est infinitum unde ex hac parte peccatum est infinitum Aliud quod est in peccato est inordinata conversio ad immutabile bonum ex hac parte peccatum est finitum Ex parte aversionis respondet peccato poena damni quae enim est infinita Est enim a missio infiniti boni scilicet Dei En parte conversionis respondet poena sâ—nsus Aquin. 1 2 quest 87. Act 4. yet it s infinite in regard of the Object as being committed against a boundless Creator therefore it s punished with the absence of all good which is an infinite loss and the presence of all evill which is infinite in duration though not in intension because of the incapability of the sinner The infernal pit is the place of those punishments into which by the ladder of death men descend Matth. 7.23 and 25.41 Mark 9.49 Death is but the sinners trap door into Hell The English capital malefactors when cast are carried into a Dungeon and from thence to the Gallows Ungodly men being cast by the Law of God and not suing out their pardon from the Gospel which is an office set up for that purpose do go through the Dungeon of death to the place of their dreadful and everlasting execution God hath also engaged to bestow on the members of Christ an incomparable and unchangeable Crown It is your Fathers pleasure to give you a Kingdom but Death is the young Prophet that anointeth them to it and giveth them actual possession of it They must put off their rags of mortality that they may put on their robes of glory It is in the night of Death that Saints go to their blessed and eternal rest The corn must first die before it can spring up fresh and green Israel must die in Egypt before he can be carried into Canaan There is no entrance into Paradise but under the flaming sword of this Angel Death that standeth at the gate The soul must be delivered out of the prison of the body that it may enjoy the glorious liberty of the sons of God This bird of Paradise will never sing merrily nor warble out the praises of its Maker in a perfect manner till it be freeed from this cage The sinner dieth that according to Gods word he might receive the bitter fruits of his evil ways Death is to him as the gate through which condemned and piacular persons pass to their deserved destruction The Saint dieth that according to Gods promise he may enjoy the purchased possession Death to him is as the dirty lane through which Chrysostom passed to a feast a dark short way through which he goeth to the marriage Supper of the Lamb. His body is mortal that his sins and sufferings might not be immortal The third Ground of the point 3 Reas Mans apostacy from God may be Mans apostacy from God Death broke in upon man by reason of mans breaking the commands of God We had never fallen to dust if we had not fallen from our duties Sickness had never seised on our bodies if sin had not first seized on our souls Mors est conditio naturae non peccati argumentum vel poena Son Suas 7. The Pelagians and Socinians say That death is not a consequent of sin but a condition of nature The blasphemous Jews tell us that Adam and his posterity were therefore condemned to dye because there was one to come out of his loyns who would make himself a God meaning Christ but the God of truth hath resolved the genealogy of death into another cause even the first Adams aspiring to be like God and ambition to cut off the entail and hold onely from himself Gen. 3.15 Rom. 5.12 As a Lethargy in the head diffuseth universal malignity through the whole body and thereby corrupteth and destroyeth it Ideo factum est par peccatum non mortale quod erat sed mortuum quod non fieret nisi peccaret Lâ—mb Sent lib 2. dist 19. The apple which Adam did eat was poisoned which entred into his bowels and being the venome of it is transmitted all along like Gehazi's leprosie to his seed Some tell us that he would often turn his face toward the Garden of Eden and weep reflecting upon what he had done Sure I am it was not without cause for we all got the infection from him and by him it is that the whole world is tainted and turned into a pest-house Whatsoever delight he had in the act there was death in the end Vide Vossium Disputat Theol de peccat pr hom quaest 3. p 43. It seemeth unquestionable that man in his estate of innocency had a conditional though not an absolute immortality T is true he was mortal ratione corporis being a compound of corruptible Elements but immortal ratione foederis being free from the Law of death by vertue of the covenant As before he fell he had a posse non peccare a possibility not to have sinned but since a non posse non peccare a necessity of sinning So in his estate of purity he had a possibility of not dying but in his estate of Apostacy a necessity of it If he had stood he should like Enoch have been translated that he should not see death he should have entred into his Fathers house but not have walkt thither through the dark entry of death Psa 90.7 Rom. 8. The flesh faileth us because sin hath defiled it Mans flesh at first was fly-blown with pride and is ever since liable to putrefaction Sin is therefore called a body of death because it causeth the death of the body When one asked who set up the stately Edifices in Rome it was answered The sins of Germany meaning the money which the Popes Agents received for Pardons granted to the Germans If it be demanded Who pulleth down the goodly building of mans body it may be answered The sins of man It is sin which turneth such costly curious houses into confused ruinous heaps Draco the Lawgiver appointed death the punishment of every offence for which cause his Laws are said to be written in blood and being demanded the reason he gave this answer that though when crimes were unequal he seemed to be unjust in making all equal in punishment yet herein his justice appeared that the least breach of the Law deserved death The light of Nature taught them that those that sin are worthy to die Rom. 1.32 The estate of all sinners lyeth in the valley of the shadow of death Wheresoever sin hath but a finger death will have a hand Sin though never committed but onely imputed did put to death the very Lord of life It is like that wilde Caprificus which if it get but rooting though in the substance of a stone in the wall it will break it asunder CHAP. IIII. First Vse discovering the folly of them that mind the flesh chiefly First Use of Information The folly of them that
be found who are more foul but Death will pluck off their masks present them with a true glass in which all the spots and dirt and wrincles in the faces of their hearts and lives will be visible Men flatter them often but Death never flattered any It is observable that Haman the day that he died was called and named according to his desert the Adversary and Enemy is this wicked Haman Hest 7.6 Haman probably had many a Title given him before Some had stiled him Haman the Great Haman the Magnificent Haman the Prince Haman the Vertuous all before nick-named him but when he comes to dye t is Haman the Enemy t is wicked Haman then he is called by his proper name Since he was born he never heard his right name till now The Enemy and Adversary is this wicked Haman So it may be in thy life time thou art stiled Great or Gracious because in place higher then others but when Death comes those gaudy colours will be washt off and thou shalt hear Not the King of Heavens Favourite but his Fool when thou art nigh thy execution as he was it will be not the Worshipful but the Wicked Haman Satan will then play hardest upon thee with his biggest gâ—ns when his time is but little his rage is greatest This is his hour and the power of darkness As the Turkish Emperour when he hath blunted the edge of his Enemies weapons and wearied their arms with thousands of his ordinary Souldiers then falls on with his Janizaries the pride and power of his Kingdom When thou through pain of body and perplexity of mind art least able to resist then the Devil cometh with his fiercest assaults If on thy death-bed thou shouldst think of turning to God he hath a thousand ways to turn thee off from such thoughts When there is but one battel for a Kingdom what wounds and work what fighting and striving is there When the Devil who knoweth thee to be his own already hath but a few hours to wait on thee and then thou art his for ever be assured he will watch by thy sick bed night and day and if all the power and policy of hell can prevent it neither cordial shall benefit thy body nor counsel thy soul Will not this be a trying hour to thee when the cloath shall be drawn and thy bodily comforts all taken off the Table will not death search thee to the quick when those Theives in their frightful vizards all thy sins in that Night will break in upon thee As the Elders of Samaria said of Jehu when he sent to them to prepare and provide to fight with him Two Kings stood not before him and how shall we Adam and Angels could not stand before sin it laid them both low and how wilt thou Beleive it those that have been Lions in peace have carried themselves like Harts in this War Brutus whose blood seemed as warm and to rise to as great a degree of courage as any since the Roman Consuls yet when Furius came to cut his Throat he cryed out like a Child Heathen who saw nothing almost in Death save rottenness and corruption accompanying the body who lookt no farther then the Grave have esteemed Death the King of Terrors The Terrible of Terribles and have been frighted into a Feavor upon the sight of its forerunner But Death is not half so terrible to a moral Heathen as t will be to thee O wicked Christian thou knowest that thy Deaths-day is thy Dooms-day that the Ax of Death will cut the down as fuel for the unquenchable fire that as soon as thou art carried from the Earth thou art cast into Hell Thou presumest that thou shalt behave thy self like a man in the onset with this Enemy but I dare be the Prophet to foretel that thy courage will be less then a Womans in the issue for man man dost thou not know as Pilate said to Christ that Death hath power to kill thee as well as to release thee it can send thy body to the grave and thy soul to the place of endless misery and desperation Fifthly The misery of the unprepared Fifthly Dost thou not know the misery of every carnal man at death In thy life time thou doest the Devils work and when Death cometh he will pay thee thy wages sin at present is a Bee with honey in its mouth but then the sting in its Tail will appear and be felt now thou hast thy savoury Meat and sugered draughts but then cometh the reckoning Some tell us that sweet meats though pleasant to the taste are very heavy in the stomach Sure I am the sweet morsels of sin which now thou feedest so merrily on will then lye heavier then Lead on thy heart and be more bitter then Gall and Wormwood Thou mayst see now and then in this World through the floodgates some drops of wrath leaking in upon thy soul but when Death cometh the Flood-gates will be all puld up and then O then what a torrent of wrath will come pouring down upon thee Here thou sippest of the Cup of the Lords fury but then thou shalt drink the dregs thereof The pains which thou sufferest here are onely an earnest penny of thy eternal punishment It was a cruel mercy which Tamberlane shewed to three hundred Lepers in killing them to rid them out of their misery but Death will be altogether merciless and cruel to thee for it onely freeth thee from the Goal to carry thee to the Gallows t wil deliver thee from Whips but scourge the with Scorpions its little finger will be infinitely heavier then the loyns of this miserable life When God saith to Death concerning thee as Judas to the Jews concerning Christ take him and lead him away safely who can tell the mockings buffetings piercings scourgings the cursed painful and shameful eternal death which will ensue Suppose for thy souls sake in earnest as Turannius did in jest Componi se in lecto velut examinem a circum stante familia plaugi jussit Senec. de Brevit vitae cap. ult who would needs be laid in his bed as one who had breathed out his last and caused his whole family to bewayl his death that thou wert ascending up to thy Chamber whence thou shouldst never come down till carried on mens Shoulders betaking thy self to thy dying bed Thou lookest on thy body and beholdest deaths Harbinger Sickness preparing his way before him O how thy colour comes and goes at the sight of this Ax which the hand of death hath laid at the root of thy tree of life Like the Locust thou art ready before hand to dye at the sight of this Polypus Now thou art laid down on that bed whence thou shalt never rise more Thy next work is to seek for some shelter against this approaching storm thou lookest upward and seest that God full of fury whom thou didst many a time dare to his very face and
2 Sam. 23.5 Mark how the pious King draws all the Wine which made his heart glad in one of his last hours from this Pipe Death is one of the sowrest things in the World and such things require much sugar to make them sweet David found so much honey in the Covenant that therewith he made Death it self a pleasant a desireable Dish If you observe the beginning of the Chapter you will find that his end was near Now these be the last words of David But this this was the quiet and ease of his heart that Gods Covenant with him was everlasting and without end As Death is famous for its terror being King thereof so also for his power it brings down the mighty Princes and Potentates of the Earth Cant. 8.6 Samson was but a Child in Deaths hands hence we read when Scripture would draw strength in its full proportion and length As strong as Death but as strong as Death is David knew it could not break in sunder the Covenant between God and him nor dissolve the union betwixt his Saviour and his soul The firmness of this Covenant being sure footing for faith to stand on is that which puts life into a dying Christian As Death though it parted the soul and body of Christ parted neither of them from the divine nature they were as a Sword drawn by a man the Sword is in one hand separated from the Sheath in the other hand but neither of them separated from the man so though Death break the natural union between the beleivers soul and body it cannot break the mystical union between Jesus Christ and the soul therefore Saints are said to sleep in Jesus 1 Thes 4.14 And truely by the vertue of this Cordial this Covenant they are so far from flying back at the sight of their Foe Death that they can look him in the face with courage and confidence See how they triumph over him as if he were already under their feet O Death where is thy sting O Grave where is thy Victory 1 Cor. 15.57 58. The sting of Death is sin and the strength of sin is the Law but thanks be to God which hath given us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ Hark they speak as Challengers daring their disarmed enemy to meet them in the field and they speak as Conquerors being assured through the Captain of their salvation of the victory before they fight Epiphanius faith Epiph. lib. 1. cap 33. that Adam was buried in Calvary where Christ was crucified Sure it is that Christ at Calvary did somewhat which made the Christians bed soft and easie that whereas it would have been a bed of Thorns he turned it into a bed of down and thereby the beleiver comes to lye on it so contentedly and to sleep so sweetly and comfortably By this time Reader I hope thou understandest the necessity and benefit of this relative change With this Covenant thou art armed Cap a pe with armour of proof with the righteousness of Christ which is law proof death proof and judgement proof and leavest Death wholly disarmed and naked Without this thou hast no Weapons and findest Death a man of War In the forequoted place thou seest that sin is the sting of Death and the strength of sin is the Law The Law binds the soul over for disobedience to its precept to its malediction and punishment passeth a sentence of condemnation already upon the creature and beginneth its execution in that bondage and fear as flashes of the unquenchable fire which seize on men in this life Rom. 7.6 John 3.18 Heb. 2.14 And as sin hath its strength from the law the law making it so powerful to curse and condemn so Death hath its strength and sting its venome and vertue to kill and damn to destroy soul and body for ever from sin Sin makes Death so deadly that its the poyson in the cup which makes it so mortal and loathsom a draught Thy work and wisdom therefore is as the Philistinos when they heard that the great strength of Samson the destroyer of their Country lay in his hair were restless till they had cut it off and became weak so now thou hearest wherein the strength of Death the great destroyer and damner of souls consisteth to be unquiet night and day to follow God up and down with sighs and sobs strong cries and deep groans for pardon of sin and to give thy self no rest till thou attainest an interest in this Covenant through Jesus Christ Pious Job though not in thy case was for this cause exceeding importunate for a sense of this pardon And why dost thou not pardon mine iniquity and take away my trasgressions for now shall I sleep in the dust and thou shalt seek me in the morning and I shall not be Job 7. ult He cryeth out as one fallen into a deep dirty ditch or one whose house is fired Water Water for the Lords sake to clease this defiled soul and to quench this scorched conscience Lord Why doth the messenger who useth to come post to me a poor condemned Prisoner with a pardon lingring so long Alas I wish he may not come too late But what is the reason of this importunity for expedition Why Job in his own thoughts was going to appear before his Judge and he durst not venture without a pardon in his hand for now shall I sleep in the dust The child did not dare to go to bed at night till he had asked his Father Blessing and begd and obtained forgiveness of his disobedience in the day Nothing in the whole creation can pacifie the conscience awakened with the guilt of sin and frighted with the fear of death but a pardon in the blood of this Covenant for want of this it was that the Heathen were either desperate or doubtfull in their deaths and their Orator ingeniously confesseth that notwithstanding all the Medicines they could gather out of their own Gardens the Disease was still too strong for the Remedy But a plaister spread with the blood of Christ and applied by faith to the sore is a soveraign and certain cure Faith in Christ is such a Shield that under its protection a Christian may stand in the evil day of Death keep his ground and secure himself from all the shot which the Law Satan or conscience can make against him I am the resurrection and the life He that liveth and beleiveth in me shall live though he dye Joh. 11. Willet Hexapl. in Levit. c. 11. The Death of the King of Saints is the onely comfort and help against Death the King of Terrors It s a strange property which some report of the Charadrion that if any man have the jaundise and look on the bird and the bird on him the bird catcheth the disease and dieth of it but the man recovereth Christ took mans disease and dyed that all who look on him with an eye of Faith might recover and live
thy immortal soul against the coming of the bride-groom When thou diest thou throwest thy last cast for thine everlasting estate thou shalt never be allowed a second throw An Error in death is like an Error in the first Concoction which cannot be mended in the second Where thou lodgest that Night thou dyest thou art hous'd for ever That work which is of such infinite weight and can be done but once had need to be done well God hath given thee but one Arrow to hit the mark with Shoot that at randome and he will never put another into thy Quiver God will allow no second Edition to correct the Erratas of the first therefore it concerns thee with all imaginable seriousness to consider what thou doest when thou diest One would think thou shouldst take little comfort in any creature whilst thy eternal state is thus in danger Augustus wondered at the Roman Citizen that he could sleep quietly when he had a great burden of debt upon him What rest canst thou have what delight in any thing thou enjoyest who owest such vast sums to the Infinite Justice of God when he is resolved to have full satisfaction either in this or the other world When David offered Barzillai the pleasures and preferments of his own royal Palace he refused them because he was to die within a while How long have I to live that I should go up with the King unto Jerusalem Let thy servant turn back that I may dye 2 Sam. 19.34 35 36. i. e. Court me no courts I have one foot in the grave my glass is almost run let me go home and dye Without controversie thou hast more cause to wink on these withering comforts and to betake thy self wholly to a diligent preparation for death The Thebans made a law That no man should build a house before he had made his grave Every part of thy life may mind thee of thy death Mortibus vivimus Senec. The Moralist speaks true Thou livest by deaths thy food is the dead carkasses of birds or fish or beasts thy finest rayment is the worms grave before t is thy garment Look to the Heavens the Sun riseth and setteth so that life which now shineth pleasantly on thee will set how much doth it behove thee to work the work of him that sent thee into the world while day lasteth that thou mayst not set in a cloud which will certainly prognosticate thy foul weather in the other world Look down to the Earth there thou beholdest thy mother out of whose womb thou didst at first come and in whose bowels thou shalt ere long be laid The dust and graves of others cry aloud to thee as Gideon to his Souldiers Look on us and do likewise O trim thy soul against that time If thou risest up and walkest abroad in the streets thou seest this house and that seat where such a woman such a man dwelt and lo the place which knew them shall know them no more they are gone and have carried nothing with them but their godliness or ungodliness If thou liest down thy sleep is the image of death thou knowest not whether thou shalt awake in a bed of feathers or in a bed of flames but art certain that shortly thy body shall lye down in the grave and there remain till the resurrection Look on thy companions thou mayst see death siting on their countenances its creeping on them in the deafness of their ears in the dimness of their eys nay it s posting towards them in the very heighth and Zenith of their natural perfections Look on thy own house of clay death possibly looks out at thy windows however it looks in at thy windows thou wearest it in thy face thou bearest it in thy bones and doth it not behove thee to prepare for it Naturalists tell us that smelling of earth is very wholesom for consumptionate bodies O Reader a serious thought of thy death that thou art but dust would be very wholsom for thy declining and decaying soul Hard bones steept in vinegar and ashes grow so soft that they may be cut with a thread Give me leave for one half hour to steep thy hard heart in such a mixture possibly it may be so softned through the operation of the Spirit with the Word Drexel Eternit that thou mayst become wise unto salvation It s reported of one Guerricus that hearing these words read in the Church And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years and he died All the days of Seth were nine hundred and twelve years and he died And all the days of Enos was nine hundred and five years and he died And all the days of Methuselah were nine hundred sixty nine years and he died Gen. 5.5 He was so strongly wrought upon by those words And he died And he died that he gave himself wholly to devotion Friend if thou hast any dram of true love to thy soul and its unchangeable condition in the other world the consideration of death would make a deep impression upon thee But that I may awaken and rouse thee while there is time and hope and then help and heal thee I shall in the prosecution of this Exhortation First Speak to somewhat that may be perswasive Secondly Offer to thee somewhat that is Directive First I shall offer thee some thoughts which may quicken thee to a diligent provision for this time Motives 1 Death will come certainly First Dost thou not know that Death will come certainly As the young Prophet said to Elisha Dost thou know that the Lord will take thy Master from thy head to day 2 Kings 2.3 Reader Dost thou know that the Lord will take thy soul out of thy body and send it to the unknown regions of the other World where thou shalt see such things as thou never sawest hear such things as thou never heardst and understand such things as thou didst never understand Possibly thou wilt answer me as Elisha them I know it hold your peace But truly I am ready to urge it again being assured that thy knowledge is as Cicero speaks of the Athenians like artificial teeth for shew onely thou dost not yet know it for thy good Therefore give me leave to inforce it still Dost thou know that God will bring thee to death and to the house appointed for all the living Dost thou know that thy ruddy countenance will wax pale thy sparkling eyes look gastly thy warm blood cool in thy veins thy marrow dry up in thy bones thy skin shrivel thy sinews shrink nay thy very heart strings crack And hast thou provided never a cordial against this hour Dost thou not read in the writings of God himself That no man hath power in the day of death and there is no discharge in that war Eccles 8.8 No man hath power either to resist deaths force or to procure termes of peace The greatest Emperor with the strength of all his