Ierusalem all the good people in that Church and Nation betake themselves to dolefull lamentations And all Judah and Jerusalem c. 1. Of the first of these That the child the dearest child of God may undergo a violent death As a child of God may be exposed in this world to any tempration that is common to the Nature of man to the sorest and sharpest affliction so to the sharpest kind of death The reason is because death by the decree of God by the desert of man is the inseparable sequel of sin to all the sons of Adam aswel to the godly as to the wicked forasmuch as all have sinned all must dye whatsoever may conduce to or bring on death whether it be corruption from within in these our earthly Tabernacles our bodies breeding some noysome or grivous disease or force and violence from without by wounds hurts and bruises may befal the the one God permitting aswel as the other As death is common to all so the same causes procurers and producers of death are incident and alike common to all As the the undergoing any sore affliction or a violent death is no sure argument that a man is the child of God so the undergoing the like is no certain evidence that he is not the child of God we cannot conclude any one to be a reprobate simply from any kind of suffering or from any kind of death because Gods dear child may be exposed to the one or the other The Donatists of old who were the forefathers of our Anabaptisticall fanatique Section separating brood vainly supposed that the undergoing of sore afflictions and violent death was the most ready way to bring them to heaven and a sure character of eminent Saints and therfore would willfully and needlesly expose themselves to grievous sufferings and sometimes to cruell death As Venner the Sectarian Preacher or rather prater the Wine-cooper and his cursed crue lately gloried to shed their blood in fighting for King Jesus Thus do they blasphemously abuse that good sweet and precious name though in open and horrid Treason and Rebellion against the lawfull powers ordained by God and in plain opposition to the laws of God and of the Land as if Christ who foretold by his Prophets as a great blessing to his Church and People under the Gospell That Kings should be their nursing Fathers and Queens their nursing Mothers would have these nurses all killed and murthered by their own children And not remember what he hath said They that take the sword upon such false grounds shall perish by the sword St. Austin Epist 50. ad Bonifacium speaketh of three kinds of death wherewith the said Donatists desired to be killed or rather indeed killed themselves Some of them would make request unto the worshippers and keepers of Idols to destroy them others would offer themselves to armed men robbers and spoylers lying by the high-way side to be slain of them and there wanted not such among them as delighted to cast themselves headlong from high places into the water and into the fire In this last age some Fanatick people have traced their steps Gualterus that famous Preacher of Zurich who lived about an hundred years since Hom. 209. in Mat. cap. 16. Relateth that he himself saw a woman after she had lived many years honestly with her husband and among her neighbours being instructed or rather seducted by the Anabaptists ran away from her husband and forsook her seven little children nothing pittying the youngest though a sucking babe and being asked why so unnaturall and unlike Mother she forsooke her children she had that pretence which the rest of the Anabaptists have Christ exhorts us to bear the Cross But though he exhort to bear the Crosse yet he requireth not that we should put needless crosses upon our selves but only to bear them patiently when he is pleased to send them and when he cals to suffer As for those who rashly expose themselves to troubles and cast themselves into wilful dangers or death it self without warrant of Gods word their actions are so far from pleasing that they are very displeasing to him As Saint Austin very well affirmeth Tract 11. in 3. Iohn Let Marculus saith he fling himselfe downe headlong from a rock and let Donatus in like sort cast himself into a pit both with intent to end their lives yet shall they not be called Martyrs or at most as he speakes in another place they are but Martyrs of a foolish Philosophy mad Fanatick Martyrs Now as these or like sufferings were no evidence to them of their salvation because it is not the meet suffering or the kind of death but the cause that makes a Martyr So the like being undergone are no argument that a man is not in Gods favour The dearest child of God may undergo a violent death The Prophet the man of God that came from Iudah to cry out against Iereboams Idolatrous Altar at Bethel in his return homeward was slain by a Lyon yet all agree though his body suffered yet his soul was saved he was the dear child of God so esteemed by the old Prophet who took care for his decent burial and laid him in his own Sepulchre and they mourned over him saying alas my brother and laid a charge upon his sons to lay him in the same Sepuchre lay my bones besides his bones 1 Kin. 13.31 So this good King Iosiah esteemed him for when in accomplishment of that Prophesie he brake down the Altar of Bethel and burnt many bones upon it digging up the bones of the Idolatrous Priests and burned them when he came to the Sepulchre of this man of God and undertood by the title whose it was he gave charge to let him alone Let no man move his bones deeming him the servant of God 2 Kin. 23.18 And all those Worthies of the Old Testament spoken of Heb. 11.36 37 48. Being too good to live in this world received hard measure from the world And had tryall of cruell hands and scourgings yea moreover of bonds and imprisonment they were stoned they were sawen asunder were tempted were slain with the sword Blessed Steven the Proto-martyr of the New Testament was pelted knockt to death with stones and many of the best of Gods Saints and Servants pledg'd him in the cup of Martyrdom which was very bitter and bloody The holy Baptists head was chopt off to satisfie the appetite of a lustful and luxurious woman and served up to her in a Charger And Gods holy child Jesus that just and religious one taking our sins upon him and standing in that place underwent a violent death the painful shameful and accursed death of Cross yet still most dear in his Fathers favour Iosiah here a good and a religious King yet slain by cruell hands The Archers shot him and he dyed now briefly for Application Vse 1. Learn here first That neither goodnesse nor greatness can exempt man from the saddest
nature it self is apt enough to shew it self upon all occasions of this nature In mourning for our near relations we are more apt to erre in the excess then in the defect to mourn immoderately then to faile in mourning for our friends deceased Therefore let us take heed that we do not exceed nor give too much way to our passion The Apostle doth not forbid all sorrow for the dead but immoderate sorrow That we should not grieve and take on like the Gentiles who were ignorant of the blessed state of the dead that die in the Lord and had no hope of ever seing them again because they were not perswaded of the Resurrection and so mourned out of measure 1 Thes 4.13 I would not have you ignorant brethren of them that are asleep as ye sorrow not even as others that have no hope for if we beleeve that Jesus dyed and arose again even them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him There are four cordials let me give you to moderate and mitigate this sorrow regulate this passion 1. Because it is our common condition death is no new or strange thing but the lot and portion of every child of Adam As by one man sin entred into the world and death by sin so death passed upon all men for that all men have sinned Rom. 5.12 Do we see some friend go before us let us not be too much troubled nothing hath hapned to them but what must happen to us yea to all it is the case of all to die Our Fathers are gone before us and we must follow after them and our children after us one generation passeth and another succeedeth all things are here in a mutable condition and so are we Omnia peribunt sic ibimus ibitis ibunt Demonax the Philosopher seeing one make great lamentation for a friend departed wished him to make enquiry among all that company being very numerous and see if he could find any one who by death had not been deprived of some friend or other which when he did and could find none with the community of the case he comforted himselfe and bridled his sorrow So if by death we have been deprived of Parents or Brethren Husbands or Wives children and Friends let us remember nothing comes to us but that which is common to all and let this restrain us from moderate mourning With this thought David put an end to that sorrow for his child which he so dearly loved But now he is dead wherefore should I fast can I bring him back again I shall go to him but he shall not return to me 2 Sam. 12.23 As if he had said death is common to all I shall die as well as he I must follow him in the way of death the way of all the earth from which there is no returning hither Therefore why should I afflict my selfe any more 2. Because death comes by Gods appointment and determination with him are the issues of death he hath fixed and appointed our time here All the dayes of my appointed time will I waite till my change come saith Job So that God hath set down how long every ones time shall be The number of our moneths years and dayes is with him he hath set us our bounds which we cannot pass Job 14. Indeed to our apprehension many times some are taken away untimely unseasonably suddenly husbands from the wives and wives from their husbands children from their parents and parents from their children some in their youth and sull strength when their breasts are full of milk and their bones full of marrow but let it not seem strange to us Their appointed times were come the will of God is done and we must be content and with patience submit to it 3. Because by death the faithful go to a better mansion and mend their condition they make a happy change they change their mortall for immortality this corruption this earthly house for an heavenly house They are freed from their labours sorrows troubles miseries afflictions molestations of this present evill-world and brought to the desired home of true aest of blisse rnd perfect happiness ut non tam plangendus sit qui hac luce caruerit quam gratisicandum ei quod de tantis malis eraserit saith the Father That he which departed hence in the Lord is not so much to be lamented for because he is deprived of this light as to be rejoyced for in that he is escaped out of such a Sea of misery and landed safely in the sure harbour of endless felicity taken up to the true light 4. Because we have assurance of a joyful Resurrection they that dye in the Lord are not lost or gone from us for ever but only gone before us they are fallen into a sweet sleep and shall for certain awake again rise again at that great day when the Lord Iesus shall shew himself from heaven and change our vile body and make it like unto his own glorious body when we shall enjoy the company and society of our Christian friends in body and soul for ever therefore as the Apostle exhorteth comfort your selves and one another with these words The second Sermon And all Iudah and Ierusalem mourned for Iosiah And Ieremiah lamented for Iosiah c. 2 Chron. 35.24 25. THe third observation which I gave you from this Text which I chiefly intended and aimed at for this day as being most suitable to our present occasion and meeting and which follows now to be spoken of was this That the death especially the violent death of a good King is a ground of great mourning to all good people Iosiah a good religious zealous King being slain in battel the Church and good people among the Jews yea the whole Nation City and Country Prophets and others all the Inhabitants of the Land fall to sad mourning and doleful lamentation This truth is so apparent that it needs not much proof yet it may be further made out upon these accounts 1. The death of any friend doth occasion sorrow and mourning much more the death of a choice friend of a chief friend of a common friend especially if he fall into the hands of merciless thieves and murderers and come to a barbarous and bloody end this must needs be a cause of great mourning to all that did bear any loving respect to him And is not a King a good King a friend a chief and choice friend a common friend to all his good people being the Minister and Vicegerent of God for the punishmen of evil doers but for the praise of them that do well 1 Pet. 2.14 Must not then his death a violent and bloody death unmercifully and unjustly brought upon him occasion sad hearts and great mourning among those who had any spark of goodness and affection towards him 2. A good King is not only a friend but a Father Pater Patriae the Father of his Country and of the
sufferings Iosiah a King as good as great yet slain in battell The Lord seeth good sometimes to have it so to humble the best and greatest that none may presume or trust to any worldly priviledge or dignity and to prepare his servants for a suffering condition 2. Let us be instructed to beware of rash Iudgmen not to be censorious of all that suffer either sharp affliction or some bitter death if they die penitently c in true faith of Christ or in a good cause it doth not diminish ought from their future happinesse but rather promote them in the way to glory But let none of you suffer as a murtherer saith St Peter or as a thief or as an evill doer or as a busie bodie in other mans matters yet if any man suffer as a Christian let him not be ashamed but let him glorifie God on this behalfe 1 Pet. 4.15 16. Christ hath taught us not to deem them the greatest sinners who are the greatest sufferers Eo nomine for that very reason because sufferers by the example of those Galilaans who sacrificing were sacrificed Pilate mingling their own blood with the blood of the beasts which they offered and of the other who were mangled and quashed to death by the sudden fall of a Tower Suppose ye that these Galilaeans were sinners above all the Galilaeans because they suffered such things I tell you nay but except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish Or those eighteen upon whom the Tower in Siloe fell and flew them think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwell at Ierusalem I tell you nay But except you repent you shal likewise perish Lu. 13.2 3 4. And though our late dear Iosiah underwent a bloody death made as it were a sacrifice for the Church and his people by the rage malice and immane cruelty of mercilesse and perfidious men or rather monsters Horrendum factum dictu Horrendum Yet God forbid any of us should have the least doubt of his souls felicity Although his hard hearted and implacable enemies denyed him that which is freely granted to the vilest and most notorious condemned malefactors the help and comforts of his Chaplaines for his souls refreshment in the time of his hard imprisonment and therein as he complaines in his Soliloquies might seem as they sought to deprive him of all things else so to be afraid he should save his soul other sence charity it selfe can hardly pick out of these repulses I received saith he Yet we have good ground to conclude and ful assurance to perswade us that the better part of him is safe they which killed the body had no power to hurt the soul That bitter cup conduced much to his souls happinesse calix mortis calix salutis the cup of death and Martyrdom was to him a cup of Salvation His meek submitting to the will of God his patient bearing taunts reproaches and injuries evento shameful spitting on his meek yeelding to an unjust and bloody stroak his hearty praying for his enemies and murtherers according to that glorious pattern of his blessed Master his commending his soul to God trusting to his mercies in Jesus Christ our only Saviour for an eternal crown all being fruits of a sanctified soule are comfortable evidences of a saved soule Though his death was bloody and violent yet being sweetned with Christs death and his being washed and bathed in the blood of the Lamb we have firmperswasion and good assurance that he lived and dyed the dear child of God and is now a Saint in Heaven praising God among the noble army of Martyrs an heire of salvation and of that immarcescible Crown of glory which the Lord hath promised to them that love him Vse 3. Let it prepare and arm us against the fear and terrour of violent death if such should befal any of us we know not but it may it is sometimes the lot of Gods dearest children Let us not then overmuch disquiet our selves with the fear of violent death by theeves robbers murtherers or by the rebellious rout of Fanaticks The Sectaries talk high and hope yet to have a day their hearts are bloody and their hands would be at work these times they say will not hold we shall have a change though we have now a time of rejoycing yet we shall ere long have a time of howling and crying our harp shall be turned into mourning and our mirth into the voyce of them that weep but we hope their hornes will be clipt and their nailes pared a book be put into their nostrils and a bridle in their lips to hold them back from rebellion and mischief If they should break out in murther as they did begin and if any of us should fall by their knives swords or guns let not the fear or thought of this too much affright us Let us arme and prepare our selves with the shield of Faith and be alwaies ready and if we die in the Faith and favour of our God in Christ it shall not hinder us at all to our way to heaven but bring us the sooner to our Fathers House the place of true rest and happiness I proceed to the second Observation That it hath been an ancient custom among the people of God to mourn for the dead and in a moderate manner to mourn for our departed friends is not unlawful but rather Christian and commendable The custome hath been very ancient Solomon speakes of it as a thing commonly used in his time Eccl. 12.5 And we find it more ancient Abraham the Father of the faithfull bewailed his dead wife Sarah Gen. 23.2 Sarah dyed in Kirjath-arba the same is Hebron in the Land of Canaan and Abraham came to mourn for Sarah and to weep for her Joseph mourned many dayes for his Father Jacob. They mourned with a very great and sore lamentation and with grievous mourning Gen. 50.10.11 All the people mourned thirty dayes for Moses Deut. 34. David mourned for Ammon and for Absolom and for Abner yea he was the chiefe mourner there King David himselfe followed the biere and the King lift up his voyce and wept at the grave of Abner and all the people wept yea all the people wept again for Abner 2 Sam. 3.31 32. And as in the Old Testament so we find it used in the New The devout widows wept for the death of Tabitha Act. 6.39 Christ wept at the grave of Lazarus Joh. 12. And the good woman mourned and wept when he dyed And devout men carryed Steven to his buriall and made great lamentation over him Act. 8.2 And here all Judah and Jerusalem mourned for Josiah and Jeremiah lamented for Josiah c. From all which examples we see the the antiquity of this custom and hence Use May learn That moderate mourning for the dead is not unlawful but rather commendable Christians are not to be like Stoicks or rather Stocks void of all naturall affection But to this I shall not need to exhort
down apace as also are many other Churches within the Land That O shame to Christianity by our great reformers for many years made not only a den of theeves but a stable for horses As the barbarous Turks dealt with that renouned Temple of St. Sophia in Constantinople when they had conquered that imperial City 3. Josiah was a great friend to the Clergy to the Prophets and Ministers of God the Priests the Levites and gave them encouragement in their Service 2 Cron. 35.2 So was our Iosiah a great lover and respecter of Godly and learned men of able and Orthodox Divines a great benefactor to the Universities and Schools of learning the greatest countenancer cherisher and encourager of the Clergy and Ministers of England of any King before him A tender nurse a most propitious Father of the Church Hear his own words in the foresaid heavenly booke Pag. 208. I am so much a friend to all Church-men that have any thing in them beseeming that sacred function that I have hazarded mine own interest chiefly upon conscience and constancy to maintain their rights whom the more I looked upon as Orphans and under the sacrilegious eyes of many cruell and rapacious reformers So I thought it my duty the more to appear as a Father and Patron of them and the Church And again speaking of the harsh deniall of his Chaplains attendance during his imprisoment But my Agony must not be relieved with the presence of one good Angel for such I account a learned godly and discreet Divine and such I would have all mine to be And again As I owe to the Clergy the protection of a Christian King I desire from them the benefit of their gifts and prayers which I look upon as more prevalent then my own or other mens by how much they flow from minds more enlightned and affections lesse distracted then those which are encumbred with secular affaires besides I think a greater blessing and acceptableness attends these duties which are performed as proper to and within the limits of the calling to which God and the Church have specially designed and consecrated some men And lastly Pag. 214 I must confess I bear with more griefe and impatience the want of my Chaplaines then of any other my Servants and next if not beyond in somethings to the being sequestred from my wife and children since from these indeed more of earthly and temporary affections but from those more of heavenly and eternal improvements may be expected What more cordiall expressions could come from a pious soul of love and affection to that calling 4. Iosiah was a great promoter and furtherer of Gods publike and solemn worship that it might be decently and reverently performed as appears by that most famous and solemn Passeover which he kept in this Chapter which was done by his command and to which he contributed upon his own charge super abundantly thirty thousand Lambs and Kids and three thousand great cattell 2 Chron. 35.7 So our Iosiah was a zealous furtherer of the publike and solemn worship of God that it might be performed with all holy devotion decency and reverence not negligently irreverently rudly and slovenly And which is to be pitied and with a fountain of tears to be lamented this his pious zeal for Gods house and worship and Ministers for the true Protestant Religion for the Church and its Patrimony and for the ancient and orderly Government and Discipline therof was the great crime that provoked the Sectaries to hasten his destruction 5. Iosiah was a King unblameable in regard of any notorious personal crime we find him not noted for any remarkeable personal evill as most of the former Kings had been fome are said to be good and some bad but the best of them had their naevus their spots and blemishes we read of Davids Adultery and of Solomons Idolatry but none was stamped upon Iosiah The greatest blemish I can possible discover in him was a little too much wilfulnesse his rash and unadvised rushing into that fattall battell at Megiddon for which the good man paid dear So our Iosiah was of unblameable life more entire and free from any notorious personal crime as searing drunkennesse whoredom or the like then most of the Kings before him no such like as these could be charged upon him even his most bitterest enemies could not taxe him had they espied any blemish no doubt we should have heard it again and again 6. Josiah was a Prince of a soft heart and a tender conscience Thine heart was tender and thou hast humbled thy self before me saith the Lord 2 King 22.19 So our Iosiah was of a soft heart and very tender conscience how did his conscience check and trouble him when by restless importunity he had yeelded compliance for plenary consent it was not as he said to the Act for the Earle of Straffords death which in his Iudgement and conscience he could not be satisfied was just by any clear Law he confesseth he did never bear any touch of conscience with greater regret How did he mourn like a Dove and complain of itin the bitterness of his soul How meekly did he mention it with griefe as the main thing troubling him at the time of his Martyrdom acknowledging that the giving way to an unjust sentence might besome cause that the Lord permitted such an unjust sentence to be executed upon him What is it that made him so firm and constant to uphold the Church in her just and ancient Rights Government and Patrimony but his tender Conscience which as also his Oath perswaded him that Epistcopacy with some smal regulations was most Ancient Universall Divine and Apostolical and therefore could not yeeld to the extirpation of that Government and to the alienation of the Church-revenues without wounding his conscience with some stain of perjury sacraledge and impiety This tendernesse of conscience and the immeasurable and unmercifull pressing him against it struck him to the heart and stuck nearer to him then any thing else as we find it at large in his wofull complaints uttered between God and his own soul in his Soliloquies This his tenderness of conscience was a clear evidence of a godly gracious and sanctified soul wicked and ungenerate men feel no such cheeks of conscience at sin Though sin be an unspeakable burden like a talent of lead yet the weight of it doth not trouble them so as to seek ease from the Lord. They complain not with David My sin is ever before me and mine iniquities are gone over my head and are like asore burden too heavy for me to bear The Philosophers observe that no Element is heavy in its own place in the Sea let a man be in the bottom of it although he hath the whole Sea on his back yet he feeles not the weight of it but let him take but a bucket full out of the Sea out of its place and then he shall feel how heavy it is So unregenerate