Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
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A54461
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A sermon preach'd before the King and Queen in Their Majesties chappel at St. James's, on the twentieth Sunday after Pentecost, Octob. 25. 1685 by the Reverend Father John Persall ...
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Persall, John, 1633-1702.
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1686
(1686)
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Wing P1652; ESTC R11063
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9,002
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31
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A SERMON Preach'd before the King and Queen IN Their MAJESTIES Chappel at St. James's on the Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost Octob. 25. 1685. By the Reverend Father JOHN PERSALL Of the Society of JESUS Professor of Divinity Published by His Majesties Command LONDON Printed by Henry Hills Printer to the King 's most Excellent Majesty for his Houshold and Chappel 1686. A SERMON Preach'd before THEIR MAJESTIES On the Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost Octob. 25. 1685. Erat quidam Regulus cujus filius infirmabatur Joannis c. 4. v. 48. There was a certain Nobleman whose son was sick THE Holy Church in this Days Gospel invites us all to the Bed-side of a Rich Noble Young but Dying Prince who lies groaning at Deaths-door and notwithstanding his Plenty of other things is become a Beggar for a little Breath which all the Power of the World is not able to afford him I wish that the Followers of Sensuality who make Pleasure their God live as if they were never to die imagine Time to stand and laugh at Discourses of another World as Fables only for the Entertainment and Pastime of this I wish I say they would turn their Thoughts hither a little while and behold the dismal Theatre whereon every one of them must one day infallibly act the same Part which now this Noble Youth represents before them trembling betwixt two great Eternities of Happiness above and Misery below and uncertain which of the two is to be their Lot Now tho' we go no further certainly the Pangs of a dying Prince and Death triumphing over Wealth Nobility and Youth is an Emblem clear enough of the Vanity and Uncertainty of Worldly Happiness and might well deserve to be the Subject of our present Consideration Serm. 44. de Verbis Domini But because I hear the Great St. Augustin speaking of our Saviour's restoring the Widows Son to Life advise us That it was our LORD's Intention that by what he acted visibly towards the Body we should understand his invisible Operations on the Soul applying all his exteriour and Corporal Performances to an interiour and Spiritual Sense Dominus noster JESVS CHRISTVS ea quae faciebat corporalitèr spiritualitèr volebat intelligi It shall therefore be my present Endeavour First by the Sickness of this Youth to lay before your Eyes the Sickness of a Soul in Sin and Secondly from the Circumstances of his Cure we 'l gather the Means for the Curing of our Souls But because I am too conscious of my own Weakness to hope for any Fruit from my Words unless the Holy Ghost vouchsafe to put them in my Mouth and speak them again to the Hearts of my Hearers I must have recourse to the Blessed Virgin whose powerful Intercession is an Aquaeduct or Channel as the devout St. Bernard assures us through which Celestial Gifts are conveyed unto us Wherefore let us humbly invoke the same saluting her with the Angel Ave Maria c. Erat quidam Regulus c. IT being then my intent by the visible Sickness of the Body to discover the invisible Sickness of the Soul let us enter a little into the Chamber of this Dying Prince which probably you will find adorn'd with the richest Tapestry beautify'd with choice Cabinets and set out with other Moveables of the highest Price The Curtains Vallence and Canopy of the Bed all proportionable to the Nobility and Greatness of their Master but approach a little towards that stately Bed draw open those Royal Curtains and see what lies within A gasping Life an half-living Death a breathing Carcass His sinking Eyes already seek their Grave his pale and wan Countenance puts us in mind of his Winding-sheet the feeble and unactive Condition of his Body declares that he is Death's Close Prisoner the Panting of his Heart is a sad warning that the fatal Stroke is ready to be given which must break asunder the Gordian Tye betwixt Soul and Body And is this He on whom so much Gallantry do's attend Is it to him those Hangings Cabinets and Embroider'd Curtains do belong This certainly is the Fable inverted and not a Pearl on a Dunghil but a Dunghil in the midst of Pearls These were the visible Effects and Consequences of this Prince's Corporal Sickness Let us now try how far they will lead us towards the Discovery of the invisible Effects of a Spiritual Disease If you view the Chamber or Bed wherein a dying Soul lies gasping what for the most part more glorious It is one perhaps of these trimm'd-up Beauties of the World which seem to out-shine the Suns brightest Beams Gold Silver Pearls and whatsoever the blind World calls Precious is all too little to set them out But turn hither the Eyes of your Understanding draw open those gay Curtains by a serious Consideration and look on that Soul which lies within them O quale Monstrum What a Monster Had we Eyes of Angels it would appear far more hideous to us than the expiring Carcass which we just now beheld The Poyson of his Disease had dry'd and wither'd up his Body consum'd all his Spirits and the Soul being now ready to depart all the Train of Beauteous Features had already taken their leave But the Poyson of Sin is yet far ranker and its Effects upon a poor infected Soul far more deplorable It consumes to nothing all her Substance all the Stock of Grace whereby she flourisht The Sun of Justice her only Life is ready to withdraw his Divine Rays and consequently all the Flowers of Vertue must needs dry up and wither so that she who before had Beauty enough to enamour the very Fountain of Beauty is now become the Source of a Poyson rank enough to infect the whole World She is a meer Sink of Loathsomness and Corruption What is she else but a putrifying Carcass feeding the Worms of a bad Conscience and engendring innumerable venemous Infects I mean the cursed Brood of vicious Habits She breaths forth such a Stench that were our Corporeal Senses capable of being wrought on by Spiritual Objects it would not be possible for us to live within the Sphere of its Activity For the truth of all this I appeal to those Saints to whom Almighty God has given a more peculiar Light for the discovering the Horrour and Ugliness of Sin St. Chrysostom calls Sin the only Evil asserting That we ought to abhor nothing but Sin no not even Hell it self And the Reason hereof will appear clearly if we consider the Nature of an Humane Soul She is created to the perfect Image of her Creator and participates in an high Degree of his Divine Essence Divinae Particula Aurae Hence she has in her a strong and forcible Appetite of being united to her God and consequently cannot be at rest whilst she is separated from him but in this Night of Sin the Fogs arising from a corrupted Will do so obscure the Understanding that tho' the Soul perceives an unquiet Appetite within
her self of some great Good yet what that Good is or where to find it she knows not and falls on that which comes next Sensual Pleasures Riches Honours mistaking the Rivulets for the Fountains but still ends with a Restlesness and Dissatisfaction So Solomon after he had glutted himself with all the Pleasures so great a Knowledge could invent and so great a Power could procure Quicquid desideraverunt oculi mei non negavi eis quin omni voluptate fruerentur he experienc'd in all Vanitatem a certain Emptitiness Afflictionem spiritus an Affliction of Mind because Nothing is good or according to the innate Appetite of the Soul but GOD on the other side nothing is ill or contrary to this innate Appetite but Sin And hence it was that those Pauls Anthonies Hilaries who liv'd on raw Herbs lay on the hard Ground spent their Days in Prayer and Mortification and were depriv'd of all the Delights of Sense never complain'd of Misery because having God and being united to him they seem'd to want nothing whereas Solomon tho' abounding with Riches being without God seem'd to have nothing So true it is that there is nothing satisfactory to the Rational Soul but God and nothing hurtful or grievous to it but Sin The Holy Archbishop of Canterbury St. Anselm protests That he would rather leap into the eternal Flames of Hell purus a peccato free from Sin than peccati labe pollutus coelorum regna tenere defil'd with Sin to possess Heaven St. Augustine has many things to the same purpose but none more emphatically describes this Plague than St. Peter Chrysologus 'T is the nature of Sin says he to breathe forth a certain venemous Vapour in the Soul which so dims the two Lights of Faith and Reason that it leaves her wholly in Darkness So that being led by Passion she throws her self from one Precipice to another till she comes at length to the very Brink of Hell and yet sees not all this while whither she has faln or how near she is to her eternal Ruine Besides this her Fever afflicts her with an insatiable Thirst of all those things which increase her Disease and on the contrary side Fontibus dulcissimis amara salsedo it so spoils and vitiates her Taste that those Fountains of Graces and Spiritual Comforts the Sacraments Sermons Spiritual Books and the like which to a Soul in Health are most savory and delicious to her are as bitter as Gall. To this purpose St. Chrysologus By which sufficiently appears the deplorable Condition of a Soul in Sin had we a Sense or Understanding capable of conceiving it But as the Sickness of the Body is never the less dangerous because the Patient perceives not the Malignity of his Disease So the Condition of a Sick Soul is never the less miserable because in this Lethargy of Flesh and Blood she discerns not her own Misery And now if nothing else will serve the turn let at least the Danger of an Everlasting Death move us to look after a Cure and that as earnestly and efficaciously as the thing deserves When a wise and skilful Physician tells his Patient that he is in Danger of Death it makes him presently seek a Remedy attend to the Physician 's Prescriptions and put all diligently in execution But what is the Death of the Body compar'd with the Death of the Soul That is only Temporal This Eternal That implies a Separation of the Body from a Rational Soul This the Separation of the Soul from the Fountain of all Happiness Almighty God That leaves the Body bereav'd indeed of Sense yet without Pain This buries the Soul in Hell there to suffer and for ever such Torments that all the Pains and Torments of this Life are nothing to them When I sometimes consider with my self that it may be it is not impossible that I should one day groan under the heavy Burden of Eternal Damnation tho' I go no farther reflecting only on a meer Possibility of so great a Misery it makes my whole Body tremble My Hair stands an end my Heart pants and my Bones are almost disjointed with Fear But forasmuch as concerns a Probability thereof and such a Probability too that the contrary is improbable who is there that is not dead already or quite void of Sense who can live with such a Thought under such an Apprehension And yet certain it is that those who follow their sensual Inclinations and scarce ever seriously think of their Souls are in a Probability and in a very great Probability of being damn'd Damn'd Oh what a Deluge of Misery is included in that little word Damn'd Let these Considerations Beloved Christians sink into our Souls Let a just Horrour of Sin seise upon our Hearts And so dispos'd let us pass to the Second Part and learn to cure our Souls by weighing the Circumstances and considering the Particulars of this young Prince's miraculous Cure The Father of our Sick Youth no sooner heard of our Saviour's coming that way but he presently went unto him The first thing then we are to do is to have recourse to the Physician Abiit ad eum says the Text He departed unto him the word Abiit here signifying not only a Going to but a Going from Many are willing enough to go to the Heavenly Physician on condition that they may not go from the World They will I say go to him but not follow his Advice in parting with their Riches Honour Pleasure the Source and Origine of their peccant Humour and consequently the Cause of their Distemper The second thing is to Present him with our Petitions Et rogabat eum And he ask'd him Some come to him but like the proud Pharisee ask him nothing justifying themselves and scorning to acknowledge their Wants or any need they have of a Physician Quid rogaverit Deum quaere in verbis ejus nihil invenies Examine a little says St. Augustine the Pharisee's words and see what he ask'd of God and you shall find that he ask'd nothing This is not the way But on the contrary we must with Humility own our Misery and Sickness if ever we expect a Cure We must rogare beg with an humble Confidence ut descendat that he will come down to us at least that he will be pleas'd to cast down an Eye of Mercy upon our sad and helpless Condition and then we ought not to doubt of a Remedy from that Hand which is so far from repelling us when we ask that its Omnipotent Bounty is always beckning to us and encouraging us to ask The third thing which we ought to do is of very great moment and that for want whereof many have been eternally lost and it is not only to Go nor only to Ask but to do Both in time 'T is a dangerous thing to delay the Cure of our Souls Alas how many are there who at this instant fruitlesly deplore in eternal Torments that ever they put off