A CORDIALL AGAINST THE FEARE of DEATH Delivered in a Sermon before the Vniversity of OXFORD May 28. 1654. By THOMAS HODGES B. D. Rector of Souldern in Oxfordshire OXFORD Printed by H. H. for Thomas Robinson 1659. To his much Honoured Friend Mr WALTER PELL of Aldermanbury in LONDON Merchant SIR SHould I be blamed for Printing this single Sermon I desire the great and Universall concernment of the Subject here treated on the seasonablenesse of it at all times especially in these sickly times after the observation of three generall Fasts for the diseases and mortality in severall parts of the Nation together with the eminency of the Auditory to which for the main it hath been Preached namely the two Universities successively may be my Apology for adventuring it to the presse And if you should admire my confidence in this manner of addresse to you I pray you be pleased in part to charge it upon your own account and to assure your selfe that your late civilities and favours to me and respects for me have encouraged me to this undertaking And if the observation hold good elsewhere which I lately heard from a Neighbour Mr Wilde of Ayno Minister at a Funerall Sermon namely that God in this visitation seemed especially to levell at aged persons having taken away 10 persons of his parish in one yeer all of them about or above threescore yeers old when you shall number your own daies and behold your own face in a glasse and see how the fields are already white unto the harvest and consider how the very streets you walke in might in some measure be paved with the skuls of those who have dyed since you first lived in the City though you should censure the Preacher as impertinent yet may you judge the Sermon here presented not altogether improper T is true indeed the mention of Death is an unpleasing note in the eares of those usually who are full of the comforts of this life I have heard or read of a King who upon pain of death forbad any to mention Death in his presence and of a great Queen who was highly displeased with a favourite for preaching a Sermon minding her how age had furrowed her face and besprinckled her haire with its meal but I hope you have better learned Christ and sure I am dare talke of death and touch this harsh key your selfe and will not therefore I perswade my selfe judge me your enemy meerly because I tell you the truth Now Sir whilst I preface this Sermon to you I desire I may Preach to my selfe and to all that read this Epistle whether old men or maidens young men or children Let us get oyle in out lamps before the Bridegroome comes and all things ready for death before death comes for who now so young so strong so good but there are younger and stronger and better already in their graves The Jewes have a proverb there are skulls of all sizes in Golgotha and the Apostle John tells us he saw the dead small and great stand before God Rev. 20.11 12. Let us not then put farre from us the evill day but consider that some sudden blast may blow out the Candle as well as it may goe out in the socket Physitians say there are 300 diseases incident to the body of man but if we escape all other diseases old age that incurable disease reckoned one of the three messingers of Death will creep upon us ere we are aware if we do not think of it Oh! that we could as we dye daily so get our selves more ready for death daily Let us meditate often how the two axes of time day and night are continually chopping at the root of the tree of every mans life and how some fruits are blown off the tree whilst in the bud or green aswell as some others fall off when they are ripe and how some flowers of the field are trod down or crop'd by man or beast aswell as others stand and wither till they be cut down 1 Let us know that death is the wages of sin and forasmuch as all have sinned it is a Statute enacted by the Parliament of Heaven that all must dye once so t is ordinarily for it is thought Lazarus dyed twice and those who shall be found alive at the day of judgment shall not dye at all but be changed Now if death be our wages let us Consider that wages may be payd in any lawfull coyne gold silver or brasse in any place the house street or field at any houre of the day or watch of the night as the master pleaseth and so Death may be inflicted diverse wayes and manners at any time and in any place Further know we that t is a solemn thing to dye because after death the Iudgment Eternity treads on the heels of death so that there 's no place here for a second Error 2 Let us often think of Death T is observed that Beasts cannot think of dying le ts shew our selves therefore men meditate of it not put far from us the day of Death that may be a meanes to make us secure for we read that the wise virgins slumberd as well as the foolish whilst the bridegroom delayed his coming and t is observed that God therefore keeps secret from us the day of death and judgment that men should watch alway and be ever prepared 3 Though we think of death which the beasts cannot doe yet let us not slavishly feare it but therein endeavour to be as the Angels of heaven who though they understand Death yet doe not feare it being out of the reach of it Consider we may that the sting of Death which is sin is taken out and our death is the Death of Death to us that out of this eater comes meat and out of the strong out of the bitter comes sweetnes Indeed if we looke upon death as the punishment of sin as the dissolution of the most excellent creature on earth as the parting of two old friends and intimate acquaintance the soul and the body as an end and period of service to God and man in the Church and comonwealth on earth so t is rather terrible than desirable yet again if we consider that t is a period to sin and sorrow an inlet to glory a dark entry to a lightsome palace no other than the Portall or entry into the house of God and the gate of heaven to the godly and that death is ours for our benefit and advantage as well as life that our death is precious in Gods eyes and that when we are dead and our vile bodies in the dust when the wormes are spread under them and the wormes cover them even then are we Gods Jewels when we are dissolved then are we like gold melted in the furnace precious in the eyes of the owner thereof Le ts consider that we goe to our friends and acquaintance who are gone before us to heaven yea we goe to God
afraid to look death in the face of whom then should they be afraid they may by grace do what t is said the horse doth by nature even mock at fear when it cometh We may say as David doth the Righteous is hold as a Lion A righteous man may say with David Psal 3.6 I will not be afraid of 10000s of people that have set themselves against me round about or as in Psal 46.2 Although the earth be removed and the mountaines cast into the midst of the Sea I will not fear Although the greater world fall this lesser world need not shake or be moved And so we are here taught 3ly the great Blessednesse of Christians in miserable times these are the happy men and women in times of war plague famine Miser Christianus videri potest non potest inveniri he may outwardly seem miserable he shall never be truly miserable Are ye by Christ freed from the slavish fear of death temporall and eternall Use 2 then let not such men as you be terrified at the newes of the approach of death and be not unwilling to die when the God of our lives calls for you When once good old Simeon had got his Saviour in his armes he presently sings his Now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace Luk. 2.29 Rebeckah that went so willingly with Abrahams servant to Canaan to be Isaacs wife may rise up in the day of Judgment and condemn us if we hang back when our bridegroome the Lord Christ comes or sends for us She went to an earthly Canaan we to a heavenly she went to Isaac a type of Christ we to Christ himselfe she to Sarahs tent we to Abrahams bosome she to a moveable tent or Tabernacle we to Mansions to a building that has foundations whose builder and maker is God himselfe she went from her own kindred and fathers house to live and die in a strange country we go to our own country and fathers house to dye no more death shall no more have dominion over us Consider for I speak to those who are passible and mortall and to whom no day can bring a priviledge nor place be a Sanctuary from the arrest of death no though our breasts be full of milk and our bones of marrow consider I say 1. that death can but bruise our heel he cannot break our head when death hath killed the body he hath done all God sayes to this destroying Angell or Messenger of his when he hath taken away the life of our bodies stay now thine hand it is enough put up thy sword into the scabbard and therefore do not fear death for the sword of death is like the sword of the magistrate he beareth it indeed not in vain but to be a terror to evill doers and a praise to them that do well 2. Death will cure thee of thy body and soul diseases The long-sick writ upon his grave stone hîc ero sanus here I shall be well And as for sin the disease of thy soul death will perfectly cure that leprosie and stop that bloudy issue and be the death of that body of death within thee 3. As the fining pot for silver and the furnace for gold so shall the grave be to our drossy bodies our bodies like the China dishes after they have been buryed for some generations under ground shall be taken up and made vessels of honour fit for our masters use in heaven The soul is now indeed a Pearl but set in clay but at the Resurrection in the day when God makes up his Jewels when he takes them up out of the dust and dirt he will then set them in bodies of gold yea in bodies like the Sun for we shall be made like unto the glorious body of Christ Phil. 3. Revel 1.16 last And his body is like the Sun when it shineth in its full strength 4. Death is the beaten road to everlasting life Christ the King of heaven and earth went this way and it may suffice Christians to walke to heaven even as Christ walked in and by the way of death 5. Consider Death is Christs messenger he will not run before he is sent he is Christs Angel or Minister sent out for the good of them who are heires of Salvation In the 2 King 6.32 we read that when Jehoram sent a messenger to take off Elisha's head the Prophet bid shut the door for saith he is not the sound of his masters feet behind him But let us use death kindly and not handle him roughly at the door but rather say turn in turn in my Lord for is not the sound of his and our Masters feet is not the sound of Christs feet behind him 6ly and lastly consider that so long as thou art slavishly afraid of death and judgment thou art either not a son or surely a son under age thou art not made perfect in love I shall never think my soul in good case said one so long as I fear to think of dying And Luther in a Sermon on Luk. 21.25 saith that untill we can from our hearts desire the day of judgment we cannot say boldly that we are Christians he would therefore have us pray to God for this day thus fac si fieri potest ut hâc horâ veniat I desire it may come even this very hour But yet truly I think that the house of our soul may sometimes lie so unswept and out of order that we may be for a season willing that our Lord and husband should delay a little his comming But t is our duty and let it be our study and endeavour to set the house of our soule in order daily not knowing but that any day we may dye and not live To this purpose le ts meditate often on death thus le ts die daily thus le ts acquaint our selves with it and prepare for it and so shall we be at peace and so shall we not be afraid We read in the Gospell of one mad man who lived among the tombs the world think all mad that do so Joh. 19.41 42. compared with Math. 27.59.60 although but by meditation and yet we read that devout Joseph of Arimathea had his tomb in his garden where he probably used to walk And oh that my people were wise Deut. 32.29 that they would consider their latter end were some of the last words of Moses This is the way to prepare for death and watchfulnesse and preparation may prevent a surprisall may turn death into a sleep the longer and more we watch for death our sleep and rest will be the sweeter In vita vigilant justi ideo in morte dicuntur dormire August the righteous watch whilst they live and their death is a sleep And what weary long waking man is afraid of a sound and sweet sleep Use last And so I come to the last Use of the Doctrine If Christians ought not to fear death neither temporall nor eternall of whom or what then should believers be afraid Let us not fear the Devill he is an enemy but a conquered enemy but an enemy bound in chaines he is a Lyon but led in chains and so muzled that a child of God need not fear him Le ts not fear the day of judgment t is a time of refreshing from the presence of the Lord t is the day of Redemption of our bodies Let it be the object of our hopes not of our feares Le ts not fear the world not all the evill the men of the world can do unto us let us march on in the way of truth and holinesse and that although the whole world should be against us although our dayes should prove daies of darknesse of clouds and of thick darknesse daies of rebuke and blasphemy to us yet let us Christians whether Prophets or Prophets children or professors of the Gospell which is the truth and the Doctrine according unto godlinesse let us be zealous and couragious for truth against error and for holinesse against profanenesse let us quit our selves like men and be strong let us stand up to and for the truth our hearts never once failing us for fear of what may come upon us no not if it should come to a worship the golden Image or be cast into the fiery furnace cōsidering as one saith that Dei miles nec in dolore deseritur nec in morte finitur Gods souldier is neither deserted in sufferings nor ended in death And again quanto plus tormenti tanto plus erit gloriae the more torment the more glory For although we must not have amorem mercenarium yet we may have amorem mercedis though not a mercenary love yet a Respect to the recompence of reward Let us know that although t is a blessed thing to dye in the Lord yet t is a more glorious thing to dye for the Lord. Let us therefore look unto the cloud of witnesses of the martyrs of Jesus who have gone before us either in the Primitive or in the Marian times yea let us look unto Jesus the Author and finisher of our faith Heb. 12.2 who for the joy that was set before him endured the crosse and despised the shame and is now set down at the right hand of God from whom he came into this world that he might deliver us out of the hands of all our enemies that we might serve him without fear 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. saith Dr H. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in safety in holinesse and righteousnesse all the daies of our lives To conclude all In all our qualms and faintings of heart le ts endeavour to revive and encourage our selves with this soveraigne cordiall and Antidote that it was one great end wherefore Christ took upon him flesh and blood which could suffer and dye that so by his death and resurrection he might not only rescue one day our bodies after death from the power of the grave giving us a glorious Resurrection unto eternall life but also might by his victorious death on the crosse destroy our Arch-enemy the Devill who had the power of death a deadly power or a power to kill and deliver us who through fear of death otherwise ought and should have been all our life time subject unto bondage FINIS
doth invite the Devill to come to us timor attrahit ad se daemonas And surely it was not without all cause that Vives said Nulla est miseria major quà m metus Burton There is no greater misery then feare No greater misery no rack or torture like it saith another 2. But then to feare all our life time that aggravates the misery and bondage that makes our lives life we use to say is sweet bitter as death yea it causeth some to chuse although they make an ill choice death rather than life The day-labourer waits for the even and then he shall rest the servant for the end of the yeer the Apprentice for his year of Jubile when he is to go out free and the forethought of liberty sugars the bitter cup of servitude to them But alas to be under the terrible bondage of feare without any hopes or expectation of freedome or of redemption all our life time this is a burden which neither we nor our Fathers were ever able to beare Nay in death it selfe I say not that the servant is free from this master when a man dies he rather feeles the evill which he feared than is freed from it And although we must say blessed is he that feareth God alway the Lord of life with a filiall child-like ingenuous feare yet we may say miserable is he that feareth death alway that hard master that cruel tyrant with a servile and slavish feare And so I come to the third and last degree of the bondage 3. To feare Death all our life time is a burden and bondage which is intolerable Under the word Death I shall comprehend with the generality of interpreters not onely temporall death which is the separation of the soule from the body but eternall death also which is the separation of both soul and body from God everlastingly Now to feare death alway is a terrible bondage quid miserius est aut fingi potest said one quam metu mortis perpetuo trepidare Death is cal'd by the Philosopher the terrible of terribles the most terrible evill that can be by Job the King of terrors Joh. 18.14 T is the feare of Kings as well as mean men and t is the King of feares and those who slavishly feare death are the veryest bondmen in the world qui metuunt mortem illi servi sunt ac servili conditione non autem ingenui neque filii Rolloc in loc and so Theoph. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they that feare death are the servants of death Not onely his servants we are whom we obey but his servants and vassals we are whom we feare and the little finger of the feare of death will be heavier than the loynes of all other feares and tyrants whatsoever The feare of other evills chastiseth us with whips this with scorpions Death is an evill a great evil and an unavoidable evil and therefore terrible It is usherd in and accompanied and followed with a black guard and train of feares the way and walke of death is very low and darke we read of the valley of the shadow of death Psal 23.4 and in this valley there is too a Lyon yea many legions of roaring Lyons waiting for their prey continually yea certainly many thousands if not millions of men who have gone downe this way have been sore wounded yea cruelly slaine here have lost their lives and their soules here But more particularly death will appeare ghastly and formidable if we consider 1. That it has a venomous and deadly sting t is an old serpent and has a poysonous sting the sting of death is sin and that is terrible Sin is the edge of the sword of this deadly enemy t is the poyson of the Dragon t is a greater enemy to us than death than the Devill than Hell it selfe If sin was not there we should not die or we should not need to feare Death we might easily shake off this viper into the fire and rid our hands of it as Paul did of the viper Act 28. and feel no harme but therefore death is death indeed and hell hell indeed because t is the wages of sin 2. Death will appeare terrible if we consider who impowers death primarily who hath the absolute and supream power of life and death and from whom death originally hath his Commission and that is God The Lord killeth and maketh alive he bringeth down to the grave and raiseth up 1 Sam. 2.6 And truly God is a consuming fire God the supream judge of all the earth and who cannot erre in judgment hath passed sentence upon us according to his holy just and righteous Law and t is deaths part but to be an executioner to execute upon us the judgment written The avenging justice of Almighty God commands death to seize upon the sinner and to teare him in sunder like a Lyon yea to come hissing upon him like a dragon with the sting of vengeance in the mouth of it morcem intellige cum ira Dei conjunctam qualem necesse est extra Christum esse saith Beza T is the justice and wrath of Almighty God which commissionates death to kill Psal 90.11 and destroy and take the spoyle and of Gods wrath t is said according to our feare so is thy wrath our feares may be aboue the wrath of men but the wrath of God is greater then our feares 3. Death is terrible if we consider who has the power of death i. e. not so much a delegate power such as Kings Magistrates have as a power by consequence let us call it so such as an Executioner or an hangman hath over condemned persons to put them to death and that is the Devil v. 14. The Devil may be said to have the power of death either 1. As a tempter who seduceth us to sin James 1.15 and so brings us to death Sin being finished bringeth forth death Theophylact tells us the Devil got the power of death how 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so he i. e. peccatum est fortitudo roburque mortis he got it by Sin Sin is the strength and power of death Or 2ly As an Accuser of us unto Almighty God and urging the Law against us before God continually soliciting pressing this Iudge to doe iustice upon us urging God as the Nobles and Courtiers did Darius against Daniel Daniel 6.12.13.15 that he might be cast into the Lyons den so he that we might be cast into hell the den of the roaring Lyon and out of which we have no hope of deliverance Or 3ly he may be said to have the power of death sicut carnifex habet imperium rotae patibuli as an executioner hath power of the wheel or gibbet therewith to torment men not whom and how he pleaseth but condemned malefactors according to the direction and appointment of the Iudge thus the Devil hath the power of death and surely t is a