Friends a kind Acquaintance his Servants a good Master and we a liberal Benefactor and we may justly cry and say O Death thou dost indeed make great spoil and havock in the World thou dost visit every Family and every Person at one time or other thou art so cruel that thou sparest neither Young nor Old neither the Useless nor the Serviceable neither the Profitable nor Unprofitable Servant Our Sin has indeed given thee all thy Power and made thee look with a formidable Aspect to Flesh and Blood but because thou art so formidable we turn our Eyes from thee and look with more pleasure upon that Blessed Redeemer that has disarmed thee of all thy hurtful Power and that will give us Life when thou hast exercised all thy Rage and done the very worst he dyed that that such as believe might never die We cannot but somewhat fear thee O Death as thou dost dissolve our present Frame but we bid thee welcome as thou art the Messenger of the Lord of Glory to convey us thither To Conclude It is like that we who are in this Assembly upon this occasion shall never meet again Oh that We and all our Acquaintance might meet in Heaven above And let us be sure not to Fall out in our Way thither Let us while we live in a changeable and fading World prepare for one that will never fade Let us not be amazed at the Grave it now swallows us up and our Friends but it shall not keep us very long for our Lord will shortly come and make our Dust to live again and make those Bodies that were weakned by Sickness and destroyed by Death to be like his own glorious Body and what we now believe we shall then see and know to be true In the mean while let us make Conscience of Meditating at the least once a day upon that Comfortable and Reviving Place of our Apostle 1 Thes 4.14 and so to the end For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him For this we say unto you by the Word of the Lord that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep For the Lord himself shall descend from Heaven with a shout with the Voice of the Archangel and with the Trump of God and the dead in Christ shall rise first Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the Clouds to meet the Lord in the Air and so shall we be ever be with the Lord. Wherefore Comfort one another with these Words I conclude this Subject with the Prayer of the same Apostle 2 Thes 3.16 Now the Lord of Peace himself give you Peace always by all Means The Lord be with you all THE END Books lately Printed for John Dunton at the Raven in the Poultry viz. THE Mourners Companion Or Funeral Discourses on several Texts by John Shower p. 1 s. 6 d. The Life and Death of the Renowned John Eliot the first Preacher of the Gospel to the Heathens in America Written by Mr. Cotton Mather Mr. Barker's Book Intituled Flores Intellectuales or Select Notions Sentences and Observations Collected out of several Authors Mr. Lees Joy of Faith Casuistical Morning-Exercise the Fourth Volume By several Ministers in and about London preached in October 1689. Mr. Quick's Young Man's Claim to the Sacrament Mr. Crow's Vanity of Judicial Astrology A New Martyrology or the Bloody Assizes containing the Lives and Sufferings of those who died in the West The third Edition Early Piety Exemplified in the Life and Death of Mr. Nathaniel Mather With a Prefactory Epistle by Mr. Matthew Mead. Mr. Baxter's Poetical Fragments Mr. Oakes Funeral Sermon Mr. Kent's Funeral Sermon The Tragedies of Sin together with the Remarks on the Life of the great Abraham By Stephen Jay Rector of Chimer The Heads of Agreement assented to by the United Ministers There is now in the Press Mr. Brand's Funeral Sermon Preached by Dr. Annesley which will speedily be Publish'd Printed for John Dunton
upon the DEATH OF Mr. Anthony Dunwell GEN. xlv 24. See that ye fall not out by the way IT is not unknown to several here That this Evening is solemn to us upon more Accounts than one not only as 't is the Evening of the Lord's Day and the usual Time of our Lecture here but also as the Providence of God hath given us a peculiar Occasion to remember a Departed Friend by whose Appointment and Desire before he dyed I am now come to Preach a Funeral Sermon for him It is the same Person for whom when I was last here we prayed as being then in the painful Agonies of Death and the next Morning God was pleased to let him Dye He had for several Months by a Lingring Wasting Disease found the Truth of that in Job 14.1 That man that is born of a Woman is full of Trouble and now his going hence has also given us the Proof of the next Verse how he cometh forth like a flower and is cut down He fleeth also as a shadow and continueth not This Flower on which a little while ago we looked with Delight is now blasted with the Stroak of Death and we shall not behold its Greenness and Freshness in this World any more Though we hope it is transplanted to flourish in a better Place This Friend whose Funeral we now celebrate was a constant Hearer in this Place a generous Encourager of this Lecture to my Brother Kentish and to me he was a Cordial and sincere Friend but alas he is gone His Death is indeed our Loss but we hope it was his Gain He is gone whose Friendship was so pleasant and so necessary to us He that delighted in the Activity of his serviceableness to God and us is now at rest in the silent Grave there we hope he sleeps in the Lord there we must leave his Dust and thither will his Works follow him He used to be a constant Attender on this Lecture as he was always more than a Well-wisher to it and I could heartily desire that those other Young People to whom we are beholden for their Kindness would be equally Serious and if it consisted with the Order of their Families as diligent Attenders there are some indeed that are so and if they were all such we hope they would not lose their Time We would willingly have them to receive some Benefit by our poor Pains and to taste of the Fruit of those Studies which their Liberalities have Promoted and Encouraged If it had so pleased God I had rather have come hither to have preached a Sermon of Thankfulness for the Recovery of our Friend than a Funeral Sermon I know it would have been pleasant to us and to all his Relations to have joyned together on such a chearful occasion and our Praises then would have been as many as are now our Sighs and Tears To these Mourners I am sure the Garments of Praise would have been much more delightful than these of Heaviness But what shall we say the Will of God is Done and let us humbly and quietly acquiesce therein for he alone knows when it is the most proper Season for us all to dye Our Acquaintance are going into the next World one after another and in a little while we shall also be gone and our Places know us no more To those that are Departed we must go they will not return to us though our Duty under the Stroaks of God and the Loss of our Friends obliges us to be sensible of his Warnings and of our own Frailty yet it also does engage us not to Repine or Murmur at his Providence Our Eyes may justly weep when we see the Graves of our Holy Friends but they ought not so to weep as to hinder our View of their certain and approaching Resurrection when their now vile and consuming Bodies shall be like the glorious Body of our Lord. I believe you will think this a very strange Place of Scripture on such a sad occasion as this I believe had I been left to my Liberty I should not have chosen it but it was bequeathed to me in the Last Will and Testament of our deceased Friend Mr. Anthony Dunwel and I do now understand That it was that which he had fixed upon several Years ago Men never put any thing in their Wills of this nature but what they most firmly desire to have done It may be a great Comfort to his Friends and Acquaintance that he not only retained a quiet and peaceable Spirit to his Dying Day but that he was willing to have Peace and Quietness flourish in the World and in the Church when he was Dead and Gone a Temper not like to those selfish and narrow Soul People that so they may Live and Dye at Ease care not if all the World be in Flames and Wars and Confusions afterwards as he said Me pereunte ruat Mundus Our peaceable Friend was in this Like to our Blessed Saviour who as he chose to be manifested when the Temple of Janus was shut at Rome and all the World was in a profound Peace and being himself the Prince of Peace and his Reign full of Pity he endeavoured to Reconcile God and Man and the Sons of Men to one another So a little before his Death discoursing with his Disciples Peace was the great Legacy that he bequeathed to them Joh. xiv 27. Peace I leave with you my Peace I give unto you And it is like our Deceased Friend had this in his Eye when he left this Text which is indeed a most pleasant Text though the Occasion on which I am to insist upon it be sad and mournful and I will apply my self to the handling of it when I have done that Justice to the Relations and Friends of the Deceased as to say That I never heard of any falling out among them nor is there I fully believe any Disagreement but a cordial and sincere Love as there ought to be Nor do I believe that he intended them when his Thoughts fixed upon this Subject but only from what I apprehend he was greatly desirous that there should be Love and Friendship and Union and Peace among all Good People of whatsoever Profession and Denomination whether Conformists or Nonconformists and in this Sense and with Relation to this that I shall now explain this good Advice See that ye fall not out by the Way This History of Joseph contains a series of admirable Transactions and is a great instance of the Mysteriousness and Wisdom of the Divine Providence that by Ways to Appearance very unlikely and undiscerned at first by Mortal Men does certainly bring about his own Designs and that Curious Succession and Period of Things which was first laid in his own Decree The Malice and Envy of Joseph's Brethen was the Means of his Advancement their Selling of him preserved their own Lives It was a Cruel Lye that they told his Father Jacob when they said Joseph
truest Bonds of Love We have one Baptism and are all nourished with the same Bread from Heaven he entertains all at the same Table that we may lay aside all our little Quarrels when we see him shedding his dearest Blood to appease his Father's Wrath and to testifie how he loved us all Consid 7. You ought not to fall out by the Way for you will very shortly be at your Journey 's End This is the Motive of our Apostle Let your moderation be known unto all Men the Lord is at hand Phil. 4.5 The Lord is at hand who is to judge you and them The Lord is at hand that will bless you for ever if you are peaceable and meek and lowly but he will condomn you if he find that by Wrath and Strife and Contention you are altogether disagreeable to his Holy Example Oh let not the Great Judge find you quarrelling with one another when he comes but labour to be found of him in Peace Surely the Brethren of Joseph might keep from falling out by the Way when it was but a little Distance between Egypt and Canaan It would have been a very unpleasant thing to their good Father to have seen them coming Home in so bad a Temper Oh my Friends let us heartily love one another let us do all we can for one another It is but a little Season that we are to be together a little while hence we that are in this Congregation shall be in the Congregation of the Dead and our Places and our Friends know us no more Oh let us not be Clamorous now against one another seeing we shall shortly be in the silent Grave Surely we that have so short and so vain a Life and may so soon be dead should spend our Time to better Purpose than to quarrel or fall out People that are to die together do usually embrace one another with all the Marks of a tender Affection just before they die Let us labour to die in Charity with all the World for Death will come upon us all and we must rest together in the Grave there will be no Warmth no Fire in our Common Dust there will be no Fighting or Scolding in the Grave there lye the Heads now Cool enough that were once full of Heat and many a Vexatious and Uneasie Thought and who once disturbed both themselves and others with needless Disputations and Strife and Quarrels Oh let us be as Loving Travellers that are all going to the same Blessed Home and let us help one another in the Way thither seeing it is but for a little while and we know we have but a little way to go and when we are at our Journey 's End our Heavenly Father will most kindly entertain us all I shall only say two or three things relating to the particular Occasion and so conclude First To the Relations of our Deceased Friend Secondly To the Young Men that were his Acquaintance And Thirdly To those who are usually Hearers in this Place First You that are his Relations have lost a kind Relation and a good Friend you that heard him discourse and saw him with Delight shall not see him again till the Heavens be no more You have laid him in the Grave and there his poor Body does now consume away But let his Death and the Death of your other Friends teach you to prepare to Dye as you now Mourn for him so will others Mourn for you when a few Days and Nights are gone Oh make you sure of a better World for this is altogether Vanity Breath after Eternal Life for this that you now have does very quickly pass away And let me beseech you earnestly to long for that Day when you and your Holy Friends shall meet in Health together and never part again when you shall see those that you beheld here pale and wan with Sickness to shine like the Sun in Glory when you shall see those Breasts from whence there came so many Sighs and Groans in their painful dying Agonies to be full of Love and Praise You shall never hear their Tongues faulter with a Disease nor their Breath stop nor see their Countenances change they shall never complain nor die again they shall be with you and you with them and all of you with the same God and the same Jesus and shall never quit or be separated from one another Oh blessed State Oh sweet and comfortable Priviledge of all true Believers What is all that shines in this World to the least Beam of this Approaching Glory You have lost a dear Relation and one whom if our Prayers could have prevailed we would have kept longer with us I beseech you see that you have an Interest in a God whom you may never lose You that attended him and visited him in his Sickness have beheld his Patience and seen his Resignation In the many Times that I visited him I never heard him in the least murmur at the Hand of God though it pressed him very sore he never in the least opened his mouth to complain that his Disease was so tedious and so very long imitate you his Patience when you come to the like Trials and shew your Submission to the Will of God who has now taken your Dear Friend away Some of us that were near him in his dying Agonies heard him praying earnestly to God through Jesus Christ and expressing his Trust in his Righteousness alone and hoping only for Acceptance in and through this Great Mediator and indeed let Men in Health and at a great distance as they think from Death talk what they will of the great Power of their own Will or of the exactness and multitude of their own Works yet the approach of Judgment will strangely change their Apprehensions and let them know that the Mercy of God in Christ is the best Plea when they are to die Some of you were Sick at the same time and the Physicians had no hope of your Recovery but God has been your Healer God has turned your Glass when his is run out and whilst you are in Time he is in Eternity God has renewed your Life and taken his away his Lamp is gone out and yours is recruited with fresh Oyl again Let the Mercy and Goodness and Deliverance of so kind a Physician draw you nearer to himself and whilst you see our departed Friend and your Son no more in your Habitation beg of God to dwell with you there he is better than a thousand Sons and Daughters his Presence and his Favour is a part of Heaven God may have spared you with this design that you may more glorifie him by a patient acquiescence in his Will and I do not question but you do Let me further entreat you his Relations to continue to live in Love for your Friend has left you all this Legacy And if at any time by any occasion whatsoever you are tempted to Passion remember your dead Friend as if