her for whose sake and safety he accepted it before and exposed himself readily to a voluntary banishment rather than he would be a spectator to those miseries which were about to exercise his native land and to which he could then apply no remedy since that how vigoroysly did he contribute his assistance to our late happy Revolution and how firm and unalterable has his adherence been to the best of Princes and of Governments and all this without being acted by those little motives of advancing his fortune or his figure in the world but receiving all his deserved preferments as the favours of a Prince whom he valued more for his personal vertues than for his royal Bounties and only esteeming them as the instruments and opportunities of being more signally and successfully useful to his Country How freely ever after did be expose himself to danger whensoever her honour or advantage called upon him till at last he sealed his tenderness for her with the highest expression of it that could be given Greater love than this has no man that he lay down his Life This did he for his dear Country fighting in her cause against her most powerful and most inveterate enemies and testified a sensible concern at his Death that he had not another life to sacrifice for the advancement of her interest and the service of his Prince and he met with a grateful return of love since few if any have ever had the happiness to be so much the Darling of all sorts of people or to be attended to their grave with so general a sorrow But Thirdly Let us consider him as a Souldier and here we shall find him vigorous and active surprizingly brave in the most dangerous emergencies and eagerly catching at all opportunities in which he might signalize his Courage without forfeiting his Judgment If all the other actions of his life were silent Athlone would speak both his Valour and his Conduct an action in which I know not whether was more wonderful the Attempt or the Execution both of them were admirable and both his own I appeal to those who were under his Command if he ever refused to take the first Essay of danger or addressed to them in other Language than that of the great Julius who requited and expected nothing more from his Legions than that they would follow where he led the way and yet with all this ardour of an invincible courage he was not of an uneasy turbulent disposition or overapt to be engaged in idle quarrels for as the sweetness of his nature and the politeness of his education hindered him from offering an affront to any man so the modest sense which he had of his own just merit would not suffer him to suspect that he was designed upon by others the Fire then of his temper worked calmly and regularly like that vital warmth which cherishes the body and is subservient to the great ends of health and liveliness whilst that of too many others resembles the malignant heat of a Feaver which boils up into folly and distraction He loved all Souldiers he lived amongst them and he died like one and since he was no less beloved by them I have hopes that the desire of revenging his death may prove a sharper Spur to their future Undertakings than even his presence formerly and great example that so the just anger which his loss works in them the loss of a Patron as well as of a Leader may send thousands of our Adversaries to wait upon his Ghost and make Sampson's character be applicable to him that the Enemies which he destroyed by his Death were more than those which he slew in his Life Thus have I acted like that Painter who drawing the picture of a young Noble-man some days after he was buried was fain to fall vastly short of the beautiful Original and could only copy out a very faint resemblance in like manner have I dealt with my present subject giving you only some imperfect lines by which you may be just able to guess at the party Such then as fame and your own knowledge will more fully decipher him was this Great man who is now but a cold neglected lump of Clay Death which is the end of all men has asserted its Jurisdiction over him also I mean over as much of him as could dye for his unblemished reputation is exempted from mortality Death has no farther dominion over him Tho his carcass must be consigned to worms and putrefaction yet the memory of his great actions shall for ever live and flourish in whatsoever parts of the earth an accomplished Gentleman a zealous Lover of his Country or a deserving Commander is remembred with respect the name of Tolmach who was eminently all these shall never fail of an honourable mention Let us then attend him to his Grave with decent expressions of a manly sorrow let no mixture interfere of weakness or esseminacy nothing unbecoming the person we mourn for but let us take our leave of him at the Dormitory of his Ancestors with the Prophet's Lamentation Alas my Brother And let us who are yet living so duly and seriously lay to heart not only his end but that of all men else that whensoever this common lot of mankind shall as it once must be ours in particular we may leave behind as he does the odour of a good memory and only exchange this life for a better Which God of his infinite mercy grant we may all do through the merits and mediation of our blessed Redeemer to whom with the Father and the Holy Spirit be ascribed all honour power might majesty and dominion henceforth and for evermore Amen FINIS
A SERMON Preached at Helmingham in Suffolk June 30th 1694. At the FUNERAL OF L. Gen. Tolmach By Nicholas Brady M. A. Minister of St. Catherine Creâ—â—-Church and Chaplain in Ordinary to Their Majesties Published at the Request of the Friends of the deceased LONDON Printed for Rich. Parker at the Vnicorn under the Piazza of the Royal Exchange 1694. TO HER GRACE THE Dutchess of Lauderdale May it please Your Grace AS nothing could excuse my Confidence in presenting this following Discourse to your Grace but the great share you have in the much lamented occasion of it so nothing could attone for the meanness of my Present but the eager transports of a hasty Zeal which rather urged me to pay this imperfect Tribute to the Memory of so great a Man than to consult my own Ease or Reputation by making the shortness of the warning my just excuse for waving an Employment as difficult as honourable To do tolerable Justice to so deserving a Theme required a larger portion both of Time and Ability than I had either the good fortune to enjoy or the confidence to pretend to and if I have but testified my veneration for his Memory which every True Englishman will joyn with me in doing it is the only Reputation that I aim at from a performance as hearty as it is inartificial I question not but your Grace will add to all your other Virtues that of a chearful resignation to the will of God and give a fresh evidence of the firmness of that Courage which has formerly supported you under the greatest Trials Especially since to sweeten and temper the bitterness of your loss your Grace has the advantage of some signal consolations to see your Son consecrated to immortal Fame universally regretted by all that knew him and embalmed with the Tears of that most Excellent Princess in whose Service it was his last wish to spend another Life If any passage in the following Discourse as part of it is directed particularly to that end may be serviceable to the lessening your Grace's Affliction it will be matter of the greatest Joy and Satisfaction to May it please Your Grace Your Graces most obedient Most faithful And most humble Servant N. Brady ECCLES VII Ch. Latter end of the 2 Verse For that is the end of all Men and the living will lay it to his heart IF the conspiring wishes of the greatest part of Christendom could reverse the immutable Decrees of Heaven if the most eminent and distinguishing personal Accomplishments could bribe the grim Messenger to delay his Summons or the most elevated Courage and Bravery of Soul could awe the King of Terrours into a favourable compliance we had not now been met together to perform our last duties to the small remains of This Great Man not so dearly paid for a remarkable Instance of the unavoidable necessity of Death to all men by seeing one of the noblest of our English Worthies within the short compass of a few days shrunk into a Coffin full of dust and ashes But since we are convinced by too sad an experience that nothing can exempt from that impartial Sentence which has passed upon all the Sons of Adam since the Wise and the Foolish the Noble and the Base the Valiant and the Coward must equally ly down in the bed of Corruption and descend together unto the silent Chambers of the Earth since Death is thus the necessary consequence of Life and the living know that they must die it will be a useful labour to enquire what advantage may be made by us of such a knowledge and after what manner we ought to lay it to our hearts that Death is the end of all men And indeed it is matter of the justest astonishment that Death which is the entertainment of every day which endeavours to refresh our memory of it by such repeated instances of its unavoidable certainty that speaks to us out of the mouth of every dead man and reads us a Lecture out of every Coffin should yet almost utterly be lost to our remembrance should fall so very seldom under our serious consideration and therefore the wise Man had sufficient reason to inform us as he does at the beginning of this Verse that it is better to go to the house of morning than to go to the house of feasting religious meditations and reflections upon Death being at all times a proper and useful entertainment but when we have before us such objects of Mortality as This which has assembled us together at the present contemplations of this nature are necessary and indispensable the solemnity of the occasion calls for them loudly and forcebly exacts them at our hands and as our deceased brother seems to preach to us this Doctrine That that is the end of all men so every well instructed Christian will be ready to make this sober Application That the living will lay it to his heart That Death is the period of every Life that we must all die and return unto our Dust is a truth acknowledged so universally and so undeniably verified by constant experience that it is needless to produce arguments for the proof of that assertion which none have the confidence or the folly to deny I shall not therefore lose my time and abuse your patience in the unnecessary confirmation of this established Maxime that Death is the end of all men but shall wholly confine my following discourse to the inference which the wise Man draws from thence that the living will lay it to his heart by shewing what useful deductions may be made from a due reflecton upon the certainty of Death in order to influence our lives and conversations First Then from a due reflecton upon the certainty of Death we may learn this lesson of instruction that since Death is the common lot of all mankind and some time or other we must submit to it we ought therefore to be always so prepared to meet it as that we may at any time undergo it willingly and chearfully Indeed if all our care and apprehension if all our carefulness and concern could enable us to avoid the stroke of Destiny there were then some reason for us to be anxious and solicitous upon that occasion but since this is an irreversible Decree which has past upon all the race of mankind a wise man will make a vertue of necessity by endeavouring to manage himself after such a rate as may make this dreadful Enemy of humane nature appear least formidable and affrighting He will at least attempt to disarm him of his Sting and that can be done no other way but by leading a life unblameable and inoffensive we are assured that the sting of Death is sin it is that only which makes his approaches to very terrible let us but secure our selves upon that side and we may then meet him with assurance and satisfaction Nothing will rejoice us upon a Death-bed so much as the Conscience of a well
spent life all outward Consolations shall then drop a way our Riches can purchase nothing for us but a Coffin and a Windingsheet our Friends can only weep by our Bed-side attend us to our Grave and ly down there and lament over us our Honours will but serve to adorn our Hearse and to lay us in the dust with greater Pomp and Pageantry but a Life that has been led Innocently and Devoutly this will support us under our last conflict will strengthen and sustain us in our mortal Agonies and enable us to confront Death in its most ugly shape not only with courage but with comfort also Every good action which we have at any time performed will then administer to us joy and satisfaction and if we have constantly persevered in well doing we shall have nothing to ruffle or discompose us our passage out of this World will be easie and agreeable we shall ly down in Death as to a sweet repose from whence we shall awake into everlasting happiness and shall close our eyes with that triumphant exclamation O Death where is thy Sting O Grave where is thy Victory Thus is it the Office of true wisdom to make that easie and familiar to us which we know is not possibly to be avoided since tho we hang back never so much and are never so unwilling to be acquainted with it yet still Death follows us close at the heels and will at last infallibly overtake us But nothing will more effectually prepare us for our end than to have it continually in our thoughts that whenever it comes to seize on us it may not be new to us and add to its other terrours the fright of a surprise Things the most terrible and frightful in their nature become easie and supportable by our being used to them and so we shall find it in Death its self He who lives every day as if that were his last will never be unprovided when his last day comes he who contemplates upon his end frequently will receive Death when ever it calls upon him as an acquaintance whom he has long conversed with and whose nearer appreoaches he has expected hourly whereas that man who makes it his business to put off that evil hour as he stiles it far from him never to fix his thoughts upon the consideration of it will be strangely startled and discomposed at its appearance he will not know how to give reception to a an intruding rugged Guest whose visit is as unwelcome as it was unexpected and yet whose distastful company he cannot possibly avoid And indeed when the good man has accustomed himself some time to a due consideration of his latter end he will not meet with any thing else in it but matter of delight and satisfaction it will only appear as an ill-looked Jaylor that comes to release him out of a hard captivity as a surly messenger that is sent upon a welcome errand or as a rough gust of Wind that blows him into the Harbour He has so fully reflected upon the certainty of Death that he has made it his business to be ready for it whensoever it shall come and can lay down his life chearfully and contentedly because he has the assurance of taking it up again as knowing it is but hid with Christ in God Thus a due reflection upon the certainty of Death will instruct us in this lesson of true Wisdom that we should at all times be qualified to look Death in the Face without being terrified at it or unprovided for it But Secondly Another lesson of true Wisdom which may be learnt from a due reflection upon the certainty of Death is this that since our continuance in this world cannot last for ever we should therefore wean our selves from too great a fondness for such things as we must certainly part with at the last Being rationally convinced that all the enjoyments of this world must at one time or other drop away from us the common rules of Prudence will then instruct us to disintangle our affections from them betimes not to wed and tye our selves too closely to them but only to value them so far as they are necessary to us in our present circumstances without foolishly placing our chiefest happiness in the possession of those things which we must certainly be divorced from Riches and Honours and Pleasures and all the enjoyments of this life are seldom so constant as to attend us to the end of it they generally forsake us before we reach the Grave but it is most certain that they cannot accompany us beyond it and there will be no more remembrance of them within the Land where all things are forgotten and how unreasonably then does that man act who places all his satisfaction in such transitory trifles as must shortly either leave him or be left by him Indeed if it were probable or but barely possible for us to be always conversant in this Land of the living we had then some reason to be careful and solicitous for the delights and conveniencies of this present life But when we are assured that our years must come to an end as a tale that is told and that our age is even as nothing that we are but Travellers and Pilgrims in this world have no sure abiding place no settled dwelling or habitation in it this should teach us to deal with it as wayfaring men with the Inns which they bait at just to make use of it for our present occasions without ever contracting any great intimacy with it or being much concerned what becomes of it when we are gone For how dreadful must Death be to that unwary person who so little reflects upon the certainty of his leaving this world that he never attempts to disengage himself from it How will that clog and encumber him in his flight and how hardly will his soul be able to get loose with such a weight of earth about it To such a man as this Death comes arrayed in all his pomp of Terror to take him from the world is to tear him from himself he is grown as it were one piece with it being rivetted to it by all the ties of interest and inclination and to separate him from that his beloved companion is like another divorce of Soul and Body whereas that serious and considering man who has duly represented to himself that Death will call upon him some time or other and that then he must leave behind him all the gaieties of this World will never be so besotted with the love of them as to doat upon those things which he must one day renounce and the loss of which will be so much the more grievous by how much the more deeply he is enamoured of them Thus will a due reflection upon the certainty of Death give to us that are living this most useful instruction that we should wean our selves from the vanities of this present life and disengage our selves from too
extravagant a fondness for them But Thirdly Another lesson of instruction which we may be taught by a due reflection upon the certainty of Death is this that since that is the end of all men living we should therefore look back upon the occasion of it and seriously consider by what means it prevails so universally upon all mankind Man was created in a state of Immortality as well as Innocency and after a long and happy life in this world would have been translated into another without any uneasie passage through the gates of Death but when sin entred into the world Death also entred with it and by it and took its original commission for destroying from God's primitive Curse upon our disobedience and indeed they are now linked together so inseparably that they always advance hand in hand and as the world has daily grown more sinfull so Death also has grown more powerful has daily made its more near approaches and our life which passes away as a shadow like that upon the Dial of Ahaz has gone backwards For tho' Death is the most dreadful enemy of humane nature yet our darling sins however they may seem to flatter and cajoll us keep up a most strict League and Correspondence with it every embrace they seem to give us does but forward the inslaving us to this potent Adversary and every kiss like that of Judas does but betray us into Ruine and Destruction all those enjoyments with which they seem to treat us are but so many inlets to the Grave and so many entrances into the chambers of Death Those are they however gay and lightsome they may appear which labour to deprive us of the light of the Sun to lay us down in darkness and in silence to throw us amongst mouldring Bones and putrifying Carkases and to make us the companions of Rottenness and Corruption all our beloved bosome transgressions are but so many bewitching Dalilahs which lull our heads in their laps and rock us into a Lethargy that so they may give us up bound and settered into the hands of our most mortal enemy And can we then be employed in considerations of this nature can we believe that Death is the wages of sin not only a Salary that will certainly be paid but such a one as ought in justice to be so as if we had bargained and covenanted for it without loathing and abominating those fatal incendiaries which have set us at enmity with our God and have brought Death and destruction into the world If there be any thing in Death that is frightful or dismal it ought to work in us a strong aversion against sin which alone has laid upon us the invincible necessity of entring into a conflict with that formidable Adversary This then is another piece of prudence which is taught us by a due reflection upon the certainty of Death it engages us to look back upon the cause of it sin and to entertain a horror and detestation for it But Fourthly Another Lesson of true Wisdom which may be learnt from a due reflection upon the certainty of Death is this that since nothing can exempt us from the Grave that common receptacle of all humane kind we should therefore be patient and contented under Sickness and bear the Infirmities of this life with a chearful resignation Sickness is the usual forerunner of our end the commom road which most Men tread to the dark Palace of imperious Death and therefore to murmor or repine under such dispensations is as if we should be angry at being put into the way which leads directly to our journe's end Diseases are the general Harbingers of Mortality which come before to marck out those places where the great King of Terrours designs to lodge and tho' some go off without any warning and drop out of the World suddenly and insensibly yet whether that may be in Mercy or in Judgment God only knows sure I am that which can but once be done and the consequences of which are so considerable ought to be done very well and sickness is the surest and most effectual remembrancer to put us in mind of dying as we should It is recorded of King Philip the Macedonian that least his prosperous estate should too far puff him up he ordered one of his Attendants each morning to remind him of his Mortality with this expression O King thou must die and how many of us should be apt to forget our selves did not sickness perform for us this charitable office and give us a kind Item of our perishing condition How unjust then and ungrateful a proceeding will it be to quarrel at the Visits of an obliging Monitor who only comes to refresh our memory that we may not be forgetful of our most valuable concernments how heavy or intolerable soever our pressures may appear yet Death we are sure whose messengers they are will not fail quickly to put an end to them and can we not then bear with a quiet resignation those things that bring with them so considerable an advantage and whose remedy is so certain and so near How unfit is that man to look Death in the face who cannot bear its most distant approaches or to struggle with mortal Agonies and Convulsions ' that shrinks under the first assault of an Ague or a Feaver whereas that constant and resolved mind which chearfully submits to the hand of God and breaks the force of his distemper by a Christian patience is by these lighter tryals exercised and prepared to stand the shock of the grand encounter he becomes familiar and acquainted with Death by conversing calmly with its friends and companions and can never be startled at its Personal appearance when he has thus been used to correspond with it by the interposition of its Embassadours This therefore is a 4th lesson which we may learn from a due reflection upon the certainty of Death patiently to undergo all sicknesses and infirmities which are the necessary preliminaries and forerunners of it But Fifthly and lastly Another lesson of instruction which may be taught us by a due reflection upon the certainty of Death is this that since that is the end of all men and nothing can qualify us for an exemption from it we ought therefore to bear the loss of our Friends or our Relations without any immoderate or excessive sorrow for them For why should that violently afflict or discompose us which we have all the reason in the world to expect can we suppose that our Friends should be peculiarly excepted out of the common lot of all mankind or because they are Ours must they therefore be Immortal It was the comfort which a father applied to himself to lighten the loss of an only Son Scio me mortalem genuisse I know that I begot him a mortal man by having considered that he must once die he was able to support his Death whensoever it happened and this will not fail to have the same
effect upon us if we will but press it as homely upon our selves all our care and endeavours are necessary and decent to assist our sick friends in order to their recovery a becoming sence of our own loss of them and a moderate sorrow for them is natural and commendable but to carry our concern to an unreasonable height to be violent or extravagant in our expressions of grief to let it swell beyond the limits of Reason and Christianity this is as if we would arraign the providence of God which has appointed that Death should be the end of all men or as if we expected that for our sakes our Friends should be excepted out of that general Sentence which has universally past upon all mankind We should consider that they have got the better of the exchange by being taken out of a miserable world to be admitted into a state of happiness and perfection we should prefer their advantage before our own enjoyment rejoycing at their removal into bliss tho we pay dearly for it by our own want of them we may long to be dissolved and to be with Christ and them but cannot be so selfish or uncharitable as to wish them back again with us we should rejoyce that our companions are in a better Society and that our Friends are preferred into Angels in a word we should have nothing so dear which we cannot resign unto our God or which we can desire to be disposed of better He that by considering his latter End has seriously imprintep printed in his mind the unavoidable necessity of Death to all men that it strikes impartially and will spare none will best be enabled to practice this lesson will never be too much disturbed at such an event as he always foresaw and for which he has constantly been prepared whether in himself or in others This then is a fifth Aphorism of Wisdom which may be learnt by a due reflection upon the certainty of Death that we should restrain all excessive or immoderate sorrow for the loss of our Friends or our dearest Relations Indeed if the loss be of an Extraordinary nature if the Publick be a sufferer as well as Private families as it is in that Great man whose Obsequies we now celebrate as sorrow is then most busy and importunate so ought we then most especially to stand upon our guard we should Summon to our assistance whatsoever may sustain us against the attempts of a grief so just and piercing But God who delights not to afflict the Children of men has generally accompanied such melancholy circumstances with an Antidote sufficient to combate their malevolence The fame and reputation which such persons leave behind them and which always shines clearest out of the land of Darkness and stretches out with their dead bodies usually administring such additional consolation as may serve to buoy up the spirits of their friends under the heavy pressure of their encroaching sorrow And if ever that comfort was abundantly indulged it is now imparted in a most eminent degree to the surviving lamenters of this departed Heroe than whom as none has gone to the Grave more universally regretted so none will live more generally or more lastingly in the Remembrance and respect of all that knew him And now as I have performed my Duty to the Living by shewing them what advantages may accrue to them from a due reflection upon the certainty of Death so give me leave to aquit my self in some measure of my respects to the Dead by hinting to you some sew of those many excellencies by which he was elevated very considerably above the common rank of men But lest too a great a variety of matter should make my discourse confused and rambling I shall therefore confine my imperfect character to these three qualifications in which he was most eminent of a Gentleman a Patriot and a Souldier First Then let us consider him as a Gentleman and we shall find him possessed of all those accomplishments which intitle a man justly to that honourable appellation and recommend him to universal esteem Besides the felicity of an illustrious extraction of an antienter date than the Norman conquest for which he afterwards over-paid his family by imparting to it greater lustre than he borrowed from it he was singularly remarkable for those commendable embellishments which distinguish a man of sense and breeding from the less resin'd part of human kind His conversation was familiar and engaging his wit lively and piercing his judgment solid and discerning and all these set off by a graceful person a chearful aspect and an inviting air his natural abilities were cultivated and improved by the additional advantages of Travel and Experience to his own reputation and the credit of his Country much of his youthful time did he spend abroad by which his riper years were qualified to become more useful and serviceable at home he made it not his business as too many have done to glean the follies and the weaknesses of those Nations he conversed with and to traffick only in Bells and Bawbles but imported such things as deserved his application and inriched his mind with their most valuable Commodities He pryed into their customs their politicks and their strength without being partially byassed in their favour returning as he went out a True Englishman and valuing more highly the constitutions of his own Country by comparing them with the mismanagements and irregularities which he had carefully observed in the Government of others Thus did he wisely endeavour to fit himself more for Service than for shew looking upon Language and fashionable breeding in which however he was versed as well as any man but as the becoming trappings and furniture of his more considerable substantial improvements Besides all which he was particularly taken notice of for a surprizing largeness and generosity of Soul such as set him above the little temptations of private intriguings and narrow designs being always ready to make his own interest truckle to the advantage of others or the service of the Publick By such methods as these he gain'd esteem every where and had the general commendation from all tongues of being what so many aim at and so few attain to a compleat English Gentleman But Secondly Let us consider him as a Patriot and we shall find his affection to his native Country to have been as disinterested as it was firm and exemplary His earlier years were spent abroad in her Service and in the honourable fatigues of a foreign war nor could all the allurements of royal favour which would largely have been showred upon so considerable a man bribe him afterwards to forsake her cause or to espouse a Party opposite to her interests he stuck close to his Honour and to his Love to her tho at the expence of a valuable employment and much more valuable expectations he laid down his Commission with a chearful resignation when he could no longer keep it without disserving