of the death of the righteous calleth it not a death but a sleepe 1. Cor. 15.51 as if hee had called it not rottennesse but rest For this cause also is our death in heathen Authors called a sleepe as the Scriptures call it and our graue our bed At night wee take our chambers and lie downe in our beds so when death comes which is the end of life as the night is of the day we goe to the chambers of the earth and there make our beds or lie downe in bed till the day of refreshing which is the day of rising come that commeth from the Lord. The reasons are This was figured in the embalmings which the Iewes vsed And this figure as al other figures of the old Testament must bee performed in one which one is Christ As therefore their embalmings did perfume the graues in which they laid their dead for a season so the most precious blame of Christs buriall did for euer sweeten to the Saints their graues of corruption Secondly as the end of Christs death was that he might vanquish death so it was one end why hee was buried that he might after the manner of conquerours subdue death at his own home and as it were pluck him out of his owne den and cabbin Thirdly the bodies of the godly are parts of Christs mysticall bodie while they are in the graue and when they are turned to corruption and therefore cannot but bee precious in his eyes and grauen vpon the palme of his hand till they be restored For as the Husbandman doth make no lesse reckoning of that corne which he hath sowne in his field and lies vnder the clod of the earth then he doth of that which he hath brought into his barnes So Christ doth as highly esteeme of those bodies as it were graines of corne that are sowne in corruption as of those that yet neuer saw corruption nor came to the graue Therefore wee shall not rest in death though we rest in our graues For that God who raiseth the Sunne daily out of his den will one day raise vs out of our graues to stand before him for euer A confutation of that fancie that hath so long deluded the simple world Vse 1 which is that dead bodies walke after their death and appeare to men For how can that be when the bodies of Gods children rest in their beds so soone as their breath departeth and the bodies of the wicked are in their prisons till the day of assise Whereof if any make question let him open their graue and see And seeing the soule returneth not after it hath left the bodie how can the body walke that wanteth a soule or soule be seene if it should walke that hath no bodie Or if death bee a loosing of our soules from our bodies Phil. 1.23 How can there be any death when soule and bodie are not parted and when the man is not dead but liueth But this fancie came from Pithagoras a Philosopher and is but a Philosophers dreame Pithagoras told his dreame to the world which was that the soules of men departed did enter into the bodies of other men good soules into good mens bodies bad into bad mens The world then beleeued him And since that time Satan who can turne himselfe into all formes did in the darke night of Poperie to deceiue that ignorant age change himselfe into the similitude and forme of some person that was lately or had beene long dead and was beleeued by such a transformation to bee the partie man or woman that hee made resemblance off So entred the errour that Spirits did walke and that dead bodies came out of their graues and haunted sundry houses in the night which were not the bodies of the dead but the Diuell in those bodies or shapes as is to be seene in Samuels counterfet shape raised by the Witch at Endor 1. Sam. 28.8.14.15 And this errour as it deceiued the blind world and somewhat troubled the seeing Math. 14.26 Act. 12.15 So it is still in the mouth and faith of credulous superstition at this day But
God hauing giuen eyes to vs to see his truth and the light of iudgement to see it by let vs not walke in so great darknesse as they who know not the truth nor whether they goe Here also we learne to put difference betweene the condition of the righteous Vse 2 and the state of the vngodly in their graues and buriall the godly hauing their graues for their beddes of rest the wicked contrarily for their prisons out of which they shall come to the resurrection of death Ioh. 5.29 as malefactors to their execution And where the godly as honest men of the countrey shall stand before the Iudge without feare they shal stand as the guilty Prisoner at the barre of shame to receaue the sentence of their iust condemnation in soule and bodie And what comfort can this be to shamelesse sinners in the night of the putting off of their tabernacle seeing they goe not to their beddes as doe the righteous but to their dungeons of darknesse and horrible feare For as if a man should be bidden to goe to his rest that after he had slept and was risen the punishment of some terrible death might be inflicted vpon him So is the state and condition of all impenitent sinners in their death For they must lie downe for some time in their beddes of dust and rise againe that a second fearefull death may be inflicted vpon their soules and bodies Now could any poore man goe comfortably to his bed that is bidden so as we haue heard to goe vnto it with what comfort then can desperate sinners remember their graues of earth from which they must passe to their graues of fire for euer Indeed as a man that is out-lawed may take his pleasure and walke at large for a time but whensoeuer or wheresoeuer he is taken he must yeeld to the punishment that law hath awarded so the wicked vpon whom sentence of damnation is past alreadie by an out-lawrie and iudgement that cannot be reuoked may for a season goe vntaken taking their libertie and fetching their friskes as if it would neuer be otherwise or as if that iust God who is their creditour and must be their Iudge would neuer serue an execution vpon them by death his Minister but the time will come when they shal be arrested and after some short repriuie of their bodies in the gaole of the graue be violently haled to the prison and pit of hell from which there is no redemption It were well for such if they had beene cast into their graues as a dogge into a ditch for though his buriall be homely yet his case is much better then theirs who are buried gorgeously and goe to hell The dogge endeth his misserie with his death but when such die they beginne their miserie and end their â—oyfull daies for euer For man shall not die like a beast though he liue like a beast nor be senslesse of paine hereafter though here he was senslesâ—e of sinne free from paines and smart that others felt As before in respect of their soules that presently enter into peace Vse 3 so here in regard of their bodies which sleepe in their beddes of rest the godly may be comforted for their godly friends departures at least it may stay all sorrowing without hope For who would be sorrie for his friend because after his hard labour he goeth to his rest in a bedde of much ease prepared for him or to vse an other comparison A man locketh vp his best apparrell in a chest meaning hereafter to weare it will he mourne and be sorrie that it is so kept till there come a high daie to weare it So the faithfull concerning their bodies which are the vesture of their soules are shut vp by death in the coffers of the Earth And shall their friends take on because their friend hath his best clothing so preciously laid vp that euerie soule vpon the highest day of the daies of the yeere may haue the seuerall robe and vesture of it owne body to be put vpon it or will any man thinke much that his friend hath put off his old rags to put on robes of glorie This is the very case of the righteous when they lay downe their bodies They put off vile bodies to put on glorious and their bodies are but chested in the earth when they returne to their dust that in the solemne and high day of resurrection they may be brought forth againe and restored but with farre greater beautie and shining to the soules that were owners of them So much for the comforts promised The persons follow to whom such comforts are promised Euerie one that walketh c. The persons whose soules shall enter into peace and bodies be put in their sepulchers no otherwaies then if they should be laid in their beds of rest so soone as they goe hence are they who walke before the Lord or walke that is liue as in his sight And here the Prophet setteth downe two things the generality of the promise euerie one and condition vnder which it is made that walketh before Him that is the Lord. For the generalitie and where the Prophet saith euerie one his meaning is that neither countrey nor parentage nor diuersitie of sexe and calling nor any outward thing shall make his end vnhappy whose life by reason of his godly life is happie where learn That Doctr. God is no accepter of persons that is respecteth not the person of man but his grace in man Whosoeuer beleeueth in him or hath receaued the grace of faith to put faith in him and to liue vnto him let him be borne wheresoeuer and let his degree be whatsoeuer such an one saith Amen shall not perish But so it may be that is one may not perish and yet misse of peace therefore it is added and haue euerlasting life as if it had beene said he shall not be miserable and he shall be happie euer he shall not die and he shall liue eternally in glorie Ioh. 3.16 Peter perceiued this and in a vision comming from heauen saw this and therefore as God opened the vision Act. 10.15 so hee opened his mouth and said Of a truth I perceiue or to say the truth I now know that God is no accepter of persons or God doth giue his grace indifferently to one and other whether born in Iewrie or fearing God in Caesarea and therefore in euerie nation he that feareth him and worketh righteousnesse no matter what countrey-man so he be a good man he that reuerenceth him shall haue his part in him Act. 10.34.35 whether Iew or Gentil circumcised or vncircumcised rich or poore bond or free he shall haue life if he walke before the God of life Blessed is euerie one that feareth the Lord and walketh in his waies Psal 128.1 All that walke in the sunne-shine of Christ shall receaue the die of his fauour as all that walke in the Suâ— are tanned They shall gaine peace and find rest
where others meete with shadowes and shall liue in miferie that liue in vnrighteousnesse The reasons The things that cause errour in iudgement and accepting of persons are imperfect knowledge and respects in the world of good to our selues or of our bond to others But these are not in God whose knowledge is wonderfull who needeth no mans good and is no Mans debter Ps 139.3.4.5.6 16.2 Math. 20.15 Secondly God forbiddeth his Seruants who are the Iudges of the Earth to accept the persons of men and commandeth them to iudge indifferently not accepting faces 1. Sam. 16.7 2. Chr. 19.7 It was Iehosaphats charge to his Iudges or rather the Lords by him And so being Gods law to others and a law of great iustice will he himselfe breake it and will not the Iudge of the world doe iudgement Gen. 18.25 Thirdly God hath made many promises to those that walke before him and vprightly in his commandements The scriptures plentifully speake of this And will an honest man keepe his word and shall God falsifie his truth Ps 51.4 shall he say it and shall he not doe it God forbid wee should so thinke As Gods promises are generall to all that walke before him Vse 1 so they that endeuour so to please God and to walke in his truth must haue bands of particular faith to receaue them God is generall in his gifts and we must be particular in our receit and euerie man liue by his owne faith Habac 2.4 Anothers good life will not bee imputed to vs nor anothers faith saue vs. Therefore all that thine hand shall find to doe doe it saith Salomon with all thy power Eccles 9.10 He saith thine hand not anothers hand For he that will not doe good but by a deputie shall goe to heauen by a deputie and to hell in his owne person Some say let Ministers liue precisely and let Diuines walke before God but for themselues because they are not in that calling they take liberty and giue themselues leaue by a dispensation sealed by themselues to walke other wise as much as if they should say let Ministers be saued and diuines goe to God but for vs let vs perish if we must perish and because God will not haue vs let the diuell haue vs. This is fearefull and their case no lesse fearefull who post off goodnesse to others Let this confute superstitious poperie and carelesse Atheisme One saith well why art thou proud of another mans gift and thou giue nothing Euerie one that will haue peace must walke vpon his owne feete and worke with his owne hands Ephes 4.28 And Papists who with the foolish Virgins trust vnto the store of the wise shall receaue answere we haue not inough for our selues and for you Math. 25.9 But some feare too much as others feare too little who though they haue liued orderly and are sorrie with the sorrow of true repentance where they haue not yet are short-handed in receauing what God hath promised to those who walke before him But will a condemned malefactor at the barre not faile to apply the Kings generall pardon to himselfe for life and shall a iustified sinner feare to make the generall promise to all beleeuers particular to himselfe who is a beleeuer that be may liue Paul saith Christ came to saue sinners of whom I am chiefe 1. Tim. 1.15 He pleaded the Lords generall pardon though a sinner and the chiefe of sinners So the father of Iohn the Baptist Zacharias in his canticle putteth in for the horne of saluation Christ drawing that great redemption in him to himselfe as he applied it to others saying for vs that is for others in Israel and for Mee an Israelite Though in other cases a man cannot with good manners be importunate in matters and for things which concerne himselfe in commoditie or preserment yet here a godly man can neuer be too earnest nor lay too much vpon such a foundation Somtimes we wil applie hastily catch where we should not but if we wold be prouidently captious without offence let it bee here And as it is written of the seruants of Benhadad who were sent to the King of Israel that they tooke diligent heed if they cold catch any thing from him towit for his aduantage who sent them which made them when the King of Israel had said Is Ben-hadad yet aliue hee is my brother Presently to reply saying Thy brother Ben-hadad so let faith and hope our seruants confessing guilty with humbled necks and ropes about them watch what the King of the Kings of Israel hath spoken and set downe vnder his hand in his word concerning repentant sinners and we shall finde it written in the volume of the book concerning them Is he yet aliue he is my brother That is Doth the hungry soule pant for my saluation and the thirstie for my righteousnesse Doth it yet trust in God Doth it still beleeue Behold saith the mercifull King of Christendom Christ Iesus and hee that saueth vs from our sinnes I haue brought many brethren to my father and many sonnes to glorie and this is one Let vs now well obserue and diligently marke what hee saith Benhadad is the Kings brother Therefore say we thy brother Benhadad and catch him in his words that is God my father and Christ my elder brother The father will not cast away his penitent child nor one most kinde brother betray another to death 1. King 20.33 Indeed the deiected soule of man cannot alwaies being laden with troubles thus raise vp it self into confidence and some in the brunt haue complained that they haue been cut off from God whose voices in their feare haue been these or such as these Christ indeed came into the world to saue sinners but not such as we are and was appointed a Sauiour but not for vs singling out themselues Some in their hast haue said Here is the fire and wood but where is the Lamb for sacrifice Ge. 22.8 But let such remember that peace shall come to euery one that walketh before God or that would that is vnfainedly would walke before him We see not the Lambe for sacrifice but God will prouide nay God hath prouided it and open wee the eyes that blind distrust hath shut vp and wee shall see it Christ spake as one forsaken and a man would thinke that he had despaired when he twice said My God my God why hast thou forsaken me Math. 27.46 But if we dig through the bitter barke of the letter deeper into the words we shall finde an hony combe in them of perfect consolation Iudg. 14.8 For he calleth him yet his God and as if he wold adde another cord of faith to his first and make it a two-fold cord that cannot be broken he calleth him againe the second time his God that is the God in whom he trusted in whom hee will trust If God shall fashion any of vs to our head in the similitude of such a sorrow euer let
fill in them they haue Gods blessing inwardly in the peace of a contented minde outwardly in so much as is sufficient The wicked who haue them in greater measure haue them not vnder Gods hand nor as his blessings but as stolne wares that they shall answere for because they haue no right vnto them by Christ nor hold them in Capite that is in him Therefore their table is a snare vnto them and their prosperitie their ruine They liue to the encrease of their damnation and they die to take possession of it Fourthly they who with the glorified virgins wait for Christ in the life of the righteous are alway prepared for death when it knocketh Mat. 25.10 to open vnto it And what is a prepared death but an happy death And what followes an happie death but an happy life neuer to die againe Such goe in with Christ to his marriage of euerlasting life We see then that the last houres repentance the common refuge of worldlings as it commeth short of a sanctified life Vse so it seldome reacheth to an happy death or life after death For as the tree boweth before it bee cut downe so it falleth and in the place where it falleth there it shall be Eccles 11.3 That is as we liue so wee commonly die Or shall we thinke that men can easily begin righteousnesse at their last houre and that repentance in that houre is ordinarily good and sound repentance Let them well consider this who put off their conuersion to God and send away by hope of repenting old all those good motions that knocke at the doore of their hearts for a sanctified life One saith well While the Lord speaketh to thee make him answere and while he calleth let there bee an eccho in thy heart such as was Dauids who when God said seeke yee my face presently answered thy face will I seeke Psal 27.8 The Lord hath promised pardon to him that repenteth saith another but that hee or any other shall liue till to morrow he hath not promised Many in their puttings off fare as if they should say Lord let me sinne in my youth and pardon me in mine age But where in the meane season is their walking before God yong that peace may come when they are old And is it not a iust thing that men dying should forget themselues who liuing neuer remembred God Surely let them looke for no better who watch not the stealing steps of death in their tower of repentance in the life of the righteous And if moe things belong to repentance then can bee done in an houre and well in a mans life as to bring forth the buds of it young to beare fruits of it at more yeares to ripen it being man and to gather it toward death in the autumne of fruits how can they thinke one poore houre to be sufficient to bring the seednesse the spring the summer the autumne and full crop of these things together in so short time and how can they hope in such a span of life to prepare themselues for the Lord when so many els of long lâ—fe afford so scant measure to the best men to set them in a readinesse for him Let vs therefore while wee haue time laying vp treasures in heauen for our soules store vp in the summer of life for the winter of death which will come Prou. 6.8 In our last sicknesse and vpon our death-bed we are fitter to seeke ease for our bodies then mercie for our faults and grace for our soules Besides how fearefull will it be to be taken then by sudden death as by some vnexpected Officer without baile or warning and by it to bee brought to the goale of the earth in the bodie and in the soule to perpetuall prison in the torments of hell Of this more was spoken in the first Sermon and vse of the last doctrine there But shall they who liue well here Vse 2 liue well hereafter that is blessedly then their desperate and cursed errour is confuted who blaspheme the way of righteousnesse saying that it is to no purpose to bee so deuout godly and that they are most wise who giue themselues most libertie in the pleasures and iollitie of life So say the wicked in Malachy it is invaine to serue God Mal. 3.14 And the wicked in Iob say what profit to pray vnto him Iob 21 15. As if they should haue said we may serue God and we may pray to God but there is nothing gotten by it or they speed as well and are as wise that are cold in these matters as they who kindle and are hottest in them But they Prophet here saith that peace shall come that is they shall see the peace of God in heauen who make peace with God here and they that serue him shall raigne before him The wicked are as the chaffe which the wind driueth away Psal 1.4 That is so soon as God punisheth them with the wind of death their hope is gone But the godly haue a sure foundation and no storme either of death or of mans ill will can blow them to destruction whose house beeing builded by God not on the sand of time but vpon a rocke vnmoueable standeth fast in all changes Math. 7.25 The builder vp of Sion is the wise God whose worke abideth for euer Let the vngodly oppose themselues neuer so much they shall not be able to beate down Gods house and death is their aduantage Phil. 1.21 Or if the Princes Palace be safely guarded we must not think that any of Gods houses shall be left without their keepers sufficient watchmen and the righteous shall flourish when the hornes of the vngodly shall be broken And thus it is no vaine labour nor gamelesse seruice to serue the Lord. Doth a good life bring a good death Vse 3 Then the despairing words of Gods children in a troubled skie and when the waters enter into their soul as that God hath forsaken them that God hath cast them off in displeasure that God will not saue them and such like are words of distemper not of reason and iudgement For will God cast away his people The answere is Godforbid The meaning is hee will not Rom. 11.1 Neither can mans changeable tongue alter the decree of God that is vnchangeable Rom. 3.3.4 And we must not iudge of the estate of any man before God by his behauiour in death or in a troubled soule For there are many things in death which are the effects of the sharpe disease he dieth of and no impeachments of the faith he dieth in And these may depriue his tongue of the vse of reason but cannot depriue his soule of eternall life Which may bee spoken also of a troubled soule For as in a troubled water the face in the water cannot bee perceiued which when it commeth to be cleare is manifest so in a troubled spirit the face of Gods mercie seemeth to be changed against vs and to
is sufficient for vs to know that such a day will come and it shall be our wisdome alwayes to be ready for it that it come not vpon vs as the snare vpon the bird The reasons of the certainetie of this day of iudgement are First it is the will and decree of God for the Apostle saith He hath appointed a day in the which hee will iudge the world in righteousnesse Act. 17.31 Now the wil and decree of God is vnchangeable His counsell shall stand Esa 46.10 Secondly it is an article of our faith grounded on the word of God But the articles of our faith are all certaine and most certaine Thirdly the scripture saith that God will make manifest euerie mans worke and iudge the secrets of men Eccles 12.14 Luc. 8.17 Rom. 2.16 This is not done here and here many matters are cloked and carried in a mist that deserue iudgement and merit condemnation Therefore and that God may be iust in his sayings there must be a sessions of gaol-deliuery which we call with the scriptures the iudgement of the last day Fourthly the godly doe here groane vnder many miseries and the vngodly wallow in delights the rich liue delicately and Lazarus is in paine therefore is it necessary as it is certain that a day should come wherein the Lord may make knowne his righteousnesse and magnifie his iustice before his glorious throne that they who haue liued merrily dishonouring God might liue in torments of fire and they whose life hath beene miserable seruing the Lord might be comforted for euer Some haue offended deepely and haue not beene touched by the Magistrate some haue suffered great rebuke somtimes death deseruing fauour therefore a day must come and is appointed wherein the Lord that is iust will recompence tribulation to all that haue troubled the righteous and to such as were troubled by them rest 2. Thes 1.6.7 On the other side would it not be hard for the godly who here haue endured the crosse for the ioy that was set before them if there shold not come a time of refreshing from God and would it not too much induâ—rate the wicked who drinke iniquity as water if they should escape all punishments and vengeance here and after death Fiftly this is shadowed out in that housholder who when euen was come called the Labourers and gaue euery man his hire and pennie Math. 20.8.10 And if a wise Master will reckon with his seruants Math. 25.19 shall we thinke that the wisest will not one day reckon with sinners and call them before him for his money that is precious graces of wit learning authoritie wealth and other ontward and inward ornaments of life which they haue consumed on their lusts Sixtly euery wicked mans conscience doth by a trembling feare as in Felix at one time or another iustifie this point of a iudgmeÌ„t to come Act. 24 26. And therefore as the flood of waters once drowned the world except a few who were saued in the arke Gen. 7 1.7.2 Pet. 2.5 So it is certain that the flood and tempest of the last daies fire shall burne it and all in it except such as Christ hath or wil then gather into the little arke of his Church In the euening of this world and when there shall be no more time he will call the labourers before him giuing them the pennie or pay of euerlasting life but for the idle and loiterers forth of the vineyard and out of Christ he will let them goe with sinners to the place prepared for them as they haue liued without the Church or idlie in it so when the labourers receaue their pennie they shall heare depart from mee ye that worke iniquitie I know you not Math. 7.23 Thus it is proued not onely to be certaine but necessarie that there should be a iudgment But some will say Quest seeing men come to their account at their death what needeth any other day of audit or hearing I answere Answ Men at their death receiue but priuate iudgement here they shall receiue publike sentence Then they are iudged in their soules onely here they shall bee iudged in soule and bodie that is but a close Sessions that an open or solemne assise There much of their shame is hid here they shall be shamed to the full And if our owne lawes doe not condemne and execute malefactors in prison but for their greater shame in open place and manner It is great reason that wicked sinners should not priuately in their graues as in prison bee iudged and led to execution but be brought to the publike scaffold and barre of solemne fession there to receiue their shame and sentence together and not to bee executed by a close death in the goale but be broght forth to suffer vpon the high stage of the world in the sight of Saints and Angels where all eyes may see them But is not Christ iudge in this life Quest And is there not a iudgement begun here Indeed Answ there is a iudgement begun already a iudgement that goeth before this of the last day For God hath erected in the consistorie of euerie mans heart a certaine iudgement seat where conscience is iudge The wicked securely despise or scornefully deride this iudge and iudgement seat but it giueth them many secret gripes though they profit not by them Oftentimes Gods children themselues because that the noises and sounds that the ring of the world maketh in them doe too much neglect these loude cals of their consciences to amendment of life But this is the iudgement that the Lord beginneth here with which they must well bee acquainted who meane to stand before Christ the iudge at the last day And this one well compareth to our quarter-Sessions which are kept for mulcts and meddle not in matters of life and death as Sessions of goale deliuerie doe For in this mid-space betweene these Sessions and that day of assise the Lord executeth a kind of iudgement among his houshould people and enemies by taking his grace from his seruants for a season from the wicked for euer Or by taking something from his children that they loued to much and did hurt them and that from the wicked that they seemed to haue The first to prepare the righteous for a better world the other to make the wicked readie for the sentence of their last and iust damnation begunne in this world That we may be fitted for this comfortable meeting of the Lord in the ayre and not liue in sinne as those workers of iniquitie doâ— vpon whom these mid-Sessions haue passed sentence binding them ouer to the close sessions of their death or more publike assise of the last day when all prisons must be rid and graues emptied let vs not sleightly passe ouer those seuerall penalties that the Lord inflicteth at his quarter-sessions in the twitches of our conscience for some good omitted or euill done But when he thus calleth vs let vs answere here am I. A
chuse but come And the Euangelist Iohn the third witnesse of this truth vnto vs saw this in a vision wrote it in a booke His words are And I saw the dead both great and small stand before God Apoc. 20.12 Not some dead but all the dead little and great And they were iudged Not some men but euerie man according to his workes ver 13. But shall the dead onely stand before Christ not they who shal be found aliue at his comming Yes euen they shall stand before Him and the elect then aliue shall come vp vnto him 1. Thes 4.16 The elect shall be with him in the Mount the wicked and sinners shall stand at the foote of the hill The reasons First euerie thought and worke must bee brought into iudgement Eccles 12.14 11.9 and if euery secret thing and worke then the persons out of whose hearts those thoughts came and in whose hands those workes were must be iudged Secondly among the sonnes of Adam some are gold and they must be purged and some drosse and they must be burnt vp with the fire of the Lords comming Here goates and sheepe feede together as in one common pasture and here tares and wheat grow vp together as in one common field But when they come to the fold the Porter of heauen not Peter but Christ will open the doore of life to his sheepe and open hell for damned goates and reprobates and when they come to the haruest the Master of the field will command his Reapers the Angels to gather the wheate of his election into his garner but for the chaffe of his wrath he will scatter it with the wind of his iudgement and burne it vp with the vnquenchable fire of hell Math. 3.12 13.30 It is necessary therefore for the triall of euery mans worke and person that there should be a generall iudgement and a generall appearing at it Thirdly it is more for the glory of God and the solemnitie of the day that all without exception shall be cited to it and be present at it It is more to the glorie of God for then the glory of his iustice shall more appeare in the reprobation of sinners and the glorie of his grace be more and more gloriously manifest in the saluation of his people And for that daies magnificence what can be imagined to make it more solemne stately and glorious then to haue all countreyes tongues and kindreds of the earth to come together to it for what a great day will that be and how full of maiestie beautie and honour when the whole world shall appeare together at once that is at one session and iudgement If a King should marrie his eldest sonne and bid many Kings and some Emperours to the marriage would not that be a great marriage but at the day of Christs marriage wherein he shall be eternally espoused to his Church all the world shall be present all Kings and Emperors that euer were shall be at it some as guests to honour it some as enemies to be driuen from it Math. 22.11.13 Quest But if the godly shall be iudged and if all persons both the godly and sinners shall and must appeare before Christ in iudgement how is it true that the Saints shall come with Christ and that no iudgement shall passe by Christ against the saints and why doth Saint Iohn say that he who beleeueth in the Sonne shall not come into iudgement Ioh. 3.18 For answere I say that Answ though all persons must come vnto iudgement yet the righteous onely shall stand in the iudgment Ps 1.3 and with boldnesse before Christ the Iudge Luc. 21.36 who therefore shall receiue sentence with them not as the wicked against them and here the sentence of come yee blessed not the wofull sentence of goe ye cursed into euerlasting fire Math. 25.34.41 where it is said that he who beleeueth shall not come into iudgement the meaning is and so our bookes haue it into iudgement of condemnation Quest Answ But the text hath against all men I answere the me anng is and the greeke preposition may well be rendred vpon all men and so the last translated Bible copie hath it Will Christ giue iudgement vpon all men Vse 1 good and bad then the bodies of all men that sleepe in the dust good or bad must be raised For if they be not raised how shall they be iudged or shall they be iudged in their soules onely then not men but the soules of men onely are to be iudged This point of the resurrection is a point or article of faith to saluation wherein we professe to beleeue by the scriptures that when the soule goeth out of the bodie to rest or paine the bodie it selfe is laid in some graue till the day come wherein the Lord Iesus will raise it by his voice in an Archangell either to eternall happinesse or to eternall miserie I speake of the soules going out of the body For some haue thought that the soules of men which die not are kept in still within the body that dieth as in a sleepe or swoune till the last day But we reade to the contrarie in the word of God as of soules vnder the altar not still in the body and of crying soules not of soules asleepe or soules in a traunce Apoc 6.9 So Lazarus soule was carried to heauen Therefore not least in the bodie but taken out of the bodie Luc. 16.22 Other groser opinions of the soules estate after death I leaue to the Mowles and to the Backes from which they came Esa 2.20 My purpose being to speake of the bodies estate as it shall be at the last day not of the soules as it is at the day of our death And here for the resurrection of bodies which we beleeue with all the true Churches of Christ Satan hath raised some in all ages to cauill against it or flatly to denie it For all haue not altogether denied it who were enemies to it as Himineus and Philetus who granted there was a resurrection but said it was past 2. Tim. 2.17.18 And the Sadduces did not generally resist it but had their false glosses and diuers interpretations of it Indeed the Stoikes and Epicures among the Philosophers were peremptorie adâ—ersaries to it Act. 17.18 and Libertines among Christians doe in their liues denie it But the truth of it shineth brighter in scripture and reason then that it can be darkned by any cloude how blacke soeuer of humane opposition Iob saith that after the wormes haue done with his bodie yet euen in that bodie he shall see God Iob. 19.26 Ezechiel foresheweth the bringing againe of the people out of captiuitie vnder an excellent figure of the rising and restoring of our flesh at the last day Ezech. 37.5.6 as if he should haue said He that can restore flesh and breath to rotten bones can restore the Israelites to their country Esay speaketh plaine of this matter saying Thy dead men