Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
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A57063
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A sermon preached before the Queen at White-Hall, August 21, 1692 by Nathanael Resbury ...
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Resbury, Nathanael, 1643-1711.
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1692
(1692)
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Wing R1133; ESTC R35361
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10,306
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32
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not able to move an arme or wink into a moment's rest not able to bear the least food or support of Nature much less to exercise the nobler faculties of Mind in any just thought or act of good reasoning This incidency to sickness and bodily diseases is founded partly in the frame of our Natures partly the common Accidents of Life but especially and without which that Divine Hand that made us would have secur'd us against all the Accidents of our nice and tender Composure the great in-let to all Calamity Sin and our fatal Apostasie from God 1. The very frame of our Natures We are so fine a piece of Workmanship wrought off with such Applications of Wisdom as well as Power and made up of such numberless dependencies all so tender and so easily interrupted that were we to consider the structure of our bodies the small fibers the necessary communication of parts the strange ways of conveyance for the nourishment of the whole it might rather be a wonder every moment that we feel our selves in health and order than any surprize to labour under an indispos'd Nature which may be so easily over turn'd by any peccant humour by the least obstruction in any of its parts by the redundancy as well as defect or decay of what in a just and equal temperament might be our support and defence However such is indeed our Contexture and Frame that the very necessary use and exercise of the several parts for the maintenance of the whole and of one another do's wear and decay them takes off their natural service brings in a gradual death upon some of our parts which becomes past all possibility of repair or revival and as the Learned Lord Verulam somewhere observes puts us in old Age under the torments of Mezentius that is tyes the living to the dead parts that are decay'd and have ceas'd their Functions to those that are alive and animated and still at work for the meer continuance of life and action So that Old Age is one natural and unavoidable disease which the strongest the best compos'd the best us'd Constitution cannot but fall under And thus the Wise man describes all the parts and organs of the Body as having by degrees spent themselves off into a perfect unserviceableness in Old age till the whole structure it self comes to fall and be demolish'd Eccles 12.2 3 6. When the Sun or the Light or the Moon or the Stars begin to be darken'd When the keepers of the house tremble the strong men bowe themselves and the grinders cease and they that look out of the windows be darken'd When the silver cord is loos'd and the golden bowl is broken or the pitcher broken at the fountain or the wheel broken at the cistern c. That is when all the faculties and powers of the Soul the leading and the rational the lower and the sensitive shall begin to be obstructed in their several operations and when the members of the Body shall betray their sensible decays the nerves loose and enfeebl'd the spirits low and unactive the leggs and hands trembling the teeth dropping out the optick juices of the eye drying up the brain with all its defences shatter'd the circulation of the blood slow and languid This is an unavoidable disease in nature and closeth in the dissolution of the whole But then 2. The common accidents of life point to us the incidency of humane nature to bodily diseases The constant returns of Spring and Autumn pestilential airs unhealthy seasons immoderate exercise or slothfull and undisturb'd ease unwholsome diet surfeits either by excess or something not of agreeable digestion maims or bruises by falls or quarrels natural propensities deriv'd from the loins of diseas'd parents when the stamina vitae the first threds of life if I may so express it are wove amiss and numberless other accidents which time wou'd fail to reckon up do necessarily expose the whole race of Mankind to distemper and infirmity that might every moment take off the lustre and desirableness of life 3. Lastly I add also a Consideration of Sin and our fatal Apostasie from God which was indeed the great and onely inlet to all humane Calamity For without this that Divine Hand that made us wou'd have secur'd us against all the accidents of our nice and tender composure It was Sin that brought sickness and disorder upon the Soul and Body of our first Parents which Adam cou'd not but derive upon his Posterity when he must needs beget one in his own Likeness and after his own Image By one man saith the Apostle sin entred into the world and death by sin Rom. 5.12 Now Sickness is the harbinger of Death and had its same both way and time of entry into the World with Death it self It was Sin that made the healthy and well temper'd Climate of Paradise too hot for our first Parents Sin that made the Earth so pregnant with noxious Vapours and other fatal issues of her Womb Sin that brought that Universal Curse upon the Creation that every thing prov'd so unkindly that had been made either for service or sustenance Sin that occasion'd that intire sickliness in the whole Constitution of nature that tainted our very Birth and Original who otherwise must have come into the World with that equal poise of temper that nothing wou'd have mov'd disorderly within nothing have assoulted impetuously without so as to have blasted or impair'd this noble composure of ours till it had pleas'd God in all the gentle disposals of his Providence to have call'd us out of this sphere of action to the immediate enjoyment of himself Some usefull reflections upon this observable 1. By all that has been said what reasons have we of thankfulness for every moments enjoyment or continuance of health it is that which is so much the brightness and joy of present life that without it no other advantages of Nature or Art can make the enjoyment of life so much as tolerable much less desirable and yet it is what may be broke in upon so easily that nothing but one-continu'd wonder of Divine Providence preserves it entire to any one of us Bless the Lord O my Soul who healeth all thy diseases who redeemeth thy life from destruction c. saith the Psalmist 2. As we should be thankfull for Health so also submissive in Sickness It is we see the common lot of humane Nature the Seeds of which we take in with our first Being Diseases and Maladies are the Rods in God's hand to discipline the good and punish the bad Nay I may further add They are frequently the natural products of some men's sins that do necessarily follow such or such vicious ways of life upon all which accounts we are owing to the good pleasure of the Divine Will where we enjoy so great a blessing any one day and have reason to submit when it is otherwise So much for that first Observable II. Come we
Dr. RESBURY's SERMON Preached before the QUEEN AT WHITE-HALL August 21. 1692. A SERMON Preached before the QUEEN AT WHITE-HALL August 21. 1692. By NATHANAEL RESBURY D. D. Rector of S. Paul Shadwell and Chaplain in Ordinary to Their Majesties Published by Her Majesty's Special Command LONDON Printed for Tho. Bennet at the Half-Moon in St. Paul's Church-yard 1692. Job xxxiij 22 23 24. His soul draweth near unto the grave and his life to the destroyers If there be a messenger with him an interpreter one among a thousand to shew unto Man his uprightness Then is he gracious unto him and saith Deliver him from going down unto the pit I have found a ransom THese words have something in them that seems dark and mysterious as a great many passages in this Book of Job particularly have It is one entire and lofty Poem and not onely so but one of the ancientest pieces of Writing that was ever deliver'd to the World and so must needs have things in it very difficult being either Proverbial expressions peculiar to the Age or Countries amongst whom they were then in use or else References to the Histories of those Times which being now wholly out of reach render the passages that concern them so much the more abstruse and unintelligible However if we consider the drift of this Chapter where my Text is it may make for clearing up these words and the design of that Subject of discourse I intend from them Elihu one of Job's Visitants is remembring him of the various methods God is pleas'd to take in teaching and disciplining Mankind with all his gracious Ends and Designs in these ways of instruction viz. to bring Men to the knowledge both of God himself and of their own state He shows further all those mixtures of goodness the softnings and mitigations the allays or refreshments that God is pleas'd to minister even under the sharpest afflictions which he thinks fit sometimes to bring upon Men. The ways of instruction represented in this Chapter are 1. By Visions or Night-dreams When the Mind was retir'd from the business and noise of the day and was more receptive of divine impressions A way which it pleas'd God to take something more frequently as a Ministry of knowledge when Men had no other supply of Revelation no written Oracles of God for a rule and standard of their belief and actions Ver. 14 15 16. God speaketh once yea twice yet man perceiveth it not In a Dream in a Vision of the night then he openeth the Ears of men and sealeth their instruction But then as God was wont to instruct Mankind by Visions or Dreams so he had another way and that more usual that which as it might be circumstanc'd might prove much more instructive more effectual for his correction and amendment every way And this was by afflictions and calamities of life Especially Diseases and Sicknesses which were not intended meerly to afflict Mankind or make their lives uneasie or uncomfortable but to give them a sight of themselves to remember them of their guilt to teach them their duty how they may learn to carry themselves before God with all submission to his Will dependance upon his Providence and repentance for the irregularities of Life by which they have provok'd God Ver. 19. and so on He is chasten'd also with pains upon his bed and the multitude of his bones with strong pain so that his life abhorreth bread and his soul dainty meat His soul draweth near unto the grave and his life to the destroyers And this way of instruction as Job himself was at present under so Elihu in describing it seems to accommodate his Expressions to the circumstances of Job's Sickness to the allays and mitigations he might observe in them and to the hopes he might have of a good issue and deliverance out of them The circumstances of his disease he describes by the pains in his bones the weakness of his stomach the consumption of his flesh and that degree of wasting that he seems as we express it as if he were just drawing on His soul draweth near unto the grave The allays and mitigations he might observe were these That he had those about him that might instruct him in the Will of God that might bring him to a sense of himself that might interpose with God in his behalf and prevail for the removal of this present affliction If there be a messenger with him an interpreter one among a thousand to show unto man his uprightness Then he is gracious unto him and saith Deliver him from going down unto the pit I have found a ransom Lastly The encouraging hopes he might have of a rescue from death tho' his disease look't very dangerously ver 25 26. His flesh shall be fresher than a Child's he shall return to the days of his youth he shall pray unto God and he will be favourable unto him and he shall see his face with joy In the words thus explain'd by what went before and what follow after there may arise these three Things observable 1. The great incidency of humane Nature to sickness and bodily diseases His soul draweth near to the grave c. 2. That sickness and bodily diseases to which humane Nature is so incident have a great deal of instruction in them and it pleaseth God frequently to inflict them for this very end that Men might be taught the knowledge of themselves and their duty toward Him This I gather from the tendency of the Argument that Elihu is upon viz. showing the various methods by which it pleaseth God to teach Men the knowledge of his Will sometimes by Visions and Dreams in the night at other times by sickness and other calamities 3. Lastly It is further observable how great a blessing of Providence it is and what an allay to the affliction to enjoy one of the Messengers of God about a Sick-bed Some excellent Person that may read Lectures upon Divine Providence that may govern us in our behaviour toward God when under his correction and chastisement and that may pray in our behalves for the removal of that Calamity in his own good time If there be a messenger with him an interpreter one among a thousand to shew unto man his uprightness c. Of these in their Order I. I observe to you the great incidency of humane Nature to sickness and bodily diseases The best of Men are not exempt from them We have two great instances in Job and David who both fell not onely under the power of common distempers and weaknesses of body but diseases as soul and noisom as sore and painfull as strange and exemplary as have ever yet befallen the worst of Men. And as the best of Men are not exempt so neither are the youngest nor those of the strongest constitution We may be gay and flourishing in all the Vigours of youth and health to day and to morrow groaning under the pains and languishings of a sick-bed