Every wise man intends some good to himself in what he doth and therefore unless sorrow will do us some good it is a foolish thing to indulge unto it But can any man that hath had his fill of it tell us what satisfaction it hath given him May we not put all our gains in our eyes as the Proverb is after they have wept so immoderately Doth any man say he is glad that he mourned so much Then he had best mourn again if there be so much gladness and profit in it Had we not better say with David concerning his child when it was dead I shall go to him but he shall not return to me I may bring my self in sorrow to my grave but I cannot bring him up from the dead I cannot water him with my tears as we do a dry plant that he may spring up again but I may easily drown my self and learn others by my example not to weep for me What I would not have them do for me why should I do it for another Why should I make my self miserable and make no body else the better The truth is if there were only no good in it it were the less matter but it doth us likewise not a little harm Though it will end of it self yet it may breed us no small trouble before it end This is all the comfort that such a man hath and it is a very poor one that if his grief do not kill him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Phot. Epist 234. it will kill it self But many an one hath grief destroyed many a body hath it distempered and given most mortal wounds also to the soul it self Many affections move the soul most vehemently but none more then grief which hath been the cause of madness in some as Plutarch hath observed and in others hath bred incurable diseases and made others to destroy themselves And this it may do either naturally for nothing eats the heart so much as grief nothing casts such a damp on the vital spirits as immoderate sorrows or else providentially by Gods anger who is displeased to see us so angry and repining and often inflicts worse things upon us then those which we causlesly make the matter of so doleful complaints Let us therefore cease that which brings such troubles before it cease it self and when it is ceased gives us a new sorrow to think that we should be so unreasonably sorrowfull We must write upon this as well as upon inordinate joyes Vanity of vanities all is vanity and vexation of Spirit And therefore let us not be troubled now lest we be troubled more afterward to consider how foolishly we were troubled The Fable of Niobe which tells how she turned her self with sorrow into a stone doth but signifie the stupidity and dulness that waits upon grief and the excessive melancholy into which it sometimes casts us which renders us as insensible as a stone Take heed how you grow in love with sadness for it hath no profit wherewithall to recompence your affection to it but pays your folly only with it self and such diseases as ordinarily use to accompany it And we should be the less in love with it because there are so many occasions of it in our lives We need not weep so much for the loss of one thing for we must expect continual losses The world is not such a place that we should take care to spend all our tears on one thing we shall have occasion enough for them if we have any mind to weeping Let us bestow therefore the less upon one because there are so many to sollicite our sorrows And if our souls be tender and apt to receive the impressions of dolefull things we have the more need to comfort our selves for every grief will but make us still more apt to grieve And besides what a folly is it thus to die with continual grief for him who if he did grieve to die his grief continued but a little while He died but once why should we die alwayes with grief He dyed that he might live why should we live only for to die It is certain we must die but of all deaths let us not die with grief and much less for grief about that which we see we cannot avoid our selves But let us be furthest of all from making our life a perpetual death and grieving for that which by grief we may so soon run our selves into IX Ask thy self again Weep no more for thy friend then thou wouldst have had him weep for thee Whether two friends do not think that one of them must die first Do we not see that in the common course of things one man goes before another to his grave Who then if it had been permitted to thy choice wouldst thou have appointed to be the leader unto the other Wouldst thou have given thy self the preheminence and resolved to have shewn him the way Then Death it seems is a good thing for if it were evil we can scarce believe thy self-love is so little as to wish it might be thy portion before another And if it be good then thou mayest soon satisfie the pretence of loving them better then thy self by being glad that they enjoy it before thy self Or wouldst thou have had both gone together and been enclosed in the same Coffin and interred in the same grave Then it seems it is no such great mattter to die as thou makest it seeing thou art so willing to die also And if it be no great matter for thee to live then no more was it unto him If the sorrow of living without him be greater then the sorrow of dying with him why then was not he desirous that thou shouldst die and why did he pray for thy life and health when he dyed And if he would not have thee to die also when he dyed why dost thou then live in a kind of death and enjoyest not thy self nor the pleasures of life Either resolve to die also or else to live as a man should do X. If his death be so sad thou wilt not be able to bear thy own Ask thy self How can I take my own death Certain it is that thou must die also but if thou canst not part with a friend how canst thou part with thy self How wilt thou endure that soul and body should be separated if thou canst not shake hands with another body distinct from thy self Are not they the most antient friends is not their union most strict and close Can two men cleave so together as thy soul embraces its companion What then wilt thou do then when their bonds shall be untied if thou canst not bear the rupture of lesser cords of love What wilt thou think when thy soul sits on thy lips and gives thy body a farewell kiss if thou canst not close the eyes of thy friend without so many tears Will thy soul mourn after thy body is dead as
thou dost now lament the death of thy friend Will it groan and sigh to think of the hole where its flesh lies Will it sigh to think that its old companion is then become the companion of worms If not then let it not groan so heavily for a less matter that is now befaln it If it will then why art thou troubled for thy friend and not for thy self to think how sad thou must one day be The fear of thy own death must more then equal thy sorrow for the death of another man And how canst thou have time to think of any thing else if thou dost fear it Or if thou dost not fear it how canst thou fall under thy sorrow who hast overcome so great a fear Dost thou intend to go crying out of the world If not then be not now dismayed at that which thou must bear so valiantly thy self Then do not mourn so much for the loss of anothers life which will but put self-love into a most piteous case when thou comest to yield up thy own Death is no strange thing as I have said for we must all die But then why should we mourn so much if it be such an usual thing If we do mourn excessively it is a sign we think not of the commonness of it and then how shall we take our own death seeing we think not of it Let us but comfort our selves upon solid grounds against our own departure and I will warrant you that shall cure all our other lamentations Let us but dare to die our selves and we shall not dare to cry so much for any mans death Isidore of Pelusium thinks that our Lib. 2. Epist 173. Saviour did not mourn for his friend Lazarus because he was dead for he knew that he was going to raise him from the dead but because he was to live again and to come from the haven where he was arrived back again into the waves and storm from the crown which he enjoyed to a new encounter with his enemies If thou dost not believe his interpretation yet dost thou believe the thing Dost thou seriously consider that the misery of this world is so great that we should rather weep that we are in it then that others are gone out of it Then I ask thee again whether when thou art dead and well thou wouldst willingly live again If not then thou knowest what to say to thy self concerning thy friends death If thou wouldst then it seems thou canst be contented with this grief and I will not go about to comfort thee seeing thou lovest life with all the miseries thou createst to thy self But the very truth is we are so sensible of our bodies and have so little feeling of our souls or divine things that it is ready to make us think we are not when our bodies are dead This makes death such a terrible thing This makes both our own and others death so heavy because it seems as if there were an extinction of us That which we feel not nor have any sense of within us it is as if it was not And therefore if we feel not heavenly things and perceive not that we have a soul we shall receive death as if it was the loss of our selves and then who can but be sad Let us live therefore in a sense of such things as may make us die willingly and think that we our selves are not lost and then we shall not think that we have lost our good friends nor lay their death so much to heart XI Ask thy self likewise Nor wilt thou be able to help others to bear their sorrows How wilt thou be able to comfort others if thou canst not comfort thy self It should seem by thy tears that thou art very ambitious of the name of a friend but if thou be not able to comfort thy friend what is he the better for thee and how didst thou deserve to have the friend which thou hast lost If thou art able or hast ever given any comfort unto others administer then the same cordials to thy self Why should not that satisfie thee which thou expectedest with so much reason should satisfie them What thou wouldst say to another if his friend was dead that say to thy self And if thou wouldst wonder that he should reject comfort then do not make thy self a wonder Didst thou never tell any man that it is a shame to be impatient when we can cure our selves that they suffer nothing but what God and nature have appointed that we must all expect such losses that no body knows whose turn is next Take then thy own counsel and be not such a Physitian as cannot cure himself at all Is thy distemper different from theirs are there not the same griefs and maladies in their mind Then the same medicine will cure thee that thou gavest to them Or if it would not cure them then thou wast much too blame that didst not seek a better both for them and thee Or is thine some strange loss the like to which never any suffered Then this may comfort thee that thou shalt never suffer the like again For it would be more strange if a thing that never comâ—s shall twice fall upon one man If it be so strange to thee then thy courage will be as strange to others If thou art drawn into an example of suffâ—rings then thou mayst render thy self an example to all of patience and contentedness And so Seneca saith of the Brother of Drusus that though Drusus dyed in the midst of his embraces and with his kisses warm upon his mouth thoug he dyed in the very height of his fortune with the most war-like Nations dead at his feet yet he not only put a measure to his own grief but taught all the Army how to be moderate also And indeed he could not have stopt the tears of others unless he had been of so brave a spirit as first to stop his own If thou art a friend therefore unto any let them all learn of thee how to be well satisfied Comfort thy self as thou hast comforted others or else as thou dost intend to comfort them And let it be seen by thy worthy behaviour toward thy self that thou art worthy to be a friend to another person XII Ask thy self again Death doth sometime befriend us Whether friends only be mortal Do none die but they that love us must not all our enemies and they that hate us die also Death then that makes thee sad may give thee comfort As it puts an end to some comforts so it is the common end of all miseries Though we may not wish for the death of any yet it is no harm to think that they must die who hate us and their rage shall not last for ever If nothing can cease their malignity yet death can It hath done us then no such wrong but what it can repay us with the same hand that did it Though we have now
and supports And as for brute creatures you see that they make a doleful noise for the loss of their young a very short while and then they remember it no more Some of the people of Cous if I forget not used at the age of seventy years either to kill their parents or pine them to death and to rejoyce much at it They thought that they had lived long enough and that it was both a misery to themselves and a great burden to their children to have them continue any longer The Caspians also and some of the people of old Spain had the like custom which we well can inhumane and barbarous But why cannot understanding teach us that which want of understanding taught them Why should Barbarism make them rejoyce at what they did themselves and Christianity make us sad at what is done by God and the order of things St. Hierome reports that in his time there was at Rome a man who had had twenty wives marryed to a woman who had had two and twenty husbands There was great expectations which of them should die first and when the man buryed her his neighbours crowned him with Lawrel and caused him to bear a bough of Palm in his hand in token of a victory at his wives funerals It seems that men can sport at death if they list and laugh at that which makes so many cry Why then cannot reason make us moderately sad to bear that which humor and fancy can make men not to lament at all Why cannot our Religion do more with us then the people or our friends who it is like can laugh us our of our sorrows If I have not said too much in this argument I have some confidence that I have not said too little And indeed I have said more then I first intended and so much that if any one have the patience to read it through me thinks the very length of the discourse should make them forget their sorrows and by thinking so long upon another thing they should not remember what they thought upon before One soul is scarce big enough to hold all these considerations and the thoughts of grief also Here are so many that they are able to thrust sorrow out of doors by their multitude if not by their strength and force And yet notwithstanding I must detain you a little longer before I give your thoughts leave to turn themselves to other things For I am of the mind that all these considerations will only asswage the grief and pricking of the wound but will not quite heal it and take away its putrefaction I shall therefore commend two or three things for the pressing out all the filthy matter for the closing of the sore and to make the soul perfectly whole and sound Be dead to all things and thou wilt not be offended that they die §. 8. I. It is not their death but the life of something else that troubles us Mortifie thy spirit to the world and all things that are in it and when thou hast left them it will be no wonder that they leave thee Think with thy self often that thy friends are dead that thou seest them carryed to the grave that thou beholdest worms crawling out of their eyes and mouth and try how thou art able to bear that thought Think that he or she that lies in thy bed by thy side is as cold as a stone think that thou embracest the carkass of thy dear friend and ask thy soul how it can brook it Think thus often and though thy soul may start at the first yet at last it will be patient That little sadness will banish and chase away all the greater that else would seize on thee hereafter There will be little to do when death comes if thou constantly dost this Thy soul will be so loose from them that thou wilt not give a shrike none will bear the strings crack when you are separated Death will not be a breaking of your society but a fair easie untying of it Nothing will happen to you but what you have looked for long before and you will be able to say This is not the first time that I have seen my dear friend dead Yea think with thy self that thou seest thy own body laid in the grave and that thou feelest thy self as cold as a clod of earth Think that thou art turned into rottenness and dirt and that thou art forgotten by thy neighbours If thy soul can endure these thoughts then why should it be troubled at the death of another This is a kind of death to be so separated from thy body in thy thoughts It is all one not to be in thy body and not to feel that thou art in it Raise thy mind then up toward heavenly things fix thy thoughts on God and the life to come think that thou seest thy self in heaven among the Saints of God and while thy soul is there it is not in thy body here below This kind of death differs from that which will be hereafter in this only that then thou wilt be more perfectly out of thy body But if there be no trouble in this separation which thou now makest even whilest thou art in it There will be far less trouble one would think quite to part with it and to get from it And the way to be dead to these earthly things We must not let false opinions live is to change our opinion of them and to see them to be what indeed they are empty and unsatisfying changeable and unconstant Of this I have spoken before in the former discourse but seeing it is a thing so great and fundamental to our contentment let me again present you with it We are the cause of our own grief by magnifying the things of the world to such a value that the loss of them shall be worth so many tears We think that they are happy who are rich and honourable though they be never so wicked and unskilful how to live 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. L. 1. cap. 19. We presently cry up a man for wise and what not who to use Arrianus his phrase is preferred by Caesar though it be but to be Groom of his close-stool And on the contrary we dispise vertue if it be in a thred-bare coat and count him a fool who is unfortunate No wonder then that we cry and whine like children when we lose any of these worldly things seeing we think our selves more happy then men in the enjoyment of them We think that we are undone when we part with that which we have such an high opinion of and there is no way to make us think that all is safe but by altering of that forlish opinion We expect what cannot be and will not be content with what may easily be We cannot make the things of this world to be still and quiet but may make our selves so and the way to that quietness
I where the head of us all is and where we enjoy the light of his most blessed face I would not live if I might again no not for the love of thee I have no such affection to thy society once most dear unto me that I would exchange my present company to hold commerce with thee But do thou rather come hither as soon as thou canst And bid thy friends that they mourn not for thee when thou dyest unless they would wish thee to be miserable again If we should have such a short converse with one of our acquaintance what should we think what should we say Should we fall a mourning and crying again would it open a new sluce for our tears to flow out would we pray him to go to heaven no more but stay with us would we entreate him to beg of God that he might come and comfort us If not then let us be well content unless we can give a better reason for our tears then our love to him Holcoth reports of a learned man In 4. sap v. 7. that was found dead in his Study with a Book before him A friend of his was exceedingly amazed at this sight when he first came into the room But when he looked a little further he found his fore-finger pointing at this place in the book of Wisdom c. 4. v. 7. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Though the just be prevented with death yet shall he be in rest And when he observed this he was as much comforted as he was before dejected We have no reason to lament them who are made immortal and that live with God If we respect them only we should carry them forth as the Aegyptians did the great Prophet of Isis when he dyed Heliod l. 7. Aethiop not with howlings and sorrow but with hymns and joy as being made an heir 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with our Betters and gone to possess most glorious things The truth of it is if it were rational love to him that expresseth these tears then we should not begin them so soon nor make such a noise and cry when men are a dying For the sad countenances and the miserable lamentations wherewith we encompass sick mens beds make death seem more frightful to them then it is in it self What misery am I falling into may a man think that causes them to make such a moan What is this death that makes even them look so ghastly who are not like to die What a mischief is it to leave so many sad hearts behind me and to go my self it should seem by them to some sad and dismal place also I tell you a dying man had need have a double courage to look both death and them in the faces or else their indiscreet shrikes and lamentations will make a poor soul fall into such dark and cloudy thoughts Nor for our own sakes that are alive Men are fain therefore to say that it is indeed love to themselves that forces them thus to bemoan the death of their friends But what are you that cannot be contented one should be made much better by making of you a little worse Is this the great love you pretend to your friend that you are sorry he is gone to heaven are you a friend that look more at your own small benefit then at his great gain Was he not much beholden to you for your love that would have had him lived till you were dead that he might have been as miserable in mourning for you as you think now your selves to be But what is it I beseech you that you thus bemoan your selves for because that you are now miserable No it seems that you are not miserable enough and that makes you weep so much If you had some greater trouble befaln you that would put all your friends out of your mind If you were sick or in pains or had lost all your goods these things could take your mind off from this loss why then cannot the enjoyment of them When Joab did but threaten David that they all would leave him 2 Sam. 19.7 unless he would be comforted then he could wipe his face and appear in publick as a man well pleased Fear of losing his Kingdom put away the grief for the loss of his son And therefore let us not speak of our being miserable by this loss for at last we find it is not so Yea I must tell you that it is not meer self-love that begets these tears For suppose this person to have been at a great distance from us for some years Did we weep and mourn because he was not with us did not the meer thoughts that he lived comfort us was he not as good as dead when we neither saw nor felt nor heard him What help could he afford us at that distance and did we account our selves miserable all that time we are now as we were then in all things the same but only in the knowledge that he is dead But was he not dead as to us before did he do any thing for us at that time that he doth not now Let us be quiet then for the truth is it is not love to him nor love to our selves that makes us sometimes weep but a meer natural affection that stirs within us i. e. Men mourn oft-times they know not why but only it is natural so to do They think they are not as they were before They feel that there is something wanting as they imagine It is a thing of long acquaintance perhaps and so nature is loth to part with it Get a new nature then and that will mend all And yet it is not meer natural affection neither that makes us sad For we our selves shall soon forget it but the freshness and the presence of the object of our sadness Time will make us forget it or if our parents had dyed a little after we were born we should never have wept when we came of age to think that they were departed It is no hard matter then for a considerate person to cease his grief seeing it depends upon such small causes And if any one shall say that it is love to the good of the world that makes him mourn for the loss of an useful person He hath reason to rejoyce that he loves the good of men so much For then he will labour to do much good in the world himself and he will perswade all the friends he hath remaining that they would do all the good they can and repair that loss II. But let me further ask you Was thy friend Gods friend also Our friends if Good are not lost or was he not If he was the friend of God as well as a friend of thine why should not he have his company rather then thou If he was not Gods friend then he could not be thine neither No man can love us aright that doth not love God and if he do love God
no friend yet shortly we may have no enemy neither This was one support to the Christians under their persecutions that though their enemies like Saul did breath out nothing but threatnings and slaughters against them yet their breath was but in their nostrils and might soon evaporate and vanish away Julian called the Apostate had done more hurt to the Christians then the ten Persecutions if death had not suddenly wounded him with one of his arrows The Marian flames had devoured in all likelihood a great many moâ—e bodies if death had not shortnâ—d her reign and so extinguished the fires We have no reason then to look upon it as unkind which may do us so many courtesies nor to accuse that of cruelty to us which destroys the cruelty of others towards us XIII And now may you not well make one question more to your selves and say Contentment hath more to say for it self then grief hath Is there not more reason to be comforted then there is to be sad If there be as certainly there is what should hinder your comfort if you live by reason If you do not live by it then nothing that a man can say will comfort you Nothing will chear us unless we think of it and make it our own by meditation neither will any thing sadden us unless we think of it also Seeing then they are our own thoughts that make us either sad or merry and we have more comfortable thoughts then heavy we cannot but be of good chear if we will not be enemies to our selves All that we can say for our sadness is that we have lost a friend a very dear and perhaps only friend But you have heard that there are more in the world and that you have not lost this and that you have more comforts remaining then are taken away and that if you had none but God you had enough and if you will read again what hath been said twenty other reasons will offer themselves to chear for one that arises to make you sad If there was no reason at all to be sad then none need spend any time in giving of comfort But if they be very few in compare with others and we are made to follow the most and strongest reasons then he is not to be pittied who notwithstanding the small reason of his sorrow will not be of good comfort The greatest cause that I know of this sort of trouble is when many that we love die soon after one another So it hapned to that Prince which the L. L. 1. Essay cap. 2. Mountainge speaks of who received the news of his Elder Brothers death whom he highly esteemed with a great deal of constancy and shortly after the tidings of his younger Brothers decease in whom he placed much hope did not alter the smoothness of his countenance But when one of his servants dyed not long after that he suffered himself to be so far transsported that he quitted his former resolution and gave up himself to all grief and sorrow The reason of this was not from the love that he bare to this person more then the rest but as he well saith because being top full of sorrow before the next flood must needs break the banks or overflow all the bounds of patience And so Hier. Cardan tells us In Dialog cui tit Guilielmus that after he had patiently born many reproaches and the cruel infamous death of a son of great hopes and the dangerous sickness of another son and the death of his parents and wife with many other evils yea and after he wrote a book of Consolation against all these evils yet he was overcome with grief at the death of an English youth whom he brought from Dover with him as he passed from Scotland in the time of Edward the sixth And he gives the same reason for it that the other doth Fatigatum multis adversis oppressit me haec extrema infaelicitas being wearied before with many griefs this last unhappiness made me fall to the ground It was not its strength but his own fore-going weaknesse that made him fall It was not heavy but it came upon the back of many other loads and so oppressed him But something hath been said to this also For holy Job was in the same condition and far worse one messenger did tread upon the heels of another to bring him tidings of his misery and yet he was patient though he himself likewise was in his own body most sadly afflicted We have the same grounds of comfort that he had and abundance more then was known in those younger times And when one cause of trouble falls upon the neck of another we can add one reason likewise unto another and so be comforted For our troubles can never be so many as the causes of our consolation are Yea one single reason of those that I have propounded will answer all Do we not know very well that all friends are mortal Then it can be no new thing if we well consider it for two or three to die after we have lost one But the loss of one doth rather mind us of the mortality of all And doth not God govern the world in the death of the last as well as of the first then there is no less wisdom and goodness in it when many die then when one He that can solidly comfort himself in the death of one will not be immoderately troubled for the loss of more If we let our grief indeed work under-ground while nothing of it appears if our hearts be loaded with it though our eyes look not heavily before others then it is no wonder if it do at last break forth when the heart is over-charged and can find no other way to ease it self But if we take a course to comfort our hearts at the very first and make them truly contented or if we let not the grief settle it self but labour to dislodge it then we shall be the better disposed to bear such another cross with the like patience For then a new trouble doth not come upon the other but only follows after it It doth not adde to the former but only comes in its stead it doth not augment but only renew our grief XIV And now is it not time to conclude these questions and to say to your selves We should not be the more troubled because we understand our trouble Why should not reason do that which little or no reason can do The more we are men shall we be the less in peace and cry like children Nay children weep while they see their parents put into the grave and within a day or two they forget their sorrows why cannot we do so also Though they know not their loss yet they know not the reasons neither why they should not be discontented for their loss Though they have little understanding of their sufferings yet they have as little knowledge of our comforts
our hearts The hands as Ant. Guevara observes do work the seet do walk the tongue speaks but it is the heart only that weeps The eyes are but the spunges of the heart through which its affections are drained and dried up An afflicted heart hath neither hands to labour nor feet to walk nor can it find a tongue to speak but tears are all that it hath to tell you what it wants And therefore we ought to reserve these for some greater thing then our dead friends which our heart ought much to be affected withall As our Saviour said to the women of Jerusalem when he was going to the most cruel sufferings so might our friends say to us when they are a dying Weep not for us but weep for your selves if you be dead while you are alive Mourn more then you do if you have not yet mourned for your sins and amended them But if you have then rejoyce in the favour of God and bless him for his Son Jesus who is better to thee then ten Sons or all thy friends which thou lamentest Are our sins dead as well as our friends have we buried them in the grave of our Lord are we risen again to an heavenly life let us go then to God and pray to him and praise him and this will give us ease But if we be troubled for sin then sure we shall not add another sin by immoderate sorrow and forgetfulness of Gods goodness If it be sin we hate then mourning complaints and discontents must all be hated Would you indispose your self to pray to praise God and meditate in his sacred Word Would you render your self unfit to receive the Sacrament of his most blessed body and blood If not then mourn but so much as will not hinder any of these and you have leave to mourn as much as you please Stop but here and there is no man will lay any restraints upon you But then how short your mourning must be you will soon guess and the Sun must not go down upon your grief no more then it must upon your wrath But if you take no great care whether you disturb your souls or no then you have most reason to mourn for that carelesness and neglect Go then and bewail your unkindness to God your unthankfulness for his mercies and unbelief of his Gospel for you can never take your hearts in a better time then when they are so sad and inclined to be sorrowful Tell them that now they are very well disposed for a necessary business and bid them look if there be not something else to bewail that is more considerable Ask thy self hast thou not deserved this and ten times more Wilt thou add another sin when thou shouldst cease all sins Hast thou not been careless of seeking God Hast thou not foolishly wasted thy precious time and art thou not troubled at all for that Yea art thou now impatient as if God dealt hardly with thee and wilt thou spend more time badly when thou art taught by the death of thy friend how short it is It is most incongruous thus to bewail the death of a child or acquaintance when thou art like to die thy self both body and soul And when thou hast mourned for thy sins thou wilt be taught thereby how little thou oughtest to mourn for thy losses For even our tears for sin must not be immoderate and therefore much less must we dare to let them flow in abundance for our losses So you know the great Apostle commands the Corinthians to comfort him that had been guilty of a great sin and receive him again into the Church now that he repented lest perhaps such an one should be swallowed up with overmuch sorrow 2 Corinth 2.7 I wish all those who are ready to destroy themselves with grief would seriously confider this that we may not over-load our hearts with grief for our sins themselves which are the causes of all other sorrows We cannot please the Devil better then by discontent He would fain oppress every good man with some passion or other let us take heed how we joyn with him against our selves If we have left his service that is enough to provoke him If we have bid defiance to his pleasures this doth incense him and we must expect that he will endeavour to overcome us with griefs The Devil is mad against all good men and therefore let all those who have irritated him against them beware how they now prove cowards and execute his vengeance for him with their own hands Let us take heed as Photius excellently expresseth it lest we be good at stirring up and provoking the envy and rage of our adversary but naught at resisting and overcoming him by patience and perseverance to the end 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But if we must needs weep for the loss of something here let it be for the afflictions of the people of God Let us mourn to see the Church sit like a widdow in her black garments Let it pitty us to see the blood of Gods servants shed like water upon the ground If our own sins do not trouble us let us weep to see the wickedness of the world and let our eyes run down with tears to think that men do not keep Gods Law Some such channel we should cut for our tears and not let them spend themselves on this fashion about our own personal troubles This is a method both to stop our tears and likewise to make them useful to us while they run It is a way to ease us of our present grief and of all others also We shall exchange that sorrow that would have troubled us for a great deal of joy and comfort Whereas our worldly grief would have left the heart sad this will leave it light and merry Believe throughly that the Lord Jesus lives III. The life of our Lord Jesus gives us the greatest comfort against death and so thou maist both expect a resurrection from the dead and likewise hope for comfort from him when thou art left sad and desolate The Body it self doth not die any more then corn doth which dies that it may live and spring up again with large gain and advantage Are we loth to throw the corn into the ground and do we not patiently expect till the harvest comes Why should we then bury our friends with so many tears seeing they are but laid in the womb of their mother again that by the power of God they may have a better birth The Heathen could say much to comfort themselves but they knew not this comfort for indeed they were rather contented then comforted Those that did think themselves most wise and judged that they had the best supports did only dream that the soul might take another body and shift its place at several times But we know that there will be a time when even our scattered ashes will fly into one anothers embraces again and a new life