Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
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A58818
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A sermon preach'd at the funeral of Sir John Buckworth, at the parish-church of St. Peter's le Poor in Broadstreet, December 29, 1687 by John Scott.
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Scott, John, 1639-1695.
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1688
(1688)
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Wing S2072; ESTC R14391
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14,116
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40
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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
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