a better Book of the Vertues of Womankind from her alone and have out-done all his other Book of Lives I cannot but apply that Character and Commendation to Her which Heraclitus the Philosopher gave to his Daughter Athenaea when for that reason he Disinherited her and gave her little or no Portion Sufficient Chronicon Pascale Olymph 300. Socrat. Histor Eccles l. 7. c. 21. Evag. l. 1. c. 20. Nicephor l. 15. c. 23. said he to her are her Beauty Learning and Vertue in which she excells all her Sex Though this afterwards brought her to be an Empress and which was more a Christian by a Publick Controversie brought before the Judges concerning her Fathers Will whereby she became known to the Emperour Theodosius the Younger who thereupon Marryed her Our Queen had Personal Excellencies enough without her Crown and without all that Rich and High Estate and Worldly Greatness wherewith God had besides Endowed her to Entitle her every way to the Character of the Finest and Bravest Woman in the World the very Phaenix of her Sex nay even to that higher Title in my Text of God and Angel above most other Princes To give her Character in little She was certainly one of the best Women the best Wives the best Princesses and the best Christians that ever lived the Ornament and Glory of her Sex the Ornament of the Court of our Church of the Nation and of the Age. I am loth to leave this Glorious View of Her But I must come to the Dark and Melancholly Scene and draw the Cloud that has covered this our Sun at Noon-day that has Quenched and Eclipsed this Light of our Israel and Darkned all our Joy and Glory with Gloominess and Mourning Though she was a sort of Earthly God upon a better Account and more peculiar Reasons than most other Princes and had the most Divine and Angelick Properties yet alass to our grief she had not that of Immortality I have said ye are Gods but ye shall dye like men Neither the greatest Dignity or greatest Quality of Birth and Fortune no nor the greatest Personal Excellencies and Vertues can protect from Death and the Grave nor Exempt any one from the Common Fate of Mortality to which all the Sons and Daughters of Adam are subject by the Decree of Heaven by the Constitution and Frame of their Nature and by the Punishment of their Sins God and Nature have appointed a certain Period to Humane Life such general Bounds as it cannot pass so that the days of Men are determined the number of his months are with God Job 14.5 And we all carry the Seeds and Principles of our own Mortality within our selves We are of the Earth Earthy and our Earthly Tabernacles however we prop them up awhile will at last sink and decay fall and crumble into Dust so that we must all go down to the Grave the place of Darkness and Forgetfulness where we have seen our Fore-Fathers laid before us and no Man can be so Foolish or so Sceptical as to doubt any more whither he shall once dye then whither he was once born Though every one puts the Thoughts of Death far from him and thinks it is alwayes a great way off of him and though he come never so near it himself by Age yet he fancies 't is still like a Shadow flying as far from him and that at Forty or Fifty he has still a good Life to live and at Sixty or Seventy there are still Older Men than he and those who have lived much longer yet alass this is but a weak however comfortable Delusion Death will quickly meet us somewhere or other and come up to us and strike the Fatal Stroke very probably before we are aware of it It dogs and follows every one of us and may be much nearer us than we are aware and by silent and undiscerned Steps it is every day nearer approaching and making up more closely to us Mankind we see are every day burying of one another We stand wondering to see such and such drop by us and to hear of the unexpected Death as we call it of such of our Friends and Acquaintance who were as like to live as our selves till it comes to be our own turn at last and we drop likewise and are generally as much surprized with our own Death as we were at theirs We are Busie and Thoughtful about a great many Projects and Contrivances which are to take Effect perhaps many of them several Years hence but before half of those Years are gone our whole Life is and the Mighty Babel we were building to our selves of Worldly Happyness and Mighty Designs here is struck down with our Life and in that day all our thoughts perish We whose Blood is now warm our nerves strong and our Pulse beating the Nimble Stroke of Life we alass must have all these lively Motions stopt the whole Clock-work spoilt and we must quickly become only stiff and clammy cold numbed and senseless Carkasses lay'd out at first upon our once warm Beds lockt up in our Coffins put in our Graves lay'd in a Hole turned into heaps of Stench Rottenness and Putrifaction quickly mouldring into the common Dust of the Earth and as quite forgotten in a little while as if we had never been Lord How much is there in this Thought this one Thought the serious thinking of our own Mortality How would the wise and frequent thinking of this one thing if we did it with due and full Consideration and Application of Mind How would this Considering our latter End make us Wise and Religious How would this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this Meditation of Death teach us the truest Wisdom and best Philosophy make us Wise in undervaluing this Life and all the Little and Vain and Momentany things that belong to it Wise in preferring the Great and Lasting and Eternal Things of another World Infinitely before it Wise not to be so much concerned for these sorry Bodies of ours and not make it so much our business to Cater and Provide for them which must quickly dye and perish but rather to take care of our Souls those more Precious Parts of us that make us truely Men and not to neglect those which are Immortal and will live for ever This was the Wisdom of our Excellent Queen Though she was encompassed with the highest Glories of this World and had all the Enjoyments of it set before her and the glitterings of an Earthly Crown to dazle her Eyes yet she looked beyond them all and fixt her Thoughts and desires upon that Heavenly Crown which She has now obtained and which she sought and desired and strove to gain a Thousand times more than she did that other Though she had the Noblest and the Finest Body built with all the Strength and Beauty and Elegance of Ornament as a Fit Temple for her more Noble and Divine Soul so that an Anthropomorphite would by that have took her for
a God yet she took much more care to Improve the one by Wisdom and Religion then to Adorn the other by Dress or Clothes and spent almost as many Hours about the former as Minutes about the latter for I have often heard that she was remarkably quick at Dressing This Noble and Beautiful Body of hers which carried all the visible Marks and Indications of a Sweet Beautiful Noble Great and Majestick Mind This alass now like a Glorious Temple fired from Heaven and burnt down to Ashes like the purest Chrystal broke to pieces like a Star faln has all its Beautiful and Shining Greatness spoilt and destroyed The Sun is gone down and Darkness and Horrour succeeds Light And though all Regard and Honour is due to her Mortal remains and they ought like Sacred Reliques to be treated with Respect and Reverence yet alass the most Pompous Funeral is but a poor Reprize against Death and a very mortifying odd Triumph where the seeming Conqueror is the true Captive fast bound in Chains of Death and goes only more solemnly to Deaths Mighty Prison and shows his greater Victory But her Pious Vertuous Heavenly Soul is more than Conquerour gone up in Triumph to those Regions above where is no Death or Corruption welcomed and winged up by Angels to those Mansions above where she shall be ever with God and with those Angels whom she was so like upon Earth where she shall be made more partaker of the Divine Nature and beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord shall be changed to the same Image even from glory to glory I shall observe but one Remarkable thing in her Death which confirms all I have said of her and that was her Courage Evenness and Unconcernedness proceeding from the Goodness of her Life and consequently her full Preparation for Death when she heard the fatal Opinion of her Physicians that she must dye she received it as Martyrs used to do their Sentence without any Fear or Dread upon her but in these or like words She thanked God She was provided She never trusted She said to a Death-Bed Repentance She hoped She did not flatter Her self and She thanked God She was not afraid to dye Oh Blessed and comfortable words coming not from a conceited Enthusiast or False and Mistaken Opinions of Religion but from one of Her Understanding judging of her self by right Principles and speaking the Sincerity and Comfort of her own Heart What Wise and Good Christian can have more Hopes more Assurance in his Death What Power what Comfort is there in Religion and a Good Life and Conscience to make even Death it self the greatest of Natural Evils no way Frightful or Terrible to us How do they even then Strengthen and Support us and Infuse Sweetness and Cordial into that otherwise bitter Cup How do they take out the sting of Death and disarm even that King of Terrours of all the Horrour and Amazing Dread in which he appears to Dying Sinners How do they make a Good Christian such as our Queen was more than Conqueror in that last Combat Let the Atheists and all other Enemies to Her and to Religion come hither and be Converted by Her Death and by Her Life I shall Conclude with the Wish and Prayer of an Excellent Person Attending Her at that time May I and may all of us when God shall think fit to call us be as well provided as She was And may we be then as Happy as She now is Which God of his Infinite Mercy grant through Jesus Christ our Mediator and Redeemer FINIS
could look upon it without any Concern and brave and defye it however it appeared to him and face it very boldly at the Mouth of a Canon or point of a Sword now it has found out a way to be too hard for him and to Revenge it self too cruelly upon his Fearless and Undaunted Temper It has found out his Weakness and wounded him in his softest and tenderest part it has wounded him to the very heart He was invulnerable every where else but in his Queen and there his tenderness prevailed over his Courage and the Husband over the Soldier and he has thereby shown that he had a great deal of that Goodness and Benignity of Temper which was in her and that this is not a Womanish but a truely Masculine Vertue accompanied as it was in Her with the Noblest Courage and Bravery of Mind 2. The next Divine Vertue in our Excellent Queen was her Inclination to do good to all Persons and upon all Occasions to the utmost of her Power Which though a Branch or an Effect of the Benignity of her Nature that fruitful Soil or rather Root of a great many Christian Vertues yet is it so considerable in it self and was so remarkable in her that it ought to be distinctly taken notice of as it will be by the great Judge at the last day She fed a great many hungry and cloathed a great many naked both French and Irish who had fled for their Religion and could bring nothing over with them but a good Conscience She gave very largely and bountifully to their Necessities out of Her Privy Purse and her Royal Heart was larger and more open than her Purse could alwayes be The Poor Widows and Orphans of Seamen and Soldiers tasted very largely of her Bounty and had the best Provision made for them She was able and She was Contriving and Designing Hospitals and Places of Refreshment for their Relief and Comfort and for the better Reception of the Sick and Wounded who had ventured their Lives and lost their Limbs for their Countrey I have heard of very large Sums given by her and a great many were given very Secretly and can be called to no account but that of God who has Rewarded her for them Even some of her Enemies I believe when they hungred and thirsted had according to the Apostles Rule Bread and Drink given to them Rom. 12.20 even those very Mouths that were sometimes opened against her There were many hard Cases and Instances of Pitty occasioned by the Revolution and the War not only at home but out of Ireland and Scotland whom She tenderly considered and charitably Relieved as they were offered and represented to her Pity and Compassion is a most generous Vertue and a sign of a Noble Spirit and it was so much hers that as she never did a hard thing to any so she did many kind ones where she was blamed and was merciful in the Opinion of others even to a fault though she was alwayes willing to Err on the right side if on any and could hardly be brought to do her self Justice upon her Enemies till their folly and her absolute necessity compelled her to it even against her Will But besides her Charity and her Mercy she had a great many other wayes of doing good to others especially to all her Dependants and those about her but above all by taking great care to make them Vertuous and Religious which was a kindness exceeding all others It was her hearty Endeavour and she had a great Zeal to spread and propagate Religion and she did all she could to do it both by her Example and by her Encouragement She had no By-Ends no Mean and Low Designs to serve but only the ends of Goodness and the Glory of God these were her only Scope and Aim her chief Pleasure and Delight the very Bent and Tendency of her Mind the Inclination of her Will the Complexion of her Soul was to every thing that was good Whatever things were true whatever things were honest whatever things were just whatsoever things were pure whatsoever things were lovely whatsoever things were of good report if there was any Vertue if there was any Praise She thought on minded and loved and delighted and was pleased with all those things She was a Woman indeed after God's own Heart That Character I doubt not belonged as well if not much better to Her than to King David himself She had all his Goodness and Piety without any of his faults She had as much Love to Gods House and as good Designs for it as he He was not more pleased with his Contrivances about Building a Temple than she in hers about St. Pauls and in Building up and Repairing the whole Church of England and making it like Mount Sion the joy of the whole Earth improving its Worship ordering its Discipline amending its Defects in making up its Breaches and bringing all Sober Protestants to one Communion which would have been the greatest Blow to Popery and Service to Religion in general She had a great many such Excellent Designs for the good of Religion of the Church and Nation which her own Thoughts and our late Excellent Primate had suggested to her and had she out-lived the present Troublesome and Expensive War we should have seen a great many more Instances of her doing good in all kinds than we yet know or have heard of for what Mighty things would such an Active Mind such a Power joyned with such an Inclination to do good have produced had it been set free from all hindrances and encumbrances but God thought not us of this sinful Nation worthy of such a Blessing nor the World worthy of such a Woman but rather thought her worthy of a sooner Reward for the extraordinary good Deeds she had done already according to Plutarchs Remark upon Biton and Cleobis two Graecian Youths who for an extraordinary Act of Piety done by them for which their Mother prayed they might receive the best thing could be given to Mortals were that Night found dead in Juno's Temple whither they had drawn their Mothers Chariot the Goddess as he supposes rewarding their signal Piety and good Deed with a sudden Death Plut. Cousol ad Apollon 3. I come next to consider her Universal Vertue Innocence and Purity of Life in which she was so Angelical and so confirmed as no Devil ever dared to Tempt or which is more to Slander her Her whole Life was the Brightest the most Charming the most Lovely and Complete Example of all manner of Vertue through all the parts of it it broke forth very Early and appeared in the very Morning of her Age and gave very promising hopes of what she proved afterwards a most Excellent Princess it rose Higher and shone Brighter and Brighter even to a perfect Day and as all admired its Lustre so not a few felt its Influence it scattered and dispersed Vice where-ever it came as