goethunder the name of some other Authour but also in his divine discourses wherin he acts the part of a Preacher he declares to the world that these remedies must be applied for he saith there is a time to heal and that a medicine doth good if rightly used for he compares it to a chearful spirit or rather a good conscience which is a continual feast CHAP. XIII CErtainly Ahab would never have been so sinfully ambitious to abtain the vineyard of Naboth for a garden of herbs If he had not understood their virtue as well as delight Doubtless the good will of him that dwelt in the bush is further declar'd to man-kind by the fruit the leaves and the flowers growing theron which he hath impregnated with such virtues that they are good for the healing of the nations in a corporal as well as in a spiritual sence those contemptible persons Job speaks of who cut up mallows by the roots probably understood they were nutrative and medicinal as the experience of many ages demonstrate CHAP. XIV THe bitter herbs appointed to be eaten with the pascal Lamb were not only typical but medicinal if we may beleeve some of the antients Nay a Dinner of herbs with Evangelical charity is preferd by Solomon before a costly banquet Medicinal herbs as Mint Anniss Rhue and Cummin c. were so much in use amongst the Jews that they layed tithes and costomary impositions upon them CHAP. XV. WHen the Church would make a Metaphorical description of the external and internal qualifications of her beloved doth she not compare him to those things that are most excellent and usefull as Myrrhe Aloes Cassia and all the chief Spices Without controversie Physitians are not onely usefull for the Embalming of the Dead as Joseph used them but for the recovering of the dying as our Saviour intimates when he saith the whole have no need of the Physitian but they that be sick have Who can be so weak as to imagine that the Art of the Apothecary should be employed only to prepare the Holy Oyntments for the Consecration of Priests and Kings of old and not to prepare variety of Medecines for the restauration of virtuous and pious Souls who through the meritorious death of the Son are made Kings and Priests unto God the Father CHAP. XVI THe Evangelical Prophet Esay reflecting upon the deplorable condition of the Church with the whole head sick and heart faint full of wounds bruises and putrifying sores being not bound up nor mollified with oyntments doth plainly intimate how necessary he thought the natural as well as the spiritual application of fit remedies in such a case which must needs be sad indeed when there is no Balm in Gilead and no Physitian there Jothams Parable may be useful thus far to instruct the world that not onely the Olive the Fig-tree and the Vine are usefull to Honour and cheer the Heart of God and man but also the bramble may have an excellency and superiority in some distempers for although its thorns do tear the flesh yet of its leaves are made a healing application Such is the Beneficence of our great Creator that since the Appearance of the second Adam we may eat of every tree in the garden without any prejudice to us or our posterity asking no question for conscience sake for the Earth is the Lords and the fulness thereof It is wonderfull to observe the miraculous providence of God in preserving the seminal virtues of plants from perishing by the deluge when we read not of any seeds preserv'd in the Ark the innocent Dove shewing a leaf to the new world preached a Sermon of Divine goodness so that the Poet might well say Quaelibet herba Deum c. CHAP. XVII EZechiels vision through Gods goodness may be daily seen a tree whose fruit is good for food and leaves for medicine Our Saviour the Physitian of Souls was Physitian of bodies too and not only commended the good Samaritan but acted the part of one throughout his whole life Saint Luke the beloved Physian was the quill of the holy dove the Divine Amanuensis The Angelick Spirits think it not an office inferior to their natureto be instrumental in the healing of the sick as may be seen in the stirring the waters of Bethesda Although our Saviors restoring sight to the blind man was miraculous yet means was used although but clay and spittle Saint Paul himself prescribes wine to Timothy as a medicinal cordial to chear his spirits and to support him under his infirmities CHAP. XVIII ANd the utility of Physicall Remedies is not onely demonstrated from Scripture but it may be evinced from the use of it by the most knowing and intelligent part of mankind both Jews and Pagans In the Temple of Esculapius there was a fountain of oyle with a golden Arch a perfect symbole of Physick the one denoting its usefullness the other its honour Again it is founded upon reason and attended with the experience of many Ages Therefore the unsuccesfulnes of it cannot be from the nature of the thing but from the misusings of it CHAP. XIX THe Design of medicines being not to prevent death for it is the unalterable Decree of Heaven that men must dye but it is to make life comfortable and to preserve natures lamp so long until there is no more oyl left to feed it And if we rightly understand the excellency of natural life it being that space of time alloted us for the securing our eternal state it highly concerns us to use those means which may be most likely to preserve it Now there are several things absolutely needfull in order to the preservation or restoration of natural life and must be observed or we cannot rationally apply the remedies The ability of the Physitian in prescribing The faithfulness of the Apothecary in preparing The regularity of the Patient in observing The care of Nurses in attending The strength of Nature in Assisting The Providence of God in influencing CHAP. XXI Concerning the choise of an able Physitian which is the unum necessarium in sickness next to the imploring the Divine Benediction This I may say that there is no action of a mans life of greater consequence neither doth any discover more of wisdom or folly then a preposterous or prudent choise There 's no wife man but will choose a person of learning experience and known integrity If a mans horse be troubled with the glanders it is a point of prudence to apply himself to the ablest Farrier for advise and not to every Hostler that hath a confidence to prescribe a drench If my watch want mending I would choose to send it to the most ingenious Artist People seldom are so imprudent in other things as they send not their Bellows to a lookinglass maker to mend but their bodies shall be sent to any mungrel Physitian who can sooner cure all Diseases then one The curing of Diseases being like mending a watch if not
Many times providence may make use of those distempered humours which the child derived from its Parent to be the instruments of death a holy person may dye in battail and be surpriz'd by every accident all these things falling alike to all Yet these examples doe not contradict a general rule viz. that Piety and Faith in Christ is a good preservative of natural life Enoch and Elias never dyed and became examples that a spotless life might possibly have been immortall CHAP. XLIV SO that the best way to secure our health is to indeavour to procure the providence of God to be our life guard but when he withdraws his protection we are exposed to the aspect of a Star the contingencies of a battel and the accidents of a humor every day and every minute we escape a thousand deaths surrounding us it is as natural for a young person to dye as an old because that is most natural which is most common and hath most natural causes but to dye with age is a very rare thing but the sins of youth are the immediate instruments of death and although a man in a consumption be under the preparations for death yet one in health may be as near it upon more fatall and less discern'd accompts by a sudden Feaver or Apoplexy c. There are some vices that carry a knife in their hand and cut of man before his time every sinfull pleasure tops off a branch from our short life Although we fly from death yet it followeth us and we doe like the poor creatures in Noahs flood when one flour drowned go to the next and so higher and higher and more and more diffracted with the horror of death and when at the uppermost story yet drown'd at last so we run from one disease and another overtakes us and we are pursued untill destroyed at last by the king of Terrors CHAP. XLV DAvid indeavours to use all the means possible to secure his life notwithstanding he had been told by Samuel he should live to wear the Crown so that the Divine determinations concerning our lives should not lessen our care to preserve our lives In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye the death was Adams sentence the wicked and blood thirsty man shall not live out half his days as the Patridge sitteth on eggs and hatcheth them not so he that getteth riches and not by right shall leave them in the midst of his dayes The covetous rich man shall have his soul or life taken away and then whose are all his goods Sauls disobedience Ahaziahs evil consultations Jeroboams Idolatry Benhadads curiosity Ahabs cruelty Hananiahs false Prophesie Herods vainglory Saphyras perjury the Samaritan lords infidelity the forty two childrens calumny these impieties had a particular influence upon the contracting of their days as sacred writ demonstrates CHAP. XLVI MOreover the infirmities of virtuous good men may so far provoke the Almighty as to take away their natural lives although he reward them with Eternal life as in the example of Moses and Aaron and the good Israelites that murmured the good Prophet slain by the Lion Ely and Vzziah Somtimes God cuts off children for the sinfull miscarriage of Parents as in the case of Abijah the widows child Davids child Elies children Somtimes Subjects for the Ruâ—ers Impieties as Davids Subâ—ects CHAP. XLVII ANother thing that is necessary towards the procuring the fluence of a Divine blessing with the means is to endeavour to find out the cause of the distemper I mean the supernatural cause and to learn those lessons which providence intends to teach by sickness the Prophet's quaere wherefore doth the living man complain doth plainly intimate that there is a reason there is an Achan oâ— Babylonish garment or something that causeth the thorn in the flesh and this must be removed for the Almighty doth not afflict willingly the rod hath a voice there are many ends thaâ— God aims at in all afflictions Aâ— to correct for sinfull miscarriages our minds have diseases as weâ—… as our bodies the tympany oâ— pride the feaver of passion thâ— dropsie of covetousness anâ— therefore we are fed with thâ— bread of affliction and the water of adversity the plaguâ— of the heart is many times cureâ— with the plague of the body there is a root of bitterness from whence all our troubles spring As there is a vanity lyeth hid in the best worldly good so there is a blessing lyeth hid in the worst worldly evil we should imitate the Bee gather sweet fruit out of bitter flowers CHAP. XLVIII WE should not like Baalam strike the Ass look only upon the second cause of our sickness but behold the Angel that is the immediat instrument We are very prone to attribute too much to second causes but holy Job was of another minde when his children were killed by the fall of a house he saith The Lord took them away Sometimes the Almighty takes away a person by death in mercy to the person as Abijah and Josiah and others Sometimes he removes the child to exercise the parents faith as Jobs children and in the case of Isaac One reason why our distempers are no sooner removed is because the design of it is not answered CHAP. XLIX THere are many happy intentions that Divine providence aymes at in laying sicknesses and diseases upon the bodies of men One end that Divine Goodness aimes at is to demonstrate his own glory in healing and restoring so saith our blessed Lord concerning Lazarus this sickness shall not be unto death but for the glory of God and indeed deliverance from sickness is a singular mercy both to a mans self and others Epaphroditus was sick nye unto death but God had mercy on him and on me also saith holy Paul and therfore we should bless the Lord with our souls and all that is within us should praise his holy name and that upon this account because he healeth all our diseases CHAP. L. THis consideration ellivated the holy soul of Hezekias and transported him into a divine Doxology viz. the living the living they shall praise thee as I doe this day When men are miraculously delivered from death after they have received the sentence thereof in themselves it is given to this end that thanks may be many on their behalf When our souls are delivered from going down to the grave and our eyes are enlightned that we sleep not the sleep of death then â—hould we praise the Lord in the great congregation and our songs should be unto the God of our lives CHAP. LI. ANother design of providence in sickness is to prepare men for greater sufferings it prepares us for death St. Paul whose bodily presence was weak was ready to dye for the name of Christ why should he be afraid of them that kill the body they can do no more then an Ague or a Consumption the sick-bed is the attiring room of the grave in which we should be preparing
man may dye in a time when God forbids and yet dye when God permits and live out all Gods time who wickedly shortens his own The murmuring Isralites were buried in the wilderness notwithstanding their promise of seeing Canaan their infidelity anticipated their funerals The wages of sin is death and may as justly be payd in the morning as in the evening of our lives Indeed temperance doth not alwayes prove an Antidot against the Pestilence nor Abstinence a preservative against Famin nor innocence a security from the stroke of injustice but they are likely meanes The flagitious impiety of the old world sent a Deluge which possibly might have been prevented had their repentance been as visible as the Ninevites was who were repreived from execution after the sentence of death had passed upon them whereby omnipotence did demonstrate that he hath reserved a power in his own hands to length then or shorten the lives of men as he pleaseth and to make the sands in the glass of time run swift or slow according to his pleasure it is very observable how the Patriarks out-lived all their titles of consanguinity yet none lived to a compleat thousand years some indeed give this reason for it be cause God would make good his threatning to Adam that in the day he eat he should dye the death and so they would compute a day for a thousand years as St. Peter speaks but this is trifling and foolish A more probable reason may be to declare to the world the vanity of life when those who lived longest could not arrive to such a period which in comparison of Gods eternity is but a day CHAP. XXXVII SIn brought death at first and as sin increased death came near er by 500 years presently after the flood man sinned still and built Castles in the air and then it is reduced to 200 years and by Moses time half that remnant is taken away and threescore and ten is the period had God gone on still to shorten our dayes as we increased in sin our life by this time had not been a day long and therefore he no longer destroys the kind but punisheth the individual and sets it down for a rule viz. evil shall slay the wicked So that not one in 500 arrive at that state which they might attain unto by the course of nature but end their dayes in sin and folly and in a period appointed in anger we may easily observe how the blessing of health is contradicted by an impious life for from surfeting proceeds disolution of members relaxation of nervs fractures of bones inflamation of the liver crudities of the stomach which Solomon sums up besides the uncleanly consequences of lust which hunt for the pretious life and like a dart strike through the liver and the casual deaths caused by Jealousies and animosities thus providence intervenes and suffers not nature to take its course by reason of impieties CHAP. XXXVIII IT is observable that not a Son dyed a natural death before the Father for three thousand years untill Terahs time who was the first that taught the people to make Images of clay and corrupted the Worship of God his son Haron was snatched away by death before him The Jewish Rabbins do observe that during the standing of the second Temple there were 300 high priests but in the time of the first but 18 which stood within 10 years as long as the first which may be much attributed to their impieties It is thought by some of the antients that Balaam's wish to dye the death of the righteous was not only that he might be sav'd at last but also seeing what judgments God had purposed to bring upon the Moabites that he might come to his grave in a good old age with his father in peace we live by the word of blessing out of the mouth of God every command if observ'd like food and physick tends to the length of our natural as well as spiritual lives CHAP. XXXIX THe fear of God is the best Antidote against sickness as it is a direct enemy to sin which brought in death If sin destroy soul and body why should not piety preserve both If the sting of conscience torment body as well as soul doubtless peace of conscience releives both Why may not the soul as well conduce to the prolongation of the body as to the immortality of it Why may not the body have the perfection of life viz. health from the soul as life it self CHAP. XL. THe circumstantial actions of piety are influential towards the lengthening the lives of men as the sweet sleeps of temperate persons and their freedome from violent and inraged passions and the admirable contentment that dwells in a holy conscience these must necessarily conduce to a healthfull life Dying to sin is an excellent means to preserve life if men would try the experiment It is observed that the male heir of Ely's family dyed as soon as born for many generations according to a divine threatning until they set themselves unto a serious humiliation and solemn repentance We live not at an adventure but the manner and moments of our death come under a divine appointment the Jews could not prejudice our Saviours life untill his hour was come viz. that hour which by a special providence was appointed to be his last hour although St. Paul was in deaths often yet he dyed not before providence thought meet it is appointed to men once to dye that is it is once appointed to men to dye CHAP. XLI A Man may shorten his own dayes but he cannot shorten a Divine determination the date of Hezekia's life was lengthened with respect to himself but not in respect of Divine purpose that is the same be our time long or short CHAP. XLII Object But if Piety doe so prevaile with God to lengthen our lives how comes it to pass that many good and holy men dye whilst in the prime of their years Answer Those that reason thus doe not consider that the righteous may be taken away from the evil to come and by their deaths God may serve other ends of his Providence and yet make his promise good by recompensing Temporal with Eternal life Although God hath promised long life to them that obey yet he never promised that he would not borrow our natural lives as it were and make a glorious exchange CHAP. XLIII DEath may sometimes be a great mercy and life a great misery It is observed that from Adam to to the Flood by the Patriarks were eleven Generations but by Cains line eight they being shorter lived because God intending to bring a flood upon the World rescued the Elect from the fatall Deluge And the same reason is generally given in case Infants dye before the use of reason for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven Although Abijah came to his grave whilst young yet ther was some good thing found in him towards the Lord God of Israel
those means which may preserve them in health and vigor King Asa was not condemned for using but for trusting to the Physitians CHAP. VI. IT is a great sin upon the pretence of Gods power to be disobedient to his will in despising Physick which God hath ordained to be the means to restore us to health this is to try what God can doe and yet neglect what he commands in not adminstering those things which are necessary for the body c. The miraculous cures which the Apostles effected by their Handkerchiffs and by Oyntment and laying on their hands these wholly ceased according to that rule cessante causa cessat effectus the cause of that miraculous power being only to confirm their Doctrine in its first preaching that being done that miraculous way ceaseth and therefore now men must use more ordinary means found out by reason and experience as the extraordinary way of understanding tongues is ceased we must doe it by humane industry and natural study The life is more then meat and the body then rayment and therfore queen Hester preferred life before liberty and importuned the King to grant the life of the Jews and told him if they had been sold for bondmen and bond-women she had held her peace CHAP. VII THe father of lyes never spake a greater truth then when he said skin for skin and all that a man hath will he give for his life It is a precious Jewel and Solomon saith the Adulteress hunts for the precious life That which was sick was not to be offer'd in Sacrifice why should we not therefore indeavour to present our bodies a healthfull as well as a holy Sacrifice which is but reasonable service When the body is in a weak and languishing condition it is not fit for holy service and therefore one part of the happiness of heaven consists in a freedom from sickness and distempers there Leah shall not be blear eyed nor Mephibosheth halt Saint John prayeth for Gaius that his body might prosper and be in health even as his soul was And Saint James bids us pray for one another that we may be healed Now if it be our duty to pray for one anothers health much more ought we to indeavor to preserve our own CHAP. VIII THe soul sits uneasie in a diseased body The body it is the sheath of the soul as Daniel calls it if the sheath be defective or impaired it is prejuditial to the blade so when the Golden bowl is broken and the sound of the grinding is low and the strong men bow themselves then the Sun and the Moon and the Stars will be darkned That is all the faculties of the Soul will be clouded and not so fit to perform their several offices the understanding the memory and the fancy will not be so clear strong and lively and desire it self must needs fail Barzillai took small delight in the pleasures of the Court when his sight and his tast fail him Our bodies are members of Christ therfore we ought to have a respect for them neglecting of the body is by St. Paul reckoned as a peece of will Worship The best way to keep the body under is by a virtuous mind CHAP. IX THe cure of the Leprous persons under the Law was appointed to be managed by the Priest rather then by the Physitian because it concern'd him to keep back men who were Leprous from the Sanctuary although it is probably though he might have the advice of the Physician for their profession was ancient as we may observe in the 50 of Genesis It is very remarkable the conformity between the Leprous contagion and the Law of cleansing the Leprosie did putrifie the skin and opposite to that was Cedar-wood commended against putrefaction it was of an offensive colour opposite to that was the colour of scarlet of an ill sent contrary to that was the sweetness of Hysop it did consume the flesh and bring death there was the sparrow let loose a significant sign of recovery and continuance of life It is probably thought that the prohibition of many sorts of meats in the 11 of Leviticus was not only upon a moral but also upon a physical account because they yield no good nourishment but are unwholsome CHAP. X. THe world is very full of complaints of the ineffectual application of Medicines in order to the procuring of Health when it is lost or the preservation of it when enjoyed and doubtlesse the the cause of these complaints must arise from the imprudent and preposterous use of so excellent an ordinance of God for the good of mankinde for who but a person whose reason is unhinged and whose intellectuals are Eclipsed with the fogs of ignorance or prejudice can reflect any deficiency in those remedies themselves which are designed by the God of nature to be good for food and physick even every herb bearing seed therefore he that dare to say in his heart ther is no God who hath given every herb for the service of man his folly is manifest to all men doubtless that profession which hath received a pattent from the King of Kings and the great preserver of men must needs be of great utillity transcendent excellency Shal the Almighty himl f prescribe an Emolient Cataplasme for the plague-sore of Hezekias in order to the addition of 15 years to his life and shall any condemn so noble a faculty as physick is in it self if rightly applyed CHAP. XI HOw many singular examples of physical applications do the inspired penmen of holy writ exhibit to us and whatsoever was written aforetime was written for our learning Were not the waters of Mara made salutiferous by the casting in of medicinal ingredients Without doubt the sons of the prophets had a physical intention in the composition of ther Broth with physicall herbs although it was attended with a mistake as to the nature of the simple CHAP. XII KIng Solomon who had the priviledge granted him from the only wise God to be the only wise man made it his business to enquire into the nature of vigetables from the tallest Cedar to the contemptible Hysop and shall we cast the Imputation of folly upon him whom the spirit of God hath recorded for the most eminent example of Wisdom and imagine that he spent his time in such a study as was not likely to be profitable to human nature shall he whose brow was incircled with a glittering Diadem whose Gold was so plentious as to pave his palace whose orchards were replenisht with delicious fruits whose eares were entertain'd with the most harmonious melodies and had all the delights of the sons of men shall he I say condescend to the study and improovement of physick and yet Contemptible fooles despise it The wiseman doth not onely tell us with what remedies the Almighty heales men and takes away their pains in his discription of the variety of plants a book which possibly the world hath lost or else
diseases with their symptomes and nicknamed distempers and giving them some common denomination and apprehending that it being nothing else but what they have known some recover of they neglect the properest remedies until it be too late or until the distemper be complicated and hath taken deep root It costs many a man his life whilest he eyeth only the external causes of distempers It is usual to discourse thus I have left off a coate or put on a damp shift or eaten somthing that did not agree with my stomach or drank cold beer when hot or over walked my self or have been frighted or grieved or the like when at the same time the stomach is disordered by a loade of corrupt humors and a meer Quagmire the Blood inflamed the Liver and Spleen obstructed and the Lungs perished and this is not taken notice of as if a man when his house is on fire should not mind it so as to quench it but satisfie himself with this consideration that it came only by a boy throwing a squib c. And many times they will depend upon the advice of some friend or apish Doctor until cold sweats affright and then the learned Physitian is sent for when the time for purgation and bleeding is let ship and so the Physitian shares with the Patient in the infamy of miscarriage and he is sent for not to cure that he cannot because nature is spent but to try whether he can antidate resurrections Nothing destroyes more Persons then imprudent hearkning to the advise of persons of other professions and neglecting learned Physitians until it be too late CHAP. XXXII A Nother effectual ingredient in the cure of distempers and that which is most necessary is the concurring influence of a divine blessing unto God the Lord belong the issues from death and therefore it concerns us so to behave our selves that we may procure a divine Benediction The best way to procure a divine influence to cooperate with the means is by a Holy and a pious life so saith God Almighty to the Jews If you obey my statutes and hearken to my Judgments I will bless your bread and your water remove sickness from the midst of you Solomon urgeth the consideration of our health as a very strong argument to promote divine fear It shall be health our Navel and marrow to our bones Wisdom is a Tree of life to them that lay hold upon it what man is he that loveth life and many dayes let him depart from evil and do good Godliness hath the promise of the life that now is as well as of that which is to come Solomons asking of wisdom was attended with the addition of long life If the obedience of our naturall Parents hath the promise of long life annext to it much more the service of our spiritual parent especially so far as life is good life is yours saith the Apostle because you are Christs CHAP. XXXIII PIety it secures men from the power of evil Angels who have a great influence in the procuring of distempers by a Divine permission as in the case of the excommunicated Corinthian and the incestuous persons about Lots House struck blind Herod destroyed by an Angel and the evil angels sent amonst the Israelites and several other examples of the like nature and the Demoniacks in the Gospel Again Piety it usually secures men from the stroke of Humane Justice as it guards them from those flagitious impieties which expose them to the penalties of humane lawes as murders thefts and rapine And it also preserves men from the terrors of an evil conscience which makes men many times wash their hands in their own blood as Judas did Again Piety preserves life as it teacheth men temperance and moderation in the use of those means that preserve life We find in Sacred Oracles that immature death is threatned as the penalty of disobedience and that the Penmen of Holy writ doe often inculcate the benefit of the fear of God as it is attended with the promise of longaevity So that to imagine the life of man to be fixed beyond the possibility of the Almighties abbreviation or prolongation is vain and inconsistent with scripture and reason CHAP. XXXIV THe Turks dream that the manner and moment of every mans death is prefixt by the Immutable laws of fate and that his lot is written in invisible Characters in his forehead that they accompt it vanity and cowardise to arm themselves against the blows of war by defensive weapons but it is to be hop'd that Christians have learned better It being a confest verity that every natural motion hath its beginning duration and period dependent on the will of the first motive now the life of man being a natural motion our nativity and death are both order'd by divine providence for in him we live and move and have our being The natural life of man consisting in a requisite harmony of the first qualities and in a proportionate comixture of the natural heat and radical moysture which harmony is more or less according to the more or less exquisite temperament of body assigned to each single person by the free dispensation of the divine will It followeth that the continuance of every individual in this natural life dependeth upon the pleasure of the first cause as Holy Job intimates when he saith our dayes are determined and the number of our Months are with him who hath set bounds to humane nature so that no man can live beyond the durability of his specificall temperament the principles of his vitality and permissions of providence CHAP. XXXV THe only wise God hath composed our bodies like a lamp of heat and moysture hath given appetites of hunger and thirst to feed this lamp and so supply the expences of the moysture by the heat he hath given us reason and understanding to govern our appetites and the revelation of his will to guide our reason now if we through the depravation of our natures and the predominancy of temptation do suffer our appetite to dethrone our reason and give way to Ebriety Gluttoners salacity other immoralities which have a natural tendency to extinguish the lamp of life we may justly exspect to be cut off in the midst of our dayes and to dye before our time by being wicked over much as Solomon expresseth it Whereas piety and obedience like the Tree of life in paradise not only sacramentally but really conduceth to health and long life so far as it is a blessing and this it doth by impregnating our elements with the tincture of a divine benediction by meliorating our temperaments and constitutions by infusing salutiferous dispositions in the air propitious influences in the host of heaven which many times impress the seminalities of diseases upon the blood and spirits so that the period of our days and all the second causes conducing thereunto are circumscribed within the circle of a divine prenotion and limitation CHAP. XXXVI A
say to corruption thou art my father and to the worm thou art my mother and sister CHAP. LIV. ONe end of sickness it is to hide pride from man what a vain thing is humane power it will not avail in the day of sickness and death if God doe not withdraw his anger the proud helpers stoop under him men of high dègree are vanity although a man flourish like a green bay tree yet he shall soon be cut down like the grass and wither like the green herb Sickness teacheth us the vanity of strength though a mans bones be full of marrow yet when sickness coms his strength shall be dryed up like a potsherd How can our hands be strong in the day that God contends with us by sickness although a bow of steel hath been broken by our armes yet when sickness comes we are powred out like water and all our bones are out of joynt then the keepers of the house the arms will tremble and the strong men the limbs will bow themselves and we shall have reason to say verily every men at his best estate is all together vanity It may convince us of the vanity of children they are indeed mercies in themselves O that I were as in months past saith Job when my children were about me though the fare be but course yet it is the more pleasant to have these plants about the table but sickness eomes and then these sweet flowers like a posey wither that we must conclude childhood and youth are vanity An aking tooth will damp all the pleasures of the world CHAP. LXV HOw vain must the World be whose comforts are not valuable then whiles we have them not What will all the glittering nothings of the world be worth when God shall let fall great drops of burning wrath upon that part of our souls which is most tender when he shall with a heavy hand chafe our consciences with fire and brimstone when the worldling that wallows in thick clay shall behold that judge which Gold and Silver cannot bribe when the voluptuous will relish little pleasure in carnal delights God writing bitter things against him what a vain thing will musick be to him that hears nothing but the screeches of his own conscience what will cups avail him that must drink only a cup of Fury what are titles of honour to a man whose conscience calls him Reprobate CHAP. LXVI SUppose our tongues faultering our eye-strings broken our limbs trembling for fear of an arrest by this grim sergeant death mingle the best ingredients the world can afford it cannot make a cheering Cordial Honour is but a blast of Popular breath and like an eccho vanisheth into silence The misers Angils are all winged and fly away as an Eagle towards heaven Doth any man lye the safer because his bed posts are gilt doth our meal relish the better because served up in gold are our clothes more fit because more fashionable what is gold and silver but diversified earth and shining clay the entrails of the earth the place of its birth upbraid us for accounting them so precious the best perfumes are but the sweet of trees or the mucous excrement of a beast the softest silks are but the workings of a vile worm the most generous wines but puddle water straind through a vine and our choisest dellicacies are but dirt Cook'd up in various forms Why should we lay the foundation of our happiness upon such phantacies But sickness comes and gives us right notions of these things and it teacheth us the right conduct of our Passions to love these things as if we loved them not it is like wormwood to wean us from the breasts of the creature The most considerable design of sickness is to prepare us for Death and Judgement to make us listen to the strikings of the clock of time with the more attention to bring us to a more familiar acquaintance with that stinglesse Serpent and makes us apprehensive of our pilgrime state there is nothing in death to make it dreadfull to a good Christian many times our bitter cups are but as mornings draughts to eternity by sickness we knock at the gates of the grave every little accident stops our breath the roughness of a grape stone the reflections of a Sun beam the dust of a wheele the aspect of a star introduce death let us therefore with Joseph take a turn or two in our garden and visit our Sepulchre Old age is but a young death and a man may read the sentence of death in some mens foreheads written in the lines of a lingring disease CHAP. LXVIII ALthough we came into the world but one way we may go out a thousand Thus we see sickness hath many ends when it comes and unless these be answered we cannot expect its removal It is like a faithfull messenger it will not go without its message CHAP. LXIX ANother means to procure the influence of a Divine blessing is by imploring a Heavenly benediction by fixing our eyes upon Him who laid the sickness upon us We should look to the hills from whence cometh our help for our help cometh from the Lord that made heaven and earth it is he that wounds that must heal it is his hand that must make whole Hence David calleth the Pestilence a falling into the hands of God and when diseased he cryeth out Thy hand presseth me sore and I am consumed by the blow of thy heavy hand Diseases are called Gods arrows he shoots the arrow of a Consumption into the lungs of a man the arrow of a Fever into the heart of a man or the arrow of the Gout into the limbs of a man like a shot dear he walks and eats and sleeps yet the arrow sticks friends pull and Physitians pull but he may say Thy arrows stick fast in me If he give a commission to the small-Pox or any other disease then the wounds stink and are corrupt and the body is filled with a loathsome disease and there is burnings in stead of beauty Our times are in Gods hands he appoints the frequent returns of our distempers At the noise of his water spouts his waves and his billows pass over us He appoints how long the distemper shall last many continue in a languishing condition some years so that their lives hang in doubt as Moses expresseth it or as Heman saith of himself I am afflicted and ready to dye from my youth up and so Job complains I am made to possesse monthes of vanity and wearisom nights are appointed to me CHAP. LXXI SO may we observe men spitting their lives away notwithstanding their friends provide good dyet the Physitians prescribes good remedies the Minister puts up fervent prayers yet as Job speaks God is of one mind and who can turn him to restore health But when he speaks the word the man is healed I am the Lord that healeth thee is the name he gives himself and this is acknowledged by the
Leper Lord if thou wilt thou canst make me whole and Christ did it I will Be thou clean Thou art my King command deliverances for Jacob said David when the water-spouts came pouring upon him Vnto God the Lord belong the issues from Death CHAP. LXXII WHat a great impiety is it to go to Witches or Wizzards or such as have familiar Spirits nay to the Devils for cure A thing absolutely forbidden in Scripture A sad thing for a man to procure the Devils blessing with Gods curse It is called Idolatry and Whoredom It is a violation of our Baptismal Covenant Shall not a Nation seek to their God in Covenant Our Saviour abhorred to worship them and shall his members do it They use good words the better to deceive the ignorant They use charms circles spells words and other signes which have no naturall virtue nor can we with any ground pray for a blessing upon these The Devil being herein God's Ape for As God hath made a Covenant with his people and hath appointed signs and Seales upon the faithfull use of which he is present to perform what he hath promised So the Devil makes a Covenant with Witches upon which he hath given signes and tokens that if they use the one he wil perform the other Let such as are guilty in this kind repent and pray that the thoughts of their hearts may be forgiven them as the Apostle counselled Simon Magus The power of Christ is the same now in Heaven as when on earth in his hand our breath is and all our wayes in him we live and move and have our being we live not by bread alone but by the word of blessing out of his mouth Many a man loseth his life for want of asking it We are apt to blame this means and that accident but seldom say as she did Lord if thou hadst been here My Brother or Sister had not dyed the means alone are but like Elijahs staff it will not doe unlesse he come himself By fervent prayers we should invite Omnipotence to our beds sides And call for the Elders of the Church to pray for us All second causes are but the instruments in Gods hand to lengthen or shorten as He pleaseth CHAP. LXXIII THere are three general second causes of the death of all men assigned in 1 Sam. 26.10 As some inward corrupt Humour or Disease that smites the vitals extinguisheth Nature's lamp as a Lamp goeth out when the oyle it putrefied or corrupt as Asa's Gout Jehoram's bloody-flux the plague of Leprosie the womans child's Headach and those diseases mentioned in the 28. of Deuteronomy Another second cause is some external accident as a Lamp is putout by the Wind so the unbelieving lord kil'd in a crowd Ahab slain with an arrow the Captain of fifty with Lightning Jobs children with the fall of a house the good Prophet by a Lion Absolom hanged in a tree by the hair Sodem by fire the fifty two children by the Bears The old world by water the Rebels against Moses the earth swallows up CHAP. LXXIV ANother second cause is when the naturall heat and radical moysture is consumed as in old age as Jacob when a man comes to his grave in a full age as a shock of corn comes in its season as a Lamp must go out when there is no more oyle to feed it Yet Providence hath a hand in all these second causes so that men provoke God by their impieties to cut the thred of their their lives and by Piety and Obedience they may prevaile with Him to lengthen their days if he see good CHAP. LXXV ANother means towards the procuring the concurrence of a Divine blessing with the means is To act faith and a holy confidence in God with the use of proper means one touch of faith will cure our faith will make us whole therefore trust in the Lord for ever for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength I had failed unless I had believed said David Faith is the best cordial in quietness and confidence lyeth our greatest strength why should we be cast down let us hope in him who is the health of our countenance What time we are afraid we should trust in God and beware of slavish fear and carnal confidence former experience is a good ground of confidence He hath delivered and in him we trust he will deliver us Stand still and see the salvation of God is good counsell towards recoery of health it is a sign of carnall confidence in the means when we are continually trying new experiments and run from one thing to another and leave rationall and experimental remedies CHAP. LXXVI REpentance and humiliation is another means towards recovery from sicknesse if we humble our selves under the mighty hand of God he will exalt us in due time the way to hasten the cure is to hasten repentance our desire of life should be in order to our preparations for death if we break off our sins by righteousness it may be a lengthning of our tranquillity Nineveh's repentance spared their lives if men will not reform then God resolves to make them sick with smiting them as the Prophet speaks The last means to procure a Divine blessing it is a patient waiting the good pleasure of God without murmuring and repining They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength God hath his times for deliverance It is goad for a man to hope and quietly to wait for the salvation of God and not to say This evil is of the Lord why should I wait for him any longer God hath his time to an hour as our Saviour intimates Father save me from this hour The Promise is that Women shall be saved in child-bearing if they continue in faith and patience and it is of force in all other dangerous distempers A meek and a quiet spirit under all Divine chastisements is a very great ornament Some make Afflictions seem amiable by a pious and a patient Deportment CHAP. LXXVII MUrmuring is a dangerous sin we have the Jews for an example who were destroyed thereby A dreadful thing when a mans body is so weak that he cannot rise up in his bed yet his corruptions are so strong as to rise into an uproar against Gods will and Authority It may be some in Sickness may let fly their discontented spirits against their children or relations but they may answer as Moses to the Israelites What are we your murmurings are not against us but against the Lord. Some men practise what Jobs wife attempted viz. curse God and dye Murmurers shall be judged at the last day as ungodly men as Jude speaks Some in sickness howl upon their beds when they should be blessing God In all sickness we should say with Naomi Truly the hand of the Lord is against me and not in a stupid senseless way cry out Indeed I am not well but I shall shake it off it is only a flight distemper I wil work
and the same word which signifieth to heal signifieth to Worship because after healing men should Worship yet the Physitian is worthy of a liberal fee the Abderites when they wrote to Hippocrates for the cure of Democrates whom they thought distracted because he alwayes laughed at the rediculousness of mâ—ns lives sent him word Quicquid auri apud nos est libenter persolvemus etiamsi tota urbs nostra aurum esset it is a great mercy to be in a condition to administer help to the sick in their distresse the generallity being like the Priest and Levite if they see a man wounded though to death pass on the other side of the way nay like Hazaels wet cloth prove deadly to their friends lives and healths Sickness saith one is officina virtutis morum disciplina the shop of virtue the school of manners the tide time of devotion King Alfred was wont to say I alwaies find my self best in soul when worst in body CHAP. LXXXIX BEnhadad the King of Syria an enemy to goodness in his health will send to Elisha with a large present and submissive expressions in his sickness a sick bed being the highway to the grave makes men serious The Rabbies say that when Adam eat the forbidden fruit his head aked 't is clear sin is the original of sickness when we are chastised with pain upon our beds and the multitude of our bones with strong pain then the Almighty seals up our instructions and the sick bed becomes a pulpit in which the Spirit of God preacheth to us many serious truths and convinceth us of our sin folly our Redeemer is said to bear our sicknesses because he bears our sin in his body on the tree yet so incorrigible are some under Divine corrections that having been smitten they have revolted yet more and more and like Jeroboam been worse after his hand was withered and will not acknowledge the soveraignty of God as Naaman did after his recovery that when ther are ten cleansed we may well say where are the nine that return thanks such is the power of infidellity and Ingratitude CPAP. XC A healthful life is a right hand blessing Prov. 3.16 Adam the first man lived near a thousand years after his creation 930 years being then a perfect man we may reckon him nearer a thousand years than Methusalah when he dyed There might be many reasons consigned for the long lives of the patriarchs as that mankind might be multiplied that Arts and sciences might be perfected and that men might be acquainted and skilled in the course of nature having no books from which to collect observations but alass the case is not so with us fewand evil are the dayes of our pilgrimage and we cannot arrive at the years of our Fathers in the dayes of their pilgrimage we are but of yesterday and know nothing comparatively to what we might know because our dayes upon earth are but as a shadow indeed Adam in his sinless state might possibly have been Imortal and his eating of the tree of life might have conduced to the supplying of his radical moysture as fast as it suffered depredation by his vital spirit Moreover the tree of life in Paradise might be of a Sacramental signification that perseverance in a state of Evangelical obedience unto the father by the son through the Spirit is the most effectual way to obtain a long and a healthful life in this world so far as it conduceth to the creatures good and the Creators glory and a blessed Immortallity in the next FINIS ERRATA'S Courteous Reader thou art desired to correct with thy pen these following Errata's or any other if thou observest them PAge 8. line 4. read pretious p. 9. l. 5. r. prejudicial p. 10. l. 12. r. thought p. 16. l. 7. r. nutritive p. 24. l. ul r. then p. 42 l. 21. r. paratur p. 50. l. 21. r. gluttony p. 75. l. 8. r. shalt p. 76. l. 11. r. errand p. 82. l. 8. r. for not read only p. 107. l. 14. r. all men are Abels vain