Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
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A41543
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A fair prospect shewing clearly the difference between things that are seen & things that are not seen, in a sermon preached at the funeral of the Honourable Lady Judith Barrington at Knebworth in Hertfordshire / by Tho. Goodwin ...
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Goodwin, Thomas, d. 1658.
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1658
(1658)
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Wing G1270B; ESTC R40911
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26,888
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78
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that are seen are but temporal be improved to the Comfort of Believers I 'l onely adde one use more which shall be of exhortation from the latter part of the Doctrine That the things which are not seen are Eternal There are Christians you hear things eternal and you to whom I am speaking of these things are all of you such as must live eternally amongst things Eternal The Continuances of your beings here among things seen may be different from each other some may be longer others shorter but in the world to come however in kind your beings may differ infinitely as farre as heaven and hell yet in duration they will all agree to be Eternal Many of us live as if they had never heard of things Eternal most as if they did not believe any such things and truly even the best of us do not improve as we ought the knowledg of things Eternal Now my exhortation to you all is that you would seriously Consider and meditare on those things Eternal I will direct my exhortation of you to three particulars for your Meditation 1. Meditate seriously on Eternity it selfe which is the Interminable Infinite endlesse duration of a being Eternity makes good things infinitely good and evil things infinitely evil The happiness of the Saints in heaven and the misery of the damned in hell have both of them a vast Circumference but the very Center of both is this one thing Eternity The Crowns of Glorified Saints and the Chains of tormented Sinners are both made so weighty by this inclining of Eternity The mind of man is a vessel too narrow indeed to form or contain a meditation which may bear any proportion to Eternity yet some Devout men have well improved their meditation to helpe to affect us with the thoughts of Eternity One discoursing of the Eternal sufferings of the damned in hell thus represents them if sayes he the whole world from the lowest bottome of the earth to the highest top of heaven were filled with small grains of sand as close as they could possibly lye together and every thousandth year an Angel should come and fetch away one of them untill the whole heap were spent if then the prison door of hell might be set open and the damned set at Liberty it would be jowful News to them yet those years although innumerable are nothing to Eternity Another thus if God should make this Motion to the damned that every thousandth year they should shed one single tear all which should be kept together untill they amounted to the quantity of a great Ocean and then with this sea of their tears he would quench the fire of hell and their torments should be at an end there would sayes he be great joy in hell at this merciful motion but the weight of Eternity in their sufferings presseth them down every day lower and lower with inconceivable unsupportable misery O Eternity My Brethren if you could make your thoughts but stick to it if you would every day task them to some solemn meditations of it if you would breath them every day by walking up this high hill Eternity and there be taking a prospect of things that are not seen you would find it exceeding healthful to your soules I would commend it to you as a {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Physick to cure all soul-diseases and distempers If I were asked what were good to make a proud man humble Let him meditate seriously on Eternity what will make a vain man serious a covetous worldling heavenly minded a loose liver strict and precise a wicked man good and a good man better and better let them all daily seriously thinke on Eternity Your hearts it is likely will be very averse from the practise of this duty as a foul stomâ—ck nauseaâ—es all Physick but you that tender the health of your soules enâ—orce it down let it be part of thy daily Spiritual dyet some warme draughts some serious thoughts of Eternity Many excellent advantages and benefits might be shewn you would follow from this duty This would make Jesus Christ sweet and precious indeed to you that have obtained him whether you look on Eternal good things or eternal evil things he being a Sun by which are communicated to you all eternal good things and a shield by which you are defended from all Eternal evil things And you that are yet out of Christ how anxious and industrious would this make you to obtain him In this life thou canst make a shift without Christ thou art well provided against the evils of this life and well furnisht with the good things of it Many friends thou hast who profess themselves thine till death but Christ can only make good to a Soul Thine eternally This would keep your hearts in awe of sinne for fear of after claps and after-reckonings in Eternity This would put you upon exact and circumspect walking This would make you like and chuse the wayes of holiness I have read of a Profane loose witty Gentleman being seriously asked what he thought of the severe strict life of Religious men and what of the voluptuous ungodly debauch'd courses of such as himself he answer'd Cum istis mallem vivere cum illis mallem mori I had rather live with these but I would be glad to dye with those said he as Balaam let me die the death of the righteous Serious frequent meditations of Eternal things would make you willing to live with them as well as to die with them to fast and pray and sowe in teares with them on earth as well as to feast and triumph and reap in joy with them in heaven This would make you less earthly and more heavenly minded this would make you chuse suffering before sinning the reproaches of Egypt before the pleasures and honours of Pharaohs court This would make Christs yoke easie because of Eternal pleasures and sins yoke heavy because of Eternal wrath this would make you fight the good fight of faith valiantly and hold out to the end without fainting in hopes to obtaine that incorruptible Crown of Eternal Glory Having meditated on Eternity in General let thy next step be to consider thy Eternal things in particular Having set before thy thoughts Eternal joyes and eternal torments eternal happiness and eternal misery a Heaven Eternal and an hel eternal O my soul which of these Eternals will be thine for temporals thou art well enough thy lot is fallen into a good ground thou art well situated well accommodated with Wealth Honours Houses Lands Friends Relations but these are thy temporals thy Moment anea What are thy Eternals this world is but thy Inne where must thy home be in Heaven or in hell I do but sojourn here where must I dwell and abide where will my Eternal mansion be who must be my Eternal Companions God and his Saints or the Devil and his Angels must I dwell with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob with the
good as life health wealth food Rayment liberty Friends c. or evil as Sickness Pains Poverty Nakedness death c. are all Objecta sensibilia things which may be seen they do incurrere in sensum Men that walke by sight look much at them and are much affected with them In this sense the Apostle 1 John 2. 16. calls wealth the lust of the eye But the things which immediately Concern the Soul whether good as Grace and Glory or evil as Sinne and misery guilt and wrath as the soul it selfe is a thing not seen eternal so are those concernments of it therefore only regarded and lookt after by men that walk not by sight but by faith So that upon the point by things that are seen and that are not seen may be meant the same which in 1 Tim. 4. 8. is exprest by the things of the life that now is and of that which is to come The things of the life that now is are temporal but the things of the life to come are eternal 2. What is meant by Temporal and Eternal T is a very easy and a very hard Question what is Time what is Eternity The durations of all beings are Philosophically divided into three kinds Tempus Aevum and Aeternitas But Theologically into two only Time and Eternity Time in eneral in the Lump signifies the Duration or Continuance of things from the beginning of the world to the end of it Time being measured as Philosophers say per motum primi mobilis by the motions of the heavens extrinsecally when the heavens therefore shall be dissolved Time shall be no more Rev. 10. 6. Time in the Nature of it including 1. a Beginning 2. Succession 3. An end And by its parts 't is Differenced by past Present and Future This is time in General {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} 2. Time in particular called {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} of which the word {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} in my Text is Compounded is a part portion or quantum of this Time a little arme of this Sea a Page or two of this whole Book {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} old Father Time it selfe is but an Infant of a span long to this great Giant Eternity {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} season is a limbe of this little Infant Time it selfe is but a moment a minute of Eternity and season is a Minutulum of this Minute a very inconsiderable thing yet 't is by this that all particular worldly things are measured they are not said to be {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} but {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} They are not measured by the whole yard of time but by the inch of season they are but for a while for a season But what is Eternity without blushing I may reply as an acute Diâ—putant once did to a hard argument Respondeo me non posse Respondere My answer to this Question is that it is a question past my skill to answer or as the Philosopher Symonides did to King Hieron's question What is God he required three dayes one after another to meditate an answer to it and at last told him he was farther from knowing what to Answer then when the Question was first propoundrd for that Quò plus cogitaret plus cogitandum occurreret the deeper we digge the fasteâ— and higher will water rise upon us to drown our very meditations Many descriptions are given of it which I will not spend time in rehearsing only Note a common Distinction of Eternity into Increated Created Absoluta Participata a Complete perfect Eternity that is God's and an Incomplete inperfect eternity Communicated to some Creatures Gods Being is every way infinite Sâ— are all the Perfections of it In wisdom Omniscience is his infinite Perfection in power Omnipotency it Presence Immensity in Duration Eternity Gods Eternity includes four things 1. That God was from everlasting without any beginning Psal. 90. 2. Before the mountains were brought forth or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world Even from Everlasting to Everlasting thou art God In Isaiah 57. 15. he is called the High and Lofty One that Inhabiteth Eternity In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth But God the Creatour of heaven and earth himself was without beginning from everlasting 2. That Gods Being hath no ending God did not begin to bee God cannot cease to bee Rev. 10. 6. He lives for ever and ever 1 Tim. 6. 16. he only hath Immortality God only hath it Intrinsecally Essentially independently some Creatures have it by Communion from Gods good will and pleasure and in subordination to Gods glory God only is from Everlasting to everlasting To be eternal A parte ante and a parte post both is Gods incommunicably 3. In Gods Eternity there is no succession no prius posterius no yesterday and to morrow all things being equally present to God's Eternity One therefore calls it Duratio semper praesens unum perpetuum â—odie quod non transit in praeteriâ—um aut â—uturum Gods knowledg comprehends things a thousand years distant one from another more exactly theâ— ours can doe things of yesterday Things come to our knowledg somâ— before some after others 't is not so with God's This some schoolemen have Illustrated by such a similitude A man standing on the toâ— of some high mountain or hill to seâ— an army marching he sees the whole body of it at once thougâ— possibly one part of it be many mileâ— distant from another another maâ— standing on the ground sees but very little at a time first one raâ—â— of men then another one trooâ— after another one Regiment afteâ— another some before some behind some coming others going other gone Thus do we that stand 〈◊〉 this low valley of time see anâ— know things successively and compute by dayes and years yesterdaâ— and to Morrow last and next year One Generation passeth away and anâ—ther cometh but the High and Loâ—ty One that inhabits Eternity know no yesterdayes nor to morrows hiâ— eternity possesseth altogether all aâ— once God's Eternity is interminabilâ—â— vitae tota simul possessione If thou sayest thou canst not conceive how tâ—is should be I only say to thee 〈◊〉 the words of a Learned Philosoâ—â—er Si scires quid Deus esset Deus 〈◊〉 None but God can comprehend God 4. Gods Eternity is Causall he dispences and measures out the duration and Continuance of all other bâ—ings he sets out their races and stages when they shall begin and when end The times and seasons of every thing under the Sun are appointed by him the Sun it self and Heavens keep the Courses he appoints them and when he will Time shall be no more This is increated Eternity 2. The Creatures eternity is Communicated and dependant and t is but an half eternity God is