and preventing these sinful excesses of sorrow for the death of our dear Relations And although much hath been said already to disswade from this evil and I have enlarged already much beyond my first intention yet I shall cast in some farther help and assistance towards the healing of this distemper by prescribing the following Rules 1. Rule If you would not mourn excessively for the loss of creature-comforts then beware that you set not your delight and love excessively or inordinately upon them whilst you enjoy them Strong affections make strong afflictions the higher the Tyde the lower the Ebb. According to the measure of our delight in the enjoyment is our grief in the loss of these things The Apostle knits these two graces Temperance and Patience together in the Precept 2 Pet. 1. 16. And it 's very observable how Intemperance and Impatience are inseparably linked in experience yea the experience of the best men You read Gen. 37. 3. How Israel loved Joseph more than all his children because he was the son of his old age and he made him a coat of many colours This was the darling Jacobs heart was exceedingly set upon him his very life was bound up in the life of the Lad. Now when the supposed death of this child was brought to him How did he carry it See Ver. 34 35. And Jacob rent his cloaths and put sackcloth upon his loins and mourned for his Son many days And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him but he refused to be comforted and he said for I will go down into the grave to my Son mourning Thus his Father wept for him Here as in a glass the effects of excessive love to a child are represented Here you may see what work immoderate love will make even in a sanctified heart O therefore let your moderation be known to all men in your delights and sorrows about earthly things for ordinarily the proportion of the one is answerable to the other 2. Rule If you would not be overwhelmed with grief for the loss of your Relations be exact and careful in discharging your duties to them while you have them The testimony of your Conscience that you have laboured in all things to discharge the duties you owed to your Relations whilst they were with you will prove an excellent allay to your sorrows for them when they are no longer yours 'T is not so much the single affliction as the guilt charged upon us in times of affliction that makes our load so heavy O what a terrible thing is it to look upon our dead whilst Conscience is accusing and upbraiding us for our duties neglected and such or such sins committed O you little think how dreadful a spectacle this will make the dead body of thy friend to thee Conscience if not quite stupid or dead will speak at such a time O therefore as ever you would provide for a comfortable parting at death or meet again at Judgment be exact punctual and circumspect in all your relative duties 3. Rule If you would not be overwhelmed by trouble for the loss of your Relations then turn to God under your trouble and pour out your sorrows by prayer into his bosom This will ease and allay your troubles Blessed be God for the ordinance of prayer How much are all the Saints beholding to it at all times but especially in heart sinking and distressful times It 's some relief when in distress we can pour out our trouble into the bosom of a Wife or faithful Friend How much more when we leave our complaint before the gracious wise and faithful God I told you before of that holy man who having lost his dear and only Son got to his Closet there poured out his soul freely to the Lord and when he came down to his friends that were waiting below to comfort him and fearing how he would bear that stroke he came from his duty with a chearful countenance telling them he would be content to bury a Son if it were possible every day provided he might but enjoy such comfort as his soul had found in that private hour Go thy way Christian to thy God get thee to thy knees in the cloudy and dark day retire from all Creatures that thou mayst have thy full liberty with thy God and there pour out thy heart before him in free full and broken-hearted confessions of sin Judge thy self worthy of Hell as well as of this trouble Justifie God in all his smartest strokes beg him in this distress to put under thee the evering arms intreat one smile one gracious look to inlighten thy darkness and chear thy drooping spirit Say with the Prophet Jer. 17. 17 Be not then a terrour to me thou art my hope in the day of evil And try what relief such a course will afford thee Surely if thy heart be sincere in this course thou shalt be able to say with that holy man Psal. 94. 19. In the multitude of my thoughts which I had within me thy comforts have delighted my soul. 4. Rule If you would bear the loss of your dear Relations with moderation eye God in the whole process of the affliction more and secondary causes and circumstances of the matter less I was dumb I opened not my mouth because thou didst it Psal. 39. 9. Consider the hand of the Lord in the whole matter And that First As a Soveraign hand which hath right to dispose of thee and all thy comforts without thy leave or consent Job 33. 13. Secondly As a Fathers hand correcting thee in love and faithfulness Prov. 3. 11. Whom the Lord loveth he correcteth as a Father the Son in whom he delighteth O if once you could but see affliction as a rod in a Fathers hand as proceeding from his love and intended for your eternal good How quiet would you then be And surely if it draw your heart nearer to God and mortifie it more to this vain world it is a rod in the hand of special love If it end in your love to God doubt not but it comes from Gods love to you Thirdly As a just and righteous hand Hast thou not procured this to thy self by thy own folly Yea the Lord is just in all that is come upon thee Whatever he hath done yet he hath done thee no wrong Fourthly Lastly As a moderate and merciful hand that hath punished thee less than thine iniquities deserve he hath cast thee into affliction he might justly have cast thee into Hell It 's of the Lords mercy that thou art not consumed Why doth the living man complain 5. Rule If you would bear your affliction with moderation compare it with the affliction of other men and that will greatly quiet your spirits You have no cause to say God hath dealt bitterly with you and that there is no sorrow like your sorrow Look round about you and impartially consider the conditions that others are in and they nothing
in one Hence it s noted in Scripture as the greatest of earthly Sorrows Jer. 6. 26. O daughter of my people gird thee with Sackcloth and wallow thy self in Ashes Make thee mourning as for an onely Son most bitter Lamentation Yea so deep and penetrating is this grief that the holy Ghost borrows it to express the deepest spritual troubles by it Zech. 12. 10 They shall mourn for him namely Christ whom they pierced as one mourneth for an only Son Fourthly And yet to heighten the afflliction it is super added ver 12. And she was a Widdow So that the staff of her age on whom she leaned was broken She had now none left to comfort or assist her in her helpless comfortless State of Widdowhood which is a condition not only void of comfort but exposed to oppression and contempt Yea and being a Widdow the whole burden lay upon her alone she had not an Husband to comfort her as Elkana did Hannah in 1 Sam. 1. 8. Why weepest thou and why is thy heart grieved â—m not I more to thee than ten Sons This would have been a great relief but her Husband was dead as well as her Son both gone and she only surviving to lament the loss of those comforts that once she had Her calamities came not single but one after another and this reviving and aggravating the former This was her case and condition when the Lord met her Secondly Let us consider the Councel which Christ gives her with respect to this hersad and sorrowful case And when the Lord saw her he had Compassion on her and said unto her Weep not Relieving and Supporting words wherein we shall consider The Occasion Motive Councel it self First The occasion of it and that was his seeing of her This meeting at the Gate of the City how accidental and occasional soever it seems yet without doubt it was providentially suited to the work intended to be wrought The eye of his Omniscience foresaw her and this meeting was by him designed as an ocâ—â—sion of that famous Miracle which he wrought upon the young man Christ hath a quick eye to discern poor mourning and disconsolate Creatures and though he be now in Heaven and stands out of our sight so that we see him not yet he sees us and his eye which is upon all our troubles still affects his heart and moves his bowels for us Secondly The Motive stirring him up to give this relieving and comfortable Councel to her was his own Compassion She neither expected nor desired it from him but so full of tender pittty was the Lord towards her that he prevents her with unexpected consolation Her heart was nothing so full of compassion for her Son as Christ was for her He bore our infirmities even natural as well as moral ones in the dayes of his flesh and though he be now exalted to the highest glory yet still he continues as merciful as ever and as apt to be touched with the sense of our miseries Heb. 4. 15. Lastly The Councel it self Weep not herein fulfilling the office of a Comforter to them that mourn whereunto he was anointed Isa. 61. 1 2 3. Yet the words are not an absolute prohibition of tears and sorrow he doth not Condemn â—ll mourning as sinful or all expressions of grief for dead Relations as uncomely no Christ would not have his people stupid and insensate he only prohibits the excesses and extravagancies of our sorrows for the dead that it should not be such a mourning for the dead as is found among the Heathens who sorrow without measure because without hope being ignorant of that grand relief by the Resurrection which the Gospel reveals The Resurrection of her Son from the dead is the ground upon which Christ builds her consolation and reliefe Well might he say Weep not when he intended quickly to remove the cause of her tears by restoring him again to life Now though there be somewhat in this case extraordinary and peculiar for few or none that carry their dear children to the grave may expect to receive them again from the dead immediately by a special resurrection as she did I say this is not to be expected by any that now loose their Relations the occasion and reasons of such miraculous special resurrections being removed by a sufficient and full evidence and confirmation of Christs divine power and Godhead Yet those that now bury their Relations if they be such as dye in Christ have as good and sufficient reason to moderate their passions as this mourner had and do as truly come within the reach and compass of this Christs comfortable and supporting councel Weep not as the did For do but consider what of support or comfort can a particular and present Resurrection from the dead give us more than that it is and as it is a Specimen hansell or pledge of the general Resurrection It is not the returning of the soul to its body to live an Animal life again in this world of sin and sorrow and shortly after to undergo the agonies and pains of death again that is in it self any such priviledge as may afford much comfort to the person raised or his Relations It is no priviledge to the person raised for it returns him from rest to trouble from the harbour back again into the Ocean It is matter of trouble to many dying Saints to hear of the likelyhood of their returning again when they are got so nigh to Heaven It was once the case of a godly Minister of this Nation who was much troubled at his return and said I am like a sheep driven out of the storm almost to the fold and then driven back into the storm again or a weary Traveller that is come near his home and then must go back to fetch somewhat he had forgotten or an Apprentice whose time is almost expired and then must begin a new term But to die and then return again from the dead hath less of priviledge than to return only from the brink of the grave for the sick hath not yet felt the agonies and last struggles or pangs ofdeath but such have felt them once and must feel them again they must die twice before they can be happy once and besides during the little time they spend on earth betwixt the first and second dissolution there is a perfect 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 forgetfulness and insensibleness of all that which they saw or enjoyed in their state of separation It being necessary both for them and others that it should be so for themselves its necessary that they may be content to live and endure the time of separation from that blessed and ineffable state quietly and patiently and for others that they may live by faith and not by sense and build upon divine and not humane authority and report So that here you see their agonies and pangs are doubled and yet their life not sweetned by any sense
to restraine prayer and turn thy back upon God Or if thou darest not wholly neglect thy duty yet thy affliction spoyles the success and comfort of it thy heart is wandering dead distracted in prayer and meditation so that thou hast no relief or comfort from it Rouze up thy self Christian and consider This is not right Surely the rod works not kindly now What did thy love to God expire when thy friend expired Is thy heart as cold in duty as his body is in the grave Hath natural death seized him and spiritual deadness seized thee Sure then thou hast more reason to lament thy dead heart than thy dead friend Divert the stream of thy troubles speedily and labour to recover thy self out of this temper quickly least sad experience shortly tell thee that what thou now mournest for is but a trifle to that that thou shalt mourn for hereafter To loose the heavenly warmth and spiritual liveliness of thy affections is undoubtedly a far more considerable loss than to loose the wife of thy bosom or the sweetest child that ever a tender parent laid in the grave Reader If this be thy case Thou hast reason to challenge the first place among the mourners It s better for thee to bury ten sons than to remit one degree of love or delight in God The end of God in smiting was to win thy heart nearer to him by removing that which estranged it How then dost thou cross the very design of God in this dispensation Must God then lose his delight in thy fellowship because thou hast lost thine in the creature Surely when thy troubles thus accompany thee to thy closet they are sinful and extravagant troubles Fourthly Then you may also conclude your sorrows to be excessive and sinful When they so overload and oppress your bodies as to endanger your lives or render them useless and unfit for service Worldly Sorrow works death 2 Cor. 7. 10. that is Sorrow after the manner of worldly men sorrow in a meer carnal natural way which is not relieved by any spiritual reasonings and considerations This falls so heavysometimes upon the body that it sinks under the weight and is cast into such diseases as are never more wrought off or healed in this world Heaviness in the heart of a man makes it stoop saith Solomon Prov. 12. 25. The stoutest body must stoop under heart pressures It is with the mind of man saith one as with the stone Tyrhenus as long as its whole it swimeth but once broken it sinks presently Grief is a moth which getting into the mind will in short time make the body be it never so strong and well wrought a piece like an old seary garment Philosophers and Physitians generally reckon sorrow among the chief causes of shortning life Christ was a man of sorrows and acquainted with griefes and this some think was the reason that he appeared as a man of fifty when he was little more than thirty years old Joh. 8. 57. But his sorrows were of another kind Many a mans Soul is to his Body as a sharp knife to a thin sheath which easily cuts it through and what do we by poreing and pondering upon our troubles but whet the knife that it may cut the deeper and quicker Of all the Creatures that ever God made Devils only excepted man is the most able and apt to be his own tormentor How unmercifully do we load them in times of affliction How do we not only waste their strength by sorrow but deny relief and necessary refreshment They must carry the load but be allowed no refreshment If they can eat the bread of affliction and drink tears they may feed at full but no pleasant bread no quiet sleep is permitted them Surely you would not burden a beast as you do your own bodies you would pitty and relieve a bruit beast groaning and sinking under an heavy burden but you will noc pitty not relieve your own bodies Some mens souls have given such deep wounds to their bodies that they are never like to enjoy many easie or comfortable dayes more whilst they dwell in them Now this is very sinful and displeasing to God for if he have such a tender care for our bodies that he would not have us swallowed up of over much grief no though it be for sin 2 Cor. 2. 7. but even to that sorrow sets bounds How much less with outward sorrow for temporal losses May not your stock of natural strength be imployed to better purposes think you than these Time may come that you may earnestly wish you had that health and strength again to spend for God which you now so lavishly waste and prodigally cast away upon your troubles to no purpose or advantage It was therefore an high point of wisdom in David and Recorded no doubt for our immitation who when the child was dead ceased to mourn but arose washed himself and eat bread 2 Sam. 12. 20. Fifthly When affliction sowres the Spirit with discontent and makes it inwardly grudge against the hand of God then our trouble is full of sin and we ought to be humbled for it before the Lord. Whatever God doth with us or ours still we should maintain good thoughts of him A gracious heart cleaves nearer and nearer to God in affliction and can justifie God in his severest strokes acknowledging them to be all just and holy Psal. 119. 75 I know also that thy Judgements are right and that thou in faithfulness hast afflicted me And hereby the soul may comfortably evidence to it self its own uprightness and sincere love to God Yea it hath been of singular use to some souls to take right measures of their love to God in such tryals to have lovely and well pleased thoughts of God even when he smites us in our nearest and dearest comforts argues plainly that we love him for himself and not for his gifts only And that his interest in the heart is deeper than any creature interest is And such is the comfort that hath resulted to some from such discoveries of their own hearts by close smarting afflictions that they would not part with it to have their comforts whose removal occasioned them given back in lieu of it But to swell with secret discontent and have hard thoughts of God as if he had done us wrong or dealt more severely with us than any O this is a vile temper cursed fruit springing from an evil root a very carnal ignorant proud heart or at least from a very distempered if renewed heart So it was with Jonah when God smote his Gourd Tea saith he I do well to be angry even unto death Jonah 4. 9. Poor man he was highly distempered at this time and out of frame this was not his true temper or ordinary frame but a surprize the effect of a paroxisme of temptation in which his passions had been over-heated Few dare to vent it in such language But how many have their
A TOKEN FOR MOURNERS OR The Advice of Christ to a distressed Mother bewailing the Death of her Dear and only Son WHEREIN The Boundaries of Sorrow are duly fixed Excesses restrained the Common Pleas Answered and divers Rules for the support of Gods afflicted ones prescribed By J. F. Preacher of the Gospel of Christ at Dartmouth in Devon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Transivere patres simul hinc transibimus omnes In coelo patriam qui bene transit habet LONDON Printed for Robert Boulter at the Turks-head in Cornhill over against the Royal Exchange 1674. THE Epistle Dedicatory To his dearly beloved Brother and Sister Mr J. C. and Mrs. E. C. the Author wisheth Grace Mercy and Peace Dear Friends THE double tye of Nature and Grace beside the many endearing passages that for so many years have linked and glewed our affections so intimately cannot but beget a tender sympathy in me under all your troubles and make me say of every affliction which befalls you half mine I find it is with our affections as with the strings of Musical instruments exactly set at the same height if one be touched the other trembles though it be at some distance Our affections are one and so in a great measure have been our afflictions also You cannot forget that in the years lately past the Almighty visited my Tabernacle with the Rod and in one year cut off from it the root and the branch the tender Mother and the only Son What the effects of those strokes or rather of my own unmortified passions were I have felt and you and others have heard Surely I was as a Bullock unaccustomed to the Yoak Yea I may say with them Lam. 3. 19 20. Remembring mine affliction and my misery the wormwood and the gall my soul hath them still in remembrance and is humbled in me I dare not say that ever I felt my heart discontentedly rising and swelling against God no I could still justifie him when I most sensibly smarted by his hand if he had plunged me into a Sea of sorrow yet I could say in all that Sea of Sorrow there is not a drop of injustice But it was the over-heating and over-acting of my fond and unmortified affections and passions that made so sad impressions upon my body and cast me under those distempers which soon imbittered all my remaining comforts to me It was my earnest desire so soon as I had strength and opportunity for so great a Journey to visit you that so if the Lord had pleased I might both refresh and be refreshed by you after all my sad and disconsolate daye And you cannot imagine what content and pleasure I projected in that visit but it proved to us as all other Comforts of the same kind ordinarily do more in expectation than in fruition for how soon after our joyful meeting and embraces did the Lord overcast and darken our day by sending death into your Tabernacle to take away the desire of your eyes with a stroke to crop off that sweet and only bud from which we promised our selves so much Comfort But no more of that I fear I am gone too far already It is not my design to exasperate your troubles but to heal them and for that purpose have I sent you these papers which I hope may be of use both to you and many others in your condition since they are the after-fruits of my own troubles things that I commend not to you from another hand but which I have in some measure proved and tasted in my own tryals But I will not hold you longer here I have only a few things to desire for and from you and I have done The things I desire are First That you will not be too hasty to get off the yoak which God hath put upon your neck Remember when your child was in the Womb neither of you desired it should be delivered thence till Gods appointed time was fully come and now that you travail again with sorrow for its death O desire not to be delivered from your sorrows one moment before Gods time for your deliverance be fully come also Let patience have its perfect work that Comfort which comes in Gods way and season will stick by you and do you good indeed Secondly I desire that though you and your afflictions had a sad meeting yet you and they may have a Comfortable parting If they effect that upon your hearts which God sent them for I doubt not but you will give them a fair testimony when they go off If they obtain Gods blessing upon them in their operation surely they will have your blessing too at their valediction And what you entertained with fear you will dismiss with praise How sweet is it to hear the afflicted soul say when God is looseing his bands It 's good for me that I have been afflicted Thirdly I heartily wish that these searching afflictions may make the most satisfying discoveries that you may now see more of the evil of sin the vanity of the Creature and the fullness of Christ than ever you yet saw Afflictions are searchers and put the soul upon searching and trying its ways Lam. 3. 40. When our sin finds us out by affliction happy are we if by the light of affliction we find out sin Blessed is the man whom God chasteneth and teacheth out of his Law Psal. 94. 12. There are unseen causes many times of our troubles you have an advantage now to sift out the seeds and principles from which they spring Fourthly I wish that all the love and delight you bestowed upon your little one may now be placed to your greater advantage upon Jesus Christ and that the stream of your affection to him may be so much the stronger as there are now fewer chanels for it to be devided into If God will not have any part of your happiness to lye in children then let it wholly lye in himself If the Jealousie of the Lord hath removed that which drew away too much of your heart from him and hath spoken by this rod saying Stand aside child thou art in my way and fillest more room in thy Parents hearts than belongs to thee O then deliver up all to him and say Lord take the whole heart intirely and undividedly to thy self Henceforth let there be no parting sharing or deviding of the affections betwixt God and the Creature let all the streams meet and center in thee only Fifthly That you may be strengthned with all might in the inner man to all patience that the peace of God may keep your heart and mind Labour to bring your hearts to a meek submission to the rod of your Father We had Fathers of our flesh who corrected us and we gave them reverence shall we not much more be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live Is it comely for children to contest and strive with their Father Or is it the way to be freed from the yoak
by struggling under it Oh that your hearts might be in a like frame with his that said Lord thou shalt beat and I will bear It was a good observation that one made Anima sedendo quiescendo fit sapiens The Soul grows wise by sitting still and quiet under the rod. And the Apostle calls those excellent fruits which the Saints gather from their sanctified afflictions The peaceable fruits of Righteousness Heb. 12. 11 Lastly My hearts desire and prayer to God for you is that you may die daily to all visible enjoyments and by these frequent converses with death in your family you may be prepared for your own change and dissolution when it shall come O Friends How many graves have you and I seen opened for our dear Relations How oft hath death come up into our windows and summoned the delight of our eyes It is but a little while and we shall go to them we and they are distinguished but by short intervals Transivere patres simul hinc transibimus omnes Our dear Parents are gone our lovely and desireable children are gone our bosom Relations that were as our own souls are gone the greatest part of us is gone And do not all these warning-knocks at our dores acquaint us that we must prepare to follow shortly after them O that by these things our own death might be both more easie and more familiar to us the oftner it visits us the better we should be acquainted with it and the more of our beloved Relations it removes before us the less of either snare and intanglement remains for us when our turn comes My dear Friends my flesh and my blood I beseech you for Religion sake for your own sake and for my sake whose Comfort is in great part bound up in your prosperity and welfare that you read frequently ponder seriously and apply believingly these Scripture-consolations and directions which in some haste I have gathered for your use and the God of all consolation be with you I am Your most endeared Brother JOHN FLAVEL Luke 7. 13. And when the Lord saw her he had Compassion on her and said to her Weep not TO be above the stroke of passions is a condition equal to Angels to be in a State of Sorrow without the sense of sorrow is a disposition beneath Beasts but duly to regulate our Sorrows and bound our Passions under the rod is the Wisdom duty and excellency of a Christian. He that is without natural affections is deservedly ranked among the worst of Heathens and he that is able rightly to manage them deserves to be numbred with the best of Christians Though when we are Sanctified we put on the Divine Nature yet till we are glorified we put not off the infirmities of our humane Nature Whilest we are within the reach of troubles we cannot be without the danger nor ought to be without the fear of sin and it is as hard for us to escape sin being in adversity as becalming in prosperity How apt we are to transgress the bounds both of Reason and Religion under a sharp affliction appears as in most mens experience so in this Womans example to whose excessive Sorrow Christ puts a stop in the Text He saw her and had Compassion on her and said to her Weep not The Lamentations and waylings of this distressed mother moved the tender compassions of the Lord in beholding it and stirred up more pitty in his heart for her than could be in her heart for her dear and only Son In the words we are to consider both the Condition of the woman and the Counsel of Christ with respect unto it First The condition of this Woman which appears to be very dolorous and distressed her groans and tears moved and melted the very heart of Christ to hear and behold them When he saw her he had Compassion on her How sad an hour it was with her when Christ met her appears by what is so distinctly remark't by the Evangelist in ver 12. where it is said Now when they came nigh to the Gate of the City behold there was a dead man carried out the only Son of his Mother and she was a Widdow and much people of the City was with her In this one Verse divers heart piercing circumstances of this affliction are noted First It was the death of a Son To bury a child any child must needs rend the heart of a tender Parent for what are children but the parent multiplied a child is a part of the parent made up in another skin But to lay a Son in the grave A Son which continues the name and supports the family this was ever accounted a very great affliction Secondly This Son was not carried from the Cradle to the Coffin nor stript out of its Swathing to be wrapt in its Winding cloaths Had he dyed in infancy before he had engaged affection or raised expectation the affliction had not been so pungent and cutting as now it was Death smote this Son in the flower and Prime of his time He was a man saith the Evangelist ver 12. a young man as Christ calls him ver 14. he was now arrived at that age which made him capable of yeilding his Mother all that comfort which had been the expectation and hope of many years and the reward and fruit of many cares and Labours Yet then when the endearments were greatest and her hopes highest even in the flower of his age he is cut off Thus Basil bewayled the death of his Son Filius mihi erat adolescens solus vitaesuccessor solatium senectae gloria generis flos aequalium fulcrum domu saetatem gratiosissimam agebat hic raptus periit qui paulo ante jucundam vocem edebat jucundissimum spectaculum parentis oculis erat I once had a Son who was a young man my only successor the solace of my age the glory of his kind the prop of my family arrived to the endearing age then was he snatcht from me by death whose lovely voice but a little before I heard who lately was a pleasant spectacle to his Parent Reader if this have been thine own condition as it hath been his that writes it I need say no more to convince thee that it was a sorrowful State indeed Christ met this tender Mother in Thirdly And which is yet more he was not only a Son but an only Son so you find in ver 12. He was the only Son of his Mother One in whom all her hopes and Comforts of that kind were bound up For Omnis in Ascanio stat chari cura Parentis All her affections were contracted into this one object If we have never so many children we know not which of them to spare If they stand like Olive plants about our Table it would grieve us to see the least twigg amongst them broken down But surely the death of one out of many is much more tolerable than of all
vain and useless complaints of our misery or the dirt of sinful and wicked complaints of the dealings of the Lord with us The rod of affliction goes round and visits all sorts of persons without difference It is upon the Tabernacles of the just and of the unjust the righteous and the wicked both are mourning under the rod. The godly are not so to be minded as that the other be wholly neglected they have as strong and tender though not as regular affections to their Relations and must not be wholly suffered to sink under their unrelieved burthens Here therefore I must have respect to two sorts of persons whom I find in tears upon the same account I mean the loss of their dear Relations the Regenerate and the unregenerate I am a debtor to both and shall endeavour their support and assistance for even the unregenerate call for our help and pitty and must not be neglected and wholly slighted in their afflictions We must pitty them that can't pitty themselves The Law of God commands us to help a beast if fallen under its burden How much more a man sinking under a load of sorrow I confess uses of comfort to the unregenerate are not ordinarily in use among us and it may seem strange whence any thing of support should be drawn for them that have no special interest in Christ or the promises I confess also I find my self under great disadvantages for this work I cannot offer them those reviving cordials that are contained in Christ and the covenant for Gods afflicted people but yet such is the goodness of God even to his enemies that they are not left wholly without supports or means to allay their Sorrow If this therefore be thy case who readest these lines afflicted and unsanctified mourning bitterly for thy dead friends and more cause to mourn for thy dead soul Christless and graceless as well as childless or friendless no comfort in hand nor yet in hope full of trouble and no vent by prayer or faith to ease thy heart Poor creature thy case is sad but yet do not wholly sink and suffer thy self to be swallowed up of grief thou hast laid thy dear one in the grave yet throw not thy self head-long into the grave after him that will not be the way to remedy thy misery but sit down a while and ponder these three things First That of all persons in the World thou hast most reason to be tender over thy life and health and careful to preserve it for if thy troubles destroy thee thou art eternally lost undone for ever Worldly sorrow saith the Apostle works death And if it works thy death it works thy damnation also for Hell follows that pale horse Revel 6. 8. If a believer dyes there 's no danger of Hell to him the second death hath no power over him but wo to thee if it overtake thee in thy sin beware therefore what thou dost against thy health and life Don't put the candle of sorrow too near that thread by which thou hangest over the mouth of Hell O its far better to be childless or friendless on earth than hopeless and remediless in hell Secondly Own and admire the bounty and goodness of God manifested to thee in this affliction that when death came into thy family to smite and carry off one it had not fallen to thy lot to be the person thy Husband Wife or Child is taken and thou art left Had thy name been in the Commission thou hadst been now past hope O the sparing mercy of God! the wonderful long suffering of God towards thee Possibly that poor creature that is gone never provoked God as thou hast done thy poor child never abused mercies neglected calls treasur'd up the thousandth part of that guilt thou hast done So that thou mightest well immagine it should rather have cut thee down that hadst so provoked God than thy poor little one But oh the admirable patience of God! Oh the riches of long suffering Thou art only warned not smitten by it Is there nothing in this worth thy thankful acknowledgement Is it not better to be in black for another on earth than in the blackness of darkness for ever Is it not easier to go to the grave with thy dead friend and weep there than to go to hell among the damned where there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth Thirdly This affliction for which thou mournest may be the greatest mercy to thee that ever yet befel thee in this world God hath now made thy heart soft by trouble shewed thee the vanity of this World and what a poor trifle it is which thou madest thy happiness There is now a dark cloud spread over all thy worldly comforts Now O now if the Lord would but strike in with this affliction and by it open thine eyes to see thy deplorable state and take off thy heart for ever from the vain world which thou now seest hath nothing in it and cause thee to chuse Christ the only abiding good for thy portion If now thy affliction may but bring thy sin to remembrance and thy dead friend may but bring thee to a sense of thy dead soul which is as cold to God and spiritual things as his body is to thee and more loathsome in his eyes than that corps is or shortly will be to the eyes of men Then this day is certainly a day of the greatest mercy that ever yet thou sawest O happy death that shall prove life to thy soul. Why this is sometimes the way of the Lord with men Job 36. 8 9. If they be bound in fetters and helden in cords of affliction then he sheweth them their work and their transgression that they have exceeded he openeth also their ear to discipline and commandeth them that they return from iniquity O Consider poor pensive creature that which stole away thy heart from God is now gone That which eat up thy time and thoughts that there was no room for God soul or eternity in them is gone All the vain expectations thou raisedst up to thy self from that poor creature which now lyes in the dust are in one day perished O what an advantage hast thou now for heaven beyond what ever thou yet hadst If God will but bless this rod thou wilt have cause to keep many a thanksgiving day for this day I pray let these three things be pondred by you I can bestow no more comforts upon you your condition bars the best comforts from you they belong to the people of God and you have yet nothing to do with them I shall therefore turn from you to them and present some choicer comforts to them to whom they properly belong which may be of great use to you in reading if it be but to convince you of the blessed priviledge and state of the people of God in the greatest plunges of troubles in this world and what advantages their interest in Christ gives
I beseech you the time of your childs continuance in the womb was fixed to a minute by the Lord and when the parturient fulness of that time was come Were you not willing it should be delivered thence into the world The tender Mother would not have it abide one minute longer in the womb how well soever she loved it And is there not the same reason we should be willing when Gods appointed time is come to have it delivered by death out of this state which in respect of the life of Heaven is but as the life of a child in the womb to its life in the open world And let none say that the death of children is a premature death God hath waies to ripen them for Heaven whom he intends to gather thither betimes which we know not In respect of fitness they dye in a full age though they be cut off in the bud of their time He that appointed the seasons of the year appointed the seasons of our comfort in Relations and as those seasons cannot be altered no more can these All the course of providence is guided by an unalterable decree what falls out casually to our apprehension yet falls out necessarily in respect of Gods appointment O therefore be quieted in it this must needs be as it is 4. Consid. Hath God smitten your darling and taken away the delight of your eyes with his stroke Bear this stroke with patience and quiet submission for how know you but your trouble might have been greater from the life than it is now from the death of your children Sad experience made a holy man once to say It s better weep for ten dead children than for one living child a living child may prove a continual dropping yea a continual dying to the parents heart What a sad word was that of David to Abishai 2 Sam. 16. 11. Behold saith he my Son which came out of my bowels seeketh my life I remember Seneca in his consolatory Epistle to his friend Marullus brings in his friend thus aggravating the death of his child O saith Marullus Had my child lived with me to how great modesty gravity and prodence might my discipline have formed and moulded him But saith Seneca which is more to be feared he might have been as others mostly are for look saith he what children come even out of the worthiest families such who exercise both their own and others lusts in all whose life there is not a day without the mark of some notorious wickedness upon it I know your tender love to your children will scarce admit such jealousies of them they are for present sweet lovely innocent companions and you doubt not but by your care of their education and prayer for them they might have been the joy of your hearts Why doubtless Esan when he was little and in his tender age promised as much comfort to his parents as Jacob did and I question not but Isaac and Rebecca a gracious pair spent as many prayers and bestowed as many holy councels upon him as they did upon his brother But when the child grew up to riper years then he became a sharp affliction to his Parents for it s said in Gen. 26. 34. That when Esau was forty years old he took to wife Judith the daughter of Berith the Hittite which was a grief of mind to Isaac and Rebecca The word in the original comes from a root that signifies to imbitter This child imbittered the minds of his parents by his rebellion against them and despising their councells And I cannot doubt but Abraham disciplin'd his family as strictly as any of you never man received an higher encomium from God upon that account Gen. 18. 19. I know him that he will command his children and his houshold after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord. Nor can I think but he bestowed as many and as frequent prayers for his children and particularly for his Ishmael as any of you We find one and that a very pathetical one recorded Gen. 17. 18. O that Ishmael might live before thee and yet you know how he proved a son that yeilded him no more comfort than Esau did to Jacob and Rebeccah O how much more common is it for parents to see the vices and evils of their children than their vertues and graces And where one parent lives to rejoice in beholding the grace of God shining forth in the life of his child there are twenty it may be an hundred that live to behold to their vexation and grief the workings of corruption in them It is a note of Plutarch in his Morals Niocles saith he lived not to see the noble Victory obtained by Themistocles his Son Nor Miltiades to see the battle his Son Cimon wan in the field Nor Zantippus to hear his Son Pericles Preach and make Orations Ariston never heard his Son Plato's lectures and disputations But men saith he commonly live to see their children fall a Gaming Revelling Drinking and Whoring multitudes live to see such things to their sorrow And if thou be a gracious soul O what a cut would this be to thy very heart to see those as David spake of his Absolom that came out of thy bowels to be sinning against God that God whom thou lovest and whose honour is dearer to thee than thy very life But admit they should prove civil and hopeful children yet mightest thou not live to see more misery come upon them than thou couldst endure to see O think what a sad and doleful sight was that to Zedekiah Jer. 50. 10. The King of Babilon brought his children and slew them before his eyes Horrid spectacle and that leads to the 5. Consid. How know you but by this stroke which you so lament God hath taken them away from the evil to come It is Gods usual way when some extraordinary calamities are coming upon the world to hide some of his weak and tender ones out of the way by death Isa. 57. 1 2. He leaves some and removes others but taketh care for the security of all He provided a grave for Methuselah before the flood The grave is an hiding place to some and God sees it better for them to be under ground than above ground in such evil dayes Just as a careful and tender Father who hath a Son abroad at school hearing the Plague is broken out in or near the place sends his Horse presently to fetch home his Son before the danger and difficulty be greater Death is our Fathers pale Horse which he fends to fetch home his tender children and carry them out of harms way Surely when National calamities are drawing on it s far better for our friends to be in the grave in peace than exposed to the miseries and distresss that are here which is the meaning of Jer. 22. 10. Weep not for the dead neither bemoan him but weep for him that goeth away for he shall return no
more nor see his native Country And is there not a dreadful sound of troubles now in our ears Do not the clouds gather blackness Surely all things round about us seem to be preparing and disposing themselves for affliction The dayes may be nigh in which you shall say Blessed is the womb that never bare and the paps that never gave suck It was in the day wherein the faith and patience of the Saints were exercised that John heard a voice from heaven saying to him Write Blessed are the dead which dye in the Lord from benceforth Thy friend hy an Act of favour is disbanded by death whilst thou thy self art left to endure a great fight of affliction And now if troubles come thy cares and fears will be so much the less and thy own death so much the easier to thee when so much of thee is in heaven already In this case the Lord by a mercifull dispensation is providing both for their safety and thy own easier passage to them In removing thy friends before hand he seems to say to thee as he did to Peter Joh. 13. 7. What I do thou knowest not now but hereafter thou shalt know it The eye of Providence hath a prospect far beyond thine it would be in probability an harder task for thee to leave them behind than to follow them A tree that 's deeply rooted in the earth requires many strokes to fell it but when its roots are loosned before hand then an easie stroke layes it down upon the earth 6. Consid. A parting time must needs come and why is not this as good as another You knew before hand your child or friend was mortal and that the thred that linked you together must be cut If any one saith Basil had asked you when your child was born What is that which is born What would you have answered Would you not have said it is a man and if a man than a Mortal vanishing thing And why then are you surprized with wonder to see a dying thing dead He saith Seneca who complaines that one is dead complains that he was a man All men are under the same condition to whose share it falls to be born to him it remains to dye We are indeed distinguisht by intervalls but equalized in the Issue It is appointed to all men once to dye Heb. 9. 27. There is a statute Law of heaven in the case Possibly you think this is the worst time for parting that could be had you enjoyed it longer you could have parted easier but how are you deceiv'd in that The longer you had enjoyed it the lother still you would have been to leave it the deeper it would have rooted it self in your affection Had God given you such a priviledge as was once granted to the English Parliament that the union betwixt you and your friend should not be dissolved till you your self were willing it should be dissolved When think you would you have been willing it should be dissolved It s well for us and ours that our times are in Gods hand not in our own And how immature soever it seemed to be when it was cut down yet it came to the grave in a full age as a shock of corn in its season Job 5. 26. They that are in Christ and in the Covenant never dye unseasonably whensoever they dye Saith one upon the Text They dye in a good old age yea though they dye in the spring and flower of youth they dye in a good old age i. e. They are ripe for death when ever they dye When ever the godly dye its harvest time with him though in a natural capacity he be cut down while he is green and cropt in the bud or blossom yet in his spiritual capacity he never dyes before he is ripe God can ripen his speedily he can let out such warm rayes and beams of his spirit upon them as shall soon maturate the seeds of grace into a preparedness for glory It was doubtless the most fit and seasonable time for them that ever they could dye in and as it is a fit time for them so for you also Had it lived longer it might either have engaged you more and so your parting would have been harder or else have puzled and stumbled you more by discovering its natural corruption And then what a stinging aggravation of your sorrow would that have been Surely the Lord of time is the best Judge of time and in nothing do we more discover our folly and rashness then in presuming to fix the times either of our comforts or troubles as to our comforts we never think they can come to soon we would have them presently whether the season be fit or not as Numb 12. 13. Heal her now Lord. O let it be done speedily we are in post hast for our comforts and as for our afflictions we never think they come late enough not at this time Lord rather at any other time than now But it s good to leave the timing both of the one and other to him whose works are all beautiful in their seasons and never doth any thing in an improper time 7. Consid. Call to mind in this day of trouble the Covenant you have made with God and what you solemnly promised him in the day you took him for your God It will be very seasonable and useful for thee Christian at this time to reflect upon those transactions and the frame of thy heart in those dayes when an heavier load of Sorrow prest thy heart than thou now feelest In those your spiritual distresses when the burthen of sin lay heavy the curse of the Law the fear of hell the dread of death and eternity beset thee on every side and shut thee up to Christ the only door of hope Ah what good news wouldst thou then have accounted it to escape that danger with the loss of all earthly comforts Was not this thy cry in those dayes Lord give me Christ and deny me what ever else thou pleasest Pardon my sin save my soul and in order to both unite me with Christ and I will never repine or open my mouth Do what thou wilt with me let me be friendless let me be childless let me be poor let me be any thing rather than a Christless graceless hopeless soul. And when the Lord hearkned to thy cry and shewed thee mercy when he drew thee off from the world into thy closet and there treated with thee in secret when he was working up thy heart to the terms of his Covenant and made thee willing to accept Christ upon his own terms O then how heartily didst thou submit to his yoak as most reasonable and easie as at that time it seemed to thee Call to mind these dayes the secret places where Christ and you made the bargain Have not these words or words to this sense been whispered by thee into his ear with a dropping eye and melting heart
be His joy and Crown of rejoycing in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ at his coming 1 Thes. 2. 19 20. which must needs imply his distinct knowledge of them in that day which must be many hundred years after death had separated them from each other Whether this knowledge shall be by the glorified eyes discerning any lineaments or property of individuation remaining upon the glorified bodies of our Relations or whether it shall be by immediate revelation as Adam knew his wife or as Peter James and John knew Moses and Elias in the Mount as it is difficult to determine so it is needless to puzel our selves about it It is the concurrent judgement of sound Divines and it wants not countenance from Scripture and reason that such a knowledge of them shall be in Heaven and then the sadness of this parting will be abundantly recompensed by the joy of that meeting Especially considering Thirdly That at your next meeting they shall be unspeakably more desirable sweet and excellent than ever they were in this world They had a desirableness in them here but yet they were not altogether lovely and in every respect desirable they had their infirmities both natural and moral but all these are removed in Heaven and for ever done away No natural infirmities hang about glorified bodies nor sinful ones upon perfected spirits of the just Oh what lovely creatures will they appear to you then when that which is sown now in dishonour shall be raised in honour 1 Cor. 15. And then to Crown all Fourthly You shall have an everlasting enjoyment of them in Heaven never to part again The children of the Resurrection can dye no more Luk. 20. 36. You shall kiss their pale lips and cold cheeks no more you shall never fear another parting pull but be together with the Lord for ever 1 Thes. 4. 17. And this the Apostle thought an effectual Cordial in this case when he exhorted the Thessalonians to comfort one another with these words 10. Consid. The present felicity into which all that dye in Christ are presently admitted should abundantly comfort Christians over the death of such as either carried a lively hope out of the world with them or have left good grounds of such an hope behind them Some there are that carried a lively hope to heaven with them who could evidence to themselves and friends their interest in Christ and in the Covenant Yea though they had dyed in silence yet their conversations would speak for them and the tenour of their lives leave no ground of doubting touching their death others dying in their infancy or youth though they carried not such an actual hope with them yet they have left good grounds of hope behind them Parents now ponder these grounds you have prayed for them you have many times wrestled with the Lord on their behalf you have taken hold of Gods Covenant for them as well as for your selves and dedicated them to the Lord and they have not by any actions of theirs destroyed those grounds of your hope but that you may with much probability conclude they are with God Why if the case be so what abundant reason have you to be quiet and well satisfied with what God hath done Can they be better than where they are Had you better provisions and entertainments for them here than their heavenly Father hath above There is no Christian parent in the world but would rejoyce to see his child out-strip and get before him in grace that he may be more eminent in parts and service than ever he was And what reason can be given why we should not as much rejoyce to see our children get before us in glory as in grace They are gotten to heaven a few years before you and is that matter of mourning Would not your child if he were not ignorant of you say as Christ did to his friends a little before his death when he saw them cast down at the thoughts of parting Joh. 14. 28. If ye loved me ye would rejoyce because I go unto the Father q. d. Do you valew your own sensible comfort from my bodily presence with you before my glory and advancement in heaven Is this love to me Or is it not rather self-love So would your departed friend say to you you have professed much love all along to me my happiness seemed to be very dear to you How comes it to pass then that you mourn so exceedingly now This is rather the effect of a fond and fleshly than of rational and spiritual love If ye loved me with a pure spiritual love ye would rejoyce that I am gone to my Father It 's infinitely better for me to be here than with you on earth under sin and sorrow Weep not for me but for your selves Alas though you want your friends company he wants not yours Your care was to provide for this child but Jesus Christ hath provided infinitely better for it than you could you intended an Estate but he a Kingdom for it you thought upon such or such a match but Christ hath forbid all others and married your child to himself Would you imagine an higher preferment for the fruit of your bodies A King from heaven hath sent for your friend and do you grudge at the journey O think and think again what an honour it is to you that Christ hath taken them out of your bosom and laid them in his own stript them out of those garments you provided and cloathed them in white robes washed in the blood of the Lamb. Let not your hearts be troubled rather rejoyce exceedingly that God made you instruments to replenish heaven and bring forth an heir for the Kingdom of God Your child is now glorifying God in an higher way than you can and what though you have lost its bodily presence for a time yet I hope you don't reckon that to be your loss which turns to Gods greater glory When Jacob heard his Joseph was Lord of Egypt he rather wisht himself with Joseph than his Joseph with him in wants and straights So should it be with you You are yet rowling and tossing upon a tempestuous Sea but your friend is gone into the quiet harbour desire rather to be there then that he were at Sea again with you II. Consid. Consider how vain a thing all your trouble and self-vexation is it no way betters your case nor eases your burthen As a Bullock by wrestling and sweating in the furrow may make his yoak to be more heavy gall his neck and spend his strength the sooner but no way helps himself by that Why thus stands the case with thee if thou be as a Bullock unaccustomed to the yoak What Christ saith of caring we may say of grieving Mat. 6. 27. Which of you by taking thought can add one Cubit to his stature Cares may break our sleep yea break our hearts but they cannot add to our stature either in a natural or
can restore it yea double it in kind if he see it convenient for you And if not then 13. Consid. Consider though he should deny you any more comforts of that kind yet he hath far better to bestow upon you such as these deserve not to be named with You have an excellent Scripture to this purpose in Isa. 56. 4 5. For thus saith the Lord unto the Eunuchs that keep my Sabbaths and choose the things that please me and take hold of my Covenant even to them will I give in my house and within my walls a place and a name better than of sons and of daughters I will give them an everlasting name that shall not be cut off Mens names are said to be continued in their Issue in their male Issue especially and consequently to fail in such as wanted Issue Numb 17. 4. And a numerous Issue is deemed no small honour Psal. 127. 4 5. God therefore promiseth here to supply and make good the want of Issue and of whatsoever either honour here or memorial hereafter might from it have accrued to them by bestowing upon them matter of far greater honour and more durable a name better or before the name of Sons and Daughters It 's a greater honour to be a child of God than to have the greatest honour or comfort that ever children afforded their parents in this world Poor heart thou art now dejected by this affliction that lyes upon thee as if all joy and comfort were now cut off from thee in this world A cloud dwells upon all other comforts this affliction hath so imbittered thy soul that thou tastest no more in any other earthly comfort than in the white of an egg O that thou didst but consider the consolations that are with God for such as answer his ends in affliction and patiently wait on him for their comfort He hath comforts for you far transcending the joy of children This some have found when their children have been cut off from them and that in so eminent a degree that they have little valued their comfort in children in comparison with this comfort I will here set down a pregnant instance of the point in hand as I find it recorded by the grave and worthy Author of that excellent book entitled The fulfilling of the Scripture Another notable instance of grace with a very remarkable passage in his condition I shall here mention One Patrick Mackewrath who lived in the West parts of Scotland whose heart in a remarkable way the Lord touched and after his conversion as he shewed to many Christian friends was in such a frame so affected with a new world wherein he was entred the discoveries of God and of a life to come that for some months together he did seldom sleep but was still taken up in wondering His life was very remarkable for tenderness and near converse with God in his walk and which was worthy to be noticed one day after a sharp tryal having his only Son suddenly taken away by death he retired alone for several hours and when he came forth did look so chearfully that to those who asked him the reason thereof and wondered at the same in such a time he told them He had got that in his retirement with the Lord that to have it afterwards renewed he would be content to lose a Son every day Oh what a sweet exchange had he made Surely he had Gold for brass a pearl for a pebble a treasure for a trifle for so great yea and far greater is the disproportion betwixt the sweet light of Gods Countenance and the faint dim light of the best creature-enjoyment Would it please the Lord to make this sun arise and shine upon you now when the stars that shined with a dim and borrowed light are gone down you would see such gain by the exchange as would quickly make you cast in your votes with him we now mentioned and say Lord let every day be such as this funeral day let all my hours be as this so that I may see and taste what I now do How gladly would I part with the dearest and nearest creature-comfort I own in this world The gracious and tender Lord hath his divine Cordials reserved on purpose for such sad hours these are sometimes given before some sharp tryal to prepare for it and sometimes after to support under it I have often heard it from the mouth and found it in the Diary of a sweet Christian now with God That a little before the Lord removed her dear husband by death there was such an abundant out-let of the love of God into her soul for several days and nights following that when the Lord took away her husband by death though he were a gracious sweet temper'd and by her most tenderly beloved husband she was scarce sensible of the stroke but carried quite above all earthly things their comforts and their troubles so that she had almost lost the thoughts of her husband in God And had not the Lord taken this course with her she concluded that blow had not been possible to be born by her she must have sunck without such a preparative A Husband a Wife a Child are great very great things as they stand by other creatures but surely they will seem little things and next to nothing when the Lord shall set himself by them before the soul. And how know you but God hath bid these earthly comforts stand aside this day to make way for heavenly ones It may be God is coming to communicate himself more sweetly more sensibly than evâ—r to your souls and these are the providences which must cast up and prepare the way of the Lord. Possibly Gods meaning in their death is but this Child stand aside thou art in my way and fillest my place in thy parents heart 14. Consid. Be careful you exceed not in your grief for the loss of earthly things considering that Satan takes the advantage of all extreams You cannot touch any extream but you will be touched by that enemy whose greatest advantages lye in assaulting you there Satan is called the Ruler of the darkness of this world Eph. 6. 12. i. e. his Kingdom is supported by darkness Now there is a twofold darkness which gives Satan great advantage the darkness of the mind viz. ignorance and the darkness of the condition viz. trouble and affliction Of the former the Apostle speaks chiefly in that Text but the latter also is by him often improved to carry on his designs upon us When it 's a dark hour of trouble with us then is his fittest season to tempt That cowardly spirit falls upon the people of God when they are down and low in spirit as well as state Satan would never have desired that the hand of God should have been stretched out upon Jobs Person Estate and children but that he promised himself a notable advantage therein to poyson his spirit with vile thoughts of
beg'd of the Lord and I concluded when I had it that it brought with it the returns and answers of many prayers But now I see it was nothing less God had no regard to my prayers about it nor was it given me in that special way of mercy as I imagined it to be My child is not only dead but my prayers in the same day shut out and denyed 1. Answ. That you prayed for your children before you had them was your duty and if you prayed not for them submissively referring it to the pleasure of God to give or deny them to continue or remove them as should seem good to him that was your sin you ought not to limit the holy one of Israel nor prescribe to him or capitulate with him for what term you shall enjoy your outward comforts If you did so it was your evil and God hath justly rebuked it by this stroke if you did pray conditionally and submissively referring both the mercy asked and continuance of it to the will of God as you ought to do then there is nothing in the death of your child that crosses the true scope and intent of your prayer 2. Answer Your prayers may be answered though the thing prayed for be withheld yea or though it should be given for a little while and snatcht away from you again There are four ways of Gods answering prayers by giving the thing prayed for presently Dan. 9. 23. or by suspending the answer for a time and giving it afterwards Luk. 18. 7. or by withholding that mercy which you ask from you and giving you a much better mercy in the room of it Deut. 3. 24. compared with Deut. 34. 4 5. or lastly by giving you patience to bear the loss or want of it 2 Cor. 12. 9. Now if the Lord have taken away your child or friend and in lieu thereof given you a meek quiet submissive heart to his will you need not say he hath shut out your cry 2. Plea But I have lost a lovely obliging and most endearing child one that was beautiful and sweet it is a stony heart that would not dissolve into tears for the loss of one so desirable so engaging as this was Ah it s no common loss 1. Answer The more lovely and engaging your Relation was the more excellent will your patience and contentment with the will of God in its death be the more loveliness the more self-denyal and the more self-denyal the more grace Had it been a thousand times more endearingly sweet than it was it was not too good to deny for God If therefore obedience to the will of God do indeed master natural affections and that you look upon patience and contentment as much more beautiful than the sweetest and most desirable enjoyment on earth it may turn to you for a testimony of the truth and strength of grace that you can like Abraham part with a child whom you so dearly love in obedience to the will of your God whom you love infinitely more 2. Answer The loveliness and beauty of our children and Relations though it must be acknowledged a good gift from the hand of God yet it is but a common gift and oftentimes becomes a snare and is in its own nature but a transitory vanishing thing and therefore no such great aggravation of the loss as is pretended I say it 's but a common gift Eliab Adonijah and Absolom had as lovely a presence as any in their generation Yea it 's not only common to the wicked with the godly but to bruit animals as well as men and to most that excel in it it becomes a temptation the souls of some had been more beautiful and lovely if their bodies had been less so Beside it 's but a flower which flourishes in its month and then fades This therefore should not be reflected on as so great a circumstance to aggravate your trouble 3. Answer But if your Relation sleep in Jesus he will appear ten thousand times more lovely in the morning of the Resurrection than ever he was in this world What is the exactest purest beauty of mortals to the incomparable beauty of the Saints in the Resurrection Then shall the righteous shine forth as the Sun in the Kingdom of their Father Mat. 13. 43. In this hope you part with them therefore act sutably to your hopes 3. Plea O but my child was nipt off by death in the very bud I did but see and love and part had I enjoyed it longer and had time to suck out the sweetness of such an enjoyment I could have born it easier but its months or years with me were so few that they only served to raise an expectation which was quickly and therefore the more sadly disappointed 1. Answer Did your friend dye young or was the bond of any other Relation dissolved almost as soon as made let not this seem so intollerable a load to you for if you have ground to hope they died in Christ then they lived long enough in this world It 's truly said he hath sayled long enough that hath won the Harbour and he hath fought long enough that hath obtained the victory he hath run long enough that hath toucht the Gole and he hath lived long enough on earth that hath won heaven be his days here never so few 2. Answer The sooner your Relation dyed the less sin hath been committed and the less sorrow felt What can you see in this world but sin or sorrow A quick passage through it to glory is a special priviledge Surely the world is not so desirable a place that Christians should desire an hours time longer in it for themselves or theirs than serves to fit them for a better 3. Answer And whereas you imagine the parting would have been easier if the enjoyment had been longer it is a fond and groundless suspicion The longer you had enjoyed them the stronger would the endearments have been A young and tender plant may be easily drawn up by a single hand but when it hath spread and fixed its roots many years in the earth it will require many a strong blow and hard tug to root it up Affections like those under-ground roots are fixed and strengthned by nothing more than consuetude and long possession it 's much easier parting now than it would be hereafter whatever you opine However this should satisfie you that Gods time is the best time 4. Plea O but I have lost all in one it is my only one I have none left in its room to repair the breach and make up the loss if God had given me other children to take comfort in the loss had not been so great but to lose all at one stroke is insupportable 1. Answer Religion allows not to Christians a liberty of expressing the death of their dear Relations by so hard a word as the loss of them is They are not lost but sent before you And it is
inferiour to you in any respect You have one dead child Aaron had two at a stroke Job all at one stroke and both these by an immediate stroke from the hand of God Some godly Parents have lived to see their children dye in their sin by the hand of Justice others have seen them live to the dishonour of God and breaking of their own spirits and would have esteemed it a mercy if they had dyed from the womb and given up the ghost when they came out of the belly as Job speaks In what misery have some Parents seen their children lye God holding them as so many terrible spectacles of misery before their eyes so that they have beg'd the Lord with importunity to let loose his hand and cut them off Death being in their esteem nothing to those continual agonies in which they have seen them lye sweltering from day to day Oh you little know what a bitter cup others have had given them to drink Surely if you compare you must say the Lord hath dealt gently and graciously with you 6. Rule Carefully shun and avoid whatsoever may renue your sorrow or provoke you to impatience Increase not your sorrow by the sight of or discourses about sad objects but labour to avoid them as occasions presented by the enemy of your souls to draw forth the corruptions of your hearts I told you before why Jacob would not have the child of which Rachel dyed called after the name his wife had given Benoni the Son of my sorrow lest it should prove a daily occasion of renuing his trouble for the loss of his dear Wife but he called his name Benjamin Your impatience is like tinder or Gun-powder so long as you can prevent the sparks from falling on it there is no great danger But you that carry such dangerous prepared matter in your own hearts cannot be too careful to prevent them Do by murmuring as you do by blasphemous thoughts think quite another way and give no occasion 7. Rule In the day of your mourning for the death of your friends seriously consider your own death as approaching and that you and your dead are distinguisht but by a small interval and point of time 2 Sam. 12. 23. I shall go to him Surely the thoughts of your own death as approaching also will greatly allay your sorrows for the dead that are gone before you We are apt to fancy a long life in the world and then the loss of those comforts which we promised our selves so much of the sweetness and comfort of our lives from seems an intollerable thing But would you reallize your own deaths more you would not be so deeply concerned for their death as you are Could you but look into your own graves more seriously you would be able to look into your friends grave more composedly And thus I have finished what I designed from this Scripture The Father of mercies and God of all comfort whose sole Prerogative it is to comfort them that are cast down write all his truths upon your hearts that they may abide there and reduce your disorder'd affections to that frame which best suits the will of God and the profession you make of subjection and resignation thereunto FINIS 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Graec Comic * In adolescentia defunctus fuit ideo plus dolendum fuerat quia in flore aetatis suae fuit et cum grandi labore ac solicitudine parentum ad istam aetatem perductus Dion Cath. in loc Mortem levins toleraret si non unicus fuisset si alter qui parentis dolorem leniret superfuisset Ambros. Virgil. Nibil charius unico filio sic dolor de morte ipsius intenfissimus existit Carthus in Loc. Duplici nomine charissimus fuit tum quod esset unigenitus tum quod esset solatium quasi bacūlus viduitatis ipsius Pisc. in Loc. Victurosque dii celant ut vivere durent In eo futurae resurrectionis illustre habemus Specimen Cal. in Loc. Quae ardenter diligimus habita graviter suspiramus amissa Greg. mor. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * Nec enim pudet sanctos viros postquam renovata corda fuerint per resipiscentiam lapsus sui dedecoris ad dei gloriam meminisse Nihil nobis decedit quod cedit in illius honorem Brightman in Cant. cap. 1. ver 4. pag. 11. Cumque ille nominasset Arcam dei q d. nondum integram sed inchoatam audiens narrationem mente praevolans exitum presagiens ruebat Meneoz in Loc. Tristitia mundi est tristitia secundum mundum quae ex amore mundi nascitur Estius in Loc. * Haec tibi scribo qui tam immodice flevi ut quod minime velim inter exempla sim eorum quos dolor vicit hodie tamen factum meum damno Seneca Ep. 63. p. mihi 637. * In est quidam dulce tristitiae cum occurant sermones eorum jucundi conversatio hilaris officiosa pietas tunc occuli velut in gaudio relaxantur Sen. Ep. 806. Ex eorum more qui luctus sui irritamenta querunt Calv. Nil miserius misero non miser ante seipsum Senecas Epist. p. 84. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 erant amaritudo animi Plut. Moral p. 222. Aequo animo excipenecessaria quam multi post luctum tuum lugent Sen. Ep. 99. Seneca's Ep. 804. Car. in Loc. Habui enim illos tanquam amissurus amisi tanquam habeam Seneca Ep. 63. Melchior Adam in vita Luth. Aug. Ep. 6. Vide English Annotations in Loc. Fulfilling of the Scripture p. 491. M. M. his Appendix to Solomons prescription p. 112. The fullfilling of the Scriptures Quem amabas extulisti quaere quem ames satius est amicum reparare quam flere Seneca's Ep. p. 637. Melchior Adam in vita Lutheri Vide Mr. Baxter's Epistle to the life of Mr. John Janeway Non amittuntur sed praemittuntur Epict. Enchiri Cap. 15.