blessed Exchange shall we Mourn for their glorious preferment whom we profess to live with God Spei nostrae ac Fidei prevaricatores Simulata ficta fucata videntur esse quae dicicimus Cyprian What difference in this respect between the Hopeless Heathen and the Professed Christian St. Cyprian thinks it incongruous to Mourn for them in Black that follow the Lamb in White This perhaps may seem a Flower of Rhetorick but certainly Excessive Sorrow shews us to be of a defective Faith That Faith can hardly be thought sincere unto which we walk so contrary in Practice Especially seeing a very Heathen could say That we do not amittere but praemittere not lose them but send them before us in Hope as our Faith further teacheth us to follow and communicate with them in the same Glory and Blessedness And this leads me to the next General part of the Text the First Reason against Excessive Sorrow for the Dead the Nature of Death It is a sleep Sleep in phrase of Scripture admits of divers senses for we find First The sleep of Nature A binding of the Senses Somnus Naturae a Rest cessation and suspention of them from their Actual operations and consequently Ligatio sensuum of all the Members of the Body from executing their Natural offices and functions Thus Adam slept in Paradice Jesus in the Ship Peter in the Prison 2. The sleep of Sin A secure Spiritual Lethargy Somnus Culâ—ae Eph. 5.14 1 Thess 5.6 Awake thou that sleepest Let us not sleep as do others but let us watch and be sober that is Arise from the Grave of Infidelity and Sin unto the Life of Faith the Life of Righteousness and then to keep the Eyes of our Souls continually waking lest we be inveigled by the Devil or the Worlds Temptations 3. The sleep of Grace Somnus Gratiae A holy Peace and Tranquility of Mind arising from the apprehension of Gods favour in Christ I will lay me down and sleep If David can attain a glimpse of the light of Gods Countenance then he will lay him down and sleep 4. Somnus Sepulcri The sleep of the Grave The long sleep of Death when the Body lying in the Bed of Dust doth rest until it be awakened by the Sound of the last Trumpet Now to prevent Error and Mistake this Sleep is not to be conceiv'd of the separated Soul as some have vainly thought supposing it to be not only without Organical by a bodily Instrument action but without all Action Not considering that the Soul even in the state of Union and Commerce with the Body hath her proper and Immaterial acts of Thinking Reasoning Judging c. Yea the most perfect Acts of the Soul are exercised when the Bodily Senses are tied up as in Extasies and deep Contemplations Besides the Spirits of Men in and after their Transmigration are still Spirits but without motion and activity they would be no Spirits For the Nature and Essence of a Spirit consists in Act and it is not obscurely intimate Rev. 5.12 that they are employed in Magnifying and praising God Understand this Sleep therefore to be of the Body in the Grave a Metaphor very frequent in Holy Scripture Deu. 12.2 Many of them that sleep in the dust of the Earth shall awake Of divers of the Kings of Israel and Judah 't is said that they slept with their Fathers St. Paul reproving the abuse of the Holy Sacrament in the Corinthian Church For this cause saith he many are sick and weak among you and many sleep And St. Stephen having commended his Spirit into the hands of Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 7.59 fell asleep A Similitude used among the Heathen Hence their distinction of the Greater and Lesser Sleep Homer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 One calls it Deaths Brother Another Deaths Sister Another Deaths Image Of one Gorgias it is said That being sick and heavy unto Death and very sleepy being ask'd how he did Virgil. Stulte quid est somnus gelidae nisi mortis Imago Jamme somnus incipit tradere fratri suo 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 replied Now sleep begins to deliver me up to his Brother Death These although Ignorant of a Resurrection could easily find in Death the similitude of a Sleep Hence our Graves are called Beds and our Churchyards Sleeping-places or Dormitories And indeed if Death be a Sleep the Grave must needs be the Bed Isai 57.2 Unto this may fitly be applied that of the Propht They shall enter into peace they shall lie down upon their Beds each one walking in his uprightness Divers Reasons may be given of this Similitude I shall pitch upon two First Sweetness of Rest Secondly Certainty of Resurrection 1. Sweetness of Rest Rev. 14.13 Blessed are the Dead which die in the Lord for they rest from their Labours Man is born to affliction as the sparks fly upwards No Family Age Sex or Condition of Men but hath experience of Humane Miseries A heavy yoak is laid upon the Sons of Men from the day of their Birth unto the day of their Death Afflictions like Waves come rolling one upon another the end of one misery is the beginning of another Hear we not one crying My belly my belly with the Prophet another My head my head with the Shunamites Son One My Father my Father with Elisha another My Son my Son with David One complaining of Cruel Enemies another of False Friends One of Sore Labour another of Hungry Meals One of Grief in the Body another of Sin in the Soul Here lies Jacob in the Fields there Joseph in Prison Here Jeremy in the Dungeon there David in the Wilderness Daniel among the Lions the Three Children in the Fiery Furnace It is not unsignificant that Nature sends us into the World Weeping a sad presage of our future Calamity Such our Ingress such our Progress through this Vale of Tears So that Man and Misery seem to be born under one Planet If Man had not been Sorrow upon Earth had never been And as we suffer many Evils so we do more the Flesh continually lusting against the Spirit and the Spirit against the Flesh so that the good which we would we do not and the evil which we would not that we do From all these this Sleep in my Text gives us a sweet discharge the Soul carried into Abrahams Bosom And what is the Fathers Bosom but a place of Repose unto the Child The Body laid up in a Couch of Sacred rest and security sweetned sanctified seasoned and perfumed by the most precious Death and Burial of Christ Cubile in quo mollius dormit quisquis durius se en hâc vitâ gesserit where our sleep shall be sweeter as our labour hath been harder The Body no sooner dead but it feels nothing the Soul no sooner fled but it feels it self happy 2. Certainty of Resurrection Indeed more certain than we are
condemn'd by the Apostle as a blockish stupidity and may justly fall under that Censure Jer. 5.3 Thou hast smitten them but they have not grieved For certainly the death of Friends is a stroke Ezek. 24. I will take away the desire of thine eyes with a stroke saith God to Ezekiel a stroke which toucheth all of dear relation and is it fit the strokes of God should fall upon a flinty and unrelenting heart Therefore we find that Abraham mourned for Sarah Joseph for Jacob the Israelites for Moses Aaron Samuel Customary it was among the Jews to mourn seven days sometimes longer with fasting and renting of the Clothes This perhaps more of Superstition than either of Necessity or Decency Yet there ought to be a Moderation for them that are dead in Christ. As all our Affections that they may be useful in a Christian Life must be bankt up within their due Bounds and bridled with a strong hand of Grace neither misapplied in their Object nor falling over or short in their Measure And therefore some of the very Heathen have placed the top of Wisdom in the Moderation of the Affections their Ethicks or Doctrine of Moral Vertues being exercised chiefly in this Task So particularly a special care is to be had that they overflow not the Banks in mourning for the Dead Hence God did forbid to his People those Heathen Rites of cutting themselves Deut. 14.1 and shaving of the hair Our blessed Saviour in the case of Jairus his Daughter newly dead when both the Father and Mother of the Child and the Disciples there present opened the Sluce of Tears to their Affections sets Bounds and Banks to that Passion in these words Weep not she is not dead but sleepeth For this cause he disliked in their Solemn Funerals the use of the Jewish Minstrelsy the end whereof was to encrease Sorrow by sad and doleful Tunes Detestandae sunt illae lacrymae quae non habent modum Thraenodiae Affection saith One in this Case hath need of a Bridle not a Spur. St. Hierom's Caution is worthy of Observation Those Tears are to be detested which have no measure Indeed some of Gods Children have Impotently yielded to the violence of this Passion as indeed it is most easie to slip into Excess where the Matter about which our Actions are conversant is of it self confessedly Lawful Hence Rachels Weeping Mourning and great Lamentation for her Children because as to her present sense they were not And Davids Passionate Ejaculations for Absolom O Absolom c. would God I had died for thee c. But these Examples are neither commendable nor imitable and rather Documents of Humane Infirmity than Precedents of Imitation And for the last he bewail'd not so much in St. Augustines Judgment his Sons death as that fearful state wherein he seem'd to die stain'd with horrid Incest against his Fathers Bed and Vnnatural practises against his Fathers Life How much more comly and Imitable was his Demeanour in the Death of his Child born to him by Bethshabe Seeking to the Lord by Prayer and Fasting for the Child while it was yet alive 2 Sam. 12.23 but when dead Wherefore saith he should I fast I shall go to him but he shall not return to me Now for the suppressing of this Inordinate Passion take into your serious Thoughts these Considerations 1. That it is Gods doing and we must give him leave to use his own Power and Soveraignty over his Creature Isai 64.2 in whose hands we are all as Clay in the hands of the Potter He that inspired the Breath of life may justly recal it Whatsoever the Weapon be the Hand is his that wields it This one Meditation is enough to silence all Repining and Impatient Thoughts as to draw from us that humble Resignation of St. Paul Acts 21.14 The Will of the Lord be fulfilled Of Eli It is the Lord let him do what seems good in his sight Of David I held my peace and opened not my Mouth for it was thy doing This Consideration allayed Jobs Sorrow in the loss of his Children He look'd not at the Rotten House or the Four Winds that smote it but at him that bringeth the Winds out of his Treasures and therefore sets up within himself this patient Resolution The Lord giveth Job 1.21 and the Lord taketh away Blessed be the Name of the Lord. 2. Consider the Vanity and Unprofitableness of Excessive Sorrow it profiteth neither the Living nor the Dead Not the Living Prov. 12.25 Heaviness in the heart of Man bringeth it down and Worldly sorrow worketh death As Fire lightly sprinkled burns more clearly too much overwhelm'd gives neither heat nor light So moderate Sorrow advantageth the Soul in many Natural Moral and Spiritual Actions Immoderate quencheth the Vigour of the Spirits and renders us unfit for every good Duty Again It profiteth not the Dead Should we fill their Tombs with Tears and spend our Lives in Lamentation we cannot redeem them Excessive Sorrow may bring us to them no Sorrow Care or Cost can bring them back to us As David I shall go to him but he shall not return to me 3. Consider the Necessity of Dying Ever since that necessitating Law Dust thou art and unto Dust shalt thou return Man is by the Chain of Gods irrevocable Decree tied unto Death It is appointed to all Men once to die and who shall disappoint his Appointment Whatsoever parts have been acted upon this Stage of Mortality Death is the Catastrophe and the Grave the place of Retyring The Wisdom of the Wise cannot prevent it the Tongue of the Eloquent cannot charm it the Strength of the Mighty cannot resist it It Reverenceth neither the Gray hairs of the Aged nor the Green locks of the Young No swiftness can over-run it no Prowess over-match it No gifts of Nature priviledges of Place endowments of Grace can free us from the stroke of it Where are those Millions of Generations that have hitherto Peopled the Earth Have they not made their Beds in the Dark And when they have serv'd their time have they not seen Corruption And shall We think to have our Friends Fathers Mothers Husbands Wives Children exempted from the Universal Law of Humane Nature 4. But that which is yet more effectual to moderate Sorrow for the Dead is that Death is indeed a Portal and passage unto Life If indeed they were utterly extinct shut up in Eternal Darkness some reason had we with Rachel to Mourn for them supposing that they are not But we know that they are and believe that they are happy and that when this Earthly house of our tabernacle is dissolved we have a building not made with hands eternal in the Heavens When the Soul taking her flight into a state of Bliss and leaving behind her this Clog of Mortality shall be removed an incomputable distance from this Vale of Sin and Misery And are we sorry for this
of rising in the Morning when we go to Bed at Night Dan. 12.2 They that sleep according to Daniels Prophecy shall awake The Sea and the Grave shall deliver up their Dead as faithful Trustees and Depositaries of that which is committed to them A Voice will one day sound like that of Christ who is the Resurrection and the Life to Lazarus Lazarus come forth Or like that in the Prophet Awake and sing ye that dwell in the Dust Isai 26.19 for thy dew is as the dew of Herbs and the Earth shall give up her Dead As the sweet Dews or Showrs as we commonly say loosen many a Prisoner make Corn and Grass to grow so the Dew of heavenly Vertue and Influence which flows from Christ shall loosen many a Prisoner raise our Bodies the Prisoners of Hope from that dark Cell of the Grave unto a state of Blessedness and Glory And now since death is a sleep much may be learnt hence for our Instruction and Comfort 1. For Instruction first Unto a due and serious preparation for it We prepare our selves to sleep by setting aside all worldly Negotiations giving to Body and Mind a Cessation from outward Imployments So should we dispose our selves to this last sleep laying aside all worldly Cares and Distractions 2 Kings 20.1 Set thy House in order saith the Prophet to Hezekiah for thou must dye While the House is out of order the Mind is out of frame and not yet rightly composed to sleep Especially the Soul it self is to be set in order by serious Repentance and unfeigned Resolutions and Endeavours of a new Life It was Agurs Prayer Prov. 30.7 Two things have I desired of the Lord before I dye One is Remove from me Vanity and Lyes Sin is often represented to us under the Notion of vanity and lies as in the sourth Psalm and elsewhere indeed a lying vanity abusing our Apprehensions with the shadow and appearance of a seeming good but in the mean time betrays us to a real evil of guilt and torment This therefore should be the chief care aime and endeavour of our whole Lives not to dye in our sins But laying aside the sin which besets us about as Clothes do the Body * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the rotten raggs of the Old man and so having made our peace with God we may be fit to lay down our heads in peace Thus prepare thy self continually for this blessed Rest by renewing thy Repentance fortifying thy Resolutions of better Obedience confirming thy Interest in the Merits and Mediation of Christ that whensoever it shall please God to call thee to Bed thou may'st with a serene Conscience and a good assurance of Hope lay down thy dying head upon this Pillow the free and immerited Grace of God in Christ and chearfully Commend thy Soul into his hands as into the hands of a faithful Creator and Redeemer 2. It teacheth Resignation When we sleep we willingly yield to Nature without strugling or reluctation so should we unto the God of Nature when he calls us to this long sleep being not haled or drag'd out of this Earthly Tabernacle but willingly resign it into the hands of our great Landlord Our Death should not be a violent Divulsion but a gentle Dissolution Mark St. Paul's words 2 Tim. 4.6 Nihil interest utrum abjures depositum aut doleas restitucum I am now ready to be offered ready as a Freewill Offering God requires but what he hath for a time lent us and shall we be unwilling to restore We had as good deny the Debt as grieve to make Restitution 3. It teacheth hope of a Resurrection When men go to sleep they put off their Clothes indeed but expecting to put them on again in the Morning so we are to nourish in our selves this Faith that ' though we uncloath our selves of this vile Body it is not lost but put to the mending to be changed in the fashion restored to Immortality and Incorruptibility and made like unto the glorious Body of Christ This for Instruction Again here is Matter of exceeding Comfort 1. First against the seeming horrour of the Grave That Death is but a sleep and differs only from it in this which is its advantage soundness of Rest and perhaps length of Continuance Fear not then O Christian the stink of Rottenness horrour of Darkness gnawing of the Worms c. these things shall not sensibly touch thee Conceive of it rather as a Castle of Security a Chamber of Rest a Bed of Down a Pillow of Ease wherein thou shalt safely and sweetly rest till the Morning of the Resurrection Truly therefore we may say Stultum est mortem horrere somno delectari It is a vain and foolish thing to delight to sleep yet to be afraid to dye Dost thou go to Bed every Night and art thou afraid to go this once Art thou not yet weary of hearing seeing doing and suffering so much evil Art thou like a pettish Child unwilling and fearful to go to Bed When therefore our time of sleep approacheth and that we are called to rest in our Fathers Bosom let us be affected as good old Hilarion Go forth Egredere anima mea egredere quid times O my Soul go forth What fearest thou My Body lye down and sleep 2. This Comforts us against the Miseries and Sufferings of this present Life Methinks when I look on Man I see a deplorable Creature subject to innumerable Miseries hurried with Temptations distemper'd with Passions Job 7.2 as a Servant earnestly desiring the shadow and as an hireling the reward of his work Chear up thy self in this that as the shadow of the Night doth equally gratifie Master and Servant High and Low Rich and Poor with the common benefit of Nature so there is a time of sleep and rest approaching which will shut up our Miseries with our Eyes and end our Labours with our Lives Though here we have born the travail and heat of the day our Comfort is we shall go to Bed at Night It is recorded of Babilas that renowned Martyr that when Decius the Emperour commanded his Head to be chopt off receiving that bloody Sentence with a sweet Calmness and Serenity of Soul he used only those few words of the Psalmist Psal 116.7 Return then unto thy rest O my Soul A blessed sleep indeed not as our Natural sleeps often are troubled and short but restful without disturbance blissful without pain and annoiance and which shall not be startled or amazed with the voice of the Arch-Angel and the Trump of God But both Body and Soul united shall be put into possession of that glorious Eternal Rest which remains unto the People of God The third General part of the Text remains which is the second Ground of Comfort The hope of a blessed Resurrection implied in these words Even as they that have no hope The Hope here mentioned as appears by
end is more certain so the Assurance more full A full Assurance of Hope and so of far greater virtue to support the Soul It hath made the glorious Martyrs to suffer the loss of all things of Life it self not accepting deliverance that is upon base terms and with loss and prejudice of their Faith that they might obtain a better Resurrection The Natural Hope carries us but to our Lives end that 's the utmost Verge of it While I live I hope to live Dum spiro spero cnm expiro spero But the Grace of Hope carries us further When dead I hope to live and therefore let Health The Righteous hath hope in his death Prov. 14.32 Wealth Liberty Friends yea Life and Breath and all go yet I will hold fast the hope of Joy that is set before me Though therefore we dwell here as Lot in Sodom our Souls vexed tortured with the sinful Vanities of Men there is hope of a Day when every thing that offends shall be cast out Though our sincere endeavours to please God be derided by the Profane World there is hope of a Time coming when our Judgment shall break forth as the light and our Righteousness as the Noon day when we shall have Beauty for our Ashes and Glory for our Shame Do we groan under the burthen of Sin the rebellion of Nature against Grace of the Flesh against the Spirit there is hope of an exchange of Weakness for Power Imperfection for Perfection Necessity of sinning for a Confirmed state of obeying Thus Hope supports the Spirits and keeps us from Sowning It seems St. Paul was sometime a little dispirited and out of heart but revives presently and what was his Cordial Hope of the Resurrection and the consequent Glory That this light affliction which is but for a moment worketh to us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory If our Hopes were terminated within the narrow bounds of this Life Christianity were at a poor stay and Christians of all Men most miserable so cold entertainment doth it find in the World but being Anchored within the Vail we are of all Men most happy 3. To Conclude as I began This should moderate our Sorrow for them that are Dead in the Lord That they breathed out their Souls in hope that their flesh rests in hope and their Bodies in Graves are but Prisoners of Hope and their Re-union with us in a glorious and Triumphant Fellowship In quo non potest subesse fulsum is the matter also of our Hope And though a Fiducial and Infallible assurance of anothers final Happiness while they are yet in the state of Travellers none can have without special Revelation 'T is well if we can attain this Assurance to our selves with all diligence and much difficulty by many degrees working out our salvation with fear and trembling yet for them that have fought a good fight and finished their course in the true Faith and fear of God well may we have an erected Hope of a glorious and eternal Association and that together with them we shall for ever be with the Lord 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 v. 7. wherefore comfort one another with these words Indeed a solid ground of Christian Consolation in this short Temporal privation of our dearest Friends and such as the Gentiles who were without Christ the ground of Hope without the Church the Sanctuary of Hope without the Covenant of Grace the Reason of our Hope could not afford Those Cordials that are fetch'd out of Natures Boxes That Death is the common end of All Mors exitus communis ea lege nascimus that it is the Law and Condition of our Birth are but cold Comforts in comparison of that which Christian Hope holds forth unto us And therefore Blessed be God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the Resurrection of Christ from the dead to an inheritance immortal incorruptible undefiled that fadeth not away reserved for us in Heaven Amen And now my Discourse like a Circle is return'd to the Point where I began viz. This truly Vertuous Noble Courteous Dearly beloved Gentleman A great Treasury though exhausted a shining Light quenched a burning glorious Lamp extinguished a sweet delicious comly fragrant Flower cropt and fading a bright Star of a distinguished magnitude removed from our Horizon and well may Darkness cover this Hemisphere Here I could willingly sit down a while in silence and only by the language of our Tears speak our sense of this heavy Loss but as I have newly Discours'd all Passions especially that of Grief need rather a Bridle than a Spur. Let therefore the Thoughts of his Superlative Merits while living and the Inexpressible Glories he is now in possession of bring down the Sluce a while and dam up the streaming Fountain of our Tears and Sorrow whilst to his most deservedly Worth and Memory and our abundant Delight and Comfort we pay that Tribute of Praise that is due to Gods Servants and Children advancing thereby his Glory and adding Spurs to the Pious Endeavours of those who Survive And that I may the more both suitably and succinctly delineate those Graces which though they are gone with him for his Comfort yet stay behind him for his Honour and our Imitation Be pleased to veiw him in the Method of these following Particulars First In his Birth There we may see great Excellencies descended to him by his Progenitors To be born of a good Family and to be well Descended is a Mercy not to be neglected Nec imbellem progenerant aquilae columbam saith Horace You have read of Mr. Philpots zealous Martyrdom V. 2. Examin of Mr. Philpot. Acts and Mon. Vol. 3. Dr. Wilk H. gl being a Knights Son told his Persecutors He was a Gentleman Anabaptistical parity and Levelling designs are ever to be abhord and look'd upon as the ready way to Rapine Confusion and Violence To be born of Noble Parents from a Family that is not stain'd nor sullied with the foul spots of Faction and Rebellion nor tainted with the Seeds of Error Schism and Division nor basely dirted with the black filth of Debauchery Atheism Prophaness and Irreligion all which is eminently true without Flattery in this Gentlemans Escutcheon questionless is one of Gods choice Blessings And to a Mind inclining to Vertue it availeth much to be born well Est aliquid clarus magnorum splendor avorum The glorious Deserts of Honourable Parents is no small Patrimony sed vix ea nostra a voco Secondly Therefore consider him in his own Person And in that first his Outward and then secondly his Inward Ornaments Grace and Perfections His Body of exact symmetry and proportion where we might behold a great share of Comliness and Beauty which God our Creator the Fountain of all Beauty had imparted to this lovely Creature and in such a measure as if Mother-Nature had called