truly I am thy servant I am thy servant Thus did David and thus ought we but do we thus we all profess our selves the servants of God and what is the proper notion of a servant but one who is ad alterius nutum at another man's command and therefore serve God we cannot if we serve not his Will But alas how many of us according to Saint Pauls Character are taken captive by the Devil at his will and like the Centurion's souldiers he bids us go and we go come and we come do this and that and we do it we serve diverse lusts and pleasures following as our Church teacheth us to confess the devices and desires of our own hearts And like those of whom Saint Peter speaketh that wrought the will of the gentiles we conform to the humours of wicked and ungodly men so far are we from being what we profess to be servants to the will of God Oh therefore let us sit down and consider with our selves 1. What the will of God is which we are obliged to serve and according to Saint Pauls exhortation Prove what is that good that acceptable and perfect will of God He hath shewed thee oh man saith the Prophet what is good and what doth the Lord thy God require of thee Whatsoever God willeth and requireth is good just and equal and that were it for no other reason but because he willeth and requireth it David speaking of the will of God saith The Law of the Lord is perfect The Statutes of the Lord are right The fear of the Lord is clean The Judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether good reason we should serve his will which is so just pure right and perfect 2. Whose will it is namely the Will of God who is 1. Supremus in imperando most supreme in commanding having an absolute Soveraignty over all his creatures Wherever the Supreme power on earth resideth Whither in one or many it is and must be arbitrary but surely much more in him who is without a solaecism or hyperbole most highest king of kings and lord of lords and therefore his Will ought to be our Law and the rule of our actions 2. Benignissimus in adjuvando most gracious in assisting who as in Justice he may command what he will so in mercy will enable us if we seek to him to do what he commands upon which account it is that the yoke and burthen of Gods law is said to be light and easie 3. Indulgentissimus in condonando most merciful in forgiving the defects and imperfections of our service for so the promise runs I will spare them as a man spareth his son that serveth him accepting the will often for the Deed and pardoning the imperfections that usually accompany best deeds 4. Munificentissimus in remunerando most bountiful in recompencing those who serve him Indeed there wants not prophane Atheists who say It is in vain to serve the Lord but Saint Paul hath assured us He is a rewarder of them that seek him diligently nay he is not only a rewarder but he himself is the reward they are his own words to Abraham I am thy exceeding great reward And surely upon all these considerations we shall conclude that nothing is more reasonable than after David's pattern in our Generation to serve the will of God From the Character of his life proceed we more briefly to the threefold character of his Death by which is described the state of the Dead 1. He fell asleep that respects the person 2. Was laid to his Fathers that respects both his soul and body 3. And saw corruption that only respects the body 1. He fell asleep Those words which precede The will of God are by some intepreters referr'd to this clause he fell asleep in which construction they afford us a good instruction namely that death befalls us not by chance but by the will of God It is appointed saith the Apostle for men once to dy and not only the thing it self in general but the circumstances as to individuals namely the means manner place time are all appointed by the will and counsel of God we are all in this world as so many Tenants to God the great Landlord and this not for any certain term of years but durante beneplacito during his good pleasure we come in and stay and go out of this world so much that prayer of Simeon imports Lord lettest thou thy servant depart in peace we can neither stay longer nor go sooner than God pleaseth A consideration which ought to be an argument of contentation both in respect of our selves and others whensoever or howsoever they dye since it is by the will of God to which we must necessarily and ought voluntarily to submit 2. To let this go I might further observe that it is said of David he fell asleep after he had served the will of God in his generation or served his generation by the Will of God not before nor doth any of Gods servants dye before they have fulfilled the work for which God sent them into the world It is said of our blessed Saviour that though the Jews sought to take him yet no man laid hands on him for his hour was not come yea he saith of himself I must work the work of him that sent me into this world whilst it is day not did the day to wit of his life exspire till he had done that work The time of my departure saith St. Paul is at hand but what followeth I have finished my course then and not till then was the time of his departure when he had finished his course It is that which may very much comfort us whensoever death seemeth to or really doth approach that as we dye not before the time which God hath allotted us to live so neither before the service be done which he hath appointed for us in our generation and if that be done we have reason to be willing to ly down to sleep as here David after he had served his Generation fell asleep 3. But that which I here especially take notice of is that Death is resembled to a Sleep It is observable among prophane writers both Greek and Latine Poets and Oratours that sleep is said to be the image the kindred the Sister the brother of Death and this metaphor is frequently used in the holy scriptures in the Old Testament promiscuously of both bad and good in the New especially of the good who are said not only to sleep but to sleep in Jesus and to sleep in the Lord. And thus Christ useth it of Lazarus St. Luke of Stephen and here St. Paul of David and this more particularly in a double respect 1. Sleep is a levamen laborum a quiet repose and a cessation of all pain and labour thus they that dy in the Lord rest
from their labours It is a saying abundantly verified Omne quod vitae praesentis miseria This life is a wilderness of troubles wherein our bodies are exposed to pains and pain and our souls suffer somtimes by sympathy with the body and somtimes by its own immediate sorrows cares and fears but when we dy we are freed from all these Valerius expresseth it by 4 letters H. R. I. P. hic requiescit in pace Petrus Diaconus by three D. M. S. dormiunt mortui securi the dead sleep in safety and rest in peace This is that which in respect of the body is common to the wicked with the righteous but in regard of the soul peculiar to the righteous for whilst the soul of Dives is tormented the soul of Lazarus is comforted saith Abraham True the soul doth not as the Psuchopannuchists fondly asserted sleep with the body nor yet as the body for though by the separation of the soul from the body there is cessation of those organical actions which the soul performeth by the help of the body yet its immanent and immaterial acts are performed by it in that State of separation and if as we observe in our own experience the soul is active in dreams and fancies whilst the body sleepeth we may very well conceive that the Soul hath its proper acts which it exerciseth whilst it is without the body But as to a cessation from all disturbing passions the Souls of the good may be said to fall asleep In this respect they are said to be in Gods hand a place of safety in Abrahom's bosome a place of refreshment and under the Altar a place of refuge The Greek word here used as hath been already intimated referrs to the oar and tugging at the oar is a laborious imployment How Sweet is sleep to the weary labourer and so was death to David who had laboured more abundantly than others in serving his generation The Churchyards are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sleeping places the coffin a couch and the grave a bed so saith the Prophet They enter into peace they rest in their beds so the Poet Somnus ut est mortis sic lectus imago sepulchri and such a bed quo mollius ille dormit qui durius in vita se gesserit wherein he sleepeth most sweetly who hath suffered most bitterly for which reason Saint Stephen dying under a shour of stones is said to fall asleep 2. When we ly down at night to sleep we hope to awake again in the morning and therefore is death a sleep to the Godly ob spem futurae Resurrectionis for the hope of a future Resurrection Sleep is a short death and death is a long sleep but though long it is not perpetual we shall arise again and as though a man sleep many hours it seemeth when he awaketh but a few minutes so though we ly dead many years it shall seem at the Resurrection but as it were a few hours nor do we with so much ease awake any man out of his sleep as Divine power shall raise us from the dead Yea as usually we awake men by our voice so shall the dead at the last day hear the voice of the Son of God and come forth This notion of deaths being a sleep in reference to the Resurrection is true both in respect of bad and good since all shall be raised at the last day but whereas sick men awake disturb'd but healthy men refresh'd so shall it then be with the wicked and the righteous those shall arise to sorrow these to Joy those shall awake and sigh but these shall awake and sing And therefore saith David of himself my flesh shall rest in hope and again When I awake I shall be satisfied with thy likeness So that to close up this seek not consolation against Death but let death it self be our consolation True it is Death it self is very terrible yea the king of terrours and the thoughts of it so dreadful that we are very unwilling to entertain them But lo here it is reprefented to us in a mollifying Phrase and that which is familiar to us and why thus but to mitigate our fears of death upon which account Christs crucifing is called a lifting up and the afflictions of Gods servants instructions to smooth the roughness and asperity of them and withall to render death familiar to us that every evening when we put off our clothes ly down in our beds and fall asleep we may call to mind our Death and our grave looking upon this as a bed and that as a sleep 2. The next Character of death David is that he was laid to his fathers which I have already told you may be understood in reference either to the Soul or the Body 1. To the Soul and so the meaning is that when he fell asleep his soul went to the nest of those holy Patriarchs which were gone before him I am a stranger upon earth and a sojourner saith David as all my Fathers were because as they so he had but a short continuance upon earth and looked upon themselves as going hence and when he went hence he went to those his Fathers which had gone before him What that place was I shall not stay to dispute most certainly it was not a Limbus subterraneus prison under ground on this side hell where their souls were detain'd till Christs resurrection most certainly it was the bosom of Abraham and that a place of comfort yea most probably by our Saviours words the kingdom of Heaven And it is no small comfort to consider that when we dye we shall be gathered to our godly Ancestors and Progenitours 2. To the body and so it may be taken in a narrow or an enlarged sence in a narrow sence those are laid to their Fathers who are buried in the same Grave or Vault with their Progenitors but in this sence this was not true of David for where it is said He slept with his Fathers it presently followeth and he was buried in the City of David which City of David was not Bethlehem the place of his Fathers but Sion the place where the Kings were buried so that it must be taken in an enlarged sence inasmuch as the grave being the common receptacle of all men any one being buried is laid to his Fathers because in a grave which is the place for all mankind and so gathered quasi in tumulum cumulum to the heap of dead bodies It is that consideration which should render the grave so much the less dreadful to us because it is no more than what is common to our Fathers nay to the whole race of them that dwell upon the earth 3. The last Character referrs only to the body which is that he saw corruption Seeing according to the Hebrew Phrase is as much as experiencing so we read else where of seeing death what man is he that
liveth saith the Psalmist and shall not see death there were never any but two Enoch and Elias and I may say What man is he that dieth and shall not see corruption there was never any but one the holy one of God But otherwise all that lie in the grave rot for which reason the same word in Hebrew signifieth both the grave and corruption I have said saith Job to corruption Thou art my Father and to the Wormes You are my Mother my Sister and this as appeareth by the foregoing words in reference to the grave wherein though some by embalming are preserved longer than others for so say some was Alexander's body kept from putrefaction above an hundred years yet sooner or later all rot for which cause our body is called by St. Paul vile body or according to the Greek body of humiliation A consideration which may very well be matter of abasement to the strongest man beautifullest woman that their strength must degenerate into weakness their colour into paleness and both at last into rottenness though withall let it not too much discourage us since as the rotting of the grain in the ground maketh way for its springing up and fructifying so shall the corrupting of our bodies in the grave And therefore let us in the multitude of our thoughts within us touching the grave look beyond it at that day when as St. Paul assureth us our Lord Jesus shall change our vile body and when as the same Apostle tells us Mortality shall put on immortality and corruption shall put on incorruption ANd thus I have given you an account of Saint Pauls narrative concerning King David But another narrative is and that justly at this time expected from me concerning the Life and Death of the Right Worshipful and Right Worthy Knight Sir Thomas Adams Knight and Barronet There is no less than a threefold obligation to wit of Piety Equity and Charity laid upon us of publishing the excellencies of those who have done worthily and been famous in their Generation since as Saint Basil hereby 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we glorifie the Lord in and for his servants and that is Piety 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we honour the dead in their memory and that is equity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we rejoyce and benefit the People by their examples and that is Charity As Physicians and Chirurgians do very much advance their knowledg by Anatomising the bodies of dead men so we either are or may be much better'd in our practise by a delineation of the graces of dead Saints and therefore though this eminent servant of God and of his generation being taken out of this valley of Bacah and carried to that mount of Joy where beholding the glorious Deity he sings eternal Halelujahs stands in no need of any praises from us Yet it is needful very needful for us who are left behind that we may be stirred up to follow his choyce example And now what Paterculus saith of Aemilius Paulus he was vir in tantum laudandus in quantum virtus ipsa intelligi potest I may fitly apply to him the circumference of his Encomium may very well take in all the lines of virtue which meet in him as in their Center and I could heartily wish that as those Confessours truly said in their epistle to Saint Cyprian Vigorous expressions were correspondent to the glorious actions or rather Passions of those Martyrs whom he commended so I could now draw the Picture of this Worthy not only at the length but to the life But alas my Pencil giveth so rough a draught that I am afraid I shall but disfigure him whilst I go about to commend him so that I am ready to draw back my hand whilst I am drawing his lineaments and therefore shall desire as he did who wrote the life of Saint Cyprian that quicquid minus dixero minus enim dicam necesse est If I shall say less as less I must needs say than he deserveth it may not derogate from his honour but be imputed to my unskilfulness and if any shall think I say too much I shall ascribe it to their ignorance since none who knew him but must needs have a high value for him nor shall I say more of him than what not only very credible information but for the most part my own personal knowledg will warrant me having had the honour of more than 20 years acquaintance with him 15. whereof he was the chief inhabitant of that Parish wherein I was an unworthy Labourer The truth is as Titus Vespasian was called deliciae generis humani the delight of mankind so was he the Darling of the City so generally well reputed and reported of that I suppose it will be said of this Panegyrick concerning him what one said who met with a book called Herculis encomium The praise of Hercules Quis Lacedaemoniorum unquam vituperavit who ever dispraised him to wit that knew him His very outward aspect was amiable nay venerable and his presence as the appearance of some benign Star having a pleasing influence upon all that looked upon him But could you have viewed his inside behold that virtuous soul which inhabited his comely body how would it have ravished you and yet though we could not directly we might reflexively and that both from his words and works The Tongue of the Just saith Solomon is as choyce silver of which the Trumpets under the Law were made because of its sweet sound and again the lips of the righteous feed many to wit with wholesome counsels and comforts keeping as it were open table for all comets such was his tongue frequently tip'd with silver nay golden sayings which he brought forth out of the treasure of his memory such were his lips with which as well nay better then with his bountiful table he fed not only his children and servants but all who conversed with him among whom I can truly say I never went to him but I did or might come away from him bettered by his gracious and prudent discourse Nor was he only as I doubt too many are a man of words his goodness was not only at his tongues but his fingers ends That of our Saviour concerning himself my works testifie of me is though in a far inferiour way verifyed of him at least we may make use of what Solomon saith concerning the virtuous woman His works did praise him in his gates so that he was not only in respect of his words a sweet and pleasing voice but of his works a burning and shining light It is said of David that he died in a good old age full of riches and honours The age to which this worthy Patriot attained was old elder then David exceeding it eleven years for whereas David lived but 70 he was above 81. years old when he died and if Davids were a good old age his was better being more
The Royal Common-Wealths man OR King DAVID'S Picture Represented in a SERMON Preached at the Solemnity of the Funeral of Sir Tho. Adams Knight and Baronet and Alderman of London In St Katherine Creechurch On the 10th of March 1667. By Nath. Hardy D. D. D. R. Chaplain in ordinary to His Majesty and Vicar of St. Martins in the Fields David fortis in bello patiens in adversis in Hierusalem pacificus in victoriâ mansuetus in peccato dolens in senectute providus rerum modos vices temporum per singularum sonos servavit aetatum â—t mihi videatur non minus vivendi genere quam canendi suavitate praedulcis moralem Deo sui fudisse meriti cantilenam Ambros. de officiis l. 1. cap. 24. In the SAVOY Printed by Tho. Newcomb for William Grantham at the Sign of the Black Bear in Westminster-Hall 1668. To the Right Worshipful Sir WILLIAM ADAMS Baronet AS it is not only lawful but in Gregory Nazianzens opinion a most due debt to publish the praises of Gods eminent servants especially when dead so it is expedient that the publication should be extended as far and perpetuated as long as may be It is the advantage which all discourses particularly encomiastical have by being printed above that which they have by being only spoken that whereas these are like pictures hung in a private Gallery those are as statues set upon an high hill every way conspicuous these are as pictures drawn in fading colours those are as Imagery wrought in lasting Arras Vpon these considerations worthy Sir I suppose it is that you desired this following Discourse might by the Printers help become legible and though I am very conscious of its manifold defects upon the same reason I have fulfilled your desire It were too great pity if such a rare and precious Jewel as he was should have been lockt up in a Cabinet yea pity it is that a more skilful Lapidary was not made choice of to have set him forth in his lustre But the best of it is his native lustre was such as needed not the help of Art and so far is this Discourse from adding to his splendour that in truth it receiveth whatever worth it hath from him Such as it is I tender to you by this Dedication and justly since you have the greatest right to it as being an Inventory of your Dear Fathers best goods and choicest riches which he hath at once carried with him and left behind him in as much as the good works of them who die in the Lord follow them to wit for their own remuneration and yet stay here to be paterns for others Imitation An Inventory I call it and that such as I dare own to be so far true that there is nothing said of him which doth not belong to him and therefore let none think that I do nimis adulari at all flatter him though on the other hand I ingeniously acknowledg it is far short of what might have been said of him and therefore your self with the rest of his relations may think that I did frigide laudare coldly commend him The Truth is though I will not use Saint John's hyperbolical expression concerning our Saviour There are many other things which Jesus did the which if they should be written every one I suppose that the world it self could not contain the books which should be written yet I dare say the several Passages of his excellent life could not be contained in an hours discourse but justly require a large Volume And now Honoured Sir though it grieve you to have lost it is no small comfort to you that you had such a Father so far excelling in all virtue nor will I hope the reading afresh what you have heard before discompose you since you will finde more white of your deceased Fathers gracious life than will checker the black of his dolorous death nor is it only a Comfort but an honour a great honour to you to have had such a Father who was greatly and highly yet no more than deservedly beloved and honoured both living and Dead in City and Country But withall give me leave to mind you that the having such a Father layeth upon you a strong obligation of duty to walk in his steps and conform to his Patern which I trust in some measure you do and will do more and more May you if it be God's will equalize his years and as you grow in years grow in grace that you may if not equalize yet come near to his righteous Patern I doubt not but whilst he was on earth he put up many devout Prayers for you your Consort your Posterity and not for you only but your sisters with their Relations whereof you all have and will experience the benefit nor can I close with a better Prayer than that all those blessings ghostly and bodily which he implored for you may by divine bounty be continued and multiplied upon you I subscribe my self Apr. 7. 1668. Sir Your affectionate servant Nath. Hardy Acts 13. 36. David after he had served his own generation by the will of God fell asleep and was laid to his Fathers and saw corruption I Am at this time to preach upon a Double text the one whereof I have now read in your ears and the other is here presented to your eies both of them so copious that the scantling of an hour is too narrow for each And therefore waving all Prefaces and without enquiring into the context or occasion of the words I shall immediately address my self to a short discourse upon the text and so proceed to give an account of the sorrowful occasion of this solemn Assembly And if in performing this double task I shall exceed the limits of a single hour my Apology shall be in the language of Salust Praestat tacere quam pauca loqui It were better to say nothing at all than too little upon two such pregnant subjects The former whereof is St. Pauls narrative concerning David as it is set forth in these words David after he had served his own generation by the will of God c. Which Narrative plainly parts it self into the life and death of David The Character of his Life is but one but that unum aggregatum such an one as by the handling it will appear hath many involved in it He served his own generation by the will of God Those of his Death are Three by which the state of the dead is represented to the life He fell asleep and was laid to his Fathers and saw corruption I begin with the Character of David's life He served his own generation by the will of God And before I proceed further it will not be amiss to observe that the Apostle speaking of David though but collaterally giveth him an excellent Encomium It had been sufficient as to the scope of St. Pauls discourse only to have said David after he fell asleep saw