A SERMON Preach'd at the FUNERAL OF Sir JOHN BVCKWORTH At the Parish-Church of St. PETER's le POOR IN BROADSTREET December 29. 1687. By JOHN SCOTT D. D. LONDON Printed for Walter Kettilby at the Bishop's-Head in St. Paul's Church-Yard and Thomas Horne at the South-Entrance of the Royal Exchange in Cornhill 1688. IMPRIMATUR Guil. Needham Jan. 10. 1687. TO MY Lady Buckworth MADAM IN Obedience to Your Desires I here present You with the Discourse I delivered at the Funeral of Your Excellent Husband and my never to be forgotten Friend And indeed considering how little there is in it I have no other Apologie to make for the Publication of it but that I could not without some degree of Incivility refuse it being urged with the concurrent Requests of Your Ladiship and the rest of those my worthy Friends his dearest Relatives Not that I altogether despair of its having some good Influence upon Sober and Attentive Readers There are some Thoughts in it which are apt enough to Inspire considering Minds with good Affections and Resolutions The Text I am sure contains excellent Sense in it and the Argument is mighty Serious and Momentous and how meanly soever I have managed it some honest Reader I hope may from hence take occasion to supply my defects out of his own Meditations and so to improve it to his everlasting Advantage And as for Your Ladiship I hope the perusal of it instead of reviving Your Sorrows for Your Dear Loss may be some way Instrumental to Animate You with a firm and vigorous Resolution to pursue that Blessed State wherein This and all Your other Losses here will ere long be abundantly repaired in a most joyous and everlasting Fruition And This MADAM is my hearty Prayers as well as my hope who am Your Ladiships Obliged and Faithful Servant JOHN SCOTT ECCLESIAST xi 8. But if a man live many years and rejoyce in them all yet let him remember the days of darkness for they shall be many I Shall not trouble you with the various rendrings of these words which with a very little difference do all amount to the same sence viz. That supposing it should be a man's good fortune to live very long and exceeding happy in this world yet he ought to have great care that the Joys of this Life do not so wholly take up and ingross his thoughts as to make him forget those days of darkness which must ere long succeed this delightsome Sun-shine which days will be many more and of much longer continuance than the longest Life of happiness we can promise our selves in this World. So that all the difficulty in these words is what we are to understand by the days of Darkness which are here opposed to a long Life of Joy and Rejoycing in this World And this difficulty will be easily resolved by considering the foregoing Verse Truly the light is sweet and a pleasant thing to the Eye to behold the Sun upon which it follows But if a man live many Years i. e. supposing he should for many Years injoy this pleasant spectacle of the light of the Sun yet let him remember those days of Darkness wherein his Eyes shall behold the Sun and Light no more wherein he shall be laid up in a dark and silent Grave whence the light of the Sun is excluded and where the sight of the Eyes is extinguished or as he expresses it in the Third Verse of the next Chapter wherein those that look out at the windows are darkened So that we shall have neither visible Objects nor visive Organs but be buried out of sight in deep darkness and insensibility By the days of Darkness therefore is evidently meant all that space of time between our Death and our Resurrection wherein our Bodies shall lye mouldering in a dark Grave utterly insensible of Good or Evil till by the powerful call of God they shall at length be roused up out of this fatal slumber into a state of Everlasting Life and Activity And these days saith he shall be many though they shall not run out to an infinite duration but at length conclude in a general Resurrection yet they shall be many many more in all probability than any man now alive can hope to live in this World. The words thus explained resolve into this sence That how long and happily soever men live in this World they ought to entertain their thoughts with frequent remembrances and considerations of their approaching Mortality Which is a duty so obvious to the Consciences of all men as being founded on the plainest and most conspicuous Reasons that the men of all Ages and Nations and Religions have owned and acknowledged it Thus the Heathen Philosophers teach That our lives ought to be a Constant Meditation of Death and that even in our most pleasant and healthful moments we ought to look upon our selves as Borderers upon Eternity That we should still take care to mingle our delights with the sad remembrances of our Mortality and not suffer the Joys of this Life to divert our Thoughts from that impending Fate which ere long will set an Everlasting period both to Them and That But the necessity of entertaining our minds with frequent Remembrances of our Latter end is founded upon far more powerful motives than a company of fine Sentences and pretty Sayings of Philosophers For First It is necessary to moderate our Affections to the World. Secondly It is necessary to allay the Gaiety and Vanity of our minds Thirdly It is necessary to put us upon improving our present injoyments to the best purposes Fourthly It is necessary to fore-arm our minds against the Terrors of Death Fifthly It is necessary to excite and quicken us in our preparations for Eternity I. It 's necessary to moderate our Affections to the world while we are encompassed round with the pleasures and delights of this world they commonly so ingross our minds that we shut our eyes against all futurities and are impatient to think of any thing to come unless it be the continuance of this happy scene of things which is at present before us with which continuance we are exceeding apt to flatter our selves that so thereby we may heighten the gust of our present enjoyments to which the consideration of their leaving us or our leaving them would be apt to give a very ungrateful farewel and when our thoughts are wholly intent upon these present goods and upon the prospect of their continuance our affections must necessarily run out towards them with an immoderate ardour and greediness For now our flattering Imaginations represent them to us as standing and permanent things as a kind of immortal heaven upon earth and accordingly our affections pursue and imbrace them as the best of goods and are for dwelling upon them and building Tabernacles in them there to make their final abode as in their highest and ultimate happiness Now there is no more effectual way to rouse mens minds out of
is not a few extorted Promises or forced Resolutions or rack'd Confessions and Lord have mercy upon us O no to Die well is an expensive Passage which we shall never be able to defray unless we carry along with us a very great stock of Spiritual Preparations We shall have need of a strong and active Faith of a Mind well furnished with wise and good Considerations of a deep and large and a tried Repentance of an unrestrained Charity of a confirmed Patience of a profound Submission to the Will of God and a well grounded Hope of a blessed Eternity For without all these together we shall be very ill accoutred to Die and run a fearful hazard of miscarrying for ever And these are such things as do not usually spring up like Mushromes in a night and much less in the disturbed moments of a Dying hour but do ask a much larger and serener Season to grow and ripen in But if whilst we are entertaining our selves among the Joys and Pleasures of this Life we banish from our Minds the remembrance of our Mortality and look upon Eternity as a thing at a vast distance this will put us upon delaying and deferring our preparation for it For in this temper we shall be apt to conclude that we have time enough to come to begin and compleat our Repentance and that we may safely indulge our selves yet a good while longer in the free injoyment of our own hearts desires and sin on at present upon this Security that we will certainly Repent hereafter and by this easie Train do men toule themselves on through the several stages of their Sin and Life till they arrive at their Death-bed and then they begin to think of Repenting in good earnest But then alas what will they be able to do when their Thoughts are continually disturbed with the care of disposing their Affairs in this World and the frightful prospect they have of the other When their Minds are distracted with incessant Pain and uneasiness so that it is not in their power to consider so much as a quarter of an hour together when through the stupor and indisposition of the Organs of their Reason they are not able to range their scattered and unwieldy Thoughts into any of those sober Reflexions and serious Meditations that are necessary to the forming of a sincere Repentance In effect therefore for men to refer their Repentance to a Death-bed is the same thing as to retire into a Battel to Meditate or to set up a Closset to study Philosophy in in the head Quarters of an Army where most men are as capable of free and undisturbed Contemplations as they are of Repenting amidst the Tumults and Hurries of a Death-bed And yet upon this dismal extremity do men commonly cast themselves through their neglect of remembring their approaching Mortality Whereas did they but often remember and seriously reflect on it they would as soon dare eat Fire as defer their Repentance upon the uncertain hopes of futurity For alas what is vain Man that he should talk of Repenting hereafter when perhaps while the words are in his mouth the earnest of Death is in his Head or Heart or Bowels when for all he knows he may be inflamed with a Fevor with what he hath drank to day or stifled with a Surfeit with what he shall eat to morrow when he may expire his Soul with his next Breath or suck in his bane with the next Air and so many unlooked for accidents may presently put an end to all his talk of Repenting hereafter and render it impossible for ever Now of what dismal consequence would it be should I be thus surprized If while I presume upon my future Repentance I am merrily Sinning on I should all of a sudden be hurried away out of the company of my Jovial Associates into that of houling and tormented Spirits And from my Songs and Laughter into weeping and wailing and gnashing of Teeth How would it blank and amaze me to think that ever I should be so mad as to run such a desperate hazard How dare we then talk of Repenting hereafter when we consider that it is not in our power to command so much as one moment of future time When for all that we know the hope of Eternity which is now in our hands may be lost for ever and drop through our Fingers before to morrow morning And that when we lye down at night and fall asleep securely in our Sins we do not know but before the next Twilight we may awake with horror and amazement in Hell Let us seriously consider therefore that the present time only is in our power and that as for the future it is wholly in God's and that therefore when we defer our Repentance to the future we do as it were cast Lots for our Soul and venture our Everlasting hopes upon a contingency which is not in our power to dispose of For all we know this may be the Evening of our day of Trial and if it be our Life and Eternity depends upon what we are now doing Wherefore it highly concerns us by all the regard we owe to our own Everlasting safety wisely to manage this last Stake the winning or losing whereof may be our making or undoing Thus will the frequent remembrance of our Mortality put us upon laying in good store of Spiritual provisions against that great day of Expence For he who often considers the great uncertainty of Life the dreadful approaches the concomitant Terrors and the momentous issues and consequents of Death must be strangely stupified if thereby he be not vigorously excited to fore-arm and fortifie himself with all those Graces and Defences that are necessary to render his Departure hence easie and safe and prosperous And now having done with the Text I shall only crave your leave to say a few words upon this sorrowful occasion viz. The Funeral of our common Friend Sir John Buckworth who perhaps while he lived was a person as eminently known as ever any Merchant that trod the Exchange of London And indeed considering the great share he had of Intellectual Endowments He was a Gentleman that seemed to have been mark'd out by Providence to make a considerable Figure among Men. For First Nature had inrich'd him with a clear bright Mind with a quick Apprehension a prompt Memory a steady and a piercing Judgment together with a natural presence of Mind and fluency and readiness of Speech which inabled him upon all occasions easily to express his own conceptions of things in very clear and apt Language All which Natural Indowments he had vastly improved and cultivated by a long and curious Observation and Experience For as Nature had fitted him for an active Life so Providence soon introduced him upon the stage of Action For as he was born a Gentleman so he was educated a Merchant which perhaps is one of the most advantagious Academies in the World to instruct the
IV. That we should frequently remember our Mortality even in the midst of our most happy Circumstances here is highly necessary to fore-arm our minds against the Terrors of Death Whilst we abound with the enjoyments of this Life we are apt to put far from us the evil day and with the rich Churl in the Gospel to promise our selves many years Ease and Voluptuousness in this World So that Death generally steals upon us before we are aware and like a Thief in a frightful Vizor surprises in the midst of a deep Security and after we have strugled with him a few moments to no purpose robs us of our Lives and our Happiness together And O how terrible must Death be when it approaches a man under such Circumstances when the poor deluded wretch hath been just Singing a soft Requiem to himself Soul take thy rest and ease thou hast goods laid up for many years and many years to possess and enjoy them For Death now to pronounce that fatal sentence Thou fool this night shall thy soul be taken from thee Now when he thought all was safe and concluded himself secure of a long Lease of Life and Happiness Now before he hath given himself the leisure to think of his Dying hour or to fortifie his Heart with any wise or good Thoughts against the Terrors of this terrible one that is just now brandishing its fatal shaft at his breast How must it needs blank and amaze and confound him and what a trembling horror must it strike through his Heart to see himself thus unexpectedly hurried away one part of him to the Grave and the other to Eternity now when he thought himself so securely possessed of a long enjoyment of the good things of this Life Wherefore as we would be fore-armed against the Terrors of Death and enabled to abide his dreadful approaches with a firm and constant Mind it concerns us now while we are surrounded with the Joys and Pleasures of this Life to entertain our Minds with frequent thoughts and remembrances of him to retire now and then into the Charnel-house and there to read Lectures to our selves upon the Skelitons and Deaths Heads those emblems and representations of our approaching Mortality and from them to take such lively Pictures and Ideas of this King of Terrors as may render his grim visage and fearful addresses more familiar to us and give our thoughts a more intimate acquaintance with him and with the manner and method of his approaches with what an Army of Diseases he is wont to lay Siege to the Fort of our Life and how in despite of all the resistances of Nature he plants and quarters them in our Veins and Arteries and Stomachs and Bowels and from thence infests us all over with continual Anguish and Pain how when he hath tired and exhausted us with his continued Batteries and worn out our strength with an uninterrupted succession of wearisom Nights to sorrowful Days he at last storms the Soul out of all the out-works of Nature and forces it to retire into the Heart and how when upon this last retreat of Life he hath marked us for dead in a cold Baptism of clammy and fatal Sweats he summons our weeping Friends together to assist him in grieving us with their parting kisses and sorrowful adieus and how at length when he is weary of tormenting us any more he rushes into our Hearts and with a few mortal Pangs and Convulsions tears the Soul from thence and turns it out to seek its fortune in the wide world of Spirits where it is either seized on by Devils and carried away to their dark Prisons of Sorrow and Despair there to languish out its Life in a dismal expectation of that dreadful day wherein it must change its bad condition for a worse or be conducted by Angels to some Blessed Abode there to remain in unspeakable Pleasure and Tranquillity till the great day of its Coronation with a Glorious Resurrection If we would thus frequently survey our approaching Mortality in all the Circumstances and Appendages of it we should hereby familiarize its Terrors to our Minds so that when ever it happens to us our thoughts which have been so long accustomed to converse with it will be much less startled and amazed at it and the often remembrances we have past upon it will put us upon laying in such wise and good Thoughts and Considerations as are best able to fortifie our minds against it and to inspire us with Courage and Alacrity under it V. And Lastly Frequently to remember our Mortality in the midst of our most happy Circumstances here is highly necessary to excite and quicken us in our Preparations for Eternity and hence it is that we are so often called upon in this Militant Estate to consider our latter end Deut. 32. 29. and by the examples of the best men are invited So to number our days that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom Psal. 90. 12. and to wait till our change comes Job 14. 14. To which end also we are put in mind that Here we have no abiding City Heb. 13. 14. and that it is appointed for all men once to dy Heb. 9. 27. and that our life is even as a vapour that appears for a little time and then vanishes away Jam. 4. 14. And to this purpose the Apostle applies this consideration 1 Cor. 7. 29 30 31. Now this I say brethren i.e. of our uncertain abode and continuance here upon which he exhorts us to compose our selves to a great indifferency as to the things of this World it remains that they that have wives be as if they had none and they that weep as though they wept not and they that rejoyce as though they rejoyced not and they that buy as though they possessed not and they that use this world as not abusing it for the fashion of this world passeth away i.e. Since your time here is so very short and uncertain see you endeavour beforehand to loosen your selves from this World and to put your selves into a fit posture to leave it for 't is but a short Scene of things that will quickly be shifted and then there will an Eternal state of things succeed And indeed since to Dy well is the last Act and final Consummation of our Life it must needs highly concern us to arm and prepare our selves for it beforehand lest we lose the prize by stumbling just at the Goal and after a long Voyage miscarry within sight of Harbour For in the hour of Death we throw our last Cast for an Eternity of Happiness or Misery And how much are we concerned to throw that well upon which so vast a Stake depends O my Brethren it is a most serious thing to Die to pass this dark Entry of Eternity through which as we go right or wrong we are made or undone for ever For to carry us right through 't is not a few Death-bed sorrows or good wishes 't
Mind in the knowledge of Men and the management of Humane Affairs His Education furnished him with a fair opportunity of seeing the World as well abroad as at home and of prying into the Intrigues of Commerce and into the Manners and Interests of Men whence he drew so many wise and useful Observations as rendred him a Prince among Merchants and an Oracle of Trade insomuch that he was thought worthy to be chosen Deputy-Governour of that wise and great Company of the Turky Merchants and was perhaps as much consulted by his Superiors about the Interest of the English Trade and the Mysteries of Commerce as any one Merchant of this City or Nation Thus for his Intellectuals As for his Morals I believe that all that knew him will allow him this Character That he was a Gentleman of great Integrity and Fidelity to his Trust of exact Justice and Righteousness in his Commerce and Dealings That he was a studious and successful Peace-maker And great part of his Time before he was called up by his Prince into a more busie and active Station being spent in Arbitrating differences between Man and Man in which he was so expert so impartial and prosperous that I am apt to think he cemented as many broken Friendships reconciled as many Quarrels and adjusted as many Differences which otherwise might have flamed out into destructive breaches as most of those blessed Peace-makers that are gone before him Consider him in his respective Relations and there all that knew him I am sure will allow him to have been a Faithful a Loyal and useful Subject to his Prince a kind and obliging Husband to his Lady a tender and a wise Father to his Children a prudent careful and benevolent Master to his Servants and in a word a wise Counsellor a faithful Friend and a just and diligent Correspondent As for his Religion he was a hearty Protestant of the Church of England which upon mature Judgment and upon thorow Information he preferred for the Loyalty of its Principles the Simplicity of its Doctrines and the Primitive Purity of its Worship and Discipline before all the Churches in the World and what his Judgment was of our Church he visibly exprest by his constant attendance upon the Publick Offices of our Religion upon the Lord's day from which he never absented but when he was either detained by Sickness or some very urgent and unavoidable occasion and in which he always demeaned him with all the profound Reverence and Devotion that outwardly expresses a Mind inspired with a Pious Sense of its Duty and of the awful presence of the great Majesty of Heaven Thus he Lived and as for his Death though it was accompanied with all the Circumstances that could render a man fond of Life and make him play loth to depart though he had a plentiful Estate a loving and beloved Wife dutiful and hopeful Children and these all of them happily disposed off and setled in the World to his own Hearts content To leave all which at once seems a very hard Chapter to a mind not well resolved yet all these together had no such effect upon him Indeed not long before his Death though then in perfect health he seemed to have an Aboding of his approaching Fate for having to his hearts desire disposed of his only Son in Marriage who was the last of his Children undisposed he hath been often heard to say That now he thanked God his business in this World was finished and that it was high time for him to think of his Departure into the other and when soon after he was seized with his last Sickness he bore it with an invincible Courage and Constancy and though the last part of it was extremely painful to him he underwent it without Complaint or Murmuring with a Mind that seemed intirely resigned to the Soveraign Disposer of all Events And when he perceived the approaches of Death and found that he was going off this Stage of Mortals he never shew'd the least sign of Regret or Reluctancy but took a solemn leave of his Friends and which was much harder of his dearest Relatives who stood lamenting and weeping about him and this with a Mind very serious indeed but in all appearance very calm and composed And finally he gave up the Ghost like a brave Man and a good Christian with a firm and undaunted Mind and as one that had placed his main hope on the other side the Grave and did expect to exchange an uneasie Mortal Life for an Immortal one of Pleasure And therefore though I make no doubt after all but that as a Man he had his Faults and he that hath none let him cast the first stone yet I am sure he had his Vertues and those very eminent ones too And therefore it will highly become us who survive in Charity to cast a Vail over the one and in Piety imitate and transcribe the other That so with him and all our other Christian Brethren departed this Life in God's true Faith and Fear we may have our final Consummation in Bliss and Glory through Jesus Christ our Lord To whom with the Father and Eternal Spirit Three Persons and One God be ascribed all Honour and Glory and Power and Dominion for ever and ever AMEN FINIS