same The God the Mediator and the Comforter that they chose and do chuse the same The Gospel-Covenant that they studied lived upon and by and do study and live upon the Promises and according to the Demands of the same If you exercise daily the Faith you have seen in them the Hope and the Love the Repentance the Diligence and the Patience the Humility the Justice and the Charity The holy things which ye have both Learned and Received and heard and seen in them do ye and the God of Peace shall be with â—ou After severe study of the way 〈◊〉 Heaven they neither wilfully â—andred out of it nor slothfully â—alked in it Take you their Way â—nd their Pace and hold both â—mitate you their Watchfulness over your Hearts and your Senâ—es and their Resistance of both â—ssaulting Temptations and conspiâ—ing Corruptions They did as the Army of Israel which passing thorough a Wood abounding with Honey would not taste it because â—he King had forbad them The people feared the King's Oath 1 Sam. 14.26 They chose rather Afflictions than sinful Pleasures and Reâ—roaches for Christ rather than the Treasures of Aegypt Love you the World and the things of it as little is they loved them They understood the disproportion between a spiritual Nature and carnal Sensualities and looked not on Temporal things as the goods of immortal Souls Pray as hard 〈◊〉 they prayed for the Peace of Jerusalem Loving the Church as knowing they were to be judged by their Affections unto the suffering Churches Not confining God's Church unto their own Party nor making their unnecessary Opinions Articles of Faith and their unnecessary Modes of Worship Terms of Communion Let it not be said that Joshua's Resolution was theirs more than yours As they so do you resolve to serve God with your Housholds commanded so to do Educating your Children piously and prudently Loving your Servants Souls with care to save them and using them in all references as you would be used your selves if you were in their conditions Contemplate seriously and frequently as before directed the blessed state of which they are now possessed Spend not all the thoughts â—ou have to spare upon their Life Of the two bestow them most liâ—erally upon the Estate they entred â—nto at their Death And do not â—ndure your Living Friends to take from you the time in which you â—hould remember your Dead ones Take it for no less a duty to Commemorate the Dead than to visit the Living To Commemorate the Place where they be the Company wherewith they dwell the work wherein they are employed And stay ye sometimes in these thoughts when you form them as you use to stay in visits of your Neighbours when you make them Start not out of these useful thoughts assoon as you are got into them As tho' you dreamed that little benefit and comfort could be expected from them Rest not till you have overcome the first shyness of your minds Their strangeness unto these thoughts Yea till sensible benefit hath made them impatient of keeping long from them A little serious exercise will make them so For to say the truth which some tell me they feel and which I have felt as my great motive both to Preach and Publish this hasty discourse These thoughts are most exceeding helps to facilitate and to sweeten our thoughts of God with whom is dazling and overwhelming Majesty Mr. Baxter calls them our stepping-stones and stairs of ascent to look at God And a greater than he doth methinks direct us to eye the glorified Saints as a sweet mean to promote looking unto Jesus Christ Heb. 12.1 2. Unto Jesus Christ who is our only and perfectly sufficient Mediator His glory dare you not for your lives to give unto his most glorified Members But neither dare you to neglect such remembrance of those his Members as so makes for the honour of Him the Head As is both an Evidence of your Principle of Holiness toward Him and a Means of its Practice and Progress The promotion of which Principle Practice and Progress is the dutiful Design of every Sermon And may it be the plentiful Blessing of this Occasional one unto you Amen and Amen! Postscript THE foregoing Discourse hath pressed the Remembrance of departed Saints Glory without any thing said of departed Sinners Misery Because I had purposed to treat thereof distinctly and as fully from another Text. But opportunity being here given me I take it to say thus much Of the Means of Grace all are Excellent but none Superfluous They do all â—ualifie and Engage us unto the use of each other No one excuseth from the use of another It hath been shewn to be highly beneficial to stir up our selves by the consideration of deceased Saints Blessedness unto an imitation of their Faith and Holiness And it is as certainly profitable to urge our selves by the consideration of deceased Sinners Ruine unto an abhorrence of their Unbelief and Disobeâ—ience The Reasons are both obvious and numerous So are convincing Observations and Experiences He was an eminently pious Antient that thus bespake his Auditory Sirs Let us be oft going down to Hell in our contemplations while we live that our Souls may not go down into it when we die And I have heard our greatest Divines praise another who having found that exercise very helpful against his Temptations did not stick to exclaim O Lord my Soul doth bless thee for Hell It is true the Hope of Heaven is the sweetest Persuasive but it is as true that the Fear of Hell is commonly the strongest Motive to our Duty Unregenerate hearts do feel little but this latter And the most sanctified men alive will tell you that they are fain under most of their Conflicts to call in their Fear to the help of their Hope And that their Life is a Flying from the Wrath to come as well as a Laying up Treasure in Heaven To clear this let it be observed The Objects of Hope are less conceivable by our minds than those of Fear be Although Storms and Darkness be without any difficulty pictured Calms and Sun-shines cannot be drawn without exquisite Art and extreme Industry Hell's Torments be a thousand times more easily understood than Heaven's Joys and Glorys be The Imagination of a natural Man will frightfully represent the burning Fire and the gnawing Worm But the fulness of Joy in God's presence and the everlasting Pleasures at his right hand these are foolishness unto him neither can he know them No Eye but a Spiritual one and that strained hard in deep Contemplation can discern much of them Alas who is it that can say he needs not all the helps prescribed in Mr. Baxter's Saints Everlasting Rest part 4th page 219. unto page 242. I mean his Helps to conceive affectionately of the Heavenly Glories These things premised I exhort unto the Duty easily inferred Unto frequent and most serious Consideration of impenitent Sinners end as well as of penitent Believers Naturalists say that the attractive vertue of the Loadstone is less when it is single and draweth much more strongly when it is encompassed and armed with Iron You shall find I am very sure that the Hope of Heaven will much better draw you when the Fear of Hell doth conjunctly drive you Briefly Having here no more room I advise to a just meditation of these three particulars There is an Hell as sure as there is an Earth There be damned men Burning as sure as there be sinning men Breathing Yea and as many of them as have ever died in Impenitence and Unbelief and Disobedience Christians and Jews also believe this So do Turks and Pagans for the substance of it The Alâ—oran mentions a house of Perdition Plato speaks almost the words of Holy Scripture 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This Hell is the Center of Misery A Collection of all evils in their â—ighest degrees Passing all our preâ—ent understanding forasmuch as not comprehending what an incensed God can do 't is impossible to comprehend what a Damned man doth suffer A man that eternally Dies and Lives together having a Death without End and a Life without Ease And Tortures too without and beyond all comparison This Hell or Center of Misery hath six Memorables e. gr 1. It s Scripture Names A Prison bottomless Pit second Death never dying Worm unquenchable Fire 2. Its Essentials Deprivation of all good of Drops of Water as well as Cups of Wine and Accumulation of all evils for the Vessels of Wrath are filled with it 3. Its Efficients The Place Company and enraged Conscience are grievous ones but God's own immediate hand is inconceivably the sorest and strikes the hardest blows â—ee Dr. Tho Good win hereof 4. Its Concomitants These are an Enlargement of mind and a Fixedness of it upon tormenting Objects God lets in upon the Damned a great Light to exaspeâ—â—te their Fire There Ignorance â—ould do them a kindness so â—ould one minutes Forgetfulness But it cannot be Here they would 〈◊〉 know God there they must â—ere they would not Think of him â—ere they cannot cease one moment â—om thoughts of him And thereâ—â—re feel nothing but confounding Shame piercing Sorrow racking â—ury and Despair that is beyond 〈◊〉 Epithets 5. It s Duration And this is FOR EVER An Eternity â—â—expressable as its Extremity 6. Its â—nds and Reasons Which are the â—estraining of Sin in the World â—nd the shewing forth God's Holiâ—â—ss Righteousness and Power upâ—n Sinners finally incorrigible Indeed if we saw all the Blessed â—â—ining in Heaven and all the â—amned burning in Hell as daily and plainly as we see any thing with our Eyes it could not make us Holy without the gracious influence of the Holy Spirit But be it considered that blessed influence of his is not to be expected without the use of his prescribed Contemplations and Practices It is by Heaven and Hell both of them in our Thoughts that he pleaseth to rectifie our Affections and Works Let us therefore neither Pray for his Grace without Meditations of both nor Meditate of both without Prayers for his Grace FINIS NB. The Marginal Note page 59â— was by the Printers mistake inserted The substance of it being found page 60 and 61 in its proper place
History give us Testifying still â—gainst the frauds of all Temptations â—gainst the folly of all our distractâ—ng fears and unto the Duty Safeâ—y and sure Victory of persevering Faith By consequence it must be the Will of God that in all our Tryals we ever and anon consider the Eyes of these excellent Persons thus upon us And their Testimony as hath been said that is ever upon the side of our Duty That we do so consider and lay this to Heart as to turn it unto our motive encouragement And a provocation to put forth the utmost of our Spiritual strength Whereby alone we can answer the gracious End of God in vouchsafing unto us this encompassing Cloud and encouraging one In short God's Preceptive Will makes a perfect Necessity And this his Will is revealed for the remembrance of Saints deceased So that his Fear cannot be duly before your Eyes when these Persons are not duly kept in your minds C. 9. Your God's promises do bind you to remember your Godly Ministers and Friends deceased Know ye not that he hath promised an honourable and lasting Memory unto his righteous Servants And that Memory to be among your selves the only persons Qualified to bear it Now his promises speak that Will of his that is the Rule of yours If you Consent not to it you Oppose your God If you but Consent to it with an Unoperative and Ineffectual Will Sola voluntas est cadaver Scalig. that is as if you Consented not If you Consent entirely you remember those we speak of with sweet memory And by that Practice ye fulfil the divine Promise Add hereto God hath honoured this gracious Practice with considerable Promises unto such as hold it The very promise of dwelling in his holy Hill is made unto such as honour them that fear Him And 't is a wonderful mistake if any think it made to such as honour them but for term of life Such as honour them here as the Excellent of the Earth but cease to honour them at all when God honours them most taking them to Heaven as â—udged to be too good for this World â—f this Promise then be a cord of Love wherewith God draws us to â—he Honour and Love of the Saints in Light as well as of the Household of Faith what must be inferred They break it daringly do they not as many as Love and Honour Saints but unto their Deaths Accounting themselves to have don their last Office indeed when the have followed their Corps unto the grave's side Giving the grave thâ— Victory over all their regards unto them C. 10. Lastly Your own Prayer and Promises bind you to remembeâ— your Godly Ministers and Friends deceased A word shall serve in thâ— plain Argument You pray that Gods will may 〈◊〉 done by you and by others on Earth 〈◊〉 it 's done in Heaven As there it 〈◊〉 done by all the Spirits about thâ— Celestial Throne But how prâ—phanely must you thus pray without some very lively thoughts câ— those Spirits and of their Obedience Without which it is as if yoâ— prayed plainly that his will may bâ— done by you like you know not whom and as to manner you mind nâ—â— how Your Prayers all are full of viâ—tual promises Praying that yoâ— may you do constructively promise that you will labour to obey God as the Heavenly Host do Consequently that you will well consider them and their performances Even with the accuracy and frequence of those who set themselves to imitate greatest Exemplars And is it a trivial thing in your sight to lie unto God! And that in your very prayers Or do you not so if you exercise not your minds in the foresaid consideracy of your glorifyed Friends Other considerations might be added but I will hope what is said hath inforced your Belief and raised in you full purposes of Obedience unto this Truth Granting that it hath so done some may ask what will the Belief and Obedience of it make for Edification Urging that this remembrance of Godly Ministers and Friends deceased is a subject they have rarely heard preached And notwithstanding all the caution wherein it is expressed it is one very liable to be abused unto Superston c. I answer If indeed it be a Trutâ— the less it hath been insisted on thâ— more it ought now to be insisted or And must not be kept from all People for fear it should be abused bâ— some I have convincingly prove it to be a Truth And one whoâ—â— faith and regular Obedience contrâ—butes more than a little unto thâ— love of God unto the life of Faith unto all Grace and Consolation which I must believe is to Edifie Neveâ— theless I acknowledge it's use untâ— Edification to be more manifesteâ— in the sequel of this Discoursâ— Wherein are set forth those holâ— things whereunto the foresaid Râ— membrance is an Antecedent botâ— most Conducive and Necessary Wherefore I will but briefly suggest a few Inferences from this firâ—â— Doctrine and proceed unto a second I. 1. The best of this World must â—ave it In Death's War there 's no Discharge The Prophets and Apostles â—re dead John the beloved Disciâ—le is not left behind It was the advice of a Heathen Reckon your best friends as least duraâ—e things And it is the Sentence â—f holy Scripture the Body is dead â—ecause of Sin Rom. 8.10 I. 2. God honours them in their Deaths that honour him in their lives â—nd that here where they have hoâ—oured Him For as He commands â—â—e Church above honorably to receive â—hem So Chrysostom Clem. Vatablus Menoch and Lud. de Dieu in loc construe the Text. He commands â—e Church below honoâ—â—bly to remember ' em â—e will have their â—ames shine here as â—ell as their Souls â—ere Abel so long ago murdered 〈◊〉 to this day most honourably menâ—â—oned Heb. 11.4 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Being dead he is yet spoâ—en of with renown immortal I. 3. Every Believer hath a Jacob 's Ladder I mean he hath that whereby he can in his Thoughts ascend the Heavens and Spiritually view his glorified Ministers anâ— Friends there In his mind he caâ— see where they are what they are and what they are doing as we shall hereafter shew I. 4. Sorrow for godly men deceased ought to be moderate For we are tâ— remember them honourably and foâ— imitation not scandalously to oâ—â— distraction True we may aâ—â— ought to mourn When Lazaruâ— died Jesus wept But we may nâ—â— sorrow unmixedly and as withoâ—â— Hope The Israelites mourned nâ—â— so much for Jacob as the Egyptiaâ—â— did The grief of Saints muâ—â— know its bounds I. 5. Although God be to be remeâ—bred by us principally he is not to 〈◊〉 remembred only For he commandâ— us to remember his and our hoâ—â— Friends that are in glory attendinâ— him Remember your Father but â—orget not his Children who carry â—ost of his Image and Likeness on â—hem Remember your Redeemer â—ut forget not those his Redeemed â—n whom
not nearly and immediately so teach the possibility of the foresaid Life as his Servant's example doth A Soul under Temptation exclaims that be it ever so necessary 't is altogether as impossible to live by Faith in this World and hold a rightly ordered Conversation in such a Catholick Sodom Go you and tell him that the Son of God did live by Faith and fulfil all righteousness even in this World He shall reply upon you that it is a wild inference that he may because the Son of God did so do He shall tell you Christ had none of his sins in him and he has little or none of Christ's strength in his dejected Soul Christ had all created and uncreated holiness and might well overcome World and Devil but it were a wonder if they should be overcome by him a weak and sinful Dust He shall ask you what Logick of yours it is that thus argues An Angel slew an hundred thousand Enemies therefore a Worm may slay as many But on the other hand tell you this bruised Reed that yonder in Heaven be multitudes and many of his own Acquaintance that were Worms as weak as himself as tempted as himself and many a time as dejected as himself who did nevertheless keep the holy Faith and finish their holy Course and win the Crown of Righteousness What then Why then you do bind his contradiction hand and foot and it is odds but you cast out his despairing Spirit To be sure you silence him and very probably you make him by and by to speak Evangelically And to fall to chiding of his legal self and counselling it in Davids Rhetorick Why cast down O my Soul why disquieted in me Trust in God For I even I may yet Praise him who is the health of my countenance and my God And now I ask Should such a Tower of David such an Armory as this whereon there hang a thousand bucklers and shields for tempted despondent Souls should such a practice suffer disuse It would be unspeakable loss to the whole generation of the righteous But blessed be his excellent name He that delights of bruised Reeds to make polished Pillars in his Temple and of smoaking flax to make burning and shining lights He is more wise and kind than to admit it Glory be to him in the highest R. 3. This practice doubles the glory of God from the Faith and Conversation of Saints deceased If I may so speak God had from themselves one crop Or tribute of glory And would have had it tho' no eye but his own had seen their Faith and Conversation Tho' no mortal man had observed and followed them But now now that Faith and Conversation are not buried in Oblivion but are lifted up and draw men after them behold a second crop another tribute springs up So fruitful do living Christian's Meditation and Imitation make them that it may be said of deceased ones much like as of Sampson The Praises they bring unto their God in their death be more than they which they brought in their life Can therefore any Lover of God be without a deep sense of the reason of this practice Or need to be farther told that he who hath made all things for his glory hath required this practice for the same Here I must believe that none are Blind but those that will not see R. 4. This Practice doth likewise add unto the joy of Saints deceased Heaven is the element of Joy There 's less water in the Sea and light in the Sun than Joy in Heaven But we are generally taught that the Inhabitants have various degrees even after the Resurrection However it be it is this only that I would here propose viz. Of their Joys in Heaven this must needs be one that they did in their measure glorifie God in their day upon Earth And if they have knowledge of it it must be another Joy to have their Faith and Obedience live and bear fruit after that they are transplanted To have their old Graces and Duties for many years after to edify their Brethren and glorifie their Father And why we may not conceive them soon to know it when it is so let them say that can I cannot With humble submission I conclude that they are informed of it when the matter of their Joy is obtained Whether the holy Angels give them notices or what way they receive the same I take not on me to determine Some have thought that this is true concerning men Damned Such whose Errors are remembred to the diffusing of their enmity and malignity after their death they have proportionable encreases of their torment in Hell made presently made and with full significations given of the meritoriously procuring cause of it And on the other side concerning Saints in Heaven some have presumed this viz. That such whose Faith and Holy Life are commemorated c. made use of to the edification of the Church they receive like encreases of Joy As soon made as the foresaid sinners increases of Torment Learned men have thought Jer. 17.10 to make this way I the Lord search the heart I try the reins even to give to every man according to his ways and according to the FRUIT of his doings and with full certification of the service that is so of grace rewarded I contend not but to as many as with me do suppose this which I think no one will pretend an ability to disprove To such at least I shall think this reason of good force Upon the very single account hereof I dare ask them Is there not a cause for the commended Practice If we on Earth have Power should we not have Will to add to the Joy of our Brethren in Heaven R. 5. This Practice of good men exalts the saving grace of God Grace unto a Sinner is and will be an eternal Wonder Saving grace even most restrainedly considered is above all the blessing and praise that can be given it in the very state of Glory Abraham himself even after the Resurrection will be unableadequately to praise the grace of his own Salvation The grace that took him out of his misery and qualified him and brought him unto Glory That said to him in his blood Live That when he was alive gave him Life more abundantly And when he waâ— Meet placed him in the inheritanâ—â— of the Saints in Light This gracâ— unto his single Person will transcenâ— all his possible conception But leâ—â— this Grace to him be considered iâ— its just extent As saving him anâ— making him an Instrument of savinâ— many others In a sense the Fathâ—â— of thousands of heirs of Salvation An Exemplar unto them Making his Faith and Obedience blessâ— means of grace unto multitudeâ— Causing generations to call him blesseâ— Using him when Alive and alâ—â— when Dead as a Co-worker with Goâ— What an addition is this Thiâ— that makes Salvation it self somewhâ—â— more than it self Yea much more As to save a man from
their Kinds and their Circumstances With their Demerits of outward of inward and of eternal and extremest punishments For these God knows what were their sighs and their groanings were not hid from Him Their mixtures of sin in all Natural Civil and Religious things did foul their faces with weeping Think you that it is a peculiar sin or grief of yours in a great degree to Eat Drink to Buy and Sell yea to use the holy Word and Prayer from selfish Principles and to selfish Ends not Purely from Principles and unto Ends Heavenly your mistake is gross It was the common sin of all your friends in Heaven and the common grief of all while they lived upon Earth Ardently all desired but no one ever attained unto sinless purity no not in any one of their pathes Phil. 3.12 13. 1 Joh. 1.8 Jam. 3.1 In every motion of Nature there was much of Corruption In every Secular thing most lawful there was what was Unlawful In all holy things there were Iniquities And for these went they mourning all their days Their long unaccomplished desires and unanswered Prayers made their hearts sick an hundred times Ours be a sword in our Bones that we are prone to think did never cut any other Souls But it is without any colour of Reason that we think so in our haste It is very well known God used to make our Predecessors wait as long as He makes any of us And as frequently they cryed as we do now cry How long wilt thou forget me O Lord for ever Mine eyes fail while I wait for my God I am weary of my crying my throat is dryed For day and night thy hand is heavy upon me O God I cry in the day time and thou hearest not To conclude this particular The sorrows of death compassed them as they compass us Great was their consternation in the prospect of their Dissolution Unto which all their great Grace could not reconcile their reluctant Nature With fearfulness and trembling they felt the King of Terrors entring and pulling down their Tabernacle of Clay Laying their Earthly House in the Dust Turning their Flesh into rottenness and sending it out of the sight of man into darkness Have we our terrors they were not without theirs Of some and those extraordinarily sanctified it is credibly reported that very Fear was their Executioner And they died for fear of Death Of others I pray bethink your selves how was it that you saw them lye gasping on their Beds and heard them ratling in their Throats and observed them to take the breach of the strings of their Eyes and Heart 'T is impossible here to say all and hard to me not to say too much But I proceed P. 2. These very Souls thus winnowed are gloriously escaped out of all these evils So the Text saith expresly And so the whole Scripture so brightly that all are Believers except such as are not Christians To quote the obvious Texts would be to recite a great part of the Bible Let that one which I produce recall others unto your remembrance Rev. 14.13 Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord. An illustrious Maxim in few words declaring man's great End or Aim which is blessedness And man 's only way unto the same which is by dying in the Lord or in the Faith of Christ Jesus after living in him by Faith This Maxim St. John had from Heaven And this he was bid to write for the use of the Saints on Earth And this he telleth us is confirmed by the Holy Ghost Yea saith the Spirit that they may rest from their labours and their works do follow them In which confirmatory reasons we have these things asserted scil 1. That before their death in the Lord these Saints had labours and works for him which were hard Such as to be exempted from was a part of blessedness 2. That at their Death they were exempted from them And now lived no more in Sweat much less in Tears 3. That with freedom from sufferings they now received Gods Rewards of their Obedience His rewards of Grace which are like the Donor beyond comprehension and objects of eternal wonder Their works do follow them That is the immense reward of their slender work The eternal reward of their short work The far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory This argument flows with Milk and Honey stay we and feed a while hereon Think pleasantly of what is proved so evidently Saints raised out of the Valley of Tears are lifted up into the Mount of Joy Wherein no Eye ever wept or Breast sighed or Tongue complained Or ever had cause or occasion so to do Wherein neither the World nor the God of this World could ever give trouble For Satan's Vassals cannot reach it And he and his Angels were long ago cast far enough from it Wherein the Immortal Father never gave a blow to any Child or took from any the Kisses of his Mouth sweeter than Wine Wherein sin the most hateful evil hath no more place than the Devil whose work it is But the perfect purity long desired is fully enjoyed Wherein no one sinful or mixed and imperfect act ever blemished the holy state Wherein no Hope is ever delayed one minute nor ought is desired before God's will is that it should be possessed Wherein there is no Doubt or Grievance of Life nor any Fear or Possibility of Death Wherein we do all know all things are better than any of us upon Earth can know For we know that when Saints enter the House made without hands they presently take possession of all the Goods And who can know till he goes up and sees how many and how rich they be Indeed the holy Oracles do warrant thus much to be said of our good Friends that are entred there They possess blessed Light One in comparison whereof their former knowledge was but a less thick darkness The open light of the Sun vastly exceeds a few Beams strained through the crevice of a Wall And no less doth Gods manifestation of himself above exceed that which he affords his Church below Neither is there any compare between the strength of a glorified Eye and of an imperfectly sanctified one Unto glorified ones the deep Fountains of Wisdom and Grace are laid open The riches of Goodness the beauties of Holiness the glories of Power are manifested The Embroideries of Providence are unfolded 'T is not easie to name what God doth hide from ' em For why He himself is All in all And this we know They do see him as he is Wherefore necessarily They possess blessed Love So argues the infallible Teacher We shall be like him For we shall see him God is love And sight of God turns us into flames of Love Such are our glorified Friends like unto the blessed Angels Ever receiving the highest love that God confers on finite Creatures and giving back the greatest love that God can have from their glorified