Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A58818
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A sermon preach'd at the funeral of Sir John Buckworth, at the parish-church of St. Peter's le Poor in Broadstreet, December 29, 1687 by John Scott.
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Scott, John, 1639-1695.
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1688
(1688)
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Wing S2072; ESTC R14391
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14,116
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40
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A SERMON Preach'd at the FUNERAL OF Sir JOHN BVCKWORTH At the Parish-Church of St. PETER's le POOR IN BROADSTREET December 29. 1687. By JOHN SCOTT D. D. LONDON Printed for Walter Kettilby at the Bishop's-Head in St. Paul's Church-Yard and Thomas Horne at the South-Entrance of the Royal Exchange in Cornhill 1688. IMPRIMATUR Guil. Needham Jan. 10. 1687. TO MY Lady Buckworth MADAM IN Obedience to Your Desires I here present You with the Discourse I delivered at the Funeral of Your Excellent Husband and my never to be forgotten Friend And indeed considering how little there is in it I have no other Apologie to make for the Publication of it but that I could not without some degree of Incivility refuse it being urged with the concurrent Requests of Your Ladiship and the rest of those my worthy Friends his dearest Relatives Not that I altogether despair of its having some good Influence upon Sober and Attentive Readers There are some Thoughts in it which are apt enough to Inspire considering Minds with good Affections and Resolutions The Text I am sure contains excellent Sense in it and the Argument is mighty Serious and Momentous and how meanly soever I have managed it some honest Reader I hope may from hence take occasion to supply my defects out of his own Meditations and so to improve it to his everlasting Advantage And as for Your Ladiship I hope the perusal of it instead of reviving Your Sorrows for Your Dear Loss may be some way Instrumental to Animate You with a firm and vigorous Resolution to pursue that Blessed State wherein This and all Your other Losses here will ere long be abundantly repaired in a most joyous and everlasting Fruition And This MADAM is my hearty Prayers as well as my hope who am Your Ladiships Obliged and Faithful Servant JOHN SCOTT ECCLESIAST xi 8. But if a man live many years and rejoyce in them all yet let him remember the days of darkness for they shall be many I Shall not trouble you with the various rendrings of these words which with a very little difference do all amount to the same sence viz. That supposing it should be a man's good fortune to live very long and exceeding happy in this world yet he ought to have great care that the Joys of this Life do not so wholly take up and ingross his thoughts as to make him forget those days of darkness which must ere long succeed this delightsome Sun-shine which days will be many more and of much longer continuance than the longest Life of happiness we can promise our selves in this World. So that all the difficulty in these words is what we are to understand by the days of Darkness which are here opposed to a long Life of Joy and Rejoycing in this World And this difficulty will be easily resolved by considering the foregoing Verse Truly the light is sweet and a pleasant thing to the Eye to behold the Sun upon which it follows But if a man live many Years i. e. supposing he should for many Years injoy this pleasant spectacle of the light of the Sun yet let him remember those days of Darkness wherein his Eyes shall behold the Sun and Light no more wherein he shall be laid up in a dark and silent Grave whence the light of the Sun is excluded and where the sight of the Eyes is extinguished or as he expresses it in the Third Verse of the next Chapter wherein those that look out at the windows are darkened So that we shall have neither visible Objects nor visive Organs but be buried out of sight in deep darkness and insensibility By the days of Darkness therefore is evidently meant all that space of time between our Death and our Resurrection wherein our Bodies shall lye mouldering in a dark Grave utterly insensible of Good or Evil till by the powerful call of God they shall at length be roused up out of this fatal slumber into a state of Everlasting Life and Activity And these days saith he shall be many though they shall not run out to an infinite duration but at length conclude in a general Resurrection yet they shall be many many more in all probability than any man now alive can hope to live in this World. The words thus explained resolve into this sence That how long and happily soever men live in this World they ought to entertain their thoughts with frequent remembrances and considerations of their approaching Mortality Which is a duty so obvious to the Consciences of all men as being founded on the plainest and most conspicuous Reasons that the men of all Ages and Nations and Religions have owned and acknowledged it Thus the Heathen Philosophers teach That our lives ought to be a Constant Meditation of Death and that even in our most pleasant and healthful moments we ought to look upon our selves as Borderers upon Eternity That we should still take care to mingle our delights with the sad remembrances of our Mortality and not suffer the Joys of this Life to divert our Thoughts from that impending Fate which ere long will set an Everlasting period both to Them and That But the necessity of entertaining our minds with frequent Remembrances of our Latter end is founded upon far more powerful motives than a company of fine Sentences and pretty Sayings of Philosophers For First It is necessary to moderate our Affections to the World. Secondly It is necessary to allay the Gaiety and Vanity of our minds Thirdly It is necessary to put us upon improving our present injoyments to the best purposes Fourthly It is necessary to fore-arm our minds against the Terrors of Death Fifthly It is necessary to excite and quicken us in our preparations for Eternity I. It 's necessary to moderate our Affections to the world while we are encompassed round with the pleasures and delights of this world they commonly so ingross our minds that we shut our eyes against all futurities and are impatient to think of any thing to come unless it be the continuance of this happy scene of things which is at present before us with which continuance we are exceeding apt to flatter our selves that so thereby we may heighten the gust of our present enjoyments to which the consideration of their leaving us or our leaving them would be apt to give a very ungrateful farewel and when our thoughts are wholly intent upon these present goods and upon the prospect of their continuance our affections must necessarily run out towards them with an immoderate ardour and greediness For now our flattering Imaginations represent them to us as standing and permanent things as a kind of immortal heaven upon earth and accordingly our affections pursue and imbrace them as the best of goods and are for dwelling upon them and building Tabernacles in them there to make their final abode as in their highest and ultimate happiness Now there is no more effectual way to rouse mens minds out of