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A66253 Preparation for death being a letter sent to a young gentlewoman in France, in a dangerous distemper of which she died. Wake, William, 1657-1737. 1687 (1687) Wing W253; ESTC R5512 22,586 170

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then a minute to the thoughts of Heaven send up an Ejaculation to the God of your Salvation This is a piece of thrift that by frequent exercise will do you much good and yet never injure any other business Augustus Caesar is highly commended by the ancient Poet that in the midst of his most troublesome occupations he could still find time to look up to Heaven and consider the frame and contemplate the parts and motions of it How much more should we always be at leisure to reflect on him that framed both that and us to whose Providence we owe every minute of our lives and whom therefore we ought above all other things incessantly to praise for his unspeakable Mercies CLOSE AND now Madam that I may close with what I begun after so long an intrusion upon your Meditations with these reflections which I am confident make a great part of your dayly entertainment The only thing that can render either these Papers or their recommendations acceptable unto you that can secure you against sin and endear Vertue and Religion to your practice will be to raise your affections above this World by seriously considering the excellence and certainty of another life and how vain and transient indeed how troublesome and unsatisfying are the highest felicities of this 2. I HAVE not here time to delineate to you the glories of God's heavenly Kingdom nor indeed could I tell you if I had what the happiness of that place is likely to be where all tears shall be wiped from our eyes and there shall be no more death nor sorrow nor crying nor pain When our Bodies shall be freed from every disease our Souls from every trouble those shall be chang'd into incorruptible and immortal substances these be entertain'd with the most comfortable and ravishing objects and both continue to be thus unspeakably happy throughout all Eternity without the least danger of either losing or lessening their enjoyments 3. BLESSED God! How contrary is this to our melancholy and uncomfortable portion here below a place where not a day passes but we eat our Bread with sorrow and cares The present troubles us the future amazes us and even the past fills us with grief and anguish I forbear to mention the particular evils which every Man best knows by his own experience If we look abroad upon the present face of the World What do we see in the several Kingdoms about us but Wars and confusion all things running to ruine and destruction to the confounding and devouring of each other If we consider the Church that holy Mother of us all how do her unnatural Children rend and tear her sacred bowels by their contentions What Schisms What Heresies what Profaneness is there in it Only in Sin and Impiety we agree on all sides here there is neither Jew nor Gentile but all are united in a monstrous confederacy against God and our own Souls 4. IF we contract our view and confine it to our own sinful nation It has pleased God to preserve us yet in peace to see if we will repent and anticipate his Judgments But alas his hand is lifted up to strike and we do nothing to prevent the blow and what can we expect but that it should at last fall upon us to our confusion 5. PARDON me Madam if I freely confess to you my fears that I tremble to think what shall be the issue of so great an Impenitence as we have now these many years shew'd under all the various methods of God's Providence to redeem us 6. HE has sent the sword both of civil Troubles and publick War amongst us and it has been deeply stain'd in the blood of the best and chiefest of our strength Our Princes have been forced into Captivity Our Church been chased into the Wilderness The breath of our nostrils the Anointed of the Lord has been cut off by the vilest of his Subjects yet have we not return'd nor sought our God. 7. THE Fire has consumed our dwellings the Plague destroy'd its Thousands and ten thousands in our Streets yet behold we are still incorrigible we go on as before in the ways of our own hearts and speak peace to our souls even in the midst of all these dangers 8. GREAT certainly is our sin and fatal I fear shall be the punishment of it and what shall we do for Madam I must here beg leave to joyn my self in this reflection to prevent our part in the common destruction Let us take heed that we have no share in their sins and then by God's mercy we shall have none in the punishment Let us live as those who attend such trials and then he will either be pleased to take us from the evil to come or cover us with his hand in the midst of it He will to be sure with the danger make a way for us to escape and being past through this short storm will bring us to that Port where we shall find everlasting Rest and a consummated felicity Those blessings which neither Eye has seen nor Ear heard nor does it enter into the Heart of Man to conceive but which God has prepared for them that love him Among which blessed number that you may then be found as it was the only intention of these reflections to prepare you so shall it ever be the hearty prayer of him who with all imaginable respect and sincerity remains Madam Your most humble and most obedient Servant W. W. THE CONTENTS * 1. INtroduction to Pag. 30 That the fatal source of all our evil is That our affections are tied to this World and we do not as we ought consider another * 2. The Letter it self divided into 4. Chapters CHAP. I. Of Contentedness p. 30. This I. A duty very difficult n. 2. Yet which we are engaged to 1. Because 't is God who smites us n. 3. 2. He always designs our good in it n. 4. 3. And by our Afflictions shews that we are his n. 5. 4. That the best Men have still had their share n. 6. 5. Particular considerations n. 7. to 1● This II. Expressed in 3. particulars 1. Of not despairing nor 2. Murmuring nor 3. Being fretful under our Calamities CHAP. II. Of the Fear of Death p. 57 Nothing more generally dreaded n. 1. Yet this fear may be banished 1. By living well n. 2. 2. By taking off our Affections from this World. n. 3 3. By considering the evils it frees us from n. 4 4. By viewing the sins it prevents n. 5 5. By expecting it every day n. 6 6. Particular considerations n. 7 CHAP. III. Of providing for another World. p. 72 This we ought immediately to set about n. 1 2 3. How we ought to do it 1. In general n. 4. to 8. 2. In particular by I. Faith. II. Repentance I. Faith. p. 86 What it is n. 1 2. The parts of it n. 4. ib. these fulfilled 1. In a firm assent to God's truths n. 3. 2. An obedience to his Commands n. 4. 3. A fear of his punishment n. 5. 4. A hope of his promises n. 6. What faith every man is bound to have of his own Salvation n. 7 8. II. Repentance p. 97 What it is n. 1. The parts of it n. 4. 1. A sense of sin n. 3. 2. Contrition for it n. 4 5. 3. Confession of sin n. 6 7. 4. Resolution against it n. 8 9 10. CHAP. IV. Of particular Duties p. 115. I. Prayer p. 116 Its necessity n. 1 2. Why we do not always perceive the benefit of it n. 3 4. 1. We often receive it when we think we do not n. 5 6. 2. If we receive it not the fault lies at our own doors n. 7. The qualifications requisite that we may obtain it II. Charity p. 134 Its Excellence n. 1. Parts Towards God. n. 2. Towards our Neighbour n. 3. III. Of spending your time well p. 137 1. Take all occasions of doing good n. 1. 2. Live innocently n. 2. 3. Often return to holy Exercises n. 3. 4. Constantly intermix pious ejaculations n. 4. * The Close p. 144 FINIS Advertisement Private Devotions digested into six Litanies with Directions and Prayers by Hen. Valentine A Private Prayer to be used in difficult Times Newly published Both Printed for Ric. Chiswell Luk. 2. 29. Phil. 1. 21. 23. Heb. 12. v. 11. 1 Sam. 3. 18. 2 Cor. 4. 17. Revel 21. 4. v. 5. 6. Heb. 12. 2. Heb. 11. 37. 38. Heb. 12. 1. Ps. 38. 8. Matthew xxvii 46. v. 55. v. 57. Job 14. 1. Psal. 119. 55. Gen. 2. 17. Gen. 3. 15. Psal. 19. 12. Phil. 3. 20. Josh. 10. 12. 1 Kings 17. 2 Kings 20. 6. James 4. 3. 1 Cor. 15. 58.
be still wanting CHAP. II. That you ought not to be amazed at the fear of Death THERE is nothing in the world more generally dreaded and yet less to be feared than Death Indeed for those unhappy Men whose hopes terminate in this life no wonder if the prospect of another seems terrible and amazing Hell is a place which the most resolute Soul cannot but tremble to think of how much more to enter into But for him who has lived well and who therefore relies on God's mercies for an eternal Salvation to shew this concern it betrays either much weakness or great doubt and either his faith or his hopes or both are less firm than they ought to be HE therefore that will not fear to dye must first be careful to live well 2. THE stroak of death is nothing Children endure it and the greatest Cowards find it no pain But when to this we shall add the certain apprehension of its being the gate to an eternal life then may we presume to say we have wholly conquer'd this King of terrours and sing the Epinikion of St. Paul 1 Cor. 15. O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory Thanks be to God who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Secondly He must take off his Affections from this world 3. IT was the reflection of the Son of Sirach Ecclus 4. 1. O death how bitter is the remembrance of thee to a Man that liveth at rest in his possessions to the Man that hath nothing to vex him but hath prosperity in all things Whilst we please our selves with the vanities we enjoy here we cannot expect but that it must needs be a trouble to us to be divorced from them But let us only change the scene instead of these earthly transient goods let us raise our Souls to the Heavenly and Eternal then shall we begin to think the time long that we are divorced from them and wish for that end we before feared Tully tells us that Cleombrotus was so taken with this speculation that having only read in Plato the conjectures of that great Man concerning the state of the Soul after death he had not patience to tarry the tedious course of nature but by a violent death cut the thread himself that he might immediately enjoy what he so infinitely desired 4. NOR may we fortify our selves much less against the fear of death Thirdly From the Consideration of those evils it frees us from than of that happiness it transfers us to When the Great Emperor of Persia wept over his Army upon this Consideration that within the revolution of a single Age not a Man of all that innumerable confluence would be left alive Artabanus standing by improved his meditation by adding that yet all of them should meet with so many and great evils that every one should wish himself dead long before that It is the true character of our lives which Job once gave Man that is born of a Woman hath but a short time to live and is full of trouble It is the great blessing of Heaven that as our lives are very miserable so are they very short too and what we usually complain of as our misfortune we ought rather to congratulate as our happiness Had David died a little sooner How much trouble had he escaped which now he endured in the rebellion and death of his own Son and all the miseries of a Civil War that was raised against him Let any Man consult his own experience and say how many sorrows he had miss'd had God called him to his rest but a few years before and therefore whether the promise he has made to deliver the just from the evils to come ought not to be made our dayly prayer for its accomplishment rather than fill our Souls with terror at the apprehension But fourthly Death do's not only free us from misery but sin too 5. THE life of a Christian is a continual warfare full of dangerous conflicts and doubtful consequences Our lusts sollicit us the World encourages the Devil tempts us we fall often and are never secure But Death frees us from all danger sets us safely on Shore in our long-expected Canaan where there are no temptations no dangers no possibility of falling but eternal purity and immortal joys secure our happiness for evermore 6. THERE is yet an advice which may usefully be added here and it is this That since the time of our dying is uncertain we should every day expect what every hour may bring to us IT is our great unhappiness in this matter that though we live never so many years we are still surprized We put the evil day far from us and then it catches us at unawares and we tremble at the prospect But let us stand on our guard let us live like those who expect to dye and then we shall find these terrors very much lessen and that we fear'd Death only because we were unacquainted with it Philip King of Macedon had a Page constantly attending in his Chamber to tell him every morning as soon as he awaked Remember O King that thou art mortal 7. BUT to quit you wholly of this fear and that I may close this point too with something particular give me leave Madam to desire you instead of a thousand arguments to recur only to your own experience you have already lookt death in the face you are acquainted with it what have you found so terrible in it as to disturb the repose of a good Christian i.e. of such a one as your self I cannot without satisfaction remember the calm the quiet the peace you were then in when every hour seemed to tell you 't was your last Death is an enemy you have already met and already conquer'd you have pull'd out his sting by the preparation you have made for it and you know he has nothing now remaining that can injure or affright you Only maintain your conquest by securing your innocence and working out your Salvation and then you may with confidence undervalue that which so much terrifies the world and which yet all even those who the most dread it must in a little time meet whether they will or no. CHAP. III. That you ought to be careful to provide for another World. THIS is the great duty of our lives and ought to be the chief business of us all every day of them No Man knows what the next hour may bring forth and to put our Salvation and the hopes of eternity to so dangerous a hazard as we do when we procrastinate though never so little our working of it out with fear and trembling is to shew either a very unwarrantable presumption upon God's goodness or a very light esteem of our own Souls 2. OUR lives depend on so many curious parts and organs so many diseases assail them every moment so many accidents may take them from us that we can never say the